Sarasvati (texts & arch.II)

[Paul K. Manansala]

      Michael Witzel <witzel at FAS.HARVARD.EDU>
wrote:

> On Sun, 24 May 1998, Paul K. Manansala wrote:
>

> > My contention about the Sarasvati is that the AI theorists do seem to be
> > "retrofitting" the data here and there.  The first and foremost thing
> > is there is no hard archaeological evidence of a "Vedic" culture
> > entering  India.
> > We certainly cannot label PGW culture as Vedic anymore than IVC.
>
> That last sentence alone shows that the data are not taken into account.
> The data of the Indus civ. just do not fit the RV (we need a special
> e-sattra on that), but the PGW has many correspondences, in spread,
> material culture, etc., with the *POST*-RV texts.
>

I find the above statements biased.. While one could argue
that IVC is not particularly Vedic, neither is PGW. The latter was
primarily a pig and rice culture. The people were sendentary and
lived in mud huts. They made very little use of the horse, and I'm
not aware of any chariots associated with them.  They used wheel-made
pottery, associated with Asuras,  instead of the "Aryan" handmade
variety.

The work of Dilip Chakrabarti suggests that the iron used by the PGW
culture was not of foreign origin as previously thought.

Could you provide a list of the correspondences between PGW and Vedic
culture?

Regards,
Paul  Kekai Manansala