Pythagoras mentioned in Vedas?

[Ferenc Ruzsa]

Friends,

as the corpus of Greek texts is unfortunately pretty much closed by now, the
old (1925) analysis of Keith (The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and
Upanishads. Vol II., esp. pp. 605-10) is still valuable. (His conclusion is
negative.)

On the other hand there is nothing inherently improbable in Greek-Indian
contacts in e.g. the 6th century B.C.E. The Greeks were very mobile traders
(and colonizers), and trade routes did exist much before that time. It must
have been not very difficult for a Greek, an Old Persian and a Sanskrit
speaker to learn each other's language.
There is some tradition of contacts before Alexander (e.g. Socrates talking
to Indian philosophers in Athens), but they are not too reliable. The lack
of data does not prove anything, as we have generally very meagre
information about the most important characters in the history of early
Greek philosophy. Only scant and typically late references.

Yours,
Ferenc