Snake and Mongoose

[Michael Witzel]

V.Agarwal:
>Dr. Witzel said:
>"Since IE *bhebhru 'beaver' ... is found in Central Asia even today,"........
>But, beavers occur *even now* in Central Asia, as a look in Grzimek's
>encyclopedia will show."

>VA comments: .... how one defines 'Central
>Asia'. Grzimek's encyclopedia DOES NOT indicate ... beavers in the Central
>Asian republics (except >perhaps the very northern fringes of Kazakhstan),
>Afghanistan, Iran, Sinkiang.
>However, Beavers are indeed found in Mongolia, Siberia and northern shores
>of Caspian Sea.

Remains to be seen, I read the section on beavers nearly 30 years ago in
connection with Yasht 5, in the original German version of Grzimek, and
vividly remember that it speaks of some "beavers surviving today in pools
(Tuempel) in a desert like environment" or something to that effect. Memory
may fail me, however, the facts can be checked.

> --that the Beavers were/are found in Europe
>from the borders of Spain to Sweden and all across Russia and Mongolia to
>Amur River. Nor have any fossils been found in our region of interest,
>except very far up north in Siberia, Mongolia...

Palaeontology is an altogether different matter. Just as in the case of
some unmentionable people, the find of *one* skeleton changes the
situation.

Fact is that Palaeoclimate took a dramatic turn after the end of the last
Ice Age, c. 10,000 BCE, also in Central Asia,  where there were giant
lakes, etc. Though the climate has then remained more or less stable since
3000 BCE or so, even by 2000 BCE there existed,  in the deltas of the
Tiurkmenistan/Tajikistan BMAC area and elsewhere, giant brush areas and the
typical riverine forests. Of course, competition of beavers with humans
would be fierce in this kind of environment (just as last year with
Washington DC's cherry tree cutting beaver family). Any receding beaver
population would  naturally go upstream, towards the less populated
mountains, such as the Tien Shan/Pamir Ranges, where more trees are to be
found (in C. Asia  lower tree line is now only at 1000 m. on average, no
stands of trees below that, exc. riverine forests) ...
The rivers of the interconnected (!) Altai-Tienshan-Pamir-Hindukush ranges
would  supply the habitat.

But I do not want to argue ex nihilo. Palaeontology will tell the tale. I
doubt that very extensive searches have been done in the various Stans.
Soviet archaeologists were interested in other matters. I will find out and
let y'all know.

>Apparently then, the Avestan Beavers' skins must have been been imports.

This is always possible: fur trade is/was of course widespread (and even
the mongoose fur is used, not as a dress but for a purse. A. Wezler has
written on that some 15 or 20 years ago:
nakuli-bhrastraa).

However, the Avestan people know a little too much about beavers, for my
taste, not just about their furs. (Another long tale) ...
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========================================================
Michael Witzel
Department of Sanskrit & Indian Studies, Harvard University
2 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge MA 02138, USA

ph. 1- 617-496 2990 (also messages)
home page:  http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~witzel/mwpage.htm

Elect. Journ. of Vedic Studies:  http://www1.shore.net/~india/ejvs