LBTAI
L. Suresh Kumar-LSK
l_s_k at NETZERO.NET
Wed Dec 20 03:38:18 UTC 2000
----- Original Message -----
From: navaratna rajaram
Sent: Wednesday, December 20, 2000 02:06 AM
Subject: Re: My HINDU article on Vedic origins
The Hindu, December 19, 2000
http://www.the-hindu.com/2000/12/19/stories/13191351.htm
LOOKING BEYOND THE ARYAN INVASION
> From time immemorial India's ties with East and Southeast Asia have
been much closer than with Central Asia or Eurasia. Ancient India must
be re-examined taking this and other scientific facts into
consideration.
N.S. Rajaram
Background
There is now an active debate concerning Vedic Aryans and their
relationship to the Harappan Civilization. The debate is focused
mainly on the origin of the Aryans- whether they were indigenous to
India or if they were invaders from outside who entered India from the
northwest in the second millenium before the Common Era. Beginning
about the middle of the nineteenth century, or roughly from the time
the British established control over all of India, it has been the
official position that the Vedas and the ancestor of the Sanskrit
language were brought by invaders from Central Asia or Eurasia or even
Europe. This is the famous Aryan Invasion Theory that is now at the
center of historical debate.
More than anything, the Aryan Invasion Theory (AIT) shows that each
era views history in the light of its own beliefs and experience. As a
product of the European colonial period, it is only natural that the
AIT should embody certain Eurocentric biases. In addition, the theory
was created at a time when Indian archaeology was still in an
embryonic stage, and scientific data from fields like biology, ecology
and others was virtually non-existent. Scholars had little to go by
beyond the new field of Comparative Linguistics made possible by the
European discovery of Sanskrit and its close affinities to the
languages of Europe.
This led them to postulate a common ancestral language (proto-Indo-
European) and a common ancestral home they called the Aryan Homeland.
It is now called the Indo-European Homeland. These Aryan invaders were
said to have entered India and subjugated the natives, imposing their
own language and culture upon them. These original inhabitants were
said to be Dravidians, who were driven south by the invading Aryans.
The Vedic literature, the Rigveda in particular, was interpreted in
the light of this theory.
Beginning in the early decades of the twentieth century, technical
data also became available, especially from archaeological
excavations, notably of the Harappan or the Indus Valley Civilization.
It was natural that there should have been attempts to fit these new
findings to the already existing Aryan Invasion Theory- an attempt
that still continues. It was suggested that the Harappan Civilization
was 'Dravidian', which was destroyed by the Aryan invaders. This
creates a permanent divide between Harappan archaeology and the Vedic
literature. But it was not long before scholars began to notice
serious difficulties. Without going into technical details, these may
be summarized as follows: the Harappans, the creators of one of the
greatest material civilizations of antiquity have no literature, while
the Vedic Aryans, the creators of the greatest literature of the
ancient world have no archaeological existence.
This is all the more puzzling when we recognize that the Harappans
possessed writing, while the Vedic Aryans were said to be illiterate
who depended on memory for preserving their literature. And yet it is
the literature of the illiterate Aryans that has survived in abundance
while the literate Harappans have vanished without a literary trace.
New data, new problems
As more technical data became available, scholars began to notice
serious contradictions between data and the theory. For example,
genetic studies showed that the presence of any genetic input from
Eurasia or Europe in the Indian population was negligible to non-
existent. Further, this insignificant imprint was the same in North
and South India, which flies in the face of the Aryan-Dravidian
division. A scientifically more acceptable explanation is that the
physical differences among Indians is the result adaptation to the
environment by natural selection. This takes tens of thousands of
years and not centuries or millennia. All this suggests that the
Indian population is very ancient and not the result of any recent
migrations or invasions.
There is now a new dimension to this scenario. Throughout history,
going back untold millennia, India's ties with East Asia and Southeast
Asia have been much closer than that with Central Asia or Europe. This
was interrupted by three centuries of European colonialism in the
region, leading to a Eurocentric version of history being imposed on
it. (The Aryan Invasion Theory was a key part of this.)
In recent years, scholars have begun to reexamine many
assumptions of the colonial period, looking in particular at the
physical and biological imprint in the region. This has to begin
with the recognition that Indian climate as well as flora and fauna
are closely related to those of Southeast Asia. In particular,
Indian cattle (Bos Indicus) are domesticated versions related to
the wild cattle of Southeast Asia known as the Banteng (Bos Banteng
or Bos Javanicus).
Similarly, the Indian horse is a special breed, close to an ancient
equid known as Equus Sivalensis (the 'Siwalik Horse'). This or its
close relative appears to be the horse described in the Rigveda- and
not the Central Asian or the Eurasian variety, which is anatomically
different. (The Rigveda describes the horse as having thirty-four ribs
like the Sivalensis, while Central Asian breeds have thirty-six.) Thus
the widely held belief that horses were unknown in India until they
were brought from Central Asia has no scientific support.
It is a similar story when we examine the human imprint on the region,
especially the genetic evidence. As several experts like Manansala and
Kennedy recently pointed out, the skeletal record shows that in most
ways the Indian population is quite unique. Genetic studies lead to a
similar conclusion- that the Indian population is very ancient to
which the contribution of Eurasian strains is negligible to non-
existent. It is a different story when we compare Indian and Southeast
Asian populations. Paul Kekai Manansala points out: "The overall
genetic picture indicates a very old biological relationship, probably
extending in part at least to the original migration out of Africa."
The current understanding is that Africa was the original home of the
entire human population now distributed all over the world. The
overall genetic picture of Indians is that they are closely related to
the Southeast Asians, going back tens of thousands of years. In
contrast, their links to Eurasia or Europe find no scientific support.
As a result, one thing can safely be asserted: Indians are ancient
inhabitants of India and Southeast Asia (or Greater India) and not
recent immigrants.
Maritime background
> From all this it is safe to conclude that in order to understand the
origins of the Vedic civilization, and its history, it is necessary
first to drop the west-northwest bias that has dominated discourse for
nearly two centuries. One of the keys to this is recognizing the
maritime background of Vedic civilization. In this context it is worth
recording that the Rigveda is preeminently an Indian document. While
there are occasional references to the lands beyond the Indus, these
are greatly exceeded by references to oceans and maritime activity.
Prayers for the safety of ships and navigators occur in many parts of
the Rigveda. This again shows a southern rather than a northwestern
orientation.
Recognizing this will allow scholars to break free of the shackles of
the northwest, particularly the Aryan Invasion Theory, which has been
a major obstacle to a rational study of India. The next logical step
is to explore links between the Vedic Civilization and movements from
the south, and the resulting exchanges of people and ideas between
different regions. Ecological changes, notably the ending of the last
Ice Age contributed to it in a major way, in the form of two momentous
developments. First, rising sea levels led inhabitants of the coastal
regions, and possibly also from now submerged regions, to move to the
interior and the north seeking safer ground. Next, the melting of ice
caps in the north resulted in the release of the rivers of the
northern plains-making this formerly arid region fertile and
inhabitable.
These two epochal events are encapsulated in the two most significant
myths of ancient India- the Flood Myth of Manu and the Indra-Vritra
Myth. The Rigveda appears to be the product of the mix of two groups
of people: tribes and ruling families that inhabited the north and
poets and sages from the coastal regions and the south - some possibly
from beyond the seas - who brought with them their maritime memories
and experiences. This explains why the Rigveda, though composed in the
Sarasvati heartland, abounds in oceanic symbolism and maritime
activity. But soon the distinction between the northern rulers and the
southern sages came to be blurred as the two groups became intermixed.
It is therefore no accident that two of the most important seer
families of the Rigveda - the Vasishthas (and the brother Agastya) and
the Bhrigus - should have strong maritime connections. It is important
also to know that the south or the peninsular India and beyond was not
unknown to the Vedic people, especially the seer families. But much
information about it has been overlooked or misread in attempts to
make data fit the northwestern orientation of scholars over the better
part of two centuries. Even so-called 'nationalistic' scholars like
Tilak and Savarkar have not been able to escape its hold. The main
point is that in studying the Vedas, science demands that we pay much
greater attention to the south and southeast than has been the case so
far. This calls for a fairly radical reorientation.
Southern contribution
Recognizing the southern contribution to the Vedic civilization
clarifies many literary, linguistic and historical issues in the
ancient texts. It is inconceivable that these poets and sages, who
brought with them the oceanic imagery and the maritime experiences
that pervade the Rigveda did not also bring linguistic elements and
spiritual ideas that went into the Vedic language and literature. It
becomes clear that many ancient peoples and even places have been
grossly misidentified in attempts to fit history and geography to the
idea of an 'expansion of Aryans' from the northwest to the south and
southeast. For example, the Ramayana has been misinterpreted as the
expansion of Aryan civilization into the peninsula. In reality, what
Rama found in the south, even in Lanka, was a Vedic civilization. The
Uttarakanda of the Ramayana is a goldmine of information about the
southern, largely maritime people known as the 'Rakshasa'. The river
Narmada appears to have served as the boundary between the 'spheres of
influence' of the Rakshasas of the south and Ikshvakus and Bharatas of
the north, with the Yadus somewhere in between. And the Rakshasa
leaders often retreated to Rasatala - the 'nether lands' (or 'Down
Under') - when threatened. This Rasatala was probably part of
Indonesia or some other region of Monsoon Asia.
So, what we have is not any 'expansion of Aryans from the northwest
and the north', but a free exchange of people and ideas among
different regions- much as it has existed throughout history including
today. And this included lands beyond the oceans. It was interrupted,
as previously noted, during the period European domination of the
region. Naturally enough, they looked at history and culture of the
region through Eurocentric glasses. This is the 'history' that is
still being followed by most establishment Indologists, especially in
the West, though it is giving way under the impact of archaeology and
a more rational approach to the study of the primary literature.
In summary, bringing this southern reorientation of ancient India
appears to resolve many of the puzzles and paradoxes that plague
current theories that try to explain the Vedic and Harappan
Civilizations in terms of invasions and/or migrations. This is not to
suggest that a southern origin for the growth of the Vedic
Civilization should replace the current version. All that is being
suggested is that it is an important but sadly neglected area that
merits serious study.
Of one thing we can be certain: trying to explain the origin and
growth of the Vedic Civilization in terms of migrations/invasions a
few thousand years ago runs into formidable scientific and literary
obstacles. We should learn from this experience and first build a
scientific foundation that makes use of all data available today. Only
then can we hope to recover the history of that hoary age based on the
records they left behind. As Albert Einstein said: "A theory must not
contradict empirical facts."
____________
About the author: N.S. Rajaram is the author with Natwar Jha of the
book The Deciphered Indus Script. They are now working on the two-
volume Magnum Opus of Harappan Inscriptions.
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