The Real History of India – Part 6: Aryan Invasion Theory
TweetProlog:
Now that we have established the religion that was followed in the IVC, we will take a look at the Aryan Invasion Theory debate. The words “Aryan Invasion” seem to suggest that there was a sudden death for the Dravidians, the words “Aryan Infusion” seem to suggest a benign and gentle influence, the words “Indigenous Aryans” seem to suggest that the IVC was Aryan and they were always indigenous. I believe none of this to be true. We will see why, shortly. I would like to use the term “Aryanization”. It is the only one that explains the modern day Hinduism, which is a clever amalgamation of the Dravidian religion, Jainism and Buddhism, created using a combination of violent incursions/violence, proselytizations, influence and other techniques as appropriate . As a note of caution, the terms Aryans and Dravidians are being used in the historical context. At present, the Indians of India, excluding some racially pure tribals and the people of the North East, are a mix of both the Aryan and Dravidian peoples as well as other peoples like Scythians, Huns, Moghuls, Europeans and others, who had made India their home during the course of history.
The Principle of Concordance
When you want to analyze a book, a linguistic technique called Concordance is very helpful. The Concordance of a book is nothing but a compilation of the frequently used words within the book and their associated frequencies.
For example, take a look at the Concordance for Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code .You will notice that the top most frequently used words (occurrences) are Langdon (1516), Sophie (1103), Teabing (594) and Fache (397) – the most important names in the book. If you look further you will notice that Grail (286), Church (234), Silas (266), Grandfather(222), Collet(176) and Keystone(160) round out the Top 10. If you have read the book, you will know how beautifully the concordance captures the most important elements of the story.
Rig Vedic Concordance
I decided to apply the same principle to the Rig Veda (RV), the holiest of holy Vedic texts. Fortunately, I found the Concordance for the Rig Veda . It uses Griffith’s translation of the Rig Veda Samhita as its base. Griffith’s translation of the RV has come under attack. Since i am only using the concordances of the RV, his supposed translation errors will not affect it. Of course, if someone has the time and has access to a better Concordance Set, we can compare notes and make sure we are on the right track.
Then i went through the RV concordance and noted down the base set of concordances – important words and their frequencies in descending order. Then I derived some concordances by adding concordances of related terms together. For example, i added the frequency for Steeds and Horses together to get the concordance for Steeds. The resultant file is a pdf- Rig Veda Concordance .
The Top 10, in descending order of concordances are – Indra(2819), Agni(1921), Soma(1525), Prithvi(799), Chariot(775), Horses(761), Maruts(714), Asvins(588), Varuna(574) and Mitra(416).
In the previous post, we analyzed the IVC Religion and from that we know that the Sun, the Moon and the Mother Goddess (Earth) were the key gods. In the RV, the Sun God has 397 occurrences, Moon+Moons have a combined concordance of 29 putting them both way down in the pecking order. Siva is not to be found at all. Yeah, Rudra was mapped to Siva later, but Rudra/Rudras combo concordance is 151 again way down the hierarchy of Gods. Visnu with 107 is ranked even lower than Rudra. As for Brahma, it wasn’t mentioned at all. Someone has interpreted Precem to be Brahma and assuming we accept that interpretation, the keyword Precem has the glorious concordance of 2!
Therefore, Siva (after mapping to Rudra), Vishnu & Brahma, the Vedic trinity that we now worship, was not at all important to the RV. That means they were made important later to amalgamate with the IVC’s Proto-Trinity. We also know that cows and bulls were very important to the IVC people, whereas the RV concordance shows that the Horses and Chariots were more important. Both horses and chariots are conspicously absent from the IVC.
Indra Destroys Dravidian Puras
The RV talks of Indra destroying Puras of the Dasyus (RV term for Dravidians). Western historians committed a critical error by assuming that this term meant the IVC’s beautiful cities. It is an error because the evidence from the IVC city excavations show no evidence of any destruction. So what did Indra destroy, then? I think Puram/Pura is referring to the clay brick village settlements, the people, outside the IVC’s cities, lived in. If you remember the interpretation for Meluhha=Melagam, i had mentioned that Agam also meant inside. Puram in Tamil is the opposite of Agam, which means outside. You can think of melagam as the inner city and the puram as the outer suburbs. Even in today’s modern world, we use the same terminology – inner city and outer suburbs. These destructions, that the RV refers to, must have been the Violent Incursions that the Aryans used. There are also multiple references in the RV to Dasas who were collaborating with the Aryans and adopting their systems [Citation: Romila Thapar’s Early India]. Therefore, the Aryans must have used a combination of military power, influencing some powerful Dravidian chiefs with their new religion, to Aryanize the IVC people.
Why RV couldn’t be about a riverine civilization like the IVC?
1. In a riverine agriculture-based civilization, the river would have great significance, as we have seen with Egypt, where even the calendar was fixed according to Nile floodings and the Deities were carried in a Nile Boat (barque) during processions. Whereas in the RV, concordance for Sarasvati is 73 (compare that to 2819 for Indra) and Sindhu has 50.
2. Riverine people use boats extensively. We also know that the IVC people were seafarers. RV Concordance for Boats+Ships = 16. Very insignificant.
3. If the RV was written by/for agriculturists, you will find more mentions of Agricultural elements. That is not the case with the RV – Plough/Ploughs concordance = 4, sickle=2, sowing=2, till=12. Very insignificant. Interestingly, Visnu, the agricultural god ranks way below the other important gods. Compare Visnu=107 with Indra=2819 concordances.
Therefore, saying that the RV represents the IVC [or the Indus-Sarasvati Valley Civilization as the revisionist Hindutvavadis call the IVC] is delusional.
Outside India
At this point, I decided to look at the neighboring areas of the IVC. Thanks to Priya Raju, I became aware of the Avesta . Just going through the various sites referring to the Avesta and its similarities to RV blew my mind away. They had the same Soma/Haomo rituals, they had the same fire worship rituals etc. It is so similar that, today, linguists use Vedic Sanskrit to decipher the Gathan Avesta language! I have compiled the similarities between Avesta and Veda in this PDF with citations – Rig Veda and Avesta Comparison. The only inference you can draw from this is that the Avesta and RV were written by the same people.
But the reference to Daha/Dahyu (RV Dasa/Dasyu) in the Avesta bothered me. The Avestans never came to India and we know that the RV is referring to the IVC people as Dasas, then how come both are talking about the same enemies? I concluded that the Avestan/RV people when they were together must have encountered the same people as well whom they called Dasas/Dahas. When i started looking at the pre-Avestan cultures, i found the same Mother Goddess religion, thereby confirming my inference that the Dasas of RV/Dahas of Avesta were the Mother Goddess worshippers . That inference started my quest, which eventually led me to the point where i realized/proved that the entire Neolithic Plate, as I called it, was following the Mother Goddess Religion.
If that is the case, who are these Avestan/Vedic people? Horses and Chariots seem to be very important to them and of course Agni, Varuna, Soma etc.
Epilog:
1. Where are these horse/chariot people from? What is the big deal with horses/chariots?
2. What was happening in the rest of the Neolithic Plate when the Aryans came to the IVC?
3. What about genetic evidence? Is there any?
Sukumar,
This would my last post on this topic, since I would also like to move on.
1. I believe proselytization to mean conversion to another religion/faith. What you have mentioned is one religion/faith (Hinduism) absorbing principles/gods from another religion (IVC).
2. I think #2 and $5 are related. It is about clarification of what Dasas/Dasyus meant in RV. All I am saying is that there is a possibility that Dasas could have meant the last wave of immigrants from Iran.
4. I understand and did not claim that IVC was wiped out. If I did it was a mistake. My statement was that Harappan culture got subsumed in IVC and that IVC people might have been migrated away from Mohanja-daro and other places due to climactic changes and tectonic movements
5. See #2. Will try and see what I can learn about Dasyus and Dasas. For this, I think I need to learn a lot about RV about which I know nothing about.
7. With British India of India, Hinduism still thrived and still does to this day. So, I do not still see the analogy/comparison you are trying to make. With Aryan immigration into India, the IVC religion seems to have been wiped out and subsumed by Hinduism.
8. About thread being OTH, it is certainly not your writing style, but my utter lack of knowledge on the areas that you had blogged about.
All said and done, good discussion. I do want you to understand that my aim is not to glorify Hinduism or its precursor. I claim to be a Hindu Brahmin, though I accept that I fully do not know what it means to be Hindu. I do wear the poonal, though do not certainly the daily sandhya vandhanam. Now, you can ask me – as an educated man, why do I do things or follow a faith that I do not understand fully. There is no simple answer – except that I believe in the oneness of all Human beings that Hinduism preaches. That does not mean that I am against any other religion or that I will not enter a Church, Synagogue or Mosque. On the contrary, as I have mentioned before, I believe that all religions at their core lead the same end, just that the means is different.
At the same time, I want to make sure that when a revised history from what I know is suggested, I question that and understand the reasoning behind the revisions.
Ganesh
Sukumar,
I absolutely agree with one of your main points – We need to look at Indus Valley Civilization independently for what it is. This glorious civilization should not corrupted by other discussions around AIT etc.
Ganesh
Another good post Sukumar. Concordance research is very interesting, and I am hearing about it for the first time.
I couldn’t understand why you say that Indra stopped at destroying the outer settlements, but not the inner cities. Was there any structural changes between the two?
Also I found it odd that Avesta and RV uses the opposite words to refer to gods and demons. I think you had answered about this in a previous comment that in Avesta it must have been changed purposefully. Could you explain this better?
Thanks Sreedhar.
Ganesh, we are on the same page with respect to your last few lines. I treat our blogging community as an extremely smart peer group. If this group can vet the material and it passes muster then it can probably be submitted to real historians for review. So please feel free to poke holes. Your questions are outstanding. And my purpose isn’t denigrating hinduism. In fact Hinduism is probably the only religion that will permit an agnostic like me to be a part of it.
1. Proselytization also involves amalgamation. If you look at christianity’s evolution they first had to incorporate the pagan religion- the mother goddess became Mary. They got the trinity also -father, son and holy spirit, the idol worship, the xmas tree, making christmas coincide with winter solstice pagan festivals, easter with spring festival etc. Once it got established it gave way to protestantism which is a strict interpretation of the Bible – no idols, no mary etc. So I believe a group of Dasyus were proselytized then thru a better understanding of their religion their symbols and gods were incorporated and then the next wave of conversion must have happened.
2 and 5. Dasyus as Iranians is possible but not likely due to reasons I gave before.
4. There seems to be a typo here. IVC includes both Harappa and Mohenjadaro.
7. The British dominated us using a similar set of techniques. Instead of imposing a religion they imposed an education system which reduced the imprtance to hindu religious education which was a big part of our education system prior to the British system. This way they influenced our ability to propagate our religion to our people and made our citizens westernized. Inspite of that Hinduism thrived because it is more of a personal type religion compared to Christianity which is a more group-based religion – sunday mass, church action etc.
So there are significant similarities anthropologically speaking.
Hope that helps.
Meenaks,
Thanks.
1. My guess is that the RV people wanted to make a point about their superior military power and hence they destroyed the clay-brick suburban settlements which are much easier to destroy. Archaeological evidence also shows that there is no destruction in the IVC cities.
2. We don’t really don’t know why the Avestans switched the meanings of Asura and Devas. When we analyze the names of Gods the other Indo Europeans were using (including the RV people), they all used the same gods and there is ample evidence to support that. So the only explanation is that the Avestans had a disagreement with the RV people who crossed the Khyber to move to the IVC and continued with what must have been the Proto-Avestan-RV document. The Avestans went their way over to neighbouring Iran to the west and twisted the Gods around. Why would they do that? I guess to create their own identity. I guess they succeeded beyond their wildest dreams because no one realized that the Parsis who came later to India were the same Avestan people, who were originally the same as the RV people. Even now Indians don’t realize that Parsis and us share the same ancestral religion.
Hope that helps.
Thanks Ganesh for agreeing with me on the need to focus on the IVC.
Sukumar,
Regarding #4, thanks for catching it. I meant Iran and not Mohanja-daro. Just that my enthusiasm got ahead of my fingers.
Ganesh
Ok. that probably goes well with your interpretation that the Dasyus are Iranians. It is definitely possible. I will evaluate that possibility more seriously and see if i can find any evidence.
Hi,
I am happen to stumble upon this blog due to the Phase “Aryan Invasion Theory” and investigation done + analysis done …however, I am trying to find out what is the theory abt it , its impact and why it assumes importance in the study of Vedic History …
I could note usage of Concordance(assumption is that some old texts are available in electronic form), details of Gayathri mantra, various religious gods including reference to Indra as Devadata, usage / domestication of animals and usage of chariots + finer points
However, if feasible, if answers are indicated for the questions raised it would be helpful for one group of audience – Indian Civil Services Aspirants . These aspirants have analysis for previous generations of SME only . However analysis of the present generations of SME namely Sukumar, Ganesh, Senthil, Jayashree, Venkat and Vamsi + others who participated in this discussion would be helpful since their interpretation will be well supported by Technology and practical experience.
To start with, I hv got these references – History of India by Romila Thapar, another on Indian History by Bhasyam and finally Discovery of India by J Nehru . Among three, I find Romila Thapar presentation appropriate.
May I request the participants to help in this discovery path by providing answers to the questions raised . (SME – subject matter experts)
AmV,
Thanks for stopping by. I am not able to follow your comment. Which questions are you referring to? All the questions in the comments have been answered.
I also don’t see how this post is relevant for Indian Civil Services aspirants. For that purpose, established history books like Romila Thapar and A.L. Basham should suffice.
Hope that helps.
“All i am saying is that Aryans were different people from the IVC people and I also believe that their genetic markers were different, in other words they were geneticaly different”
According to the genetic studies below, there was no
major genetic flow to India for the past 10000 years or so.
http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/103/4/843
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1380230
That would imply that IVC people (~2000+ BCE), and the and the
Vedic people (lets assume around 1500 BCE ?) must have the same “gene”, right ?
Otherwise how do you explain these genetic results ?
Ranjith,
I am glad atleast a few of you are questioning my findings. Thank you so much for the research and the pubmed paper. I had not gone through this paper before. But I have gone through several other papers that attempt to look at India’s genetic makeup. All of them concluded that there is no real genetic difference between India’s castes.
This pubmed paper you refer is saying that there is no infusion for the past 10,000 years or so.
Here is my view, what mars all these papers is that they have not established reference popuations properly. Today’s India is completely mixed up across caste and linguistic boundaries and that is a good thing. But we need to identify reference populations for genetic studies. One way to do that will be identify those tribal groups who have maintained their racial purity and do a separate genetic profile of them first – I see Gonds, Santals, Irulas etc. in this category. In this paper that you point out Gonds seem to be conspicuously absent. Once you do that, you can establish what would be the reference genetic profile. As a second step, do a normal genetic profile study excluding all the tribal populations that were used in step1. Now if you compare the genetic profiles from step 1 and step 2, you will find what is new.
I am yet to see a study of this type. I believe this is the methodology used by the National Geographic Project which i referred to.
R1A1 haplogroup is thought to be the central asian marker by many experts and if you look at the pubmed paper’s findings it found 15.8% . If you see the wiki http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_R1a_(Y-DNA) you will understand why R1A1 is important for India. In this same wiki page you can see an entry in the Asia section that says r1a1 = 15.8 %- it doesn’t name the citation, but the sample sizes seem to match with the paper you found. Right below it another study says r1a1=27%. I have extracted the rows below for you reference.
[India 728 0 15.8 8 ?
India 325 0.3 27 12 ? ]
It is hard to know which study to rely upon. But one thing we can say with certainty is that r1a1 is present in India.
Now If you go further down the table, you can see these entries:
[
Kallar Dravidian 84 0 4 5 Wells et al. (2001)
India Dravidian (Tribal) 180 – 2.78 8 ]
These 2 entries show that for the Tribal populations the R1A1 is 4 and 2.78percent. It is not clear which population was used for the second study. Nevertheless, it is easy to infer that tribal populations which are generally racially pure because of their isolationist approach to life. Even in those populations R1A1 has penetrated to 2-4% based on the 2 studies above. It can also be inferred that other Indian populations have either 15.8% or 27% r1a1 depending on which study you believe. So where did this r1a1 come from? Genographers have done a great deal of research and continue to do so to identify genetic markers. It will be impossible to claim that genographers are in on the Aryan Invasion conspiracy.
In sum, using the genetic studies so far to either prove or disprove anything may not be a wise thing to do. There are ample clues from the studies done to show that there has been infusions of people with different genetic markers over the years.
Hope that helps. Thanks again for raising an interesting question.
BTW Are you the Ranjith Nair from Satyam that i know?
Many of this R1a1 issues have already been discussed.
To quote from the PNAS paper:
“Rather, the high incidence of R1* and R1a throughout Central Asian and East European populations (without R2 and R* in most cases) is more parsimoniously explained by gene flow in the opposite direction, possibly with an early founder effect in South or West Asia”
The Sengupta et al paper also reaches similar conclusion of central asia as the “receptor” of R1a1 lineages.
After all, what matters is the “genetic distance”. Of course there is a finite genetic distance between the Indian caste groups and the tribal groups. BUT, the genetic distance between indian caste groups and indian tribes is smaller when compared to other asians or europeans.
Also note that, Sengupta et al say:
“Associated microsatellite analyses of the high-frequency R1a1 haplogroup chromosomes indicate independent recent histories of the Indus Valley and the peninsular Indian region. Our data are also more consistent with a peninsular origin of Dravidian speakers than a source with proximity to the Indus and with significant genetic input resulting from demic diffusion associated with agriculture.”
Hey, I am not Ranjith Nair. I don’t think we know each other!
Ranjith,
I merely asked if i knew you. I didn’t presume that.
As for the paper, maybe i miscommunicated. I know what the paper talks about because i read it. The point i am making is very simple – just because the current day’s genetic distance is not that significant it does not mean 3500 years ago, the genetic distance was as insignificant.
I disagreed with most of the Indian population genetic studies that i have read including the ones you referred because the reference population was not established properly. This is the same thing i mentioned in my previous response to you.
If you can convince yourself that the present day genetic distances are enough to explain what happened 3500 years ago, you are welcome to have that view.
I will ask you a simple question – we know that just in the past 1200 years are so we have had the moghuls, other muslim people, europeans (greeks, french, dutch, english, portugese), kushans, pallavas, indo-parthian kings, scythians, and so many others have come into India in significant numbers. How can we then say no significant infusion has occured in the past 10,000 years?
”
we know that just in the past 1200 years are so we have had the moghuls, other muslim people, europeans…… How can we then say no significant infusion has occured in the past 10,000 years?”
I guess that is why there is a “minor” genetic influence — but not major — as shown by the data. We very well know that Muslims, Europeans etc did not replace the whole pre-existing Indian gene pool. In fact there seem to be genetic studies indicating precisely this (e.g. Gutala et al 2006).
“I disagreed with most of the Indian population genetic studies that i have read including the ones you referred because the reference population was not established properly.”
I haven’t understood what you mean by this. I don’t see anything wrong with the methods of the current studies.
Ranjith,
There are several studies that have been published, which contradict the study you’ve quoted. The “A” haplotype confers lactose tolerance. Studies done on Indian adults shows this distinct trend – Around 67% of South Indians & 27% of North Indians are intolerant.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7234720
Other studies show even different numbers with 75% of South Indian adults being intolerant. Coincidentally, the nickname for brahmins in Tamil Nadu is “Thayir Sadham”. (Curd Rice). Many non-brahmin friends of ours use very little yoghurt. Whereas I can’t imagine even a single meal without several cups of milk or yoghurt.
If people went from India to other countries, as the PNAS study seems to suggest, there would be a substratum influence in language, historical artifacts & in religion. Nothing of that nature has been found in the Central Asian cultures. Whereas, heavy substratum influences have been found in India. So, any conclusions on whether people came in or went out should be based on the entire anthropological framework.
Various ethnic groups that came to India have mixed reasonably well. Any genetic study should list the most pre-ponderant genetic markers found by Region (such as the lactose study above) or Region AND Caste.
Hello Priya Raju,
I will comment on the paper you mentioned after reading it. But it is a 1981 paper and at that time even techniques like PCR were not available to do a detailed study comparing DNAs. So I have to see what they are talking about. However, note that the Sengupta et al paper i cited (also the other paper) critically examine all important previous papers and point out what are their limitations and why they are correct/incorrect.
And i guess the lactose tolerance you mention is just one mutation. Given that there is a finite genetic distance between north-indian castes and south-indian castes, a few mutations are easily possible — the current models here do not prevent that. Note that these studies consider many many mutations (very high molecular resolution) with a very large sample size. That is why those studies are very important and scientifically sound.
“If people went from India to other countries, as the PNAS study seems to suggest, there would be a substratum influence in language, historical artifacts & in religion. Nothing of that nature has been found in the Central Asian cultures”
You have to note the time scales. If you read both the papers carefully, you will realize that this flow of gene towards central asia might have happened 10000+ (ten thousand+) years ago. So today we may not know much about the “cultural changes” that happened then. That flow answers the question, “So where did this r1a1 come from?”, that Sukumar asked. It didn’t “come”. But it probably “went”.
And also note: Not even linguists, today, seriously believe that “Aryans” replaced indigenous populations in india on a massive scale.
If you believe that north indian caste groups are “central-asians”, who migrated to north-India around 1500 BCE or so, you have to answer the following question: How do you explain the major absence of haplogroups like C3, DE, J*, I, G, N, and O, which cover almost half of the Central Asian Y chromosomes but majorly absent in north Indians ? How do you explain the presence of C*, F*, H, L, and R2 in indians, which are not seen in “central asians” ?
Ranjith,
So, there is no proof that people went from India to Central Asia – that certainly doesn’t strengthen this point of view. Results should only fit available data. As I mentioned earlier, there is plenty of substratum influence of Central Asia in India.
People pick up many haplogroups from passers-by. Haplogroup J for e.g., is not prevalent in Central Asia. It is found in the Near East & in the Balkan countries. J2 is a primary feature of Anatolian Neolithic people. In Ukraine, for e.g., there’s only a 7% penetration of J. Not what I could call prevalent. Whereas, it is found in Western – especially, South-Western India.
J1 is prevalent in Arab countries – again, not prevalent in Central Asia. If you look at the areas where R1A lights up, its North India & the regions of the Andronovo culture. To understand the primary ethnic influence of a group of people, we should look at the most prevalent haplogroup(s).
You mention that some haplogroups are absent in Central Asia, but present in India. If indeed there was a movement of people from India to Central Asia, why are these haplogroups absent there?
Its too simplistic to suggest that North Indians are Central Asians or that Aryans “replaced” the Indus people. There were several groups living in that region & a fusion of cultures happened. People mix to create any nation’s unique culture. Which is why, as I said, pre-ponderance is what we can look at.
Regarding the lactose tolerance test, since no one has systematically proved the test wrong, I’m sticking to it. In the event that new data becomes available, I’ll change my opinion. Stating that certain tests were not available then & hence the result could be wrong isn’t enough.
“You mention that some haplogroups are absent in Central Asia, but present in India. If indeed there was a movement of people from India to Central Asia, why are these haplogroups absent there?”
Good question. Again, please note the time scale. Out-of-India flow happened many many years (of the order of 10000+) ago. After they leaving india, according to this theory, there is ample time for India specific mutations to happen within India. On the other hand if there were any “recent”(say ~3500 years ago) migrations into india, that is too little a time, in the genetic time scale, for this many mutations to happen. That answers your question.
Finally, it is suffice to say that the current best genetic models, published in reputed peer reviewed journals, agree that there was no major migrations into India for the past 10000+ years or so. If anyone has substantial counter arguments to disprove them, they may write it up and send it to any of those journals. From whatever i know, i do not see any flaw in the arguments presented in the papers i mentioned. It rather very nicely explains many of the important issues.
“Regarding the lactose tolerance test, since no one has systematically proved the test wrong, I’m sticking to it. “
I am afraid, you have not understood what i said. I didn’t say the test is wrong. I said, within the current genetic model, it is possible to have such differences. Because there is a non-zero genetic distance between south-indian and north-indian caste groups even in the models of Sahoo et al and Sengupta et al.
Ranjith,
1. Here is the problem with the minor/major influence. On the surface of it, that seems right, because it is likely only a few 100,000 moghuls/muslims/scythians/greeks etc may have invaded with their armies. For us to truly understand the genetic influence, we need to do a sample in the areas where the maximum impact would have been. If you try to find the moghul markers across India, you will conclude that there is no moghul genetic influence and it would be wrong.
2. In the same way, we need to do a genetic study that studies those areas which may have likely had the maximum Central Asian influence and still retains the same profile (that is no later people commingled in that area). Now this will be very hard to do.
3. This is where the reference population suggestion is useful. We can find tribal populations across India who are relatively genetically more protected (for instance we know r1a1 in the tribals is very less etc). Then we find their predominant markers, measure the nature of genetic drift these people have had using mtDNA and Y chromosome analysis to arrive at the profile. We also know that most Indians share the M* haplogroup markers with the tribal population. Now we can measure the genetic drift of these haplogroups and compare. Since R1A1 is not present in tribals, we need to identify reference populations from outside India to get a drift profile. Overall i want to know how the genetic drift has occurred across various populations of India by geographic region over time.
I am yet to see a study that does such a thing. Since you seem to be know so much about Genetics, maybe you can point me to a study.
Now coming to the discussion between you and Priya Raju. It is an interesting discussion. You seem to be very convinced about the papers you have cited. Let us for the moment accept that the papers are 100% correct. Eventhough they prove that there is no genetic drift and there is no evidence of R1A1 coming from the outside, they have not proven that 10,000 years ago r1a1 went from India to Central Asia. Is it possible? Sure, but this does not show up in any genography research that I have seen so far. Again, since you seem to be very versed in this area, please point me to a paper that proves this.
The central asian haplogroups that you talk about from Central Asia that are missing from India, do you know what are the timeframes on those? The current day central asian population is not the same population that existed 3500 years ago. Lots of other people moved into Central Asia later and it has collected several haplogroups over time like India. So you cannot compare today’s India’s genetic profile and today’s central asia’s genetic profile and say it does not match, so it is not possible for them to have come here.
As for the lactose tolerance studies Priya Raju cites, which you say are dated. I agree with Priya, no one has disproved those studies yet. Do you know any competing study of lactose intolerance in India that has reached different conclusions?
Ranjith – I think the genography project is the most comprehensive attempt so far to map human migrations. Thus far, its in agreement with the author of this post.
Is your theory then that most mutations happened within India & that people didn’t come from elsewhere? You have misunderstood my point. There have been frequent migrations of people to India since the original M* haplotype moved in 40,000 years back. When the Aryans came in, Indus valley already had multiple ethnic groups living in close proximity. 3,500 years back – Indo-Iranians came in. That’s what I said. We’ve been accumulating many kinds of “Y”.
10,000 years is not enough time for so many mutations to accumulate in the Y chromosome: You mention so many different haplotypes. “Y” (& Mitochondria) changes very slowly, which is why it is invaluable in mapping human migrations.
There is no historical proof of migrations from India. Historians & geologists say that most people who came to the fertile Indo-gangetic plains in the past 5000+ years stayed put. Because there’s no earthly reason to move back to arid Central Asia.
I think that agrees very well with the findings of the Genography project & prevailing historical theories. Whereas the only issue we have with people getting into India is – figuring out if a significant number of people came in. In every other respect, we have more than substantial proof for people coming to India.
How many people (strength) came to India is a good question. For which we can keep looking for answers. By itself that doesn’t invalidate all the other tangible proofs that we have.
@Sukumar
Eventhough they prove that there is no genetic drift and there is no evidence of R1A1 coming from the outside, they have not proven that 10,000 years ago r1a1 went from India to Central Asia. Is it possible? Sure, but this does not show up in any genography research that I have seen so far.
You haven’t seen anywhere else because no one had done such a detailed analysis of such a complete set of Y-DNA data before these two. No one had such high molecular resolution. No one had used such smart and detailed statistical analysis. That is why these papers appeared in highly reputed journals.
The current day central asian population is not the same population that existed 3500 years ago. Lots of other people moved into Central Asia later and it has collected several haplogroups over time like India. So you cannot compare today’s India’s genetic profile and today’s central asia’s genetic profile and say it does not match, so it is not possible for them to have come here.
Of course everyone know that today’s gene in a certain region may not be the same 3000 years ago. Even taking all these into account, I can see at least 5 different arguments to prove that “north indian caste groups” are not “recent” migrants. Whatever be the current central asian and north indian gene profile, the following argument itself disproves the migration. Consider the “spread” of R1a1 frequencies among the tribes, south indians and the so called “lower castes” as shown in the paper i mentioned. To have such a high variance, you need a *lot* of time and they estimate the time as 14000 years. That is, R1a1 is there among these groups at least 14KYA. Then only it can have such a large variance. Also see the clustering analysis. This in itself disprove the migration theories. Similarly one can calculate the spread of other genes as well.
One more thing:
@ Sukumar, i also wanted to say, even though the genetic profile of today might be different from that of 3500 yeas ago, one can find out how old are the most common recent ancestors of north indians and central asians. What these papers are proving is that the most common recent ancestors of these people are at least 10000 years old.
@Priya Raju
Whereas the only issue we have with people getting into India is – figuring out if a significant number of people came in
Everyone agree that there must have been a flow of a non-significant number of people at various times in the history — even in the recent past. What these papers proved is that those numbers were indeed insignificant as far as the change in genetic profile is concerned.
Hey Sukumar and Priya, thanks for nice discussions.
Ranjith,
I don’t see this discussion going anywhere and that is not because you are not agreeing with me. I originally thought that you were a genealogy researcher but it appears that you want to hang your hat on these 2 papers.
I already talked about the methodological issues in these papers. And i also pointed out that even if assume this paper is completely correct, it can only goto the extent that people didn’t come here from anywhere. That is the conclusion they have reached and you seem to like that.
Let me say this one last time, any conclusion this paper reaches, however accurate it may be, has to fit with genealogical, archaeological, linguistic, cultural, religious, historical evidences from India and neighboring areas. Either that, or it has to prove that people from India moved to Central Asia 10-14000 years ago. It is not enough for them to say “parsimoniously explained by people moving from India to Cental Asia”. that is what is called conjecture. Conjecture does not equal scientific proof.
Additionally, the premise of this paper wrong. This is because you have to understand why Genographic Researchers say immigration from Central Asia happened. The reason being chromosomal variations in the r1a1 marker occurs the most in central asia and if you radiate outwards from there and goto places including India, the variation in R1A1 reduces. This is how Genography researchers prove that the original r1a1 homeland is central asia.
Sukumar,
It’s not a question of whether I or you like it or not — that is what the research says. Can you show me a paper disproving these studies ?
I am afraid you haven’t understood why all the “original” R1a1 “radiating out of central asia” argument is inconsistent and wrong. It is not just these two papers, by the way. Even papers that appeared in 2008, with more data and more sample size, conclude the same. It’s there for you to read. Also these arguments perfectly agree with the mtDNA studies — both Y-DNA and mtDNA rule out any recent large-scale immigration. Now if you disagree with the “methodology”, you may write a paper proving the “methodology” is wrong. But experts in this field haven’t found anything wrong with these.
Now about your “cultural” changes: I hope you realize that cultural changes can occur even without large-scale genetic changes.
About “historians” and “linguists” : Historians and linguists have already changed their views many times. As new and new evidence keep coming, the theory keeps changing from “invasion” to “large-scale migration” to “small-scale migration” and so on. Anyways, in this case, it is suffice to say that cultural changes can occur without large-scale genetic changes.
I wanted to say: both Y-DNA and mtDNA rule out any recent large-scale migration. (not immigration!, typo)
Ranjith,
At last we seem to agree on something – that history is not a popularity contest based on likes and dislikes. Unfortunately, in India, it is a popularity contest. That Aryans didn’t come from the outside is a populist notion (anyway, you may have understood where i stand, if you had read my post, instead of picking one line from one of my comments!).
Just a few weeks ago, someone has written a whole book on how the IVC people spoke a Vedic language. So because something is released in 2008 does not make it right.
History is also a scientific pursuit, when new evidence comes in, views change. Physics, Chemistry any of the sciences, it is the same case. so the fact that historians have changed their view is not a proof of anything.
Again for the last time, proving that large-scale migration (first of all no one is arguing large scale migration but you choose to use those words so that you can construct your argument) didn’t happen in India does not explain the presence of R1a1 in Central Asia. Someone needs to prove that Indians went to Central Asia sometime in the past 10-15000 years in large enough numbers to make this happen. Since you keep asking me to prove/disprove things, maybe you can take this “proof” of a 10000 year old Indian migration to Central Asia as a homework project and do it.
As i said before, i don’t believe in the methodology used by these papers you cite. And just because i don’t agree does not mean i have to disprove it myself. There are plenty of genetic studies to cite which prove the argument that R1A1 marker came from outside India.
It is up to you to decide which papers you want to support and which theories you believe in. You know where i stand because that is the subject matter of this entire series.
“History is also a scientific pursuit, when new evidence comes in, views change. Physics, Chemistry any of the sciences, it is the same case”
Unfortunately, it appears that, the history in the case of “Aryan invasion” was not a scientific pursuit and not at all like physics or chemistry! In physics and chemistry, a view itself is formed based on some scientific evidence. Here, the “view” that Aryans invaded was formed without any scientific evidence at all. That is why it had to be changed!
Great. Another point we agree upon. I have pointed out several errors commited by historians over the years in this series. Aryan “Invasion” fell out of favor in the historian community a long time ago. But at the same time, no one will agree with the “indigenous” Aryan theory as well. The fact that an invasion did not occur does not mean they didn’t come from the outside. Most of the arguments against Aryan Invasion try to disprove that Invasion didn’t happen with the idea that thereby they can disprove Aryans coming from the outside as well. This is one of the oldest tricks in the scientific argument playbook – called “burying or destroying the strawman”. There are even people going around trying to disprove that Dravidians were not “pushed” down to the south. That idea that Dravidians were pushed down to the South by the invading Aryans is a very old theory and has been abandoned a long time ago. But for our populist historians, it is a great hunting ground for disproving Aryan Invasion. Go figure.
If you actually read my post right in the prolog i say this “The words “Aryan Invasion” seem to suggest that there was a sudden death for the Dravidians, the words “Aryan Infusion” seem to suggest a benign and gentle influence, the words “Indigenous Aryans” seem to suggest that the IVC was Aryan and they were always indigenous. I believe none of this to be true. We will see why, shortly. I would like to use the term “Aryanization”. It is the only one that explains the modern day Hinduism, which is a clever amalgamation of the Dravidian religion, Jainism and Buddhism, created using a combination of violent incursions/violence, proselytizations, influence and other techniques as appropriate .”
The above statement is what i believe happened – “Aryanization” of India.
Hi, I have read with interest those who are making a case for an Aryan Indus. But
excavations have a long way to go. So far the Indus have not shown the slightest
evidence for having horse and chariots. In the case for horses, I can bet that if the
Indus script is deciphered there will not be one mention of horses. I don’t know why
the case is being drummed into our ears that the Indus is of Aryan origin. Aside
from this, the theory that there was a migration of tribes from India to parts of
Europe, then if this is so, wouldn’t the supposed Indus Aryans left their seals and
scripts in those places? The one thing the Indus Aryanists cannot explain is the
Mitanni documents where pure Sanskrit language is written and probably spoken. It
destroys their out of India migration.The Aryans were superb horse breeders and the
Mitanni documents has so far stumped the Indigenist Aryanists. The Rigvedas is
replete with horses and for those who still maintain that the Indus civilization is
Aryan, here are a few examples of Aryan knowledge of horse breeding in the
RigVedas:
BOOK HYMN TITLE VERSE DESCRIPTION are:
2 1 Agni 5 givest noble steeds
2 1 Agni 16 with kine and steeds
2 2 Agni 10 valor with the steed
2 2 Agni 13 kine and steeds
2 10 Agni 2 dark steeds or ruddy
2 11 Indra 6 two Bay steeds
2 11 Indra 11 Indra, thy Bay steeds
2 18 Indra 18 thy two Bay Coursers
3 35 Indra 3 Tawny Horses
3 36 Indra 9 Lord of the Tawny Coursers
3 42 Indra 7 by thy Stallions
3 43 Indra 4 let thy two Bay Stallions
3 44 Indra 2&4 Lord of Tawny Steeds
3 30 Indra 2 with thy Bay horses
3 43 Indra 23 a sluggish steed
5 53/64 Maruts 3&9 They came with winged steeds
5 56 Maruts 6 the bright red mares
5 59 Maruts 5 like steeds of ruddy color
The Aryans were super horsebreeders and they knew it like the back of their hands
and the categories of horses that they used for transport and war, there was the
Bays, the Coursers, the mares, the stallions and the steeds chargers They also knew
flying horses which connect them with their mythologic Greek cousins.
Neville,
Please read my post. I have counted up the concordances of horses/steeds and proved that horses/chariots were more important.
Hi, This is just a short note on the Aryan subject. I find it amusing that some people in India and abroad who do not believe in the genetic origins of the Indo-European as appearing in the white skinned upper caste Indians a mere couple thousand years ago. But they believe entirely in the African genetic origin of man’s makeup millions of years ago as a source of modern humans. Its preposterous and laughable.
I came across this site recently, which gives a different picture of Saraswathi Civilization.. (referred as IVC here)..
The utility value of elephants is far more than the horses, and india had developed a very advanced elephant fleet, which no other country could do so even till today..
http://2ndlook.wordpress.com/2010/02/25/military-idiom-in-the-indus-saraswati-region/#comment-4384
Horse was NOT central to saraswathi civilization, and the effectiveness of cavalry was nullified with a elephant fleet..
Having so many elephant seals, in saraswathi civilization, its very clear, that elephant had been widely in use during that period.. So when horse was referred as a mark of cilivilization, we can very well take on taming of elpephant as a reference point of our civilization..
How elephants were crucial factor in victory of many european battles? Pls read this link.. The Hannibals Elephants..
http://2ndlook.wordpress.com/2008/08/07/hannibals-elephants/
The Stanford University and british archeology did a project tracing hannibal’s alpine route with an indian elephant.. more interesting links and references on the above article..
And Hannibals started his campaign against Rome with 37 elephants, but only one elephant survived when he reached there.. and this one elephant was a deciding factor in his victory against them.. the romans just shivered and uriniated at the very sight of this gigantic beast..
And what did alexander took away from his Indian Expedition? 2 lakh indian zebu humped cattles, elephants, Macedonian National dress (the salwar) and the KISS ..
http://2ndlook.wordpress.com/2009/02/17/what-happened-to-alexanders-loot-from-india/
Elephants were a prized possession and rule changers in the war.. the cavalry unit failed miserably against war elephants.. The horses just could not stand before elephant’s trumpheting..
So with a large elephant fleet, indian rulers did not consider horse as important constituent..
This elephant factor has never been considered by any of the western historians? Why? Colonial Prejudice? or Colonial bias?
The western History on india is centered around the Alexander Conquest of India.. but if we look at the source of alexander history, we find these were written based on accounts, written some 200 years later.. so its almost a hearsay account, written at a very later period.. the western historian says this is a scientific proof, and indians accept this meekly..
For a alternate perspective on alexander’s invasion, pls read the following article, which is full of reference..
http://2ndlook.wordpress.com/2009/01/23/alexanders-conquest-of-india/
Porus was just a small king at the frontiers of india, and western historians project as though alexander had worn the entire indian continent by this one war.. Yet no one here is ready to question that stand.. (the white people had said it and hence it should be true)
the truth is very clear.. Alexander’s army were frightened by the elephant fleet of 100 deployed by porus.. and the fact that chandragupta army has 6000 elephants is what made the alexander army revolt against him..
Now, having known that Horse was NOT a significant force by indian kings, and that elephants were reared for long, for which evidence is found as IVC seals, the entire junk on this AIT or AMT should be reviewed.. the so called scientific proof had been artificially constructed with narrow focus..
An 8000 year old civilization has been found along konkan coast.. the below DNA link has photos showing 24 km man made wall 3 metres below the sea level..
http://www.dnaindia.com/mumbai/slideshow_photos-8000-year-old-advanced-civilisation-in-konkan-coast_1547920-1
Similarly, the dwaraka submerged city, the poompukar submerged cities are not yet excavated.. It is pretty clear that the entire western history has to be thrown to the dustbin along with their dating.. we need to realise that western history is a colonial project to claim white superiority over the rest..