Just a reminder, I contributed a chapter to Which of Us are Aryans? Some of you are probably skeptical of this book because the editor is Romilla Thapar. You know who that reminds me of? Kabir! He, the master of pollution and contagion (perhaps he’s descended from Brahmins?).
I’ve noticed that there is an increase in rudeness recently. I am pretty lax on the “Open Thread”, but if it doesn’t start to get more in control soon I’m going to start randomly deleting comments. Some of you enjoy writing comment-novels, it would be a shame if something happened to those…
Due to the popularity of this website, I’m going to have to spend some time figuring out how we can scale getting 500 comments on one post in 5 days. The WP install I have isn’t really designed to handle that and the front-end scripts are clearly starting to strain under that. In consideration of my time invested, please consider joining the Patreon (which also totally defrays the cost of hosting and editing the podcasts).
Alright here is something for the first comment.
I remember listening to one of the podcast episodes that Razib was in some time ago and I recall him saying something along the lines of him being verbal (perhaps in reference to reading vs videos or something else, I think I more specifically recall it being from a justin murphy episode though i may be misremembering) but that was it as far as the information of interest for this particular comment is concerned.
Here is my question for Razib: Based on your own self evaluation, how would you compare your own verbal vs non verbal intelligences/ cognitive abilities.
Based on your own self evaluation, how would you compare your own verbal vs non verbal intelligences/ cognitive abilities.
one of my brothers is a physics phd and the other majored in math undergrad. so i’m the least mathy brother being a statistical geneticist.
because i write and read a lot my crystallized verbal intelligence is really high. but i’m more balanced on my verbal/math fluid intelligence.
i may have been alluding to the fact that lots of STEM/quant oriented people are not good at writing fast or speaking off-the-cuff. i have no issues with that.
Math is kind of a verbal and non verbal mix as in arithmetic is a part of the verbal section on iq tests and more of the modern math has incorporated verbal oriented stuff like the arguments in a symbol format. By non verbal I meant visuo-spatial stuff like geometry, 3D visualization and object manipulation.
BTW what did your math undergrad brother pursue afterwards?
I will try to be terse….
Is IVC aryan (OIT), are Indians mostly AASI, and Is Sanskrit a foreign origin language? AASI people (i.e. Indians) transliterated IVC culture (i.e. Indian culture) into a then minority and foreign Indo-European language (by the priestly caste that spoke the language) word for word. The adoption of foreign language as native seems common enough the world over? The difficulty is for many Indians to believe Sanskrit is foreign, but everything else seems quite uniquely Indian- wouldn’t this explain OIT and a Sanskrit migration theory?
https://medium.com/incerto/the-most-intolerant-wins-the-dictatorship-of-the-small-minority-3f1f83ce4e15
\The difficulty is for many Indians to believe Sanskrit is foreign\
Sanskrit is wholly Indian , both vedic and later sanskrit. No doubt linguists can bring up similarities and near equivalences between Gathic or Hittite. That does not ‘prove’ any external origin of Sanskrit
Is IVC aryan (OIT), are Indians mostly AASI, and Is Sanskrit a foreign origin language?
1 – unlikely
2 – definitely no (we can calculate, it’s less than 50%)
3 – depends on how you define it. sanskrit could be the aryan dialect as it expresses in situ in s. asia through synthesis with native substrate (retroflex is there early right?)
AASI people (i.e. Indians) transliterated IVC culture (i.e. Indian culture) into a then minority and foreign Indo-European language (by the priestly caste that spoke the language) word for word.
this is false. the IVC were mostly not AASI, but related to the people of iran.
but everything else seems quite uniquely Indian- wouldn’t this explain OIT and a Sanskrit migration theory?
the taleb model is not good for the premodern world usually as it’s inter-group competition, not aggregate choices of groups, if that makes sense. it’s not about tolerance, but winning and losing.
Hey Razib. I ordered the book and received it today. I liked your chapter.
Question: Back in June 2018 you posted an analysis about the South Asian Genotype Project and you mentioned how the Maharashtra Kayastha Prabhu were curiously in the same position on the PCA as the two Brahmins from the region and South Indian Brahmins. You said you don’t know what this means. I know in March 2019, you were able to get another Maharashtra Kayastha Prabhu. Do you have an idea of what’s going on or put any thought into it? It doesn’t seem like Marathi Kayasthas conform with what we see with Bengali Kayasthas.
I maybe outing myself here but I was one of the Maharashtra Kayastha Prabhu samples.
@Razib
To add: The name of an IVC man “Lu-Sunzida” has been found in Akkadian texts. It has been dated to the oldest Rig Vedic texts by Asko Parpola, a Finnish Indologist. @Razib do check pp.161 – 163, and if there is any mistake, please point out [1][2]. This means Harappans spoke Sanskrit as the earliest Rig Vedic texts are purely IE [3]. Hence, I believe our problem is solved with direct historical evidence.
My Take: There were a lot of IVC colonies in Mesopotamia [2]. Colonists were very successful and controlled the local economy; Akkadians may have employed some of them for dock security; however, their main economic activities were related to trade and craft (suggested in [2]) [2]. There was a different level of assimilation of the IVC colonists — as different policies were adopted by local states [2] — into Mesopotamian society. In time, Hittites, who adopted more of Mesopotamian customs, and Mittani, who were recent migrants, emerged; that is why there are so many differences in cultural practices of IE speakers in Mesopotamia.
Steppe theory is unable to explain these facts, but OIT can. Also, with direct historical evidence, IVC could have only spoken Vedic Sanskrit.
References
[1] https://www.researchgate.net/publication/274936748_The_Meluhha_Village_Evidence_of_Acculturation_of_Harappan_Traders_in_Late_Third_Millennium_Mesopotamia
[2] https://www.harappa.com/sites/default/files/201402/Vidale-Indus-Mesopotamia.pdf
[3] https://talageri.blogspot.com/2019/10/dravidian-connections-with-harappan.html
In time, Hittites, who adopted more of Mesopotamian customs, and Mittani, who were recent migrants, emerged; that is why there are so many differences in cultural practices of IE speakers in Mesopotamia.
your comments are dumb. hittites are basal to all other IE groups. there is so much befuddling to me in your comments i don’t know where to start.
that being said, i appreciate you being succinct. i actually read your comment this time.
Are there any archeological, literary proofs that Yamnaya spoke PIE? What about “Lu-Sunzida”? Is it not possible Harappa spoke Sanskrit? Is that also dumb? I have other proofs; I will post those in some time. Hittites were basal because they migrated earlier, or am I wrong? IVC migrants were present there, and some (possibly not all) of them adopted cultural practices of Mesopotamia; this is attested from historical sources. Did IVC colonists just evaporate without anything? Is there any definite proof that IVC migrants in Mesopotamia had nothing to do with Hittites and Mittani? There are other OIT scenarios possible; I was just discussing one of them.
I associate IVC with IE; and it is my hypothesis. Providing proof in support of OIT is not dumb.
Hi Warlock, sorry I forgot to respond to your last post. Yeah, the first month of residency (especially if you start on a core service) is the most brutal. But don’t worry, do the best you can. Everyone senior to you knows that it’s a terrible time, and everyone has to go through it.
IMHO, the commenting system needs a total overhaul. As I wrote in the last OT, the ability to block people (like Kabir) would be welcome. The size of the comments/words/letters are also huge. This works when there are 10-15 comments. It doesn’t work so well when there are hundreds.
Threading is also critical and could partially solve the size issue. Quoting is non-existent without manually putting in scare quotes, but we need a blockquote function. I repeat that I think that the Unz comment section functionality/structure is great, so maybe ask him for tips?
If you feel that is too much work – which is a fair rejoinder – then just import a turnkey solution like disqus or a similar product?
It would be good if an option for marking read comments is introduced. I could use the “upvote” button to mark comments i have read. But the “upvote” button doesn’t work well
I ordered the book ‘Which of Us Are Aryans’ and received it today. I liked your chapter.
Question: Back in June 2018 you posted an analysis about the South Asian Genotype Project and you mentioned how the Maharashtra Kayastha Prabhu were curiously in the same position on the PCA as the two Brahmins from the region and South Indian Brahmins.
Excellent twitter thread on how timekeeping has evolved in the Indian sub-continent since the third millienia. Originally the muhurta referred to a system of time keeping by water clocks(!!) until sun clocks were developed.
https://twitter.com/JoeAgneya/status/923818607154315269
And another short summary of the solar year calculation changed over the millennia
https://twitter.com/JoeAgneya/status/1081244261369098240
Indian time keeping and calendar systems are interesting.
Most of the holidays use a sidereal lunar calendar for eg Diwali, and don’t coincide exactly with the Georgian calendar from year to year (I think Lunar Hindu calendar adds a leap month every few years using some complex calculations to compensate for 27 day lunar month)
But interestingly the Sankrankti (sun god) related holidays use a solar calendar (and generally fall on the same day every year per the Georgian calendar or within a days or so). So Makar sankranti festival is usually Jan 14 / 15.
Anyone know the history of how the two categories calendar systems came to be used (I realize there are more than two calendar systems in India).
I am vexed that I can’t find the YouTube link for an excellent intro explanation of Indian calendar and time keeping system.
But this is a very interesting topic both in terms of how soli-lunar calendar aligns moon cycles with annual revolution, and precession is considered in calculation of yuga cycles.
The two main differences in celebration of yearly festivals around India is for new-moon or full-moon reckoning of months. Sanskrit month names are based on full moon position against the zodiac(e.g., (chaitra month is based on full moon being in Chitra asterism when Sun is in Aries based on sidereal zodiac, and navami-the ninth day from new moon in chaitra would be Sri Rama Navami-Rama’s birthday celebrated). This makes sense because full moon against night sky is an observable event that could be used to figure out solar position against sidereal zodiac.
Other than 60year cycles of year-names (based on Jupiter-Saturn cycles), there is era reckoning from Sakas and Sathavahanas in Telugu. I have also seen using Vikramaditya period in calendars. It is fascinating to see the long term effort in time keeping both over very long periods (e.g. Yugas) and very short periods (e.g. Ghatikas) and all of it based on astronomy of naked eye. Muhurtha (the right time) is still considered very important in many rituals and they are based on correction to precession based on couple of thousands of years ago (Surya Siddanta?).
It is a story itself how current Indian government came to have a calendar (and correction to precession – Lahari Ayanamsa) to declare state holidays for Hindu festivals.
I wish there was more discussion on this fascinating information or interest from educated Indians.
@ Razib – I am looking forward to buying this book.
1. Do you get any Royalty for the contribution – you must be but still wanted to ask.
2. I have read Tony Joseph’s book and am mildly critical of the book. What do you think of that book?
3. Also, have you read Asko Parpola’s Roots of Hinduism?
I am currently reading that book.
4. Also is there any more ancient DNA work happening in India that you have heard of. Especially in the south and Deccan?
How’s Asko Parpola’s Roots of Hinduism ?
Ì read that when it came out. From what I remember, I thought some of it is a stretch. For instance, he mentioned a crocodile cult in Gujarat but I couldn’t find any reference to it (granted, I only did a google search) other than his own writings. I think overall he is on track but some of the details are problematic. As a bong, his theory on the origin of Durga was interesting to me but I’m not convinced about a Kushan period west Asian origin yet. He may well be right, but I doubt that’s the entire picture.
Was just looking some of the reviews, seems like the book is bit dated, considering all the new info on genetics and stuff
just started reading Roots of hinduism.
sounds interesting but I assume it will make lots of leaps of faith.
i’ll think about the commenting system. appreciate the input.
“but everything else seems quite uniquely Indian- wouldn’t this explain OIT and a Sanskrit migration theory?
the taleb model is not good for the premodern world usually as it’s inter-group competition, not aggregate choices of groups, if that makes sense. it’s not about tolerance, but winning and losing”
If you look at South Indiia, the process of ‘Indo-Europeanization” of language is in various forms of incompleteness. I am certainly not a linguist but I can still understand 5 Indian languages, 2 Dravidian and 3 Indo-European (Tamil, Kannada, Hindi, Marathi and Gujarati) The Brahmins were quite an intolerant Talebian minority and there are residual fights on language of religious communication even today in the South. The model would require that the ruralization of IVC occurred before Sanskritization and could have involved taking up more AASI genes and simultaneously or soon thereafter the max 30% Steppe genes before endogamy froze things but the language transitioning continues with some pressure from North India to South India.
I think the aryan integration theory is quite awesome except I am not sure if it is correct to link ‘Steppe nomadics with Aryan culture’ or more likely rather “IVC with Aryan culture”. Certainly Steppe could have provided minority genes along with Indo-European language…. no more no less
1) middle lion, i can barely comprehend what you are trying to get at. be more clear
2) i feel like I’ve talked about my models enough. read this: https://www.gnxp.com/WordPress/2019/09/12/the-aryan-integration-theory-ait/
Certainly Steppe could have provided minority genes along with Indo-European language…. no more no less
what does even mean? the steppe did provide a minority of genes. that’s quantifiable. no more and no less? huh?
When I mean no more no less- I meant genes and language were brought into India and not necessarily aryan culture. We need to delink aryan from steppe.
Can we have more posts about Sulla and his relevance to the political times we live in?
we don’t say his name
Sulla means penis in Telugu btw. 🙂
Romila Thapar is not consistent or honest. Earlier she used to say the whole of Aryan question in India is a red herring and no point spending time with it. But she devotes whole book to it and keeps talking about it. She can’t handle original material in sanskrit and she does not have a strong indological background. She depends – or has depended so far- on History of India by Vincent Smith which depended on early 20th century / late 19th century understanding of India which was invariably racist history
The title “Which of Us are Aryans? ” itself is racist to me
Have you seen any British historian writing a book ‘Which of us are English’
RT is bonkers
the title is weird imo. but your analogy is stupid. “which of us are anglo-saxon” is the right mapping.
English ethnicity is self-designation. Angllo-saxon is passe for a very long time and you see the usage mostly in French writers and non English writers
jesus fucking christ, do i have to be explicit for you to understand what i’m getting at? do you only know indian history?
let me be clear: the angles, saxons, and jutes, settled in the British isles in the 5th to 6th centuries. there has been a long-standing argument about what their genetic contribution is. the reason that this argument emerges is that there is very little impact of brythonic Celtic on modern English, Christianity seems to have died, and even cultivation patterns shifted.
We are not talking of history of movements of germanic tribes . Everybody knows Angles, jutes, etc. At present and for the past many centuries English have themselves just that. So , no English historian would write a book like Who of us are English as if he is a validating authority
To me, the biggest puzzle is: what is the language of the IVC. It is not Dravidian, and if Aryans = Steppe = Sanskrit speaking, then IVC people did not speak any IE. How could it be the case that with such strong genetic contribution to current Indian population and also (probably more importantly) with such cultural continuity, the language just disappears into thin air with no trace whatsoever. Kenoyer talks about bangles being abundantly available in IVC sites (cultural continuity). Some IVC symbols are identifiable to even this day.
What I find even more puzzling is why did any Dravidian language survive? In terms of civ, nothing even remotely resembling the scale of IVC is found in S. India, and its not like there are Hindukush mountains separating the North from South. It is a bit surprising that Steppe expansionists just stopped after entering Gangetic planes.
Btw, what is the timeline of the Steppe population entering India? If I am not wrong, Narasimhan paper puts it at 1200 BCE right?
Chittadhara, I’ve always assumed that the narmada basin and borderlands between the deccan plateau and north were far more broadly and densely forested 2-3k years ago. Also, the suitability of a north-south tranfer of a gangetic crop/husbandry package to the godavari basin may have not been easy.
I’m not sure you implied it, but the absence of a bronze age culture in south india may not indicate anything about the survival of dravidian languages. The time depth of dravidian doesn’t seem long, and there’s a possibility that it was exogenous. Dravidian could be associated with the sahelian crop package and pastoralism, that much like IA, asserted themselves on an InPe diaspora population. The ashmound people of central deccan may not have been dravidian yet.
Its possible that our model of how languages conquer and survive will get more elaborate and that political pedigree isn’t enough for one to perpetuate. There may even be inherent properties of languages that make them replicable, like a host-parasite relationship. The the original AASI and InPe languages may have no heirs like Elamite, Sumerian, and Celtic languages. Imagine the bronze age indus as a being ringed by diverse ethnicities and language isolates, that one or more of them opportunistically grew in importance.
Interesting points. Indeed Narmada border was heavily forested, but that did not stop AHG from coming north.
“…north-south tranfer of a gangetic crop/husbandry package…” – not sure why, the climate isn’t widely different. Crop and bovine DNA analysis can probably answer this question?
“The time depth of dravidian doesn’t seem long, and there’s a possibility that it was exogenous.” It was long enough to infuse Sanskrit with retroflexes (don’t know if this is the consensus among linguists, it passes the smell test for me).
“Imagine the bronze age indus as a being ringed by diverse ethnicities and language isolates, that one or more of them opportunistically grew in importance.” I am inclined to think that the elites of different settlements in IVC had a common culture (strong archaeological evidence). Some of the settlements had continuous occupation for 5K years, I am pretty sure there was a lot of intermixing that happened.
https://www.gnxp.com/WordPress/2019/09/12/the-aryan-integration-theory-ait/
I read Razib’s AIT very recently, and I find it to be somewhat believable. Out of all theories of “Aryans”, I find this one to be the most reasonable. My contention is that “Aryans” should have entered India with what would be an equivalent of a guntenberg printing press because they start producing Sanskrit literature like crazy! Vedas, Puranas, Ramayana, Mahabharata totaling a literary output that is just insane. What would be a possible evenhanded explanation for this? More importantly, why are such literary works absent in other places? India is well suited for agriculture, so people had more leisure? Others were too busy building their cities with stones whereas we were building with bricks?
The stories were originally not written, they were oral compositions and as far as building is concerned, IVC and the middle east began using brick buildings around the same general era.
Oral compositions with specific meter and structure are even more difficult to compose, right? Why don’t I see anything such specific structure in other European languages. Avestan has some resemblance to Vedas but if I am not wrong, Steppe entry into India was not through Iran but from South Russia. Is there a Steppe migration pattern that explains the closeness between Avestan and Sanskrit?
In Europe there were the Germanic oral traditions including the Anglo Saxon oral epics, in southern Europe, Homer’s poetry was oral, and meanwhile in the Middle East, I know that at least parts of the old Testament were originally oral, so the Indian epics are not the only extensive oral traditions.
Homeric poetry has very rigid meter and structure, in a lot of ways similar to Vedic poetry.
The earliest inscriptions from India are from the 200s BC, and they must have had writing for some time before that. Probably several hundred years, but perhaps even longer, if the Brahmic script is in fact descended from the Indus Valley Script. At least some ancient Sanskrit literature could have been written down from the beginning.
brahmi is clearly from aramaic via the persians.
reading the mahabharata there are sections which are similar to greek motifs. e.g., daysex is BAD BAD 🙂
To add [1]:
“””
Most scholars believe that Brahmi was likely derived from or influenced by a Semitic script model, with Aramaic being a leading candidate.[40] However, the issue is not settled due to the lack of direct evidence and unexplained differences between Aramaic, Kharoṣṭhī, and Brahmi.[41] Though Brahmi and the Kharoṣṭhī script share some general features, the differences between the Kharosthi and Brahmi scripts are “much greater than their similarities,” and “the overall differences between the two render a direct linear development connection unlikely”, states Richard Salomon.[42]
“””
Regarding earliest proof of Brahmi script
“””
One of the most important recent developments regarding the origin of Brahmi has been the discovery of Brahmi characters inscribed on fragments of pottery from the trading town of Anuradhapura in Sri Lanka, which have been dated between the sixth to early fourth century BCE.[119] Coningham et al. in 1996,[120]
“””
and
“””
More recently in 2013, Rajan and Yatheeskumar published excavations at Porunthal and Kodumanal in Tamil Nadu, where numerous both Tamil-Brahmi and “Prakrit-Brahmi” inscriptions and fragments have been found.[122] Their stratigraphic analysis combined with radiocarbon dates of paddy grains and charcoal samples indicated that inscription contexts date to as far back as the 6th and perhaps 7th centuries BCE.
“””
Indus script may have influenced Brahmi, but the process is unclear; there are some other proofs for the existence of Brahmi at least from 8th century.
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brahmi_script
“How could it be the case that with such strong genetic contribution to current Indian population and also (probably more importantly) with such cultural continuity, the language just disappears into thin air with no trace whatsoever.”
precisely my point (of bewilderment). i have always wondered about it. across the broad swath of N india, from punajb to assam, IE languages are spoken *exclusively*. not even tiny pockets of any other language family exist in this IE belt. such a massive language turn over by a bunch of nomads from steppes is astonishingly hard to believe.
“What I find even more puzzling is why did any Dravidian language survive?”
again, i puzzle with you. after all, steppe genes are present in S indian population, though in smaller proportions. so why didn’t steppe languages which had such a massive impact in N india didn’t leave its mark in S india?
I am not opposed to AMT on any ideological ground. i am pretty free of such trivial ideological/political BS. but the story has holes and no satisfactory answer is forthcoming.
“across the broad swath of N india, from punajb to assam, IE languages are spoken *exclusively*. not even tiny pockets of any other language family exist in this IE belt”
This is not entirely true, there are pockets of austro-asiatic speakers in eastern India, concentrated in Jharkhand.
http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pritchett/00maplinks/overview/languages/himal1992max.jpg
I thought Austro-Asiatic are intrusive. There was more recent work on this as well Manasataramgini had a blog post on Munda traveling from S.E.Asia to India.
https://www.discovermagazine.com/health/phylogenetics-implies-austro-asiatic-are-intrusive-to-india
@Scorpion Eater Same here, I am not emotionally invested in AIT or OIT. The world has enough problems and my ancestors (both genetic and cultural) gave me a good tool kit to deal with them. I envy Chinese because they started appropriating Science as part of their culture and Indians are still dealing with the caste and colonial hangover. I wish the Indian math and science education started with historical contributions of Indians and weave Science in our narrative.
Can we reasonably separate out genes, culture and language? I would say yes, and we do it in Europe but not so easily in India.
Steppe provide genes but much more so language, IVC provided genes and much more so culture, and AASI on average provided much more so genes. There is a broad cline of the genes, language and culture but It is easier to comprehend for me if we break them into those 3 parts.
Steppe provide genes but much more so language, IVC provided genes and much more so culture, and AASI on average provided much more so genes. There is a broad cline of the genes, language and culture but It is easier to comprehend for me if we break them into those 3 parts.
language is a subset of culture. but on the whole not a bad methodology
How could it be the case that with such strong genetic contribution to current Indian population and also (probably more importantly) with such cultural continuity, the language just disappears into thin air with no trace whatsoever.
anglosaxons contributed 10-25% of the ancestry in England. but almost no trace of the brythonic Celtic language remains
@Razib,
Your point actually proves OIT. I always knew you will come around to accept OIT. Details of Celtic influence on English [1]:
“””For the most part, Celtic influence on the English language is mostly apparent through place names.” “Some names that survive are the names of rivers such as the Thames and the Yare, and important Roman towns such as London, York and Lincoln. A number of names are compounds of Celtic and Anglo-Saxon words.”””
In India’s case, all IE place/river names in North India are Sanskrit based. There are some more influences of Celtic on English as given in [1].
Also, you have stated “language is a subset of culture. but on the whole, not a bad methodology”. In AMT, however, cultural influence is accepted; yet language influence is rejected. Why such discrimination against Harappan language (if considered to be not Sanskrit)? From Akkadian sources, we have proof that around 2000 BC there were colonies of IVC in Mesopotamia; did they just die off? What about Harappan influence in earliest Rig Vedic texts as proven from Akkadian sources, i.e., name of IVC man?
1. http://homes.chass.utoronto.ca/~cpercy/courses/6361Lovis.htm
I think that no one should be blocked (not even him!). Anyone can circumvent any comment by using Recent Comments. The length of RC can be extended to 30. I don’t understand why some commenters act ad hominem and like to shout the mouth of people they dislike. The length of comments can be controlled by the visible part of the comment (e.g. 200-250 words or 1500 characters or whatever) and the rest of the comment will be behind the Continue Reading link. Those who are interested can continue to read the rest of the comment, others can move on. If comments are too short, they will be trivial and without ability to explain more complex things what the main quality of the blog is. Some people like to socialize, prefer chat comments and interactivity, others like more depth, analysis and debate. I am in the later group.
i block people all the time. your opinion is yours to have. but I’ll keep blocking when clear trolls show up.
This blocking based on editing policy is ok, otherwise we would have various kind of idiots. I was thinking about providing the additional blog functionality to enable individuals to block seeing comments from a particular person.
this is the ‘killfile’ from the usenet days. i am open to it but don’t see a WordPress plugin for it.
i would rather not use offsite platform like disqus since 3rd party platforms often disappear.
We agree, we do not need this functionality although some comments are asking for this.
We are not talking of history of movements of germanic tribes . Everybody knows Angles, jutes, etc. At present and for the past many centuries English have themselves just that. So , no English historian would write a book like Who of us are English as if he is a validating authority
god you’re a jackass. you don’t even bother addressing what i say but just restate your point. the book would be “who of us are indians.”
Who is a jackass? Indian is a nationality and not ethnicity; English is a nationality as well as an ethnicity. Few years back , there was a TV programme Blood of the Vikings . This analysed the contribution of Vikings i.e. Scandinavians in different parts of Britain. Angles, Jutes, Vikings, etc history’s closed files . English and Arya are not history’s closed chapters and still work in progress – so a historian worth her salt would tread more carefully around the question and preferably avoid such questions. Obviously RT is not one – notwithstanding her earlier vow Aryan in Indian history is a red herring
don’t tell me about british genetics. i’ve forgotten more on this topic than you’ve ever known. we both know this. i don’t need to watch a documentary. i can analyze the data myself. and i do.
you’re free to criticize RT. but half the time i don’t know what you are criticizing about her through your online scream.
@razib
I was wondering if there’s been genetic studies on the bunt community in costal Karnataka. Aishwarya Rai, Shilpa Shetty, Sunil Shetty, Devi Prasad Shetty (cardiologist in India) belong to bunt community. Most of the community look distinct from the local population.
Some of their myths are about horse warriors invading the lands, but their religious practices are distinctively non-vedic.
Some of the stories talk about a Naga origin. (not Nagaland, but nagas of Mahabharata period).
not to my knowledge. i mean there is some microsatellite work i think.
I think bunts along with billavas make up most of the Tulu speaking people . They could be of similar origins as Nairs. We have harappaworld results of 2 bunt samples shared at anthrogenica .
Bunt 1
1 S-Indian 50.77
2 Baloch 36.09
3 Caucasian 5.07
4 NE-Euro 2.07
5 Mediterranean 1.56
6 NE-Asian 1.47
7 Papuan 1.08
Bunt 2
1 S-Indian 51.55
2 Baloch 37.88
3 NE-Euro 3.42
4 Caucasian 2.02
5 Mediterranean 1.62
6 Siberian 1.34
7 Papuan 1.00
Small sample size but they are broadly similar to Nairs but with higher S.Indian and lower NEuro .The difference might be due marital alliances Nairs had with Kerala Brahmins.
“language is a subset of culture. but on the whole not a bad methodology”
When I meant culture, I broadly mean by what is categorized as Hinduism today. Most Hindus are ok with a dual definition of religion/culture within a three-dimensional patchwork grid of geography, caste and sect/form of religious practice. That’s perhaps what keeps India together rather than broken apart. For preabrahamic India, it may be worth linking religion and culture and delinking language and culture.
It’s unfortunate that Romila Thapar gets such a bad rep nowadays, particularly among the Hindutva folks. If you are able to look beyond your AIT/OIT bias, she’s a fine historian, especially her writings on the economic and social history of ancient India. They have nothing to do with AIT/OIT and she herself claimed she is not a Marxist historian. Her prominence coincided with the dominance of Marxist historiography in post-independence India (Kosambi, Jha, etc), but her approach has been much broader than the narrow limitations of Marxist historiography. She’s getting very old, though, so I’m not sure how much longer she will be active. It’s really a shame that a historian of her stature is called a ‘fraud’ and a ‘charlatan’ on certain social media circles. The world doesn’t revolve around AIT/OIT.
Absolutely disagree. She might have written fine books, but her public opinion about Ayodhya-Ram Mandir is just unforgivable. Despite the overwhelming archaeological evidence, she denied the existence of any Hindu Temple below Babri Masjid and instead stated that it could be a Buddhist place of worship. I think her and her cabal’s opinion bears a huge responsibility for shaping the vision of “elites” and made them perceiving Ayodhya movement as “fascist”.
Can you just imagine the amount of reconciliation that could have potentially happened if she came out and openly said that there were remnants of Hindu temple below the masjid? I can be charitable and think that she was too afraid of the consequences. But in return, when she does this virtuous finger wagging and accuses Ram Mandir movement as fascism, that is when I draw the line. She might be a fine historian, but she caused great damage to India. She just pushed a generation of elites further away from the common population.
i think noam chomsky is correct on free speech and linguistics.
but he is a ‘anarcho-communist’ who has apologized in the past for genocidal regimes.
you can have your red-lines. don’t extrapolate to everyone else tho. the RT rxn you present above illustrates again the SJW-strain in hindu nationalism. the tendency not to be able to separate and disaggregate aspects of an individual.
Can someone be respected as a historian even when they deny archaeological evidence? I don’t think this is SJW-think. If people are angry at Fauci for his early statements about masks, would you lump them as Trumpian?
I think she will do fine. There is more to life than being trolled by being called ‘fruad’ and ‘charlatan’ . Looking at her career, she hasn’t paid any cost of either taking ‘marxist’ , ‘left’, ‘anti-hindutva’ positions. She held many prominent positions not just in India but outside India, representing ‘Indian’ viewpoint on History, for most past she has only profited from the ideological stands she has taken. Its not as if her carrer has suffered in any material sense, unlike right wing historians. Its only recently post liberalization, when marxism became a bad word, only then have most of them sort of distanced themselves.
So these fake sympathy doesn’t cut much ice with me. For much of her life she has profited from the afterglow of the stranglehold Marxist historians had on the intelligentsia, so her not being a marxist in the literal sense dosen’t really change anything. Its like Minakshi Jain saying she is not right wing technically, since she didn;t attend a RSS shakha.
We have a saying, if you want something done good, get a native. If you want it done cheap and fast (but with questionable quality), get a Slav.”
interesting comment @principia from previous open thread. i was aware of western european’s dim view of eastern european, but i didn’t know it persists to this day. i thought soviet army’s march into berlin put paid to these stereotypes, but who knows. (after all, didn’t east europeans “ruled” germany – at least half of it – during cold war.)
in my previous workplace we had a bunch of east europeans. they had their own stereotypes against romas. (like how roma are lazy, bad with money, etc etc). i guess people always manage to find other people inferior to them.
just a note, not all slavs are ‘eastern european.’ poland and czech and slovakia are really central. copernicus was part of latin-speaking western intellectual culture. and south slavs are totally different too.
“poland and czech and slovakia are really central.”
Czechia, yes. Poland and especially Slovakia are definitely Eastern European in culture. Geography is a different matter. You often get this line from them, which is in large part due to status anxiety.
Put differently, if Ukraine was as rich as Germany is today and Germany was as poor as Ukraine, these same people would be crawling on all four howling how eastern they are.
I’ve met many of them and I live in a Germanic country. They have more in common with Russians/Ukrainians/Belarussians than they do with us in their mentality etc. Many of these countries, especially Poles, have a very Russophobic attitude due to history, not because of underlying cultural differences. Having a latin alphabet isn’t saying much. Serbs still mostly use cyrillic whereas croats use latin alphabet. Nobody would dispute these people are very close culturally, which is of course reflected in their language etc.
agree you can’t dispute czechia.
would have to look at the data for the other two. before peter the great poland-lithuania was seen as the eastern frontier of europe. traditionally poland was part of the ‘west’ (it had large protestant communities until the 18th century among poles)
“Czechia, yes. Poland and especially Slovakia are definitely Eastern European in culture. Geography is a different matter. You often get this line from them, which is in large part due to status anxiety.”
Traveling from Budapest to Vienna I noticed a distinct character between eastern and western cities, I can’t exactly describe it except that it just feels different. The contrast feels even greater when the fact that both cities were part of a single empire for centuries is taken into consideration. Bratislava is more of a transition zone, as it borders the Germanosphere and as Pressburg was a German-dominated city for a long time. Vienna on the other hand feels fully like a western European city.
Prague is an interesting case, if one were to ignore the Slavic signage on the streets it feels no different from a large-sized German city. The people are less…survivalist compared to their fellow Slavs in cities further east in Poland, Bulgaria and Ukraine.
The Czechs also have a rather strong industry for a country with 10 million people, Skoda and Bata coming to mind. In India, many children were brought up thinking of Bata as a national company because it had an ambiguous name and sometimes expressing happiness that their shoes benefitted a local brand (this was true for the first few years after the country opened up till 2000 or so). Imagine the confusion when they found out where the company was from.
Turns out being part of the Holy Roman Empire benefitted most successor countries from a long-term entrepreneurial perspective. The real Bohemians are people of industry and commerce, not just music and artistry.
Emil Kirkegaard had a decent paper up recently where he looked at Danish attitudes on various immigrant groups and he cross-checked various by socio-economic factors.
Once adjusting for these, hostility against EE was the greatest, even more so than against Africans! Though the question here is to what extent there is a social “permissability” to be racist/xenophobic against EE as opposed to blacks etc. That could be a factor. If you’re interested, he goes through the paper here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eUoMQq4YpA
As for EEs, many of them are in a pickle. Their youth often pick up Alt-Right talking points. A few months ago, a bunch of 1st gen poles joined some nazi gang and got busted by the UK government. Many of these poles are probably looked down upon by these same far-right people. It’s basically insecurity that drives this.
Your comment about gypsies matches my experience when talking to them. They are very open about it. In recent years, some EEs have staged loud protests against taking in refugees and even LARPing as saviours of the white christian west or whatever. But while you can fool the low IQ rabble with this talk, the higher-ups know their countries are far behind and very dependent on EU gibs, which again reinforces their insecurity and anxiety. There’s a lot of stigma attached to being seen as the poorer, underdeveloped (and culturally backwards) part of Europe.
Lol, what does he mean by “even Indians” at 36:44? (Based on the data I see, Indians have a good net fiscal contribution and a low crime rate)
Anyway, the graph at 36:44 reminds me of this-
Turkey, Pakistan and Romania are all >40 and
Russia and Poland are both >25
Rest of them fall between 13 to 18
And I don’t really get why they chose to cite a paper that uses the YouGov poll from 2016 when there’s another poll from 2018-
https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/dqjh8rbx2e/InternalResults_180425_Immigration.pdf
He’s talking about an Asian context, and ‘Asian’ in Denmark usually means East Asian (unlike in the UK).
More speculatively, he could be hinting at the racial angle. Northeast Asians are definitely racially distinct but in skin color quite close to Danes, unlike most Indians. So in that sense, there doesn’t seem to be much net opposition penatly to Indians based on skin color (which he could have predicted).
If you look at that poll, the net favourability of letting in more Indians is lower than for e.g. Poles, despite Indians being on average significantly more educated. So that is an area where skin color could be a factor (though Indians still are obviously more welcomed than e.g. Pakistanis).
Would this lend weight to the idea that Anglos are more racist?
“Northeast Asians are definitely racially distinct but in skin color quite close to Danes, unlike most Indians. So in that sense, there doesn’t seem to be much net opposition penatly to Indians based on skin color”
Didn’t really look at it from the whole “brown people” angle. I was mostly just thinking along religious lines.
“Would this lend weight to the idea that Anglos are more racist?”
I don’t really wanna throw the word ‘racist’ in there that easily, it’s probably more complicated than something purely based on race. Their stance on Indians probably has a lot to do with their largest news agency (BBC) having a very strong anti-India bias, and Pakistanis having a bad reputation is also somewhat of a factor (because I’ve often seen certain people say stuff like “Indians, Pakis, it’s all the same shit”).
There is still some some favouritism towards other majority-white countries, both in the UK and Denmark, based on the results. Media-based perception is quite a big factor.
Curious as to how Danish media reports on India.
I cited the one that Noal Carl used in his study (published in 2016, https://openpsych.net/paper/48). I didn’t know there was a newer one.
Our published paper is here by the way: https://www.mdpi.com/2075-4698/10/2/29
Which of us are Aryans?
The answer is very easy – Those of us who worship Indra, Agni, and the other Vedic gods.
Alright I bought the book. 22 bucks plus another 22 to ship all the way here. What the heck – might as well support the discussion. And I agree, Romila Thapar gets too much hate.
Oral compositions with specific meter and structure are even more difficult to compose, right? Why don’t I see anything such specific structure in other European languages. Avestan has some resemblance to Vedas but if I am not wrong, Steppe entry into India was not through Iran but from South Russia. Is there a Steppe migration pattern that explains the closeness between Avestan and Sanskrit?
the point of origin for indo-iranians was in the southeast european russia/lower volga/south urals region.
but they dispersed a lot from there in all directions. i am not totally clear on how *indo-aryans* got into s asia, but it seems most plausible they used the montane fringe which includes ferghana and came through afghaistan. the iranians who went to iran proper seem to have forked west into turkmenistan (steppe ancestry shows up ~2000 BC in khorsan).
Thanks! Appreciate your input.
As for Romila Thapar, I did read quite a bit of her works and later also listened to talks she had given. She’s very clearly a highly intelligent woman with an astounding command of the English language, as you’d expect from India’s arguably most influential historian of the post-independence era.
I have followed the debates about Ayodhya and the controversies surrounding Tipu Sultan, Aurangzeb etc. I remember listening to her comments and it was clear she was downplaying it subtly. She didn’t go as far as Audrey Truschke in trying to do bizarre revisionism. My impression was that Romila was in fact more ‘woke’ than she let on, but for ideological reasons preferred to downplay that history because she was and remains very wedded to the secular idea of India, which is a noble ideal. I never felt she was being dishonest or shady the way that Truschke gives vibes of.
As Faulkner famously noted; the past is never dead, it’s not even past. It was a romantic bet that they made, but it was doomed to fail. India had to have a reckoning with its past, sooner or later.
For people who want to read an intelligent critique of Thapar and her ideological milieu, the former editor of the Indian Express (and Vajpayee BJP stalwart) Arun Shourie wrote a fantastic book on the subject, called Eminent Historians.
since romilla thapr is flavor of the season, i decided to look her up a bit. i haven’t read her extensively, but was generally aware that she belongs to the previous establishment (left liberal) camp. so i stumbled upon this article from her in NY times.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/17/opinion/india-elections-modi-history.html
“They Peddle Myths and Call It History”
“It is striking that remarkable new ideas surfaced in Hinduism during the period of Muslim rule, such as those developed by its many devotional sects, which enriched the religion and gave it a form that is currently observed by some Hindu devotees. But these are treated as isolated incidents. Nor is there reference to some of the most exquisite religious poems in praise of Hindu gods that were composed by Muslim poets, and that continue to be sung in repertoires of classical music.”
who is she kidding? i can think of only 4 hindi poets of muslim origin of any note in medieval india – amir khusrow, kabir, jayasi and rahim. none of them wrote any “exquisite religious poems in praise of Hindu gods”. yes, their poems are deeply soaked in folk wisdom of india, but these are essentially secular poems. they are moralistic and mystical in nature. some of them may refer to a generic “god” in code words like “piya”, but their idea of god is closer to islamic single god than hindu divinity. you will certainly not find any explicit and unambiguous devotion to hindu gods like rama or krishna in them, as you would find in the poem of say, meera or tulsidas.
had such statement come from some genuine believer in ganga-jamani tehzeeb hoax (think our on BP kabir), then one would have dismissed it as delusion. but coming from someone who has spent a lifetime researching indian history, it can only be termed as intellectual dishonesty of highest order.
i can understand her need to play to the gallery. she can probably fool her western audience with such statements, but she can’t hoodwink someone like me who studied in hindi medium throughout his school years, and who had to cram up the dohas and chaupais of these very medieval hindi poets for his exams.
The point is not even that. But a larger point. Who decides what’s ‘Hinduism’? And why Hindutva is not real ‘Hinduism’ , and who made Marxist authorities on that. Do people who practice the religion have any say on that, or will non believers articulate and tell us whats’ real Hinduism?
Finally she is a punjabi, an ethnicity where Hindus are not only a minority, but super minority. An ethnicity which has little to zero contribution on what or how Hinduism is practiced today. If tomorrow an Assamese would say this is not real Hinduism, u would laugh them off the room . All these things needs to be first clarified b4 we even go into temple destruction or Ganga Jamuna tehzeeb, dohas and all.
I don’t think anyone really has the authority to declare who or what is or isn’t Hinduism, although of course everyone is free to opine on the matter and those with more influence and better arguments will probably get listened to.
I don’t think the current inhabitants of the area where a religion emerged have the authority to declare that either, just like Levantine Christians don’t have a veto on who is Christian or Arabian Peninsula Muslims don’t have a vet on who is Muslim. Her being Punjabi or someone else being Assamese doesn’t have much to do with it.
This is exacerbated by the fact that Hinduism is extremely diverse (to the point where some would not consider it a religion in the conventional sense of the term) is a fusion of various strands of thought and practice from various regions (including Punjab).
The Gangetic Plains hold great significance in Indian and Hindu civilization – moreso than any other region individually – but lets not get carried away.
#AllHindusMatter
“Finally she is a punjabi, an ethnicity where Hindus are not only a minority, but super minority. An ethnicity which has little to zero contribution on what or how Hinduism is practiced today.”
That seems wrong on a number of counts. Punjabi is not an ethnicity. Hindu Punjabis are hardly a minority, except within Indian Punjab. If you count the Hindu Punjabis living outside Punjab, there are probably more Hindus than Sikhs among Punjabis. Finally, who decides how Hinduism is to be practiced today. Punjab’s Hindus, are mostly Arya Samaji and they were the most aggressive of Hindus in North India.
Keep in mind that intellectuals undergo a process of decay over time. Paul Krugman was very smart in the 1990s, now he just regurgitates Lefty boilerplate and is useless. Joel Kotkin used to be a sharp heterodox thinker, now there’s nothing in his new book that you wouldn’t find in a few Douthat columns.
Thapar is very old and demented, she has likely undergone a similar process of intellectual decay.
this is correct assessment. her NY times article is a give-away. it is an insipid, deeply cliched, bureaucratic report of left’s main gripe-checklist against hindu right. nothing new in the article. tho what was particularly sad was her attempt to create a false moral equivalence by digging up rare instances of hindu temple plunder by rival hindu kings.
“Some powerful Muslims did attack Hindu temples, both to loot their riches and to direct aggression against the religion. But this again was known in pre-Islamic times when some Hindu kings looted and destroyed temples to acquire wealth.”
are these cases even equal? muslim-on-hindu cultural vandalism was multiple orders of magnitude more destructive than hindu-on-hindu vandalism. there are visible reminders of muslim vandalism in places like kashi-vishwanath or anantnag. as a historian she should know. i used to respect her for her work on ancient india. sadly she is turning into a caricature of typical “secular” indian historian.
Yeah, that talking point is dumb on a lot of levels.
1) Since Hindus wrote very little about these acts, but Muslims made a hue and cry about their deeds, it’s obvious that the acts played a categorically more important role in Islamic than they did in Hindu ones.
2) As I understand it, the dominant pattern (that we know of) in Hindu raids was to reinstall the deity (for political and spiritual reasons), whereas Muslims intended destruction (and the reallocation of later revenues to build mosques, naturally).
It’s a sort of dumb sophistry that wouldn’t be accepted if we were talking about any other region. But people turn off their minds when it comes to India.
I think this whole temple destruction revisionism is mostly Left historians talking among themselves, with some push back from right wing. Its like they started drinking their own kool aid. Mostly, an academic debate.
On ground, no one really believes it . The Hindus know what happened, and the Muslims also know what happened.
Exactly – just elite leftists and naive foreigners think otherwise
The Varshagira battle buttresses sequentialism and falsifies any theory that posits an alternative vector – such as Arya migrationism/invasionism into India.
The Varshagira battle is the “holy of holies” for primary evidence of OIT because it is referenced in both the Avesta and the New Rgveda. It is a tremendous sheet-anchor for king names, battles and lore. There hasn’t been any mainstream attempt to discount this evidence since Talageri first published this critical piece of evidence in 2009.
For those who are interested in reading up –
https://talageri.blogspot.com/2020/05/the-varsagira-battle-in-rigveda.html
http://koenraadelst.blogspot.com/2009/01/great-book-about-great-book.html
my skin is more brown than this half-white person: https://twitter.com/nhannahjones/status/1284525292120428544
https://twitter.com/Ahsan_H_Durrani/status/1284365309541928960
“A life sized statue of Buddha was discovered in a construction site in Takhtbhai, Mardan recently.
However, before the Archaeology dept was informed about it, the contractor had already broken it into pieces”
Indus people ?
The people who destroyed the statue have all been arrested. There was a front page story about it in today’s DAWN.
“Dr Abdul Samad, KP director archaeology and museums, termed the destruction of the statue a “crime” and said “disrespecting any religion is intolerable”.
KP police later tweeted that the suspects had been traced and arrested while pieces of the broken statue were also recovered. According to the police, those arrested include Qamar Zaman, Amjad, Aleem and Suleman. ”
https://www.dawn.com/news/1569758/police-arrest-4-men-for-destroying-ancient-buddha-statue-found-during-construction-in-mardan
But don’t let that detract from your anti-Pakistan agenda. I was hoping I wouldn’t have to comment here again, but you couldn’t resist mentioning my country. I also see my name being thrown around in the main post itself. Nice to see I’m that important.
RE 1/2 – EE(SE) vs WE(NE)
Very briefly for now. I will write about Sea People. Just to say to timepas that I personally know Louise whom Cline mentioned when answering the first question. Also, I will write about ‘East Europeans’ vs ‘West Europeans’. All presented is pretty shallow including principia (not important but probably a Danish) only Scorpio came close. It is a big difference btw. Bulgarians/Romanians and Czechs who are closer to Germans than to the previous.
Some EE have inferiority complex toward WE, some not and some very opposite. It maybe ‘irritating’ or ‘eyesore’ or ‘muh’ but I can say that Serbs are in the last group. Not only because they are the oldest European civilisation and culture. Primarily, because of everyday lifestyle. None from the Southern Europe would be changing this with Northern Europeans. Not only Serbs, all SE think for e.g. about Germans as dumb and all (including even Germans think about English as treacherous idiots).
I don’t know about plumbers and painters, but Serbian professors in US/Canada could form one good university. Not speaking about Tesla who changed the stream of human civilisation and still contributes to national self-esteem. What about NATO bombing of Serbia? One thousand of modern planes bombed a 600x200km territory with uranium bombs and tomahawks from Mediterranean. These guys had to be very important to engage such military resources against them. Serbs were waiting for promised Nato ground forces, but cowards gave up because they knew that they would be defeated with thousands of casualties. Because of all this Serbs think about themselves as lifestyle world champions what is more important then gdp/capita.
RE 2/2 – ancient epics, Iliad-Mahabharata (IM) similarities, etc
One mentioned that there is no example in Europe about oral traditions (except Germanic??? )
In brief, Serbs have dozens and dozens of books of epic and lyric poems, tales, proverbs, riddles, fables from the past, many of them from the pagan period and one even from people who, after a thousand or two years, pushed by Chinese returned from S.Asia to Serbia. Homer was not a Greek (this name appeared several hundreds of years after him), Iliad was not a Greek epic. It was orally transmitted for 600 years (not on Greek language) before was translated (!) to Greek. At that time, future Greeks hardly lived in today’s Greece, they did not have any kings nor kingdoms, they did not know for Mt Olympus. None mentioned Greeks in few dozens of papers written about Sea People (Minoans were not Greeks). Often mentioned Aegeans, were not Greeks. Philistines were not Greeks (after discovering the king David’s palace in the Philistine’s city of Ashkelon last year, scientists said they were “Europeans”! Who were Goliath and Dalila?). Sardinians (Sherdens?) have Novak Djokovic’s genetics.
It would be very strange that one nation has only ONE (!) epic (actually two-Odyssey, who, btw was an Illyrian) and no any other oral tradition. Where the IM similarities could come from? Maybe, because they came from the same cultural matrix (being researched by Arjun&Anan). Greeks do not believe that Aryans existed (because it was before their time). Rig Veda and other were not created in a short time period, they were formed for hundreds/thousands of years before they came to SA and probably updated with a local knowledge.
A question for timepaas – what is the link btw Sardinia, Heracles, Serbs, Greeks and S.Asia?
“coming over” from the GNXP blog again. Read this article from the Washington Post today on just how accurate India is keeping track of COVID19 deaths:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/india-coronavirus-1-million-cases-death-toll/2020/07/17/9c6aacac-c0a2-11ea-b178-bb7b05b94af1_story.html
Anecdotally speaking, in the past ~4 months or so, have there been any reports on mass graves being dug or hospitals getting crushed by influx of respiratory patients? Been curious about that since those things are “gold metric” for rise in excess deaths, such as in Italy and Brazil.
Love this cuisine, can’t find good restaurants serving it in the West unfortunately.
https://amp.scmp.com/lifestyle/food-drink/article/3093115/indian-chinese-food-why-indians-cant-get-enough-spicy-chilli
There is an Indian ‘Chinese’ restaurant in New York,- In Jackson Height Brooklyn, run by Chinese from Calcutta..
The Harappan influence permeates the whole Rig Veda. The Goddess Vac that gave birth to Rig Vedic gods Brahma; Agni; and Prajapati is conceived as the all-mighty Goddess in Rig Veda. Her status in Vedic Pantheon is indisputable. Harappans worshipped her as attested by recorded history and the Indus seals; a manifestation of her was also worshipped in West Asia and Afghanistan [1][2][3][4].
With such pervasive influence of IVC on the early Rig Vedic texts, how is it possible that not a single Harappan word entered into them? Did they communicate through sign language? We can also observe that all Vedic texts were composed in India; Yamnayas lack the cultural, geographical, and religious context for this [5].
Moreover, God Agni was also worshipped by Mittanis. This is attested by recorded history. If they had no inkling of Goddess Vac, how could they worship her firstborn God Agni? What about her West Asian manifestation? What about astronomical observation from the Harappan period? AMT implies that early Rig Veda was composed in a way to make sure the Harappan language did not enter into it. The claims commanded by AMT are incredible; we all know incredible claims require incredible data. Where is it? [6] [7]
References
1. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/274936748_The_Meluhha_Village_Evidence_of_Acculturation_of_Harappan_Traders_in_Late_Third_Millennium_Mesopotamia
2. Cf. E. Mackay, Further excavations at Mohenjo-daro (1938) II, pl. LXXXVIII, 279 & XCII, 1
3. https://www.harappa.com/blog/buffalo-sacrifice
4. https://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780190226909.001.0001/acprof-9780190226909-chapter-19
5. https://talageri.blogspot.com/2020/03/the-rigveda-and-aryan-theory-rational_27.html
6. https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/d08e/02c5706b6f16f986ce868d834a81b2ae7b38.pdf
7. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indo-Aryan_superstrate_in_Mitanni
The Harappan influence permeates the whole Rig Veda. The Goddess Vac that gave birth to Rig Vedic gods Brahma; Agni; and Prajapati is conceived as the all-mighty Goddess in Rig Veda. Her status in Vedic Pantheon is indisputable. Harappans worshipped her as attested by recorded history and the Indus seals; a manifestation of her was also worshipped in West Asia and Afghanistan [1][2][3][4].
With such pervasive influence of IVC on the early Rig Vedic texts, how is it possible that not a single Harappan word entered into them? Did they communicate through sign language? We can also observe that all Vedic texts were composed in India; Yamnayas lack the cultural, geographical, and religious context for this [5].
Moreover, God Agni was also worshipped by Mittanis. This is attested by recorded history. If they had no inkling of Goddess Vac, how could they worship her firstborn God Agni? What about her West Asian manifestation? What about astronomical observation from the Harappan period? AMT implies that early Rig Veda was composed in a way to make sure the Harappan language did not enter into it. The claims commanded by AMT are incredible; we all know incredible claims require incredible data. Where is it? [6] [7]
I don’t think there is an intent to say that IVC words especially proper nouns did not enter an Indo-European language, but the common nouns and structure could be Indo European while proper nouns could still be IVC. The names of rivers for example could be pre-IE…. this practice is true even in modern times.
@Middle Lion
These are hard facts (not exhaustive):
1. Vedic Sanskrit observed in early Rig Veda texts is descended 100% from PIE. [1]
2. Rig Veda is pastoral. That is why Yamnayas were declared to be pastoral. This implies Yamnayas did not know agriculture, while Harappans were urban and knew farming. [2]
3. Early Rig Vedic texts contain religious, cultural influence from IVC as proven by me before. [3]
4. All place names/river names in Northern India are Sanskrit based. [4][5]
5. Astronomical data in Rig Veda. [6]
6. Rig Veda was composed in India. [2]
7. Material culture continuity. [7]
8. Urban settlements in India continue to exist after the end of IVC; there was reorganization and expansion, but no dissolution. How could Rig Veda not record this and be exclusively pastoral if it has been composed after 2000 BC? [8]
The only scenario that can explain all these facts is if Rig Veda predates Harappa.
Fun Observation: Goddess Vac is associated with Saraswati
One article that you should definitely read is: “Stuhrmann, Witzel and the Joke that is Western Indology” [5]
I have other proofs too that I will provide in some time, where I will also look at linguistic data from the lens of genetic data. The conclusion remains the same: AMT is untenable on linguistic grounds, and OIT is the only answer. There are so many evidences that it is mind-boggling how scholars consider AMT likelier than OIT.
There is a lot of research and hard work that goes into writing these informative posts: the only thing I wish for is to engage readers and get enlightening feedback from them; the tougher questions they ask, the better it is; I also hope that they will go through all the links that I post and get a holistic view of the debate. In time, I will create a place, where I will host these proofs and references so that people can read and learn. I also have my engagements that I need to complete plus RL constraints, so I ask you to wait for my future posts that contain more proofs; I don’t want to spoil the fun prematurely.
References
1. https://talageri.blogspot.com/2019/10/dravidian-connections-with-harappan.html
2. https://talageri.blogspot.com/2020/03/the-rigveda-and-aryan-theory-rational_27.html
3. https://www.brownpundits.com/2020/07/18/open-thread-brown-pundits-7-18-2020/#comment-67008
4. The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture” [p. 98-99]
5. https://talageri.blogspot.com/2017/06/stuhrmann-witzel-and-joke-that-is_24.html
6. https://talageri.blogspot.com/2017/12/the-use-of-astronomical-evidence-in.html
7. The Indo-Aryan Controversy: Evidence and Inference in Indian History [pp.50-72]
8. The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture” [pp. 232-233]
These are hard facts (not exhaustive):
if you have to say the facts are “hard” they probably aren’t.
i don’t argue with you much because you’ll come to the right conclusions or not. hope you expand your reading.
I see that many Indians try to feel superior by the mere fact that they have some remote ancestral connections to West Asia, it’s understandable as the West (Asia) is dominant region in today’s world. Sooner or later the Chinese will be the most powerful, my feeling is that again some Indians will probably look in their genome to see if their great-great-great-…. daddy happened to be of East Asian descent? Currently NW Indians are winning this game, in future probably Bengalis will win this? I wonder how this ancestral connection game worked during the time of Emperors Ashoka, Sri Krishna Devaraya, etc. One thing we know for sure is that during the Mughal, Delhi Sultanate period Persianized and Islamic Turko-Mongol, Persian, Arab ancestry was something to be proud of (even today we see that many Indian muslims distance themselves from the native Hindu or AASI AF looking Muslims). I am not sure how this ancestral pride dynamics worked during native Indian rulers’ regimes.
Isn’t We Wuzzing more a Pakistani thing? Arab/Turkic invader ancestor LARPing is a big industry there.
Ertegul, an Turkish TV show, was hugely popular in Pakistan. In Turkey itself, the show was mostly seen through the prism of Turkic nationalism (even though there is literally no historical record of the events in the show, as the creators admit).
Pakistanis, desperate to latch onto anything remotely islamic, started to see it through a pan-Islamic lens and thusly started to police the actors on social media for being “unislamic”. This created unease and irritation in Turkey, many whom see Pakistan as an underdeveloped and undesirable country. Turks often want to pretend to be Europeans (they have their own LARPing problems). Getting stuck with Pakistanis doesn’t help that.
To me, the whole sequence of events just pointed to the weak identity inherent in Pakistan. I’m not aware that India, nor Bangladesh, has similar We Wuzzing issues.
Pervez Hoodbhoy, arguably Pakistan’s finest intellectual, wrote about it at length here:
https://www.dawn.com/news/1561638/dangerous-delusions-ertugrul-mania
I have 0.2% East Asian ancestry, does that count? lol
Yeah Muslims in South Asia generally do claim Persian, Turkic, Arab or Mughal descent. It’s true many do have some lineage. But for some reason they think the bit they have means they are 100% which is bullshit.
“Currently NW Indians are winning this game, in future probably Bengalis will win this?”
NW Indians have lots of western Eurasian ancestry (~70-80%?) so it justifies their pride. Bengalis 15% East Asian ancestry won’t shake-up them in the same fashion.
when the japanese beat the russians some bengalis did express ‘race pride’ because they knew they were more east asian. i don’t know if it was savakar, but one of the marathi nationalists made fun of the ‘black bengalis’ for being prideful about this…
Maratha nationalist outlined the known fact then. East Asians are generally racist towards darker races. I never had issues with them though. My childhood sweetheart was half White-half Chinese. We liked each other (50:50 W.Eurasian/E.Eurasian attraction, maybe 😉 ), she liked my Bengali (Pan-South Asian) look, and I liked her pseudo-central Asian look.
Probably already happening in North Eastern states in India.
Saw some documentary about how K-pop is much more popular there than Bollywood.
I think Bengalis are too South Asian, and don’t seem interested in the East Asian part of their ancestry.
I think Hazaras will start to take even more pride in their Mongolian ancestry especially given that they keep getting targeted in anti-Shia attacks.
bengali attitude to e asian ancestry is weird and ambivalent. for example, a ‘chindian’ comedian (half Chinese half Tamil indian) in Singapore can talk about how bangladeshi construction workers always talk to him in bengali and the audience laughs knowingly.
By the way, timepass, do you seriously believe in OIT? David Reich and others have used genetic data to essentially settle that debate as far as I am aware. The Hindu wrote about it at length over several years. These are very good deep dives:
https://www.thehindu.com/society/history-and-culture/theres-no-confusion-the-new-reports-clearly-confirm-arya-migration-into-india/article29409611.ece
https://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/science/how-genetics-is-settling-the-aryan-migration-debate/article19090301.ece
Scroll also had a very good write-up (I prefer their website since it is less cluttered):
https://scroll.in/article/936872/two-new-genetic-studies-upheld-aryan-migration-theory-so-why-did-indian-media-report-the-opposite
@principia
In the paper “Discussion: Are the Origins of Indo-European Languages Explained by the Migration of the Yamnaya Culture to the West?”[1], Reich et al. have stated that genetic data imposes constraints on what is possible, and it cannot resolve the IE question on its own. They admit Yamnaya migration can only explain a subset of IE languages spread in Europe. Also, genetics does not encode language + culture.
The Narasimhan et al. paper that shows Yamnayas coming to India also provides proof for genetic flow from IVC to BMAC. In addition, recorded history tells that IVC had colonies in Mesopotamia.
Do you know, there are 2 AMT theories: Anatolian and Steppe, i.e, there are 2 versions of AMT? Reasons:
1. Anatolian: Semitic loan word in PIE. Do you know why nobody argues for Mesopotamia as the place for Aryan homeland? Recorded history is against it. If it was not, western Indologists would have definitely argued for it!!!
2. Steppe: Uralic language borrowings from and to Indo Iranian, but one-way borrowing from Sanskrit to Uralic languages.
Steppe theory is the weakest in explaining Anatolian spread; this is its Achilles heel. I will write a future post on this with references; if you are interested you can read that. Now, which AMT scenario made some sense to me: it was Anatolian. But genetics has proven that Anatolian is not possible for IE. So, now I can say: I don’t think AMT is true, and OIT is the only possible answer.
References
1. https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/european-journal-of-archaeology/article/discussion-are-the-origins-of-indoeuropean-languages-explained-by-the-migration-of-the-yamnaya-culture-to-the-west/9E34F625389AF81B7EC16012F1D21FD9
Three candidates for the ancestral homeland of “Indo-Europeans” or “Proto-Indo-European”.
• First hypothesis – Asia Minor, or more specifically Turkey/Anatolia, precisely the area between the Lake Van and Urmia, just south from the border of the former USSR, in western Iran, namely western Azerbaijan.
• Second hypothesis – the southern steppes of modern Ukraine/Russia, in the landscape of the so-called “Kurgan Culture”.
• Third hypothesis – Eastern or Central Europe, or more specifically, the plains along the river of Danube or the Balkans, or even the northern Alps.
At one time, even Western Europe pitched in to be the Aryan homeland! Then there was Iran and BMAC. I think there are maybe 6? Western Indologists can declare every place on Earth to be an Aryan homeland if its name is not India. Which do you like? Moreover, I saw your question; I will answer some of it after I have brought more OIT facts to light.
From your posts, you appear to be just like an Indian; are you really a Serb?
You’ve got me finally! It means that all these ‘irritating’, ‘muh’ and ‘eyesore’ humdrums, even song links, were wasted time. How did you do this? It seems that Razib has a mole in his admin team who is leaking database information. Bishkagate? In fact, I think that StraightGuy is a Serb. He was writing comments in Cyrillic and one OIT guy (‘irritating’) recognised him immediately. Keep your eye on him. Btw, to my knowledge there are 25 places suggested as a homeland of so-called ‘Indo-Europeans’. Who hits the target, misses everything else.
“In fact, I think that StraightGuy is a Serb. He was writing comments in Cyrillic”
It’s a pity that i am not even close to being Serb. But I still acknowledge the fact that modern humans originated from Serbia and all human achievements have Serbian link.
The truth about Serbs and Serbia(AKA the best country ever) can be written in any language.
塞爾維亞人是耶穌的重生
الصرب هم تجسيد ليسوع
सर्ब यीशु के पुनर्जन्म हैं
Οι Σέρβοι είναι η αναγέννηση του Ιησού
செர்பியர்கள் இயேசுவின் மறுபிறவி
After all, all languages of the world has Serbian roots.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/19/world/asia/india-afghanistan-sikh-hindu.html
The Narasimhan et al. paper that shows Yamnayas coming to India also provides proof for genetic flow from IVC to BMAC
this is years out of date. the narasimhan paper focuses on sintashta ppl who are not yamnaya but reflux from corded ware (to whom in some ways yamnaya were antecedents). this is not a major issue, but for some reason the indian press doesn’t seem to be moving on from the yamnaya tho the model is updated
Razib,
It is unfair to say that something published <5 years as “years out of date” from general public point of view. Narasimhan et al. is fairly recent for any non-genetics layperson. If genetics is moving that fast (and seems it does because ANI and ASI became AASI, InPe, Steppe in no time) it is unfair to say that AMT question is settled with all its nuances.
The issue isn’t if steppe came to India, the issue is, are they the sole carriers of Sanskrit and not earlier Iran_N? If that’s not settled elsewhere it’s not settled for India too.
Why is steppe = Aryans when current IA culture carriers are InPe+steppe? It’s not communicated to general public with any clarity.
it is unfair to say that AMT question is settled with all its nuances.
who says it is settled? don’t put words into my mouth!
are they the sole carriers of Sanskrit and not earlier Iran_N?
vageesh seriously considered this. we had some conversations on this. the main issue seems to be that unlike hittie indo-iranian languages are much more phylogenetically close to other indo-european groups + they show evidence of interaction (reciprocal) with uralic languages.
Have you guys ever noticed that North Indian English accents have stronger retroflex compared to other regions?
https://twitter.com/codedvirus/status/1285056750857510912
I wonder why none of this analysis has ever been conducted on the Neolithic Farmers who migrated to Europe and Asia from modern-day Turkey. What were these people’s genes like, and did their genes change from when they first started migrating to a few millenia after they started migrating?
Also, it would be interesting to know how many of these Farmers contributed to the genes of the Yamnaya or the Zagros Mountain Farmers or even the pre-IVC people of South Asia. After all, the Anatolian Farmers contributed “the single largest component of the ancestry of modern-day Europeans.” (https://phys.org/news/2019-03-anatolian-farmers-local-hunter-gatherers-agriculture.html)