Shri Girilal's Jain's review referred in the article above:
Appendix 1 - Resolving the Ancient Language Problem from the book <i>The Hindu Phenomenon</i>
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->An unknown Indian has taken on proponents of Aryan invasion/migration theory, demolished their case, and established that northern India is the original home of the Indo-European family of languages. The importance of this remarkable achievement cannot be exaggerated. In course of time, it can compel the revision of the history not only of Indian but also world civilization.
The truth is invariably simple and convincing once one is able to cut through the maze of misinterpretation and obscurity. Indeed, one then wonders why other scholars could not grasp so obvious a proposition. This is so in the case of Srikant G. Telageri's Aryan Invasion Theory and Indian Nationalism 1.
This is, of course, not the first conclusive repudiation of the invasion/migration theory in the English language. David Frawley too has made nonsense of it in his invaluable work Gods, Sages and Kings: Vedic Secrets of Ancient Civilization 2. But he has not taken note in detail of what various proponents of the theory have written. The scope of his work is also much larger and in parts it is rather speculative. (Frawley is, incidentally, a recognized Vedacharya and has written extensively on various aspects of Vedic civilization).
Telageri puts his finger at the source of much of the trouble when he challenges the common assumptions that the Vedic language was the earliest form of Indo-Aryan, that classical Sanskrit developed from the Vedic, that the Prakrits developed from the Sanskrit, and the modern Indo-Aryan languages from these Prakrits.
According to him, the earliest from of Indo-European speech was spoken in the interior of India, in prehistoric times. It spread out as far north and west as Kashmir and Afghanistan; the original language developed into at least three Proto-Outer-Indo-European (in northern Kashmir and Afghanistan), Proto-Central-Indo-European (in southern Kashmir and Punjab), and Proto-Inner Indo- European (in inner India). This is Telageri's point of departure. And this is the crux of the matter. For if it can be established that the movement of the users of the Indo-European speech in India in ancient times was from the east to the west and not vice-versa, the invasion/migration theory, as it has been propounded, cannot stand.
It is known to student of Sanskrit texts that they enumerate Indian rivers from the east to the west and not the others way around. But the evidence has not been regarded as strong enough. Telageri comes up with the stronger evidence and the interesting point about it is that he locates it in the Rigveda itself.
One of the hymns of the Rigveda (IX. 96) and one of the three verses in another hymn (X. 179.2)are composed by Pratardana, who is clearly described as Kasiraja (king of Kashi). Kashi (Varanasi), as we know, lies in south eastern Uttar Pradesh. The Puranas not only confirm that Pratardana was king of Kashi but name at least six of his predecessors.
One entire book (Book III), of the ten books of the Rigveda, is similarly authored by composers belonging to the family of Visvamitra. According to the Puranas, Visvamitra was the ninth descendant of Jahnu, who established the kingdom of Kanyakububja (Kanauj) in Uttar Pradesh. In the Rigveda the composer of the hymn refers to himself as belonging to the house of Jahnu. In other words, the kingdom of Kanyakubja was in existence at least nine generations before the composition of any of the hymns in this book.
In two other hymns (VIII. 2.41) and (VII. 3.21-24) the poet Kanva Medhatithi praises king Vibhindu and king Pakasthaman for their gifts and the Brahaddevata (VI. 42) clearly identifies them as rulers of Kashi and Bhoja (in eastern Uttar Pradesh and western Madhya Pradesh, respectively).
Another hymn (III. 53.14) mentions Kikata and its king Pramaganda. Kikata later came to be named Magadha. Thus south Bihar is also mentioned in the Rigveda.
This, however, raises the question whether the language of these hymns attributed to authors in present day Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Bihar is different from other hymns composed in Punjab and, if so, how significant is the difference? Telageri has not posed this question.
That apart, however, the eastern Aryan theory provides us a possible explanation for the rise of non-Vedic Jainism and Buddhism. Both provide for 23 predecessors of the historically known founders - Mahavir and Gautam Buddha in the sixth century B.C. It may also help fill the gaps in our knowledge of the linguistic history of India, to which Suniti Kumar Chatterjee has drawn our attention. (See Chapter 2.)
According to Telageri the Vedic dialects disappeared in course of time and their speech area (Punjab and its environs) was taken over by the Inner-Indo-European dialects. But long before that, they had set in motion a cult movement which covered the entire country. This Vedic cult finally also gave way but continued to remain in force as the elite layer of a pan-Indian religion of the Inner-Indo-Europeans and Dravidians. Vedic hymns still dominate Hindu rituals but have little impact on the lives of Hindus.
Classical Sanskrit was created by ancient grammarians (Panini was preceded by hundreds of others, many of whom are named by him in his Astadhyayi) to serve as a via media between the Vedic language and the Inner-Indo- European dialects which and developed together with the Dravidian languages over the course of millennia and were therefore structurally different from the Vedic, and also had their own roots and words. Later the Prakrits came into vogue. Finally, the Inner dialects came into their own in the form of the new Indo-Aryan languages, as heavily Sanskritized as the Dravidian languages. India's cultural history thus beings with a grand synthesis.
Telageri's summing up is important. He says: "In short, the linguistic structure of the present Indo-Aryan languages is not a change from an originally Vedic-like linguistic structure; it is a linguistic structure which developed, in the course of millennia, in the Inner-Indo- European speech family, in conjunction with the Dravidian languages."
I am not a specialist in this field. But as an interested student, I can say that it answer many of the problems philologists have faced and raised for around 200 years. It also settles the question of the cultural unity of India. The Aryans and the Dravidians together shaped the languages and culture of India.
Many other peoples named in the Rigveda are associated by other ancient Indian texts with other parts of India. In one hymn (VIII. 5.3739), for example, we find a reference to the Cedis and their king Kasu. The Puranas point out that the Cedis were Yadavas who migrated northwards to Bundelkhand from Vidarbha in northern Maharashtra.
The poetess-composer of the Vedic hymn (1.179), Lopamudra, wife of Agastya, the great rishi known to be father of the Tamil grammar, is declared by every single ancient Indian text to be the daughter of the king of Vidarbha. Thus there were Aryan speakers in northern Maharashtra well before the composition of these hymns.
All in all, the Rigvedic hymns, in combination with the other texts show that the Indo-European language speaking people of the time were not restricted to the Punjab region, but were found as far east as south Bihar and the Bay of Bengal, and as far south as Maharashtra. This is, more or less, the geographical extent of the Indo-Aryan languages to this day.
Some points may be made at this stage. The vedas testify to the existence of the Purana in the Vedic period itself which obviously got divided into 18 and in the process expanded. These Puranas provide a genealogy of kings of major dynasties up to the time of the Mahabharata war. Telageri uses the list of about 100 kings provided by P.L.Bhargava.
On the basis of the excavation work by marine archaeologists belonging to the National Institute of Oceanography under the direction of Dr. S.R.Rao, the date of the submergence of Krishna's city of Dwarka can be fixed around 1500-1400 B.C., which, incidentally is also suggested by Puranic records which place it 1000 years before Nanda who ruled in Patliputra around 400 B.C.
Take the average reign of a king to be 18 years which is generally accepted by scholars. This takes up back to 3200-3100 B.C. The Aryans are supposed to have come into north-west India around 1500 B.C. and the Rigveda is dated 1000 B.C. at the earliest!
The conquering Aryans are alleged to have treated the conquered original inhabitants of India with contempt. The two words which have been used most to make this charge stick are Dasa and Dasyu. The Rigveda throughout refers to Dasa/Dasyus as asraddha (faithless), ayajna (offering-less) and avrata (without rituals). It is obvious that these terms refer to religious practices, and not to race or language. As such they could apply only to would-be Iranians, who were hostile to the cult of Indra and to the sacrifice of animals in the sacred fire. This is not a matter of conjecture. Telageri shows that the Iranians called themselves by these names. The world Dasyu is found in the Avest as Dahya, s becoming h as in all Persian dialects. The word Dasa is found in the eastern Iranian dialect of Khotanese as Daha meaning man. But some how the charges has stood.
The Rigveda makes it clear that Dasa and Dasyu are one and the same and so are Dasyus and Asuras in the later hymns when Asura has ceased to be the equal of Devas and come to acquire an unsavoury connotation.
Telageri is, therefore, justified in concluding that the Arya-Dasyu conflict in the Rigveda reflects the Vedic- versus Iranian conflict which took place in the Punjab region. After the bulk of the Iranians left Punjab and migrated westwards, the term dasa/Dasyu ceased to be used in reference to a community, and came to be used only in the sense of slave and robber, respectively.
Ten dynasties or peoples are mentioned in the Puranas; of them four are described in some detail. These are the Saryatis, Pramsus, Iksvakus (Ram belonged to this dynasty) and the Sudyumnas are then divided into Drahyus, Anus, Turvasus, Yadus and Purus. Of them, the Anus, who lived close to the Purus in Kashmir, later became Iranians. This is confirmed by most ancient Iranian text.
The first chapter of Vendidad lists 16 holy lands rendered unfit for man by Angra Manyu, the evil spirit of Zend Avesta. The first of these is Airyano Vaejo, bitterly cold and full of snow. If there is doubt that this refers to Kashmir, the designation of the next as Hapta Hindu, that is Sapta-Sindhu (Punjab) should remove it.
Since Punjab now contains five and not seven rivers, it may be added that the Saraswati, biggest of them in Vedic times, dried up about the same time as the so-called Indus Valley civilization disappeared around 1800 B.C. and another river Drishadvati, now known as Naiwala, is going dry.
Students of the Rigveda are familiar with the battle of ten Kings. The relevant hymns have been variously interpreted. Most of these interpretations cannot stand scrutiny. The details, however, do not concern us. Pertinent for us is the fact that the names mentioned there help us identify various Iranian peoples.
The Parthus are obviously Parthians of latter-day Iran, the Parsus the Persians, the Pakthas the Pakhtoons or the Pathans, the Bhalanas the Baluchis (witness Bolan pass), the Visanins Pisaca (Dardic people), and the Bhrigus ancestors of the Phyrgians.
As Telageri has put it, the evidence is overwhelming that eight groups of Anus mentioned in the Rigveda and the Puranas (seven of those being from the ten peoples named in a single historical incident) are the ancient and modern Iranian peoples, covering practically all the major ones: the Medes, the Persians, the Parthians, the Phrygians, the Khivs, the Dards (Pisacas), the Baluchis and the Pakhtoons. These peoples are today found stretched out westwards from Kashmir right up to Asia Minor:
Dr.S.R.Rao, the well-known archaeologist, has provided a valuable Foreword which powerfully reinforces Telageri's case on the strength of archaeological evidence. Dr.Rao himself is a linguist of no mean achievement. Indeed, he has deciphered the script of the Indus Valley seals. This has begun to win wide, though not yet universal, recognition among scholars. Though the non-discovery so far a bilingual seal remains a handicap, Dr.Rao's work is convincing in that it links the seals with a concrete (Vedic) culture, while others have speculated about a Dravidian culture which they have not defined.
Notes And References
   Â
  1. Srikant G. Telageri, Aryan Invasion Theory and Indian Nationalism, Voice of India, New Delhi, 1993.
   Â
  2. David Frawley,Gods, Saages and Kings:Vedic Secrets of Ancient civilization, Indian edn. Motilal Banarssidass, New Delhi.
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Appendix 1 - Resolving the Ancient Language Problem from the book <i>The Hindu Phenomenon</i>
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->An unknown Indian has taken on proponents of Aryan invasion/migration theory, demolished their case, and established that northern India is the original home of the Indo-European family of languages. The importance of this remarkable achievement cannot be exaggerated. In course of time, it can compel the revision of the history not only of Indian but also world civilization.
The truth is invariably simple and convincing once one is able to cut through the maze of misinterpretation and obscurity. Indeed, one then wonders why other scholars could not grasp so obvious a proposition. This is so in the case of Srikant G. Telageri's Aryan Invasion Theory and Indian Nationalism 1.
This is, of course, not the first conclusive repudiation of the invasion/migration theory in the English language. David Frawley too has made nonsense of it in his invaluable work Gods, Sages and Kings: Vedic Secrets of Ancient Civilization 2. But he has not taken note in detail of what various proponents of the theory have written. The scope of his work is also much larger and in parts it is rather speculative. (Frawley is, incidentally, a recognized Vedacharya and has written extensively on various aspects of Vedic civilization).
Telageri puts his finger at the source of much of the trouble when he challenges the common assumptions that the Vedic language was the earliest form of Indo-Aryan, that classical Sanskrit developed from the Vedic, that the Prakrits developed from the Sanskrit, and the modern Indo-Aryan languages from these Prakrits.
According to him, the earliest from of Indo-European speech was spoken in the interior of India, in prehistoric times. It spread out as far north and west as Kashmir and Afghanistan; the original language developed into at least three Proto-Outer-Indo-European (in northern Kashmir and Afghanistan), Proto-Central-Indo-European (in southern Kashmir and Punjab), and Proto-Inner Indo- European (in inner India). This is Telageri's point of departure. And this is the crux of the matter. For if it can be established that the movement of the users of the Indo-European speech in India in ancient times was from the east to the west and not vice-versa, the invasion/migration theory, as it has been propounded, cannot stand.
It is known to student of Sanskrit texts that they enumerate Indian rivers from the east to the west and not the others way around. But the evidence has not been regarded as strong enough. Telageri comes up with the stronger evidence and the interesting point about it is that he locates it in the Rigveda itself.
One of the hymns of the Rigveda (IX. 96) and one of the three verses in another hymn (X. 179.2)are composed by Pratardana, who is clearly described as Kasiraja (king of Kashi). Kashi (Varanasi), as we know, lies in south eastern Uttar Pradesh. The Puranas not only confirm that Pratardana was king of Kashi but name at least six of his predecessors.
One entire book (Book III), of the ten books of the Rigveda, is similarly authored by composers belonging to the family of Visvamitra. According to the Puranas, Visvamitra was the ninth descendant of Jahnu, who established the kingdom of Kanyakububja (Kanauj) in Uttar Pradesh. In the Rigveda the composer of the hymn refers to himself as belonging to the house of Jahnu. In other words, the kingdom of Kanyakubja was in existence at least nine generations before the composition of any of the hymns in this book.
In two other hymns (VIII. 2.41) and (VII. 3.21-24) the poet Kanva Medhatithi praises king Vibhindu and king Pakasthaman for their gifts and the Brahaddevata (VI. 42) clearly identifies them as rulers of Kashi and Bhoja (in eastern Uttar Pradesh and western Madhya Pradesh, respectively).
Another hymn (III. 53.14) mentions Kikata and its king Pramaganda. Kikata later came to be named Magadha. Thus south Bihar is also mentioned in the Rigveda.
This, however, raises the question whether the language of these hymns attributed to authors in present day Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Bihar is different from other hymns composed in Punjab and, if so, how significant is the difference? Telageri has not posed this question.
That apart, however, the eastern Aryan theory provides us a possible explanation for the rise of non-Vedic Jainism and Buddhism. Both provide for 23 predecessors of the historically known founders - Mahavir and Gautam Buddha in the sixth century B.C. It may also help fill the gaps in our knowledge of the linguistic history of India, to which Suniti Kumar Chatterjee has drawn our attention. (See Chapter 2.)
According to Telageri the Vedic dialects disappeared in course of time and their speech area (Punjab and its environs) was taken over by the Inner-Indo-European dialects. But long before that, they had set in motion a cult movement which covered the entire country. This Vedic cult finally also gave way but continued to remain in force as the elite layer of a pan-Indian religion of the Inner-Indo-Europeans and Dravidians. Vedic hymns still dominate Hindu rituals but have little impact on the lives of Hindus.
Classical Sanskrit was created by ancient grammarians (Panini was preceded by hundreds of others, many of whom are named by him in his Astadhyayi) to serve as a via media between the Vedic language and the Inner-Indo- European dialects which and developed together with the Dravidian languages over the course of millennia and were therefore structurally different from the Vedic, and also had their own roots and words. Later the Prakrits came into vogue. Finally, the Inner dialects came into their own in the form of the new Indo-Aryan languages, as heavily Sanskritized as the Dravidian languages. India's cultural history thus beings with a grand synthesis.
Telageri's summing up is important. He says: "In short, the linguistic structure of the present Indo-Aryan languages is not a change from an originally Vedic-like linguistic structure; it is a linguistic structure which developed, in the course of millennia, in the Inner-Indo- European speech family, in conjunction with the Dravidian languages."
I am not a specialist in this field. But as an interested student, I can say that it answer many of the problems philologists have faced and raised for around 200 years. It also settles the question of the cultural unity of India. The Aryans and the Dravidians together shaped the languages and culture of India.
Many other peoples named in the Rigveda are associated by other ancient Indian texts with other parts of India. In one hymn (VIII. 5.3739), for example, we find a reference to the Cedis and their king Kasu. The Puranas point out that the Cedis were Yadavas who migrated northwards to Bundelkhand from Vidarbha in northern Maharashtra.
The poetess-composer of the Vedic hymn (1.179), Lopamudra, wife of Agastya, the great rishi known to be father of the Tamil grammar, is declared by every single ancient Indian text to be the daughter of the king of Vidarbha. Thus there were Aryan speakers in northern Maharashtra well before the composition of these hymns.
All in all, the Rigvedic hymns, in combination with the other texts show that the Indo-European language speaking people of the time were not restricted to the Punjab region, but were found as far east as south Bihar and the Bay of Bengal, and as far south as Maharashtra. This is, more or less, the geographical extent of the Indo-Aryan languages to this day.
Some points may be made at this stage. The vedas testify to the existence of the Purana in the Vedic period itself which obviously got divided into 18 and in the process expanded. These Puranas provide a genealogy of kings of major dynasties up to the time of the Mahabharata war. Telageri uses the list of about 100 kings provided by P.L.Bhargava.
On the basis of the excavation work by marine archaeologists belonging to the National Institute of Oceanography under the direction of Dr. S.R.Rao, the date of the submergence of Krishna's city of Dwarka can be fixed around 1500-1400 B.C., which, incidentally is also suggested by Puranic records which place it 1000 years before Nanda who ruled in Patliputra around 400 B.C.
Take the average reign of a king to be 18 years which is generally accepted by scholars. This takes up back to 3200-3100 B.C. The Aryans are supposed to have come into north-west India around 1500 B.C. and the Rigveda is dated 1000 B.C. at the earliest!
The conquering Aryans are alleged to have treated the conquered original inhabitants of India with contempt. The two words which have been used most to make this charge stick are Dasa and Dasyu. The Rigveda throughout refers to Dasa/Dasyus as asraddha (faithless), ayajna (offering-less) and avrata (without rituals). It is obvious that these terms refer to religious practices, and not to race or language. As such they could apply only to would-be Iranians, who were hostile to the cult of Indra and to the sacrifice of animals in the sacred fire. This is not a matter of conjecture. Telageri shows that the Iranians called themselves by these names. The world Dasyu is found in the Avest as Dahya, s becoming h as in all Persian dialects. The word Dasa is found in the eastern Iranian dialect of Khotanese as Daha meaning man. But some how the charges has stood.
The Rigveda makes it clear that Dasa and Dasyu are one and the same and so are Dasyus and Asuras in the later hymns when Asura has ceased to be the equal of Devas and come to acquire an unsavoury connotation.
Telageri is, therefore, justified in concluding that the Arya-Dasyu conflict in the Rigveda reflects the Vedic- versus Iranian conflict which took place in the Punjab region. After the bulk of the Iranians left Punjab and migrated westwards, the term dasa/Dasyu ceased to be used in reference to a community, and came to be used only in the sense of slave and robber, respectively.
Ten dynasties or peoples are mentioned in the Puranas; of them four are described in some detail. These are the Saryatis, Pramsus, Iksvakus (Ram belonged to this dynasty) and the Sudyumnas are then divided into Drahyus, Anus, Turvasus, Yadus and Purus. Of them, the Anus, who lived close to the Purus in Kashmir, later became Iranians. This is confirmed by most ancient Iranian text.
The first chapter of Vendidad lists 16 holy lands rendered unfit for man by Angra Manyu, the evil spirit of Zend Avesta. The first of these is Airyano Vaejo, bitterly cold and full of snow. If there is doubt that this refers to Kashmir, the designation of the next as Hapta Hindu, that is Sapta-Sindhu (Punjab) should remove it.
Since Punjab now contains five and not seven rivers, it may be added that the Saraswati, biggest of them in Vedic times, dried up about the same time as the so-called Indus Valley civilization disappeared around 1800 B.C. and another river Drishadvati, now known as Naiwala, is going dry.
Students of the Rigveda are familiar with the battle of ten Kings. The relevant hymns have been variously interpreted. Most of these interpretations cannot stand scrutiny. The details, however, do not concern us. Pertinent for us is the fact that the names mentioned there help us identify various Iranian peoples.
The Parthus are obviously Parthians of latter-day Iran, the Parsus the Persians, the Pakthas the Pakhtoons or the Pathans, the Bhalanas the Baluchis (witness Bolan pass), the Visanins Pisaca (Dardic people), and the Bhrigus ancestors of the Phyrgians.
As Telageri has put it, the evidence is overwhelming that eight groups of Anus mentioned in the Rigveda and the Puranas (seven of those being from the ten peoples named in a single historical incident) are the ancient and modern Iranian peoples, covering practically all the major ones: the Medes, the Persians, the Parthians, the Phrygians, the Khivs, the Dards (Pisacas), the Baluchis and the Pakhtoons. These peoples are today found stretched out westwards from Kashmir right up to Asia Minor:
Dr.S.R.Rao, the well-known archaeologist, has provided a valuable Foreword which powerfully reinforces Telageri's case on the strength of archaeological evidence. Dr.Rao himself is a linguist of no mean achievement. Indeed, he has deciphered the script of the Indus Valley seals. This has begun to win wide, though not yet universal, recognition among scholars. Though the non-discovery so far a bilingual seal remains a handicap, Dr.Rao's work is convincing in that it links the seals with a concrete (Vedic) culture, while others have speculated about a Dravidian culture which they have not defined.
Notes And References
   Â
  1. Srikant G. Telageri, Aryan Invasion Theory and Indian Nationalism, Voice of India, New Delhi, 1993.
   Â
  2. David Frawley,Gods, Saages and Kings:Vedic Secrets of Ancient civilization, Indian edn. Motilal Banarssidass, New Delhi.
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->