A South Asian race?
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1/14/07
Anil
A South Asian race?
Introduction
This is fundamentally an anthropological question, but one with profound implications for the beginnings of Indian history.
Ironically, it was scholars like Max Mueller - who had absolutely nothing to do with any form of science and who probably implicitly believed in the Biblical legend of the Tower of Babel for the origin of languages (the Theory of Evolution wasn't even proposed at that time!) - who proposed that the Vedic Aryans were one branch of people from the Caucasus region, who radiated out into all regions which came to speak an Indo-European language (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indo-European_family) and acquired an Indo-European culture (with features such as fire-rituals, which were historically practised in several regions of the Indo-European crescent).
Specifically for India, it was theorised that these invading / immigrating people of Caucasians displaced / subjugated the "native" Dravidians and tribal groups, inevitably mingling with them to some extent over the millennia, although this was greatly limited by inventing the insulating caste system. The basis for this simplistic theory was the striking similarities in languages like Sanskrit, Greek and Latin; the arguments used in constructing the theory were extremely far-fetched interpretations of a couple of Vedic verses; and the proof was the relative fair complexion of North Indians compared to the South Indians (supposedly even of South Indian upper castes compared to the "lower castes"), and the fact that the languages of North and South India could be neatly classified into two different families of languages.
1/14/07
Anil
Soon, by force of repitition, this became accepted historical theory and nobody ever asked if there was any forensic evidence for such an Aryan migration into India. But it must be said that there were scholars who rubbished it as soon as it was proposed, as completely absurd and altogether without any basis. For instance, MS Elphinstone (History of India, 1841) wrote:
"It is opposed to their (Hindus') foreign origin, that neither in the Code (of Manu) nor, I believe, in the Vedas, nor in any book that is certainly older than the code, is there any allusion to a prior residence or to a knowledge of more than the name of any country out of India. Even mythology goes no further than the Himalayan chain, in which is fixed the habitation of the gods...
"...To say that it spread from a central point is an unwarranted assumption, and even to analogy; for, emigration and civilization have not spread in a circle, but from east to west. Where, also, could the central point be, from which a language could spread over India, Greece, and Italy and yet leave Chaldea, Syria and Arabia untouched?
"...There is no reason whatever for thinking that the Hindus ever inhabitated any country but their present one, and as little for denying that they may have done so before the earliest trace of their records or tradition."
This is a point Swami Vivekananda stresses too, and, through his classic dark-skinned Bengal Brahmins vs fair-skinned lower-caste communities of Punjab argument, shows the meaningless superficiality of exceedingly simplistic, sweeping generalisations that North Indians are upper-caste South Indians are more fair complexioned than the majority of the "lower-caste" South Indians.
1/14/07
Anil
Why this theory holds sway
The British also had an ulterior motive in propagating a multi-racial theory that small numbers of foreigners superimposed themselves upon vastly larger numbers of "dark-skinned native aborigines" - if that was anyway the case, any form of opposition to British rule in India was quite meaningless!
http://www.voi.org/books/ait/ch11.htm
If pervasive Euro-centrism made a completely baseless theory mainstream, then the perversion of Nehruvian / Marxist historians has kept it alive in our textbooks: if you cannot accept that your culture may actually have had a foreign stimulus, you are an intellectual coward who cannot come to terms with the truth; and if you try to construct a theory of complete indigeneous origin, you are a closed-minded, empty-headed jingoist bent on "distorting" history to suit your convenience! This strategy of painting anyone opposed to them in a saffron brush has been remarkably successful.
It is a huge scandal that this theory has come to be regarded as an accepted view without ever been questioned in a strictly scientific light - which is, in fact, the only way of establishing its validity.
1/14/07
Anil
What anthropology says
I will limit myself to suggesting the following link, and quoting here a few sailent points mentioned on that page:
http://www.voi.org/books/ait/ch49.htm
"...If Vedic Aryans were a biological entity represented by the skeletons from Timargarha, then their biological features of cranial and dental anatomy were not distinct to a marked degree from what we encountered in the ancient Harappans.
"...the anthropological continuity between the Harappan population and that of the contemporaneous Gandhara (eastern Afghanistan) culture, which in an Aryan invasion scenario should be the Indo-Aryan settlement just prior to the Aryan invasion of India...
"...English anthropologists contended that the upper castes of India belonged to the Caucasian race and the rest drew their origin from Australoid types. The survey has revealed this to be a myth. âBiologically and linguistically, we are very mixedâ...the people of India have more genes in common, and also share a large number of morphological traits. âThere is much greater homogenization in terms of morphological and genetic traits at the regional levelâ...For example, the Brahmins of Tamil Nadu (esp. Iyengars) share more traits with non-Brahmins in the state than with fellow Brahmins in western or northern India...Internal migration accounts for much of Indiaâs complex ethnic landscape, while there is no evidence of a separate or foreign origin for the upper castes.
"...scientists...reject the identification of caste (varNa) with race on physical-anthropological grounds...
"...significant regional differences within a caste and a closer resemblance between castes of different varnas within a region than between sub-populations of the caste from different regions...
"...A more detailed study among eight Brahmin castes in Maharashtra...showed that 3 Brahmin castes were closer to non-Brahmin castes than [to the] other Brahmin castes."
1/14/07
Anil
Genetic evidence
The most conclusive refutation of the putative "foreigner Aryan" -"native Dravidian" racial divide is provided by DNA analysis. Only last year, using Y-chromosomal analysis, a team of scientists came up with some dramatic findings
Note: Y-chromosomal analysis is particularly suited for assessing if a migration from Central / West Asia (as is supposed by the Aryan Invasion / Immigration Theory) as Y-chromosomes are passed only along the direct male line and can, therefore, be used to trace paternal lineage. This contrasts with mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), which is transmitted through females. Now, in case of an invasion, it is probable that more males came at first, and the females followed - so "Aryan" genes could have been lost if the early Aryan males married "non-Aryan" females, and the "Aryan" females arriving later married the males produced by the union of "Aryan" males and "non-Aryan" females.
The paper I am referring to is Sahoo S et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA 2006, Volume 103, pp 843-848.
The paper says:
"...The Y-chromosomal data consistently suggest a largely South Asian origin for Indian caste communities and therefore argue against any major influx, from regions north and west of India, of people associated either with the development of agriculture or the spread of the Indo-Aryan language family...
"It is not necessary...to look beyond South Asia for the origins of the paternal heritage of the majority of Indians at the time of the onset of settled agriculture. The perennial concept of people, language, and agriculture arriving to India together through the northwest corridor does not hold up to close scrutiny..."
1/14/07
Anil
The detailed arguments
"Both IE- (ie Indo-European, eg Hindi) and DR- (ie Dravidian, eg Tamil - paranthesis mine, for explanation only) speaking populations show a high combined frequency of haplogroups C*, L1, H1, and R2. The total frequency of these four haplogroups outside of India is marginally low. In turn, haplogroups E, I, G, J*, and R1* have a combined frequency of 53% in the Near East among the Turks and 24% in Central Asia, but they are rare or absent in India...Similarly, haplogroups C3, D, N, and O specific to Central Asian (36%) and Southeast Asian populations (subclades of haplogroup O; 85%) are virtually absent in India...
"...Southern castes and tribals are very similar to each other in their Y-chromosomal haplogroup compositions, and that their gene pool is significantly related to the castes of Northwest India...In contrast, the potential contribution from Central Asia to the Indian Y-chromosomal pool is minor. In the case of Northwest India, there is nothing to choose between two opposing scenarios: (i) the flow of Y chromosomes from Central Asia, and (ii) the flow of Y chromosomes in the opposite direction, to Central Asia from Northwest India. Meanwhile, the West Asian contribution to the Indian Y-chromosomal pool was significantly smaller in all three admixture tests."
For those who may be interested, the paper is available here (wait for a few minutes for the PDF file to get downloaded and, if that that doesn't happen, download it manually by clicking on the given link):
http://www.pnas.org/cgi/reprint/103/4/843?...ourcetype=HWCIT
Helpful information:
What are Y chromosomes? -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y_chromosomes
What are haplogroups? -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup
1/14/07
Ranajeet
Scanned pages from works by Max Mueller and other westerners
http://www.sabha.info/research/aif.html
1/16/07
Chiron !!!!
Anil
Are you Sure that Males come first to Invade and after successful Conquest, females follow??
They were never Planned Invasions in Ancient times. In Ancient History Of India, there are only 2 planned Invasions documented..
First is that of Kaal-Yavan mentioned in Mahabharata
Second is that of Alexander.
All of the remaining Invasions were in fact Gory Migrations. Scythians, Kushans, Huns, all were entire Races and Huge tribes who were migrating in search of Greener pasteurs.
Hence even Females accompanied Men, as it was not a Guided tour. It was the journey.
Although I disapprove Aryan Invasion theory, I see this fallacy in your argument.
1/16/07
aritra ja kichu
i may be a fool, but i do not get the points of ambareesh and ranajeet. it does not matter whether the information is from a specific page or not. this is a forum for discussing issues. and aniljee has raised an important question. i had read about the y-chromosomal analysis, but unfortunately could not get the details. thanks to aniljee for the information.
1/16/07
Anil
@ Ambareesh
I only meant that Y-chromosomal analysis is more clinching evidence than mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) analysis. If it so happened that the males came before the females (which is a very probable scenario in an invasion), then the mitochondrial DNA - which is transmitted through the female line - could have been lost. That fear doesn't exist for Y chromosomes, which are transmitted through direct male lineage.
MtDNA analysis has already nullified any Aryan "invasion" or "immigration" (Kivisild T et al. Current Biology 1999, Vol 9, pp 1331-1334), but this theoretical possibility of the males preceding the females in an invasion obviously came in the way of accepting its results as final.
The paper says:
"About a fifth of the human gene pool belongs largely either to Indo-European or Dravidic speaking people inhabiting the Indian peninsula. The âCaucasoid shareâ in their gene pool is thought to be related predominantly to the Indo-European speakers. A commonly held hypothesis, albeit not the only one, suggests a massive Indo-Aryan invasion to India some 4,000 years ago. Recent limited analysis of maternally inherited mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) of Indian populations has been interpreted as supporting this concept. Here, this interpretation is questioned. We found an extensive deep late Pleistocene genetic link between contemporary Europeans and Indians, provided by the mtDNA haplogroup U, which encompasses roughly a fifth of mtDNA lineages of both populations. Our estimate for this split is close to the suggested time for the peopling of Asia and the first expansion of anatomically modern humans in Eurasia and likely pre-dates their spread to Europe. Only a small fraction of the âCaucasoid-specificâ mtDNA lineages found in Indian populations can be ascribed to a relatively recent admixture."
In other words, some genetic commonality exists between some Indians and Caucasians, but that is from a very ancient (tens of millennia ago) migration. More on that soon.
A South Asian race?
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1/16/07
Anil
The Kivisild et al. paper is available here (a PDF version can be downloaded from the link on the right side of this page):
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=A...1a75443d1e8c68d
1/17/07
SAN
We have been hearing for a quite some time that this theory is wrong that theory is wrong.
So what is the truth?? Which is the correct theory??
Somebody should come out cearly,without giving reference to old theories about the correct theory of the origin of South Asian Race.
Rest other discussions are repeat of what has been said already.
1/17/07
Anil
@ San
I trust the answer to your question will emerge in the next few posts I'm preparing.
1/17/07
Anil
@ Ambareesh
At any rate, I think it is incorrect to compare the Aryan "invasion" with later invasions, as they have a major, basic difference: the former must've been massive (large enough to have left an unmistakable genetic imprint - indeed, introduce a completely new population into the subcontinent); later ones, even ones as major as the Muslim ones, didn't leave any noticeable genetic imprint.
For that reason, it is reasonable to expect that the Aryan "invasion" would have occurred over several decades and so, one would have to be prepared for the fact that the first wave was predominantly males, so the mtDNA (transmitted through females) could have been lost - that question can only be put to rest by Y-chromosomal analysis.
1/17/07
Chiron !!!!
Anil
Of course, I agree with the data and the hypothesis that you are proposing.
The Only thing that I found intriguing was the Males First Assumption of your post.
Other than this one, The hypothesis is just fine and consistent with Genetic Principles.
The Aryan Invasion was more of a Migration. The point is, Be it Caucasian, OR negroid, OR Mongoloid, everybody is descended from African Homo sapiens ancestor.
So there has to be a point when People Migrated to Subcontinent.
And that Migration was in search of resources.
The so called Aryan race must have displaced the race that migrated to this region before them. And you are true that this migration and displacement must have happened many millenia ago, and hence can be ignored to simplify the problem and decrease the variables involved in the anomaly.
For that reason, it is reasonable to expect that the Aryan "invasion" would have occurred over several decades and so, one would have to be prepared for the fact that the first wave was predominantly males, so the mtDNA (transmitted through females) could have been lost - that question can only be put to rest by Y-chromosomal analysis.
My objection was only to the above assumption. It is based upon the migrational pattern of pastoral and/or Hunter-Gatherer and/or nomadic communities.
Given the primitive times, and time required for migration, males-first assumption misses something.
For the sake of simplicity if we assume that the so called Aryan Race was somewhat similar to Scythians OR Huns in their migration pattern, then we see that they simply moved into the next area for resources, and met the opposition by force.
For your assumption to be correct, the gap between first Male-Wave of invasion and second community wave of migration, along with the absence of mtDNA anomalies, the gap between these two waves must be of atleast a century. More but definately not less. Given the low life expectancy, 100 years means atleast 3-4 generations.
1/17/07
Chiron !!!!
Of course, I am eagerly waiting for your next posts. These doubts of mine were a bit early. The line of thought you have introduced is interesting.
Just that I thought this point is a discrepancy in the theory you are proposing.
The nomadic tribes never migrate with males 'scouting' ahead 100 years before the community actually deciding to move on. They always moved as a single unit. Men, Women, Children, beasts, everybody. And the gradually displace their predecessors OR themselves get displaced OR assimilated.
And they Displace OR get displaced OR get assimilated as a Single unit.
1/17/07
Anil
@ Ambareesh
the Males First Assumption of your post...For your assumption to be correct, the gap between first Male-Wave of invasion and second community wave of migration, along with the absence of mtDNA anomalies, the gap between these two waves must be of atleast a century. More but definately not less. Given the low life expectancy, 100 years means atleast 3-4 generations...this point is a discrepancy in the theory you are proposing. The nomadic tribes never migrate with males 'scouting' ahead 100 years before the community actually deciding to move on. They always moved as a single unit. Men, Women, Children, beasts, everybody. And the gradually displace their predecessors OR themselves get displaced OR assimilated.And they Displace OR get displaced OR get assimilated as a Single unit
I'm afraid you still don't get my point. Firstly, it is *not* a theory I am proposing. I am only outlining all extreme cases which have necessarily to be taken into account by any analysis of the problem, and citing the scientific evidence which comprehensively negates any AIT/AMT-type migration scenario in the last ten millennia. And the two extreme scenario are
1) mtDNA having got lost, or
2) Y-chromosomes having got lost...
...by admixture of the "entering" population with the "native" population. Of the two, the first is more easy to imagine as there is nothing to indicate the Aryans were an Amazonian tribe!
Why do you think career-geneticists - and many of the authors being common to both papers, too - did not stop with an mtDNA analysis (Kivisild et al - 1999), but went on to do a Y-chromosomal analysis (Sahoo S et al - 2006) also for the same problem?
Scientific rigour demands that the analysis be capable of explaining away any possibility, howsoever improbable.
1/17/07
Anil
@ Ambareesh
The point is, Be it Caucasian, OR negroid, OR Mongoloid, everybody is descended from African Homo sapiens ancestor. So there has to be a point when People Migrated to Subcontinent. And that Migration was in search of resources. The so called Aryan race must have displaced the race that migrated to this region before them. And you are true that this migration and displacement must have happened many millenia ago, and hence can be ignored to simplify the problem and decrease the variables involved in the anomaly
That's a slightly incorrect statement of the problem.
Firstly, it is incorrect to talk of an "Aryan race" - there is absolutely no such implication in the use of the word "Arya" or "Aryan" in any of our literature. This is purely a Western distortion.
Secondly, the Homo sapiens species should not be confused with races.
The peopling of Eurasia by anatomically modern man emerging from Africa around 70,000 years ago as having resulted from resources is something I don't agree with - it was probably purely wandering into any area that was conducive to life. After all, all people in Europe and Asia are believed to have descended from just 600 females - there just weren't that many people to have competed for resources!!!
The so called Aryan race must have displaced the race that migrated to this region before them...this migration and displacement must have happened many millenia ago
Firstly, if you agree it was that long ago, we can't talk of races at that time - differentiation of characteristics peculiar to races, human cultures and languages etc are much more recent phenomena.
Secondly, if you read either of the two papers, you can see that there actually has been NO major influx into the subcontinent ever since it was first peopled by anatomically modern man some 70,000 years ago. What diversity we see in India today is the result of evolution, adaptation to India's bewildering geographic / climactic diversity etc in these 70,000 years.
1/17/07
Azygos
@Ambareesh
Exactly, what i was thinking but could not paraphrase in words which Anil did....If you consider aryan as a race which displaced native Indian races, at some point in time, then there must have been a genetic admixture as evident from the Y chromosomal analysis of Indians and central asian (aryan homeland) people. But because, the evidence points to no such thing, we can safely conclude that DNA evidence is against AIT/AMT theories.
1/18/07
Ranajeet
This is from the indo-euracist forum
It seems that the genetic evidence against AIT/AMT/ATT is piling up to the extent that even Witzel is abandoning it.
`I don't mind if (current) genetics do not show an "Aryan" influx
into India. After all, I have always maintained that the immigrant
*Indo-Aryan speaking* pastoralist group, out of Afghanistan and
Central Asia ( ~~ BMAC area), can have been very small, but that it set off,
a la Ch. Ehret, a cultural wave across NW India and beyond, -- all of
which has little or *no* connection with genes.
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1/18/07
Azygos
# Post queries only when Anilji is finished
I think the initial queries have been answered to the satisfaction of everybody. Other queries can be posted when the entire article has been posted
@everyone
It is important to realize that AMT theory is cause for concern as well.....The difference b/w AMT and AIT is only in degree and not in kind. To refute AMT altogether, i believe we must debunk the astronomical hypothesis put forward by Tilak in his "arctic home of the vedas" which will be dealt separately when we analyze the rig vedic hymns.
Next, some like Rajiv Kocchar, propound theories about zorashtrians going for morals, and Indians for might....i believe, a nasty hypothesis, which Thapar and others seem to find favour with
Finally, i believe we now have enough evidence to conclusive refute any association between IVS people and the dravidians. That will be taken up in the Indus Valley Tradition thread.
1/18/07
Anil
@ Ranajeet
Thanks for mentioning Michael Witzel. His status as an unparalleled Sanskrit scholar notwithstanding, he has overreached himself and strayed deep into historical theory - an area he has absolutely no training in - and has been dishing out some utter rubbish for quite some time now - we'll probably start a separate thread to discuss his theories.
1/19/07
Anil
Background - The Story of Modern Humans
I think it would be apt now to take a step back and look at the larger background of which our question is a part: the story of how modern humans (ie, we!) came to populate the world.
Only in the last two years, evidence of fundamental importance has been pieced together by researchers, which significantly alters the idea we had of how modern man spread all over the world.
Summarising these finds, Ted Goebel writes in the prestigious journal, Science [Vol 315 (12 January 2007), pp 194-196]:
"Current interpretations of the human fossil record indicate that fully modern humans emerged in sub-Saharan Africa by 195,000 years ago. By 35,000 years ago, modern humans thrived at opposite ends of Eurasia, from France to island southeast Asia and even Australia. How they colonized these and other drastically different environments during the intervening 160,000 years is one of the greatest untold stories in the history of humankind.
"...we must know when these populations expanded from Africa into Eurasia. For the past 20 years, many researchers in this field have been under the impression that this event could have occurred as early as 100,000 years ago, but new genetic evidence indicates that the spread out of Africa occurred much more recently, closer to 60,000 to 50,000 years ago.
"...35,000 years ago, modern populations of sub-Saharan Africa and Europe shared a very recent common ancestor, one that likely expanded from east Africa 60,000 years ago. This population not only spread south into South Africa but also east into Eurasia...
"Archaeological evidence of the hypothesized passage across the Red Sea still eludes us, but the fossil and archaeological records for southeast Asia and Australia indicate that moderns had arrived in these regions by 50,000 years ago. The road east likely followed the south Asian coastal margin...
(contd.)
1/19/07
Anil
"...genetic records suggest that sets of genes, called haplotypes, carried by the first moderns into northern Eurasia existed by 45,000 years ago. Precisely where they evolved remains unknown; possibilities include southern Arabia, India, or other regions of interior western Asia. In any case, the outcome was a series of concomitant founding migrations about 40,000 years ago from western Asia to the Mediterranean, temperate Europe, Russia, and central Asia.
"...The first moderns to colonize European Russia may not have spread from the Levant (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Levant - paranthesis mine) via central Europe, but instead from interior western Asia via the Caucasus Mountains or from further east central Asia...
"So what we infer is this: Modern humans spread out of Africa very late in the Pleistocene--as recently as 60,000 to 50,000 years ago. One founding population spread east, reaching Australia by 50,000 to 45,000 years ago. Another remained in southwestern Asia or India, but after ~5000 to 10,000 years, its descendant populations dramatically expanded their range, colonizing lands as far removed from one another as northern Africa, temperate Europe, and the Russian Plain. They also reached southern Siberia by 45,000 years ago and arctic Siberia by 30,000 years ago, but the retelling of these and other events in the missing years of modern human evolution must await new fossil and archaeological discoveries as well as continued DNA sampling of the world's living populations."
1/19/07
Anil
^^^^^
I will draw the attention of readers to the underlined portions of the previous post, especially the last line.
It must now be clear to you that Russians and Europeans (ie, Caucasians) are themselves descended around 40,000 years ago from a branch of the people who had already settled down somewhere in Asia - where exactly is not known and, as the article says, India is also a possible candidate.
Next, I draw your attention back to the following line in the first paper I mentioned (Sahoo S et al, PNAS 2006):
"The sharing of some Y-chromosomal haplogroups between Indian and Central Asian populations is most parsimoniously explained by a deep, common ancestry between the two regions, with diffusion of some Indian-specific lineages northward."
Population geneticists frequently use a parameter called genetic distance (denoted by Fst), which gives an idea of the extent of dissimilarity between genetic samples from two different sources (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_distance). For the staggering amount of data that analyses like this problem involve, Fst is calculated by computers. Some earlier genetic analysis papers had similarly calculated genetic distances and found that Indian caste communities were about as genetically distant from Indian tribes as they (ie, Indian castes) are from Central Asian populations. A genetic distance table is also calculated and provided in this paper (Table 1).
However, the classic mistake the earlier papers made was in lazily leaving the number-crunching job to the computer and not looking deeply at the actual distributions of the haplogroups - this was a little silly, really, as the same computer which calculated the genetic distance could also have mapped the distributions of the haplogroups. And from such a simplistic, overall statistical parameter, they straightaway jumped to the conclusion that an Aryan migration must indeed have taken place!
1/19/07
Anil
However, if they had got down to the messy job of mapping the actual haplogroup compositions, they would easily have realised that there could have been no admixture between the populations of India and Central / West Asia. After all, if there had been an Aryan invasion / migration into India, they would have brought the characteristic, major haplogroups of Central / West Asian populations into India, and these would be observed in the genes of present-day Indians. The truth, as Sahoo et al point out, is that the major, characteristic haplogroups of Central / West Asia are almost entirely absent in India, and vice versa!
To use an analogy from cricket, this is the equivalent of judging that a batsman's is eminently suitable for a certain foreign tour simply on the basis of his overall career average of 50, while failing to take into account the fact that he averages 75 at home and 25 abroad, or that he is quite inconsistent (ie, equal numbers of high scores and ducks).
Hallelujah, geneticists even appeared to "prove" a harebrained theory! As a case study in how an absurd, baseless thing becomes an accepted fact simply by force of repitition, this would be a psychologist's delight!
Luckily, Sahoo et al are wise enough not to shirk the hard job of mapping the haplogroup compositions of the populations, and also analyse if the data is consistent with an admixture that could have been brought about by an Aryan invasion / immigration into India from Central / West Asia within the last ten thousand years. They also make it a point to refer to the earlier papers which concluded that an Aryan invasion / immigration had taken place, and explain the mistake in their interpretation (Bamshad M et al. Genome Research 2001, Vol 11, pp 11-994; Wells RS et al. PNAS 2001, Vol 98, pp 10244-10249; Cordaux R et al. Current Biology 2004, Vol 14, pp 231-235).
1/19/07
Anil
Indians from Caucasians / Caucasians from Indians?
We've been taught for a long time now that Indian upper castes are of the Caucasian stock (having entered the country as "Aryans"), and completely different from "native Dravidians and tribals". Any number of superficial arguments to support this theory: North Indians are fair-complexioned relative to the South Indians, "upper" castes are more fair-complexioned than "lower" castes and tribes especially in the south, Kashmiris look like Greeks, the Chitpavan Brahmins of Maharashtra have fair complexions and light eyes just like the Caucasians...the list is quite long.
However, by combining the results of more than one, independent, comprehensive scientific analyses, what we have is actually a complete reversal of the earlier explanations:
1) Anthropology and genetics altogether rule out any migration of the AIT / AMT-type of populations from Central / West Asia into India anytime in the last ten thousand years;
2) Almost the entire population of India - whether present-day north and south Indians, or castes and tribes - has been native to India since around 50,000 years. The differences between various groups are simply the result of evolution and the development of different physical and cultural characteristics owing to the vastly varied geographic / climactic environments of the subcontinent;
3) This is the most dramatic: it is not that some Indians are derived from "Caucasians" 4,000 years ago; many present-day "Caucasians" are very probably derived from Indians 40,000 years ago.
Of the people from India who migrated into Europe and Russia 40,000 years ago, those best suited to the colder, harsher climate of their newer home - light-complexioned etc - would have survived by natural selection, which explains the relatively uniform physical characteristics of present-day Europeans while Indians retain great diversity.
So, the next time someone flings the usual rot about North vs South, Chitpavans and Kashmiris vs Tamils and Keralites, you know what to tell them!
1/19/07
Jyotirmaya
Hey that was fantastic research.
Anil tell me sincerely, are you a Historian or an archaeologist by any chance? or the study of this subject is just an hobby. If it is a hobby then you are fantastic just dont throw away this hobby away, India and we will loose a good history writer MAN YOU ARE FANTASTIC. my hats off to you.
Take care
1/19/07
Sanket
@Anilji
Sir, thanks for the input. The theory of Max Mueller was based on the assumption that language and race share a intimate relationship. This theory is rubbished today and morever the concept of race is not held to be scientific. The word "Arya" which meant noble has been convulted to mean an invading race.The ATI is probably the most destructive theory in human history and proves from a miral point of view the destructiveness of lies.
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1/20/07
Anil
I'm very grateful to the members for patiently reading through my long-winded posts and recording their appreciation.
1/20/07
Anil
A word of caution
Although I have said above that recent scientific evidence is pointing towards to the fact that, contrary to earlier theories, it is many of the present-day Caucasians who may be derived from some Indian populations who migrated into Europe and Russia around 40,000 years ago, I hasten to caution that it should not be interpreted to mean an Out-of-India Migration as the logical opposite of AIT / AMT. That long ago, I do not think humans would have evolved sufficient cultural characteristics to have developed cultural identities of their own. I use the words Indian and Caucasian merely to denote the present-day geographical location of these populations.
This 40,000 year-old migration, of populations already settled in India into Europe, is merely a very ancient anthropological phenomenon, and a surprising one, as it
a) not only disproves earlier notions that the people migrating out of Africa branched into two groups in the Levant itself - one going westward into Europe and the other eastward into Asia, but
b) also throws up the surprising fact that they moved into Asia, settled down for 5-10,000 years and only then did groups of them start migrating from deep within Asia, in waves into Europe. Why such a thing happened is as of yet unclear.
To put it in a humorous vein, please do not interpret race in a racist way!
1/21/07
Anil
A South Asian race?
We are now left with evaluating if most South Asians actually constitute a race by themselves, like some other populations of the world which have been traditionally accorded the status of races, such as the Negroids, Caucasoids, Mongoloids etc. For almost two centuries, a rational analysis of this problem was bedevilled by prejudiced European theories, but that is being assaulted by the sledge-hammer of genetics.
As I have described above, both mitochondrial DNA (maternal) and Y-chromosomal (paternal) analyses have established that there is no contribution from either the west, north or north-west of India to the gene-pools of Indian populations. There is, however, the often unsaid phenomenon of admixture with Sino-Tibetian populations in the North-East - and this is actually quite visible.
Now, a group of American medical researchers came up with some startling results which are of relevance to us, although they were studying quite something else - plotting genetic variation among Indians to provide a backdrop for genetic diseases. Admittedly, they sampled Indian-born people who were living in the USA, but that does not in any way reduce the significance of their results as the sampled individuals represented most language communities in India, and were spread over the entire spectrum of caste-designations.
The study I am referring to is: Rosenberg NA et al., "Levels of Genetic Divergence across Geographically and Linguistically Diverse Populations from India," Public Library of Science Genetics 2006, Vol 2, pp 2052-2061:
http://genetics.plosjournals.org/perlserv/...pgen.0020215#s3
(the PDF version can be downloaded by clicking on the link on the right side of the above page).
A more pop-sci version of the above is at:
http://content.msn.co.in/Lifestyle/Moreonl...206_451.htm#top
1/21/07
Anil
And what are their results?
"We find that populations from India, and populations from South Asia more generally, constitute one of the major human subgroups with increased similarity of genetic ancestry. However, only a relatively small amount of genetic differentiation exists among the Indian populations...many genetic variants are distinctive in India...
"The noticeable genetic divergence of India from other regions is coupled with low levels of genetic divergence across the subgroups within India (ie, Indians are genetically quite distinct from other populations of the world, but quite close to each other - paranthesis mine)...Considering all populations in India, Europe, and East Asia, microsatellite Fst for India was 0.0049, smaller than the values of 0.0078 for Europe and 0.0110 for East Asia. Similarly, for the indels, India had Fst = 0.0079, whereas Europe and East Asia had Fst = 0.0110 and 0.0190, respectively.
(A quick reminder about genetic distance, Fst:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_Distance)
Populations of Europe are traditionally accepted to belong to the Caucasoid race, and those of East Asia to the Mongoloid. You can see from the genetic distance values here that Indians of widely-varying regional, language and caste backgrounds appear to be genetically closer to each other than people belonging to populations, which have already been accepted as races, are among themselves.
In simple words, although Indians have never been designated as one unique race, an Indian is genetically closer to another Indian than an Englishman is to a Pole (both of whom are accepted to belong to the Caucasoid race), or a Japanese is to a Chinese (both of whom are accepted to belong to the Mongoloid race).
1/21/07
Anil
Conclusion
The implication is clear: the earlier ridiculous theories based on superficial considerations like skin, hair or eye colour have to be debunked; South Asians are a unique race by themselves, and one of the largest ones at that, comprising around a sixth of mankind.
1/21/07
Anil
Important Note
The purpose of these posts is merely to contradict earlier, baseless and prejudiced theories about the origins of India, which were first maliciously used by Europeans to perpetuate their rule in India by making them appear as only the latest in an endless list of foreigners to colonise the land and make it their own, and are now being wickedly taught to successive generations of our schoolchildren by the intellectually perverse Marxist / Nehruvian historians - who have never shown the sincerity to update our history textbooks in the light of the dramatic, unambiguous evidence that has emerged in the last few decades outright contradicting their pet theories.
The idea was to bring out a cold, scientific truth that South Asians are a race unto themselves - if populations like the Negroid, Caucasoid and Mongoloid can be technically termed as races - and that it wasn't Caucasians who migrated into India 4,000 years ago but some people settled in what is today India who migrated into Europe 40,000 years ago giving rise to the so-called "Caucasian race".
The goal was to refute the poisonous theory coined by the Europeans that the caste-system in India is of racial origin - projecting the petty, uncivilised practices they had indulged in throughout their history, onto us (we all know how Hitler used the concept of "Aryan").
So, although it is now clear that South Asians - whether North or South Indians, whether castes or tribes - are one race, let us not misinterpret this scientific fact by making it the basis of any racially exclusivist philosophy in the future. Let there be no Indian Hitlers.
1/21/07
Anil
We were the first, and for a very long time, the only ones to talk of the universal brotherhood of mankind (vasudaiva kutumbakam) and to have an all-embracing philosophy (ekam satvipra bahudha vadanti). Let's not reverse this glorious heritage now.
Also, let us eschew hypocrisy and admit that the caste-system, although not a form of racial discrimination as we are made to believe, and is only a social institution, is bad enough; let us work against it.
1/21/07
Anil
Harshal's question
Harshal asks:
"The favourite topic nowadays is to find the genetic or racial origin of the inhabitants of Indiawhether they are Caucasian or ethnic Asians etc. Andaman & Nicobar Islands a part of India houses a stone age population of Negroid origin. Can any Hypothesis be put how did they reach their? or can they be traced back to the earlier migration of Human race before the continents Seperated. I would like to see what migration theory is applied here."
The inhabitants of Andaman and Nicobar Islands are anatomically modern humans, who could have reached there only within the last 50-60,000 years, not earlier. The broad efflux of modern man from Africa I have already described above. I don't think science agrees that they originated when the continents were still joined together, which was several millions of years ago.
To my mind, it is not how they got there - after all, they are not the only ones; you have the Australian and Tasmanian aborigines too (and they too are classified as Negroid); What I think is remarkable is that they lived all this while in complete isolation, living as primitive lives as our ancestors did tens of thousands of years ago, right up to the present day. The historian Will Durant uses a beautiful expression to describe such aborigines: "our contemporaneous ancestors".
Populations which were in touch with those settled in other regions, which migrated around, mixed with populations of other regions etc evolved varied physical (ie, skin, hair or eye colour etc) and cultural characteristics, and achieved development, to reach where we are today.
Even in continental regions, we do find tribes with primitive hunting-gathering lifestyles, don't we? You may be surprised to know that there are several such tribes all over Siberia - although they are Caucasian (white), they are about on the same plane as some tribes in the forests of Madhya Pradesh, who were "discovered" only in the twentieth century! Their skin colour is merely the result of natural selection.
1/24/07
harshal
What leads me to an agreement with your Hypothesis is that. I agree Continents seperated Millions of years ago and Modern Human history is around fifty to Sixty thousand years old.Yes it may be possible that they developed like that in isolation and got the physical charecteristics in accordance with the Geographical and climatic conditions.
1/24/07
Nikhil
anil,
I found this interesting website where the author has point wise tried to give supporting evidence for AIT. When one looks at it it seems that many of the verses from RV quoted might have been mis translated or have alternative meanings (eg. Indra destroyed the dams...which could also be related to a persons feelings etc.).
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Ithaca/133...t/fall_ind.html
One of the major points missing is that no one takes into account the drying up of the sarasvati river and the fact that so many IVC sites are found along it.
your views please.
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1/24/07
Unnamed
>>Indra destroyed the dams...<<
Eh? Indra destroys 99 fortresses to get to vrtra, who steals the waters.
It seems he's one of those saivite-dravidian fanatics..
Although I'm not so knowledgeable, this is what I say about his views:
First off, it is to be understood he's relying on an outdated work in the days of british bigotry by stuart piggott.
1. According to his claim, the same place was destroyed time over time; the harappans were foolish enough to construct at the same place, the aryans were revisiting the harappan sites and not annihilate them completely for mysterious reasons. It can also be a site of cremation, or a pottery zone..
2. A valid point, although his quotation doesn't speak of 'skulls'. Grouping of skeletons may also mean a plaque, for mass cremation is often performed at such instances.
3. The third evidence is not valid, considering the fact that hittites have nothing to do with fishing, but harappans have more to do with it. considering this important point, it depends upon how much we can accept suggestions by piggott. It is well accounted for now, that trade was well developed between indus and other civilisations. On the other hand the outdated research didn't account sarasvati in vedas, which puts their origins to 3000 BCE, predating or contemporarial to IVC.
4.Indra's conquest involves him breaking up 99 fortresses to get to vrtra who steals the waters, parching the earth dry. If it is really a conquest, then dravidians were seizing up the waters for themselves and hittites justly revolted back, but then they would be indigenous inhabitants of india. On the other hand it makes tall claims of having built dams, with no evidence at all. There is no area that looks like a dam either, and it would definitely have resisted the weather for centuries when the great bath and citadel have themselves resisted it.
5. Horse fossils have been found in early times of IVC as well.
6. Later archaeological findings contradict his statements that there is no continuity in bones
1/24/07
Unnamed
=>The claims of dravidians having been broad nosed, etc.. comes from only one hymn about vrtra (i think), which calls him anaasa(noseless) and apaada(feetless!)
As for the 'scriptural references' -
1. If i'm not mistaken, its the popular habit of occidentals translating varna as colour, when it means vocation
2. Krishna is a honorable title, historically preceding birth of krishna-govinda as well.
3. The references seem to stick to eight fold one, so I cannot comment much about them. However, one thing I know well is that rakshasa - is name of god in veda, meaning 'protector'.
The rest of it is absurd where he keeps making his own fantastical assumptions..
1/24/07
Azygos
@nikhil
That site is another of those several anti hindu propaganda sites......I cannot get into a detailed rebuttal over such a pathetically perverse article; however, i will draw your attentions to some of the points, which are the trademark shibboleths of nehruvian/eurocentrist/marxist and pakistani historians.....
# Examine the references at the bottom. You can clearly find that all of them are over two decades old. Latest scientific methods utilised by Kenoyer and Dani [harappa.com] have already debunked any archaeological evidence supporting AIT....I am sure Anil will enlighten everyone in his Indus Valley Tradition thread.
# The horse evidence holds no water.
http://www.svabhinava.org/AITvsOIT/HorsesI...yList-frame.php
I found this reply interesting...posting an excerpt
I think it is relevant to note that just as horses were central to the Vedic Indians they have always been central in Indian history, but *they have always been imported into the subcontinent* from the Epic, Mauryan, Mughal through to the British period. So the horse has always been highly prized despite not being indigenous to the subcontinent (although there is an indigenous species of onager native in the Northwest).
So the non-indigenousness of the horse need not a priori indicate the non-indigenousness of the Indo-Aryans. It was an elite, imported animal used for sacrificial and military purposes (not for food) and therefore not likely to show up in great quantities in the archaeological record.
# the chariot evidence
THere is enough counterevidence....moreover how does vedic Rath become a four wheeled chariot! Moreover, K D Sethna has shown that IVC could have had chariots. Finally, if horse is important to the rig vedic people, so is the cow.......Horse was important to other civilizations too like Greece but not the cow.....I do not understand why DONT anti AIT/AMT proponents use the cow face especially because horse lost all religious significance in puranic ages.
1/24/07
Azygos
As expected, while glossing through the messages, Witzel expectedly disdainfully brushes off any idea of rig vedic people venerating the cow.....Yet, only the cow is given the status of agnya or that which is not to be killed. And even more noticable is that the puranas dont attest any importance to the horse [I dont think horse is the vahana/mount of any god/goddess either, not even Indra of the puranas! This point can be used to negate those who claim that aryans had a dominant influence on Hindu theology...substance for another article, i will work on in the coming months]
However, one must note that out of India proponents have suggested that India was actually the first nation to domesticate the horse......but again, it is the ridiculous 1200 B.C dating of the rig veda which is the prime obstacle; because by 1200 B.C several civilizations had domesticated the horse.
# I would request some members to meticulously go through the particular message board and examine the evidence both for and against AIT....it is serious top quality research work!
# Vishnu being aryan god and shiva as dravidian god arguments are not even worth considering! Even if i ignore the shiva as rudra proposition, Vishnu is definitely not the most prominent deity of the rig vedic pantheon [even Witzel will testify for that] Secondly, the vedas as well as puranas are conspicuously devoid of any shiva Vs Vishnu battles for supremacy.....The most minimal disparaging statement may be made against each other like in the sage Brhgu episode, but certainly no counterpart to the epic Krishna Vs Indra battles as in Bhagavatam
Finally, i will once again, point out the absolutely ludicrous nature of the vritta = dam argument. Vritta can be an obstacle, but certainly it is no dam. One of the vedic verses proclaims Indra drinks Soma and destroys Vritta.
1/24/07
Azygos
Vritta cannot be a dam
One of the rig vedic verses [Indra drinks Soma and destroys Vritta]
# Vritta can be translated as obstacle. But here the primary meaning is to be taken as Ignorance. Hence, there is an obstacle and that is ignorance. [Vritta in sanskrit also stands for envelope of darkness....and the strong association of darkness with ignorance, as pointed out in several upanishad....e.g. The light of the effulgent brahman dispels the ignorant darkness (caused by maya) Sun, hence is often taken to the symbol of brahman....
Thus, it is Indra [Sri Aurobindo says Indra is the lord and controller of the senses....So Indra, destroys the darkness ; the ignorance caused by Vritta...and How; with the aid of Soma (externally alcohol but spiritually it is the lord of the divine bliss/ecstacy]....thus, the One (aspirant) who manifests the powers of Indra, thereby controlling his senses causes Soma to descent and manifest its power of divine bliss; which flushes the last bit of ignorance towering over man and smashes to smithereens all doubting dogmas inherent to the mind....
Now, vritta also stands for a serpent...thus, in puranic stories [seeking references] you will find Krishna destroying the serpent of ignorance.....
Amazingly, in the garden of Eden, it is the serpent who tempts Eve into attaining the apple (of desire). And who else is the serpent, but the inherent ignorance in the heart of humanity. And it it desire that fuels the fires of ignorance. Thereby, serpent as ignorance can possibly be considered either as a jungian archetype for spiritual ignorance.
THus, we can safely conclude that vritta could never have been a dam.
1/24/07
Azygos
An important point which i missed out; Krishna is always pictured as dark skinned, and Shiva, the god of the dark dravidians is always white skinned......A paradox in itself.
Varna has several connotations....even if hypothetically i accept it as colour; then how do you accommodate the red haired ksatriyas, the blue eyed vaishyas <!--emo&
--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif' /><!--endemo--> and why the complete absence of intervening brown shades?
#Btw, we must all thank Anil for his splendid contribution in this thread.....This article is exclusive to IHP. The DNA evidence is the definitive proof against Aryan Invasion theory.....However, proponents of Aryan Migration theory will still claim that a very small number of aryans had a tremendous influence on Indian culture, both secular and sacred....
1/25/07
Anil
@ Nikhil
I don't think we need take that article seriously - it is too vicious and intemperate to be given the respect of a dispassionate, scholarly study.
At any rate, modern archaeologists since the mid-1980s onwards have been *completely dismissive* of the notion of an Aryan invasion / migration.
1/26/07
Ekam
nice thread guys.
anil, great work on the summary.
reg one issue that u were locking horns with ambreesh:
the reason of choice of Y over mtDNA could also be this- earlier invasions usually ended up with acquisition of females of the invaded race. those societies being patriarchial ones, we wouldn't know the origins based on mtDNA. In cases like these, use of Y over mtDNA is preferred. hope this helps.
k
1/27/07
Unnamed
Um, it is best to keep the views of mystics aside, because they tend to superfluous and therefore not commendable; such as the suggestion that battle of indra with vrtra needs to have a gnostic meaning [gnostic again implies esoteric, and such ideas have to be kept aside]. We can however suggest that vrtra is a serpent due to instinctive fear towards it, and I totally agree with views of dayananda and aurobindo that vedic sanskrit was more subjective, giving greater opportunity for such meanings.
Gnostic conclusions aside, it is not sensible to say that 99 fortresses were destroyed to blow a dam up...
1/27/07
Anil
Thanks for the clarification, Karthikeyan. That's the whole idea of this community: to pool together the specialised expertise of various members in an attempt to re-investigate Indian history. Otherwise, amateurs like me may not be able to get very far...
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1/27/07
.ZangetsU.
@anil
So what does a race mean?
I guess it would have atleast a few Y-haplogroups distinct from otheres?
And btw, great work ,
"MAN THATS GOOD TO HEAR"
"WE ARE A DIFFRENT RACE"
1/27/07
Anil
@ Darth
Good question.
We could work with the definition of race as a genetic branch of a species, or a sub-species.
Given the way this term has been used (especially by the Europeans) up to the 1940s - traces of which linger noticeably to this day - some scholars (mostly social "scientists") have rejected the very use of the term race. But it could be meaningful and useful to work with a genetic definition of race.
You can see how the definition of race has evolved, starting from superficial classification on the basis of skin-colour etc a couple of centuries ago, to a more scientific one based on genetics, here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race
Also, I would like to slightly qualify your exultation that we are a distinct race unto ourselves. I repeat my cautionary words: let's not use this fact to fuel racially exclusivist / supremacist theories! What I am more pleased about is that we have evidence to conclusively disprove the poisonous "Aryan-Dravidian" or "caste communities-tribals" divide which was used to undermine our unity, perpetuate a disparaging picture of our culture, and enable foreign rule in our country; sadly, our onw historians with Marxist / Nehruvian leanings stupidly continue with this falsehood.
More importantly, it will ultimately help push back the dates for the beginnings of Indian civilisation by several millennia than what is currently taught in our textbooks.
1/27/07
Chiron !!!!
Vritra Translates as Envelope.
1/28/07
.ZangetsU.
@Anil
Yes, I know about that.(the 2500BC date and the flood mentioned in bible on which MUL(ERROR) fixed the date)
2/4/07
Anil
@ Arun
I don't myself know why humans ventured out into the more inhospitable regions like Siberia, once they were settled in warmer areas. It already appears that it may have been the inhospitability which, in the first place, stopped them from migrating into Europe / Russia in the Levant itself, when they first emerged from Africa.
I can only put it down to the inborn exploratory spirit of man, akin to the spirit with which some humans tiptoed across the Bering Straits (which were then passable by foot) "just to see what's on the other side", and arrived in the Americas.
Also, since humans had spent a very long time in Africa (~ 130,000 years!) before ever moving out, I would imagine they had grown sated living in the same environment, and were quite eager to explore - and could do so as they had "developed" (if you see what I mean, ie hunting/gathering methods, clothing etc) to a good extent.
Nor do I think they went out into Europe at once: it was a gradual process, occurring in waves. A fresh batch of people ventured out only when it had trickled in that the previous ones seemed to be doing fine.
Since agriculture etc were only to start much later (last ten millennia, really), the difference between life in the tropical climes and in the colder regions mustn't have been particularly great - it was the same hunting / gathering lifestyle everywhere.
2/4/07
Anil
@ Arun
As for the mediaeval Muslims (ie, Semites) from West Asia, it cannot be said that there is absolutely *no* genetic imprint at all - there surely must be, but it must be confined to communities which anyway trace their ancestry to outside India. There are many families even today which are aware that their ancestors came to India from Turkey, Arabia, Persia or Afghanistan in the Mediaeval times (the last two would, again, not be much different from us genetically) and, sure enough, such communities used to be endogamous.
Way more native people converted to Islam than came to India as invaders, originally.
Besides, the truth is that Islamic society in India too is as much socially stratified as the Hindu one. The Muslim nobles - who were generally from outside India - did not intermarry with native converts, and this situation actually continues to this day. Didn't the last Nizam of Hyderabad marry a Turkish princess?
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2/5/07
Azygos
Check this link
http://www.geocities.com/hinduwoman0/casteism
The asrafs are high caste muslims of India and non asrafs [mentioned even in the controversial Sachar committee report] are the lowest of the rung; the dalits who converted to Islam.
Moreover, at time of partition, majority of the islamic nobility who intermarried must have moved into pakistan. Were any DNa samples taken from the pakistani population...
2/5/07
Bhavna
The Genographic Project
This is a very interesting topic. A few y
