DeDanaan

Comments (38) to “Vedic Origins : Children of Danu”

1. brian brady wrote:

   very interesting site…any outside evidence to support textual claims? paticularly interested in the celtic claims of lineage to spain (milesius) and egypt (nectonibus)…the known pharohs of that name are one thousand years off of the timeline 1700 B.C.? anyone have a comment on this relatively major inconsistency?

   sincerely

   brian a brady
   kamloops, b.c., canada

   Posted on 07-Aug-05 at 5:12 pm | Permalink

2. bev davis wrote:

   The Celts and the Vedics are certainly related as both are descended from the protoIndoeuropeans, but the Celts were already in Spain before the Aryans were in India. It is also interesting to note that the Mittani were the farthest most west of the Aryan speaking group, and that Nefertiti might have been one of them.

   Posted on 10-Oct-05 at 4:43 pm | Permalink

3. tom donnelly mitchell wrote:

   certainly the danavas ancestors were present here in the pacific northwest, before the flood,,(missoula )see my photo#010.the crone in cartoon like profile ,a larger face,and….this one should be turned…i see proto sandskrit and a lot more…stand back and look…thanks,tom

   Posted on 14-Mar-06 at 1:51 pm | Permalink

4. WaltDe wrote:

   Very good reading. Peace until next time.
   WaltDe

   Posted on 01-Sep-06 at 12:15 pm | Permalink

5. Sharad Sharma wrote:

   My Dear Friend ,
   I am an Indian and consider myself of Aryan origin. I am in partial agreement with u.Indra is son of Aditi & not Danu as u have pointed out. The major differrences between them was of topreserve traditions. Indra wanted to preserve the word of Bramha(vedas) unlike Danvas who wanted otherwise.You have rightly pointed out that Europeans were considered as Danvas . Even now , devote Hindus point them as Asuras (don’t feel hurt) Europeans also term other as uncivilised.There has been fight among devs&danvas. My point is clear when the presence of vedas is cited among Indians (tyhat Indra wanted to preserve traditions). Also Zeus is Knowns as Dhaus( as u have called him Tvstha) the father os Indra.. The Europeans were later called as Yavanas in india . I have always felt that there is some kind of distinction between us &europeans . Your theory has finally endrosed it.
   Kashchap had 13 wives of which many different childrens were produced. Also , manu was not only the sole producer of atleast Indians are concerned . Unlike Europeans , whose myths considers them as children of Zeus &some ofhis sisters,we (read Indians) are childrens of 11 sages excluding Manu . some of them are Angira, Vashisstha,Pulatsya,Kratu,Marichi,Bhrigu(the most graceful of them) There wives has been provided by Brahma(The child of supreme soul ) Hindus consider as there creater.
   I think I have finally given many points .
   I am sorry for if I would have hurt oyur feelings

   Posted on 06-Oct-06 at 2:14 am | Permalink

6. Aine MacDermot wrote:

   You aren’t hurting my feelings, I’m not the original author of this piece, but I did get the permission of the author to post his article here.

   It was written by Dr. David Frawley (Pandit Vamadeva Shastri), American Institute of Vedic Studies
   PO Box 8357, Santa Fe NM 87504-8357
   Ph: 505-983-9385, Fax: 505-982-5807
   http://www.vedanet.com/

   Posted on 06-Oct-06 at 2:21 am | Permalink

7. ayudh.com » Blog Archive » Vedic Origins : Children of Danu wrote:

   […] Dr. David Frawley (Pandit Vamadeva Shastri), American Institute of Vedic Studies PO Box 8357, Santa Fe NM 87504-8357 Ph: 505-983-9385, Fax: 505-982-5807 http://www.vedanet.com/ Source […]

   Posted on 10-Oct-06 at 6:57 pm | Permalink

8. P. K. Garg wrote:

   Interesting article. To me also Persia seems a place where much of proto-Aryan history unfolded. However, how this reconstruction based on literure only can be proved/disproved scientifically is very difficult to say. Faith, particularly of Indians and India-lovers seems to fog truely inquisitive inquiry into such issues.

   Posted on 04-Dec-06 at 10:37 am | Permalink

9. Neville Ramdeholl wrote:

   Vamadeva, Namaste. The theory that the Indus is Aryan , I think is untrue and ridiculous. The main reason I am saying this is that for the following reason: If the Indus possessed horses as so many writers, archaeologists and historians maintain, then why there is no trace of horse trade between the Indus and the other civilizations such as Sumer and Mesopotamian and other countries? There are no documents, or attestation of horse trade between the periods of 3500-2700 BC. There are various written sources of Indian and non-Indian which states that the cities of the Indus has sites of supposedly horse remains and bones. How could the Indus alone possess horses at a time when the other civilizations did not? There has also been detailed written sources of books and Internet articles of trade of other products and natural resources from the Indus to other countries as Sumer, Mesopotamia, Dilmun, Magan and other Arabic countries but these sources fail completely to show any evidence of horse trade among them. Thus, the Indus civilization is not of Aryan origin.

   Posted on 10-Dec-06 at 4:34 pm | Permalink

10. Neville Ramdeholl wrote:

    Will anyone reply to me and prove that the Indus is of Aryan? Can anyone provide the evidence that the Indus is or was Aryan in origin? Readers, historians, archaeologists, writers of the Internet etc, Dinesh Agarwal and others?

    Posted on 09-Jan-07 at 10:02 pm | Permalink

11. Aine MacDermot wrote:

    From Wikipedia:

    Etymology

    Indo-Iranian ar-ya- descends from Proto-Indo-European (PIE) *ar-yo-, a yo-adjective to a root *ar “to assemble skillfully”, present in Greek harma “chariot”, Greek aristos, (as in “aristocracy”), Latin ars “art”, etc. Proto-Indo-Iranian *ar-ta- was a related concept of “properly joined” expressing a religious concept of cosmic order.

    The adjective *aryo- was suggested as ascending to Proto-Indo-European times as the self-designation of the speakers of the Proto-Indo-European language itself. It was suggested that other words such as Éire, the Irish name of Ireland, and Ehre (German for “honour”) were related to it, but these are now widely regarded as untenable, and while *ar-yo- is certainly a well-formed PIE adjective, there is no evidence that it was used as an ethnic self-designation outside the Indo-Iranian branch. In the 1850s Max Müller theorized that the word originated as a denotation of farming populations, since he thought it likely that it was related to the root *arh3, meaning “to plough”. Other 19th century writers, such as Charles Morris, repeated this idea, linking the expansion of PIE speakers to the spread of agriculturalists. Most linguists now consider *arh3 to be unrelated.

    The Old Persian form of *Aryāna- appears as Æryānam Väejāh “Aryan Expanse” in Avestan,[1] in Middle Persian as Ērān, and in Modern Persian as Īrān.[2] Similarly, Northern India was referred to by the tatpurusha Aryavarta “Arya-abode” in ancient times.

    Posted on 09-Jan-07 at 10:08 pm | Permalink

12. Neville Ramdeholl wrote:

    : To: Mr.Shrikant Talageri and others. :
    The idea that the Aryans are an indigenous lot is absurd as the theory that the Indus is Aryan. It is all plain for everyone to see despite the hundreds of books , articles and internet reports, that the Aryans are an intrusive people into India.
    For sometime now I have been reading several articles of the case for and against AIT/AMT versus OIT. Although the Indian historians and certain archaeologists have more or less proven that there was no invasion per se of India, by Indo-Aryans , the fact still remain that India was and still is occupied by the descendants of the Vedic Aryans whose culture and history make up what is India today and including those from the Indus civilization. A detailed reading and study of the various opinions by those historians and archaeologists on this website, especially from India still maintain and doubt that the horse and chariot came from outside the country and who insist that horses and chariots are indigenous to the land. I have perceived that there are three major points which mostly the Indian historians are stubbornly refusing to concede and that is :

    (A) They continue to hang on to the dead theory that the Indus
    civilization is Aryan and indigenous.

    (B) Despite the mountain of official documented and textual
    evidence from various sources eg: Andronovan proven Indo-
    Iranian sites, evidence from the Vedas itself, lack of evidence of
    horses and chariots in ancient India before the advent of the
    Aryans etc, Indian officials and historians still attempt to castigate
    the authors and doubt the veracity of the documented and
    archaeological evidence.

    (C) The clear absence of archaeological and attestation of horse trade
    between the Indus Civilization and its neighbors in the time period
    of supposed finds of horse remains.

    We begin from the beginning by placing the Aryans outside of India rather than being an indigenous people living thousands of years in India as so many Indian scholars believe. It is a fact that the Avesta places a home for the Aryans who sojourned outside India, which they called Airyana Vaejah or Aryan Homeland. The Aryans came through the Northwest of what is now today the state of Pakistan. That old natural pass called the Khyber. This same pass was used by different conquerors to conquer India in later times. This is a northwest route , not an east or west or south route and you can see from the geographical map where the Aryans forded and settled for a time calling it the Saptasindhu of which Five Rivers of the area were Shutudri called the Sutlej, the Vipasha or Vipash now called the Beas, the Parushini now called the Ravi, the Vitasta now called the Jhelum. Two main rivers were added called the Indus or Sindhu and the Sarasvati making it the Seven Rivers. The following points shows why the Aryans are intruders to India.

    a) Despite, the writings and articles of Indian historians, archaeologists and Internet writers, these are the only rivers other than the Ganga and Yamuna mentioned in the Vedas. If the Aryans were indigenous people, why didn’t they mention the Kaveri, the Krishna, the Bhima, the Godavari, the Narmada, the Chambal and the others?

    b) Why didn’t they mention all the other civilizations such as the Indus, and those of Southern India etc?

    c) Some may have noticed that the Vedas descriptions of their life and society only is confined to the northwest of India. There is no mention of areas of Bengal, Tamil Nadu or Maharastra and other areas.

    d) Do the historical departments of India and other such cultural organizations have the names of the original rivers , because these are mostly Rigvedic names. If the Harappans occupied the Indus civilizations for so long, surely they must have names for these rivers.

    This is the only way the Aryans could have come into India and that is through the Khyber Pass between the borders of Afghanistan and Pakistan. If you look closely at the geographical map of the region, the SaptaSindhu area with all the headwaters of the seven rivers draining from the Siwalk and Himalayan mountains , and here is where the Aryans first come into India and Afghanistan with the rivers Kubha, Gomati and Krumu. It formed part of the culture of the Swat region with the rivers Suvastu, Gauri, Kusava and Trstama. The Swat culture is the first settlement or region occupied by the Aryans. If anyone whether it be Talageri or other revisionists who believe that the Aryans migrated out of India or that they were indigenous, is without archaeological foundation. Unlike the AIT theory which has some trace of Aryan intrusion into India, the OIT theory has not a single iota or fragment or sliver of any archaeological attestation of such a venture. In his book, ( The Rigveda, A Historical Analysis. Page 83 Internet Publication) Talageri writes :

    that the evidence of the hymns of the Early Period of the Rigveda, as we have already
    seen locates the Indo-Iranians further east: i.e in the area from (and including) Uttar Pradesh in the east to (and including) the Punjab in the west. It is not , therefore, Central Asia, but India, which is the original area from which the Iranians migrated to their later historical habitats.

    The only thing wrong with the Talageri proposal is that the Iranians and Indo-Aryans had already separated from each other. The Indo-Aryans came into the Swat area thence to the Indus civilization. Most probably it was in Afghanistan that the Iranians branched off from the Indo-Aryans as the Aryans came into the Swat area. There they established their culture, bringing the first horse to India. Make no mistake the Iranians knew about the Seven Rivers area since they mentioned it in their Avesta book. Talager’s book as well as others are now outdated with the new discoveries on the Russian steppes of Central Asia. The archaeological sites of horses, chariots over a vast area are what now archaeologists and historians are now confirming are Indo-Iranians origins and recently the startling discovery on one of these sites of a human figure with a horse’s head as exactly written in the RV reveals one important thing. That it was an incident that occured during the former life and travels of the Aryans on their way to India. Treated as a myth and dismissed by some as such, it revealed the former home and culture of the Aryans and legend had become fact.

    The article written by Brigadier Kaul Rattan Online called (Aryan Sarasvat Brahmin of Kashmir) states the following on the location of the early Aryans in India as they intruded into the subcontinent. He states:

    Bharatvarsha was the ancient name for the geographical area South of the Indus
    (Sindhu) extending from the Northern to Central Bharatvarsha (Hindustan) including.
    geographical limits of Kashmir, East to the Western Sea and bounded on the North
    and South by the Himalaya/ Hindukush/ Sindhu and Vindhya mountains
    respectively.

    Perhaps Talageri would like to explain what the Iranians were doing in India since they were supposed to be on their way to Persia to colonize that country. The earliest hymns reveal that the Aryans were traversing the foothills of the Siwalk and the headwaters of the Seven Rivers. That comes from Book 2 the oldest of the Aryan hymns. It is logical that the oldest hymns which contain the earliest travels of the Aryans is factual and uncontested and that early journey ended in the Swat culture in northwest India. From here at Pirak, was discovered the remains of the first horse and cremation, a custom and innovation never before experienced in India. It is baffling that Indian historians and writers continue to argue for an Aryan Indus when the evidence reveals that the Indus people practiced an Afro-Austric custom of inhumation whilst the new intrusion of a new people reveals the IE rite of cremation.

    The Cemetery H Culture. This culture is the next stage of the continuation occupation of India from which the culture takes its name, area H at Harappa.This culture developed out of the northern part of the Punjab Seven Rivers system and occurs around the last stage of the Late Harappan civilization. or Localisation Era. The revisionists familiar writings of a continuity of civilization and ethnic biological theory is that the Aryans mixed and assimilated with the inhabitants which is expected and thus the skeletons discovered does not necessarily mean that the inhabitants are foreigners. The distinguishing features of this civilization are:

    1) The use of cremation of human remains.

    2) Expansion of settlements into the east.

    3) Rice became the staple diet.

    4) Urn burials which indicated the presence of a new people.

    Here in this northwestern area of the Saptasindhu of India, the new intrusive people called the Aryans founded two cultures the Swat and Cemetery H still hugging the vast riverine system dominated by the Indus and Sarasvati, rivers which they worshipped in the Vedas. The Aryans spent a short sojourn in Afghanistan where they began to compose the Vedas and this is evidenced by the mention of the Kubha and Krumu rivers in the Vedas. Some historians say that there is no archaeological evidence that the Aryans but these rivers do flow into the Indus and left the name of Aryana, the Vedic name they gave to Afghanistan. Some sources believe that Harappan archaeology and Vedic are the same maybe so because the Aryans dominated and ruled the day. There is no such thing as Vedic Harappans. Why? The Harappans are a different people as well as their civilization for theirs are Dravidian in origin and did not practice the cultural rites and customs until it was imposed on them. Harappa was an Indus city built by an indigenous people of India. Historians cannot prove that the city of Harappa owned horses and chariots before the advent of the Aryans. How more foreign can one get?

    Looking at the map of the SaptaSindhu with its riverine system I sometimes wonder why the Aryans chose that area to make their first settlements. Of all the places in India why did the Aryans chose to come here? Why this particular northwestern area? What routes did they follow? Why not any other area of India, say in Bengal or south in Tamil Nadu? Perhaps there are some solid reasons why they did choose this northwestern part of India due to easy access and that one easy access was the Khyber Pass which is the only available pass in the area. The Khyber Pass opens up to the vast plains of the Pontic region which in turn leads to the steppes of the huge Russian grasslands. A glance at the map shows that it is the only logical route from the Sintashta/ Androvono burial sites. How did they hear of the SaptaSindhu with its fertile alluvial valleys and plains? Perhaps by accident they did happen onto the subcontinent or it is possible that these northern tribes heard of the rich empires of the south and came for its booty. Indeed , they came as freebooters. The south with its prosperous empires were attractive targets for these nomads. If the Aryans are an indigenous people , why did they just develop in the northwestern corner of India alone and not in other parts of India? Why are the other tribal peoples of India silent in their chronicles of their presence in their midst? All these considerations only point to their foreign nature and customs which is quite different from those indigenous tribes already living in India. The Aryans most likely came from the Mittani territories which is the general opinion of experts who reject the possibility that they came from the Indian subcontinent. Their association with the horse, fire cult and worship, cremation and the worship and resemblances of gods similar to IE and Greek gods points to an outside migration and not an indigenous one.

    Time and again the readers and followers of revisionist scholars question the presence of the Aryans in India and seem baffled that a nomadic people as they should produce such a brilliant religious doctrine and language. This is nothing new since skeptics of all colors are found in all disciplines and studies of history , the arts and other such academic fields. Well, the Indus people did produce an astonishing civilization far in advance of its time and very modern and exquisitely built in retrospect to its time and people. The Indus people are Stone Age people using more or less primitive stone tools, and yet they produced something of value remarkable for such an age traded, maintained it and also produced or invented writing without attending scholastic classes. Thus, they used their intelligence and wit to match their brilliance, a remarkable achievement for a people still living in the mists of antiquity. They proved that the Age does not matter but the ability to imagine and to comprehend what to do with the tools at hand and those were very primitive tools so to speak.

    Yet the readers and revisionist followers never seem to question the Indus civilization and its achievements but in most Internet articles and publications , they question the Aryans’ ability to produce such religious hymns and near perfect language. These readers can’t believe or don’t want to believe that the Aryans composed and wrote down such beautiful verses for religious purposes in a matter of centuries. So why can’t they? The Indus people used their imagination and resources to build a civilization out of the mists of antiquity. Then, why can’t the Aryans despite being nomads gave India its great religious legacy so too did the Prophet Mohamed gave Arabia , Islam and they were all nomads on the move.

    The Aryans after they entered Afghanistan began to compose the Vedas and from the moment they left Afghanistan , for India they continue to compose the verses of the Vedas. The method they used , they were masters at. They chanted everything from memory led by the Artharvans, the high priests. Chanting the Vedas for thousands of years is the method the Rigvedic Aryans used to preserve their legacy. Yes, for those readers who doubt that the Aryans could not have created such beautiful poetry whilst on the move , that is the method they used. They committed it to memory. They used their ability and natural human recources even though they were nomads just like the nomads coming out of the sands of Arabia. Those Indian doubters should be aware of this since this legacy were passed down to them from their forefathers. The rivers they encountered in India from the headwaters of the mountains they named and having known the Sarasvati in Afghanistan , they gave the Sarasvati its name. As the river began to dry up the name remained in the Vedas simply because it was taboo to change the sacred hymns. And this brings us to the area already dominated by the Aryans. The oldest books of the Vedas which contain the early intrusion of the Aryans contain one natural phenomena which seemed to have bedeviled the Aryans as they struggled to make a living in the Seven Rivers area. And that is the rampaging floods that they wrote so much about India’s raging rivers pumped up by the Monsoons every year are mentioned by the Aryans. Here are a few from Bk 2 alone:

    Book 2 Hymn V11 Verse 3 through streaming water floods.

    X I Verse 2 floods great and many

    XII Verse 12 Seven great floods to flow at pleasure

    XIII Verse 1 rapidly the floods wherein it grows

    XIII Verse 12 Turviti heldest still the flowing floods

    XV Verse 5 the mighty roaring flood he stayed from flowing

    XIX Verse 3 sent forth the flood of waters to the ocean

    XXI Verse 5 from him who speeds the flood

    XXV Verse 3 He, mighty like a raving billowy flood

    XXXV Verse 3 Some floods unite themselves, On every side the bright
    floods have encompassed

    Book 3 Hymn 1 Verse 4 Him , Blessed One, the Seven strong Floods

    LIII Verse 9 … restrained the billowy river etc

    With the above , one can imagine the conditions and wild landscape , huge raging rivers and deep forested jungle and craggy mountains and fertile plains that the Aryans enountered in the land of the Seven Rivers. The constant stream of overflowing rivers and raging tides and flooding the land must have tested the faith of these people. The monsoons of India must have created havoc with the beliefs of the Aryans since these heavy downpours flooded the land and the rivers making them deadly, especially the Indus and the Sarasvati. In parts the Sarasvati must dried up during the years but the monsoons torrential downpours which is phenomenal and extensive surely would have created awe in the world of the Aryans. The Sarasvati’s name was transferred to this great river in India for as the people of the Indus disappeared from history, the newly intrusive Aryans must have applied the name to the river. With the fall and decline of the Indus civilization , the river which probably had a name was unknown to the newly arrived Aryans and so they gave it the name of Sarasvati, which they knew in Afghanistan. I have read somewhere that revisionist Frawley once said that it was not possible that the Aryans could have brought horse and chariots to the northwest of India. Well, they did and the earliest books from 2–7 is full of horses and chariots. The northwest of India also contain fertile which would have accommodate horses and chariots and Frawley’s et al have sought to disinform readers and supporters of the migration theory that the horses and chariots mentioned in the Vedas were symbolic connected with their religion. How come the Aryans of the Tarim basin used chariots and horses to occupy parts of this area surrounded by rugged mountains and built a civilization? But that is another matter. Despite, being troubled by rising flood waters, monsoons, cold weather, the Aryans continue to invoke their most popular god Indra to help them fight off enemies and foul weather. Time and again Indra is called upon to help Aryan prayers to persevere and we divert here for a moment for a chronology of the prehistoric Aryan origin. The ridiculous Frawley et al theory of an indigenous Indus Aryan civilization does not have any foundation whatsoever. Lets begin with the Vedas and the Avesta. Vedas means Vedic Hymns so too do the Zend Avesta. which implies or stipulates that the Indo-Aryans and the Iranians were one people living somewhere before in an ancient homeland. This suggests :

    a) They are new nomadic tribes to the subcontinent.

    b) The lifestyles of the Vedas and the Avesta are the same

    c) They shared the same language, customs, rites, etc.

    d) They used the same technology such as horses and chariots, which was
    unknown at that time in the region.

    e) They worshipped the same gods and both religions were alike in their
    formative stages.

    f) They belong to the same IE family of languages and ethnicity etc.

    g) Scanning the pages of the Vedas and Avesta in detail exposes the fact that
    the people does not have any knowledge of a vast subcontinent.

    h) Their immediate geography is limited to certain areas and there is no
    knowledge of other parts of India in that earliest period.

    i) The presence of names of areas and rivers in Afghanistan reveals that they
    knew the geography of the country and is the only other country they knew.

    j) Whereas, the Indus people knew of other countries such as Sumer,
    Mesopotamia, Dilmun, Magan, and some Arabian countries.

    k) There is not mention or knowledge of the above mentioned countries in the
    Vedas or the Avesta.

    l) We can compare the invasion of the Aryans like the migratory methods of the
    Mexicans to the US, the only difference is the Aryans took over India.

    m) The Aryans had to come from somewhere , they just could not have
    evolved from the vast subcontinent. There is no evidence to support
    that, especially in the south, where the population is very much darker
    than those in the north. It is reasonable that if the Aryans were in India
    for thousands of years, interbreeding would have produced a uniform
    white skinned or fair skinned nation. America is only two hundred years
    old and the Black population is turning white skinned already. With its
    thousands of years of history, one can imagine India would be like.

    n) The Aryans who tarried in the north and northwest for thousands of years
    were a segregated lot and very clannish. To make it worse their caste
    system for a while preserved their color. So we can see that the north
    bore the brunt of the migration as they assimilated.

    o) The Androvono, BMAC and other cultures smacks of the strong smell of an Indo-
    Iranian origin with its vast burial and cremation sites of horses, chariots, wheels
    and other practices mentioned in the Vedas. The Dadhanyac horse head legend
    now brought back to life with its discovery on the steppes of Russia. The burial
    relics associated with this cultures fits nicely with IE customs and rites and
    the migration route from the shores of the Black Sea to the Hindukush to the
    Swat culture and the only mention of a foreign country called Afghanistan. The
    Aryans knew the Kubha river and others. The Swat culture is the most
    likely locus of the earliest IE presence east of the Hindus Kush of the bearers of
    the Rigvedic culture (Wikipedia Page 5 Textual References.Internet Article)

    p) The Aryans in the Vedas have not mentioned any knowledge of being familiar
    with any people or tribes or their customs to suggest a past habitation.

    q) As proven outsiders and the clinching evidence that the Aryans were that is the
    evidence portrayed by the Swat Culture. Here there is a major change in the
    Swat Valley with the introduction of new ceramics, burial sites and cremation
    remains in urns which is a custom of the early Vedic people from the Sapta
    Sindhu which is reminiscent of the Trojan cremation urns. IE people are known
    to practice this custom and not people descended from Afro-Austric lineage.
    Then, there are horse burials and trappings. Do the revisionists accept this?
    Thus, attempts of proponents of continuity to portray the Rigvedic culture as
    native to the subcontinent, such as identification of horses and chariots in the
    Indus art have little or not acceptance from Indologists. (Horse and chariot,
    Page 11 Wikipedia. Internet Article)

    r) For those who like to quote the Nadistuti Sukta and its praise of rivers to base
    their argument for an indigenous Aryan civilization, should look again. The sages
    who compiled this list, suggests that the Aryans only knew these rivers in
    northwest India and Afghanistan. Nothing here suggests a hinterland geographic
    knowledge of the rest of the subcontinent.

    The migration into India as shown above is ironclad and I will now go on to change topic and
    make a few comments here on the supposed theory of the Out of India model as presented by Mr. Elst’s emerging model as presented in Wikipedia page 3. Internet Article.
    Mr. Koenraad Elst writes:

    The Out of India theory as suggested by him holds that the Indo-Iranians were
    remnants of the Proto-Indo Europeans culture that resided with the Indian
    subcontinent in the 5th millennium BC. After the split of the Proto-Indo-
    Iranians. The Iranians would have migrated towards the Hindu Kush and
    eventually towards the Central Asia making their discovery of the chariot during
    this period.

    I am amused by his speculation which also include a map showing his theory how the
    PIE language spread from the Indus Valley outwards from India! Mr. Elst and his colleagues still believe in an Aryan Indus and and indigenous IE civilization of India and that it spreaded outwards despite the lack of convincing evidence of habitation, custom, rites etc that these people supposed to have left behind in Indian burial sites such as horses, chariots, pottery language etc. Mr. Elst’s emerging model is weak and has no foundation. Lets see:

    According to Mr. Elst a very highly educated and disciplined person in this craft, believed that the PIE originated in the Indus, that the Aryans left India to discover the chariot in Asia and spread the language in Europe etc. Then,

    a) How can a people of India migrated outside to Asia to discover the chariot,
    when 6,000 years ago the sites of the Russian steppes such as Sintashta and
    Petrovka and Kazakhstan were already buried in their burnt graves?

    b) If and when they got back to India why are there no evidence of horse burials
    or evidence of of chariot usage in India before the advent of the Aryans?

    c) Why did they not have evidence of the use of the horse and chariot in the
    Indus which is a complete blank in its archaeological sites. Did they come
    to India and used the horse and chariot excluding the Indus?

    d) How can PIE originate from the Indus civilization when the seals and script
    does not represent a spoken language per se?

    e) New analysis of material from the graves from this area shows that these
    chariots were built more than 4000 years ago , strengthening their case
    for their origin in the steppes rather than the Middle East. ( Remaking the
    Wheel-Evolution of the Chariot. Science Times Book of Archaeology. NY
    Edited by Nicholas Wade 1999. by John Noble Wilford 1994)

    Poor Mr. Elst et al , they cannot seem to account properly for the absence of the horse
    and chariot at the Indus, hence an OIT. This subject of the horse and chariot has thrown
    their axis out of tilt and they can’t seem to get it straight.
    I’d like to make a point on the subject of horses to those who believe that the Indus was a center for horse breeding from the inception of the Indus civilization circa 3500BC. Indian historians and some archaeologists have written a host of articles of horses at the Indus and reported findings of bones and remains. Also, we hear how the Indus empire was far flung in its trading with other nations such as Sumer, Mesopotamia and Arab lands. We read of the vast trading commerce of the Indus people with their sailing ships and we read of the products they traded with other people. Also , most of the Indian writers and historians state how vast deposits of horse bones are found in most Indus cities. If all this is true , then why in the trading documents are there no mention of horse trading of Indus ships with the other nations? Where are the detailed descriptions of the color of the horse, the breed of the horse etc in the trading lists of the Indus traders? Where are the parts of the chariots that was traded from the Indus to other cities and civilizations? Why are there no details of horse trading from the other lands , especially from the Arabs? How is it that the Indus ALONE possessed the horse from 3500BC, and no other civilization or city has no textual evidence of its presence within that time? The Indus was indeed overflowing with bones, asses and onagers. The Indus civilization drew on an inexhausted supply of asses and onagers from the Rann Of Kutch where the ass is known as khurs. This is where the Indus people derived the source of their transport , because the Rann OF Kutch was overflowing with asses and onagers and they were used for transport, pack animals, dray carts along with the oxen and bulls. Even today the area still depends on the Rann Of Kutch for its pack animals. So the Indian historians and archaeologists should stop looking in every nook and cranny of the Indus for horses. They didn’t exist. If any Indian archaeologist or historian could find any textual evidence that the Indus traded in horses with their neighbors , I’d recommend him for a Nobel Peace Prize. Indian scholars and historians who fervently believe in an Aryan Indus love to include in their books and pieces supposed evidence of horse bones, remains and fauna in the cities and sites of the ancient Indus. But none so far can prove that evidence exists that the Indus possessed this technology and as I have said above that if the Indus people knew this animal , they would have left evidence of horse trading in those ancient times. It is amazing that several historians and scholars give glowing accounts of reasons why the Indus is of Aryan origin but omits the main animal– the horse and worse yet go into detail about Indus trade and yet cannot produce attestation of horse trading. Every conceivable item, article and artifact is detailed for the trade industry for the Indus but the trade in horses is missing. Dr. Subhash Kak, a devotee of Aryan Indus in his article: “Vedic Elements In the Ancient Iranian Religion of Zarathushtra” ( Pages 51-56) makes a comparison of the two religions but ominiously leaves out the horse and chariot but includes the cow. This is cynical of the writings of historical revisionists who write and publish articles as the true history of India arguing for an Aryan Indus but omits the horse and chariot. This kind of argument never clinches their theories. Or if they do mention the horse and chariot, they rely on the false layer of deposits of ass bones found in the Indus as evidence of the animal’s existence. A horse rich Aryan Indus existing from 3500BC should leave us and archaeologists a vast amount of remains of a horse culture, a culture of attestation which should exhibit the training and breeding of horses, textual evidence of horse management, use of the horse as a mode of transport or for martial purposes and written documents of horse trade with the surrounding empires. None of this is available in the ruins of the Indus and while the Aryans and Trojans are superb examples of horse breeding, of which the evidence attests to this, the Indus are not known to have seen a horse and therefore are not horse breeders. There is no pictorial evidence of interaction or integration of the horse and chariot in the evidence produced so far in the Indus. There are no seals or scripts attesting to people of the Indus driving chariots pulled by horses as we have seen in other societies. If any animals were used in the Indus civilization , they were amply supplied by the limitless herds of asses and onagers roaming the Rann Of Kutch, known as khurs. As G.L Possehl the archaeologist said,

    “As far as I can tell, there are lots of asses documented at the Indus
    settlements , but not domestic horses.”

    Who else can be more right? All this has been confirmed by Meadow and Kenoyer the two leading archaeologists in the Indus excavations and most times they are irritated by the revisionist scholars whose enthusiasm carries they them away. This is what the various Hindunet articles are trying to suggest that the donkey carts of the Indus is a point of origin for the development of lightly rolling war chariots of the Vedas. They are employing lexemes, morphemes, phonemes and various other subtle ingenuous and insidious word building in these articles in order to fit the Aryans war machine for an Aryan Indus society when the archaeological evidence does not produce such a picture. Other internet articles state that:

    Carts were pulled by oxen and asses in Sumeria between 3000 and 2750 BC
    By the time of the Copper Age , 3000BC solid wheels and axles were used.
    There are records of two four wheeled carts pulled by oxen and asses in
    Sumeria and Mesopotamia between the above date. Also many model carts
    have been dug up. (www. Techitouk.com)

    The King of Sumer rides out in cart pulled by 4 donkeys for war.
    (www.answerbag.com)

    If the reader notices , these are the same time period which so called horse bones are found in the Indus and this brings up the following questions , which I am sure no historian or scholar of a revisionist nature will attempt to answer.

    a) If there was an Aryan indigenous civilization with the above dates, where are the
    cremation sites or urns from this time period? The Trojan civilization produced
    cremation sites and urns from this early period.

    b) Why is there no evidence of a deep and vast horse culture in the Indus?

    c) Why are there no remains of sacrifice and buried chariots which is the custom of
    Aryan people?

    d) If the Aryans were indigenous to India why is there an absence of such
    documentation in the texts and chronicles of other neighboring clans and tribes?

    e) Why is there only mention of cremation in the Vedas and not in other
    chronicles?

    f) Why is there only mention of horse sacrifice only in the Vedas and not in other
    chronicles of the other people?

    g) Most important of all, how can the Indus possess horses in a vaccum at a time
    when other empires did not have them? Did the Indus alone have them? If so
    why are there no evidence of trade?

    h) The Indus as a civilization has failed to demonstrate or illustrate its familiarity with
    horses in a two fold manner:

    The absence of interaction and integration of its people, history and
    archaeological remains with the horse and chariot.
    There is no pictorial or illustrative carvings, engravings or writings that allude to it
    familiarity of the horse with its people. eg. there is no pictures of people
    together with horses and chariots, no writings or seals that reveal the
    breedings, categories or worshipful reverence of the horse or allusions to rich
    people owning horses or horses used as transport in the cities.

    Secondly, the Indus civilization as a cluster for habitation for survival has no
    evidence that the horse existed as an integrative icon in its religion, culture ,
    lifestyle or as a tool for transport or for martial purposes. Its absence as an
    integrative icon or symbol in the society of the Indus is complete. Historians
    and archaeologists as AK . Sharma and Bonkoyi are dead wrong. They cannot
    prove that the horse was used for trading nor can anyone else connected with
    the Indus. The Indus has no evidence of trading in horses and thus its
    integrative absence is true. Also, had the horse existed in the Indus , its rulers
    would have certainly traded its value, used it for personal and martial purposes
    etc. I challenge anyone to provide evidence that the Indus traded horses with its
    neighbors between 3500BC-2500BC when supposedly horse bones and
    remains were found in its soils of its cities.

    I once posed this question to Mr. Elst about the question of evidence of horse trade from the Indus with their neighbors. His answer was not satisfactory nor was his attitude conducive to me in his reply. The trading of horses as an industry or occupation in the Indus is non-existent and revisionist writers bask in the glory of the greatness of the Indus in their trading relations with their neighbors. Dozens of books , articles and publications are devoted to the huge trading industry of the Indus with the distant empires and cities in faraway lands. We also read about the Indus people , especially sailors and merchants and traders lived in Sumer, Mesopotamia and other foreign lands and carried on trade with their counterparts. This is the time period that where most revisionist theories date the supposedly Aryan Indus from 3500BC to 2700BC in which horse remains and bones are plentiful in the Indus cities from Ropar in the north to Surkotada down south.and even further. Then there is the familiar terracota finds of horse figurines and such things that some archaeologists and historians label as true findings of the existence of the horse at the Indus. Mr. Elst’s long list of horse bones and remains is grand and convincing if one does not delve further into the history of the Indus. Here is a piece from the Internet dated July 9 2003. titled

    Trade and Economics of the Indus: The Harappan Tradition.

    A complex system of trade networks made the Harappans rich and guaranteed
    access to exotic goods. Internal networks moved every imaginable good throughout
    the Civilization. Shell, dried fish, and pearls from the coast; copper, tin, chert,
    precious metals and semiprecious stone from the hill country, and grain, animals,
    and wood from the rural areas flowed from one area to another, resulting in a
    nearly homogenous distribution of goods across the face of the civilization irrespective
    of origin. Networks extended into Central Asia, Mesopotamia, and the Arabian
    Peninsula. These networks exported every good and luxury available in the
    Harappan Civilization. It is unclear what was being imported, but it is likely to be
    wool , fish and grain.

    Subsistence and Trade

    Subsistence and trade settlements lay on the flood plains of the Indus and Gha
    riverss, where fertile land was annually refreshed by innundation. Recent research
    has shown wheat, barley, pulses, millets, fibers/ oilseed, melons ,coucumbers,
    squashes , and water buffalo, goat and sheep provided animal products.Floodplains
    lack raw materials, urban economies provided surplus for exchange to oil. Kenoyer
    proposed a series of trade or resource routes linking the urbanized centers with
    areas of lapis lazulli, carnelian, steatite, shells, chert, tin, copper and gold. These
    materials processed were redistributed within the Indus region and the surplus was
    traded to the Persian Gulf states as far as Elam and Mesopotamia.
    (Welcome to the Human Past Page 5&6 Internet Article 12/14/06)

    I will now continue with the Indus and its trading partners from the Internet article which is quite a thick document and has the following headlines. Of course, I am only extending the discoveries of the trade of the Indus and the neighboring cites and empires. I am doing this to point out a few instances where trade is claimed by the authors of this document dated 12/5/06 and has three separate titles. This will show precisely what was traded for the three different regions. viz:

    Central Asia, Mesopotamia and Sarasvati Sindhu civilization

    Sarasvati Sindhu civilization is one tip of the triangle linking
    with the Central Asian and Mesopotamian cultural areas.

    Bactrian - Margian - Archaeological - Complex BMAC

    From Bactria peculiarly the article does not say that trade was done with the Indus and the author assumed that,

    ” there is every ground to assume the dissemination from it of metal-works (celts, daggers,
    pins) and specific forms of earthenware (stemmed vases, saucers etc) in the eastern
    direction down to the valley of the Indus, by way of exchange, trade and cultural
    contacts. This period embraces the existence of the Harappan civilization and does
    not presuppose the arrival of new tribes. This is strikingly proved by the Harappa
    culture itself, which demonstrates a continuous line of development without any
    invasions from outside. We shall merely remark that southwestern Iran and possibly
    Caucasus emerge as a zpne where numerous metal articles come to be produced(mid
    2nd millennium BC) while Iranian Khorassan is doubtlessly the main venue for their
    penetration into the southern areas of central Asia, Bactria and possibly the valley of
    the Indus.
    (Viktor I. Sarianidi, 1979, New Finds in Bactria and Indo-Iranian Connections, pp 643-659, South Asian Archaeology 1977, Naples)

    The above information as I said looks peculiar to me. Here we have an assume trading of goods between BMAC region, Iran, and the Caucasus in the 2nd Millennium and only the mention of metal articles are noted for trade. This region is famous for horses because this is where the Aryans came down from the Black Sea area

    The Horse in Sarasvati Sindhu Civilization

    States dating Tepe Hissar IIIB a little before 2000 BC … skull of horse found and
    furthermore the horse is alleged to have been domesticated at Sha Tepe much
    earlier still thus anticipating it appearance at Boghazkoy in Central Asia Minor in the
    Hittite period…..

    What does this tell you? The theme running through this paragraph is that the skull is found at Hissar IIIB and domesticated at Shah Tepe says just that and nothing else. It does not say anything about the Indus. It does not connect the Indus with ShahTepe nor does it say that the horse was known at the Indus. The next few paragraphs from:

    AK Sharma, The Harappan horse was buried under the dunes of … in
    Puratattva…..In the Harrapan levels over here have been found clearly
    identifiable terracota figurines of this animal.

    (Pages 3,4,5 and 6.Mackay FEM , MEL Mellowan 1965 Early Mesopotamian and
    Iran, London Thames and Hudson p. 123

    Vol 1, page 289, Ak Sharma, Bulletin of the Indian Archaeological Society No 23,
    1992-93 pp. 30-34, Mackay FEM Vol 1 p 289 Wheeler Indus Civilization 1968
    p. 92 Cambridge. Prof. S Bokonyl, Director Archaeological Institute Budapest 13
    Dec 1993 , Dr Joshi,. Archaeological Survey of India, S. Rao, and B Nauth of
    the Zoological Survey of India 1985 p. 641, Lal, 1998 p. 112 , Gupta 1979,
    Vol. 2

    The professional names quoted above have put their signature and approval to the supposed horse finds at Surkotada, Mohenjodaro, Kolidhwa, Mahagara, Kachchha, northern
    Baluchistan, Lothal, Nausharo, and other areas. The carbon dating for these finds are from 3500 BC to 2315 BC and further down. Finds include supposedly, teeth, bones of true horse, terracota figurines, upper and lower cheek, incisors and phalanges or to bones, intermaxilla fragment , crib biting, faunal remains, cheek teeth, spur or protocone and upper molars of these supposed horses. What a find! Now, let us for argument sake say that all these finds are true, then we can come to only one conclusion and that is the following:

    a) Why aren’t there evidence of horse trade with the neighbors ot the Indus?

    b) The bloody place seemed to be overrunning with horses and yet we can’t
    find one engraving or etching on the seals and script. Why?

    c) How come the Indus have so many horses and her neighbors don’t have no
    evidence of trading in horses, no documentation to attest to this activity with
    the Indus.
    d) Horse trade among IE people is a lucrative trade but the supposed Aryan
    Indus seem to be bereft of this activity. Wht?

    e) It appears that all the experts who contributed to this article cannot seem to
    tell the difference between asses, onagers and half asses and the true
    horse.

    f) None of the trading partners as far as the Arabian lands have no evidence
    that they possessed the horse during this period of 3500 BC and 2700BC

    g) All the Internet articles written by the revisionists only allude to finds of
    horse bones for a particular area and not directly to the Indus civilization.
    None of the articles proves that direct horse bones and remains have been
    found at the Indus.

    h) Most likely and the only area which supplied the Indus and its partners with
    the ass , onager and half assses was from the great resource of the Rann of
    Kutch, on which great herds of these animals grazed. This is the area where
    the asses came from to supply the transport industry. Also, find a few horse
    bones, if they are true horse bones ,does not make the the Indus Aryan. This
    was a prized animal of the Aryans and highly valued, traded, breeded and
    worshipped and cared for. We see nothing of this in the history of the Indus.
    I see nothing in the seals or scripts saying or describing a horse, its breed, its
    uses or indications that the horse was used at the Indus.

    The Rigvedas is replete with horses and for those who still maintain that the Indus civilization is Aryan, here are a few examples of Aryan knowledge of horse breeding:

    BOOK HYMN TITLE VERSE DESCRIPTION

    2 1 Agni 5 givest noble steeds

    2 1 Agni 16 with kine and steeds

    2 2 Agni 10 valor with the steed

    2 2 Agni 13 kine and steeds

    2 10 Agni 2 dark steeds or ruddy

    2 11 Indra 6 two Bay steeds

    2 11 Indra 11 Indra, thy Bay steeds

    2 18 Indra 18 thy two Bay Coursers

    3 7 2 heaven hath Mares

    3 35 Indra 3 Tawny Horses

    3 36 Indra 9 Lord of the Tawny Coursers

    3 42 Indra 7 by thy Stallions

    3 43 Indra 4 let thy two Bay Stallions

    3 44 Indra 2&4 Lord of Tawny Steeds

    3 30 Indra 2 with thy Bay horses

    3 43 Indra 23 a sluggish steed men run not with the
    Parvata the courser, nor ever lead an ass before
    a charger.

    5 53/64 Maruts 3&9 They came with winged steeds
    Asvins with your winged steeds

    5 56 Maruts 6 the bright red mares

    5 59 Maruts 5 like steeds of ruddy color

    The Aryans were super horsebreeders and they knew it like the back of their hands the categories of horses that they used for transport and war, there was the Bays, the Coursers, the mares, the stallions and the steeds chargers They also knew flying horses which connect them with their Greek cousins with Pegasus etc. Can a supposedly Aryan
    Indus civilization have any evidence to show that they knew such details about horses? Not likely. So why do the revisionists still cling to the sterile imagination of an Aryan Indus when such details of an animal was not in their conception of an Aryan Indus? Where can one find such detail about horses in Elst’s supposedly Aryan Indus? All this is followed in the Vedas of details of the intricate part of the chariot which again is not found in the seals and script of the Indus. If the Indus knew the horse I still fail to see any evidence of detailed inscriptions or documents that they were familiar with the subject. The seals are blank as well as the script and this idea of an Aryan Indus is a very strange vision that has gripped the revisionists and every article and book they write has this idea as a background story. The Indus civilization do not only has to prove that the horse existed there but has to show further attestation of its presence. And that brings me to the most important concept of its presence in the Indus which is two fold.

    1) The revisionists will have to show its interactive role in the daily lives of the
    people.
    2) The revisionists will have to show evidence that the animal was an
    integrative part of its civilization.

    The Indus civilization had the necessary resources to leave evidence that they were familiar with the horse as an integrated factor of their society. Since its discovery site after site has shown nothing that could tell archaeologists that the horse was as integrated as the other animals such as the oxen and bullock and asses. There are plenty of asses , onagers and half asses as GL Possehl says but no evidence of the domesticated horse. None of the discoveries has exposed the real form of the horse or nary a close resemblance. That has gotten as far as the onager which are being mistaken for the real thing. The walls of the buildings also , unlike the Egyptian walls and tombs contain absolutely no etchings, paintings, carvings etc of the true horse. These people could write and it is strange that they never left us any image of the horse in their society. Therefore, one can only come to the conclusion that the horse was not a familiar sight in the eyes and knowledge of the Indus people. There are no references to the animal in the Indus society nor in its belief system or religion if any existed. From day one the archaeologists have been digging up the bones of oxen , asses , bullocks , onagers and half asses which was plentiful at the Rann Of Kutch and from where the Indus people solicited these animals. But nothing that points to the presence of horses has ever been found and they realized that the absence of a horse culture and its trappings was not there. The other part of this concept is the interactive side of the equation. Other civilizations have illustrated how they interacted with their animals but this too is absent from the Indus. There are no carvings, illustrations, seals and other such graphic themes that would tell us that the Indus people was using this animal for transport purposes , war, travel or for royal journeys as is done in other societies who knew it. This is understandable in that the horse did not reach the Stone Age societies of these civilizations at this time in antiquity. We see no drawings of the Indus people riding horses or references to it, no seals containing imprints of its form nor of its people driving chariots pulled by horses. All this is absent as well as the absence of stables and stalls for the animals and workshops to care for the vehicles and animals. Horses need a special kind of care , they have to be well fed, groomed, medically fit, trained and a host of other things. It is a point well taken that had horses existed at the Indus , they would certainly would have had horse trade with the other cities and empires but this too is absent, quite the opposite to the superb Aryan horse breeders and trainers. Nowhere are there any evidence that the traders indulged in this practice and there are no reference to the different kinds of horse breeds which is the first important thing a horse trader looks for. No documentation exists on this subject. Indus society has no reference in its daily lifestyle that point to the animal was interacting with their lives.

    People who want to change the history of India, must not only do away with something they find offensive or repugnant , but they must replace it with something of value and authentic. An Aryan Indus is not authentic nor is it being replaced with something of value. It is being replaced bya lie. But alas, other than the scholars and historians who really believe in an Aryan Indus , there are others who follow their misguided paths based on their wrong assumptions and mistaken history of India. Other than the history of the Vedas, the geography of the Rigveda is also under fire to suit the claims of those who advocate the Aryan Indus theory. And that is what it will remain a theory.

    I now refer Mr. R Goel’s ” Geography of the Rigveda” published on the Internet on 17/2/03 where he attempted to convince his readers that the Aryans of India are indigenous and that the Indus is Aryan. I personally think that it is an excellent attempt to prove the above but it has it flaws. For one, on page 15, he writes:

    That the historical movement of the Vedic Aryans across the Sutudri
    Vipas rivers at the time of Sudas, can only be a westward movement.

    Now, why would the Vedic Aryans who is supposed to be indigenous to India stop in this area which contains the Cemetery H Culture? This Culture is described by Wikipedia.org on page 1 as the following:

    The distinguishing features of this culture include:

    a) The use of cremation of human remains. The bones were stored
    in painted pottery burial urns. This is completely different to the
    Indus civilization where bodies were buried in wooden coffins.

    b) Reddish pottery , a completely different pottery to the Indus.

    c) Expansion of settlements into the east. This is evidence in
    contrast to Goel’s east to west scenario. His scenario has
    no attestation of such a movement.

    d) The cultivation of rice as a crop by the Aryans who learned it
    from the Indus people etc.

    This is a classic example of the overlaying of a new culture over the old one and of course
    the Aryans went through a process of assimilation, linguistic, cultural and political changes from the people they met from the Indus. Mr. Goel’s article of Aryans coming from the interior has no foundation since he cannot provide textual attestation that this is so. Whereas, evidence can be provided that the Aryans did come into India and left their mark in the form of culture , cremation, religion and political apparatus etc. But the major flaw in his article is the omission of the horse in the section that he discusses the animals of the Vedas. From page 31, he began to cite the names of animals found in the Vedas and they are the elephant, the buffalo, the bison the peacock and the spotted deer. On page 33 he states:

    Further, the names of these animals are purely Aryan Indo-European: the
    elephant for example, has four names each of which has a purely Aryan
    etymology.

    All well and good , but what happened to the horse? Mr. Goel. It seems that you have either forgotten the horse, overlooked it deliberately or chose to ignore it completely. This is the same journalistic transgression most revisionist writers do for the above reason. It is fascinating to see some of them composing histories of India and more or less just devote a few lines to the horse and chariot or chose not to. Maybe I should bring it to the attention of Mr. Goel, if he hasn’t noticed it already that his Rigvedic rivers are all confined to the north-west of India and he cannot provide any substantial evidence that the Aryans existed in an indigenous state in India. So if they did as he and other revisionists claim , then where are the attestation for this? Why are the revisionists only arguing for an Aryan Indus from the perspective of textual evidence from the Vedas, supposed evidence from the Indus, from the geography of the Vedic rivers, and not in return for evidence from other parts of India? Can Mr. Goel supply any evidence of Aryan indigenity for the following points?

    a) Any concrete evidence of Aryan habitation in India that
    can say that Aryans lived here?

    b) Any attested sites of cremation and burial of Aryans before 1500BC

    c) Remains of their pottery and artifacts.

    d) Textual evidence of the supposed Aryan neighboring tribes that
    can verify that Aryans once occupied the land before their
    supposed migration out of India.

    e) That horses and chariots existed in India before the advent of
    the Aryans in 1500BC.

    If Mr. Goel can provide these answers to the above then he has a case along Talageri et al. These writers and historians though they mean well, are screwed in their logic of trying to paint the Indus as Aryan. Their points of history of India is okay except for a few ideas that are flawed. One is that the Aryan Indus existed since 3500 BC and the other is the migration out of India. The other is the problem of the Sarasvati river and the other is the vexing one of the horse and chariot which has so far eluded them and thus making their theories outdated and impossible and illogical. First we will discuss the Sarasvati river which , since the satellite discovery of its disappearance has been jumped on by the historical writers who are using it to clinch their case to overthrow the Aryan occupation of India. We can see from the location of the Cemetery H civilization and settlements that the Aryans did not come from the East but from the north where they sojourned in Afghanistan. They had to be because Afghanistan ancient Aryan name is Arianna and this is an Aryan name and it is from this region where the Vedic people came from from their journey from Central Asia. One can believe that the rivers of the north-west of India were not named with their present names when the Indus civilization reigned supreme. What these people called the rivers we don’t know. But where did the Aryans come up with the name Sarasvati? It only had to come from some river they knew before and when they came into India and saw the river it was already drying up or in it last stages. They called it Sarasvati nevertheless from the one they knew back in Afghanistan. But one may ask why then should they glorify a river with such praise and epithets when probably it does not deserve it. The only logical reason is two fold:

    1 ) the Aryan custom of chanting and singing praises

    2) the sacredness of the religion and the taboo of changing
    words and religious articles of faith

    This may sound far fetched but the Aryan custom of chanting praises and verses still exist today as deeply as ever in every facet of its religion. One must remember this is a time of antiquity , an age of deep religious faith, in which verses and certain words chanted in good faith cannot be changed with the snap of a finger and is resisted by the sages, bards and seers of the tradition. We see this even today in the exact measurement of the fire altars which still have the exact length and with from thousands of years, of which not an iota has been altered. Thus , when the Aryans were in Afghanistan the local river which they named Sarasvati were praised and this was written down in the Vedas thousands of years before but was chanted as the same and they knew that the one in India ran to the sea. Nevertheless, they applied the same chanting praise and epithets to it. Perhaps, the Indian Sarasvati still packed some power , since the seasonal monsoon rains and floods probably ravaged the land before it petered out. That is why the Vedas still has the written words because it was handed down thousands of years , exactly as it was first spoken by the priestly Brahmins so long ago. I do not think for one moment a religious people as the Aryans were would worship a completely dried out river with such praises nor anyone in their right minds. Now,we turn to Mr. Goel’s theory of an east to west movement for indigenous Aryans of India which is all wrong for I will provide a chart grid to show why this is so viz:

    F i r s t M e n t i o n O f S a r a s v a t i I n V e d a s

    Name of Historian Earliest BK Hymn Verse Name First Mentioned Of

    Witzel 2 41 16 Various Dieties Sarasvati

    Revisionists 6 61 1 Sarasvati Sarasvati

    F i r s t M e n t i o n O f H o r s e s I n V e d a s

    Name of Historian Earliest BK Hymn Verse Name First Mentioned Of

    Witzel 2 1 5 Agni Steeds or Horses

    Revisionists 6 2 8 Agni Steeds or Horses

    F i r s t M e n t i o n O f H o r s e s A n d S a r a s v a t i I n BK ONE

    Earliest BK Hymn Verse Name

    HORSES 1 3 6 Asvins

    Posted on 28-Jan-07 at 1:10 am | Permalink

13. Aine MacDermot wrote:

    Neville Ramdeholl : Thank you very much for that. You seem to know more about that history than I do.

    The Altai Steppe region is where many fairly recent discoveries of the earliest “horse culture” peoples are being discovered and slowly excavated. Their nobles were buried with their chariots and wagons, horses and servants, and even their weaponry. Because of the permafrost, many of these artifacts remain in relatively good condition while still frozen, and can be studied, photographed, and documented.

    Posted on 28-Jan-07 at 2:28 am | Permalink

14. Neville Ramdeholl wrote:

    Thanks Aine McDermot, for reading my article. Its the kind of evidence that many so-called highly educated and intelligent historians and writers seem to ignore. Because this is the area where the Aryans of India came from. The evidence is there and they have eyes and see not.Thanks again for your kind words and insight.

    Posted on 29-Jan-07 at 2:09 am | Permalink

15. Neville Ramdeholl wrote:

    The Characteristic Features of Indo-Aryan India in an Indigenous
    Afro-Dravidian India

    The prevailing view nowadays is that from the prospective of the revisionists , the Indus Civilization is somehow Aryan in origin. All the writings that have gone beforehand have attempted to show that the Indus civilization from 3000BC originated with Vedic Aryans, despite certain innovations being absent such as the horse factor. Still, a whole gamut of writers with splendid education no doubt fell for this scenario and still continue to fall into this belief. Despite the proven archaeological evidence writers even up to today still argue and discuss with ardent fervor of this supposedly Aryan Indus and books, articles and magazine pieces continue to roll off the presses to display the newest evidence that is of Aryan nature. The new concept now being employed is the area of historical continuity of culture etc that certain extremist writers and historians try to portray this Indian civilization as THE Indian civilization and that the Aryans were part and parcel of the builders of this civilization, a civilization that is completely different from the customs and rites of the pastoral Indo-Aryans. Here is what Mr. Iravatham Mahadevan , a respected Indian linguist and scholar said about the Indus civilization in a recent interview from an online article dated 3/29/2007 and titled the ‘The Ancient Indus Valley Script’ :

    “Well, you can say from this that the Indus civilization itself is Aryan and the Dravidian hypothesis is wrong. I do not believe that is the correct answer. We do not have the horse in the Indus Civilization. There is no evidence for the wheeled chariot. There is no evidence for the spoked wheels. The Rgveda, the earliest document of the Indo-Aryans has no mention of great cities like Harappa or Mohenjaro-daro, so the only other possibility is that a some like cult based on some kind of hallucinogenic drug, crushed and filtered out of a plant and drunk ritually, must have existed in Harappa and that it was taken over by the Indo-Iranians and the incoming Aryans.” I make this clear that this is not Asko Parpola speaking, who is despised and a fearful figure in the world of those Indian scholars who wince every time he opens his mouth. I supposedly think that there are so many instances that can describe Aryan India because so far despite all the historical books, articles, magazines and other informational data, a no submission case has been made by a body of writers and those who want to paint over the Indus as Aryan. I still see the Aryans as an invading force despite the political correct language of these extremists. There is still a strong overwhelming Vedic presence in India and they refuse to acknowledge it. A keen reader will notice one thing with those who believe in an Aryan Indus. In every publication whether it is a book, article or magazine, the extremist scholars who are considered to be experts on this subject beat daily upon the Aryan aspects of the subject but never seem to be clear about the ramifications of the Indus civilization or its influence. For example, to impose their belief they theorize and write that the Vedic Aryans were in India from since 3000BC in order to accommodate the deficiencies or shortcomings of the Indus. Everything is pinpointed from the viewpoint of the Aryans , even the Sanskrit language is chopped up to accommodate the Dravidian indigenous language never the other way around. Apparently, this conceptual writing and viewpoint is done this way because the Indus, despite its greatness could not produce the horse, the chariot or the wheel. These are the thorns in the side of those who advocate the premise of an Aryan Indus.

    The Aryan people that lived on the banks of the Sarasvati River sang praises and worshipped this great body of water that ran from the mountains to the ocean. If one just close one’s eyes and imagine for a moment the pastoral camps that dotted this great Indian river, bustling with campfires and sounds of chanting and the smell of herds of cattle and horses as the Aryan people settled in their new lands. The Sarasvati was the central role for the life of the newly arrived Aryans. One can imagine the horse sacrifices and cremations and other rites and customs now new to India and that will lay the foundation for the future generations. Cremation, this new form of burial and funeral custom , never seen before in India must have been fascinated the indigenous people at first as the Aryans buried their dead as they brought in their warriors from raids from vast expanse of pastures and forests and mountains in the search of booty and riches. Yet, there is something lordly and noble as the Aryan nobles cremated their dead of those who die in battle and would normally receive special funeral honours. There is something lordly , indeed heroic about the great pyre flaming to the heavens, as the high priests and sages chanted to the heavens as they convey the soul of the dead to the Pitris. The Sarasvati must have witnessed many such events of Aryan life of heroic death and accumulation of wealth and treasures, a quality ingrained in the Aryans. The Saravasti was in its prime with tremendous flow of raging waters, swift and floods as the monsoon increase its volume from mountain to sea. But as far as I can see, the Sarasvati was not the name of the river on which the Indus cities were founded. It has an ancient Dravidian name.

    Thus, we began our investigation of the Sarasvati River, our Aryan Mother and its impact on the life of the people who occupied the northwestern part of India, giving its life waters to the Aryan settlers. But we just can’t begin our story with theory that the Sarasvati is found in India. We want to know most important how it came to be called by its Aryan name. We know by fact that the Indus people knew the Sarasvati but by another name in their own Dravidian language but after they left the region the Aryans took over and renamed the great river which was still in its glory. The name Sarasvati is a Sanskrit description of the river and there is no mistaking that and which is not contested. We also know that the mythological name Sarasvati is Sanskrit in origin and is an ancient river that is mentioned in Vedic hymns. The Nadistuti hymn in the Vedas says that the Sarasvati lies between the Yamuna in the east and the Sutlej in the west. and it is later mentioned in the Mahabharata that it dried up in the desert. From the Wikipedia: “The name Sarasvati is an Aryan Proto-Indo-Iranian saras-vnt-t meaning “she with many pools” (Sanskrit saras- pool , body of water”) cognate to Old Avestan, Harahvaiti. In the younger Avesta, Harahvaiti is identified as a region rich in rivers and its Avestan name is thought to be the origin of the Helmand river system. Most scholars agree that references to the Sarasvati in the Vedas refer to the Ghaggar -Hakra river while the Helmand is often quoted as the locus of the early Rigvedic river.” (Page 1 Sarasvati River 3/8/2007)

    It seems that the Aryan invasion or migration goes back to its early stages in Afghanistan where the Indo-Aryans brought the name Sarasvati with them to India. But the notion of most of the Indus historians today seem to distort and submerge without compunction the name of the Sarasvati, in classifying it with or describing or lumping it with the Neolithic Indus civilization as on entity. This is an effort by scholars who should know the difference of historical dates and events that history is a sequence of affairs with subsequent beginnings, dates, places , events and endings which cannot be revised. One such geological method that disproves this is the method of carbon dating. Anyone can push back dates and events but if the carbon dating proves to be otherwise then it is foolish to do so. I refer and take task with Dr. S. Kalyanaraman’s zealously written internet article called ” Sarasvati River: An Overview ” (circa 3000 to 1500 BC) dated OCT 1997.
    I refer to the chapter ‘ Sarasvati: Economy and Polity.’
    Now this is getting into the realms of unreality as the doctor dates the Vedic period from 3000 BC as the background for Vedic occupation of India, where as we know that there is no evidence whatsoever that the Aryans was nowhere around that time and the Indus settlers were never described as Aryans. Dr Kalyanaraman’s description is ridiculous. Here as I mentioned before he is carrying out the typical revisionist’s view of how they regard the Indus civilization as Vedic. There is no history of how the Vedic people come to start the civilization. The Indus civilization is described as the Sarasvati Sindhu Civilization , a metals economy on the banks of the Sarasvati despite the pages of the Vedas has no such description. He writes thus on the
    ‘ Metals economy of the civilization’ The trace impurity pattern of copper from the Khetri copper mines nickel and arsenic content compare with the Harrapan artifacts. Ganeshwar copper mines ascribed to the third millennium BC. (Sikar district Rajasthan) are located in the Drishadvati {Ghaggar -Hakra- Wahinda) system. RC. Agrawala made a remarkable discovery in 1977: an examination of the 60 flat copper celts (20to 25 cms Long) from a ‘hoard’ in Neem- ka -thana in Sikar district of Rajasthan were associated with the Indus Valley complex. Ganeshwar is about 15 kms from Neem-ka -thana; at this place, copper axes had been made more than four thousand years ago. This site is 250 kms. from Kalibangan and 160 kms from Bhadra. Both Kalibangan and Bhadra are in Ganganagar district of Rajasthan. By 1979, after further diggings , 1000 copper objects ( arrow heads, rings, bangles spear heads, chisels , balls celts) hand been found in Ganeshwar. Arrowheads, thin blades and fishhooks and other characteristic Indus civilization artifacts were also found. Rich copper ores are also said to exist in Afghanistan, at Tezin, east of Kabul. in the Shadkani Pass.” Page 36. He continues , ” The Early Harappans seem to have been involved in the minerals and metals economy. It is notable that sixteen furnaces were discovered on Mound F of Harappa. The civilization is most significantly a metals economy: excavations have produced : 2000 metal artifacts at Mohenjodaro and over 1000 at Harappa. The metals were copper bronze, gold silver, lead and more rarely electrum. Some necklaces or belts contain hundreds of metal beads. Metal tool types were: points, knives, chisels, needles. Tin bronze alloying was used for knives, axes and chisels. Metals additives were not used for tools such as points, razors and fishhooks. (Page 37)

    The above has ramifications for the theory of an Aryan Indus as Dr Kalyanaraman is espousing with his political correct language. The attempt to merge the Vedic and Indus civilizations is pathetic. The industrial engine that drove the Indus is as distinct as it was based on urban developments in great contrast to the nomadic life style of the Aryans. Thus, I can safely draw from the following cultural distinctions.

    (a) Copper found in the Indus is the primary metal that accompanied the different stages of the Indus civilization from 3000BC.

    (b) Since there is no evidence of Aryan presence in India, from 3000BC it can be safely say that the Indus used copper extensively for this was the primary metal used by neolithic peoples from this time.

    (c) Copper is used for weapons and other artifacts and was the mainstay for the Indus culture and its future development.

    (d) As a Neolithic society they used fish as a daily diet and this is evidenced by the extensive use of fishhooks found there.

    (e) The Vedic Aryans used beef as a diet and never used fish.

    (f) The extensive description of industrial use of metals, buildings, urban culture and society is in stark contrast to Aryan nomadic pastoral society.

    We can see that nowhere on the banks of the Sarasvati do we have evidence of cremation in the chronicles of the Indus as in the seals or scripts so how can the scholars illustrate in their articles that the Indus and Vedic are one? This is done as reasons tabulated above and for now we will leave it and go on to Minerals: references in the Rigveda: (Page 40)

    The author attempts to show that the pages of the Vedas reflects the minerals and mining that the Indus people extracted for a living. Nothing can be further than the truth. He distorts the need for wealth of the Aryans as the same as the Indus people which is false. In the pages of the Vedas , the Aryans method in search for wealth is quite different from that of the methods employed by the dwellers of the cities of the Indus The pages of the Vedas speak of the Aryans perennial greed for personal enrichment in the accumulation of a richer lifestyle. They indulge in oblations and prayers to the gods for the advancement of their tribes using such words as treasures, riches, cattle, horses, gifts, spoils and gold. Cattle raids and clan wars dominated their lifestyle as the custom of all nomadic people one would expect to behave. On page 44, Dr Kalyanaraman described the way the Indus city dwellers accumulated their wealth and it is quite different from the lifestyle of the Aryans. One such method was by way of trade. He writes:
    “There is overwhelming evidence of maritime trade by the archaeological evidence and discoveries of the so-called Harappan civilization which can now be re-christened Sarasvati-Sindhu civilization. ( How can the Indus civilization be named Sarasvati when the word Sarasvati is an Aryan name and the Indus is a Dravidian civilization?) Some beads were reported to have been exported to Egypt from this valley and the Sumerians had acted as intermediaries for this trade which extended to Anatolia and the Mediterrean…. Bahrain island , known as Telmur was the trading entrepot between Indian and Mesopotamian civilizations. Ur was in contact with Makkan and Telmun. RV describes the saving of Bhujyu from mid- ocean and of a shipwreck. (So ye , with birds, out of the sea and waters bore Bhujyu, son of Tugra, through the regions. Speeding with winged steeds through dustless spaces, out of the bosom of the flood they bore him. (RV.V1.52.61) How can this be? How can winged steeds be existing at this time in Indus literature and history when no such symbols or engraving of such images are completely absent from the civilizations? These are shades of Black Athena where the author tried to portray Egypt as the source of Greek history despite the absence of horses in its history. The vast trading and commerce empire of the Indus along with mining of ores and minerals are only part of the accumulation of wealth by the busy Indus people. There were also jewelers who provided people with riches and apart from these the fishing industry , weaving, pottery and bead making also flourished to make the Indus people very rich. Dr Kalyanaraman’s article submerged the two civilizations as is now the favorite method by revisionists using Vedic pages and descriptions. Notably absent is the interactive and integrative role of horses and chariots. Nowhere it is shown that the Indus civilization made use or knew of this technology in its writings or culture. The theory that the Indus is Vedic is ridiculed and dismissed by Ms Romila Thapar in her lecture ‘The Aryan Question Revisited ‘at the JNU Academic Staff College in 1999. page 19-21. She writes:
    ” The Vedas is a pre- Chalcolithic culture it does not speak of any urban centres. It certainly does not speak of any settlements which have the characteristics of Harappan cities. For example there is no reference to citadel areas and residential areas, there is no reference to drainage systems or to streets or to granaries or warehouses or to a public bath or to a sophisticated exchange system or weights and measures on a graduated scale which was known as and described. To me there are the essential characteristics or Harappan urbanization and all these characteristics are absent in the Vedas. You may have people saying ‘Oh” but there were coins in the Vedas and they mention the word ‘niska.’ Now niska can be a coin as was in the later period but during this period judging by the descriptions it was simply a little decorative piece in precious metal. These essential characteristics that I have mentioned none of these are referred to or described in the Vedas. The people of the Vedas are agro-pastoralists with small scale village societies essentially indulging in cattle raids and predatory raids. If you read the hymns the plea to the gods Indra, and Agni, whosover it is, is help us go and attack this ‘dasa’ village or this ‘dasapura’ help us get the cattle of the ‘dasa’. It is always the cattle that they are wanting. There is not question of help us go into battle and take over a whole territory. It is limited to small areas of attack. They are mobile pastoralists and the cattle raids and the predatory raids are surrogate for warfare. There are in fact no great battles or campaigns. Even the famous battle of ten kings is over the change that is taking place that is being brought into function over the river waters of the Ravi. It is not as if there is huge encampment on a plain and the two armies have got together and are fighting each other. None of that. It is something very much localized and controlled. Wealth as far as the Rgveda is concerned , is computed in horses and cows. You only have to read the ‘ danastuti’ hymns to realise how strong this notion is of may I be gifted ten thousand horses and sixty thousand heads of cattle. Exaggerated figures wildly exaggerated figures. Nobody had then thousand horse to give to begin with. But this is what is wealth. The centrality of the cow in words like ‘gavasti’ , the desire for cows which is also used for skirmish or a raid or ‘gopati’ as the head of a clan. The cow is also used as an item in barter and human life is calculated in terms of cows. Given this migration becomes extremely important because of the need to be continuously searching for two things– good pastures , access to water for the animals. We often forget we keep on talking about how water is important for irrigation for cultivators, but water is equally important for pastoralists, because animals need to have access to water and the shifting river courses in the Punjab obviously would create problems. You have a river like the Sutlej which is constantly changing its shape and size. So what are the pastoralists on the banks of the Sutlej to do. They have to moving all the time. Once they are moving , they are looking for good pastures, and if somebody else is over there , there is a fight and they throw them out. And the prayers are frequently for rain for this is fact a semi-arid region. Possibly even the migration eastwards was for better pastures. The centrality of pastoralism is also seen in the many terms that are used for cattle, cows, and the relative infrequency of terms used for grain and for crops. Secondly, very importantly, the eating of beef, of the flesh of the cattle is restricted to special occasions and ritual occasions. Now this is a prime characteristic of pastoral societies. This comes through very clearly in Evans Pritchard’s work on the Nuer and the work of innumerable others who worked on pastoralist societies. Herders, animal herders, do not eat their animals indiscriminately. And they are particularly careful about conserving the good livestock of the herd because the future of the herd depends on it. And so the killing of the animals for food is usually connected with ritual occasions and with very special occasions. And this is exactly so in the Vedas. Wherever there are references to the eating of beef, it is always in association either with the yajna or with the coming of the great or some special occasion. Furthermore, pastoralists have what has been called symbiotic relationships with agriculturalists. And the symbiotic relationship is that frequently and it’s at two levels one is , of course, at the level of exchange. The pastoralists bring in their products and the agriculturists have their products and there might be an exchange. For instance, dairy products may be give to the agriculturalists, while grain is taken from the agriculturalists by the pastoralists. But there is a much more subtle and intensive interrelationship. For example when the crop is harvested and the field is covered with stubble- usually six inches high after the harvest has been cut. That’s when the pastoralist come in with their herds and the animals feed on the stubble. And the animal droppings manure the field and then the animal herd will move on to the next village and do the same. An this is an unwritten convention between the agriculturist and the pastoralist. And this is extremely important because one can’t talk about the two being separate societies- they’re integrated societies…… The wealth that is raided and brought back is then distributed at the meeting of the vidatha where the vis and the rajan– the two categories of the people that constitute the main society of the Aryas and the RigVeda– are gathered and there it is partly a functional occasion, partly a ritual occasion. THERE IS ALSO NO DESCRIPTION IN THE RIG VEDA OF LARGE SCALE TRADE. Page 22 continues thus: What was their relationship to the sedentary agriculturalist once they arrived in the fertile areas? One was the immediate relationship which was to raid the local people and the Vedas is the great text describing a constant wish to raid and get wealth. It would seem that the Aryas are not very successful to being with because there is this continuous plea to the gods, please come and help us,please go and kill our enemies for us, please do this and please do that. It is as if there is a bewilderment about how they are to set about doing it. Then gradually that changes to a much more settled relationship. We are told in the Satapatha Brahmana that the asuras , and by this time the term asura is being used in the negative sense, were the cultivators and were extensively settled. So if there is a symbiotic relationship between the cattle herder and the cultivators where the cattle are coming and feeding off the stubble and manuring the fields and produce is being exchanged, there would be an exchange of other things –language, possibly inter marriage, one does not know rituals, three areas where usually exchange takes place. And all of this would also encourage bilingualism. The languages begin to change very rapidly and you would require then someone like Yaska to write an etymological text to explain the words because the meaning of words was becoming indistinct. And finally have a Panini who says that I am going to write the rules of the language so that more changes are not introduced and the language does not go off the rails. No, he didn’t actually say that. But that is the assumption behind an exercise of that kind. Did the existing sedentary agriculturalists appeal to an incoming pastoral chief for protection? This is a question I would like to pose. That you have these sedentary groups, they are people coming in who are attacking cattle keepers and sedentary groups. Did these sedentary agriculturalists who couldn’t protect themselves and remember now that the Harappan system has collapsed, the cities have declined, the protection which the Harappan system would have given to these agriculturalists is not guaranteed. It may have existed , it may not. So what does the sedentary agriculturalist do? Doesn’t he turn to the chief of this raiding tribe and say , please don’t raid me, let’s negotiate a settlement. So what I’m trying to suggest is that the pastoral chiefs come in at a level of dominance in terms of their relationship with the local population. But it is not a dominance based only on conquest. It is not dominance based only on raids. It does include the possibility of some other kind of negotiation. This would then have galvanized the long term relationship between them.”
    Also who could be quoted next but that doyen of Indian archaeology Prof. Gregory L. Possehl whose articles and contributions to this discipline has no equal. I shall use his online article dated 11/2/2006 to strengthen the arguments for an unwarranted existence for the Indus so Aryan civilization so far in 3000 BC. Mr Possehl’s account is derived from the archaeological record and as such is carbon dated and tested for its authenticity. The other scholars seem to runaway with the preconceived idea that the Indus existed from the above date. This series of lecture consisted of four parts and I shall narrate the first labeled the:

    Foundations of the Indus Civilization (Feb 18)

    The main theme of his 2nd lecture was that, despite all kinds of continuities with previous settlements in the region, IVC suddenly sprang into existence in the course of single century (2600-2500BC) as a planned urban environment inspired by a coherent ideology shared by a newly emerged elite. Before this period, there are recognizable differences in the archaeological record between regional domains such as Kulli, Sindh ( Mohenjo-daro), Sorath (chalcolithic) Ananta, Cholistan (Ganwerwala), Eastern (Rakhigarhi), Harappa, North- Western, that become unified during this period through a common civilization grid whose characteristic stamp is town planning , A ‘founder’s city’ ,Mohenjo-Daro. for example is the only Bronze Age city where one can still explore the streets, houses because they have all been preserved in baked in brick(which composes only half of Harappa, and is used only for drains and wells in Lothal), and was, like (not so) ancient Alexandria and modern Chandigarh (in Punjab) , conceived as a plan before it was built. The ideological founders apparently made a clean break with the local past for older townships were abandoned and new cities built from scratch. In Cholistan , for example, of 37 early Harappan sites 33 were abandoned; and 132 of 135 mature sites are on virgin ground. In ceramics, again, there is a sharp rupture between the typical Kot Diji early and mature Harappan pottery and artifacts. This frenzied urbanization was made possible by an amazing virtuosity in technological innovation, especially in pyrotechnology , that reveals itself in varied products; stoneware, faience, etching baked brick construction , wells double cropping, and the incredible reach of their deep sea maritime exploration. Critically developing earlier characterizations of the IVC peoples by John Marshall ( austere, peaceful, bourgeois merchants, etc) and Wheeler& Piggot (uniform, ordered, regulated, monotonous, without individuality etc). Possehl, after dismissing all speculations about their being governed by priest kings as in Sumer/Akkad, emphasized instead the universalizing fundamentalist ethos of a vigorous , rigid, disciplined elite intent on imprinting their cast of mind on the diverse populace. In fact, he goes so far as to characterize them as nihilists undetaking a socio- cultural revolution against a useless, meaningless past. S central was this ideology than when it collapsed so did the IVC peoples and the civilization itself from around 1900BC”. Coupled this with his next assertion of the IVC dominance of trade and together with their iron will in maintaining a civilization that revolves on the main occupation — that of accumulating wealth. He continues on the strict code of the dwellers of the Indus as they stretched their tentacles overseas to gather wealth in exchange for their products , an array of brilliant display of beads and jewelery and facience. In his third lecture titled :(page 28& 29)

    Indus Civilization & the 3rd Millenium Middle Asian interaction sphere

    In his 3rd lecture he revealed the IVC to be a major league player in what he calls the 3rd Millennium Middle Asian interaction sphere with trade extending from Central Asia (Indus dice at GonorDepe) across the Iranian belt to the Middle East and with tentacles into Africa. Not only did its sailors reach at least this mouth of the Red Sea, but our knowledge of this intercultural sphere begins with the discovery of the IVC, for example , with the typical’ unicorn’ seal of hump less( Bos Taurus) bulls so foreign to India (zebu= Bos Indicus), Meluhha IVC artifacts have been found in Mesopotamia (zebu and tweezers in Ur, unicorn in Kish, baked brick Indian house with drainage facilities in Tell Asimar) and Sargon the Great boasts of the boats of Meluhha-Dilmun -Magan anchored at this harbor. Among the imports from IVC, cornelian, lapis lazuli, pearls, 2 types of wood, fresh dates , a bird , peacock, a dog, cat, copper , gold, boat wooden furniture , figurines of birds. Though there is very little evidence of exchanges with ancient Egypt , IVC sailors seem to have imported African millet from the mouth of the Red Sea; thus sorghum , pearl millet and finger millet spread from Africa between 2400-2200 BC producing a huge impact , even today, on the agriculture of other wise wheat, rice and barley eating South Asians. More relevant to our problematic was his concluding focus on the shift, at the end of the 3rd millenium, of the center of gravity of this interaction sphere to the oases of Margiana- Bactria ( south central Asia at northern fringes of Afghanistan). Artifacts from this BMAC civilization are to be found all over the place from India to Egypt and even Greece and it is only over the last couple of decades that archaeologists are reviewing a vast treasure of scattered objects (much of them sold as pre historical merchanise at the Afghan markets) that previously did not make sense. Here is where Bernard Sergent has identified the archaeological traces of (pre Rigvedic culture that are scarce to come by in India itself ( traceable so far only down till to Pirak)

    The complete different lifestyle, customs and rites of the Indus and Aryans

    The detailed description of the life agricultural life of the Aryans in the Vedas is completely overlooked by the scholars who try to fit it in with the Indus dwellers in article after article. Nothing in the seals and scripts or the archaeological discoveries of the Indus pertain to any thing that the Vedas portrayed. Trade dominated the life and struggles of the Indus people. Trade with distant lands, commerce, huge construction of dams and harbors, cities and its relevant necessities like sewage , toiletry and irrigation etc. So how can the scholars lump the Vedic nomadic lifestyle and the Indus urban life with mining and other such industries as pottery, weaving ,carving of intricate and exquisite jewelery for urban wear and clothing? There are only more or less , some conclusions that can be drawn from the above evidence drawn from the lifestyle of the Aryans and the archaeological evidence of the Indus sites and they are these:

    (1) There are completely two different lifestyles between the two civilizations. One is that the Indus people were a busy , industrious urban population throughout their cities , always building new innovations to increase their wealth and standard of living. This they achieved from intensive and extensive trade far and wide and with their neighbors. There is no doubt about this.
    (2) Secondly, they were masters of their arts and industry for they made use of their statecraft and intelligence and the tools at hand despite the primitive age they lived in , and for this they are admired for this. Their minds were far advanced of their time.
    (3) The pastoral and nomadic lifestyle presented in the Vedas comes nowhere to that of the Indus. Their life consisted of oblations, prayers and sacrifice for wealth. Predatory raids brought in resources for the survival of the tribes and primitive agriculture and conquest were everyday occurrences . Without these , the Aryan occupation of India would not have lasted.
    To carry this theory a little further, I point to an article on the Internet by the famous Finnish scholar Asko Parpola dated 9/25/06 pages 15& 16 titled:

    Unresolved Problems in Identifying Vedic Aryans with the Harappans

    (a) If the Aryans and the Sarasvati- Indus Civilization are both indigenous to India, there is no continuity of cultural development from the Neolithic to the
    Harappa Culture in theSarasvati Valley.

    (b) The continuous growth is evidence only in Baluchistan right from the Upper Palaeolithic to Harappans and also their decline. Could that be the area of Aryavarta (India) of the Vedic Aryans?

    (c) The horse is so important an animal in the Vedas but is conspicuous by its absence in the Harappan seals and icons.

    (d) There is no archaeological evidence to show that the Indus Civilization grew and spread from the Sarasvati Valley towards the west; in fact, it grew in Baluchistan and spread eastwards!

    (e) The Vedic religion is animistic, in contrast to the Harappan religion which is patently iconic.

    (f) At the turn of the II Millennium BCE, there is a break writ large in all aspects : agriculture; diet; burials; architecture; settlement pattern; new cultural elements ( like Cemetery H, Jhukar, BMC artifactsetc) This all round break can perhaps be explained only by new people coming and dominating the scene.

    (g) The new DNA evidence show that there i