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Template:Indo-Aryan ethnicity

If one go by the hitlarian views of some misguided people than Great personalities like Mahatama Gandhi, Tagore, etc. were not Aryans. Aryans seems to have terribly failed in getting recognition in modern sciences and literature. Most of the noble prize winners in India are either Dravidians or Australoids and non Aryans. In past also Aryans did not do any scholarly work and rather fradulently assumed ownership of most of the distinguished works done by non Aryans. For example Raja Harishchander was non aryan, Lord Rama, Lord Krishna, Lord Shiva, were non Aryans. Similarly Vyas, Valmiki, Narhari, Narad, Vishwamittra and many other distinguished scholars in past were non Aryans. Shivaji was Anaryan, Many of the dark skinned and pious hearted Rajputs are not Aryans etc. etc. It is therefore clear that self praise supported by violent behaviour doesnot help one in attaining commanding heights of any reaslistic science.

The Indo-Aryans make up 74% of the population of India and are the creators of the concept of the Aryan race. They are a wide collection of peoples united by their common status as speakers of the Indo-Aryan (Indic) branch of the family of Indo-European and Indo-Iranian languages. Today, there are close to a billion native speakers of Indo-Aryan languages, mostly indigenous to the region of South Asia, though in ancient times, they could have been found on the eastern part of the Iranian plateau (Afghanistan) and in areas as far west as modern Syria and Iraq (the Mittani) and as far east as modern Cambodia and Vietnam (Hindu Khmer and Champa kingdoms). The Roma people migrated westward in medieval times, and modern migration gave rise to Indo-Aryan minorities on every continent.

Pre-Vedic Indo-Aryans

Separation of Indo-Aryans proper from Proto-Indo-Iranians is commonly dated, on linguistic grounds, to roughly 2000 BC. The Nuristani languages probably split in such early times, and are classified as either remote Indo-Aryan dialects or as an independent branch of Indo-Iranian. It is believed that by 1500 BC Indo-Aryans had reached Assyria in the west (the Mitanni) and northern Afghanistan in the east (the Rigvedic tribes).

The spread of Indo-Aryan languages has been connected with the spread of the chariot in the first half of the second millennium BC. Some scholars trace the Indo-Iranians (both Indo-Aryans and Iranians) back to the Andronovo culture (2nd millennium BC). Other scholars like Brentjes (1981), Klejn (1974), Francfort (1989), Lyonnet (1993), Hiebert (1998) and Sarianidi (1993) have argued that the Andronovo culture cannot be associated with the Indo-Aryans of India or with the Mitanni because the Andronovo culture took shape too late and because no actual traces of their culture (e.g. warrior burials or timber-frame materials of the Andronovo culture) have been found in India or Mesopotamia (Edwin Bryant. 2001). The archaeologist J.P. Mallory (1998) finds it "extraordinarily difficult to make a case for expansions from this northern region to northern India" and remarks that the proposed migration routes "only the Indo-Iranian to Central Asia, but not as far as the seats of the Medes, Persians or Indo-Aryans" (Mallory 1998; Bryant 2001: 216).

Other scholars like Asko Parpola (1988) connect the BMAC with the Indo-Aryans. But although horses were known to the Indo-Aryans, evidence for their presence in the form of horse bones is missing in the BMAC (e.g. Bernard Sergent. Genèse de l'Inde. 1997:161 ff.). Asko Parpola (1988) has argued that the Dasas were the "carriers of the Bronze Age culture of Greater Iran" living in the BMAC and that the forts with circular walls destroyed by the Indo-Aryans were actually located in the BMAC. Parpola's hypothesis has been criticized by K.D. Sethna (1992) and other scholars.

Vedic Aryans

The first undisputed horse remains in India are found in the Bronze Age Gandhara Grave culture context from ca. 1600 BC (although there are claims of horse bones found in Harappan and even pre-Harappan layers). This likely corresponds to an influx of early Indo-Aryan speakers over the Hindukush (comparable to the Kushan expansion of the first centuries AD). Together with indigenous cultures, this gave rise to the Vedic civilization of the early Iron Age. This civilization is marked by a continual shift to the east, first to the Gangetic plain with the Kurus and Panchalas, and further east with the Kosala and Videha. This Iron Age expansion corresponds to the black and red ware and painted grey ware cultures.

Antiquity

The Vedic Kuru and Panchala kingdoms in the first millennium became the core of the Mahajanapadas, archaeologically corresponding to the Northern Black Polished Ware, and the rise of the Mauryan Empire, and later the medieval Middle kingdoms of India.

For Hellenistic times, Oleg N. Trubachev (1999; elaborating on a hypothesis by Kretschmer 1944) suggests that there were Indo-Aryan speakers in the Pontic steppe. The Maeotes and the Sindes, the latter also known as "Indoi" and described by Hesychius as an "an Indian people".

Middle Kingdoms

The various Prakrit vernaculars developed into independent languages in the course of the Middle Ages (see Apabhramsha), forming the Abahatta group in the east and the Hindustani group in the west, see also History of the Hindi language. The Roma people (also known as Gypsies) are believed to have left India around AD 1000.21

Contemporary Indo-Aryans

Contemporary speakers of Indo-Aryan languages are spread over most of the northern Indian Subcontinent. The largest group are the speakers of the Hindi and Urdu dialects of the India and Pakistan, together with other dialects also grouped as Hindustani, numbering at roughly half a billion native speakers, constituting the largest community of speakers of any of the Indo-European languages. Other Indo-Aryan communities are in Bangladesh, Nepal and parts of Afghanistan. Of the 23 national languages of India, 16 are Indo-Aryan dialects (see also languages of India). The only Indo-Aryan branch surviving outside the Indian Subcontinent and the Himalayas is the Romani language, the language of the Roma people (Gypsies).

Hindustani communities

Hindustani is an umbrella term for various dialects descended from the Prakrits of medieval India. The largest of these are the Hindi and Urdu languages. Hindustani speaking people inhabit modern-day Pakistan and northern India. During the British Raj, this region was identified as "Hindustan", the Persian for "Land of the Hindus". Related languages are spoken all over Indian subcontinent, from Bengal to Sri Lanka and the Maldives.

Roma and Sinti

The closely related Roma and Sinti people, also known as "Gypsies", are traditionally nomadic. They are believed to have left India in about 1000 AD and to have passed through what is now Afghanistan, Persia, Armenia, and Turkey. People recognizable by other Roma as Roma still live as far east as Iran, including some who made the migration to Europe and returned. By the 14th century, the Roma had reached the Balkans; by the 15th century they appeared in Western Europe; and by the 16th century, they had reached Scotland and Sweden. Peoples with some similarity to the Roma still exist in India, particularly in the desert state of Rajasthan. Roma immigration to the United States began in colonial times, and larger scale immigration began in the 1860s with groups from Britain. The largest number of immigrants came over in the early 1900s. A large number also moved to Latin America.

Indo-Aryan peoples

References

1. Sindoi (or Sindi etc.) were also described by e.g. Herodotus, Strabo, Dionysius, Stephen Byzantine, Polienus.

• Bryant, Edwin (2001). The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-513777-9.
• Mallory, JP. 1998. "A European Perspective on Indo-Europeans in Asia". In The Bronze Age and Early Iron Age Peoples of Eastern and Central Asia. Ed. Mair. Washington DC: Institute for the Study of Man.
• Trubachov, Oleg N., 1999: Indoarica, Nauka, Moscow.

See also

Part of a series on
Indo-European topics
Languages List of Indo-European languages Extant Albanoid Albanian Armenian Balto-Slavic Baltic Slavic Celtic Germanic Hellenic Greek Indo-Iranian Indo-Aryan Iranian Nuristani Italic Romance Extinct Anatolian Tocharian Paleo-Balkan Dacian Illyrian Liburnian Messapic Mysian Paeonian Phrygian Thracian Reconstructed Proto-Indo-European language Phonology: Sound laws, Accent, Ablaut Hypothetical Balkanic Daco-Thracian Graeco-Albanian Graeco-Armenian Graeco-Aryan Graeco-Phrygian Indo-Hittite Italo-Celtic Thraco-Illyrian Grammar Vocabulary Root Verbs Nouns Pronouns Numerals Particles Other Proto-Albanian Proto-Anatolian Proto-Armenian Proto-Germanic (Proto-Norse) Proto-Italo-Celtic (Proto-Celtic · Proto-Italic) Proto-Greek Proto-Balto-Slavic (Proto-Slavic · Proto-Baltic) Proto-Indo-Iranian (Proto-Iranian)
Philology Hittite inscriptions Hieroglyphic Luwian Linear B Rigveda Avesta Homer Behistun Greek epigraphy Phrygian epigraphy Messapic epigraphy Latin epigraphy Gaulish epigraphy Runic epigraphy Ogham Gothic Bible Bible translations into Armenian Tocharian script Old Irish glosses Albanian Kanun
Origins Homeland Proto-Indo-Europeans Society Religion Mainstream Kurgan hypothesis Indo-European migrations Eurasian nomads Alternative and fringe Anatolian hypothesis Armenian hypothesis Beech argument Indigenous Aryanism Baltic homeland Paleolithic continuity theory
Archaeology Chalcolithic (Copper Age) Pontic Steppe Domestication of the horse Kurgan Kurgan stelae Kurgan culture Steppe cultures Bug–Dniester Sredny Stog Dnieper–Donets Samara Khvalynsk Yamnaya Mikhaylovka culture Novotitarovskaya culture Caucasus Maykop East Asia Afanasievo Eastern Europe Usatovo Cernavodă Cucuteni Northern Europe Corded ware Baden Middle Dnieper Bronze Age Pontic Steppe Chariot Yamnaya Catacomb Multi-cordoned ware Poltavka Srubnaya Northern/Eastern Steppe Abashevo culture Andronovo Sintashta Europe Globular Amphora Corded ware Bell Beaker Únětice Trzciniec Nordic Bronze Age Terramare Tumulus Urnfield Lusatian South Asia BMAC Yaz Gandhara grave Iron Age Steppe Chernoles Europe Thraco-Cimmerian Hallstatt Jastorf Caucasus Colchian India Painted Grey Ware Northern Black Polished Ware
Peoples and societies Bronze Age Anatolian peoples (Hittites) Armenians Mycenaean Greeks Indo-Iranians Iron Age Indo-Aryans Indo-Aryans Iranians Iranians East Asia Wusun Yuezhi Europe Celts Gauls Celtiberians Insular Celts Cimmerians Hellenic peoples Italic peoples Germanic peoples Paleo-Balkan/Anatolia Thracians Dacians Illyrians Paeonians Phrygians Scythians Middle Ages East Asia Tocharians Europe Albanians Balts Slavs Norsemen/Medieval Scandinavians Middle Ages Indo-Aryan Medieval India Iranian Greater Iran
Religion and mythology Reconstructed Proto-Indo-European mythology Proto-Indo-Iranian paganism Historical Vedic religion Ancient Iranian religion Historical Hittite Indo-Aryan Vedic Hinduism Buddhism Jainism Sikhism Iranian Persian Zoroastrianism Kurdish Yazidism Yarsanism Scythian Ossetian Others Armenian European Paleo-Balkan (Albanian · Illyrian · Thracian · Dacian) Greek Roman Celtic Irish Scottish Breton Welsh Cornish Germanic Anglo-Saxon Continental Norse Baltic Latvian Lithuanian Slavic Practices Fire rituals Horse sacrifice Sati Winter solstice/Yule
Indo-European studies Scholars Marija Gimbutas J. P. Mallory Institutes Copenhagen Studies in Indo-European Publications Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture The Horse, the Wheel, and Language Journal of Indo-European Studies Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch Indo-European Etymological Dictionary
v t e

• Aryan
• Arya
• Aryavarta
• Aryan race
• Indo-Aryan migration
• Dasa
• Kshatriya
• Proto-Indo-Europeans
• Indo-Aryan languages

• Ancient peoples
• Indo-Aryan peoples
• Eurasian nomads