Aryan Invasion Theory (history and controversies)

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This article is about historical, ideological and socio-political aspects of this controversy. For debates about modern scholarship on the subject of Indian migrations see Indo-Aryan migration.

Background to the controversy

The "Aryan Invasion Theory", abbreviated AIT, is a complex polemical construct used in the context of discussions of South Asian prehistory of the period 3000BC to 1000BC. It is not known who coined the term. It is used almost exclusively by Hindu nationalist writers as a pejorative description of mainstream academic scholarship about this period. The point at dispute is whether the original speakers of Indic languages were autochthonous to the Indian subcontinent, or entered the region from outside (specifically from areas to the north and west of the Indus river).

The case of the supporters of the AIT may be set down as follows. Unlike in the case of Mesopotamia where there are readable written inscriptions dating as far back as the ¨Sumerian period in 3100 BC, there are no written records from the Indian subcontinent before the third century BC except the Indus Valley seals which remain by general academic consensus unreadable despite occasional claims to the contrary. Yet, one must bear in mind that the earliest Hindu scriprtures, the Vedas, were orally transmitted and hence cannot be dated. One set of written records from northern Syria dated to the early second millennium BC do contain several names and words that bear very close relationship to Vedic Sanskrit. Vedic Sanskrit is an Indo-European language like classical Latin and Greek. This means that, analogous to the process by which the English language has spread from an island off the coast of continental Europe to cover all of North America and Australia, the languages that developed into English, German, French, Italian, Greek, Russian, Farsi, Pashto, Punjabi, Gujarati, Bengali and Sinhala (among others) are all directly derived from a common ancestor which was spoken in a single relatively small area at a point in the distant past. There is no general agreement on either the exact date or place of this proto-Indo-European language even with the benefit of several complex arguments based on the linguistic, archaeological and philological evidence. Current mainstream opinion regards the Indian subcontinent as almost certainly an area into which an Indo-European branch diffused rather than from which the Indo-European branch could have spread over its subsequent range.

It is important to note that this conclusion refers to the spread of languages, not people. There are numerous instances in the historical record to show that large areas can change their linguistic affiliation without the original population being wiped out and replaced by another. The dominance of English in Australia is an instance of invasion and replacement of the language of original population. Conversely, the dominance of English in Ireland is an instance of "elite dominance" in which a relatively small number of immigrants are able to impose their own language on a local population, albeit via a process that can take many centuries to carry out. Also, contrary to what is suggested in many polemics on the subject, this conclusion is not based on "unscientific" or "racist" assumptions that Indians are "inferior" and therefore could not have colonised other countries. It is instead based on mainstream readings of an extraordinary wealth of evidence and arguments. To begin to evaluate the arguments on which this conclusion is based requires a decent scholarly acquaintance with subjects as diverse as linguistic substrates and linguistic palaeontology, palatalisation, glottochronology, archaeological evidence, etc. and to do so within the context of the large area across which the Indo-European family of languages is attested in historical times (namely Europe, West Asia, Iran, Central Asia and South Asia).

The "AIT" supporters also use the underlying motives of their opponents to buttress their arguments. They beileve that the other side's polemics are motivated by a strong feeling that the Hindu religion, with its highest texts in Vedic Sanskrit, would become less "authentic" if it were to be accepted that the origin of this language were outside the sacred places of the Indian subcontinent, even though the people who wrote them lived in India and were not aware of other places.

Origins of Indian proto-history

The modern history of Indo-European studies and indeed of linguistics begins with William Jones, writing in the 1790s, who was the first to relate the kinship of Sanskrit with classical European languages.

Some theorists, such as Friedrich Schlegel in 1808, postulated that India was the source of the language. They adopted the term "Indo-Germanic". Others preferred "Indo-European", which is now the standard term. Later theorists identified that the Germanic, Celtic and Slavic languages also derived from the lost proto-Indo-European.

By the 1840s the distribution-pattern of the languages had led several scholars to conclude that India was an unlikely origin-point, since it was at the easternmost extension of the languages. Statements made in the Iranian sacred texts about a northern homeland, along with descriptions of battles in the Rig-Veda, led scholars to conclude that the original Aryans must have migrated to India. This theory is most associated with the linguist Friedrich Max Müller, who argued that the Aryans had migrated to India at around 1500 BC, from an earlier homeland in Bactria or further north, in the Russian steppe. Müller also believed that the gods of the Vedic pantheon were related to the gods of Greek, Roman and of Norse mythology, so he argued that the pagan culture of Europe could be traced back to the Aryans, who must have expanded both eastwards and westwards from their homeland.

Other discoveries in linguistics such as the role of palatalization in Indo-European language change comprehensively discredited the idea that Sanskrit could be the mother of other IE languages.

Max Müller dated the Rig Veda to 1200-1500 BCE, but he also said that these dates were provisional and that he has "repeatedly dwelt on the hypothethical character of the dates... All I have claimed for them has been that they are minimum dates." (Müller 1892). And he also asserted: " Whether the Vedic hynmns were composed 1000, or 1500, or 2000, or 3000 years BC, no power on earth will ever determine." (Müller 1891:91). Max Müller's contemporary critics have pointed out that "the whole foundation of Müller's date rests on the authority of Somadeva.. narrated his tales in the twelfth century after Christ would not be a little surprised to learn that "a European point of view" raises a "ghost story" of his to the dignity of a historical document". (Goldstücker 1860; Bryant 2001).

The common heritage of the Indo-European languages is one of the most powerful and unexpected discoveries of modern science and elicited incredulity which is still to be encountered today. Max Müller recounted that any remarks on Sanskrit were treated with contempt by his teachers and that "no one was for a time so completely laughed down as Professor Bopp, when he first published his Comparative Grammar of Sanskrit, Zend, Greek, Latin and Gothic. All hands were against him." (Müller 1883).

Role in Imperialism and Nazism

The theory that the original Aryans were northern Europeans who had migrated into India was used by some British imperialists as an ideological justification for British control of India, on the grounds that the founders of Indian culture were of the same race as the Anglo-Saxon invaders who established the British Raj. The theory provided an argument for an alliance between the British and the Indian ruling classes. However some Indian nationalists also took the view that the Aryans had originated outside India. In The Arctic Home in the Vedas (1903) Bal Gangadhar Tilak argued on the basis of astronomical data that the Vedas could only have been composed from an Arctic location – the Aryan bards having brought them south after the onset of the last Ice age. The Aryan Invasion Theory was also accepted by the Hitler sympathizers Savitri Devi and her husband Asit Krishna Mukherji. Elst (1999) claimed that "after reading her autobiography, "Memories and Reflexions of an Aryan Lady", there is not the slightest doubt left that for her and her husband, their belief in the AIT, along with their distortive reinterpretation of Hindu tradition in terms of the AIT, was the direct cause of their enthusiasm for Hitler."

The most notorious appropriation of the Nordic theory was that of the Nazis, who adopted the swastika design from Indian culture as an "Aryan" badge. The Nazi race-theorist Alfred Rosenberg argued in his book The Myth of the Twentieth Century (1930) that the Vedas were written by a superior Nordic master race who had invaded and occupied India in ancient times. These people had later become corrupted because they had lost contact with their "racial soul" due to their involvement with subordinated non-Aryans. For the Nazis, the Aryan invasion of India served as an allegory of the dangers of racial mixing. This argument was later repeated by other white supremacists such as the former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke. The Indo-European linguist Jean Haudry, who was involved with the Front national, asserted in 1985 that the Proto-Indo-Europeans were tall, blue-eyed, fair-haired, long-skulled and straight-nosed and supported the Aryan Invasion Theory (Haudry 1985, Elst 1999).

Racial aspects

Some scholars have argued that the transfer of the Indo-Aryan languages into India was accomplished by white-skinned invaders, who subordinated dark-skinned natives. The derogatory application of the word "anasa" (noseless) to the Dasa, the enemies of the Aryans, was interpreted to mean that the Dasa had negroid-type flat noses. Other arguments were derived from alleged references to the "golden" hair of some Vedic deities and the long-standing higher status of fair skin colour in South Asia. From these arguments scholars postulated that the Aryans had subordinated or displaced earlier inhabitants of India. Because the Dravidian languages of southern India were unrelated to Sanskrit and the other languages of the Indo-European group, it was assumed that Dravidian speaking peoples had been the aboriginal inhabitants.

The development of Indo-European linguistics did not lead to any conclusion about the home of the proto-Indo-Europeans, which continues to regard multiple theories to this day. It is possible that that available evidence is simply insufficient to enable us to establish where it was. This is not surprising given the enormous time scale involved: scholarly consensus places PIE at anywhere from four to six thousand years in the past.

Huxley took the view that the "primitive Aryans" were of Nordic race, writing that "typical specimens have tall and massive frames, fair complexions, blue eyes, and yellow or reddish hair–that is to say, they are pronounced blonds." Huxley's view was shared by other writers such as Charles Morris in his 1888 book The Aryan Race, and Friedrich Nietszche in On the Genealogy of Morals (1887). These and other writers argued that the Aryans were a warrior people who had imposed themselves over others by their ruthless military energy, based on chariot warfare. The invaders were thought to have entered the Indian subcontinent from the mountain passes of the Hindu Kush (present-day Afghanistan), bringing with them the domesticated horse, probably previously unknown in India.

Isaac Taylor (The Origins of the Aryans. 1892: 226-227) noted that "German scholars have contended that the physical type of the primitive Aryans was that of the North Germans - a tall, fair, blue-eyed dolichocephalic race", while French writers have maintained that they were brachycephalic Gauls. This increasing preoccupation with race led Max Müller to point out that language and race are not necessarily coterminous: "I have declared again and again that if I say Aryans, I mean neither blood nor bones, nor hair nor skull; I mean simply those who speak an Aryan language… To me an ethnologist who speaks of Aryan race, Aryan blood, Aryan eyes and hair, is as great a sinner as a linguist who speaks of a dolichocephalic dictionary or a brachycephalic grammar." (Max Müller. 1887: 120. "Biographies of Words and the Home of the Aryas".)

Later developments

Even in the 19th century several theorists had criticised the use of the term "primitive Aryans" to refer to the earliest speakers of Indo-European languages, wherever they may have originated. They argued that the word should only describe the cultures in which the term "Arya" was used – those that occupied Iran and northern India. The tribal name of the earliest speakers is unknown, hence the term Proto-Indo-Europeans is now used. Such writers stated that equation of the Indo-Iranians with northern European invaders was unjustified. There was no reason to believe that the peoples of Iran and northern India were ever Nordic. There are references in Sanskrit literature where the hair of Brahmins is assumed to be black. For example, Atharva Veda 6:137. 2-3 contains a charm for making "strong black hairlocks" grow and in Baudhayana’s Dharma-Sutra 1:2, (also cited in Shabara’s Bhasya on Jaimini 1:33) we read the verse "Let him kindle the sacrificial fire while his hair is still black". And apart from a few gods associated with the sun, there is in Sanskrit literature only one golden-haired (hiranyakeshin) person , i.e. Hiranyakeshin, the author of the Hiranyakeshin-Shrauta-Sutra. (M. Witzel in J. Bronkhorst and M.M. Deshpande. 1999: 390).

By the 1920s the theory of Aryan superiority was also challenged by the discovery of the remains of the Indus Valley Civilization, which preceded the postulated Aryan invasion. It was obviously advanced for its time, with planned cities, a standardized system of weights and bricks, etc, and it was understood that if the Aryans had invaded, then, regardless of their later achievements, they had in fact overthrown or at least post-dated a civilization more advanced than their own. On the basis of the Rig-Veda, it was argued that the Aryans themselves must have been semi-nomadic pastoralists. The British archaelogist Mortimer Wheeler argued that the Aryans may have taken advantage of the decline of the Indus civilization to invade it. As he wrote, the war-god Indra "stands accused" of its final destruction.

More recent writers have taken the view that racial arguments are irrelevant to the theory. Hans Hock (1999b) studied all the occurrences that were interpreted racially in Geldner's translation of the Rig Veda and concludes that they were either mistranslated or open to other interpretations. He writes that the racial interpretation of the Indian texts "must be considered dubious." (p.154) Hock also notes that "early Sanskrit literature offers no conclusive evidence for preoccupation with skin color. More than that, some of the greatest Epic heroes and heroines such as Krishna, Draupadi, Arjuna, Nakula and (...) Damayanti are characterized as dark-skinned. Similarly, the famous cave-paintings of Ajanta depict a vast range of skin colors. But in none of these contexts do we find that darker skin color disqualifies a person from being considered good, beautiful, or heroic." (p.154-155) Hans Hock also notes that the world of the Aryas is often described with the words "light, white, broad and wide", while the world of the enemies of the Aryas is often described with the words "darkness or fog". And in many of these instances, he notes, a "racial" interpretation can be safely ruled out. Vishnu, Rama and many others are also described as dark-skinned. On the other hand Siva who is considered by many invasion-theorists as a Dravadian god is often described as fair-skinned. Also, Veda Vyas who compiled the Vedas and wrote the great Hindu epic Mahabharat was dark-skinned.

According to another examination by Trautmann (1997) the racial evidence of the Indian texts is soft and based upon an amount of overreading. He concludes: "That the racial theory of Indian civilization still lingers is a miracle of faith. Is it not time we did away with it?" (p.213-215)

Earlier commentators on the Rig Veda like Sayana (14th century) did not interpret the Rig Veda in racial terms. According to Romila Thapar (1999, The Aryan question Revisited, "There isn't a single racial connotation in any of Sayana's commentaries."

Political and religious issues

In modern India, the discussion of Indo-Aryan migration is charged politically and religiously. Supporters of migration are faced with several accusations. The major one is that the British Raj and European Indologists from the 19th century to the present day promoted the Aryan Invasion hypothesis in support of Eurocentric notions of white supremacy. Assertions that the highly advanced proto-Hindu Vedic culture could not have had its roots in India are seen as attempts to bolster European ideas of dominance.

After Indian independence, Socialist and Marxist accounts of history proliferated in Indian universities. Opponents of the invasion theory contend that Marxists promoted the theory because its model of invasion and subordination corresponded to Marxist concepts of class struggle and ideology. Some modern opponents of the Aryan-Vedic continuity in India, like Romila Thapar, are Marxist. Some others like the Dalit Voice are proponents of the Dalit (outcast) movement. Dalits who support the Theory allege that the Aryans were nomadic plunderers who invaded and destroyed civilizations from Europe to India, especially the Harappan civilization. Missionaries in India have utilized the Aryan Invasion Theory for their own political goals. It was thus proposed by some Christians and Muslims that "Sanskrit should be deleted from the Eight Schedule of the Constitution because it is a foreign language brought to the country by foreingn invaders - the Aryans." (Elst 1999). Some Marxists, Missionaries and Dalits have questioned the legitimacy of Hinduism because of the Aryan Invasion Theory.

In contrast, the proponents of a continuous, ancient, and sophisticated Vedic civilization are seen by some as Hindu nationalists who wish to dispense with the foreign origins of the Aryan for the sake of national pride or religious dogma. The Indian nationalist Veer Savarkar, who invented the term Hindutva, accepted the Aryan Invasion theory (Savarkar: Hindutva, Elst 1999). Another motivation may arise from the desire to eradicate the problem associated with the Indian caste system; the hypothesis that it may originally have been a means of social engineering by the Aryans to establish and maintain a superior position compared to the Dravidians in Indian society may be a source of discomfort.

Shrikant G. Talageri (1993: 47) thinks that the question whether the Aryans came from outside India is not very relevant to Hinduism itself, whose holy places are all in India (in contrast to other religions like Christianity, Judaism and Islam). He noted that "Even if it is assumed that a group of people, called "Aryans", invaded, or immigrated into, India,... they have left no trace, if ever there was any, of any link, much less the consciousness of any link, much less any loyalties associated with such a link, to any place outside India."

Some Hindu thinkers like Sri Aurobindo reacted against the Aryan Invasion theory on spiritual rather than historical grounds, claiming them to be 'materialistic'. Sri Aurobindo interprets the descriptions of war in the Rig Veda often as descriptions of spiritual warfare or as nature-poetry. Some Hindus have emphasized the fact that there is not an explicit mention of an Aryan invasion in the Hindu texts. Aurobindo thus writes: "But the indications in the Veda on which this theory of a recent Aryan invasion is built, are very scanty in quantity and uncertain in their significance. There is no actual mention of any such invasion..."(Sri Aurobindo. The Secret of the Veda. Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Pondicherry. 1971: 23-4) Also Vivekananda (CW Vol. 3) remarked: "As for the truth of these theories, there is not one word in our scriptures, not one, to prove that the Aryan ever came from anywhere outside of India, and in ancient India was included Afghanistan. There it ends."

Literature

J. Bronkhorst and M.M. Deshpande. 1999. Aryan and Non-Aryan in South Asia
Bryant, Edwin: The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture. 2001. Oxford University Press.ISBN 0195137779
Elst, Koenraad Update on the Aryan Invasion Debate. 1999. ISBN 8186471774 ,
Frawley, David The Myth of the Aryan Invasion of India, 1995. New Delhi: Voice of India
Hock, Hans. 1999b, Through a Glass Darkly: Modern "Racial" Interpretations vs. Textual and General Prehistoric Evidence on Arya and Dasa/Dasyu in Vedic Indo-Aryan Society." in Aryan and Non-Aryan in South Asia.
Müller, Max. 1883. India:What it can teach us? London: Longmans.
--. 1891 Physical Religion: The Gifford Lectures. London:Longmans.
--. 1892. Rig-Veda Samhita. Vol. 4. London: Oxford University Press.
Schetelich, Maria. 1990, "The problem ot the "Dark Skin" (Krsna Tvac) in the Rgveda." Visva Bharati Annals 3:244-249.
Parpola, Asko. 1988. The Coming of the Aryans to Iran and India and the Cultural and Ethnic Identity of the Dasas.
Sethna, K.D. 1992. The Problem of Aryan Origins. New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan.
Talageri, Shrikant. 1993. Aryan Invasion and Indian Nationalism.
Trautmann, Thomas R. 1997, Aryans and British India. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Mallory, JP. 1989, In Search of the Indo-Europeans: Language, Archaeology, and Myth

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