Rigvedic vis-à-vis Epic-Puranic Geography — The Four Theories
Shrikant G. Talageri
Recently, my blog "A Review of 'Rivers of Ṛgveda' by Jijith Nadumuri Ravi" brought up a flurry of questions from some individuals (whom I will not name) who want to go deeply into issues in their own way. The two main questions they asked were: why was I writing a strong critique of a writer who has otherwise proved to be a strong supporter of my OIT theory, and who, as per my own testimony, has helped me in ways I should be grateful for. And secondly, why was I criticizing a book which has been given strong recommendations even by eminent writers like Bibek Debroy?
To answer the first question in full, I will require to go into a little more detail about the difference between the geographical picture conjured up by the Epic-Puranic literature and the geographical picture indicated by the evidence of the geographical data in the Rigveda, and the different ways in which these two geographical pictures are sought to be reconciled. But before doing that, let me answer the second question in short:
Bibek Debroy also featured on the blurb of the book "Early Indians" by Tony Joseph, and in later references to it on the media, highly recommending that book. Now he is highly recommending Jijith's book. Is it humanly possible, given the completely opposite direction of the two books, that anyone could find both these books equally "convincing", or is he now prepared to take back his earlier recommendation of Tony Joseph's book in the light of his present reading and recommendation of Jijith's book? It is clear, to me at least, that, great though he undoubtedly may be in his own field, he seems to be in the habit of highly recommending books without reading them (much less analyzing them) in detail, solely on the basis of the status of the writer: first the internationally known journalist (backed by powerful moneyed international interests), and now the ISRO scientist who received an award for his scientific work at the hands of perhaps the most respected former President of India. Well, this is a personal matter, and I will not dwell on it, but, in the circumstances, his recommendations cannot be taken seriously.
To return to the subject on hand, the geography of the Rigveda on the one hand, and the geography of the Epic-Puranic texts, as given in the texts themselves, are very clear:
1. The total geographical horizon of the Rigvedic data covers a northwestern area from the Sarayu river in Afghanistan (the Herat or Harirud) in the north-west to the westernmost areas of the Ganga and Yamuna in the south-east, i.e. to the lands of the Matsyas (VII.18.6) and the Kīkaṭas (III.53.14, whom WITZEL 1995b:333 fn locates "in eastern Rajasthan or western Madhya Pradesh").
2. The total geographical horizon of the Epic-Puranic data extends not only all over India but beyond it on both sides, extending to parts of SE Asia in the east and Central Asia in the northwest:
2a) However, this total Epic-Puranic data represents the areas known to the writers of the Epic-Puranic texts during and after the Mauryan period when these texts came to be put down in writing.
2b) The earliest origins of the different peoples, nations and tribes, as per the Epic-Puranic data, are mythically traced to an ancestral Manu Vaivasvata whose ten sons ruled over different areas covering this whole geographical horizon. However, while there are formally ten sons, the history and geography of only two sons (Iḷa and Ikṣvāku) and their descendants (respectively the Lunar and Solar tribes or peoples) are described in detail. And their geographical areas described in the texts are as follows:
The tribes described as descended from Ikṣvāku lived in eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. The descendants of Iḷa were divided into five main conglomerates of tribes (mythically treated in the later narratives as Aiḷas descended from the five sons of Yayāti, a descendant of Iḷa): the Pūru tribes in the general area of Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh, the Anu tribes to their North in the areas of Kashmir and the areas to its immediate west, the Druhyu tribes to the West in the areas of the Greater Punjab, the Yadu tribes to the southwest in the areas of Gujarat, Rajasthan and western Madhya Pradesh, and the Turvasu tribes to the Southeast (generally to the east of the Yadu tribes).
The Puranas, just as they fail to give details of the history and even the precise geography of the other eight sons of Manu, fail to give details of the history and even the precise geography of the Turvasu tribes (who are generally mentioned in tandem with the more important Yadu tribes). The main concentration of Puranic (and the Epic and other later traditional) narrative is on the history of the Pūru tribes of the western north, the Ikṣvāku tribes of the eastern north, and the Yadu tribes of the southwestern north. The early history of the Druhyu tribes is given, but later they disappear from the horizon and the history of the Anu tribes occupies a comparatively peripheral space in the Puranas.
So this is the very clear geographical data in the two (sets of) texts for the earliest period. The question is: what is the narrative which can explain or coordinate the difference in the two sets of geographical data?
So far, all discussion on the matter has been between two conflicting cases: the AIT (Aryan Invasion Theory) case and the OIT (Out-of-India Theory) case. But with the proposition put forward by Jijith in his book, it is time to recognize that a Vedic-centric attitude towards Indian history leads to a new AIOIT (Aryan Invasion Out-of-India Theory) case. So now there are actually three conflicting cases. Let us understand their contours.
1. The AIT: According to the AIT, there were twelve branches of IE languages in a PIE homeland in the Steppes. Speakers of two (Indo-Aryan and Iranian) of those twelve branches separated from the speakers of the other ten in the Steppes itself and moved eastwards into Central Asia. Then the speakers of Indo-Aryan separated from the speakers of Iranian in Central Asia and moved southeastwards into the northwestern parts of India, conquering and imposing their languages and rule over the original non-IE-speaking people of this area (i.e. the multitudinous Harappans).
Here, these various Indo-Aryan tribes settled down and composed the Rigveda in a geographical area extending from Afghanistan in the west to the western borders of the Ganga-Yamuna rivers in the east.
Later, their descendants migrated further eastwards into the rest of North India, and settled down in different parts over the whole of North India, conquering the local inhabitants and imposing their languages and rule over them. And still later these various Indo-Aryan tribes remembered their traditional history in these areas as if their earliest ancestors also lived in these areas where they themselves happened to be living, i.e. all over North India.
This is the explanation, as per the AIT for the geographical discrepancies in the two sets of texts as to the original or earliest geographical locations of the various Indo-Aryan tribes.
In sum: the AIT treats the geographical descriptions in the Epic-Puranic texts for the earliest locations of the various tribes as incorrect, i.e. based on incorrect superimposition of later contemporary geographical locations onto past events.
2. The OIT: According to the OIT, the speakers of various IE dialects were spread out over the major part of North India, as per the Epic-Puranic descriptions of the locations of the Ikṣvāku (Solar) and Aiḷa (Lunar) tribes.
The Rigveda was not jointly composed by the ancestors of the various tribes, but only by the members of one particular tribe, the Pūrus, who are in fact located by the Epic-Puranic data in the geographical area of the Rigveda. The other four Lunar Aiḷa tribes, and the Solar Ikṣvāku tribes, were located (during this period of composition of the Rigveda) in the areas to the north/west and south/east of the Rigvedic area, again as located by the Epic-Puranic data.
Major sections of two of these Lunar tribes, the Druhyus and Anus of the north/west, migrated outwards in two sets of migrations which took what became eleven branches of IE languages into their historical areas in Central Asia, Iran, West Asia and Europe.
Within India, as the Vedic Pūru form of religion spread all over the rest of the country (absorbing all the different forms of religion within India into itself and becoming the composite religion that we today call Hinduism), the other IE languages spoken by the other IE tribes to the east and south of the Pūrus (as well as the remnants of the speakers of the Anu and Druhyu dialects to their north and west) gradually evolved into the modern languages that we today call Indo-Aryan languages (with features and strong traces of their original different forms).
In sum: the OIT accepts the geographical descriptions in both, the Rigvedic data as well as in the Epic-Puranic data, as essentially correct for the earliest locations of the various tribes, and shows how the two sets of data confirm each other.
3. The AIOIT: According to the AIOI, the speakers of various IE languages (and the various Epic-Puranic tribes) were originally located within the geographical area of the Rigveda, extending from Afghanistan in the west to the western borders of the Ganga-Yamuna rivers in the east. Within this area, the different exponents of this theory locate the ultimate origin of these IE-language speakers (or the Epic-Puranic tribes) differently: Narhari Achar locates them in the Soma lands of Central Asia, Afghanistan and the extreme northwest of India; P.L. Bhargava locates them all over the different parts of the Saptasindhu or Greater Punjab; Jijith Nadumuri Ravi locates them all on the banks of the Sarasvati.
From this point, this AIOIT theory, often without exactly stating it in unambiguous terms, combines one part of the AIT with one part of the OIT:
In the West, it accepts the OIT case according to which the Druhyus and Anus of the north/west, migrated westwards in two sets of migrations which took what became eleven branches of IE languages into their historical areas in Central Asia, Iran, West Asia and Europe.
In the East, it accepts the AIT case according to which the various Epic-Puranic tribes migrated further eastwards into the rest of North India, and settled down in different parts over the whole of North India, conquering the local inhabitants and imposing their languages and rule over them. And still later these various Indo-Aryan tribes remembered their traditional history in these areas as if their earliest ancestors also lived in these areas where they themselves happened to be living, i.e. all over North India.
In sum: the AIOIT, exactly like the AIT, treats the geographical descriptions in the Epic-Puranic texts for the earliest locations of the various tribes as incorrect, i.e. based on incorrect superimposition of later contemporary geographical locations onto past events.
In one circumstance, this is even worse than the direct AIT version, because the AIT version merely assumes as fact the theory that the geographical descriptions in the Epic-Puranic texts for the earliest locations of the various tribes are incorrect, i.e. based on incorrect superimposition of later contemporary geographical locations onto past events. It does not generally actually try to chalk out (some writers like Witzel being an exception) a fictitious story to this effect from within the Rigveda: it mostly assumes the Epic-Puranic personalities and events to be post-Rigvedic.
The AIOIT version, on the other hand, actually tries to prove its point by specifically tracing the origin of the earliest Epic-Puranic personalities and rivers of the East and South within the geographical area of the Rigveda, inventing fictitious migration stories and making fictitious identifications of rivers and kings, none of which is based on any written records. The AIOIT case thereby shows even greater disregard for the geographical data in the Epic-Puranic literature than the AIT case.
If I can criticize the AIT, and if I can criticize the OIT version of Nilesh Oak and other writers belonging to that school — which is after all a full-fledged OIT version (even if the penchant for pushing dates back into the extremely remote past makes their pronouncements difficult to digest and open to ridicule; and I would have refrained from entering into direct confrontation with that school, leaving it to its devices and its admirers as a harmless school of popular thought, if not for some provocative remarks against me for not accepting their dates) — then I certainly have to criticize the AIOIT case for its greater potential for real damage.
If I may put it by means of an analogy (some may feel it is a self-flattering one), the two main existing theories can be likened to two forms of liquid: the AIT case with the economic-political strength of liquid petroleum, and the OIT case with the intrinsic healthiness of milk. [The OIT variant propagated by the Nilesh Oak school of writers is also an OIT case, but it is milk laced with bhang (bhang thandai in short) which gives its drinkers a high]. That both liquid petroleum and bhang thandai are different from milk proper need hardly be pointed out, although bhang thandai can be drunk, and liquid petroleum cannot be drunk without lethal toxic effects. What then is the place of the AIOIT case presented by Jijith in his book?
The AIOIT case is even more disruptive than the AIT case because it looks deceptively like the OIT case: it is synthetic milk, made from chemicals and fertilizers, which is more dangerous than liquid petroleum since no-one will be fooled into thinking liquid petroleum is milk, but people can be made to think that synthetic milk is milk:
The OIT case has been my life's work, fully crystallized over 30 years of study, and there is no objection or doubt, provided data on the point exists, that cannot be answered on the subject. It cannot be challenged, but it can be sabotaged (even if unintentionally or unconsciously done) by misdirection by means of revisionist theories, such as the AIOIT case presented by Jijith Nadumuri Ravi in his book. Already I noticed a review in Swarajyamag.com which first referred to my OIT work and then added "Through this book, Jijith has taken the research to the next level, building a comprehensive, convincing and compelling narrative".
I have no objection to people considering Jijith's theory "comprehensive, convincing and compelling" — every theory has its supporters and admirers — but it is definitely not the "next level" of my research: it is a complete misdirection of my research and takes the paradigm away from the paradigm indicated by the data and presented by me. Life is short, and no-one knows exactly how short. I cannot do anything after I am gone, but that is all the more reason for me to set the record straight when I am still there to do it. And that is more important than maintaining friendships and goodwill, though the importance of that also can never be overestimated.
In the title of this article, I spoke about four theories trying to coordinate the Vedic and Puranic geographical data for the earliest "Solar" and "Lunar" dynasties. Three of them, of course, are the AIT, OIT and AIOIT elaborated above. The AIOIT, as we saw, tries to forcefit Puranic geographical data (regarding the original or earliest locations of these various tribes) into the ambits of Rigvedic geography by creating fictitious identifications of rivers (primarily five different Sarayus), forcefitting Epic-Puranic kings and events connected with them (not found in the Rigveda) into the Rigvedic narrative, and tracing out fictitious migration-routes (totally unsupported by the data in both the Rigveda as well as the Epic-Puranic texts) to show the migrations of "Solar" and "Lunar" tribes from the Sarasvati area into the rest of North India.
There can be a fourth theory which tries to do the opposite: i.e. which tries to forcefit the Rigvedic geography into the All-North-India ambits of Puranic geography, or, in other words, to show that the Rigveda was not composed only in the northwestern parts of India but by composers spread out over the whole of North India. While no-one has yet brought such a formal theory into the debate, there have always been Hindu writers who have expressed such views. For example, it has been suggested before by many Hindu writers that the Seven Rivers mentioned so frequently in the Rigveda are not, as generally accepted, the Sarasvati and the Indus and the five rivers of the Punjab between the two, but the Seven Sacred Rivers of latter-day Hinduism: the Ganga, Yamuna, Sarasvati, Sindhu, Godavari, Narmada and Kaveri.
From that, the next step would be finding these rivers "mentioned" in the Rigveda. The word Brahmaputra occurring once in II.43.2 could be interpreted as a reference to the river of that name in Assam. The word Godā in I.4.2; III.30.21; IV.22.10; V.42.8; VIII.45.19 could be interpreted as a reference to the Godāvarī. The word Nārmara in II.13.8 in conjunction with a river referred to as Ūrjayantī (which Jijith identifies as the Sarasvati on pp.78,228,etc. of his book) could then well be identified as a reference to the Narmadā.
I am not trivializing the data. I am showing how the data can be trivialized in a bid to forcefit it into an unrecorded, incompatible and fictitious geographical scenario.
It is only the OIT which respects the geographical data for the earliest "Solar" and "Lunar" dynasties as given in both the Rigveda as well as in the Epic-Puranic literature, and shows how this data in the two sets of texts fits into a single geographical scenario without any forcefitting.
Refusal of most scholars to accept Puranic literature is on the basis that these texts are composed 2500-1500 years ago and hence not useful for studying Vedic or pre-Vedic history.
ReplyDeleteBy that logic, books on Indian history written by scholars over last two centuries should not be considered as sources of historical information since they were written 1000 to 2000 years after the event!
Writing a history disregarding literary sources is against rules of historiography. A literary source must be disregarded only when there is clear evidence to disprove it. As long as it is not disproved conclusively, it must be accepted as evidence.
Many say that archaeology does not provide evidence that there was a civilization in Ganga Basin before 1000 BC. But this argument is not convincing - because absence of evidence need not be evidence of absence.
Shrikant ji, you are doing everything you could to discredit my book Rivers of Rgveda. But please don't put words into my mouth. My theory cannot be described as AIOT, because it is not an 'invasion' theory.
ReplyDeleteMy OIT theory detailed in the book Rivers of Rgveda describes the source of origin of Ikswakus and Ailas along the banks of Sarasvati and broadly in the region between Yamuna and Sarasvati. The region between Sarasvati and Drishadvati rivers is considered as sacred in the Rgveda and in the Mahabharata. It is the Vara Prthivya of the Rgveda and the Kurukshetra of the Mahabharata
All these places, Sarasvati, Drishadvai and Yamuna are located within our collective cultural region called Bharata!
People moving from one place in Bharata to another place in Bharata is not 'invasion'. Cultural diffusion from one place in Bharata to another place in Bharata is not 'invasion'. The spread of language from one place in Bharata to another place in Bharata is not 'invasion'.
What I am explaining in the book is the migration of the royal dynasties and the diffusion of culture that originated in this sacred region to the rest of the Bharatavarsha. This region hailed in the Rgveda as Vara Prthivya (the best place on earth), Nabha Prithivya (the naval of the earth), described in the Mahabharata as Brahmavedi (the altar of Brahma), Uttaravedi (the northern altar), Brahmavarta (the place of action of Brahma) and as the playground of the Devas and finally renamed by king Kuru as the Kurukshetra. Sarasvati is hailed as the goddess of knowledge by all the Bharatiyas. For this Sarasvati has not invaded any lands. She was adopted by the Bharatiyas as their goddess of knowledge, because people from Sarasvati imparted knowledge to everybody in Bharata. Nobody from Sarasvati has invaded anybody's lands in Bharata. The people from Sarasvati only enriched the Bharatiyas with knowledge and wisdom. The culture that spread from Sarasvati got diffused into pre-existing cultures of Bharata, but did not replace the existing cultures like for example what Abrahamic Religion has done in all over the world.
The western world influenced by Abrahamism knows only to invade. They think the only way culture can spread from one place to other is through invasion. They have no idea that culture can diffuse and blend into other cultures by mutual acceptance, due to mutual beneifit. The mutual benifits that different cultures get by blending their culture to other cultures including new knowledge, new way of doing things, better social and political stability and so on. Those influenced by Abrahamism has no knowledge of it. According to them, the only way a culture spread is through invasions, battles, wars, and total destruction of the target culture! That is why they brought up theories like Aryan Invasion Theory.
I am not putting words into your mouth. I am only quoting your own words from your book. I am of course pointing out that your case represents an OIT case from Sarasvati westwards and an AIT case from the Sarasvati eastwards. Whether movements can be characterized as invasions or migrations or tricklings-in is a polemical matter which people like Witzel like to debate. The geographical details as given in your book show your theory to be an AIT+OIT theory, which I characterize as AIOIT (for want of a better word): quibbling over the word does not change the case presented.
DeleteI am not trying to "discredit" your theory, I am only pointing out what that theory represents. From the amount of people who must now be fans of your theory, it is obvious that this kind of theory has its strong fan following. In fact you even set up one of your fans (who was always trolling me and writing rubbish in his tweets) to propagate your theory by sending him a copy of a private mail in which I called him a clown. He is doing it on a war footing now. So your theory does not stand discredited by me: it stands in its own rights as a different theory from mine with its own supporters, which is as it should be. I just want it to be clear that it is a completely different theory, not an OIT, or an "updatation of Talageri's work" as that clown is now claiming on twitter.
Thanks for your note Talageri ji, clarifying that you are not trying to 'discredit' my theory. It means a lot. However I object to the portrayal of cultural diffusion or the movement of people and languages from one local sub-region to another local sub-region of a collective cultural region (Bharatavarsha) as an 'invasion'. It is a complete distortion of what my book is demonstrating. Hence, your application of the term 'AIOIT'. onto my Sarasvati origin OIT theory, with migrations from Sarasvati to east and west, is wrong. Not only myself, nobody reading my book will accept that. You can use other terms to describe my theory, such as Sarasvati-Origin cultural diffusion theory, the Theory of Sarasvati-Origin of the Ikshwakus & Ailas and their migrations from there to east and west etc. These will be acceptable to me, because these terms are the accurate terms that describe my theory, detailed in the book Rivers of Rgveda.
DeleteLet me publicly clarify that I have not asked or tasked anyone to propagate my theory. Nor have i copied any mails to anyone, like you mentioned in your comment. If anyone is propagating, reviewing, commenting or praising or criticizing my theory, they are doing it on their own, without any influence or direction from my side.
As per the AIT, the Vedic Aryans at the time of the Rigveda were spread out from Afghanistan to the western limits of the Ganga. They had not yet spread east of it or south of it into UP, Bihar, Rajasthan, Gujarat and MP. Their story about the spread of the "Aryans" from the Rigvedic area to all these areas can also be called cultural diffusion. The question is: who lived there in all these areas before the Rigvedic Aryans (who had no extraterritorial memories) arrived there from the Rigvedic areas?
ReplyDeleteThe same question applies to your theory. And I have pointed this out many times before. The Puranas talk about the Ikshvakus being in Avadh from the beginning, and do not remember any non-Ikshvakus living there earlier. Does this mean that all the non-Ikshvakes disappeared into thin air taking their traditional memories with them? Or was the whole area an uninhabited desert. If the Ikshvakus came from the Sarasvati area, who was there in Avadh before, and who wiped out all their traditional historical memories and replaced them with Ikshvaku ones?
Both the AIT and your theory (which is not substantiated by any text) fail to answer these questions, or rather, the answer in both cases (whatever the answer) is the same.
If you did not copy my mail to anyone, how did he put up a portion of that mail of mine in his twitter screen with a comment (from whom?) saying: "My answer: I chose not to answer further"?
But this is not a personal thing. It is about how we interpret the textual data. Do we accept the actual data and examine what the data shows, or do we try to force the data into our theory to claim that there is textual evidence for our theory. The evidence shows that the earliest textual data, in both the Rigveda and the Epic-Puranic texts, shows the "Lunar" and "Solar" tribes distributed all over North India.
DeleteI believe, based on linguistic evidence (older forms in the east, a remote Austronesian connection in the past, Austric typological influence on the formation of the IE numbers) that the origin is further east. I can state that as a matter of linguistic evidence. But I cannot force the textual data to show that even the textual data shows an eastern origin, so I just leave it as an extra-textual opinion of mine when describing the textual data which does not actually show this eastern origin.
Likewise, you believe the archaeological data (if languages must compulsorily have originated in archaeologically discovered urban civilizational areas) shows a Sarasvati area origin. You could have shown what the Epic-Puranic historical data actually tells us (you have such a massive data on that, that you could have produced a book on the Puranas which would have easily replaced Pargiter's as the main reference source on the Puranas), but you chose to try to show that the textual data confirms your opinion based on your interpretation of the archaeological situation.
You have gone so far in this matter, by way of your book (and your statements about your forthcoming books) that you cannot go back on it, so you will only continue to go forward on this. So there is no point in debating this and expecting to arrive at a consensus on the textual issue. But it should be made clear that your case and my OIT case are in clear contradiction, and that your interpretation of the texts, seeing accounts and geographical features in them which are not actually there in the texts but are assumed by you because that goes with your archaeological perceptions, is not in any way a development of my OIT case but a totally different case altogether.
In a way, I could say your interpretations are also an attempt to "discredit" my OIT case, but I know this is not so since there are clearly no unfriendly or hostile motives involved here. It is purely a matter of a different viewpoint leading to a totally different (from mine) IE paradigm.
Shrikant ji, Let us agree to disagree then.
ReplyDeleteOnly four thing remains to say:-
1.
I have already answered your questions like who lived in the eastern regions before Ikswakus and whether the eastern areas being un-inhabited desert etc. You have asked the same questions to Dr Narhari Achar and PL Bhargava and i have answered for all of them too. Hence, I am not repeating it again.
2.
"AIT too can also be called cultural diffusion" like my theory. But no. AIT - Aryan 'Invasion' Theory - is an 'Invasion' theory and not a cultural diffusion theory. This theory believes in total destruction of the target culture and its replacement with new culture. My theory of people migrating from Sarasvati to east and west is not this. Its about the diffusion of the culture of Sarasvati to the rest of the Bharata, starting with the Indo Gangatic plain.
3.
I have mentioned in the preface of the Book Rivers of Rgveda, that I am writing three books:- one on Rgveda Geography, one on Ramayana Geography and a third on Mahabharata Geography. The entire migration paradigm and the associated data is spread across these three books. I have included more information about how Ikshwakus spread into Indo Gangatic plain and then how they spread into the south throguh the southern tributaries of Yamuna and how they spread further into the south - in my second book on Ramayana Geography. The book on Mahabharata Geography explains how the Aila branches spread into diverse locations in Bharata. The book on Rgveda happened to be 100% complete and other two at 60% and 30% complete respectively as of now. Hence, wait for the remaining data to come out to make concluding remarks. The two remaining books on VRM and MBH will bring out the 'massive data' on Itihasas (not on Puranas) that I have.
4
I am not currently focusing on the 'Puranas'. They are distinct and separate from the Itihasas (VRM and MBH). I have seen you clubbing them together in your writings as 'Epic-Puranic'. But I consider Puranas to be authored at a different time period, which is later than the authorship of the two Itihasas, much like how the Rgveda is authored earlier to the Itihasas. I think that is the correct view, giving due respect to both the distinct categories:- Itihasa-category and the Purana-category. I do acknowedge Purana-style incursions into the two Ithihasas which I am marking clearly in my upcoming two books on VRM and MBH Geography. Additionally I have no plans to write a book on the Puranas in 2022. Except Visnu Purana I haven't studied the Puranas verse-by-verse with deep data mining and data analysis. Hence, any books i will be writing on the Puranas will be after such a study, may be in 2024 or 2025.
Yes, let us agree to disagree. But:
Delete1. No, you have not answered any of the questions.
2. AIT as a scholarly thesis without the political corollaries that people apply to it is as much a theory of cultural diffusion as your Sarasvati theory.
3. You can certainly write books on Ramayana geography and Mahabharata geography, but that will be the geography as known to the final redactors of the two Epics during the Mauryan period, including references to the areas of the Pandyas, Cholas and Cheras and others of the time. But it will have no bearing whatsoever on the original locations of the different Solar and Lunar tribes.
4. The problems with your case cannot be brushed aside by drawing a distinction between the Epics and Puranas.
I find it surprising that you totally fail to understand the glaring logical flaws in your case, but as I wrote in the above article, you have gone too far on this path to turn back. And there is no practical need also for you to deviate from this path, since you are fulfilling the wishful aspirations of a large class of Hindus who would likewise want a Rigvedic-Harappan origin to the whole of Indian civilization, and will therefore be extremely receptive to what you are writing. So I have no doubt whatsoever about your success, and I wish you well on that score.
A good article or book on how Vedic religion spread all over India is required. We need to know How, Why and When Bharat became Bharat? When the Vedas were being composed, 3,500 to 1,500 BCE, Bharat was only the area around Northern River Saraswathi, the area around Rakhigharhi, modern day Haryana.
ReplyDeleteBy about 1,000 BCE whole of modern day India and Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, etc., came to be known as Bharat.
So it appears that after the River Saraswathi dried up, around 1,900 BCE, the Vedas were adopted by all the people of India.
Why and how did this happen?
Did the Puru / Kuru migrate all over India after River Saraswathi dried up or did the Ikswaku spread it all over India, based on the Ramayana story of Shri Ram's journey to South India.
When did the Dravidians accept the vedas?