Moving away from this topic, if we look at the frequently discussed and controversial Aryan theory in India, then Maxmuller’s theory of Aryans invading India may be wrong but it does not mean that there was no Aryan race at all or they were people from the Indian territory only…
It was a common migration four to five thousand years ago, which used to happen from here to there. Once upon a time, in the north of the Caspian Sea (think present-day Russia and Kazakhstan), people of a tribe lived who developed as Andronovo culture and spread in different directions… They are called Aryans for identification. .
If no one has said this before 1850, then it is also because the concet of archeology
is only one and a half to two hundred years old. As things unfold, opinions are formed about them. According to many people, the term Aryans denote a linguistic family and not a race, and although many examples (including Max Muller’s theory) can be given to justify this, but in my opinion linguistic and racial identities are different.
For Aryans it needs to be seen in a broad perspective. Let us understand this with an example. With the available evidences it is certain that the birthplace of the human race is Africa and not India. Though people migrated from there and spread in small groups and were related to one or a few family trees, it is easy to understand things only by determining their identity separately.
Now take a group settled in the forests of Assam… They are not the children of one father but a group of people including those who may have migrated from their original place in the past and also those who must have joined them after bring separated from their original groups. Without going into too deep, just understand that despite not being the children of one father, that group is a family which we name… Naga.
This Naga family has its own divine beliefs, culture and language… Now when their population increases in proportion to the resources available at that place, then according to tradition, a group of them migrates and settles in a different place and forms a different identity as ‘Krath’. In the same way, groups kept emerging and spreading everywhere. Sometimes they were killed and rest were merged into another group and sometimes they killed people from other groups merged rest with them.
Those migrants also had their own identity in terms of language, culture, beliefs etc. which got mixed with original groups. Due to this internalization, the linguistic identity and culture of both of them were also mixed and they could not remain the exact copy of their original family. In other words, even though there is a lot of similarity in language, they also had their own language and those with whom they mixed also become part of that linguistic family.
Now in such a situation what separate identity will you give to that original clan and the people associated with it so that they can be known as a separate unit? It is obvious that they will be called Naga… In future, this may be called dynasty, or race, but the meaning will be the same family… It is not justifiable to mark that family with the help of linguistic identity because it will not lead to correct diiferentiation.
Apart from this, two other things are worth noting in which one is the pride that we are the best and our culture is the best. We have given all the knowledge to the world and people migrated to the world from here and achieved a lot…. especially in terms of the Aryans. This is a kind of psychosis which creates a big obstacle in seeing history from the right perspective. You will claim Sanskrit as the most ancient language, you will claim your civilization to be the most ancient but you will fail to prove it.
Based on the evidence Tamil will be proved to be the ancient language and the interesting thing is that thousands of kilometers away from here in Syria, Sanskrit words will be found in the Mitanni Treaty in 1380 BC, but such old evidence are not found in India. The language found on inscriptions or Harappan culture is not Sanskrit.
There are no such structures of archaeological importance that can prove that there was a modern urban civilization in the Indian territory before the Harappan period, while in Egypt or Mesopotamia you will find such structures even eight to ten thousand years old. It is still not known that who the Harappan civilization belongs to… So how will you prove your antiquity or superiority? Only with the help of word of mouth?
If you would quote the things of the scriptures, then those are not valid as you don’t have anything which dates back from Christ… Archaeological discoveries are respected all over the world, they are made part of official history, but India is extremely poor in this and the archaeological department here is probably the worst.
You will find religious people in this department who do research not to dig the history but to fit the preconceived notions to the evidence. In 2005 when remains like a submerged city were found on the coast of Gujarat, these people were more interested in proving it to be mytholohical city Dwarka than knowing its reality. This is the reason why there are neither researches of that level here nor those researches get that recognition.
So move away from this superiority complex and accept that there were no intentional borders and the names were just for the identification of any area. In that period thousands of groups of different human beings were spread from the eastern coast of China to the Mediterranean and from the Caspian Sea to France, Germany, etc. and all were developing in their own way in their respective places.
The initial period was also of wars and capturing and there was also reconciliation on the pretext of trade, due to which not only words, language, culture kept mixing, but also the gods and the concepts of the creation of the universe were mixed.
Consider that from India to the far western side of the Mediterranean, some similar things or names are seen in many religions. It is not because of their godliness, but it is because of the trade activities and internalization (think it as a mix of wars, surrender, conquests, and treaties) that can be traced precisely to the alliance between the Romans and the Greeks…
The Greeks were much older than them and had a strong divine concept with many gods and goddesses like Zeus, Poseidon, Athena, Hermes, while the Roman concept was a bit different and limited.. Later when they conquered Greece, they adopted the whole concept including their deities and now it became a joint concept, and all the deities became part of one concept..
In course of time Christians did the same thing with Jews and Muslims with both of them. That is, everything from their gods, deities to their customs and traditions became a part of Islam.
Ashfaq Ahmad 