Out-of-India - From Theory to Truth

A_Gupta · Post by **A_Gupta** » 24 Jun 2012 22:27

This has already been posted no doubt, but then it is worth reading once again

http://www.archaeologyonline.net/artifa ... ebate.html

Michel Danino on the horse in India.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 24 Jun 2012 23:01

Murugan wrote:Rajiv Malhotra discussing with IIT alumni at Washington DC many of the points we are discussing here

1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZD3D4mAoaE

2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WYZtS_L ... ure=relmfu

It is kind of sad that RM has to tell the elite Indians how to be Indians and give examples of
Russia, French and Japan. Rajiv has to explain Indians to identify themselves with India and Indian culture.

member_23630 · Post by **member_23630** » 24 Jun 2012 23:11

Shiv Ji,

Thank you. Now, i may not be able to write as eloquently and in-depth as you.

however, below is my humble attempt in drawing my silly understanding at a high level:

Firstly, the already out-dated non-issues per current scholarship view:
no more 'invasion', 'race' theories. nor does any scholer currently claim that IVC or RV is from outside india. so, we don't have to beat these straw men anymore.

the issues are merely of 'language evloution' and its 'geoprahical location/path' as of now.

on lingustics:
i just know few mantras that i recite on occasions. so, personally don't know any/enough lingustics(i know a bit of programming languages though

).

anyways, i do know that i don't know any/enough lingustics. So, i consult google, wiki, scholorly writings, etc, etc.

this i what quickly summarize in general:

1. language is also humans/living beings only, i.e., they do evolve, genetically(mother, sister, daughter, etc, etc) and culturally(accultration, substratum, creole, pdgin, etc, etc)

2. there are lingustics scientific methods/principles to construct language trees and waves, and establish predessor/successor/relative-date for the whole languages and for the gievn words.

3. these methods/principle are true for all languages.

4. i do understand that this linguistics science is not like pure maths which is perfectly provable. and, i am comfortable with that, as it is the same case with any non-pure-maths sciences(like say the (in)famous Economics).

5. now if someone says, "no, no all linguistics is wrong" or that none of these apply to Sanskirit/RV, i feel it is plain bluffing and 'trashing of disgreements', and i do not buy such line of arguments.

6. i feel any proposal ultimately need to meet established lingustics principles and methods.

on the correlation 'language evloution' and its 'geoprahical location/path'

now, like any other pre/old history research, scholors have extracted from IE/IR/Sanskrit/RV, few important "objects/entities" that are "date-able" and "locatable" in some way: like the infamous horse, chariot, wheels, towns, rivers, wheat, rice, etc, etc. and "attested and reconstructed words" and their relative timelines/predessor/successor, etc, etc.

now, there few archelogical sites known that are located dated over their life, like our IVC, Steppe and all the Sites that Anthony elobrately explains.

then, it is just entirely logical establish these "sites/dates/paths" with those RV "objects". this what i believe Anthony brilliantly does in his book.

now, we cannot just say, oh no, horse finding a chance only or that it is there but yet to found/missing, etc, etc.

Again, like general linguistics compliance for Sanskrit/RV, here also the evidence needs to complay with Archeological standards. Else, anyone can claim that Bellary's Bronze Age was 100000 BCE. it is just that the evidence of Bronze of that date is yet to found/missing, etc. !

i feel these type of arguments are just clever plays, and the usual and free "trashing of disagreements".

Couple of ManishH posts on horse finds/misses:
http://forums.bharat-rakshak.com/viewto ... e#p1294840
http://forums.bharat-rakshak.com/viewto ... e#p1294846

member_23630 · Post by **member_23630** » 24 Jun 2012 23:30

shiv wrote:Those proto languages are human created and fake. They are non existent, imagined model languages. But the linguists are looking for a place to put those languages.

let's compare it with human evolution. it is entirely logical to say that there would have been some proto-proto-human(whatever we call it) at 10000 BC or 200000 BC - we don't even need evidence for that. similarly, since the first human started speaking(whatever 'language'/'sounds' it was), there would have been proto-language - it is logical even without the need for any explicit proofs. and, of course, he would have lived in some place, let's say, Africa. so, i am not sure of the issue here.

member_23630 · Post by **member_23630** » 24 Jun 2012 23:51

shiv wrote:I smell blood here. Everything about "conventional scholarship" is on the wrong foot here. The dates, the geography and timelines and tired old assumptions are all open to question.

hm, i do understand what you are saying and i think overturning any of established scholarship requires 'really better scholarship' by an order of magnitude, not just wild speculations or just wishful thinking.

so, i don't smell blood yet. in fact, i feel some of these unfounded wild speculations on the net brings all of us into disrepute, due to, let's just say, for not-so-good scholarship - even in the OIT wiki page, leave alone any Peer Reviewed Scientific Journals...

of course, if any of these contrary evidences are strong enough, conventional wisdom will of course change, like from old invasion to no invasion.

Prem · Post by **Prem** » 25 Jun 2012 00:01

RajeshA wrote:]
The Kassites, who are also considered Indo-Europeans, are thought to have ruled over Babylonians, and they too had Maruttash which sounds similar to the Sanskrit Marut or Marutah, a Vedic storm god..

There are few lovely folks in Punjab with last name Kassita or Kassite. One being my cllasfellow in 8th grade.

brihaspati · Post by **brihaspati** » 25 Jun 2012 00:23

SN_Rajan wrote:Shiv Ji,

Firstly, the already out-dated non-issues per current scholarship view:
no more 'invasion', 'race' theories. nor does any scholer currently claim that IVC or RV is from outside india. so, we don't have to beat these straw men anymore.

the issues are merely of 'language evloution' and its 'geoprahical location/path' as of now.

That is jargon. How do you geographically locate and "move" a language by pure "evolution"? All that is being repeated here, is that okay, we can no longer lay down the BS that we used to lay down in our more direct imperialist days, and we are increasingly having contradictory evidence to what we claimed as the final truth. But we are still keen on preserving the core of our project - that these things came from outside India, we cannot allow any compromise on the core of our AIT objective.

on lingustics:
i just know few mantras that i recite on occasions. so, personally don't know any/enough lingustics(i know a bit of programming languages though ).

anyways, i do know that i don't know any/enough lingustics. So, i consult google, wiki, scholorly writings, etc, etc.

Today's scholars can turn out to be tomorrow's charlatans in the humanities - as many Victorian era "scientists" in the humanities domain turned out to be, like the Eugenists.

this i what quickly summarize in general:

1. language is also humans/living beings only, i.e., they do evolve, genetically(mother, sister, daughter, etc, etc) and culturally(accultration, substratum, creole, pdgin, etc, etc)

Do you understand why language change is not like actual genetic change? Genetic change happens out of mostly random mutations, and sometimes external factors like chemical mutagens or radiation. They get preferential selection if the resulting effects on the organism allows the organism to have greater reproductive success.

What are your parallels? In fact these types of talk from linguists or pseudo-linguists show all the more how little understanding most of the time they have of "science" they use as crutch.

2. there are lingustics scientific methods/principles to construct language trees and waves, and establish predessor/successor/relative-date for the whole languages and for the gievn words.

There are no linguistic "scientific" methods or principles. All that is there, are theories or models based on some empirical observations of a limited sample. Historical linguistics is not a science because conditions obtaining in modern societies are not necessarily reproducable for ancient societies. It is academic fraud not to mention the basis of linguistics as empirical and rather a crude statistical approach without understanding the basics of statistics or probability. Historical linguistics is an extrapolation of modern linguistics whose experts do not feel the need to state clearly the assumptions they are making. It is not paleogeology - which is dependent merely on assumption of constancy of physical laws.

Do stop abusing "science" by bracketing historical linguists as a science.

3. these methods/principle are true for all languages.

No that is a blatant lie, which even linguistinazis dare not make. Non-experts, like communist activists usually make such dashing claims - when they say for example, "Marxism is true - because it is a science". Just like linguistics, Marxism is a theory of historical change - and is almost completely dependent on how change is defined and interpretation of what constitutes a change, as well as perceptions and assumptions where no clear evidence emerges. Unlike particle physics - concluding things about social human behaviour in ancient societies is not a predetermined trajectory.

4. i do understand that this linguistics science is not like pure maths which is perfectly provable. and, i am comfortable with that, as it is the same case with any non-pure-maths sciences(like say the (in)famous Economics).

Economics too is not a science. It uses science tools and methods, but it has to be empirical where human behaviour is concerned. The very fact that most models in Economics have failed, shows how non-repeatable the conclusions are.

There is no problem with empiricism. Problem is that in tune with historical linguists - you are claiming empirical conclusions based on complex interactions like language in human societies now to be extrapolated as divine conclusions for ancient societies - and claim that as a science.
The least honesty that could be shown was to acknowledge the basic assumptions and axioms of the models. None showing.

5. now if someones says, "no, no all lingustics is wrong" or that none of these do not apply to Sanskirit/RV, i feel it is plain bluffing and 'trashing of disgreements', and i do not buy such line of arguments.

The basic extrapolation argument, as well as sound change laws are still in flux. Look up phonetics and current linguistics studies.

6. i feel any proposal ultimately need to meet established lingustics principles and methods.

on the correlation 'language evloution' and its 'geoprahical location/path'

now, like any other pre/old history research, scholors have extracted from IE/IR/Sanskrit/RV, few important "objects/entities" that are "date-able" and "locatable" in some way: like the infamous horse, chariot, wheels, towns, rivers, wheat, rice, etc, etc. and "attested and reconstructed words" and their relative timelines/predessor/successor, etc, etc.

now, there few archelogical sites known that are located dated over their life, like our IVC, Steppe and all the Sites that Anthony elobrately explains.

then, it is just entirely logical establish these "sites/dates/paths" with those RV "objects". this what i believe Anthony brilliantly does in his book.

now, we cannot just say, oh no, horse finding a chance only or that it is there but yet to found/missing, etc, etc.

Again, like general linguistics compliance for Sanskrit/RV, here else the evidence needs to complay with Archeological standards. Else, anyone can claim that Bellary's Bronze Age was 100000 BCE. it is just that the evidence of Bronze of that date is yet to found/missing, etc. !

i feel these type of arguments are just clever plays, and the usual and free "trashing of disagreements".

Couple of ManishH posts on horse finds/misses:
http://forums.bharat-rakshak.com/viewto ... e#p1294840
http://forums.bharat-rakshak.com/viewto ... e#p1294846

Anthony's book clearly mentions many of his suggestions as speculations. You seem to be acting more Anthony than Anthony himself. ManishH ji argues from within the PIE+AIT paradigm, but even he, just like Anthony, does not state that even archeological interpretations are based on non-archeological doctrines and legacies.

Neither have mentioned the contradiction between PIE+AIT theory and the current state of archeological understanding in the case of proto-Italic and proto-Greek. That is a monumental silence.

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 25 Jun 2012 01:23

http://www.thehindu.com/arts/history-an ... 516451.ece
Stone tools that revolutionised study of India's pre-history

Vayutuvan · Post by **Vayutuvan** » 25 Jun 2012 01:25

shiv wrote:4. They accept that literal meanings may not always be correct and that the language of the Rig Veda can have ambiguous meanings

Then they should have no problem accepting the date of 26 July 3298 BCE based on this quote from Plofker's book (Rajan ji - please note that the original is a paper published in Bryant by Subhash Kak and hence is a peer reviewed source)

Kim Plofker Page 34 wrote: The hopeful astrochronologist might wonder about the possibility of using Vedic records of more distinctive, noncalendric phenomena to get a better fix on possible dates. This has been attempted for some passages, including the Rg-veda reference to a solar eclipse mentioned above. Taking the apparently general description in the hymn to imply specific information about the amount of obscuration, location of the observer, and so on, one can hypothetically identify the event with the solar eclipse of 26 July 3298 BCE. Again, though, this depends on assigning a particular technical meaning to the words of the text.

There is some discussion on Jyothisa-vedanga (JV) and there is a curious note as follows on page 40 which discusses the length of the year as calculated in JV to be either 366 civil days (which is erroneous) or 366 sidereal days (which work out to 365 civil days) which have less error. My take is that even though the vedics have exhibited quite a lot of mathematical maturity (including calculation of intercalated months, i.e. adhika masa, which are two extra months every five year yuga), they would have preferred the 366 civil days as the reasons given in

{Oha2000} Ohashi, Yukio. Remarks on the origin of Indo-Tibetan astronomy. pp 341-369 (especially pp. 343)
SelinmHelaine, ed. Astronomy Across Cultures: The History of Non-Western Astronomy. Dordrecht: Kluwer. 2000

make more sense over

{Pin1973}Pingree, David. The Mesopotamian origin of early Indian mathematical astronomy. Journal for the History of Astronomy 4, 1973, pp. 7-8

If that is the case, then the note no. 32 on pp. 40 Kim Plofker, says that

...{Oha2000} disagrees (Ed. with Pin1973) on the grounds that a 366-day year would better preserve the synchronization with the lunar cycle, which was culturally more important than accurate determination of the start of the year with respect to the solstice. This is possible, but if true it undermines the astrochronological assumption of a precisely specified celestial location for the winter solstice

Guess what, Hock is the one who relies on the "precisely specified celestial location for the winter solstice" to date it at 1400 BCE, which becomes suspect and the objection to Kak's date of 4000 BCE goes away. It is in the general vicinity of the 3298 BCE date arrived at via the route of solar eclipse.

Can we say then that the composition date is c. 3500 BCE +- 500 years?

member_22872 · Post by **member_22872** » 25 Jun 2012 01:26

Firstly, the already out-dated non-issues per current scholarship view:
no more 'invasion', 'race' theories. nor does any scholer currently claim that IVC or RV is from outside india. so, we don't have to beat these straw men anymore.

Yes they dont overtly say it than be branded racist. Now the new mantra is Indo-European, it nevertheless is the same thing:
same $hit but different a$$ hole saying it differently.

the issues are merely of 'language evloution' and its 'geoprahical location/path' as of now.

oh you forgot history and past. This is not a 'merely' issue, but the only issue. Right from the start it has been the only issue...for all the 200 years nothing changed.

2. there are lingustics scientific methods/principles to construct language trees and waves, and establish predessor/successor/relative-date for the whole languages and for the gievn words.
3. these methods/principle are true for all languages.

not always possible, what if there is considerable admixture of more than 2 languages, how will you establish who borrowed from whom? secondly.

4. i do understand that this linguistics science is not like pure maths which is perfectly provable. and, i am comfortable with that, as it is the same case with any non-pure-maths sciences(like say the (in)famous Economics).

sorry can't agree it is not even a science, it is list of rules conjured up and words analysed results subject to interpretation, isnt how science works.

5. now if someone says, "no, no all linguistics is wrong" or that none of these apply to Sanskirit/RV, i feel it is plain bluffing and 'trashing of disgreements', and i do not buy such line of arguments.

Not being a sceince using it to study a nations history is wrong, because results can be interpreted to suit one's whims. Linguistics can have other uses, but wrong tool for study of history because the rules are assumed, and the results are inerpreted to curve fit archeological data. it is not the sam as science where first the assumptions are proved from fundamentals and a new premise is proved based on what is already proved. How can you prove PIE existed? It is indeed strange that you want people to quote from 'peer reviewed' journals yet are ready to accepted historical facts to be analyzed solely based on linguistic assumptions.

now, like any other pre/old history research, scholors have extracted from IE/IR/Sanskrit/RV, few important "objects/entities" that are "date-able" and "locatable" in some way: like the infamous horse, chariot, wheels, towns, rivers, wheat, rice, etc, etc. and "attested and reconstructed words" and their relative timelines/predessor/successor, etc, etc.

now, we cannot just say, oh no, horse finding a chance only or that it is there but yet to found/missing, etc, etc.

can you capply the same to horse finds in India? or you will be selective and say the finds in India don't belong to a horse?
if you do agree that horse remains are found in India then RV is composed and compiled in India, that also means no AMT/AIT who brought Rg Veda with them. If you don't agree that what is found in India are not horse remains, you are selecting what to believe and what not to, that means you do have an agenda to prove and are dogmatic in your understanding, you should also cut the crap about 'I am after satya'.

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 25 Jun 2012 01:35

ravi_g wrote:
SaiK wrote:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edakkal_Caves
Mr. Varier said “The discovery of the symbols are akin to that of the Harappan civilisation having predominantly Dravidian culture and testimony to the fact that cultural diffusion could take place.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Edakk ... arving.jpg
first I thought it could be a horse face.. then, naah!

http://www.hindu.com/2007/10/28/stories ... 830300.htm
Archaeologists have been campaigning for world heritage status for Edakkal Cave which is believed to be nearly 7,000 years old.

Swayambhu SaiK ji, if not the horse face then what is it?

Ok that does it. I the Swaymbhu Ravi_G declare that the expanse of SIVC be taken till Kerala.

what is fascinating is the inscriptions.. read here:
http://www.thehindu.com/arts/history-an ... 501408.ece

i pazhama (Malayalam)

idu pazhamai (Tamil)

‘this (is) ancient’ (translation)

image

A computer-enhanced image of the Malayalam inscription found at Edakal cave, Kerala

They had the foresight to look into the future, to leave something for us to think..
.."this is old" is the inscription., and that is something to say about facilities too, that they would have discussed what to inscribe due to restriction of the message format, and the tedious job it takes to carve.

this is old! and we are not saying that.. they are telling it.

so, what I am saying is that even the script dating is wrong.

Vayutuvan · Post by **Vayutuvan** » 25 Jun 2012 01:41

Slashdot wrote: "A new study by sociologists studying social networking have determined that Wikipedia is not an intellectual project based on mutual collaboration, but a war zone. The study finds that although the content does end up being accurate as a rule, it's anything but neutral or unbiased. The study includes extensive data on access and editing patterns of users related to major events, such as the death of Michael Jackson and the edit storms that ensued."

No wonder, articles on OIT and Subhash Kak's papers and Aditya Prakashan are trashed - propaganda and bias at work.

A_Gupta · Post by **A_Gupta** » 25 Jun 2012 01:44

Since the demand is for peer-reviewed papers and books published by the scientific establishment, here is one:

In a paper that says that the PIE split-up occurred 8000-9500 years ago, out of Anatolia, {Language-tree divergence times support the Anatolian theory of Indo-European origin; Russell D. Gray, Quentin D. Atkinson, Nature, volume 426 [27 November 2003], pages 435-439}, the authors say that for various reasons,

...historical linguists have generally abandoned efforts to estimate absolute ages. Dixon epitomizes this view with his assertion that, on the basis of linguistic data, the age of Indo-European "could be anything - 4000 years BP or 40,000 years BP are both perfectly possible (as is any date in between)". {Dixon, R.M.W., The Rise and Fall of Languages, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 1997}

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 25 Jun 2012 02:17

between India and Europe, anything can be inserted...'cause you have set the boundaries already. But if one removes the hyphenation and then try to join, everything is lost.

A_Gupta · Post by **A_Gupta** » 25 Jun 2012 02:17

Does anyone have R. Meadows "A Comment on “Horse Remains from Surkotada” by Sándor Bökönyi" ? What is his response to Bokonyi's mention of two teeth with measurements "far above the size variation of the Indian half-asses".
Tx!

Vayutuvan · Post by **Vayutuvan** » 25 Jun 2012 02:23

A_Gupta wrote:Does anyone have R. Meadows "A Comment on “Horse Remains from Surkotada” by Sándor Bökönyi" ? What is his response to Bokonyi's mention of two teeth with measurements "far above the size variation of the Indian half-asses".
Tx!

Can you give a better pointer (journal name and volume)? I will try to get it for you.

OK. Journal is ~~"The review of archaeology", volume, number and pp?~~ South Asian Studies 13.
That is 1997. I have access only from 2009. May be what venug garu presented below might suffice? I found the print copy and put in a request. If you have some specific point, I can look it up in the paper.

member_22872 · Post by **member_22872** » 25 Jun 2012 02:31

matrimc garu also here:
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1 ... 97.9628545

A_Gupta · Post by **A_Gupta** » 25 Jun 2012 05:25

matrimc wrote:
A_Gupta wrote:Does anyone have R. Meadows "A Comment on “Horse Remains from Surkotada” by Sándor Bökönyi" ? What is his response to Bokonyi's mention of two teeth with measurements "far above the size variation of the Indian half-asses".
Tx!
Can you give a better pointer (journal name and volume)? I will try to get it for you.

OK. Journal is ~~"The review of archaeology", volume, number and pp?~~ South Asian Studies 13.
That is 1997. I have access only from 2009. May be what venug garu presented below might suffice? I found the print copy and put in a request. If you have some specific point, I can look it up in the paper.

Thanks! I understand that Bokonyi had several arguments about why the remains in Surkotada had to be horses. One of them was what I quoted - the size of a couple of fossil teeth were outside the range of those of the hemiones, etc. Meadows disagreed with Bokonyi that there were horses at Surkotada. So I'm wondering how he addressed the issue of those teeth. I expect that either Meadows has to argue that those teeth were mismeasured or else that the range of teeth size for wild asses, etc., is much bigger than what Bokonyi says or something else. Just curious what it was that Meadows argued. Everything on the web says he was unable to convince Bokonyi.

member_22872 · Post by **member_22872** » 25 Jun 2012 05:51

Arun Gupta ji, I am trying to get the article on inter library loan.

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 25 Jun 2012 06:09

7.678329, 77.393188 on the google map is the submerged part of Tamil Nadu (kumari kandam).

http://tamilkalai.com/page21.php

According to the Kumari Kandam tradition, over a period of about just 11,000 years, the Pandyas, a historical dynasty of Tamil kings, formed three Tamil Sangams, in order to foster among their subjects the love of knowledge, literature and poetry.

The first Sangam was head-quartered in a city named Then-madurai (Southern Madurai). It was patronised by a succession of eighty-nine kings and survived for an unbroken period of 4,400 years during which time it approved an immense collection of poems and literature. At the end of that golden age, the First Sangam was destroyed when a deluge arose and Then-madurai itself was swallowed by the sea along with large parts of the land area of Kumari Kandam.

And one of the literatures there talks about horses and chariots:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaiy%C4%81 ... P%C4%93kan
Purananuru, an excerpt of song (146) by AricilKilār:

“We don't want your wealth! We don't want your precious gems!
Pēkan, who kills in battle! If you would show me your favour and give me a gift..
..then lord! hitch the horses to your towering chariot of great speed,

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 25 Jun 2012 06:18

SN_Rajan wrote:
Firstly, the already out-dated non-issues per current scholarship view:
no more 'invasion', 'race' theories. nor does any scholer currently claim that IVC or RV is from outside india. so, we don't have to beat these straw men anymore.

You have not understood what i said. I will try again with an analogy. Your objection is similar to the church telling Galileo that his alleged experiment dropping two different weights from the leaning tower was outdated because a solution has already been reached.

A "solution" has been reached that there was no invasion. But no one has any solutions about where Sanskrit came from. What I (and others) are asking for is for a shred of credible evidence that Sanskrit came from outside India and did not go out from India. Such evidence does not exist at this point in time no matter how much you protest or how long you carry on with your objections to my methods.

SN_Rajan wrote:
5. now if someone says, "no, no all linguistics is wrong" or that none of these apply to Sanskirit/RV, i feel it is plain bluffing and 'trashing of disgreements', and i do not buy such line of arguments.

Since I have not said this but someone else may have done I request you to stop talking as if the forum is a collective and single out the specific individuals who said that and ask them. Please do not club me in that category. You are guilty of the same generalization that you accuse someone else of doing.

SN_Rajan wrote: now, like any other pre/old history research, scholors have extracted from IE/IR/Sanskrit/RV, few important "objects/entities" that are "date-able" and "locatable" in some way:

You have typed some complete nonsense here sir and you don't even know it. Please name ONE datable artefact/archaeological find proven to be related to the Rig Veda. Just ONE.

Rajanji you are merely underinformed. And seriously underinformed at that.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 25 Jun 2012 06:36

SN_Rajan wrote:
shiv wrote:Those proto languages are human created and fake. They are non existent, imagined model languages. But the linguists are looking for a place to put those languages.
let's compare it with human evolution. it is entirely logical to say that there would have been some proto-proto-human(whatever we call it) at 10000 BC or 200000 BC - we don't even need evidence for that.

Sir you like argument more than fairness or information.

Sanskrit was created somewhere and probably had a proto language. You don't need evidence to say that. You need evidence to say where it was created or came from. You need evidence if you are going to put a date on it. Such evidence does not exist but is being cooked up. You don't seem to have done the required reading and insist on shooting off your arguments sans the information that you should have. You are merely posing as a judge on this forum after entering the discussion late minus any serious insight into what anyone is saying.

I now know that you have not taken the trouble to inform yourself of the issues but want to take sides. Your comments about "mirch masala" were perfectly honest. That is all your intent seems to be. There is a lot of material that you should attempt to read with a small dose of what you loudly claimed was your intent "I really don't care what the answer turns out to be as long as its fair"

Vayutuvan · Post by **Vayutuvan** » 25 Jun 2012 06:38

Rajanji, there is a flaw in your argument that there must be one pro-language out of which all languages came. Humans could have spread before any language developed and after separation different groups at different times invented languages independently and not necessarily around the same time.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 25 Jun 2012 06:44

matrimc wrote: Can we say then that the composition date is c. 3500 BCE +- 500 years?

That should be acceptable as one possible date for the Rig Veda for anyone who bothers to read all sides of the issue before jumping in and accusing others of being less fair than oneself.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 25 Jun 2012 07:22

matrimc wrote:
Slashdot wrote: "A new study by sociologists studying social networking have determined that Wikipedia is not an intellectual project based on mutual collaboration, but a war zone. The study finds that although the content does end up being accurate as a rule, it's anything but neutral or unbiased. The study includes extensive data on access and editing patterns of users related to major events, such as the death of Michael Jackson and the edit storms that ensued."
No wonder, articles on OIT and Subhash Kak's papers and Aditya Prakashan are trashed - propaganda and bias at work.

If you look at Wiki articles related to this subject, you find that they are already filled with explanations of phonetic changes and in some instances the mythical PIE is already being quoted with a "root word" from PIE as the original "mother word" from which an existing word arises ensuring the creation of another generation of SN_Rajans who will believe information without asking if the information could be misleading in any way. "Harvard scholars say so and I believe them". "Rishis said so and I believe them" is an equally valid attitude no? Truly faith is stronger than knowledge.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 25 Jun 2012 08:48

matrimc wrote:
A_Gupta wrote:Does anyone have R. Meadows "A Comment on “Horse Remains from Surkotada” by Sándor Bökönyi" ? What is his response to Bokonyi's mention of two teeth with measurements "far above the size variation of the Indian half-asses".
Tx!
Can you give a better pointer (journal name and volume)? I will try to get it for you.

OK. Journal is ~~"The review of archaeology", volume, number and pp?~~ South Asian Studies 13.
That is 1997. I have access only from 2009. May be what venug garu presented below might suffice? I found the print copy and put in a request. If you have some specific point, I can look it up in the paper.

Here is an interesting anecdote from Sharma after Bokonyi valdated his find. From Google books

Sharma, vindicated received two minutes of applause from the entire assembly (Sharma 1992-3, 30); there now seemed to be no doubt about the horse at Surkotada. Sharma, on his validation
This was the saddest day for me as the thought flashed in my mind that my findings had to wait two decades for recognition, until a man from another continent came, examined the material and declared "Sharma was right". When will we imbibe intellectual courage not to look across borders for approval? The historians are still worse, they feel it is an attempt on the part of the "rightists" to prove that the Aryans did not come to India from outside her boundaries. (30)

Amazing to find people on this forum doing exactly that

member_22872 · Post by **member_22872** » 25 Jun 2012 09:02

shiv ji, from your own journal paper experience and that of Sharma's it is evident that, even for acceptance of an article in 'peer reviewed' journal you need clout, and usually these 'peer reviewed' journal are phoren who have the veto power to decide whose articles can be published. If an article is written by bunch of Indians with no phoren sounding name, they can be rejected irrespective of the merit of the article. And then people when demand 'peer reviewed' article, you will have a dearth of such articles only get silent snickers. So much for truth seeking and for scientific scholarship. Its all about whom you know than what you have to say.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 25 Jun 2012 09:29

RajeshA wrote:What do they say about horse in the Avesta? Does anybody know?

Everything that is known about Avesta comes from Zoroastrian sources translated into Gujarati.

The Khorda Avesta is a Parsi Prayer book and here is a link to an English edition that has the original Avestan passage in angrej text with translation. Can some Sanskrit scholar please say how much different Avestan is from Sanskrit? I apologise for linking an oversize image

I will post the link and one single sample page as an image
http://www.avesta.org/kanga/ka_english_ ... deshow.htm
or as pdf
http://www.avesta.org/kanga/ka_english_kanga.pdf

Look at page 9 on the right for a sample text and translation

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 25 Jun 2012 09:38

Mango, the national fruit of India, originated from Tamil mangai. Temple in TN houses a 3500 year old mango tree too.

Per vedas, mango is the fruit of gods! only in the 14th or 15th century, Europeans got to taste mango. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mango

mango leaves and mango are part and parcel of indic/vedic culture.

Straight OIT!

Murugan · Post by **Murugan** » 25 Jun 2012 10:20

Did not they do the same thing to our acharya j c bose

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jagadish_Chandra_Bose

And Marconi took credit

Wil modern expert thieves and patent chor will learn something from acharya bose's example.

Oh stealing examples by americans is also well known, few examples are basmati, turmeric and neem patents.

Mera mere baap ka, aur tumahre me mera bhi share!

Now anarya thieves want share in aryas achievements. first ait attempt failed.

Lalmohan · Post by **Lalmohan** » 25 Jun 2012 12:41

re stonehenge: new archeological finds nearby do indicate something of the people who used to use and perhaps built the site. the ritualistic aspects are reasonably well established (alignments of stones, other monuments with star patterns, sun and moon positions) however the diggngs indicate copper tools (axes), artefacts and also skeletal remains showing signs of bone healing and IIRC some with signs of debilitating disease. this leads to the speculation around it being a centre of healing. if stonehenge was a temple, then the sick would be brought there for healing... makes sense

RajeshA · Post by **RajeshA** » 25 Jun 2012 14:01

Jhujar wrote:
RajeshA wrote:]
The Kassites, who are also considered Indo-Europeans, are thought to have ruled over Babylonians, and they too had Maruttash which sounds similar to the Sanskrit Marut or Marutah, a Vedic storm god..
There are few lovely folks in Punjab with last name Kassita or Kassite. One being my cllasfellow in 8th grade.

The Kassites were a dynasty which ruled over the Babylonians from the 18th to the 16th century BC.

By Koenraad Elst
Update on the Aryan Invasion Theory

4.5.1. The Kassite and Mitannic peoples

An important anomaly in the AIT is the presence of the Mitanni kings in northern Mesopotamia, with their Vedic cultural heritage and language, as early as the 15th century BC, with absolutely no indication that they Were “the Aryans on the way to India”. In fact, the Vedic memories appearing in the Mitanni texts were already remote, with only four Vedic gods mentioned amid a long list of non-Vedic gods. This does not in itself prove that the Mitanni dynasty was post-Vedic, but it certainly confers the burden of proof on those who want to declare it pre-Vedic.

Their language was mature Indo-Aryan, not proto-Indo-Iranian. Satya Swarup Misra argues that the Mitannic languages already showed early Middle-Indo-Aryan traits, e.g. the assimilation of dissimilar plosives (sapta > satta), and the break-up of consonant clusters by interpolation of vowels (anaptyxis, Indra > Indara).37 This would imply that Middle-Indo-Aryan had developed a full millennium earlier than hitherto assumed, which in turn has implications for the chronology of the extant literature written in Middle-Indo-Aryan.

In the centuries before the Mitanni texts, there was a Kassite dynasty in Mesopotamia, from the 18th to the 16th century BC. Linguistically assimilated, they preserved some purely Vedic names: Shuriash, Maruttash, Inda-Bugash, i.e. Surya, Marut, Indra-Bhaga (Bhaga meaning effectively “god”, cfr. Bhag-wAn, Slavic Bog).

The Kassite and Mitanni peoples were definitely considered as foreign invaders. They are latecomers in the history of the IE dispersal, appearing at a time when, leaving India out of the argument, at least the area from Iran to France was already IE. They have little bearing on the Urheimat question, but they have all the more relevance for mapping the history of the Indo-Iranian group.

Probably the Kassite and Mitannic tribes were part of the same migration, with the latter settling in a peripheral area and thereby retaining their identity a few centuries longer than the Kassites in the metropolitan area of Babylon. According to Babylonian sources, the Kassites came from the swampy area in what is now southern Iraq: unlike the Iranians, who migrated from India through Afghanistan, the Kassites must have come by sea from Sindh to southern Mesopotamia. While the Iranians migrated slowly, taking generations to take control gradually of the fertile areas to the south of the Aral Lake and of the Caspian Sea, the Kassites seem to have been a warrior group moving directly from India to Mesopotamia to carry out a planned invasion which immediately gave them control of the delta area, a bridgehead for further conquests of the Babylonian heartland. They were a conquering aristocracy, and having to marry native women, they lost their language within a few generations, just like the Vikings after their conquest of Normandy.

If the earlier Kassite and the later Mitanni people were indeed part of the same migration, their sudden appearance falls neatly into place if we connect them with the migration wave caused by the dessiccation of the Saraswati area in ca. 2000 BC.

Indian-Mesopotamian connections relevant to the Urheimat question have to be sought in a much earlier period. Whether the country Aratta of the Sumerian sources is really to be identified with a part of the Harappan area, is uncertain; the Sumerian legend Enmerkar and the Lord of Aratta (late 3rd millennium BC) mentions that Aratta was the source of silver, gold and lapis lazuli, in exchange for grain which was transported not by ship but over land by donkeys; this would rather point to the mining centres in mountainous Afghanistan, arguably Harappan colonies but not the Harappan area itself. However, if this Aratta is the same as the Indian AraTTa (in West Panjab) after all, it has far-reaching implications. AraTTa is Prakrit for A-rASTra, “without kingdom”. The point here is not its meaning, but its almost Middle-Indo-Aryan shape. Like sapta becoming satta in the Mitannic text, it suggest that this stage of Indo-Aryan is much older than hitherto assumed, viz. earlier than 2000 BC.

Wikipedia says:

Their success was built upon the relative political stability that the Kassite monarchs achieved. They ruled Babylonia practically without interruption for almost four hundred years— the longest rule by any dynasty in Babylonian history.

member_20317 · Post by **member_20317** » 25 Jun 2012 14:28

shiv wrote:
SN_Rajan wrote: 5. now if someone says, "no, no all linguistics is wrong" or that none of these apply to Sanskirit/RV, i feel it is plain bluffing and 'trashing of disgreements', and i do not buy such line of arguments.
Since I have not said this but someone else may have done I request you to stop talking as if the forum is a collective and single out the specific individuals who said that and ask them. Please do not club me in that category. You are guilty of the same generalization that you accuse someone else of doing.

Oh well I said that. Linguistics is bunkum. If after thousands of years (ok hundreds) if the RV practioners could not save everything (ManishH ji himself

said that even RV has linguistic errors) then how can anybody else.

Besides SN_Ranjan ji it was not the Hindutva vaadi people like me who killed linguistics on the forum. It was Goddess Vac or Goddess Saraswati who did that by simply stopping its flow 900 years before what the linguists said it should have.

Anyhow on the sage advise of perhaps Tyroneshoes ji, I decided to not go against Medical Linguistics or was it Speech-language therapy. But yes w.r.t. historical linguistics, even though I did not kill it I will do whatever I can to keep it dead.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 25 Jun 2012 14:31

Kassite and Mitannic peoples
Pure linguistic speculations!

RajeshA · Post by **RajeshA** » 25 Jun 2012 15:00

Acharya wrote:Kassite and Mitannic peoples
Pure linguistic speculations!

At present, the presence of these people outside India, supports the Out-of-India Theory!

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 25 Jun 2012 15:02

Still this entire migration and language evolution must be challenged and removed from this rubbish research
Only genetics and archaeology must be considered for any possible answer.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 25 Jun 2012 15:46

Acharya wrote:Kassite and Mitannic peoples
Pure linguistic speculations!

Acharyaji you have not read the link. Elst is saying that these were Sanskrit speaker migrations out of India possibly around 2000 BC.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 25 Jun 2012 15:48

RajeshA wrote: By Koenraad Elst

From the same link
http://voiceofdharma.org/books/ait/ch46.htm
Puranas as history

Admittedly, the Vedas are a defective source of history. As religious books, they only deal with historical data in passing. But that has never kept the invasionist school from treating the Vedas as the only source of ancient Indian history, to the neglect of the legitimate history books, the ItihAsa-PuraNa literature, i.e. the Epics and the Puranas. It is like ignoring the historical Bible books (Exodus, Joshua, Chronicles, Kings) to draw ancient Israelite history exclusively from the Psalms, or like ignoring the historians Livius, Tacitus and Suetonius to do Roman history on the basis of the poet Virgil. What would be dismissed as “utterly ridiculous” in Western history is standard practice in Indian history.

Essentially the same remark was already made by Puranic scholar F.E. Pargiter.41 It was dismissed by some, with the remark that the Puranas are even more religious and unhistorical than the Vedas.42 However, that does injustice to the strictly historical parts of the Puranas, mixed though they are with religious lore. No serious historian would ignore the Exodus narrative simply because it also contains unhistorical episodes like the Parting of the Sea and the voice from the Burning Bush.

Puranic history reaches back beyond the starting date of the composition of the Vedas. In the king-lists, a number of kings are enumerated before the first kings appear who are also mentioned in the Rg-Veda. In what remains of the Puranas, no absolute chronology is added to the list, but from Greek visitors to ancient India, we get the entirely plausible information such a chronology did exist. To be precise, the Puranic king-list as known to Greek visitors of Candragupta’s court in the 4th century BC or to later Greco-Roman India-watchers, started in 6776 BC.(47) Even for that early pre-Vedic period, there is no hint of any immigration.

The ref marked "47" there is Pliny's work "Naturalis Historia" and Arrian "Indica"

RajeshA · Post by **RajeshA** » 25 Jun 2012 15:54

shiv wrote:
RajeshA wrote:What do they say about horse in the Avesta? Does anybody know?
Everything that is known about Avesta comes from Zoroastrian sources translated into Gujarati.

shiv saar,

thanks.

I think we also need to look at the Avesta, to get clues as to how the pre-Avestan Iranians used to see the Vedic Aryans, the PUrus, and what was their relationship with the Druhyus. Will do so in the future.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 25 Jun 2012 16:33

Here is a link to Arrian's "Indica". Arrian was Alexander's historian and lived around 100 AD or thereabouts
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/ancient/ ... -India.asp

This is what he says that Indians told him about Indian history - i.e the number of generations of kings up to Sandrocottus (Chandragupta). That dates things back to 6000 BC - but this is no Indian nationalist right winger talking about it.

From Dionysus to Sandracottus the Indians counted a hundred and fifty-three kings, over six thousand and forty-two years, and during this time thrice [Movements were made] for liberty . . . this for three hundred years; the other for a hundred and twenty years; the Indians say that Dionysus was fifteen generations earlier than Heracles; but no one else ever invaded India, not even Cyrus son of Cambyses, though he made an expedition against the Scythians, and in all other ways was the most energetic of the kings in Asia; but Alexander came and conquered by force of arms all the countries he entered; and would have conquered the whole world had his army been willing. But no Indian ever went outside his own country on a warlike expedition, so righteous were they.

Also read this highly fascinating Megasthenes Indica recorded some centuries BC (pdf)
http://www.sdstate.edu/projectsouthasia ... Indika.pdf