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Excavator Sarianidi is of the opinion that BMAC people as the forebears of the

Iranian and indo-Aryans. Premises of this claim are:


1. Fire-worship temples
2. Soma/homa
3. Asvamedha sacrifice
4. Cult motifs on seals

Gonur Nush-i-Jan, Iran, 800 BCE


What are the archaeological Evidence?
Sarianidi did not find the interior of the temenos (crucial evidence) at Gonur temple
but claimed it as Zorosstrian fire temple!
Comparison was done with Mohenjo-daro fire altar but Mohenjo-daro predates
BMAC by centuries - Zorostrianism earlier in India then BMAC?

The evidence of soma is found in the form of hemp, poppy and ephedra – in present
time, the intoxicating substances extracted from these are ganja, afima and bhanga

Ganja is smoked and afima is eaten where as soma was drunk!


Out of the remains of six horses found at Marginana, one is the subject of discussion,
found without a head and tail in the necropolis and claimed as a sacrifice.

Pit line and anthropogenic erosions!


Prof. B.B. Lal did not agree this as part of asvamedha sacrifice
Rigveda contains two Suktas exclusively devoted to the asvamedha, viz. 1.162 and
1.163
Asvamedha's sacrifice of the horse had to be dissected piece by piece, whereas in the
case of Gonur horse, there is no such evidence whatsoever.

Motifs on BMAC Glyptics


Motifs on the seals = BMAC people were
Ancestors of the Indo-Aryans!

An impression of a cylinder seal on one


of the Margianian vessels, found at Gontur
-repeated frieze composition of a standing
nude anthromorphic winged deity with
an avian head holding two mountain goats
by legs.
Sarianidi: Certain motifs on the BMAC seals compare well with those on the Syro-
Hittite glyptics (modern Turkey and NW Syria). Hence there is cultural relationship
between the two areas. Further, since a Hittite-Mitanni treaty (Bogazkoy) refers to
Vedic gods like Indra, Mitra, Varuna, etc. – BMAC people could be ancestral to the
Vedic Aryans!

Questions remains in the glyptic found which Vedic gods are represented?

In another seal two figures with human body and animal head, holding a tall pillar
(wood?) on the pointed top of which rests the belly of another animal-headed human.
Drum players are also visible. Such scenes re never discussed in Veda.

In fact, none of such culture (artefacts) ever crossed Indus and/or was part of culture.
The Bogazkoy
archives are a
collection of texts
(25,000+ tablets)
found on the site
of the capital of
the Hittite state,
Turkey). They are
the oldest (2nd m.
BCE) extant
documents of the
state.
Rigveda Chronology through archaeological evidences

Identification of Sarasvati with the Helmand of Afghanistan is questionable:

Rigveda 10.75 verses 5 and 6 mention


O Ganga, Yamuna, Sarasvati, Sutudri (Sultej) and
Parusni (Ravi), O Marudvridha with Asikni
(Chenab), O Arjikiya with Vitasta (Jhelum) and
Susoma (Sohan), please listen to and accept this
hymn of mine. [5]

O Sindhu (Indus), flowing, you first meet the


Tristama (and then) the Susartu, the Rasa, and
the Sveta (Swat), and thereafter the Kubha (Kabul),
the Gomati (Gomal), the Krumu (Kurram) with
the Mehatnu, and (finally) you move on in the
same chariot with them (i.e. carry their waters). [6]

From these verses it is clear that Sarasvati lay


between Yamuna and Sutlej.
The, RV 2.23.4 states that the Drisvati and Apaya were its tributaries.
Further, RV 7.95.2 mentions that the Sarasvati flowed all the way from the mountains to the sea.

In Afghanistan there are no rivers by the name of Yamuna and Sutlej, nor are there the Drisvati
and Apaya. Further there is no sea. Thus, the area described indicates the present-day Sarasvati-
Ghaggar combine (dry at places) – B.B. Lal 2009.
Rigveda Chronology through archaeological evidences

During RV times the Sarasvati was a mighty flowing river, by the time of Pachavimsa
Brahmana (XXV.10.16) it got dried up – Rigveda is to be dated prior to the drying up.

Out of many archaeological evidence, one is Kalibangan in Rajasthan, which had to


be abandoned during mature stage, because of drying up of the adjacent Sarasvati
river.
Radiocarbon dates for this
abandonment is around
2000-1900 BCE
- Rigveda earlier to 2000 BCE

In this geographic zone the


archaeological evidence found is
only that of Harappan Civilization.
Vedic People – Nomads!

RV settlements were fortified

RV 7.15.14 and RV 10.101.8 refers to :

Fortification as strong as hundred walls for


man’s defence like metal forts

People had trade with overseas

RV 1.116.5:
In sea-trade, they used large-sized boats which were sometimes provided with a
hundred oars.

O Asvins, you saved Bhujyu (from drowning) in a deep sea where there was nothing
to hold on, by lifting him up in a boat that had a hundred oars and sending him to
his place. This was indeed a brave act of yours.

RV 1.126.4
Besides using bullock-carts, the Rigvedic people piled fast-running chariots, to
which were sometimes yoked as many as four horses each, bedecked with pearl
ornaments.
RV – Social and Political set-up of the times

Sabha, Samiti – refers to assemblies that took virtual decisions on matters of public
interest.

Samrat, rajan, rajaka etc. – Structure/hierarchy

RV 9.92.6
Soma enters the kalasa (pitcher) just as the
king enters the assembly or a wild buffalo
enters the forests.

Rv. 8.21.18
Chitra is said to be a Rajan while rulers of a lesser category were known as mere
Rajakas

Chitra is King, and only kingling are the rest who dwell beside Sarasvati.

Many such references, from fortification to trade to seafaring to social and political
hierarchy, are not characteristic features of any Nomadic society.
RV – Horse!

Premises of this discussion is the argument certain scholars puts forth:

During the Vedic times, the horse was a well-known animal, but the Harappan
civilization did not have anything to do with horse.

Vedic chariots are described to have spokes, no spoked wheel found in Harappan
assemblages.

Horse is not depicted on the Harappan seals.

- So was the absence of camel and presence of mythical unicorn


- Insignia signature

E.J.H. Mackay (1938, Mohenjodaro): Perhaps the most interesting of the model
animals is the one that I personally take to represent a horse.

R.E.M. Wheeler (1968): One terracotta, from a late level of Mohenjo-daro, seems to
represent a horse, reminding us that a jaw-bone of a horse is also recorded from the
same site, and that the horse was known at a considerably earlier period in
Baluchistan.
Faunal Evidence

A terracotta figure from mature Harappan phase at Lothal

Bholanath and Sreenival Rao (Lothal report 1985) states: The single tooth of horse…
the tooth from Lothal (Gujarat) resembles closely with that of the modern horse.

A.K. Sharma (1990): At Surkotada (Gujarat) a number of horse bones


Substantiated by Prof. Sandor Bokonyi. Then argues since no wild horses lived in
India in post-Pleistocene time in India, the Surkotada horse is bound to be
domesticated.

Richard Medows and Ajita Patel (1997) have their doubt about the Harappan Horse.

A.K. Sharma (1993): Identified horse molar and a fragment of a shaft of distal end of
femur and left humerus, in the Harappan context at Rupnagar (Ropar), Punjab

Bholanath (1959) categorically


stated that faunal collections
from Harappan excavated
assemblages included
remains of the horse.
Spoked Wheel Evidence

Hot and humid climate – wooden survival

Painted spoked wheel terracotta from


Rakhighari

Spokes in the form of reliefs in the terracotta


wheel at Banawali

Inferences (B.B. Lal)


Entire region from the upper Ganga-Yamuna
doab on the east to the Indus and its western
tributaries on the west was occupied by the
Rigvedic people.

During Rigvedic times river on which the


civilization was flourishing was a mighty river -
before the drying up of the river Saraswati –
before 2000 BCE
Archaeologically we have no evidence of any other occupation in this
region prior to 2000 BCE then Harappans.
Jyoti Ray, Anirban Chatterjee and Ajit Singh (2017, 2018, 2019, 2022)
Palaeo channel and geochemistry study

A river (Ghaggar-Saraswati) existed between 80,000 – 14,000 ka, fed by Yamuna (Peter D Clift 2011)

Dried Up: Yamuna diverted eastward around


14,000 ka

Rejunivation: Satlej fed the dried basin


from around 9,000-4,500 ka

Satlej changed her course post 4,500


ka – drying up of Ghaggar-Saraswati
Emigration out of India!

Three areas of study:


1. Turkey in the west
2. India in the east
3. Iran in the middle

Turkey has yielded inscriptional evidence about


presence of the Aryans - 14th c. BCE

Bagozkoy inscribed clay tablet include a treaty between a Mitanni king named
Matiwaza and Hittite king, Suppiluliuma, ascribable to circa 1380 BCE.

As witnesses to this treaty they invoked Vedic gods:


Indara (Indra), Mitras (Mitra), Nasatia (Nasatya) and Uruvanass (Varuna)

Treaty is only a chip of the large block. From surrounding regions, more than a
hundred names have come to light which have a Sanskrit stamp on them.

Context of some of these names goes back to the 17th century BCE. One tablet deals
with the technique of horse-training and mentions Sanskrit numerals like ekvartana,
trivartana, etc. meaning one round, three rounds and so on, on the race course
during the training.
Emigration out of India!

In the Mitannian art (16th-17th century BCE) – portrayal of the peacock


- a bird typical of India – Indians behind the inspiration

Renowned Indologist T. Burrow (1955): The Aryans appear in Mitanni from 1500 BCE
as ruling dynasty – Conquerors
-
At that point in time, there was no other country in the entire world except India
where the above referred gods were worshipped.

Had the local population been the core or base of the population, they and their
language would have ‘lived on and on’, which is not the case.

Iran
The sacred book of Zoroastrians Avesta – refers to Yoi hapta Hendu (Sapta Sindhu)
of the Rigveda – Avestan people cherished the memory of Rigvedic land

Its academically accepted that Avesta was composed in northeastern Iran

Its date is debated but none takes it beyond 14th c. BCE


Emigration out of India!

Indian Vedic text, namely the Baudhayana Sraustrasutra (18.44):

Ayu migrated eastwards. His (progeny) are Kuru-Panchalas and Kasi-Videhas. This is
Ayava migration. Amavasu migrated westwards. His (progeny) are the Gandhari,
Parasu and Aratta. This is the Amavasva migration.

Aila Pururavas and Urvasi had two sons, names Ayu and Amavasu. They migrated,
respectively to the east and west. The former, moving eastwards, gave rise to the
Kuru-Panchala and Kasi-Videha dynasties, while the latter, moving out to the west,
went over to Gandhara, Parsu and Aratta. The scene of partition lay somewhere in
Panjab.

Kuru-Panchala territory lay in eastern Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh.


Kasi-Videhas were settled in eastern Uttar Pradesh and western Bihar.

Gandhara is identifiable as Kandhar, Afghanistan.


Parsu is identifiable with Persia, renamed as Iran in 1935.

Aratta is subject of discussion mentioned in the epic as thousands of kms away in


the west, in Iraq.
In a section of the poem, the ruler
of the Aratta tells the messenger:
‘… The queen of heaven and earth,
the goddess of the numerous me,
holy Inana, has brought the
Aratta, the mountain of shining
me, I whom she has let bar the
entrance of the mountains as if
with a great door. ..’.

Cunningham and others place


Aratta is ‘the snow-capped
mountains that border
Mesopotamia’.
- Aratta was loated close to an opening (pass) in the mountains which the ruler of
Aratta could easily seal.
- All this enhance the claim of Ararat region, located close on the north of Iraq, in
the mountainous terrain, as being Aratta of the Sumerian epic.
- Having identified Gandhara and Parsu Aratta cant be treated as concoction but
Aratta as Ararat of Armenian region, to the northwest of Persia.
- Since the Ararat to Turkey is just a next door, the immigration of the Vedic
people to Turkey needs closer look.

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