Dravidian Madagascar and Southern Africa?

Someone either woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning, or was never taught not to be snotty in kindergarten. Either way, let’s try to be respectful. Nobody said you were wrong, I was just confused as to the terminology you used. I actually live in an area with a decently sized Ethiopian diaspora that is almost exclusively Amharic-speaking. So, when I think “Ethio-“, I usually think Semitic... although I know Cushitic languages are more prevalent.



Ok, that's great. I believe I already clarified that I wasn't talking about that time period, though perhaps we could entertain the idea. You say that the settlement of Madagascar was interwoven with the spice trade and you said something earlier about Chinese Muslims using "it" (Madgascar, Zanzibar, the coast of Mozambique?) as a trading hub. Can you elaborate more on what you're talking about and how it relates to the subject at hand, which is how to get Dravidians to Madagascar and possibly the continental coast of Africa (maybe even further inland) and make up the ethnic majority, preferably during Classical Antiquity if at all possible?





Would you care to elaborate here? What is the "major economic incentive" that drew Austronesians from the Barito River in Borneo to Madagascar?





The first paper you cited doesn't anything about Afroasiatic-speakers, but rather Khoisan pastoralists, while the second one talks about them having migrated well after the time period I was originally talking about. I guess he is technically incorrect however that Afroasiatic-speakers "never" made it south of the Horn, but... they apparently didn't do so in such numbers to outlast the Bantu, did they?

lolling me because you don't know about the topic is snotty, I retorted in kind.
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The first paper is talking about the "Eurasian" input (It's a simple way of saying people without Archaic African ancestry Afrasian vs Paleoafrican).

Its related not to Afro-Asiatic speakers per se, rather its related to Cushitic people who migrated down and were absorbed by Nilo-Saharans aka Savanna Pastoral Neolithic (Maasai as an example are descendants of this cultural complex) those who migrated further were themselves absorbed by ancestors of the proposed Khow-Kwadi-Sandawe linguistic family who migrated down the East African Littoral into what is now Southern Africa. The first and second paper are interlinked, the first is for lay people that's simplified, the second had a limited scope in its research.

"The chronology of all these genetic contributions is relatively imprecise. Estimates based on shared E-M293 haplotypes indicate that gene flow between eastern and southern African populations most likely occurred between 1200 and 2700 years ago (standard error bounded by 40–5000 years ago [30]). The admixture event which introduced Eurasian genetic traits, and which had the largest demographic impact in Khoisan populations that speak Khoe–Kwadi languages, can be dated to ∼900–1800 years ago [160]. And the analyses of the LCT region and genome-wide data among southern Africans show that the pastoralist Khoe originate from a San group that adopted pastoralism, with introgression from an East African Afro-Asiatic group that migrated south prior to 1300 years ago [29]. Using the Maasai and Ju|’hoansi as potential parental populations to the Nama, an admixture date of 1143 ± 74 years is indicated. Using the Afar, Amhara, and Tigray instead of Maasai, the admixture dates would be somewhat older around 1255 years ago [29]. It is interesting to note the diversity of these chronological estimates, and that many are too recent to correspond to the earliest infiltrations of livestock into southern Africa. All this suggests that many separate infiltration events brought East African cultural, economic and genetic traits into southern Africa over a long time span. With the help of large scale patterns in the distribution of stone toolkits, ceramics and faunal remains, we have been able to isolate two of the events which infiltrated the first livestock into southern Africa."
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0134215#sec003

Also "Khoisan" is not a real term of any linguistic or genetic merit, its just a wastebin term of all the click language speakers in Africa that are yellow skinned.

I post simple stuff because lets be real, this isn't a forum filled with people who put much time in Africa until its a "____ colonizes *insert piece of africa* thread" which quite frankly is irksome without folks doing research.
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Anyways I'll right back to those other questions of yours and why I think its ASB to have dravidians in Madagascar. You also don't seem to have a lot of understanding about WIO trade because I know I'm making sense right now.
 
lolling me because you don't know about the topic is snotty, I retorted in kind.
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The first paper is talking about the "Eurasian" input (It's a simple way of saying people without Archaic African ancestry Afrasian vs Paleoafrican).

Its related not to Afro-Asiatic speakers per se, rather its related to Cushitic people who migrated down and were absorbed by Nilo-Saharans aka Savanna Pastoral Neolithic (Maasai as an example are descendants of this cultural complex) those who migrated further were themselves absorbed by ancestors of the proposed Khow-Kwadi-Sandawe linguistic family who migrated down the East African Littoral into what is now Southern Africa. The first and second paper are interlinked, the first is for lay people that's simplified, the second had a limited scope in its research.


https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0134215#sec003

Also "Khoisan" is not a real term of any linguistic or genetic merit, its just a wastebin term of all the click language speakers in Africa that are yellow skinned.

I post simple stuff because lets be real, this isn't a forum filled with people who put much time in Africa until its a "____ colonizes *insert piece of africa* thread" which quite frankly is irksome without folks doing research.
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Anyways I'll right back to those other questions of yours and why I think its ASB to have dravidians in Madagascar. You also don't seem to have a lot of understanding about WIO trade because I know I'm making sense right now.

I was being facetious... nobody was trying to condescend to you. Now, I will ask you again to try and be respectful. You’re coming across as extremely abrasive and snooty.

I was aware of the nature of the term “Khoisan”, but you can group a lot of the Khoisans based on phenotype, superficial linguistic similarities (I’m admittedly not that familiar, and so I wonder if they can be said to form a Sprachbund?) and economy, with most of the groups in Southern Africa being hunter-gatherers to my knowledge while the ones in Eastern Africa were pastoralists, likely having animal husbandry introduced to them by northerly groups.

I’m really interested in why you think that Dravidians settling Madagascar in Classical or Late Antiquity is ASB and yet getting a bunch of Austronesians from the Barito River in Borneo there isn’t, as opposed to the population history of parts of Africa that I was never inquiring about in a time period some 500 years later. You seem to be very knowledgeable and have a number of resources at your disposal here.
 
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I was being facetious... nobody was trying to condescend to you. Now, I will ask you again to try and be respectful. You’re coming across as extremely abrasive and snooty.

I was aware of the nature of the term “Khoisan”, but you can group a lot of the Khoisans based on phenotype, superficial linguistic similarities (I’m admittedly not that familiar, and so I wonder if they can be said to form a Sprachbund?) and economy, with most of the groups in Southern Africa being hunter-gatherers to my knowledge while the ones in Eastern Africa were pastoralists, likely having animal husbandry introduced to them by northerly groups.

I’m really interested in why you think that Dravidians settling Madagascar in Classical or Late Antiquity is ASB and yet getting a bunch of Austronesians from the Barito River in Borneo there isn’t, as opposed to the population history of parts of Africa that I was never inquiring about in a time period some 500 years later. You seem to be very knowledgeable and have a number of resources at your disposal here.


People on this board seem to only act like this regarding non-Western or non-East Asian History. It's disrespectful.

So I can go deuces of you don't want an answer, your facetiousness or whatever you want to call it was not necessary on topic you don't know about after requesting people who have knowledge in this their opinion.

If you searched this forum for nearly every Malagasy thread over the past year I've chimed in because my specialty is Malagasy history as well as human migration in and around Africa. Also im of malagasy descent.

Finally read the bold, it occurred during the classical antiquity + your question was both on Madagascar and Southern Africa.

Chill.
 
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People on this board seem to only act like this regarding non-Western or non-East Asian History. It's disrespectful.

So I can go deuces of you don't want an answer, your facetiousness or whatever you want to call it was not necessary on topic you don't know about after requesting people who have knowledge in this their opinion.

If you searched this forum for nearly every Malagasy thread over the past year I've chimed in because my specialty is Malagasy history as well as human migration in and around Africa. Also im of malagasy descent.

Finally read the bold, it occurred during the classical antiquity + your question was both on Madagascar and Southern Africa.

Chill.

Act like... what? I am sincerely interested in your thoughts on this subject, but as of yet, even after reading everything you have posted, I am confused as to how those two papers have any bearing whatsoever on anything I was inquiring about. So there was a pre-Bantu migration of pastoralists into Southeast Africa. That’s excellent, but as far as I can tell it’s not into the region I was talking about at the time I was talking about. Is there something I am missing?

We still haven’t talked about Dravidians in Madagascar.
 
India is a Cradle of Civilization with the Indus Valley Civilization and possibly even older than that. We know,they had ancient contact with East Africa,so it's highly possible that they explored Madagascar,the Mascarenes and Southern Africa and then set up small colonies. It still doesn't butterfly the Bantu expansion,so you might be looking at an admixture of Bantu/Dravidian people rising up,as well as a mix of religions: possibly a proto-Hindu blended with Sangoma. Also,a Dravidian presence might mean taming of elephants,so the Syrian and/or North African elephants might be imported for use,which could save them from extinction.
 
From what I gather, South Indian seafaring dynasties were mostly concerned with securing the trade with Southeast Asia and China. This was a recurring trend that began in ancient times. Brahmins were settling Indonesia and even Vietnam during the Gupta period (300-500 C.E). Many early medieval dynasties in Southeast Asia were outright Shaiva or Vaishnava Hindus due to this influence. Around 1100-1300 Southeast Asia (Indochina and Indonesia) were basically in the Chola sphere of influence. The Cholas made no effort to consolidate or centralize their gains -- their invasions of Southeast Asia were centered around plunder and securing their share of the Asian sea trade.

The point I'm making is that South Indian naval "imperialism" was very concentrated. South Indians weren't trying to explore the globe in the way that Europeans were, they were more concerned with influencing the most lucrative part of their world (Southeast Asia) and making sure they were getting their cut of the pie. There's a reason why the Chola dynasty -- probably the strongest naval force in India at the time) -- made no effort to colonize coastal North India, Iran, or Arabia. There was no historical precedent for doing so, and in their minds, the Asian market was a thousand times more worthwhile than anything to the west.

South Indians definitely traded with Middle Eastern and European powers, but they were more the "receivers" than the "givers" so to speak. Persians, Arabs, Romans, Greeks, etc were trying to get to South India -- South Indians weren't trying nearly as hard to get to them. On the flipside, South Indians were trying very hard to "get to" Southeast Asia. South India has a minimal cultural influence on Arabia, Iran, or Ethiopia, to say nothing of Europe. Conversely, it has had an enormous cultural influence on Southeast Asia, and even on China and Japan to a lesser extent (Buddhism entirely came from India). The foreign policy of indigenous Hindu rulers (even in the North) was always oriented to the east.

To answer OP, a "Dravidian" Madagascar (or East Africa, or Southern Arabia, or Southern Persia, or even Gujarat/Sindh) would require fundamental changes to the mindset of the Cholas, Pandyas, and others. They would need to have a much more exploratory mindset than they did OTL. From what I understand, most Indian polities saw everything to the west of them as a peripheral, semi-barbaric territory that they had no interest in learning more about. This attitude continued even into Mughal times, where despite a greater degree of integration with the Islamic world, outbound traffic from India was minimal (hundreds of Europeans visited Mughal India, while the Mughal emperors only sent one ambassador to Europe).

You would need to have a Chola emperor or two with a very quixotic interest in the west. Other problems also include shipbuilding tech and the distances. Indonesia isn't exactly close to South India, but it's a lot more accessible than Madagascar. We also know very little about Indian shipbuilding tech, and from what we do know, they seem to be coast-huggers. On top of a change in mindset from the Dravidians themselves, you would probably need a more prosperous and significant East Africa to justify this exploration as well. I think this ATL would be very possible, South Indians certainly could have been more involved in Africa than they were OTL. But there are very significant and understandable reasons why they focused on Southeast Asia instead.

This is an interesting prompt for sure though. A more outward-looking India and China would completely transform world history.
 
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From what I gather, South Indian seafaring dynasties were mostly concerned with securing the trade with Southeast Asia and China. This was a recurring trend that began in ancient times. Brahmins were settling Indonesia and even Vietnam during the Gupta period (300-500 C.E). Many early medieval dynasties in Southeast Asia were outright Shaiva or Vaishnava Hindus due to this influence. Around 1100-1300 Southeast Asia (Indochina and Indonesia) were basically in the Chola sphere of influence. The Cholas made no effort to consolidate or centralize their gains -- their invasions of Southeast Asia were centered around plunder and securing their share of the Asian sea trade.

The point I'm making is that South Indian naval "imperialism" was very concentrated. South Indians weren't trying to explore the globe in the way that Europeans were, they were more concerned with influencing the most lucrative part of their world (Southeast Asia) and making sure they were getting their cut of the pie. There's a reason why the Chola dynasty -- probably the strongest naval force in India at the time) -- made no effort to colonize coastal North India, Iran, or Arabia. There was no historical precedent for doing so, and in their minds, the Asian market was a thousand times more worthwhile than anything to the west.

South Indians definitely traded with Middle Eastern and European powers, but they were more the "receivers" than the "givers" so to speak. Persians, Arabs, Romans, Greeks, etc were trying to get to South India -- South Indians weren't trying nearly as hard to get to them. On the flipside, South Indians were trying very hard to "get to" Southeast Asia. South India has a minimal cultural influence on Arabia, Iran, or Ethiopia, to say nothing of Europe. Conversely, it has had an enormous cultural influence on Southeast Asia, and even on China and Japan to a lesser extent (Buddhism entirely came from India). The foreign policy of indigenous Hindu rulers (even in the North) was always oriented to the east.

To answer OP, a "Dravidian" Madagascar (or East Africa, or Southern Arabia, or Southern Persia, or even Gujarat/Sindh) would require fundamental changes to the mindset of the Cholas, Pandyas, and others. They would need to have a much more exploratory mindset than they did OTL. From what I understand, most Indian polities saw everything to the west of them as a peripheral, semi-barbaric territory that they had no interest in learning more about. This attitude continued even into Mughal times, where despite a greater degree of integration with the Islamic world, outbound traffic from India was minimal (hundreds of Europeans visited Mughal India, while the Mughal emperors only sent one ambassador to Europe).

You would need to have a Chola emperor or two with a very quixotic interest in the west. Other problems also include shipbuilding tech and the distances. Indonesia isn't exactly close to South India, but it's a lot more accessible than Madagascar. We also know very little about Indian shipbuilding tech, and from what we do know, they seem to be coast-huggers. On top of a change in mindset from the Dravidians themselves, you would probably need a more prosperous and significant East Africa to justify this exploration as well. I think this ATL would be very possible, South Indians certainly could have been more involved in Africa than they were OTL. But there are very significant and understandable reasons why they focused on Southeast Asia instead.

This is an interesting prompt for sure though. A more outward-looking India and China would completely transform world history.

That was very useful, thank you. So, what might we do to draw their interests westward so that they might want to monopolize control of the Western Indian Ocean? Could a more Balkanized South India have this effect?

Also, @Revachah said something about the settlement of Madagascar being related to the spice trade. I’m still waiting to hear more :p
 
I don't know if Balkanization would help, South India was pretty balkanized historically. With the exception of the Vijayanagar empire (which was much more insular than the Cholas), there was at minimum some kind of a dispute between the Tamil country and modern-day Karnataka. In these situations, the focus was never on controlling anything outside of India. The Asian trade, for example, had minimal influence on the wars between the Cholas and the Hoysala Empire in Karnataka. These wars were purely centered around plunder and land control within South India itself.

There are a couple reasons why this was the case. The first is that South India in the medieval period was incredibly rich. There's an old Tamil about the land near the Kaveri River -- "in the space where an elephant lies down, you could grow enough rice to feed a village". The amounts of precious stones and gold mined in that area were enormous as well. Medieval Europeans who visited South India (like Ludovico de Varthema) wrote glowing accounts of the commerce, wealth, and quality of life there as well. So South Indian empires were much more focused on controlling this wealth -- which was very immediate and close at hand for them -- than they were with controlling other lands. Conversely, European countries were much smaller and poorer (from what I gather). There was much more of an impetus to find other places to trade with and access exotic resources.

Southeast Asia was also never under the direct control of any South Indian polity. India's influence on SEA was entirely cultural and commercial. The one exception to this was the reign of Rajendra Chola, where the Chola empire intervened in a war between the Khmers and the Srivijaya empire in Indonesia. The Cholas defeated Srivijaya and ceremonially conquered Indonesia, but they made no attempt to colonize or integrate their new possession at all. Apart from giving Tamil trading guilds more power and rights, they immediately refocused on controlling Sri Lanka and fighting the Chalukya empire in Karnataka.

The takeaway from all of this is that South Indian polities were more than capable of projecting power outside of India, but India itself was such a rich area that it dominated their focus. This phenomenon is true not just for South India, but for North India, Southeast Asia, and even China. The political focus from the Guptas, the Khmers, and the various Chinese dynasties was never on colonizing faraway places or exploration, it was on capitalizing on what they already had. Doing the latter had a known and substantial payoff, while the former was either done out of pique or in very unique situations.

This actually makes me feel like this POD would be harder to accomplish than one would think. You could compare South India, Southeast Asia, China, etc to companies who have an extremely strong user base and are making a ton of money off of a few successful technologies. Like Apple with the iMac, iPhone, iPad, etc. Expecting South India to suddenly focus on Africa or Madagascar would be like expecting Apple to suddenly start building oil tankers. They certainly could do it, but rationally speaking, they probably wouldn't.

And think about what trading with the Swahili coast would really get the Cholas. For the Arabs and Europeans, East Africa was a great resource for slaves, gold, ivory, rhino horn, exotic animals, sandalwood, and certain crops like sorghum. For the western world (including the Middle East), these resources could be compared to a cure for cancer, but for India, they could be compared to a vitamin. Trade between South India and East Africa certainly occurred and was significant, but East Africa was overall too far and too poor for it to be worth the time of the Cholas or the Pandyas. They likely could have exerted more influence in the area, but their resources were better spent controlling their most lucrative territories.

So the real POD would need to be a more lucrative, rich, and developed Swahili coast. Coupled with a Chola emperor who either had a strong curiosity about the west, or one who had a vicious animosity with Muslim traders and wanted to flex his muscle in the region.
 
Considering Zwide's points, I could think of one POD.

If you have a stronger Dravidian civilization by the time of a stronger and larger Indo-European migrations, then the Dravidian civilization might go exploring for new land to settle an another large civilization and thus they would come to, South Africa and Madagascar.

They could build an another thriving civilization there while maintaining parts of Indian peninsula under them, like Kerala, Parts of Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka.

Later, they could establish a trade route connecting to Rome, Persia, India and Africa and linking all these to SE Asia.
 
I don't know if Balkanization would help, South India was pretty balkanized historically. With the exception of the Vijayanagar empire (which was much more insular than the Cholas), there was at minimum some kind of a dispute between the Tamil country and modern-day Karnataka. In these situations, the focus was never on controlling anything outside of India. The Asian trade, for example, had minimal influence on the wars between the Cholas and the Hoysala Empire in Karnataka. These wars were purely centered around plunder and land control within South India itself.

There are a couple reasons why this was the case. The first is that South India in the medieval period was incredibly rich. There's an old Tamil about the land near the Kaveri River -- "in the space where an elephant lies down, you could grow enough rice to feed a village". The amounts of precious stones and gold mined in that area were enormous as well. Medieval Europeans who visited South India (like Ludovico de Varthema) wrote glowing accounts of the commerce, wealth, and quality of life there as well. So South Indian empires were much more focused on controlling this wealth -- which was very immediate and close at hand for them -- than they were with controlling other lands. Conversely, European countries were much smaller and poorer (from what I gather). There was much more of an impetus to find other places to trade with and access exotic resources.

Southeast Asia was also never under the direct control of any South Indian polity. India's influence on SEA was entirely cultural and commercial. The one exception to this was the reign of Rajendra Chola, where the Chola empire intervened in a war between the Khmers and the Srivijaya empire in Indonesia. The Cholas defeated Srivijaya and ceremonially conquered Indonesia, but they made no attempt to colonize or integrate their new possession at all. Apart from giving Tamil trading guilds more power and rights, they immediately refocused on controlling Sri Lanka and fighting the Chalukya empire in Karnataka.

The takeaway from all of this is that South Indian polities were more than capable of projecting power outside of India, but India itself was such a rich area that it dominated their focus. This phenomenon is true not just for South India, but for North India, Southeast Asia, and even China. The political focus from the Guptas, the Khmers, and the various Chinese dynasties was never on colonizing faraway places or exploration, it was on capitalizing on what they already had. Doing the latter had a known and substantial payoff, while the former was either done out of pique or in very unique situations.

This actually makes me feel like this POD would be harder to accomplish than one would think. You could compare South India, Southeast Asia, China, etc to companies who have an extremely strong user base and are making a ton of money off of a few successful technologies. Like Apple with the iMac, iPhone, iPad, etc. Expecting South India to suddenly focus on Africa or Madagascar would be like expecting Apple to suddenly start building oil tankers. They certainly could do it, but rationally speaking, they probably wouldn't.

And think about what trading with the Swahili coast would really get the Cholas. For the Arabs and Europeans, East Africa was a great resource for slaves, gold, ivory, rhino horn, exotic animals, sandalwood, and certain crops like sorghum. For the western world (including the Middle East), these resources could be compared to a cure for cancer, but for India, they could be compared to a vitamin. Trade between South India and East Africa certainly occurred and was significant, but East Africa was overall too far and too poor for it to be worth the time of the Cholas or the Pandyas. They likely could have exerted more influence in the area, but their resources were better spent controlling their most lucrative territories.

So the real POD would need to be a more lucrative, rich, and developed Swahili coast. Coupled with a Chola emperor who either had a strong curiosity about the west, or one who had a vicious animosity with Muslim traders and wanted to flex his muscle in the region.

Hmmm... ok. When I was thinking Balkanization, I was honestly thinking breaking everything up into little warring city-states a la Greece or Italy, which would hopefully have the effect of marginalizing at least one of them and getting its people to look westward... maybe that just doesn’t work in context.

Maybe it sounds absolutely insane but, what about a Dravidian kingdom, or its royal family converting to Zoroastrianism or Christianity? Obviously a Christian conversion would happen quite a bit later.

Considering Zwide's points, I could think of one POD.

If you have a stronger Dravidian civilization by the time of a stronger and larger Indo-European migrations, then the Dravidian civilization might go exploring for new land to settle an another large civilization and thus they would come to, South Africa and Madagascar.

They could build an another thriving civilization there while maintaining parts of Indian peninsula under them, like Kerala, Parts of Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka.

Later, they could establish a trade route connecting to Rome, Persia, India and Africa and linking all these to SE Asia.

That’s kind of what I thought initially, and I am doing something similar in my timeline with increased contact between Sumer, Elam, Egypt, and the IVC. After TTL’s equivalent of the Bronze Age Collapse, contact with Sumer and Elam dies down for awhile, but contact with Upper Egypt remains more or less stable with the Elamo-Sumerian cities of Gujarat. Bit of a spoiler I guess. As I said in my thread on Proto-Dravidian though, if I can’t get my hands on a decent grammar for it I will have to butterfly away the language family :(
 
That’s kind of what I thought initially, and I am doing something similar in my timeline with increased contact between Sumer, Elam, Egypt, and the IVC. After TTL’s equivalent of the Bronze Age Collapse, contact with Sumer and Elam dies down for awhile, but contact with Upper Egypt remains more or less stable with the Elamo-Sumerian cities of Gujarat. Bit of a spoiler I guess. As I said in my thread on Proto-Dravidian though, if I can’t get my hands on a decent grammar for it I will have to butterfly away the language family :(
I'll help you reconstruct that. I can give the prominent and important words and meanings in these languages Via PM and you could construct names of people and places with some Indo-European influence.

The Indo-Iranian/Indo-Aryan migrations could take a different form in this timeline if you have a strong Dravidian civilization.

They could either settle on peripherals or move into an another region like Iran, Middle East or North Africa or even Europe like did the Mitanni.
 
I'll help you reconstruct that. I can give the prominent and important words and meanings in these languages Via PM and you could construct names of people and places with some Indo-European influence.

The Indo-Iranian/Indo-Aryan migrations could take a different form in this timeline if you have a strong Dravidian civilization.

They could either settle on peripherals or move into an another region like Iran, Middle East or North Africa or even Europe like did the Mitanni.

Indo-Iranian languages are completely butterflied, but there will be an Indo-European family moving in after a wave of Hurrian migrants. Any help would be very much appreciated :)
 
Indo-Iranian languages are completely butterflied, but there will be an Indo-European family moving in after a wave of Hurrian migrants. Any help would be very much appreciated :)
How can the Indo-Iranian languages be butterflied when they originated in a distant land, in the Steppes?

Plus, the Northern region around Afghanistan, Iran, Kashmir, Punjab, Sogdia, etc could still have Indo-Iranian migrants settling even if the Dravidian civilization, which, obviously would be based around the Indus and the Ganges Basin, is strong.

But, which Indo-European will you have instead of them and how are the Hurrians going to come in? From what I know, they were based in the Northwest Fertile Crescent.
 
How can the Indo-Iranian languages be butterflied when they originated in a distant land, in the Steppes?

Plus, the Northern region around Afghanistan, Iran, Kashmir, Punjab, Sogdia, etc could still have Indo-Iranian migrants settling even if the Dravidian civilization, which, obviously would be based around the Indus and the Ganges Basin, is strong.

But, which Indo-European will you have instead of them and how are the Hurrians going to come in? From what I know, they were based in the Northwest Fertile Crescent.

My timeline is called Not My Heifer, and has a POD in 3500 BC, well before the break up of Late Indo-European into its various constituent branches. The main theme is getting the Indo-Europeans to migrate into the Middle East and Central Asia in greater numbers. One branch within Graeco-Aryan (which likely already a distinct category) has already migrated through the Darial Gorge in the Caucasus Mountains into Azerbaijan, merging with and largely absorbing the Maykop Culture along the way. These Indo-Europeans have in turn already taught the Hurrians of Turukkum in modern Iranian Azerbaijan horse culture, which is soon to result in a series of migrations and conquests on the Iranian Plateau that will eventually lead them into India some time before a separate branch of Indo-Europeans that has been developing alongside the BMAC migrates there... about 700 or so years before.
 
Considering Zwide's points, I could think of one POD.

If you have a stronger Dravidian civilization by the time of a stronger and larger Indo-European migrations, then the Dravidian civilization might go exploring for new land to settle an another large civilization and thus they would come to, South Africa and Madagascar.

They could build an another thriving civilization there while maintaining parts of Indian peninsula under them, like Kerala, Parts of Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka.

Later, they could establish a trade route connecting to Rome, Persia, India and Africa and linking all these to SE Asia.

The thing to remember is that the Indo-European migrations were more a process of osmosis than they were an invasion of some kind. It's also important to understand that the "Dravidian civilization" was never a monolith -- at best it's a catch-all term for the pre-Aryan inhabitants of India. Even then, there were likely other civilizations and peoples who predated the Dravidians as well. The Indo-Europeans were not some kind of an existential threat to the Dravidians -- they slowly integrated into the indigenous population of India over time. While some passages in the Rigveda suggest warfare between the two groups, it's doubtful that there was a strong "us vs them" dichotomy between the two.

Indo-Europeans pushing the Dravidians out of India is an unlikely situation. The Indo Europeans were likely tribes of pastoralists who drifted into India, traded and mingled with the locals, and possibly raided the Indus Valley Civilization as well. The Indo Europeans also didn't even really access the South for a thousand years, by which time they had significantly mixed with the indigenous inhabitants of North India.

What could spur a Dravidian Madagascar could be Muslim pirates attacking South Indian coastal cities during the Chola period. This could lead to retaliatory raids across the coastal Islamic world.
 
The thing to remember is that the Indo-European migrations were more a process of osmosis than they were an invasion of some kind. It's also important to understand that the "Dravidian civilization" was never a monolith -- at best it's a catch-all term for the pre-Aryan inhabitants of India. Even then, there were likely other civilizations and peoples who predated the Dravidians as well. The Indo-Europeans were not some kind of an existential threat to the Dravidians -- they slowly integrated into the indigenous population of India over time. While some passages in the Rigveda suggest warfare between the two groups, it's doubtful that there was a strong "us vs them" dichotomy between the two.

Indo-Europeans pushing the Dravidians out of India is an unlikely situation. The Indo Europeans were likely tribes of pastoralists who drifted into India, traded and mingled with the locals, and possibly raided the Indus Valley Civilization as well. The Indo Europeans also didn't even really access the South for a thousand years, by which time they had significantly mixed with the indigenous inhabitants of North India.

What could spur a Dravidian Madagascar could be Muslim pirates attacking South Indian coastal cities during the Chola period. This could lead to retaliatory raids across the coastal Islamic world.
The thing is, a "Strong Dravidian Civilization" didn't exist by the time the Indo-Europeans arrived, by around 1700 BC or so, when they would encountered each other, for the first time.

Indus Valley might not have been a "Dravidian Civilization" as it is posited by many claims. It was inhabited by a diverse set of people with origins far and wide. Though there might have been many of the ASI ancestry there, if they spoke Dravidian languages is a question.

In my opinion, today's "Dravidians" in terms of languages, peopling, distinct ancestry of whatever else, might have originated in what is now Maharashtra and Chattisgarh region or somewhere a bit South.

Dravidian wasn't the only language present in India before the Indo-European languages made entry, anyhow. Burushaski, Austro-Asiatic and some others to name a few existed. Indus Valley language would have existed, as in the inscriptions there, but that language hasn't been decoded for this instant. As in Europe, many Pre-Indo-European languages are yet to be decoded and there's every reason to believe in their existence.

What we could play with here is, we could have an earlier Civilization built along the Ganges river like the Indus Valley one, and then have it strengthened and extend into the lands further East and South. So now this would on one side, become an attractive target for the peoples who have just come from the Steppe and on the other side, garner a stronger resistance for any mass migrations, inward.

So, in the end, you can play with consequences on both sides.

Whichever way, you could get a Dravidian speaking empire or a state but not anything called "Pure Dravidian" or such things as such notions never existed back then. Other peoples would join always. So for an enduring Pre-Indo-European civilization in India, you'd have Austro-Asiatic, Dravidian, Burushaski, possibly Central Asian and Iranian Pre-Indo-European languages and possibly many more like even Austronesian. But the best bet is, you could have a thin Dravidian speaking majority in the South Peninsula region.

Hence, any such colonies wouldn't be fully Dravidian or such. It will be diverse set of peoples and states(if they found ethno-states).

The other thing is, "us vs them" is quite fundamental Human nature in any pre-21st century eras. If a rich Pre-Indo-European civilization developed and survived and suppose the Indo-Europeans arrive, why would they surrender their precious lands and parts of their well built cities to someone who suddenly appeared out of the Blue?

The Indo-Europeans' reaction wouldn't be any more different. Why would they have to live as subjects of an another king, answering to their new masters and in addition to this, live as foreigners, when instead they have plenty of land to settle outside the kingdom 'or' have enough power to conquer good amounts of the well built civilization. You just have to look at the Roman Empire in the 5th century.

I don't think there's evidence of Osmosis like event as well, if so, we might have had more of the Pre-Indo-European languages rather than having the ocean of Indo-European languages on the Northern parts of the subcontinent and the overwhelming use of Indo-European names and traditions in the religions and naming traditions even otherwise, in the whole Subcontinent. It in most probability looks like Pastoral Indo-Iranian Tribal confederations that settled in the Greener lands and began Agriculture and Herding in those lands, and might have swept to the East of what is today Afghanistan and South of Tajikistan, into the Indus and the Saptha Sindhu, eventually giving rise to the Mahajanapadas(foothold of a tribe in Sanskrit) and the early Indian kingdoms. Majority of the evidence goes opposite to the Osmosis thing.
 
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The thing to remember is that the Indo-European migrations were more a process of osmosis than they were an invasion of some kind. It's also important to understand that the "Dravidian civilization" was never a monolith -- at best it's a catch-all term for the pre-Aryan inhabitants of India. Even then, there were likely other civilizations and peoples who predated the Dravidians as well. The Indo-Europeans were not some kind of an existential threat to the Dravidians -- they slowly integrated into the indigenous population of India over time. While some passages in the Rigveda suggest warfare between the two groups, it's doubtful that there was a strong "us vs them" dichotomy between the two.

I could not disagree more. I have read sections of the Vedas and skimmed through much of the rest, and there seems to me to be a very pronounced "us vs. them" dichotomy between the pious and civilized Aryans and the chaotic, impious and uncivilized inhabitants of Northwest India that they literally refer to having driven out. There is also a pronounced genetic difference between North Indians and South Indians as already discussed, and so I think that this process of osmosis that you are referring to was something that probably happened as the Aryans absorbed populations that they had subjugated. Furthermore, we know just by the genetic analyses of the Sintashta and Sintashta-derived peoples and even just taking a look at Afghans, Pamirs, most Dards and Nuristanis today that the people coming into India looked noticeably different than the indigenous inhabitants, and obviously spoke very different languages and as we already know had a very different lifestyle. I cannot really imagine that at least at the beginning, the two groups did not contrast themselves to one another.

But in terms of being an existential threat to the "Dravidians", I had mentioned earlier in this thread that if there is indeed a lack of Dravidian toponyms/hydronyms in North India that this is highly suggestive that Dravidian, at least we understand it today was never present in that area.

Indo-Europeans pushing the Dravidians out of India is an unlikely situation. The Indo Europeans were likely tribes of pastoralists who drifted into India, traded and mingled with the locals, and possibly raided the Indus Valley Civilization as well. The Indo Europeans also didn't even really access the South for a thousand years, by which time they had significantly mixed with the indigenous inhabitants of North India.

I agree that they are highly unlikely to push the Dravidians completely out - there's not really anywhere to go. What's more likely is that they would absorb them, as they absorbed the peoples they probably subjugated in the north with time. I'm not really interested in a scenario like that, I suppose. What I am still very interested in is what @Revachah has to say about Madagascar and the spice trade, because I think that this could go somewhere in terms of possible Dravidian settlement.

What could spur a Dravidian Madagascar could be Muslim pirates attacking South Indian coastal cities during the Chola period. This could lead to retaliatory raids across the coastal Islamic world.

This is an interesting idea, but how exactly does this do the trick? Is it meant as a means of drawing the Cholas attention westward, with the development of more advanced ocean-going ships to combat the piracy problem that in turn leads to more exploration?

The thing is, a "Strong Dravidian Civilization" didn't exist by the time the Indo-Europeans arrived, by around 1700 BC or so, when they would encountered each other, for the first time.

Indus Valley might not have been a "Dravidian Civilization" as it is posited by many claims. It was inhabited by a diverse set of people with origins far and wide. Though there might have been many of the ASI ancestry there, if they spoke Dravidian languages is a question.

It has always seemed to me a little strange that the entire Indus Valley Civilization is assumed to belong to one group or another. If we were to apply that model to Mesopotamia, then we would think that Elam, Ebla, and Nagar spoke Sumerian. Although I think there might have been a Dravidian component to it (i.e., some of the cities/settlements could have been Dravidian), I think that if that the entire civilization spoke a Dravidian language then there would be more evidence of earlier layers of Dravidian loans into Sanskrit, since the IVC interacted and intermarried regularly with the BMAC and the westernmost outpost of the IVC to my understanding was Mundigak, near modern Kandahar.

In my opinion, today's "Dravidians" in terms of languages, peopling, distinct ancestry of whatever else, might have originated in what is now Maharashtra and Chattisgarh region or somewhere a bit South.

If it is indeed the case that North India lacks Dravidian toponyms/hydronyms, then I'm inclined to agree. Thus far though, that seems to be the conjecture of someone in this thread. Do we know that to be the case? What specifically makes you think so?

Dravidian wasn't the only language present in India before the Indo-European languages made entry, anyhow. Burushaski, Austro-Asiatic and some others to name a few existed. Indus Valley language would have existed, as in the inscriptions there, but that language hasn't been decoded for this instant. As in Europe, many Pre-Indo-European languages are yet to be decoded and there's every reason to believe in their existence.

As far as I am aware there is no evidence for Burushaski outside of North Pakistan, and the language appears to be either a mixed language between a Paleobalkan language and an indigenous language or has just borrowed heavily from a Paleobalkan language that would have been introduced following the settlement of Hellenes and Hellenistic peoples in Central Asia in Classical Antiquity. The most recent literature I have read on Austroasiatic on the other hand, posits a much later migration out of Southwest China than previously hypothesized at around 3,000 years ago, with Mundari and Khasic languages not becoming distinct until some time later (2,000 years ago, I think), and not arriving in their current locale until afterward. The term "Para-Munda", that has been used to describe what is now called the Kubha-Vipaś substrate, was only ever used out of convenience because this substrate has "Munda-like" features, not because it was demonstrably related to Mundari or Khasic the way "Para-Mongol" is used to describe the poorly attested Khitan language, which was in fact demonstrably related to Mongolic.

What we could play with here is, we could have an earlier Civilization built along the Ganges river like the Indus Valley one, and then have it strengthened and extend into the lands further East and South. So now this would on one side, become an attractive target for the peoples who have just come from the Steppe and on the other side, garner a stronger resistance for any mass migrations, inward.

So, in the end, you can play with consequences on both sides.

I'm confused... are you saying have a stronger civilization along the Ganges so that once the Aryans migrate in, they will be focused on subjugating it and not Dravidians further south, allowing for the Dravidians to develop some more? Am I being dense?

Whichever way, you could get a Dravidian speaking empire or a state but not anything called "Pure Dravidian" or such things as such notions never existed back then. Other peoples would join always. So for an enduring Pre-Indo-European civilization in India, you'd have Austro-Asiatic, Dravidian, Burushaski, possibly Central Asian and Iranian Pre-Indo-European languages and possibly many more like even Austronesian. But the best bet is, you could have a thin Dravidian speaking majority in the South Peninsula region.

Hence, any such colonies wouldn't be fully Dravidian or such. It will be diverse set of peoples and states(if they found ethno-states).

The other thing is, "us vs them" is quite fundamental Human nature in any pre-21st century eras. If a rich Pre-Indo-European civilization developed and survived and suppose the Indo-Europeans arrive, why would they surrender their precious lands and parts of their well built cities to someone who suddenly appeared out of the Blue?

The Indo-Europeans' reaction wouldn't be any more different. Why would they have to live as subjects of an another king, answering to their new masters and in addition to this, live as foreigners, when instead they have plenty of land to settle outside the kingdom 'or' have enough power to conquer good amounts of the well built civilization. You just have to look at the Roman Empire in the 5th century.

I don't think there's evidence of Osmosis like event as well, if so, we might have had more of the Pre-Indo-European languages rather than having the ocean of Indo-European languages on the Northern parts of the subcontinent and the overwhelming use of Indo-European names and traditions in the religions and naming traditions even otherwise, in the whole Subcontinent. It in most probability looks like Pastoral Indo-Iranian Tribal confederations that settled in the Greener lands and began Agriculture and Herding in those lands, and might have swept to the East of what is today Afghanistan and South of Tajikistan, into the Indus and the Saptha Sindhu, eventually giving rise to the Mahajanapadas(foothold of a tribe in Sanskrit) and the early Indian kingdoms. Majority of the evidence goes opposite to the Osmosis thing.

IMTIL, the IVC is collapsed in the 21st century BCE by incessant raiding on the part of Gutio-Sumerian, Anshanite, Mundigaki and Marhashian dynasts, the latter of whom especially use the Hurrian-speaking Turukkeans as mercenaries in the whole affair. The Indus Valley and Northwest India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan then become a sort of a "Wild West" for these peoples until around 1450 BCE. During this time, they set up various settlements along the river, and first subjugating and then absorbing the indigenous peoples. There is a lot of change in affairs in Mesopotamia during this time of course, and there is an Alexander the Great-like figure from Sumer who rises to conquer Mesopotamia, Elam, Awan, Simashki, Anshan, Dilmun, and briefly Mundigak, but who doesn't leave a clear heir and his brothers and generals fight over the empire, causing it to disintegrate into smaller pieces. The Elamo-Sumerian and Mundigaki settlements along the Indus will remain independent during this time, from about 1680-1450 BCE, while they fight a series of long, drawn out wars to stave off the impending tide of Turukkeans pastoralists from Afghanistan, with mixed success. The Indo-Europeans, who by now have mingled and almost completely (if not completely) absorbed the BMAC at this time as they have been inhabiting the same area since much earlier (approximately 300 BCE), will begin their push into North India BEHIND the Hurrians after their civilization in Transoxiana is toppled by another group of Indo-Europeans from the Ili River Valley.

During the first half of the 2nd millennium BCE IMTL, there is likely to be a lot of interaction between the maritime settlements of the Indus Valley and Gujarat as well as Dilmun and the West Indian Coast. I have read that the earliest evidence for cinnamon in Egypt comes from 1500 BCE, and so I think it would be interesting to kickstart a spice trade in the Bronze Age, if only for Southwest Indian - presumably Dravidian - peoples to lose their primary customer base in Northwest India following the migration of first the Hurrians and then the Indo-Europeans coming in behind them. Perhaps they put out their own search for the lands of Dilmun and Sumer, to keep things going as they were? Maybe they accidentally come across places like Yemen and maybe even "Punt", where they hear about Egypt?
 
I could not disagree more. I have read sections of the Vedas and skimmed through much of the rest, and there seems to me to be a very pronounced "us vs. them" dichotomy between the pious and civilized Aryans and the chaotic, impious and uncivilized inhabitants of Northwest India that they literally refer to having driven out. There is also a pronounced genetic difference between North Indians and South Indians as already discussed, and so I think that this process of osmosis that you are referring to was something that probably happened as the Aryans absorbed populations that they had subjugated. Furthermore, we know just by the genetic analyses of the Sintashta and Sintashta-derived peoples and even just taking a look at Afghans, Pamirs, most Dards and Nuristanis today that the people coming into India looked noticeably different than the indigenous inhabitants, and obviously spoke very different languages and as we already know had a very different lifestyle. I cannot really imagine that at least at the beginning, the two groups did not contrast themselves to one another.

But in terms of being an existential threat to the "Dravidians", I had mentioned earlier in this thread that if there is indeed a lack of Dravidian toponyms/hydronyms in North India that this is highly suggestive that Dravidian, at least we understand it today was never present in that area.

The problem with this is that the verses in the Rigveda (where most of the supposed Aryan vs Dravidian war are attested to) are highly metaphorical. Many parts of the Rigveda discuss the victories of Indra (the chief war god in Vedic Hinduism) over the "Dasyus". According to some interpretations, the "Dasyus" lived in "forts", were darker skinned, "noseless", and worshipped the "phallus". This, however, is a very selective interpretation of these passages. I've quoted one of the passages below:

HYMN XXX. Indra.
5 When thou wast born supremest at a distance, bearing a name renowned in far-off regions,
Since then e'en Gods have been afraid of Indra: he conquered all the floods which served the Dasa.
6 These blissful Maruts sing their psalm to praise thee, and pour to thee libation of the Soma.
Indra with wondrous powers subdued the Dragon, the guileful lurker who beset the waters.
7 Thou, Maghavan, from the first didst scatter foemen, speeding, while joying in the milk, the Giver.
There, seeking man's prosperity, thou torest away the head of Namuci the Dasa.
8 Pounding the head of Namuci the Dasa, me, too thou madest thine associate, Indra!
Yea, and the rolling stone that is in heaven both worlds, as on a car, brought to the Maruts.
9 Women for weapons hath the Dasa taken, What injury can his feeble armies To me?
Well he distinguished his two different voices, and Indra then advanced to fight the Dasyu.

This isn't exactly a clear historical record. "Conquering the floods" could mean anything. It could mean destroying the irrigation systems that supported the IVC, but it could also just be a myth along the lines of Zeus killing Kronos or Hercules fighting the Hydra. The "Dragon" who besets the waters is a reference to Vritra, a dragon or serpent who Indra defeats with his thunderbolt. Indra supposedly destroys Vritra's "99 fortresses" as well. It's possible that Vritra was a ruler of the IVC or some other indigenous civilization defeated by the historical Indra. But it's also possible that this is just another myth -- it's a stretch to say that a story about a dragon being killed by lightning somehow refers to an Aryan vs Dravidian race war.

Vedic gods like Indra could have been based off of historic warlords, but that line of reasoning has its own problems. The Norse god Thor is basically a perfect cognate of Indra -- both are rambunctious, lightning-throwing war leaders who slay dragons. If Indra's legend is a metaphor for a real-life person or sequence of events, why does Thor -- an Indo-European god worshiped three thousand years later -- have exactly the same characteristics? Even more bizarrely, in Zoroastrianism, Indra is a demon referred to as "Andra" with negative characteristics. The "Indra" character even appears in the Hittite civilization, along with "Uruvana" (cognate of the Hindu god Varuna) and "Mitra" (another Vedic god). Was Indra in North India, Iran, and Turkey all at once? What about Varuna and Mitra? The reality is that these deities and their associated legends probably originated in the Andronovo culture (or some equivalent) and spread around the world following the Indo-European migrations.

The point I'm making here is that making definitive statements about this period in Indian history is extremely difficult. We know nothing beyond the ruins of IVC cities and the Vedas themselves. We can't decipher the IVC language, and the Aryans left behind no inscriptions or monuments themselves (unlike the Egyptians and Sumerians). To your point, I'm sure that there was some conflict and some warfare (just based on basic human nature), but there being some kind of an all out race war and subjugation between the Aryans and the indigenous Indians is, at best, a creative interpretation of a 4000 year old verse. Honestly, this idea wouldn't even exist without British colonization and the legends perpetuated to support it.

I'm not a geneticist, but the physical difference between Afghans, North Indians, and South Indians isn't necessarily that large either. There are probably millions of Afghans who look like this:

Eid-Festival.jpg


and millions of South Indians who look like this:

Raja_Kathikeya.jpg


They certainly have different features, but they don't belong to clearly monolithic groups of people. There is of course massive physical diversity in South Asia, but we honestly don't know the exact history of every ethnic group in the region or why they look the way they do. We don't know enough to just boil it down to an "Aryan invasion".

Anyway this a fascinating topic and I appreciate the debate on here.
 
The problem with this is that the verses in the Rigveda (where most of the supposed Aryan vs Dravidian war are attested to) are highly metaphorical. Many parts of the Rigveda discuss the victories of Indra (the chief war god in Vedic Hinduism) over the "Dasyus". According to some interpretations, the "Dasyus" lived in "forts", were darker skinned, "noseless", and worshipped the "phallus". This, however, is a very selective interpretation of these passages. I've quoted one of the passages below:

HYMN XXX. Indra.
5 When thou wast born supremest at a distance, bearing a name renowned in far-off regions,
Since then e'en Gods have been afraid of Indra: he conquered all the floods which served the Dasa.
6 These blissful Maruts sing their psalm to praise thee, and pour to thee libation of the Soma.
Indra with wondrous powers subdued the Dragon, the guileful lurker who beset the waters.
7 Thou, Maghavan, from the first didst scatter foemen, speeding, while joying in the milk, the Giver.
There, seeking man's prosperity, thou torest away the head of Namuci the Dasa.
8 Pounding the head of Namuci the Dasa, me, too thou madest thine associate, Indra!
Yea, and the rolling stone that is in heaven both worlds, as on a car, brought to the Maruts.
9 Women for weapons hath the Dasa taken, What injury can his feeble armies To me?
Well he distinguished his two different voices, and Indra then advanced to fight the Dasyu.

This isn't exactly a clear historical record. "Conquering the floods" could mean anything. It could mean destroying the irrigation systems that supported the IVC, but it could also just be a myth along the lines of Zeus killing Kronos or Hercules fighting the Hydra. The "Dragon" who besets the waters is a reference to Vritra, a dragon or serpent who Indra defeats with his thunderbolt. Indra supposedly destroys Vritra's "99 fortresses" as well. It's possible that Vritra was a ruler of the IVC or some other indigenous civilization defeated by the historical Indra. But it's also possible that this is just another myth -- it's a stretch to say that a story about a dragon being killed by lightning somehow refers to an Aryan vs Dravidian race war.

Vedic gods like Indra could have been based off of historic warlords, but that line of reasoning has its own problems. The Norse god Thor is basically a perfect cognate of Indra -- both are rambunctious, lightning-throwing war leaders who slay dragons. If Indra's legend is a metaphor for a real-life person or sequence of events, why does Thor -- an Indo-European god worshiped three thousand years later -- have exactly the same characteristics? Even more bizarrely, in Zoroastrianism, Indra is a demon referred to as "Andra" with negative characteristics. The "Indra" character even appears in the Hittite civilization, along with "Uruvana" (cognate of the Hindu god Varuna) and "Mitra" (another Vedic god). Was Indra in North India, Iran, and Turkey all at once? What about Varuna and Mitra? The reality is that these deities and their associated legends probably originated in the Andronovo culture (or some equivalent) and spread around the world following the Indo-European migrations.

The point I'm making here is that making definitive statements about this period in Indian history is extremely difficult. We know nothing beyond the ruins of IVC cities and the Vedas themselves. We can't decipher the IVC language, and the Aryans left behind no inscriptions or monuments themselves (unlike the Egyptians and Sumerians). To your point, I'm sure that there was some conflict and some warfare (just based on basic human nature), but there being some kind of an all out race war and subjugation between the Aryans and the indigenous Indians is, at best, a creative interpretation of a 4000 year old verse. Honestly, this idea wouldn't even exist without British colonization and the legends perpetuated to support it.

Ok, let's not lose our heads. Yes, the Vedas are highly mythologized and make extensive use of allegory... so what? What is important here is the concept being conveyed, that the incoming Aryans, who pretty much built Indian civilization as we know it down the road (not that there wasn't anything there and that the people there weren't capable), viewed themselves as separate and distinct from the people inhabiting the country, even if they later intermixed with them to create today's modern North Indians. Indra is a god that was probably loaned into the almost certainly Indo-Aryan-speaking Sintashta and Andronovo cultures through their interaction with the BMAC and is shared in common with Iranians, at least from what we know about pre-Zoroastrian Iranian religion. The attributes you are citing are the result of religious syncretism between Indra and an earlier Indo-European god of thunder and storms. That's not really relevant though because of course Indra was not a real person leading the Aryans to victory against the Dravidians led by Vritra, but rather both are archetypal characters that represent a concept, and that concept is the "us vs. them" mentality that is literally enshrined within the religious text. Maybe interactions weren't all bad, indeed they probably weren't. But, they were bad enough for a time for that conflict to mean something to the people of North India in antiquity, so much so that it would make up an important part of their foundation myth.

I'm not a geneticist, but the physical difference between Afghans, North Indians, and South Indians isn't necessarily that large either. There are probably millions of Afghans who look like this:

Eid-Festival.jpg


and millions of South Indians who look like this:

Raja_Kathikeya.jpg


They certainly have different features, but they don't belong to clearly monolithic groups of people. There is of course massive physical diversity in South Asia, but we honestly don't know the exact history of every ethnic group in the region or why they look the way they do. We don't know enough to just boil it down to an "Aryan invasion".

Anyway this a fascinating topic and I appreciate the debate on here.

I have been writing out a response for an hour to this part, and I just realized we're getting way off topic. If you want to talk about the biology of race, that's a separate topic and you can shoot me a PM. Let's just say that I would eat my phone charger if you could produce evidence that the picture of the Afghan guy was taken in Badakhshan Province of an ethnic Pamir if you could show that your second guy was a Kurukh from Chhattisgarh.

Anyways, would you mind clarifying on what your thoughts were for Islamic piracy on the Southwest Indian coast during the Chola period being a stepping stone to the kind of activity in the WIO that would get the Dravidians to Madagascar?
 
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