Talk:Indo-Aryan migrations/Archive 8

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Archive 7

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Archive 10

Max Muller

Max Muller did not invent the Aryan Invasion Theory. It was around long before him. His view was that the Indo-European homeland was unknown, only "somewhere in Asia", though he favoured putting it in the vicinity of northern Afghanistan. He didn't invent that version either; it was a popular 19th century theory. In fact, he had very little to do with the Aryan Invasion Theory at all - his interest was mostly religion and mythology. Please do not put in anything about Max Muller unless you have actually checked it in real sources. For reasons that escape me, the Internet is absolutely full of nonsense about this guy. Megalophias (talk) 03:18, 21 October 2014 (UTC)

Shall we know the name of the person who had thought about the Aryan invasion theory before Max Muller? Bladesmulti (talk) 03:31, 21 October 2014 (UTC)

You shall know if you do the least bit of research, yes. (From the very beginning - Sir William Jones. This very article cites Schlegel on the issue in a book written before Max Muller was even born.) Megalophias (talk) 05:43, 21 October 2014 (UTC)

AIT was first proposed by Ramaprasad Chanda, and then popularized by Mortimer Wheeler. See HERE. But I've seen other books say different things. VictoriaGrayson^Talk 18:50, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

That's not true, or rather it's confusing the issue. There is really no such thing as "Aryan Invasion Theory". It's just a term used by Hindu nationalists to mix together a variety of semi-related scenarios about the expansion of IE languages. In fact the earliest form of a theory of "Indo-Aryan migration" (c1790-1800) was the notion that Brahmin philosophers entered India and established themselves as an inherited priestly-intellectual elite. There was some speculation that their philosophical system might have been related to that of pre-Socratic ancient Greek thinkers, and that Sanskrit was derived from some early version of Greek. This is really the first version of the idea that there was a joint linguistic/ethnic/intellectual proto-culture. By the time of Muller the notion that the proto-culture was a lot older than classical Greece was well established. Megalophias is right about that. No one person "invented" the view that the proto-culture came from somewhere in central or western Asia. Muller presented a detailed version of this view and made it widely known. The theory that Chanda proposed was quite different. It was that the Indus Valley Civilisation had been overthrown by migrating/invading Aryans. That was later developed by Wheeler on the basis of excavations at Mohenjo-daro. The remains of the IVC hadn't even been discovered in Muller's day. The importance of this is that it changed the perception of the "Aryans" from a 'superior' race who brought sophisticated philosophy, to barbarian warlords who overthrew an advanced civilisation: more like the Vandals invading Rome than the Romans invading Gaul. Paul B (talk) 19:10, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

Aryan Invasion Theory is a term of Hindu nationalists? I'm pretty sure the term was used in western textbooks even during my lifetime.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 19:19, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

The phrase "Aryan invasion" would certainly have been used, sure. But the point is that the concept that there is something called "Aryan Invasion Theory", which is equated with the notion that IE entered India from outside is an invention of modern Hindutva ideology. It arises from populist invasion models that were widely circulated in the 1940s-60s (see for example the novel The Venus of Konpara), but it then became merged with all models of extra-Indian PIE, hence the confection called "AIT" by the likes of Rajaram. Paul B (talk) 20:48, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

There *are* "Aryan invasion theories" in the sense of specific models of how Indo-European languages came into India, but actually most of the Indo-European homeland models seem to give India short shrift, or even ignore it entirely outside of "and then steppe pastoralists happened". The model that everyone seems to follow is Kuzmina's - and I see she gets cited all of once! And even she pretty much dropped the Aryans off in Balochistan, IIRC. Megalophias (talk) 06:49, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand your point. As I said, the notion of language migration into India dates back to c.1800 (though there were also earlier models derived from Biblical-literalist stories of migrating patriarchs). Kuzmina presents an extended version of the standard Kurgan/Andronovo model, which is, of course, also supported by many other scholars. The "invasion" versus "migration" distinction is really pretty meaningless anyway. It's not as if we are talking about a clash of states. Violent conflict was almost endemic in this period, and of course there were no clear borders between states. It's like arguing over whether the expansion of European settlers into the heartlands of North America was migration or invasion. Paul B (talk) 17:14, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

Max Muller:

"…it is, at all events, quite open to us to imagine that the Aryan migrations took place by the tens or hundreds instead of by millions….why should not one shepherd, with his servants and flocks, have transferred his peculiar dialect from one part of Asia or Europe to another? This may seem a very humble and modest view of what was formerly represented as the irresistable stream of mighty waves rolling forth from the Aryan centre and gradually overflowing the mountains and valleys of Asia and Europe, but it is, at all events, a possible view; nay, I should say a view far more in keeping with what we know of recent colonisation." - Friedrich Max Muller, arguing against the Aryan migration being an invasion.
Megalophias (talk) 07:10, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

• Something about Max Muller should be inserted on this page. If you think that William Jones was original creator of the theory then he has to be mentioned as well. Bladesmulti (talk) 05:55, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

Yeah, sure. Just started the section, have to work on it further. Funny, Witzel gived the same argument. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 06:46, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

@Megalophias: I've added the Max Muller quote to a note; have you got a source? Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 07:00, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

It's from Biographies of words and the home of the Aryas, 1888, p.91. E.B. Havel says much the same thing. Paul B (talk) 08:28, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

Mr Paul B, you revealed your true colours when you said "It's like arguing over whether the expansion of European settlers into the heartlands of North America was migration or invasion." The Europeans will call it a migration, the natives an invasion especially considering they once consisted 100% the population of N. America to now being less than 1%, the distinction between migrations and invasions is meaningful for them Paul. There is a clear distinction between migration and invasion, historically and in modern times; one suggests violence the other doesn't. 176.250.148.134 (talk) 16:25, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Re: Mitanni

First and foremost please lets remain civil. This is a very controversial topic and we are not going to get anywhere by letting arguments descend into exchanges of biased opinions and personal attacks. I would just like to know how the Indo-Aryans managed to Sanskritize an area as large and as fertile as North India, which had a large population (the IVC, at its peak, is said to have contained 5 million people) yet they were not able to Sanskritize Northern Syria or any part of Mesopotamia. Witzel, very rightly, observes the 'elite recruitment' model in how a smaller band of people can impose their language on a larger group via osmosis, it seems to work on the huge populations of N. India but fails to make a dent in the less fertile and less populated Middle East. Finally; considering the Indo-Aryans did migrate and Sanskritize/Aryanise North India, why is that the major South Asian river names have clear Indo-European roots yet the river names of Europe or southern Russia cannot be reconstructed using IE roots. Both are fair points if looked at objectively, please refrain from letting your bias cloud your logic. 176.250.148.134 (talk) 15:35, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

In the interest of remaining "civil," I suggest you register a user name, and avoid phrases like "true colors," "biased opinions," etc. The questions you raise are certainly interesting, but Wikipedia is not the place to pose them or answer them. We are not a debating house, and we are not researchers. We just report what the researchers conclude. Speaking from my own personal interest, I think the Indo-Aryans didn't just come and settle in India or occupy. I think there might have been synergies between them and the IVC people. Dhavalikar's thesis is that the decline of urban IVC put people into "penury" and they turned religious. The Indo-Aryans might have offered an attractive religion to them, which then became standard. We don't yet know enough about the situation at that time. Kautilya3 (talk) 17:50, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Previous genetics-section

This is the genetics-section that was previously removed by Vic diff. Might contain other sources not mentioned yet above. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 08:53, 1 April 2015 (UTC)

I'm going to edit here, to make the authors visible. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 09:03, 1 April 2015 (UTC)

Metspalu et al. (2011) and Moorjani et al. (2013) explicitly mention "purported Indo-Aryan invasion 3,500 YBP" (Metspalu et al. (20110 p.731) c.q. "the likely first appearance of Indo-European languages and vedic religion in the subcontinent" & "Although we have documentd evidence for mixture in India between about 1,900 and 4,200 years BP, this does not imply migration from West Eurasia into India during this time" (Moorjani et al. (2013) p.430). So, in response to Talk:Indo-Aryan migration theory/Archive 7#Genetics section, these and other studies are related to the topic. And by the way, they are quite nuanced, aren't they? Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 08:24, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

Genetics section

A recent series of reaserch-papers, by Reich et al. (2009), Metspalu et al. (2011), and Moorjani et al. (2013), make clear that India was peopled by two distinct groups ca. 50,000 years ago, which form the basis for the prresent population of India. These two groups mixed between 1,900 to 4,200 years ago (2200 BCE-100 CE), where-after a shift to endogamy took place. These and other studies rule out the possibility of a large-scale "invasion" by Indo-Aryans, but do show traces of later influxes of genetic material. Several studies also show significant differences between northern and southern India, and higher and lower castes, with northern India and the higher showing stronger relatedness to West Eurasian DNA. North and south India Genetical studies reveal that broadly two genetic groups can be discerned in India, namely "Ancestral North Indians" and "Ancestral South Indians." These two distinct groups peopled India ca. 50,000 years ago, and formed the basis for the present population of India. Reich et al. (2009) discerned ... two ancient populations, genetically divergent, that are ancestral to most Indians today. One, the “Ancestral North Indians” (ANI), is genetically close to Middle Easterners, Central Asians, and Europeans, while the other, the “Ancestral South Indians” (ASI), is as distinct from ANI and East Asians as they are from each other. Metspalu et al. (2011) concluded that the Indian populations are characterized by two major ancestry components, one of which is spread at comparable frequency and haplotype diversity in populations of South and West Asia and the Caucasus. The second component is more restricted to South Asia and accounts for more than 50% of the ancestry in Indian populations. Haplotype diversity associated with these South Asian ancestry components is significantly higher than that of the components dominating the West Eurasian ancestry palette. According to Moorjani et al. (2013), the two groups mixed between 1,900 to 4,200 years ago (2200 BCE-100 CE), where-after "mixture even between closely related groups became rare because of a shift to endogamy." Differences and commonalities A 2011 genetic study by Metspalu et al. ...confirmed the existence of a general principal component cline stretching from Europe to south India. One group is more common in the south, and amongst lower castes, and the other more common amongst upper caste Indians, Indians speaking Indo-European languages, and also Indians living in the northwest. This northwest component is shared with populations from the Middle East, Europe and Central Asia, and is thought to represent at least one ancient influx of people from the northwest. According to Saraswathy et al. (2010), there is "a major genetic contribution from Eurasia to North Indian upper castes" and a "greater genetic inflow among North Indian caste populations than is observed among South Indian caste and tribal populations." According to Basu et al. (2003) and Saraswathy et al. (2010) certain sample populations of upper caste North Indians show a stronger affinity to Central Asian caucasians, whereas southern Indian Brahmins show a less stronger affinity. Pre-Indo-Aryan origins These groups predate the Indo-Aryan migration, and the commonalities of the ANI with European genes can not be explained by the influx of Indo-Aryans at ca. 3,500 YBP. Kivisild et al. (2003), Sharma et al. (2005), and Sahoo et al. (2006) note that "Indian tribal and caste populations share a common late Pleistocene maternal ancestry in India," with only limited gene flow from external regions since the start of the Holocene. Later migrations Later migrations had little impact on the gene-pool of South Asia, but traces are discerneable. Kivisild et. al (1999) note that "a small fraction of the 'Caucasoid-specific' mtDNA lineages found in Indian populations can be ascribed to a relatively recent admicture." Kivisild et al. (2000) note that "the sum of any recent (the last 15,000 years) western mtDNA gene flow to India comprises, in average, less than 10 per cent of the contemporary Indian mtDNA lineages." Despite centuries of Greek rule in Northwest India, no trace of either the I-M170 or the E-M35 Y DNA paternal haplogroups associated with Greek and Macedonian males lines have been found. Evidence of E-M35 and J-M12, a supposed Greek or Balkan marker, has been found in three Pakistani populations – the Burusho, Kalash and Pathan – who claim descent from Greek soldiers. Zerjal et al. (2002) argue that "multiple recent events" may have reshaped "this genetic landscape." Elite dominance of northern India Research by Reich et al. indicates that there has been a low influx of female genetic material since 50,000 years ago, but a continued influx of male genetic material. Bamshad et al. (2001) notice that the correlation between caste-status and West Eurasian DNA may be explained by subsequent male immigration into the Indian subcontinent. Recent elite male dominance may also have led to a language shift in northern India. According to Chaubey et al. (2008), language shift is possible without a change in genetics. Notes References

Reference

Dorothy M. Figueira (2002), Aryans, Jews, Brahmins - Theorizing Authority through Myths of Identity, State University of New York Press SUNY Press Project Muse. She delves deep into how this myth was systematically constructed to help the ruling British. She even goes on to suggest that the idea of "Aryan people" itself is a fabricated one and latched on to by different groups for their benefit. --AmritasyaPutra^T 06:53, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

Project Muse:

"In it the comparatist scholar Dorothy M. Figueira chronologically examines, from the Enlightenment to the twentieth century, the ways in which European and Indian scholars have reinterpreted the shared Aryan race "myth of descent" (3) as a manner to legitimize "the construction or the deconstruction of society" (1). Figueira systematically discusses the modes in which a variety of Eastern and Western thinkers have authoritatively and idiosyncratically appropriated the canonical fiction of the Veda text to create the ideology of an Aryan past and identity in an attempt to justify and explain the present."

SUNY Press:

"In Aryans, Brahmins, Jews, Dorothy M. Figueira provides a fascinating account of the construction of the Aryan myth and its uses in both India and Europe from the Enlightenment to the twentieth century. The myth concerns a race that inhabits a utopian past and gives rise first to Brahmin Indian culture and then to European culture. In India, notions of the Aryan were used to develop a national identity under colonialism, one that allowed Indian elites to identify with their British rulers. It also allowed non-elites to set up a counter identity critical of their position in the caste system. In Europe, the Aryan myth provided certain thinkers with an origin story that could compete with the Biblical one and could be used to diminish the importance of the West’s Jewish heritage. European racial hygienists made much of the myth of a pure Aryan race, and the Nazis later looked at India as a cautionary tale of what could happen if a nation did not remain “pure.”"

So, "this myth" refers not to the IAmt, but to the "myth of the Aryan race," an idea which is propagated by some people with peculiair views on the ideal society, both east and west, but not endorsed by the IAmt. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 07:22, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

@Joshua Jonathan: yes it is about the "Aryan race" rather than the migration theory. I also said the same. This is a closely associated article. --AmritasyaPutra^T 09:42, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

The only people that talk about "Aryans" right now are the Hindutva people. The rest of the world talks about "Indo-Aryans" which is a completely different concept. Some scholars even call them "Indic" people to get away from the "Aryan" idea. Kautilya3 (talk) 08:15, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

Oh, well, I forgot the Arya Samajis, the Aryan purists, who are quite fundamentalist. Apparently, Hedgewar used to travel around with a Hanuman statue, which he used for inspiration. When he went to Punjab, they told him to stop doing that because idolatory was against Aryan purity. I don't know if they have mellowed down any by now. Kautilya3 (talk) 08:22, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

Theories --- peer reviews

Aryan migration theory was accepted in the 18th century when mostly europeans peer reviewed theories. This is now outdated

The idea of an Indo-Aryan immigration was developed shortly after the discovery of the Indo-European language family in the late 18th century, when similarities between western and Indian languages had been noted.

The OIT theory is more recent and is probably now acceptable to more indian scholars (see moresocialservicesplease.com has some elements of a holistic Indian migration theory) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.49.157.227 (talk) 09:20, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

The solution would be for Indians to learn enough linguistics to be able to challenge the established theory in peer-reviewed journals. Wikipedia is not a journal. - Kautilya3 (talk) 09:47, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

It's rather difficult to take seriously a source that claims "What we have now is a theory (stress on theory) that all humans have their origin in Africa...Since liberalism is now creeping into academia and the over emphasized "injustice" of slavery, it is most likely that these scientists were pushing for an agenda." [1] Right, so scientists say humans originated in Africa because they are a bunch of "liberals" who want to compensate Africans for slavery (which apparently is an "over emphasized 'injustice'" in scare quotes). Paul B (talk) 15:59, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

Reviewing the Genetics literature

Kivisild et al. (1999), Deep common ancestry of Indian and western-Eurasian mitochondrial DNA lineages

Publication:

• Kivisild et al. (1999), Deep common ancestry of Indian and western-Eurasian mitochondrial DNA lineages, Curr. Biol. 9, 1331-1334 pdf

Abstract:
"About a fifth of the human gene pool belongs largely either to Indo-European or Dravidic speaking people inhabiting the Indian peninsula. The ‘Caucasoid share’ in their gene pool is thought to be related predominantly to the Indo-European speakers. A commonly held hypothesis, albeit not the only one, suggests a massive Indo-Aryan invasion to India some 4,000 years ago [1]. Recent limited analysis of maternally inherited mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) of Indian populations has been interpreted as supporting this concept [2,3]. Here, this interpretation is questioned. We found an extensive deep late Pleistocene genetic link between contemporary Europeans and Indians, provided by the mtDNA haplogroup U, which encompasses roughly a fifth of mtDNA lineages of both populations. Our estimate for this split is close to the suggested time for the peopling of Asia and the first expansion of anatomically modern humans in Eurasia [4–8] and likely pre-dates their spread to Europe. Only a small fraction of the ‘Caucasoid-specific’ mtDNA lineages found in Indian populations can be ascribed to a relatively recent admixture." pdf

Quotes:

• "Only a small fraction of the ‘Caucasoid-specific’ mtDNA lineages found in Indian populations can be ascribed to a relatively recent admixture." pdf
• "... two separate late Pleistocene migrations of modern humans to India." pdf p.1334

Assessment/commentary by Wikipedia-editors:
Kivisild et al. state:

"Only a small fraction of the ‘Caucasoid-specific’ mtDNA lineages found in Indian populations can be ascribed to a relatively recent admixture." pdf

Compare this statement to Moorjani et al. (2013), who refer to this paper stating:

"... a recent study that searched for West Eurasian groups most closely related to the ANI ancestors of Indians failed to find any evidence for shared ancestry between the ANI and groups in West Eurasia within the past 12,500 years." Moorjani et al. 2013 pdf, p.430

So, in contrast to what Moorjani et al. state, according to Kivisild et al. (1999) there are also traces of relatively recent admixture! Compare also Kivisild et al. (2000), An Indian Ancestry:

"... the sum of any recent (the last 15,000 years) western mtDNA gene flow to India comprises, in average, less than 10 per cent of the contemporary Indian mtDNA lineages. " Kivisild et al. (2000), An Indian Ancestry, p.271 (referring to Kivisild et al. (1999), "Deep common ancestry").

Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 13:06, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

Barnshad et al. (2001), Genetic Evidence on the Origins of Indian Caste Populations

Publication:

• Barnshad et al. (2001), Genetic Evidence on the Origins of Indian Caste Populations, Genome Res. 2001. 11: 994-1004 full text

Abstract:

Quotes:

• "the affinity to Europeans is proportionate to caste rank, the upper castes being most similar to Europeans, particularly East Europeans. These findings are consistent with greater West Eurasian male admixture with castes of higher rank." full text
• "We conclude that Indian castes are most likely to be of proto-Asian origin with West Eurasian admixture resulting in rank-related and sex-specific differences in the genetic affinities of castes to Asians and Europeans." full text

Assessment/commentary by Wikipedia-editors:

Gyaneshwer Chaubey et al. (2008), Language Shift by Indigenous Population

Publication:

• Gyaneshwer Chaubey et al. (2008), Language Shift by Indigenous Population: A Model Genetic Study in South Asia, Int J Hum Genet, 8(1-2): 41-50 (2008) pdf

Summary:
"Language shift is a phenomenon where a new language is adopted by a population with virtually no influence on its genetic makeup. We report here the results of a case study, carried out on the Mushar populations, which is thought to have undergone language shift from Munda (an Austro-Asiatic language) to Hindi (an IndoEuropean language). We compared the mtDNA and Y-chromosomal phylogenies of this population with those of the neighbouring Indo-European and Austro-Asiatic speaking populations, standing at similar social status. The results revealed much closer genetic affinity of the Mushar people to the neighbouring Austro-Asiatic (Mundari) populations, than to the neighbouring Hindi-speaking populations. This example shows that the language shift as such is not necessarily a signal for a rapid genetic admixture, either maternally or paternally." [2]

Quotes:

• "language shift as such is not necessarily a signal for a rapid genetic admixture, either maternally or paternally." [3]

Assessment/commentary by Wikipedia-editors:

Reich, Thangaraj et al. 2009, Reconstructing Indian Population History

Publication

Publication:

• Reich et al. 2009, Reconstructing Indian Population History, Nature. 2009 Sep 24; 461(7263): 489–494. doi: 10.1038/nature08365 abstract full text editorial comment in nature

Summary:
"We analyse 25 diverse groups in India to provide strong evidence for two ancient populations, genetically divergent, that are ancestral to most Indians today. One, the ‘Ancestral North Indians’ (ANI), is genetically close to Middle Easterners, Central Asians, and Europeans, whereas the other, the ‘Ancestral South Indians’ (ASI), is as distinct from ANI and East Asians as they are from each other. By introducing methods that can estimate ancestry without accurate ancestral populations, we show that ANI ancestry ranges from 39–71% in most Indian groups, and is higher in traditionally upper caste and Indo-European speakers." abstract

Quotes:

• "We analyze 25 diverse groups to provide strong evidence for two ancient populations, genetically divergent, that are ancestral to most Indians today. One, the “Ancestral North Indians” (ANI), is genetically close to Middle Easterners, Central Asians, and Europeans, while the other, the “Ancestral South Indians” (ASI), is as distinct from ANI and East Asians as they are from each other."
• "Many Indian and European groups speak Indo-European languages, while the Adygei speak a Northwest Caucasian language. It is tempting to hypothesize that the population ancestral to ANI and CEU spoke “Proto-Indo-European”, which has been reconstructed as ancestral to both Sanskrit and European languages38, although we cannot be certain without a date for ANI-ASI mixture."
• "The stronger gradient in males, replicating previous reports, could reflect either male gene flow from groups with more ANI relatedness into ones with less, or female gene flow in the reverse direction. However, extensive female gene flow in India would be expected to homogenize ANI ancestry on the autosomes just as in mtDNA, which we do not observe. Supporting the view of little female ANI ancestry in India, Kivisild et al.44 reported that mtDNA ‘haplogroup U’ splits into two deep clades. ‘U2i’ accounts for 77% of copies in India but ~0% in Europe, and ‘U2e’ accounts for 0% of all copies in India but ~10% in Europe. The split is ~50,000 years old, indicating low female gene flow between Europe and India since that time."

Assessment/commentary by Wikipedia-editors:
This fits in perfectly fine with the idea that male elite groups brought the Indo-European languages and culture into India, as proposed by Anthony and Beckwith: the males migrated and married local women. The pidgin languages that their children spoke gave rise to the variety of Indo-European languages. The IEMt/IAMt does not speak about large groups of people moving around, so the lack of genetic changes fits into the theory. It speaks about linguistic and cultural change. Small (elite) groups can effect great changes. David Anthony and Michael Witzel have given some explanations for this; see Indo-Aryan migration hypothesis#Anthropology: elite recruitment. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 05:55, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

This is telling us something very very strong. Little female ANI in India. That means all the ANI DNA in India comes from male intruders! Not necessarily small elite groups, could have been major groups of populations too. (This overrides my comment at the bottom, which assumed that ANI native to India, and just started mixing with ASI in 2,200 BC. But, if there is no female ANI DNA in India, then ANI could not have been native to India!) Kautilya3 (talk) 19:25, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

First, AIT was debunked, now AMT is being questioned, that leaves wacky "Elite Recruitment Theory (ERT)". What exactly these "elites" possessed? Without a convincing argument in Indian context, ERT will remain as a pure speculation, not worthy of mention. It going to be an uphill task proving ERT in Indian context. First, it has to explain how the Dravidian languages survived. May be we should re-visit AIT, because it's so simple & stupid! - --Itharaju (talk) 20:26, 22 June 2015 (UTC)

You are clearly spamming this talk page without making any real point. Elite recruitment is a model of how the migration of small groups of people could cause major changes in the prevailing culture of the population. JJ thought this paper necessitated the invocation of elite recruitment, but I disagreed. The Moorjani et al (2013) paper now shows that there was indeed a large-scale migration of populations. So, the elite recruitment model is now irrelevant as far as Indo-Aryan migration theory is concerned. - Kautilya3 (talk) 22:13, 22 June 2015 (UTC)

In fact, it was clear already in January that all the ANI population of India is made up of migrants. There are no indigenous ANI people in India, because there are no females among them. This is the clearest possible proof of Indo-Aryan migration theory. All the rival theories are now dead and buried. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 22:16, 22 June 2015 (UTC)

I don't see the IAmt being questioned here. I think it's clear to most informed people what this elite possessed: Indo-European language, the Vedic religion, horses, and battle-wagons. The possibility of "elite recruitement" as a decisive factor in language shift is proposed by several notable scholars, including Witzel and Anthony. This makes it "worthy of mention". If this is judged to be "irrelevant" by some notable scholars, then I may have missed some recent scholarly debate, which definitely should be added to the article, to supplement the views of Witzel and Anthony. Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 15:15, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

Moorjani et al (2013) say the number of migrants of West Eurasian ancestry must have been extraordinarily large to explain the fact that today about half the ancestry in India derives from the ANI. They also say, "we identified previously undetected complexity in Indian history, with many sets of Indian groups not consistent with a simple ANI-ASI admixture." So things have progressed far beyond the simplistic models previously proposed by Witzel et al. More intriguing is the fact that the researchers haven't yet been able to identify a migration path, which might imply that the entire populations along the migration route emptied into the Indian subcontinent, without leaving any traces behind. This is a bit hard to believe, but we must wait and see. - Kautilya3 (talk) 16:09, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

Wait, how does the survival of the Dravidian languages conflict with the Indo-Aryan migration? (Well, unless you expect the Aryans to have literally been a people consisting of supermen, the old "ZOMG invasion of the Ancient Aliens errrrr Aryans!!!1!" strawman.) That said, Witzel thinks that the Dravidians actually entered the continent at the same time as the Indo-Aryans; he identifies various substrata (not affiliated with any major modern language family) in South India, and actually throughout the subcontinent, so there is no reason to think that the subcontinent spoke a single language or language family once – rather, it has always been at least as linguistically diverse at it is now, and probably culturally too. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 22:44, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

And David Anthony notes that those migrations were not necessarily large-scale migrations, let alone invasions. Small groups can also have a strong influence on culture and language. China is a Buddhist country; where is the Indian gene-pool in China? Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 04:45, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

Press-coverage

Elie Dolgin (2009), Indian ancestry revealed, Nature

Publication:

• Elie Dolgin (2009), Indian ancestry revealed, Nature full text

Quotes:

• "The population of India was founded on two ancient groups that are as genetically distinct from each other as they are from other Asians, according to the largest DNA survey of Indian heritage to date." full text
• "Indian populations, although currently huge in number, were also founded by relatively small bands of individuals, the study suggests." full text
• "Overall, the picture that emerges is of ancient genetic mixture, says Reich, followed by fragmentation into small, isolated ethnic groups, which were then kept distinct for thousands of years because of limited intermarriage — a practice also known as endogamy." full text
• "This genetic evidence refutes the claim that the Indian caste structure was a modern invention of British colonialism, the authors say." full text
• "The evidence that most Indians are genetically alike, even though anthropological data show that Indian groups tend to marry within their own group, is "very puzzling"" full text

Metspalu et al. (2011), Shared and Unique Components

Publication

Publication:
Metspalu et al. (2011), Shared and Unique Components of Human Population Structure and Genome-Wide Signals of Positive Selection in South Asia, AJHG, Volume 89, Issue 6, 9 December 2011, Pages 731–744 journal summary full text

Summary:

Quotes:

• "Combining our results with other available genome-wide data, we show that Indian populations are characterized by two major ancestry components, one of which is spread at comparable frequency and haplotype diversity in populations of South and West Asia and the Caucasus. The second component is more restricted to South Asia and accounts for more than 50% of the ancestry in Indian populations." (abstract)
• "Modeling of the observed haplotype diversities suggests that both Indian ancestry components are older than the purported Indo-Aryan invasion 3,500 YBP." (abstract)
• "Indians share more ancestry signals with West than with East Eurasians." (abstract)
• "the correlation of PC1 with longitude within India might be interpreted as a signal of moderate introgression of West Eurasian genes into western India, which is consistent with previous studies on uniparental5,6 and autosomal markers.18 Overall, the contrasting spread patterns of PC2 and PC4, and of k5 and k6 in the ADMIXTURE analysis (Figure 2 and Figures S2 and S6), could be seen as consistent with the recently advocated model where admixture between two inferred ancestral gene pools (ancestral northern Indians [ANI] and ancestral southern Indians [ASI]) gave rise to the extant South Asian populace." (full text)
• "In concordance with the geographic spread of the respective language groups, the Indian Indo-European- and Dravidic-speaking populations are placed on a north to south cline. The Indian Austroasiatic-speaking populations are, in turn, in agreement with their suggested origin in Southeast Asia" (full text)
• "Summing up, our results confirm both ancestry and temporal complexity shaping the still on-going process of genetic structuring of South Asian populations. This intricacy cannot be readily explained by the putative recent influx of Indo-Aryans alone but suggests multiple gene flows to the South Asian gene pool, both from the west and east, over a much longer time span." (full text)

Assessment/commentary by Wikipedia-editors:

Press-coverage

• Pakistan Defence, Genetic study shows the theory of Indo-Aryan invasion is a Myth !

Tamang, Singh & Thangaraj (2012), Complex genetic origin of Indian populations and its implications

Publication:
Tamang, R., Singh, L., & Thangaraj, K. (2012), Complex genetic origin of Indian populations and its implications, Journal of biosciences, 37(5), 911-919 abstract PubMed abstract Springer

Summary:
"Indian populations are classified into various caste, tribe and religious groups, which altogether makes them very unique compared to rest of the world. The long-term firm socio-religious boundaries and the strict endogamy practices along with the evolutionary forces have further supplemented the existing high-level diversity. As a result, drawing definite conclusions on its overall origin, affinity, health and disease conditions become even more sophisticated than was thought earlier. In spite of these challenges, researchers have undertaken tireless and extensive investigations using various genetic markers to estimate genetic variation and its implication in health and diseases. We have demonstrated that the Indian populations are the descendents of the very first modern humans, who ventured the journey of out-of-Africa about 65,000 years ago. The recent gene flow from east and west Eurasia is also evident. Thus, this review attempts to summarize the unique genetic variation among Indian populations as evident from our extensive study among approximately 20,000 samples across India." abstract PubMed

Quotes:

Assessment/commentary by Wikipedia-editors:
This paper by one of the same authors of the 2013 study says the opposite of the later 2013 study and claims that the ANI admixture event was prior to the Indo-Aryan migration time frame, and that a migration can be ruled out on this basis (which is of course not the case because genes are not languages). Why he would publish a paper contradicting himself a year later is difficult to understand. But clearly we must assume that the latter paper, with more coauthors and published in a better journal is the authoritative one of the two.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 04:13, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

I don't see a contradiction. The various research-papers are quite consistent: ANI and ASI are the original "settlers" of India, which appeared long before the Indo-Aryans. But that does not mean there were no Indo-Aryans, nor their language and religion. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 06:30, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

NB: note this comment: "The recent gene flow from east and west Eurasia is also evident." Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 07:00, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

Meitei et al. (2012) Common genetic heritage and admixture

Publication:
Meitei, S. Y., Meitei, K. S., Murry, B., Mondal, P. R., Saraswathy, K. N., Ghosh, P. K., & Sachdeva, M. P. (2012), Common genetic heritage and admixture among Indian population groups as revealed by mtDNA markers, Anthropological Science, 120(3), 227-234.

Summary:

Quotes:

• "The study also reveals admixture among Indian populations with a decreasing trend from North to South India and higher heterogeneity among Northeast Indian populations"

Assessment/commentary by Wikipedia-editors:
Confirms and corroborates the genetic distinctiveness of North Indian IE speaking populations from the Southern Dravidian ones.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 04:18, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

You are linking them to Indo-Aryan migrations via your own personal opinion. It was determined in previous discussions that such genetic studies are original research. VictoriaGrayson^Talk 04:41, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Then why did you and bladesmulti keep citing them as evidence? When you keep falsely claiming they supported your version, that means I have to review the literature to demonstrate that that is false.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 15:42, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Moorjani, Thangaraj et al. (2013), Genetic evidence for recent population mixture in India

Publication

Publication:
Moorjani, P., Thangaraj, K., Patterson, N., Lipson, M., Loh, P. R., Govindaraj, P., ... & Singh, L. (2013), Genetic evidence for recent population mixture in India. The American Journal of Human Genetics, 93(3), 422-438. abstract, full text AJHG abstract PubMed full text PuMed pdf

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Summary:
"Most Indian groups descend from a mixture of two genetically divergent populations: Ancestral North Indians (ANI) related to Central Asians, Middle Easterners, Caucasians, and Europeans; and Ancestral South Indians (ASI) not closely related to groups outside the subcontinent. The date of mixture is unknown but has implications for understanding Indian history. We report genome-wide data from 73 groups from the Indian subcontinent and analyze linkage disequilibrium to estimate ANI-ASI mixture dates ranging from about 1,900 to 4,200 years ago. In a subset of groups, 100% of the mixture is consistent with having occurred during this period. These results show that India experienced a demographic transformation several thousand years ago, from a region in which major population mixture was common to one in which mixture even between closely related groups became rare because of a shift to endogamy." abstract PubMed

Quotes:

• "One possible explanation for the generally younger dates in northern Indians is that after an original mixture event of ANI and ASI that contributed to all present-day Indians, some northern groups received additional gene flow from groups with high proportions of West Eurasian ancestry, bringing down their average mixture date. This hypothesis would also explain the nonexponential decays of LD in many northern groups and their higher proportions of ANI ancestry." pdf p.429-430

Assessment/commentary by Wikipedia-editors:
This entire study provides genetic support for a migration of IE speakers carrying the ANI genetic complex between 4200 and 1900 BP. It shows both that ANI correlates with IE, and ASI with dravidian, and that the major admixture event happened in the time period when linguistics consider Proto-Indic (Indo-Aryan) to arrived in the subcontinent.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 04:08, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

I don't agree. 4,200-1,900 is the period of the Harappan civilisation. When that vanished, the intermingling stopped, to be replaced by Sanskritisation and a caste-system - which coincides with the Vedic people... ~~

Chips. "4,200-1,900 years ago" - I read "BCE". Ha! That is 2,200 BCE-100 CE. Indeed, the Vedic people. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 06:20, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

ANI means Ancestral North Indians. They didn't arrive from anywhere, unless you are of course talking about out of Africa. This is the problem with original research and personal interpretations. Basically, the Vedics were native to North India.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 15:26, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

You are being dim, all populations arrive from somewhere and the fact that they use the word "ancestral" does not mean "native" it just means that the genes are the ancestral genes of that population. It doesnt say where that ancestral population lived. When two ancestral populations share genes such as the ANI and other Indoeuropean peoples then chances are that they lived together and one of them had to migrate. So again it boils fown to the absurd scenario that all indo-europeans originated in India, or the meaningful scenario that Europeans and Indians originated somewhere else and each migrated to their current positions.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 15:45, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Being called dim is a personal insult. Basically all I see is your personal interpretations, also known as original research.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 15:50, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Whereas your personal interpretations that contradict the statements in the actual studies are what exactly?User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 15:55, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

• Maunus you are making personal attack. If you don't have anything to say on content dispute then find something else to do. I may add you are indulging in heavy original research. --AmritasyaPutra^T 15:53, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

There is not a single word of original research going on here--Maunus is simply rephrasing the very conclusions being made in the article. And you two are, indeed, practicing an extreme form of I didn't hear that when you ignore the comment (from the source) that these gene markers match markers found through the Middle East, Central Asia, and Europe. Guess where the Proto-Indo-Europeans came from? Ding, ding, ding. Europe through Central Asia (the Andronovo complex per Anthony and Fortson) and into northern India. --Taivo (talk) 16:13, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

One researcher dates ANI to 40,000 years ago. See below. So its personal interpretation to link all of this to Aryan Migrations @Taivo:, especially when none of the studies explicitly do that.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 16:17, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for writing Taivo. You may pursue the discussion in its entirety including all the sources and argument presented. Mocking me won't help. In fact, I am learned in this topic and I fully understand what I wrote/write. Regards. --AmritasyaPutra^T 16:20, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

And Victoria, it is your own "original research" and your own "improper synthesis" to assume that the one' source using 40,000 years is the correct one. And since these sources don't specifically rule out an outside source for the ANI DNA, you are also doing original research to assume that its origin is in India. Two can play the game of accusing the other of "OR". --Taivo (talk) 18:03, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

The ANI/ASI-settlement predates the Indo-Aryans with tens of thousands of years. The admicture coincides with the Indo-Aryans. The onset of endogamy coincides with the Kushan empire; why? It looks like this article is a must-read; I've provided a link to the pdf. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 06:45, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

@Joshua Jonathan, With reference to Moorjani, Thangaraj et al. (2013), I agree with your interpretation that ANI/ASI-settlement predates the Indo-Aryans by tens of thousands of years. I draw everyone’s attention to page-423, wherein it cautioned that QUOTE It is also important to recognize that a date of mixture is very different from the date of a migration; in particular, mixture always postdates migration. UNQUOTE - Above implied that ANI/ASI co-existed as geographically separated groups. They intermixed sometime during 100 AD - 2,200 BC. It is for our historians to explain What made them to inter-marry? Why was endogamy enforced later? - Itharaju (talk) 15:56, 22 June 2015 (UTC)

I don't know what Joshua Jonathan meant by "settlement." He probably miswrote it. But the 40,000 years refers to when those genetic markers were formed. There is no claim as to which populations in which part of the world formed them. However the admixture between ANI and ASI gene pools occurred starting about 2,200 BC. Clear support for Indo-Aryan Migration. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 21:53, 22 June 2015 (UTC)

Sorry to disagree. Regarding the period 1900-4200 YBP, the paper emphatically says at page-430, “this does not imply migration from West Eurasia into India during this time”. Further it clarifies there was no “evidence for shared ancestry between the ANI and groups in West Eurasia within the past 12,500 years”. It should be quite obvious that ANI group was settled in India before 12,500 YBP; otherwise they would have mixed with other people on their way to India. Frankly, I’m appalled how some comments are being posted here without understanding the contents. Who should know better than a senior co-author? To quote; "It is high time we re-write India's prehistory based on scientific evidence," said Dr Lalji Singh, former director of CCMB."There is no genetic evidence that Indo-Aryans invaded or migrated to India or even something such as Aryans existed". Itharaju (talk) 09:56, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

Lalji Singh said this in 2011, before the present paper was published. It is not established that he was commenting on the 2013 results. So the 2011 press report is irrelevant. Moreover, the claim he made in the press report isn't in the peer-reviewed paper. So it is an unscientific claim. As for the statement in the Moorjani paper, it is true that it says that it points out that the results indicate the date of admixture, not of migration. The onus is on whoever wants to claim an earlier date of migration to establish how the populations survived in the interim period without admixture. Since the mitochondrial DNA analysis seems to indicate that the ANI females did not migrate to India, how else could the migrant populations have survived? -- Kautilya3 (talk) 10:50, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

The peer reviewed paper says ANI people were indigenous to India, further they had no genetic interactions with Eurasian after 12,500 YBP. Since then there was no major population migration into India. This clearly debunks the concept of Aryan Migration. It is wrong to assume ANI consisted of males only, no one said that. It is also wrong to dismiss the statement of Dr.Lalji Singh as "unscientific". As co-author in a number of genome research publications, he must be aware of the facts. In fact he is a co-author in several genetic research publications. (Genetic and ArchaeoGenetics of South Asia). It is not as if he's a novice to genetic science. I once again request that his views should be given the same importance as given to others. While Wikipedia maintained ostrich like attitude, rest of the world learned the facts from news media. (The Aryan Race Time to Forget About it). Genetic research has clearly debunked the Aryan Migration concept - Itharaju (talk) 14:03, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for your critical responses. Some note

• "they had no genetic interactions with Eurasian after 12,500 YBP. Since then there was no major population migration into India" - read again: ""One possible explanation for the generally younger dates in northern Indians is that after an original mixture event of ANI and ASI that contributed to all present-day Indians, some northern groups received additional gene flow from groups with high proportions of West Eurasian ancestry";
• "It is wrong to assume ANI consisted of males only, no one said that" - on the contrary, it's a quite common assumption. There's a difference between a so-called "folk-migration," in which a mixed group of males and females migrates, and 'elite-migration', in which a group of predominantly males migrates, for example an army or, in this case, herders and their herds;
• The section no large-scale invasion clearly states: "Several studies rule out the possibility of a large-scale invasion by Indo-Aryans";
• The editors of Time have correctly understood that the IAmt is not about genetics; just like Singh is sort of correct that "There is no genetic evidence that Indo-Aryans invaded or migrated to India or even something such as Aryans existed." (emphasis mine). Correct; no "genetic evidence." Which is entirely different from concluding "Genetic research has clearly debunked the Aryan Migration concept". That's a personal opinion, not a factual statement. The only factual factual statement which can be made here is "I think that ... etc." But then, again, these "debunkers" tend to debunk their own windmill, namely their socalled "Aryan Invasion Theory." The IAmt is something different, as explained in the Wiki-article.

Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 15:45, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

There is no reason to suppose ANI is a single line of ancestry. ASI certainly isn't. We know very well that ANI "had genetic interactions with other Eurasian" after 12 500 BC, because they share Y chromosome haplogroups that are much younger than this. (I doubt the Moorjani figure is terribly meaningful, but of course I am not a reliable source.) It seems highly unlikely that ANI ancestry was primarily due to the Indo-Aryans, since northern India was already densely populated by advanced and well-organized farmers at the time the Indo-Aryans are usually taken to have arrived (and the earlier dates for ANI-ASI admixture predate this). The connection with West Asians (ASI being most closely related to them) could easily go back to the Neolithic (farmers bringing Fertile Crescent crops and livestock to the subcontinent) and/or the Paleolithic (simple proximity). The early admixture dates in South India can relate to the spread of the Neolithic there. The higher amount of ANI in higher castes and Indo-Aryan speakers is simply explained by the fact that they came from Northwestern India - ANI ancestry in itself is far too old and coarse-grained to relate specifically to Indo-Aryans. Other genetic markers could, most obviously Y haplogroup R1a1a1-M417, which most certainly connects South Asia and Europe in the Copper-Bronze Age time frame, though exactly how is not yet known.Megalophias (talk) 08:07, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Indeed. The Indo-Aryan migration was neither the first migration (from western Eurasia or anywhere else) to the Indian subcontinent, nor was it the last. It was but one of many migrations, so it is unsurprising that detecting its genetic traces turns out a tricky business.

The more interesting observation is actually that compared to the uncounted waves of migration into the subcontinent there are so few known historical or prehistorical waves of migration out of the subcontinent. (The best-known is probably the migration of the Roma.) The Indian subcontinent is like a cul-de-sac, a historical dead-end, or, if you will, a honey trap for peoples. Once you're there, you never see any reason to leave again.

Why? Probably because India is so fertile and sunny, colourful and abundant and all-around awesome! (Never been there myself, though – I might have found myself caught in the same trap ;-) ) (Also, admittedly, modern India, even though it's famously the world's biggest and most culturally diverse democracy, does have some quite nasty aspects – misogyny especially.) --Florian Blaschke (talk) 22:32, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Press-coverage

Fountain Ink on Thangaraj (2013)

Publication:
Srinath Perur (3 december 2014), The origins of Indians, Fountain Ink; the link was provided by Blades.

Quotes:

• "Most Indians alive today are descended from a mixture of two very diffrent populations, Reich and colleagues reported in Nature in 2009 based on a study of 25 ethnic groups. Thse two populations—the red and green of the earlier analogy—were given the names Ancestral North Indians (ANI) and Ancestral South Indians (ASI)."
• "Th ANI showed genetic similarities with Europeans, Middle Easterners, and Central Asians. Some ANI ancestry was present in almost all Indian groups, but the percentage was found to be greater in the north of India and lesser in the south"
• "Broadly, groups that spoke IndoEuropean languages and were traditionally considered upper-caste had a larger ANI component."
• "It was still unknown when exactly these populations had mixed. Thse details came in August this year in the American Journal of Human Genetics. K. Thngaraj and Reich’s groups had assembled data from 73 diffrent ethnic groups from across India and two from Pakistan"
• "In summary: about 4,200 years ago, there would have been people in the Indian subcontinent who were completely ANI in their genetic makeup, and others who were completely ASI. About 1,900 years ago, there were likely no pure populations of either ANI or ASI left So, there began about 4,200 years ago a period of demographic change due to inter-breeding among two dramatically diffrent populations. Then, after about 1,900 years ago, there was no signifcant inter-breeding, pointing to cultural changes that brought in a strong form of endogamy, the practice of marrying within one’s group. Th period is known to be a particularly eventful one for the Indian subcontinent: large-scale changes were occurring in river systems and climate; the Harappan civilisation was fragmenting; and, according to many linguists and historians, the Sanskrit language and Vedic culture were making an appearance"
• "K. Thangaraj believes it was much longer ago, and that the ANI came to India in a second wave of migration that happened perhaps 40,000 years ago."
• "In Central Europe, it has revealed, again in conjunction with other methods, that groups of indigenous hunter-gatherer people existed side by side with immigrant farmers in the period between 7,000 and 5,000 years ago, with women from the foragers sometimes marrying into the farmers but not the other way round. (It may be that ancient India went through a similar phase soon aftr with ANI and ASI people.)"

Assessment/commentary by Wikipedia-editors:
It's not clear to me how this study "proves" that the IAMt is "wrong". It does raise an interesting question, though: why did this intermingling appear between 4,200 and 1,900 ago, that is, 2,200 BCE and 100 CE? Does it have anything to do with the end of the Harappans, the arrival of the Vedics, the secondurbanisation, and the Sanskritization of India? Notice also: "according to many linguists and historians, the Sanskrit language and Vedic culture were making an appearance". Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 06:08, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

ANI means Ancestral North Indians. They didn't arrive from anywhere, unless you are of course talking about out of Africa. This is the problem with original research and personal interpretations. Basically, the Vedics were native to North India.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 15:24, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

In your imagination perhaps, but not in the study, since that is the opposite of what it says.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 15:55, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Mixing of ANI and ASI has nothing to do with the arrival of ANI.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 16:12, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

ANI is called that because that's where the genetic testing was located. Using the term "ANI" as an argument against migration is your own improper original research and improper synthesis, Victoria. You can't accuse Maunus of original research because he reads "this DNA is linked to Europe" and sees Indo-European when you use the term "ANI" to assume that the migration theory is wrong. You are a pot. --Taivo (talk) 16:20, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

@Taivo: If ANIs date to 40,000 years ago, what does it have to do with Aryan Migrations? Do any of these studies explicitly link their content to Aryan Migrations?VictoriaGrayson^Talk 16:25, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

That 40,000 year date is not the standard used in the majority of these sources. The dates given in the majority of these sources is more along the lines of the time frame for the incursion of Proto-Indo-Aryan/Sanskrit into the Indian subcontinent. The 40,000 year date is a wisp of smoke without basis. --Taivo (talk) 17:59, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Yet again I ask: Do any of these studies explicitly link their content to Aryan Migrations?VictoriaGrayson^Talk 18:01, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

And Do any of these studies explicitly NOT link their content to the Aryan Migrations? --Taivo (talk) 19:20, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Nice questions, Joshua. The changes in 2,200 BC fit nicely with the picture of:

• Saraswati river drying up, forcing people to move upstream, and later to Gangetic plains,
• the arrival of horses and chariots, increasing mobility, and
• Vedic rishis touring the subcontinent, preaching a universalist religion, breaking down erstwhile barriers.

Very useful information from this study. Thanks! Kautilya3 (talk) 18:48, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

And, what happened in 100 CE? Many people say that the caste system of the present day took shape during the Gupta times (300 CE onwards). This was traditionally called the "Golden Age" by Indian historians. However, the Arya Samajists have always maintained that the Vedic age was the Golden age, and it got corrupted in later times. Food for thought! Kautilya3 (talk) 19:00, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Yeah, it's fascinating. And actually, this is the kind of questions we should ask ourselves. Not the black-and-white "The Aryan Invasion Theory is refuted! - No, the Indo-Aryan Migration Theory is not refuted!" That's too simple, and only stirring-up a lot of emotion. I think that the "Indigenists", at least here at Wikipedia, should try to understand that the IAMt does not speak about wilde hordes invading India. Then we can see what those studies actually say, and what's relevant for Wikipedia. After all, we're not supposed to "prove" or "refute" any theory; we're supposed to reflect the relevant academic research. And improve the articles. When we ask ourselves questions, we also open up new territories to explore. Or am I too idealistic? Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 19:50, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

To come back to Vic's objections: he's right, but not completely. The ANI and ASI form the basis of India's population, dating back to ca. 50,000 years ago. Several studies have concluded so. So that's not "a wisp of smoke without basis," and yes, it does predate the Indo-Aryan migrations. But... there have also been migrations and influxes there-after, which have left their traces. Not only male, but also female. And let's not forget, the IAm is not necessarily a "folk migration," a migration of large groups of people. It's more about elite male groups - herdsman who provided an attractive alternative to the detoriating agricultural economy of the Harappan civilisation. But it's too easy to conclude that there was no Indo-Aryan influence on India. Newspapers are to eager to state that "the Aryan invasion theory has been rebuked". Let them explain what the IAMt is about, instead of fighting Muller's 19th century ghost which is still haunting the collective imagination. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 20:48, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

It's not Muller's ghost - Muller never said anything about invading hordes with a distinct racial identity. It's populist interpretations of racialised models that never really had much to do with what most actual experts ever said. Paul B (talk) 14:26, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Dan Kedmey (2013), What DNA Testing Reveals About India’s Caste System, Time

Publication:

• Dan Kedmey (2013), What DNA Testing Reveals About India’s Caste System, Time full text

Quotes:

• "Their finding, recently published in the American Journal of Human Genetics, made waves when it was revealed that genetic mixing ended 1,900 years ago, around the same time the caste system was being codified in religious texts. The Manusmriti, which forbade intermarriage between castes, was written in the same period, give or take a century. Thangaraj says the study shows only a correlation between the early caste system and the divergence of bloodlines, and whether one caused the other is a debate better left to historians. Nonetheless, it puts a stake in the ground, marking the moment when the belief that one should marry within one’s own group developed into an active practice." full text

Assessment/commentary by Wikipedia-editors:
A clear picture emerging, when you take the effort to read those papers: India was populated by two ancestral groups, ca. 50,000 years go. In the period of 4,200-1,900 years ago they mixed - and then endogamy started. Other groups also entered India, but left significantly less genetic traces, including the Indo-Aryans. But they did have another significant influence: their language, and their religious texts. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 21:06, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

Other

• Harvard Medical School, Genetics Proves Indian Population Mixture
• Harappa Ancestry Project, Genetic Evidence for Recent Population Mixture in India
• Medical Express, Genetic evidence shows recent population mixture in India
• Popular Archeology, People of India Today a Mixture from the Pre-Caste Era, Say Scientists
• NatureIndia, Indians had a 'caste no bar' past
• The Times of India, Study reveals origin of India’s caste system
• Indian Defence Forum, Caste barriers not older than 2000 years: Study
• Dieneke's Anthropology Blog, Major admixture in India took place ~4.2-1.9 thousand years ago (Moorjani et al. 2013)
• DiscoverMagazine, Indo-Aryans, Dravidians, and waves of admixture (migration?)

Mastana, S. S. (2014)

Publication:

• Mastana, S. S. (2014), Unity in diversity: an overview of the genomic anthropology of India, Annals of human biology, 41(4), 287-299. abstract

Summary:

Quotes:

Assessment/commentary by Wikipedia-editors:

Mohammad Ali et al. (2014), Characterizing the genetic differences

Publication:

• Mohammad Ali et al. (2014), Characterizing the genetic differences between two distinct migrant groups from Indo-European and Dravidian speaking populations in India, BMC Genetics 2014, 15:86 doi:10.1186/1471-2156-15-86 full text

Conclusions:
"Our finding points to a gene-flow from Europe to north India that provides an explanation for the lighter skin tones present in North Indians in comparison to South Indians." full text

Quotes:

• "Traditional upper castes from north India tend to be Indo-Aryan language speakers and are associated with fairer skin complexion, and there tended to be little vertical inter-caste marriages [28]. This would agree with previous reports of north-western Indians and those from upper castes across India having a greater degree of genetic similarity to that present in central and west Asia, as well as parts of Europe [1,3,29,30]" full text

Assessment/commentary by Wikipedia-editors: I don't know if this study is in line with Moorjani et al. (2013), whi ascribe the European features of northern Indian higher classes to pre-Indo-Aryan origins. But it's an interesting addition. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 20:43, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

Other useful resources and links

• FOSA, Recent Findings in Archeogenetics and the Aryan Migration Theory - Abstracts of Key Studies
• Genetics and archaeogenetics of South Asia
• Non-Local Genetic Components in Southern India

What is the basis for the identification of steppe cultures as Proto-Indo-Iranian?

Hi,I just want to know why the steppe cultures like Sintashta,Andronovo etc are identified as Indo-Iranian?

I'm talking about this part : The Proto-Indo-Iranians, from which the Indo-Aryans developed, are identified with the Sintashta culture (2100–1800 BCE),[5] and the Andronovo culture,[6] How can we confirm they spoke PII without any records?

The source links to the work of D.W.Antony,which is based on absurd identification of Proto-Vedic culture and rituals with steppe cultures.He emphasizes on the Ashvamedha ritual and relates it with the steppe graves.But in reality,the Ashvamedha horse is sacrificed and offered into the fire instead being buried(with human remains and chariots,like in steppes) in the graves! The ritual has nothing to do with funeral rites,but it is rather about the prosperity and sovereignty of the kingdom.The rite also signifies fertility,since the chief queen would copulate with the dead horse(echoing proto 'Tantric' themes,also found in other Vedic rituals like Mahavrata).So it is clear that Ashvamedha had nothing to do with any graves or burials.

Also,Vedic people practiced both cremation and burials but none of the Vedic texts mentions about erecting Kurgan mounds(typical steppe graves) which were filled with horse and chariot remains.We don't have any practice of erecting Kurgan mounds in post Harappan cultures either(supposed time when the steppe tribes settled in India).Round burials are rather condemned in later Vedic Satapatha Brahmana and prefers four-cornered burials.The Avestans too,never practiced the Kurgan burials,they preferred exposing the dead.So what basis is there for identifying the Kurgan cultures of steppes as Proto-Vedic/Avestan? --AryaBharatiya (talk) 16:01, 14 June 2015 (UTC)

If you want to contest Anthony's statements, I am afraid you need to submit your work to some academic journal. Wikipedia is not an academic journal. As far as Wikipedia is concerned Anthony is a perfectly reliable source.

Based on my knowledge, the researchers first reconstruct proto-Indo-Iranian language based on historical linguistics, and then look for archaeological finds that match the ideas present in the language. - Kautilya3 (talk) 17:13, 14 June 2015 (UTC)

David Anthony, The Horse etc, p.409:

• "Similarities between the rituals excavated at Sintashta and Arkaim and those described later in the RV have solved, for many, the problem of Indo-Iranian origins (note by David Anthony: "For various theories on how to link Sintashta and the Indo-Iranians, see Parpola 1988, 2004-2005; E. Kuzmina 1994, 2001; and Witzel 2003.") The parallels include a reference in RV 10.18 to a kurgan ("let them ...bury death in this hil"), a roofed burial chamber supported with posts ("let the fathers hold up this pillar for you"), and with shored walls ("I shore up the earth all around you; let me not injure you as I lay down this clod of earth")."
• "The horse sacrifice at a royal funeral is described in RV 1.162: "Keep the limbs undamaged and place them in the proper pattern. Cut them apart, calling out piece by piece." The horse sacrifices in Sintashta, Potapovka, and Filatovka graves match this description"

Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 11:51, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

Dear Kautilya3 I am not a professional scholar to publish in academic journals,in fact I have just stepped into my 20's.I have not even passed high school properly.I am just a history enthusiast,but I have read many books and papers regarding this issue.Just because I am not an academic scholar,am I not eligible to point out the faults cited in the article from Anthony's work?

Anyway,Anthony is definitely a 'source',but he is far from 'reliable'.His theories makes no sense at all,and the identification of Sintashta-Andronovo zones with Vedic cultural traits are flawed as I have pointed out.

As for the 'reconstruction' part,I think you are aware of the fact that it is mainly based on Avestan and Vedic sources.But why should we assume that Avestan and Vedic were the only archaic Indo-Iranian languages?Just because they are the earliest attested Indo-Iranian languages,doesn't mean that they were the only Indo-Iranian languages out there during their times.For example we have the Scythians and related tribes like Massagetae,Cimmerians etc.We don't know for certainty what language did they spoke and nor do we know if they spoke a unified language(they spanned a huge area,which might have included multiple languages).But from Greek sources it seems that they were close to the Indo-Iranian.They inhabited large areas of the steppes and central Asia during historic times and indeed their customs are completely identical to those of bronze age steppe cultures like Sintashta and Andronovo(horse burials,chariot burials,erecting Kurgans etc were common among the Scythians and related tribes).But these customs are not attested either in Iran or India.So I feel we must look into these historical steppe tribes for the identity of steppe cultures and languages.If we figure out their language(s) and if it turns out to be Indo-Iranian,then I'm sure it would contribute a lot to the reconstruction and the vocabulary of Indo-Iranian(which is currently based on Vedic and Avestan).We must also watch out for isolated and extinct languages which is not mentioned in historical records.For example the Nuristani language is not attested in historical sources and it is considered as distinct from other Indo-Iranian languages by many authors(though it is considered to be closely related to the Dardic Indo-Aryan).It is a miracle that such unique II language is preserved despite the mass genocide from the hands of jihadists.Isn't it possible that there would have existed more unique II(and IE) languages which would have been wiped off from the history without any traces?They would be major game changers for the current reconstructions.

Joshua Jonathan, I am aware of these statements by Anthony,but if we analyze them,they can be easily refuted. Lets take the first claim from RV 10.18.Here I cite the whole context from Griffith's translation:

RV 10.18

1. Go hence, O Death, pursue thy special pathway apart from that which Gods are wont to travel. To thee I say it who hast eyes and hearest: Touch not our offspring, injure not our heroes. 2 As ye have come effacing Mrtyu's footstep, to further times prolonging your existence, May ye be rich in children and possessions. cleansed, purified, and meet for sacrificing. 3 Divided from the dead are these, the living: now be our calling on the Gods successful. We have gone forth for dancing and for laughter, tofurther times prolonging our existence. 4 Here I erect this rampart for the living; let none of these, none other, reach this limit. May they survive a hundred lengthened autumns, and may they bury Death beneath this mountain.[4]

The whole context makes it clear that the verse refers to getting rid or burying Death(Mrtyu) itself by living for many autumns in poetic sense(similar to Dirghayushman Bhava or Mrtyoma Amrtam gamaya!)and not about erecting any Kurgans! Also the following verse(11th) asks Earth not to press down the corpse downward heavily but rather to cover the corpse 'gently' like mother covers her baby.

11 Heave thyself, Earth, nor press thee downward heavily: afford him easy access, gently tending him.
Cover him, as a mother wraps her skirt about her child, O Earth.

This would indicate that there were no huge Kurgan mounds erected,but rather it was a simple earthly grave.There is no mention of 'roofed burial chamber' but the pillar would been erected above the grave possibly for marking the grave(much like how Christians place cross over their graves). Now for horse sacrifice from 1.162.Again,if he look at the whole context,it is clear that the horse is chopped up and offered into the fire instead being buried in the graves.

RV 1.162
18 The four-and-thirty ribs of the. Swift Charger, kin to the Gods, the slayer's hatchet pierces. Cut ye with skill, so that the parts be flawless, and piece by piece declaring them dissect them. 19 Of Tvaṣṭar's Charger there is one dissector,—this is the custom-two there are who guide him. Such of his limbs as I divide in order, these, amid the balls, in fire I offer.[5]

Horse is offered into the sacrificial fire is also confirmed by the passages from both epics:

Mahabharata and Ramayana quotes

Vaisampayana said, 'Having cooked, according to due rites, the other excellent animals that were sacrificed, the priests then sacrificed, agreeably to the injunctions of the scriptures, that steed (which had wandered over the whole world). After cutting that horse into pieces, conformably to scriptural directions, they caused Draupadi of great intelligence, who was possessed of the three requisites of mantras, things, and devotion, to sit near the divided animal. The Brahmanas then with cool minds, taking up the marrow of that steed, cooked it duly, O chief of Bharata's race. King Yudhishthira the just, with all his younger brothers, then smelled, agreeably to the scriptures, the smoke, capable of cleansing one from every sin, of the marrow that was thus cooked. The remaining limbs, O king, of that horse, were poured into the fire by the sixteen sacrificial priests possessed of great wisdom.Mahabharata Those remaining body parts that horse are there, the sixteen officiating priests have procedurally oblated all of them into fire.Ramayana

I have also looked into the arguments of Kuzmina,Witzel and Parpola,but all of them more or less revolves around horse sacrifices,grave rites etc as same like Anthony. --AryaBharatiya (talk) 14:31, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

AryaBharatiya, read WP:FORUM. We can't discuss the details of your personal theories, in which you airy dismiss the research of numerous highly qualified scholars who have spent decades of their life building up their expertise. Anthony is a reliable source according to Wikipedia's definition, aty WP:RS. That's all that is meant. Paul B (talk) 16:21, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

Hi AryaBharatiya. You're definitely "eligible to point out the faults cited in the article from Anthony's work"; the point is just that what yiu are pointing out is not "the faults", but your personal analysis. Maybe you've got a good point; I don't know. What we do know is that Wikipedia reflects WP:RS, not our personal analysis. And David Anthony is definitely considered a reputable scholar, and his publications are considered to be reliable sources. See Hartwick College: David anthony], including being a professor since 1987, and co-editor of the Journal of Indo-European Studies since 1999. Likewise, Witzel and Kuz'mina are top-scholars. If you consider them to be unreliable, then you may have a very interesting point of view to share with the academic world, which may change accepted views. But then Kautilya3 is right, and you have to publish your thoughts in an academic journal, and have it judged by the scholarly community. As long as that is not the case, we trust on Anthony and his colleagues. Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 16:31, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

Hi Paul and Joshua, Thank you for the hints.I know that Anthony is more qualified than me,a person who does not even possess a degree.But the points which I raised are not solely my observation.I base my points on the claims of veteran Indian archaeologist BB Lal which can be accessed here.He actually refutes the claims made by Sarianidi on supposed Ashvamedha from BMAC but the same refutation can be,in my opinion,applied to the claims of Anthony about Ashavmedha in steppes as well since both are based on horse burials which is in no way identical to the Vedic description of Ashvamedha as pointed out by Lal.I hope Lal can be viewed as a reliable source.He has obviously devoted his entire life on archaeological issues.

Also,even Mallory(who is obviously cited even in the current article) has now revised his old views on nomadic-pastoral Indo-European(and Indo-Iranian/Aryan) expansions from the steppes as proposed by Anthony,Witzel,Kuzmina,Parpola etc.In a recent paper,he cites that the Indo-Europeans were settled farmers and agriculturists instead of nomadic herders from the steppes.Let me quote him:

Mallory quote 1

The second cloud involves lexical-cultural data that can be ground-proofed with the evidence of archaeology. All models cited above acknowledge that the Proto-Indo-Europeans possessed an economy based on domesticated livestock and domestic cereals. Earlier models such as those developed in detail by Wilhelm Brandenstein (1936) that suggested a marked dichotomy between arable Europeans and pastoral Indo-Iranians (or Tokharians) cannot really be sustained (Mallory 1997b) and despite a considerable number of differences there is still a substantial amount of shared agricultural vocabulary between European and Asian languages (Table 1 and 2). While the lists of cognates can certainly be criticized in certain specifics and they may well be an over-optimistic summary, I fear that there would still be a sufficient assemblage of words to indicate that both Europeans and Asiatic Indo-Europeans shared inherited words for both livestock and arable agriculture (if someone can prove they did not, this would make things easier for many of the homeland models). Thus, any solution to the homeland problem must be able to explain how we can recover cognate terms associated with farming from Ireland to India. "

He then gives a brief table of currently reconstructed PIE words associated with farming and agriculture. He further states the following:

Mallory quote 2

The critical issue for these models is that while any and all of them could explain the distribution of domestic animal names, there are serious problems involved with the spread of arable agriculture. As Anthony remarks in this symposium, there is really no serious evidence for arable agriculture (domestic cereals) east of the Dnieper until after c 2000 BCE (see also Ryabogina & Ivanov 2011; Mallory, in press:a). This means that there is also no evidence for domestic cereals in the Asiatic steppe until the Late Bronze Age (Andronovo etc). From the perspective of the Pontic-Caspian model, the ancestors of the Indo-Iranians and Tokharians should not cross the Ural before c 2000 BCE at the very earliest. Hypotheses linking the Tokharians to earlier eastward steppe expansions associated with the Afanasievo or Okunevo cultures of the Yenisei or Altai (Mallory and Mair 2000) become very difficult if not impossible to sustain (as long as there is no evidence of arable agriculture in these cultures) as Tokharian retains elements of the Indo-European agricultural vocabulary. Of course, it should be emphasized that sites of the Afanasievo and Okunevo cultures are overwhelmingly burials that hardly provide the context in which one expects to recover the remains of domestic cereals; moreover, there is no evidence that any of these sites have been excavated in such a way that the recovery of seeds is likely. On the other hand, domestic cereals have been recovered from the site of Begash in the Jungghar mountains at dates of c 2300 BCE (Frachetti 2012) although this site is not connected (so far as we know) with the steppe trajectory of sites (Afanasievo, Okunevo). If this were not bad enough, it is also difficult to map the agricultural vocabulary across a Pontic-Caspian homeland within Europe itself. Main elements of the scheme suggested by Nikolai Merpert in 1977 still appear to be valid in current models of the evolution of steppe cultures involving an east (Volga-Ural) to west (Dnieper) cultural trajectory but if there was little or no agriculture east of the Dnieper, then how can we describe the eastern archaeological cultures of the Don (Repin), Volga (Khvalynsk) or the entire Don-Ural region (Yamnaya) as Indo-European if they lacked arable agriculture? That the steppe populations exploited wild plants such as Chenopodium and Amaranthus is well known and while this might explain the ambivalence of some of the cereal names to reflect a specific cereal type (rather than just ‘grain’) we would still need to explain why the semantic variance among cognate words is largely confined to ‘wheat’, ‘barley’ and ‘millet’ as if at least one of these was the original referent (and not some wild grain). All of the above problems would also be inherent in Renfrew’s revised version of the Anatolian homeland model that requires the eastern IndoEuropeans (Indo-Iranians, Tokharians) to pass through the Pontic-Caspian steppe."}}

He concludes:

The problem here, of course, is that over time we have come to know more and more and that our earlier, simpler and more alluring narratives of Indo-European origins and dispersals are all falling victim to our increasing knowledge. We have obviously moved on from the time when Nikolai Merpert first published his analyses of the role of the steppelands within the context of the Indo-European homeland but it is evident that we still have a very long way to go."

View the paper here

This paper is from 2013,just two years back.So it is obvious that even Mallory has revised the old views on nomadic-pastoral Indo Europeans(and thus Indo-Iranians) of the steppes.He also points out faults in all other major IE expansion models.

Since now I have provided my sources from both Lal and Mallory, it is my humble request to edit the current article which gives wrong image of the Aryan expansion and views the steppe model as an established theory.Steppe model,and all other models of IE/II expansions are far from established.

Best wishes, --AryaBharatiya (talk) 19:13, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

One dissenting view can hardly be considered an indictment of the very well-established relationship between the Andronovo culture and proto-Indo-Aryan. Mallory is not a majority view. Indeed, as more and more evidence is accumulated in the matter, the Andronovo=Indo-Aryan connection becomes more certain. The accumulated published scholarship is overwhelming. Indeed, Mallory's comments in that paper can be considered almost a "last gasp" for the Anatolian origin theory of Indo-European origins. For example, just last week, this appeared describing genetic studies of Europeans and firmly linking them to the Yamna culture of Ukraine/western Russia (the precursor of the Andronovo culture). Mallory's Anatolian musings are simply not being accepted in the Indo-Europeanist community at large. And even though Mallory doesn't necessarily see the link between Andronovo and Proto-Indo-Aryan, he still does not accept the indigenous Indo-Aryan notion that Indian nationalists espouse. He simply places the origin of the Indo-Aryans in Anatolia rather than in Central Asia. In other words, trying to use Mallory as an anti-migration theory is impossible. --Taivo (talk) 19:45, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

As far as I can tell Mallory is just trying to sum up, as fairly as possible, all of the problems with the principal scenarios (OIT not among them). He's certainly not promoting the Anatolian hypothesis. And there's evidence that he's rejecting a steppe model eithere. Lal, of course, is a wholly different kettle of fish (not that I've ever been sure what a fish containing kettle is for). This mode of argument reminds me of Creationists - it's all about picking holes and puffing up disagreements and uncertainties without any attempt to address the power of the supportive evidence or provide any plausible basis for the preferred alternsate theory. Paul B (talk) 20:37, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

Hi Tavio and Paul,thank you for your opinions.

Tavio, Andronovo=Indo-Iranian equation is far from established.Please show me on what basis Andronovo is being identified as Indo-Iranian.Andronovo is dated to the 18th-17th century BCE in Kazakhstan.We have Mitanni Indo-Aryans popping up at around 1600 BCE in Syria,so should we honestly believe that Indo-Aryans split off from Iranians in Central Asia and adventured all the way to Syria without leaving any sort of evidences in such a short time?Height of speculation I would say.Also,as Mallory pointed out,Indo-European vocabulary is full of farming words,which is impossible if Indo-Europeans originated in the steppes.

Mallory may not be the 'majority',but he is certainly the editor of JIES and has authored many works.

Genetics proves nothing and it cannot tell what languages people spoke or what culture did people had.Anyway it is now proven that Yamnaya was R1b instead R1a,we have no trace of R1b in either Iran or India apart from European era contacts.This argues against movement from Yamnaya folks into India and Iran.

Neither me nor Mallory ever argued that the Indo-Europeans originated in Anatolia.I agree that Mallory never gave thumbs up to the OIT,but I do not support it either since OIT too lacks archaeological and linguistic evidences just like steppe theory and Anatolian theory.

Paul, I never said Mallory supports Renfrew's theory,in fact he criticizes it in the same paper along with the steppe model.

I don't know what metaphor did you use for Lal,but he is certainly the most experienced Indian archaeologist alive today.He actually supported the Aryan migration earlier by associating Aryans with PGW,but now he has revised his views.

And creationism?Mallory points out flaws in the very basis of the steppe theory which proposes that nomadic Indo-Europeans originated in the steppes by stating that Indo-Europeans were settled farmers and could have not originated in the steppes where no serious agriculture is possible.

If we cut the base,even a giant tree would fall down.

There is no need for 'alternate theory',just put Indo-European origins in obscurity like the origins of Sumerian,Ainu,Korean etc.No need to go round and round with speculative theories unless we get some solid evidences. --AryaBharatiya (talk) 22:39, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

Hmm. That is quite an impressive argumentation. I would love to know which high school you went to so as to obtain this level of understanding! A couple of points:

• The reason the origin of Indo-Europeans is more important to know than the other cultures is that the Indo-European languages have spread far and wide. So, their history packs much more mystery than the others. Perhaps it is also the case that we spend far more resource on it because so many nations are interested in the problem.
• I wouldn't worry too much about the speed of migration. Horse-mounted or chariot-riding tribes could cover these distances in a month, let alone a 100 years, if there was a compelling reason for them to migrate. But, we would want to know why they migrated. Conflicts between tribes? Interestingly, it appears that only men migrated in many cases, leaving the women behind.
• I am glad that you don't support the OIT because it would be quite absurd to claim that a horse-cult culture originated from the one country that didn't have horses!

Cheers, Kautilya3 (talk) 00:16, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

Kautilya Ji, Thanks for the kind words.I studied at a local branch of Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan,though I stopped after 7th grade due to personal reasons.

As for your points:

1)Yes,and because IE is far more diverse than the other languages with obscure origins,it would contain more puzzle pieces and would be even harder to solve the whole jigsaw puzzle.Indeed,the IE question is fascinating.I'm not saying that we should abandon the quest once and for all,but we must stop arguing that the Indo-Europeans *MUST* have originated in place X or Y based on preconceived notions.

2)We must note that even with the invention of chariots(at around ~2100 BCE) it took them a while to reach Central Asia(Andronovo-Fedorovo variant around ~1600 BCE) from the Urals.So how could the Indo-Aryan Mitannis(~1600 BCE) suddenly split of from the Iranians in Central Asia and venture far into Syria within just 100 years without leaving any evidences?

Conflicts could be a cause of migrations,but there are other reasons like climate change and banishment due to clan/tribe issues(like how Buddha's Shakya tribe ventured into the Himalayan regions from Ayodhya due to family issues as explained in Ambattha sutta).Anyway,even during the historical era,Scythian women of the steppes were quite badass :-)

3) Actually,like I have pointed out earlier,we do not have steppe 'horse cult' even during post-Harappan times.None of the post-Harappan cultures like Cemetery H,OCP etc show extensive amount of horse bones or graves like in steppes.Even the supposed horse findings from Pirak and Swat are isolated and both these cultures were not horse-centric like steppe cultures.

Anyway,the main reason I dismiss OIT is simply because I do not think a stable urbanized people like the Harappans would go out from their civilized regions into the godforsaken steppe grasslands and adopt nomadism(even according to OIT,the IE's must pass into Europe from the steppes).It is true that after the collapse of IVC,there was no proper urbanism in India.However,according to Shaffer,the de-urbanization was a gradual process and the re-urbanization from Gangetic plains(PGW,NBPW etc)quickly picked up.So the non-urban stage did not last long.

And there is simply no archaeological proof for a migration from out of India during or after Harappan times.The Harappans started migrating into the Gangetic regions after IVC collapsed and founded the Gangetic civilization there.

Now if we want to talk about a migration from out of India during pre-Harappan times,then we will go around speculating without any solid evidences just like the migration from steppes. --AryaBharatiya (talk) 02:03, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

There is no one named "Tavio" here. Do you have a problem with simple copying of five letters? The majority of Indo-Europeanists support the Ukrainian/western Russian steppe as the homeland of Proto-Indo-European and a shrinking number support Anatolia. The evidence, as published in multiple reliable sources is simply overwhelming in its depth and scope. The references are in this article and in the various Indo-European articles. There are simply no convincing counter-arguments. Your problem, AryaBharatiya, is that out of a hundred points of argument, you have a problem with one or two and think that your original research and arguments are sufficient to tear down the entire structure. --Taivo (talk) 02:25, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

Taivo,sorry for the typo and I don't usually copy paste small words.

Like I said ,majority doesn't matter here.I have provided my source from Mallory,who is a reliable scholar who has authored many works and is the editor of JIES.In fact he has briefly published an entire encyclopedia of Indo-European culture,which is far more detailed than any other so called 'majority' scholars.

And what do you mean by "there are no convincing counter arguments" ? The counter argument in briefly detailed by Mallory himself! Did you even read what I posted? How did the steppe nomads with no farming possessed rich agricultural terms?Can you counter this argument made by Mallory? This single argument is enough to tear down the entire structure of the steppe theory which is based on the premise that the Indo-Europeans were pastoral nomads who inhabited the steppes with no farming.--AryaBharatiya (talk) 03:05, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

That is your problem, one argument will not "tear down the entire structure". You simply fail to understand science if you work under that delusion. And it's very easy for so-called "nomads" to have agricultural terminology. It's very common for nomadic groups to be part-time nomads and part-time farmers. Trying to fit an entire culture into one pigeonhole is simply naive and misleading. You are putting all of your eggs into the "Mallory" and "one counter-argument" basket. You ignore the simple fact that 99-1 is still an utterly convincing argument. --Taivo (talk) 04:19, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

I believe you don't get my point.If we destroy the base of a tower,the entire tower would fall crashing down into pieces.Nomads can pick up farming,but the dry cold infertile lands of the steppes are not suitable for farming.That is the reason why even today the steppes remain as godforsaken lands with little population.Most areas of the steppes are still under Turko-Mongol nomadic culture,and the people mainly rely on animal husbandry instead of farming.

If you are ignoring Mallory,then I have nothing more to add,I could just feel pity for your ignorance.Just cite any of those '99' works which is more detailed than these modern works of Mallory https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-oxford-introduction-to-proto-indo-european-and-the-proto-indo-european-world-9780199296682?cc=in&lang=en&# https://books.google.co.in/books/about/Encyclopedia_of_Indo_European_Culture.html?id=tzU3RIV2BWIC&redir_esc=y

I'm sure that many of those '99' works would cite Mallory.Witzel and Anthony extensively relies on Mallory.Kuzmina's work was even edited by Mallory when he still subscribed to the Kurgan theory.

Also if you feel Mallory is an isolated source,then please remove all the citations by Mallory from the current article.

Thanks a lot. --AryaBharatiya (talk) 04:34, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

That's not the "base of the tower". And your characterization of the steppes as "godforsaken lands with little population" is simply stupid ignorance. Sorry, but there's no other way to characterize your views. Ukraine produced something like one-quarter of the food produced in the former Soviet Union on what you are calling "godforsaken lands with little population" (tell that to the 45 million people who live there). And Anthony's description of Indo-European culture and dispersal is simply the standard now--it is supported by the majority of linguistic studies, archeological studies, and genetic studies. You want citations? Then read the various articles on Proto-Indo-European and Indo-European. You'll find all the references you need. --Taivo (talk) 05:37, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

So, the concrete proposal is to add a remark from Mallory's summary to the article, noticing the questions on agricultural vocabulary? Mallory himself notes " it is evident that we still have a very long way to go" (p.8), but he does not conclude that 'the entire tower falls.' Maybe he does so in the The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Proto-Indo-European World or Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture? In that case, that would also be interesting information to add - groundbreaking, I'd say, and probably a piece of information so far strangely overlooked, or neglected, by the scholarly community. Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 05:47, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

I've added some info to the article; I'm going to read Mallory's summary; it look sinteresting. Thanks for notifying! Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 07:21, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

Science is full of theories that have been demolished by one argument. The most notable is the "ether" theory of electromagnetic waves demolished by the Michaelson-Morley experiment, and replaced by Special Relativity. Now that we know the answer, we can see that Special Relativity was always staring at us the in the face, but we believed in the ether due to our own prejudices. So there is no 99-1 argument in science, it is only on Wikipedia. Thinking back about the 3 books that I read parts of, Beckwith was the most self-assured (and it turns out that he was too speculative), Anthony was mildly definitive, and Mallory was the most skeptical. Perhaps Mallory is more representative of our actual state of knowledge? - Kautilya3 (talk) 09:44, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

Science has to make claims that are falsifiable, yes. But that means that there has to be a clear criterion for falsifiability. That does not apply in this case. We are simply talking about anomalies. There are numerous cases in which there are scientific anomalies that are not used to simply throw out all existing models. Famously, for many years scientists could not explain how bumble bees flew. That did not mean they abandoned all existing models of flight mechanics as false. Also, in this case we are not dealing with a single scientific model, but rather a series of sciences overlapping with archaeological and historical evidence that in varying degrees comes closer to either science or humanities. Paul B (talk) 10:20, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

@Everyone.Thank you very much for your discussions.

@Taivo, It is indeed the base of the tower since Mallory raises points against the basic foundational aspects of the Kurgan model.And no,I am not ignorant about Ukraine,but Ukraine is not completely part of the steppes as can be seen here and the Yamnaya culture more or less derives from earlier Khavylysk and Samara cultures which are located in proper steppes,near Western Kazakhistan.We know that modern Kazakh regions are mainly populated by Turko-Mongol nomads.Also,it now proven that the steppe nomads got agriculture during 2nd milln BCE only,that too in Asian parts of the steppes.See here.Mallory states the same thing.

Why beat the dead horse on Anthony?I am already well aware of his arguments and I have pointed out faults in his identification of proto-Aryans with the steppe culture which is based on the misinterpreted passages from the Vedas.Anthony also cites Mallory in his book.Since Mallory himself has revised his views,I'd say Anthony's view of nomadic-pastoral PIE people should also be revised.

@Joshua, Thank you very much for the edit,I really appreciate it.Though I feel that it should be mentioned along with the introduction which states:

These migrations started approximately 1,800 BCE, after the invention of the war chariot, and also brought Indo-Aryan languages into the Levant and possibly Inner Asia. It was part of the diffusion of Indo-European languages from the proto-Indo-European homeland at the Pontic steppe, a large area of grasslands in far Eastern Europe, which started in the 5th to 4th millennia BCE, and the Indo-European migrations out of the Eurasian steppes, which started approximately 2,000 BCE.

This gives the impression that the Kurgan theory is a firmly established theory,which is not the case!

I agree that Mallory doesn't explicitly claim that the 'entire tower falls down' but he states the following about earlier steppe model regarding Tocharians(ie Yamnaya->Afanasevo->Tarim shift):

Hypotheses linking the Tokharians to earlier eastward steppe expansions associated with the Afanasievo or Okunevo cultures of the Yenisei or Altai (Mallory and Mair 2000) become very difficult if not impossible to sustain (as long as there is no evidence of arable agriculture in these cultures) as Tokharian retains elements of the Indo-European agricultural vocabulary.

I think the same can be applied to the supposed Indo-Iranian expansions from Yamnaya->Sintashta->Andronovo as well.

In his book 'The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Proto-Indo-European World' he does raise some skepticism over the current status of PIE.But that is irrelevant to the current discussion.

@Kautilya and Paul, We are not dealing with a 'scientific' theory here,but a (pre)historical theory.For science,we invent new stuff and validate them by testing it with prototypes.But for history,we must invent a theory from the available historical sources and then try to validate them with further citations and logical conclusions.Pre-history is something which can't comment on,that is why it is called PRE-history.We must look at the available historical records first and then conclude what might have been the case during pre-historical times.Also,some of the historical sources could have been wiped off gradually in the historical periods due to many reasons,and these extinct records could change our entire conclusion on the pre-history.And as we get newer historical evidences,we must also change the our conclusions on pre-history.

Mallory is a reputed scholar and he is cited by many other scholars.Like I said I have never seen any other equally impressive works like that of Mallory and Adams which deals with all aspects of PIE culture.

Cheers, --AryaBharatiya (talk) 11:32, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

First, you don't seem to know what science is, AryaBharatiya. Archeology and linguistics are, indeed, sciences. There's no debate on that issue. Second, while you can point out your personal opinion of Mallory's and Anthony's work here, it carries no weight. You are admittedly not a recognized scholar in the field. You have not published any scholarly works in the field. Anthony is widely recognized as a reliable work in the field and a definitive description. Your personal opinion doesn't matter. Third, your opinion, as I have pointed out above, that the agricultural vocabulary is the "base of the tower" doesn't matter. It's not and Indo-Europeanists don't consider it to be either. Your opinion doesn't matter, only the opinion of published scholars matters. Fourth, Mallory is skeptical, but that doesn't mean that he rejects the research of other Indo-Europeanists. It just means that he's not completely convinced (yet). --Taivo (talk) 14:04, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

Taivo, First,I was specifically talking about physics and biological sciences which Kautilya & Paul highlighted.Archaeology and linguistics are in a different league compared to them.Through archaeology and linguistics,we reconstruct the the pre-history through the attested historical evidences.But in biology and physics,we look for new innovations.

Second,I agree that I'm not a scholar,but these arguments are not my personal opinions,I have provided my sources and links along with quotes by Mallory.It is not my fault if you plan to ignore them to suit your preconceived notions.You argue like early creationists,who viewed creationism as an unquestionable fact and rejected all other logical counter arguments just because they didn't form the 'majority'.You have not provided a logical refutation to my points( which are backed by sources) either.Also,you are ignorant of the fact that Anthony himself cites Mallory in his work.

Third,as I pointed out above,it is not my opinion but the opinion of a reputed Indo-Europeanist like Mallory who has authored countless works and is the editor of JIES that the steppe had no agriculture while the Indo-Europeans had rich agricultural terms.I have also provided a new paper which from last year which supports Mallory's claims that even the Asian part of the steppes never had any sort of agriculture prior to 2nd milln BCE.Now do you plan to ignore the scholarly papers?

Fourth,Mallory is not just 'completely' convinced,but he is not convinced at all since he states that the steppe theory which is cited by other Indo-Europeanists in the past has 'become very difficult if not impossible to sustain'. --AryaBharatiya (talk) 14:47, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

AryaBharatiya, you are providing a classic example of "I refuse to listen" in your continued attempts to elevate Mallory (as well as thoroughly discredited Indian nationalists) above the large body of Indo-European scholars. And you simply don't understand what science is and have an exaggerated notion of what Mallory is saying and the relative importance of a single point of dispute. Your original question was based on your own original research and not based on scholarly publications. That question, "What is the basis?" has been answered multiple times here based on scholarly research by the majority of Indo-Europeanists. The fact that you choose to reject the scholarly consensus based on your own, unique interpretation of Mallory's comments, simply reflects your own personal agenda. It's not appropriate for Wikipedia. While Mallory's skepticism has been added to the article, you seem to be pushing for something more. That will not happen. --Taivo (talk) 15:54, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

For the "agricultural vocabulary" argument that Krell (1998) also harped on, see Talk:Kurgan hypothesis/Archive 2#Pastoralism vs. agriculture, redux. In short: It's not a decisive counterargument against the steppe homeland.

Funny enough, Renfrew does seem to accept a steppe origin for Indo-Aryan and Indo-Iranian, as well as for Tocharian, just not for the European branches. So you can't credibly use him to argue against the Indo-Iranian identification of Andronovo.

In any way, the well-established early Indo-Iranian and Indo-European loanwords (which include even Pre-Proto-Indo-Iranian loans, see Häkkinen (2012a), Häkkinen (2012b)) are quite possibly the single strongest reason to think that the origin of Indo-Iranian and Indo-European is really on the Copper/Bronze Age steppes. Mallory seems to ignore all of this evidence for reasons that are completely obscure to me. The steppe hypothesis may not be completely without weaknesses and problems, but the Anatolian hypothesis fares far worse, not least because of the diversity of branches in Central/Eastern/Southeastern Europe, the vocabulary, the importance of – among other things – the horse in all ancient Indo-European cultures, which all point to an origin on the European steppes and not in Neolithic Anatolia, the non-Indo-European languages in and around the supposed Anatolian homeland, and the implausibly slow linguistic change required by the Anatolian hypothesis (the Indo-European languages attested in the Iron Age – and even more so those attested in the Late Bronze Age – are still unmistakably similar to each other, not only in vocabulary but also grammar and down to specific irregular paradigms and other striking idiosyncratic irregularities, which a time-depth of more than 5000 years is difficult to reconcile with).

I find it hard to resist noting that "copulating with a dead horse" is a strikingly apt description for what "anti-Kurganists" are doing. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 16:05, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

@Taivo, I have never added anything to exaggerate what Mallory states,I have only cited his raw quotes.I am not 'elevating' Mallory,but he is already 'elevated' since I have not encountered any works which is as detailed as his.He is also the main editor of JIES,an academic journal where all major Indo-European scholars publish their papers.That speaks a lot about his 'elevated' status.I have also provided another academic paper to further support the claims of Mallory,but you have completely rejected it because it does not suit your preconceived notions.Instead you kept on citing Anthony,who extensively cites Mallory in his work.And that 'single point of dispute' is enough to destroy the basic root structure of the Kurgan theory.I know that my 'what basis' question has been answered by providing Anthony's arguments but I have countered it by providing the source from BB Lal and giving the links to original Vedic passages which Anthony has misinterpreted.I don't have any agenda and I have not 'uniquely' interpreted the words of Mallory.I have provided both his initial arguments and conclusion just as described in the paper.I am aware that Mallory's skepticism has been added to the article,and I have thanked Joshua for doing it.I am just asking to slightly modify this part:

"These migrations started approximately 1,800 BCE, after the invention of the war chariot, and also brought Indo-Aryan languages into the Levant and possibly Inner Asia. It was part of the diffusion of Indo-European languages from the proto-Indo-European homeland at the Pontic steppe, a large area of grasslands in far Eastern Europe, which started in the 5th to 4th millennia BCE, and the Indo-European migrations out of the Eurasian steppes, which started approximately 2,000 BCE."

into this (modified parts by me in italics):

"These migrations are hypothesized to be started around 1,800 BCE, after the invention of the war chariot, and also brought Indo-Aryan languages into the Levant and possibly Inner Asia.It was part of the diffusion of Indo-European languages from the proto-Indo-European homeland which is hypothesized to be at the Pontic steppe, a large area of grasslands in far Eastern Europe, which started in the 5th to 4th millennia BCE, and the Indo-European migrations out of the Eurasian steppes, which started approximately 2,000 BCE.Although there are also other hypothesis regarding the location of Proto-Indo-European homeland,see Proto-Indo-European_Urheimat_hypotheses."

I don't know if I have the right wordings,but you got the overall picture.We should not accept Kurgan hypothesis as an established fact,especially since it has many downpoints as pointed out by Mallory.We should not take other theories for granted either,since they too lack solid evidences.

@Florian, I am aware of the supposed Uralic and IE contacts.Could you please explain why the borrowing are from Indo-European to the Uralic rather than the other way around?If the original Indo-Europeans where the neighbors of Uralics and had close contacts with the Uralics,shouldn't we expect atleast a few amount of Uralic loans into Indo-European as well?

Similarly,many scholars(including Anthony and Witzel)agree that most of the IE loans in Uralic are from Indo-Iranian.Lubotsky cites a complete list of Indo-Iranian loans in Uralic languages,but does not cite a single Sanskrit or Avestan word of Uralic origin.How is it possible if the ancestral Indo-Iranians lived in contact with the Uralics?Wouldn't the Uralic contacts have transferred few amount of loans into the Indo-Iranian as well?

Comparative linguistics and relations of Indo-European with other languages such as Sumerian has been proposed by many other authors.For example see this and this

Now you may argue that these are not 'majority' opinions,but neither is PIE-Uralic relation theory.

Also,this argument does not counter the even stronger argument of Indo-European farming vocabulary.Your own personal argument(without any sources!) that the farming played a 'minor role' in PIE culture is not sustainable because as Mallory notes,PIE is rich is agricultural terms.He has provided a whole list of agricultural terms in his paper.Farming is simply impossible in the steppes and the steppe nomads acquired farming from Central Asia during 2nd milln BCE according to the paper which I have cited in the above discussion(Mallory states the same thing).

I don't understand why should we assume that if the steppe hypothesis is not true,then the Anatolian theory is?I do not subscribe to the Anatolian theory since it also has serious flaws according to the same paper by Mallory! I don't understand the '5000' year old argument since languages like Baltic,Slavic,Tocharian,Albanian etc are only attested in medieval era.So here too it would require slow linguistic shifts from their ancestral languages since the Kurgan theory requires major ancestral branches to be split off from PIE during bronze age itself.

What do you mean by 'copulating with dead horse'?Do you mean Ashvamedha?Then it was a rare and complex ritual only to be conducted by powerful emperors.It is unrelated to the Kurgan rites.--AryaBharatiya (talk) 18:39, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

Contrary to what you say, the Kurgan theory of Indo-European origins is now well-established because so many lines of evidence converge to point towards it. Extraordinary claims need extraordinary evidence, so a single objection (or a single prominent dissenter, whoever it is) cannot "destroy" an established theory. Fallacies of the type "The scientific orthodoxy is but a house of cards!" are typical of cranks and denialists attacking mainstream science. Science doesn't work that way. I refer you to the controversy about the speed of light a few years ago: Textbooks (and Wikipedia) weren't instantly rewritten only because a single experiment seemed to "debunk" the established assumption. Mallory's scepticism alone does not demolish the consensus and therefore there is no reason to clumsily rewrite the article; no need to play "teach the controversy".

As for loan contacts, these are often asymmetrical; there's nothing unusual about that. The Proto-Uralic speakers appear to have been Mesolithic foragers, while the Proto-Indo-Iranians and other Indo-European groups in the area were technically much more advanced Copper/Bronze-Age pastoralists and farmers. So Proto-Uralic speakers most likely adopted Proto-Indo-Iranian and other Indo-European dialects as second languages to be able to talk to Indo-Europeans, while Indo-Europeans had no need to learn Proto-Uralic. Perhaps some Uralic words did filter into neighbouring Indo-Iranian dialects after all, much like Native American words filtered into English, but the relevant dialects did not survive.

Curiously, in Finland it was apparently the other way round: The Uralic speakers, thanks to the technological boost received through the Indo-Iranian contacts, were already in the Bronze Age when they arrived in Finland, where they assimilated the local Indo-Europeans, still in the Neolithic/Copper Age. So it's not like Indo-Europeans are "Aryan supermen" who are always technologically superior and always win when competing with non-Indo-Europeans.

Sorry, those comparisons between Proto-Indo-European and Sumerian are not serious linguistics. There is no discernable genetic relationship (however, there may have been loan contacts; I'm well aware of this possibility and have mentioned this actually in Sumerian language).

A genetic relationship between Indo-European and Uralic is indeed not condoned by a majority of linguists. (However, Uralic has for a long time been considered the most promising candidate for external relationships of the Indo-European languages.) The loan contacts between Uralic and Indo-European, however, are quite solidly established. There may be some disagreement about the most archaic loanwords, but the very early contacts between Uralic and Indo-Iranian are rock-solid; no chance to deny them. And this is what makes this argument so important for the Indo-Iranian and Indo-European homeland; there's no dispute about this, no way around the fact that Proto-Uralic must have been spoken in the direct vicinity of Proto-Indo-Iranian, even overlapping it.

The PIE farming vocabulary is sure existent, nobody denies that, but it is not overly rich compared to other reconstructed languages. And just because a language has words for farming tools does not mean that the speakers of the language engage in farming, as opposed to their neighbours. Finally, it's simply not true that farming is impossible in the steppes; in Kazakhstan it is hard OK, especially with Bronze-Age level tech, but the Ukraine is on the margin of where farming is possible, so it could have played a role after all for the Proto-Indo-Europeans (but for the Proto-Indo-Iranians, almost none). It's nowhere as arid and barren as Kazakhstan or even Mongolia, especially not in the river valleys. See Geography of Ukraine or simply travel there and see for yourself.

I don't follow what you are saying, Central Asia is the region of the steppes, so how could the steppe nomads have acquired farming from there? Your account of what Mallory and that other source say must somehow be distorted, sorry.

Well, I just said that the ancient Indo-European languages that are attested are strikingly similar to each other (and those that are not attested can be partly reconstructed for the period in question by their descendants, as far as they have left any – we can reconstruct enough of the ancient precursors of Balto-Slavic, Albanian, Tocharian, etc., to see that they fit right in). In contrast, medieval/modern languages such as Albanian, Tocharian, (Old) Irish and Welsh are notably divergent from the standard "ancient Indo-European language" type represented by Ancient Greek or Latin. Slavic and especially Baltic languages (and also Modern Greek dialects to an extent) are notoriously conservative, that's true (mostly because they have preserved the endings better, I think, and in the case of Balto-Slavic perhaps also because of the Uralic contacts), and much more in line with the typical ancient Indo-European language, but even they have evolved notably and have not stayed the same compared to their (reconstructed or attested) ancient precursors at all, so there is no talk of stasis. But that is a distraction – I'm just saying that while the diversity of Indo-European languages ca. 500 BC makes it plausible that Proto-Indo-European was spoken 3000 (or perhaps 4000) years earlier (keeping in mind that Indo-European languages are in general not famous for being particularly slow-changing and there are good reasons to think they never were), in light of empirical values from elsewhere, the idea that the protolanguage is considerably older (as nearly all competing hypotheses assume) is just not very convincing. I have no idea which competing hypothesis you prefer and if you support any competing hypothesis at all, but they almost invariably suffer from the same defect. In any case, that isn't even the strongest argument, but it is not unimportant.

All hypotheses of Indo-European origins have flaws, nobody denies that, but the steppe theory is the one that is easiest to make compatible with the available evidence. It doesn't have to be perfect to be viable, but it's the best we have. And good enough is good enough as long as no superior competitor turns up. Perhaps you personally are more content with agnosticism, as many linguists are, but clearly, tons of people – especially laypeople – are interested in these matters.

I was alluding to the English idiom "to beat a dead horse", because that's exactly what these kinds of debates are. However, since popularisation of science is what Wikipedia is all about, and these debates can help achieve that, I still engage with them sometimes even though they tend to get tedious. Both for myself and for readers, they can be helpful to sharpen one's arguments and debating skills. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 21:59, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Dear Florian, Thank you for your response.Let me post a reply to the points you raised one by one:

\\Contrary to what you say, the Kurgan theory of Indo-European origins is now well-established because so many lines of evidence converge to point towards it. Extraordinary claims need extraordinary evidence, so a single objection (or a single prominent dissenter, whoever it is) cannot "destroy" an established theory. Fallacies of the type "The scientific orthodoxy is but a house of cards!" are typical of cranks and denialists attacking mainstream science. Science doesn't work that way. I refer you to the controversy about the speed of light a few years ago: Textbooks (and Wikipedia) weren't instantly rewritten only because a single experiment seemed to "debunk" the established assumption. Mallory's scepticism alone does not demolish the consensus and therefore there is no reason to clumsily rewrite the article; no need to play "teach the controversy".//

As I have highlighted many times,even though a single objection,Mallory's point raises doubts about the very base identification of Proto-Indo-Europeans as nomadic pastoralists of the steppes.If Indo-Europeans had a farming vocabulary,then they should be placed in an area where farming is possible.Steppes are not a good place for farming(I will discuss it below).Although,I do agree that the farming vocabulary in PIE is a minority opinion.But we should not reject it just because it is a minority opinion,since even Mallory,who is a prominent Indo-Europeanist and the general editor of Journal of Indo-European Studies(JIES) has highlighted the farming vocabulary.Anyway,since Mallory's skepticism has been added to the article,I do not have anything more to add.

\\As for loan contacts, these are often asymmetrical; there's nothing unusual about that. The Proto-Uralic speakers appear to have been Mesolithic foragers, while the Proto-Indo-Iranians and other Indo-European groups in the area were technically much more advanced Copper/Bronze-Age pastoralists and farmers. So Proto-Uralic speakers most likely adopted Proto-Indo-Iranian and other Indo-European dialects as second languages to be able to talk to Indo-Europeans, while Indo-Europeans had no need to learn Proto-Uralic. Perhaps some Uralic words did filter into neighbouring Indo-Iranian dialects after all, much like Native American words filtered into English, but the relevant dialects did not survive. Curiously, in Finland it was apparently the other way round: The Uralic speakers, thanks to the technological boost received through the Indo-Iranian contacts, were already in the Bronze Age when they arrived in Finland, where they assimilated the local Indo-Europeans, still in the Neolithic/Copper Age. So it's not like Indo-Europeans are "Aryan supermen" who are always technologically superior and always win when competing with non-Indo-Europeans.//

Well,according to Aryan migration theory the Indo-Aryans also imposed their languages over Dravidians and Mundas of northern India and yet we have supposed Dravidian and Munda loans in Vedic Sanskrit itself.Why can't same be the case with the Indo-Iranians who overrun the Uralics?We cannot confirm the existence of those 'relevant dialects' without any historical records.Presently,only Vedic and Avestan are the most archaic and earliest attested Indo-Iranian languages,and they do not show any Uralic loans.

\\Sorry, those comparisons between Proto-Indo-European and Sumerian are not serious linguistics. There is no discernable genetic relationship (however, there may have been loan contacts; I'm well aware of this possibility and have mentioned this actually in Sumerian language).//

I agree that there are no serious genetic relations between PIE and Sumerian(an isolated language),but even the loans would suggest that PIE had some sort of relations with Sumerians which would be impossible if the PIE was in the steppes.

\\A genetic relationship between Indo-European and Uralic is indeed not condoned by a majority of linguists. (However, Uralic has for a long time been considered the most promising candidate for external relationships of the Indo-European languages.) The loan contacts between Uralic and Indo-European, however, are quite solidly established. There may be some disagreement about the most archaic loanwords, but the very early contacts between Uralic and Indo-Iranian are rock-solid; no chance to deny them. And this is what makes this argument so important for the Indo-Iranian and Indo-European homeland; there's no dispute about this, no way around the fact that Proto-Uralic must have been spoken in the direct vicinity of Proto-Indo-Iranian, even overlapping it.//

External relationship is basically a speculation,just like Nostratic relationship,Dene-Caucasian relationship,Altaic relationship(in case of Japonic and Korean) etc.I agree that Indo-Iranian specific loans are well attested in the Uralic languages and it is cited by many authors.Lubotsky goes one bit further by stating that most of the Indo-Iranian loans in Uralic languages are specifically Indo-Aryan related than Iranian.But as I said above,none of the popular scholars cites any Uralic loans in Indo-Iranian languages like Vedic and Avestan,not even Lubotsky who has a detailed list of Indo-Iranian words in Uralic.

\\The PIE farming vocabulary is sure existent, nobody denies that, but it is not overly rich compared to other reconstructed languages. And just because a language has words for farming tools does not mean that the speakers of the language engage in farming, as opposed to their neighbours. Finally, it's simply not true that farming is impossible in the steppes; in Kazakhstan it is hard OK, especially with Bronze-Age level tech, but the Ukraine is on the margin of where farming is possible, so it could have played a role after all for the Proto-Indo-Europeans (but for the Proto-Indo-Iranians, almost none). It's nowhere as arid and barren as Kazakhstan or even Mongolia, especially not in the river valleys. See Geography of Ukraine or simply travel there and see for yourself.//

Mallory cites a good list of agricultural terms in PIE like plough,sickle,various grains etc.See here.If reconstructed vocabulary contains farming terms,then it would mean that the speakers of the reconstructed vocabulary knew of farming.Why else would they posses agricultural terms?I agree that at least in western Ukraine(not part of steppes) minimal farming could be possible.But the Yamnaya culture itself shows less to no farming and was mostly nomadic & pastoral.Also,Yamnaya itself derives from Samara & Khvalynsk cultures located further west,near Volga region and Kazakhstan.Both these cultures shows no signs of farming either.

\\I don't follow what you are saying, Central Asia is the region of the steppes, so how could the steppe nomads have acquired farming from there? Your account of what Mallory and that other source say must somehow be distorted, sorry.//

The defenition of 'Central Asia' varies.For me,it extends from southern part of Kazakhstan to Tajikistan,Xinjinag,Tibet and Afghanistan.While northern part of Kzakhstan which extends till Mongolia is Asian part of the steppes.Anyway,here is what Mallory states,read the highlighted part.He clearly states that earliest documented cereals in southern part of Asian steppes are from 2300 BCE,let alone Pontic steppes.His statement is also supported by this newest study,which states that the steppe pastoralists acquired agriculture from Inner Asians at around middle 2nd milln BCE.See this map.You wont find any serious agriculture in the steppes before mid 2nd milln BCE.

\\Well, I just said that the ancient Indo-European languages that are attested are strikingly similar to each other (and those that are not attested can be partly reconstructed for the period in question by their descendants, as far as they have left any – we can reconstruct enough of the ancient precursors of Balto-Slavic, Albanian, Tocharian, etc., to see that they fit right in). In contrast, medieval/modern languages such as Albanian, Tocharian, (Old) Irish and Welsh are notably divergent from the standard "ancient Indo-European language" type represented by Ancient Greek or Latin. Slavic and especially Baltic languages (and also Modern Greek dialects to an extent) are notoriously conservative, that's true (mostly because they have preserved the endings better, I think, and in the case of Balto-Slavic perhaps also because of the Uralic contacts), and much more in line with the typical ancient Indo-European language, but even they have evolved notably and have not stayed the same compared to their (reconstructed or attested) ancient precursors at all, so there is no talk of stasis. But that is a distraction – I'm just saying that while the diversity of Indo-European languages ca. 500 BC makes it plausible that Proto-Indo-European was spoken 3000 (or perhaps 4000) years earlier (keeping in mind that Indo-European languages are in general not famous for being particularly slow-changing and there are good reasons to think they never were), in light of empirical values from elsewhere, the idea that the protolanguage is considerably older (as nearly all competing hypotheses assume) is just not very convincing. I have no idea which competing hypothesis you prefer and if you support any competing hypothesis at all, but they almost invariably suffer from the same defect. In any case, that isn't even the strongest argument, but it is not unimportant.//

Well,we are talking about bronze age and medival times! So we have over 3000+ years since the split happened from PIE(Toacharian is said be an even earlier split at around 3000 BCE) and the historical attestation of these distinct IE languages.So isn't it possible that even those proto languages(of Tocharian,Balto-Slavic,Albanian etc) may have underwent serious changes in these 3000+ years?Why should we assume that the proto-languages remained static from the time of their split from PIE and the historical attestion of its decendants?Diversity is not an issue,there could have been many proto-languages which further underwent many changes prior the attestation of historical languages.

\\All hypotheses of Indo-European origins have flaws, nobody denies that, but the steppe theory is the one that is easiest to make compatible with the available evidence. It doesn't have to be perfect to be viable, but it's the best we have. And good enough is good enough as long as no superior competitor turns up. Perhaps you personally are more content with agnosticism, as many linguists are, but clearly, tons of people – especially laypeople – are interested in these matters.//

I agree that the steppe theory is a better speculation about Indo-European expansions than all other available theories.But my point is that steppe theory,like all other theories,is far from being established and proven.Many people are interested in this,yes.But most of the misinterpret the facts.For example the old school 'invasion' theory is still dominant among the common people of India,especially here in south India.Not to mention all the political mess.

\\I was alluding to the English idiom "to beat a dead horse", because that's exactly what these kinds of debates are. However, since popularisation of science is what Wikipedia is all about, and these debates can help achieve that, I still engage with them sometimes even though they tend to get tedious. Both for myself and for readers, they can be helpful to sharpen one's arguments and debating skills.///

Ah,I'm not good with idioms.Anyway,I engage in discussions because of the same reason,also to gain more knowledge from the oppossing views,so that I can understand the situation better.Anyway,nice to have a detailed discussion with you! Cheers, --AryaBharatiya (talk) 09:06, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

AryaBharatiya, no-one can, or should, respond to these interminable postings which do not addresspecific improvements to the article. You shoud not be filling the talk page with your personal musings. You've already been told this repeatedly. Paul B (talk) 13:50, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Hi Paul,pardon me,but I was just replying the the points raised by our friend Florian >_> If there is anyway to lock this specific section,then please do so. Cheers,--AryaBharatiya (talk) 13:59, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Cemetery H culture & Painted Grey Ware

@Kautilya3 I am sorry to interrupt your little private conversation. We are in 2015, still debating an article published in 2011 by Metspalu et al., that had far reaching implications on 'IAmt'. In my view, the 'IAmt' is nothing more than a 'hypothesis'. Next, yesterday you deleted diff my edit diff without a valid reason. I was only quoting from two other related Wiki articles, Cemetery H culture and Painted Grey Ware, so that there is no mismatch across the articles. The references were also taken from the same Wiki articles. No copyrighted material was copied other than these two Wiki articles & their references. I feel that my edit should be restored. Finally, it is disconcerting the way you describe Indian scholars as "I am shocked by their shamelessness.....", not the kind of language I expected in this forum. Regards Itharaju (talk) 13:57, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

It looks like you haven't bothered to read my edit summary of the revert, which explained that the reason for the revert was that you didn't provide full citations. Please feel free to undo my revert by adding full citations. I have struck my "shamelessness" remark and weakened it to "unprofessional statements." I will be quite happy to demonstrate the unprofessional claims they made in the press. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 19:29, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

If the aim is to remedy any mismatch between this article and the Cemetery H article, then some info from this article should also be copied to Cemetery H, to relate it to the IA-migrations. Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 03:58, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

I've been going through the Cementery H and Gadhara articles; it's clear that the usual arguing has been going on there, but I've also checked some sources, and it's clear that the cementery H culture is not unambiguously related to the Indo-Aryans, contrary to what I'd expected. It rather seems to be a late remainder of the Indus Vally Civilisation, which may have been infkuenced by the Indo-Aryans. As such, Kautilya3, it lends further support to our personal speculations that the Indo-Aryan/Vedic people of the early Vedic period may well have been, for a significant part, the Indus Valley people, converted to the Aryan way of life (herding), language (indo-European) and religion (Vedic). Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 05:53, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

That's interesting,Joshua.But we must ponder why did the Indus people completely abandoned their older culture and adopted a culture of newcomers who came in small waves.If we look at elite dominance,the Mitanni elites gradually got absorbed into the native population.Even in historical times,the tribes like Greeks,Sakas,Kushans,Huns etc got absorbed into the Indian culture rather than imposing their own culture on the Indians.--AryaBharatiya (talk) 09:55, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

According to Dhavalikar, the economic decline of the Indus people drove them to religion, and the religion of the Indo-Aryan migrants apparently seemed attractive to them. So, all the cultures that we find archaeologically are mixtures of Late Harappans and the immigrant Indo-Aryans. PGW is especially so because it is obviously wheel-made pottery which the immigrant Indo-Aryans did not make themselves. However, there were also large groups of Harappans that did not convert to the Aryan religion, and the Indo-Aryans waged a jehad against them. The Rigveda describes such jehad in quite colourful terms. I also believe that, while the initial migrants might have been small groups, they established bridgeheads through which huge populations of Indo-Europeans emptied into India. The recent genetic results of Moorjani et al (2013) shows that the ANI contribution to the north Indian genetic pool is equal to that of ASI contribution. So, in the long run, these people were not "small groups" any more. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 11:27, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

I will reinstate your edit. But please be sure to fill in all the missing citations. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 11:30, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Also, your language of "varying opinion" is WP:WEASEL. You need to add in the various opinions as footnotes to that the reader knows what you are talking about. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 11:51, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Dear Kautilya,there are no 'mixtures' in late/post Harappan cultures.There is simply no trace of any outside element in post Harappan cultures.At best there are few BMAC elements,but it was not unique to post Harappan era,since the Ahar-Banas complex in Rajasthan dated to mature Harappan phase already shows close links with BMAC.Harappan seals and artifacts have also been discovered from BMAC.Harappans even had trading site of Shortugai near BMAC.So it was certainly not a one way contact during late Harappan times.About PGW and its Harappan connections,PGW is heavily intermixed with Harappan cultural elements.Harappan cultural traits lasted till 800 BCE along with PGW in some areas.As for 'jehad' part,RV does mentions conflicts.But nothing about any exodus from foreign lands.In fact in later Vedic texts such as Satapatha Brahmana,we find Kuru kings(offshoot of Puru-Bharatas from RV) ruling as far as Bactria(Balhika) while RV remains silent on any foreign regions.Also,there is no evidence for 'huge' Indo-European population movement into India.Here is what Moorjani(2013) concludes:

"It is also important to emphasize what our study has not shown. Although we have documented evidence for mixture in India between about 1,900 and 4,200 years BP, this does not imply migration from West Eurasia into India during this time. On the contrary, a recent study that searched for West Eurasian groups most closely related to the ANI ancestors of Indians failed to find any evidence for shared ancestry between the ANI and groups in West Eurasia within the past 12,500 years3 (although it is possible that with further sampling and new methods such relatedness might be detected). An alternative possibility that is also consistent with our data is that the ANI and ASI were both living in or near South Asia for a substantial period prior to their mixture. Such a pattern has been documented elsewhere; for example, ancient DNA studies of northern Europeans have shown that Neolithic farmers originating in Western Asia migrated to Europe about 7,500 years BP but did not mix with local hunter gatherers until thousands of years later to form the present-day populations of northern Europe.15, 16, 44 and 45"

--AryaBharatiya (talk) 12:45, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

"no trace of any outside element" - except for two artifacts, that still exist: language and religion. When I look outside my window, I see two church-towers. Christianity was initially brought here by the Romans; they are long, long gone, but their religion is still here.

I've been pondering on it again today; maybe, just maybe, "migration" is not the correct term. Memes might be a better term. You mention the trade-connections with B-M; I also read that today. Could it be possible that some kind of 'cultural-geographical re-ordering' took place - a cultural sphere which stretched from the BMAC to the Indus Valley? And that religion and language "migrated" into the Punjab, together with the Aryan, c.q. "noble" or "hospitable" culture? To me it's clear that there was no large-scale migration; at best small groups. It also seems clear that there was a local cultural continuity. And yet, it's also very clear that there was also a new religionand new languages, which did not originate in the Punjab. What a riddle! Intriguing, intriguing. NB: I'll have to read more on PGW; I can't give any reasonable comment on that. Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 19:35, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

And what if the Harappans did not have language as we have it? The Tibetans invented an alphabet to translate the Buddhist texts; could it be possible that the Harappans did the same, import a language-system en toto? Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 19:39, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

No go. The Harappans were the most advanced civilisation of the world in their time, spanning a wide geographic extent, with perfect standardisation of measures, architecture, road systems, and world trade. It stands to reason that they would have standardised language in the same way and, also, whatever writing system they used. The Indo-Aryans were in comparison quite backward. Their only claim to superiority were the chariots. - Kautilya3 (talk) 20:06, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Makes it even more puzzling, doesn't it? Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 20:19, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

@Kautilya3, Joshua Jonathan, I see that there is a misconception about origins of ANI. Obviously ANI & ASI were original inhabitants of subcontinent. ANI were genetically related to Central Asians, Middle Easterners, Caucasians, and Europeans, but importantly, ANI became a distinctive isolated group. On the other hand, Indo-Aryans got intermingled with Eurasians, Hurrians, Iranians, BMAC on their way to subcontinent. ANI & ASI mixing may be unrelated to IA migration. IA migration, if at all happened, didn't leave any genetic finger prints in Indian population, so, Mr.Singh, the co-author of Moorjani et al. (2013) had a valid reason, though it didn't help to explain how the Indo-Europeans languages came to subcontinent.Itharaju (talk) 22:48, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Indo-Aryans, probably had no war chariots when they crossed the formidable Hindukush mountain range. IA were nomadic people, who depended on horses & wagons for carrying water & food and flocks of domesticated animals. Horses helped to control large flocks of domestic animals. They spoke Vedic Sanskrit, that had no script, being a highly inflected dialect, it is not easy for Dravidian speakers.Itharaju (talk) 22:48, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Where did you get the idea that the ANI & ASI were the original inhabitants of the subcontinent? -- Kautilya3, 23:22, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

Hi Joshua,regarding religion and language,we cannot comment on it unless we know about Harappan religion and language.Also,we should keep in mind that we don't find anything 'Vedic' in post Harappan times either.Even during Mauryan times,we have numerous figures dubbed as Yakshis and Yakshas ,there is nothing 'Vedic' about them.During pre-Mauryan times,we don't even have that.First physical depictions of Vedic deities like Indra,Surya and Agni are from Sunga and Satavahana era,that too from early Buddhist sites.First archaeologically confirmed Vedic sacrifice is from Sunga era at Kausambi,where one of the Sunga king is said to have performed Purusamedha sacrifice.But the identification is disputed by many authors.Also,I don't think spread of Christianity is a good example.In India Christians are less than 3%.Christianization is well documented,unlike Aryanization.
I have pretty similar views regarding BMAC-IVC contacts.However,I do not think that the Indo-Aryanization took place during late bronze age.My personal speculation is that BMAC,IVC and cultures of Eastern Iran(like Jiroft,Tepe Hissar etc) were already interlinked since pre-Harappan times.We also know that BMAC had close contacts with the steppes.The Sintashta culture has yeilded BMAC type objects and also domesticated Bactrian camels,bricks,metallurgy,architectural designs etc that are similar to those from BMAC sites.I think even Anthony,Kuzmina and Witzel highlights the BMAC influence on Urals.Anyway the so called long,slender 'Nordic' Harappan skull types have its closest affinities with that of Tepe Hissar,BMAC and wait for it.........the bronze age Tarim mummies! I think it is also possible that there existed multiple language families within IVC as Kenoyer explains in this awesome video.As Kautilya pointed out,IVC was a huge civilization,much larger than both Mesopotamia and Egypt combined.So obviously it contained more population as well.We know that Mesopotamia was a diverse civilization,so why cant same be the case with IVC?IMO Indo-Aryan(or Indo-Iranian) speakers were already present in IVC,at least in northern regions and near Sarasvati.From where did they came from,we don't know.Perhaps from further north or west.Anyway these are just speculations coming from me.I have not even passed high school,so don't take it for granted.I have my sources though,I'd be more than happy to provide them if you require :-)

Also regarding PGW,read thispaper.Here is the summary which states that Harappan elements in certain PGW sites lasted till 800BCE.But the study does state an interesting element in PGW.....the horse.But there are no traces of explosive amount of horse 'cult' in PGW like we see in steppes,just some random isolated findings which can also be found in few Harappan sites.Perhaps they acquired random horses through trade from central or western Asia ,which was also the case in historical times.

Best wishes, --AryaBharatiya (talk) 00:33, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Till 800 BCE... THat's an interesting date: Witzel, Michael (1995), "Early Sanskritization: Origin and Development of the Kuru state" (PDF), EJVS vol. 1 no. 4 (1995).

Thanks for your 'personal speculations' on a 'BMAC,IVC and cultures of Eastern Iran network'; it makes sense to me, for what I know now. You've read the section on Anthropology: elite recruitment and language change? Renfrew offers various possible explanations for language change. Quiz-question: which of the four could be applied to the Harappan-Vedic transition? Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 04:44, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

@Kautilya3, As I mentioned ANI were a genetically distinctive group. If they were not native to subcontinent, then they would have intermixed with other groups and would have left traces of their culture & language (??) elsewhere as well as carried the genetic traces of mixing all the way to India. Quoting from page 430, Moorjani et al (2013), “On the contrary, a recent study that searched for West Eurasian groups most closely related to the ANI ancestors of Indians failed to find any evidence for shared ancestry between the ANI and groups in West Eurasia within the past 12,500 years.” So both ANI & ASI were native to subcontinent.

Painted Grey Ware (PGW) were fine grained pottery, luxury tableware, that required levigated fine clay thrown on a horizontal wheel and fired in an oven up to 600 degrees C. Recently, PGW were found among mature Harappan objects (dated 2200 BC-2600 BC) at Alamgirpur, Meerut. Earlier both Cemetery H Culture & PGW were associated with IA peoples, now appears to be indigenous to IVC. The gradual nature of cultural change is the opposite of scenario one would expect during a language shift. Regards Itharaju (talk) 07:50, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

I see. So it is your own personal theory that the ANI people were "original inhabitants" of India? If so, you can't talk as if it is an established fact and other views are "misconceptions." Did you read any reliable sources that support your claim? - Kautilya3 (talk) 08:28, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

@Kautilay3 I have quoted from Moorjani paper (2013) Okay. How do you interpret what the paper says? “On the contrary, a recent study that searched for West Eurasian groups most closely related to the ANI ancestors of Indians failed to find any evidence for shared ancestry between the ANI and groups in West Eurasia within the past 12,500 years.”. Regards Itharaju (talk) 08:45, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

You have neglected the parenthetical statement in the paper immediately following: "(although it is possible that with further sampling and new methods such relatedness might be detected)" which clearly indicates that we do not have conclusive results yet. Moreover, you are trying to "interpret" the statements. It is not a scholarly source doing it. So, you still cannot talk as if it is a fact. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 09:08, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

@Joshua Yes,I have read that paper.But it is quite outdated now.For e.g Witzel places RV before 1200 just because of the introduction of iron.Now it is proven that iron working started in India already at 1800 BCE(though it may have become popular only by mature BRW & PGW at around 1500-1400 BCE).Interestingly,he identifies Sarasvati as Ghagghar-Hakra and we know that Ghaggar-Hakra lost its glory after 1900 BCE.So the parts of RV which mentions Sarasvati as rich in waters(mainly in family books) should obviously predate 1900 BCE.And thank you very much for considering my views.I actually got the idea after watching Kenoyer's video and reading through Possehl's book in which he highlights BMAC contacts with IVC.I also had one of my Indologist friend who highlighted about BMAC contacts with Iran & steppe zones.Finally after that I read about the striking similarity between Harappan skeletons and the skeletons from Bactira,N.Iran and Tarim mummies(I can provide the paper co-authored by Mallory,if you are interested).So I came to this conclusion from all these.I am aware of elite dominance,but I do not think it is possible(because of what happened to Mitanni elites and all other tribes who invaded India in historical times like Sakas,Hunas,Kushans etc).The elites all got absorbed into the larger population.Perhaps the Aryanization of northern regions and Sarasvati area already started during pre-Harappan times,when the civilization was at its initial stages and was less populated.Certain amount of Harappans were Aryan speakers who managed to Aryanize rest of the regions by late Harappan times.The late Harappan migration into the Gangetic region is also consistent with later Vedic shift to the Gangetic region.

@Itharaju Thank you for that paper on PGW,I had actually bookmarked it for references,but I lost it after re-installing the broswer.Thanks for bringing that paper to my attention again :) So now we can confirm that PGW is an offshoot of Harappan culture.Regarding ANI-ASI stuff,I think you should look at specific haplogroups and their mutations instead.ANI is a generic term for many genetic components,some of them might date back to pre-historic times(like ANE).So it cannot prove or disprove bronze age migrations.If we look at mutations of haplogroups,we can determine the population movement to an extant by analyzing the mutation dates. Best regards,--AryaBharatiya (talk) 10:19, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Section-7 of main article defines genetics fairly well. Since 2009 scientists have specifically looked for ancestral migrations during the bronze age and couldn't find any. Several articles have already appeared in the news media & some were listed above. What is important is the fact that the fate of 'Indo-Aryan Migration Theory' is now hinged on future discoveries. IAmt, once flaunted as a proven fact, is falling apart slowly as the archaeological evidence is piling up showing cultural continuity, rather than abrupt changes. In my view IAmt should be reverted back to ‘Indo-Aryan Migration Hypothesis’ Regards Itharaju (talk) 12:29, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

The difference between a hypothesis and a theory has been discussed (and explained) before. Basically, a hypothesis is a 'basic idea', like "Sanskrit resembles European languages, ergo they must have a common source;" a theory is an idea, or a set of ideas, about how things may be (originated, caused, etc.), which can be tested, like "the Indo-European languages came to India by migration of Indo-European speaking people." That idea is being tested, isn't it? To be clear: the "continuity-theory" seems to be supplementary; the "Indigenous Aryans "theory"" is contardictory. That is, the hypothesis/theory that the Indo-European came from outside of India is uncontested, except for the indigenists, which makes them contradictory theories; the migration-theory and the continuity-theory are somehow complementary. Well, I'm looking forward to new theoretical developments, which hopefully incorporate both memes and continuity. Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 13:18, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

By the way, regarding Christianity: orthodox Christians still narrate stories about pastoralists wandering through the desert; wuite odd, isn't it, given the lack of deserts in north-western Europe? Why did we convert to a religion which was developed in a totally different environment, with stories from a totally distinct past? Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 13:22, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Itharaju : Isn't theory and hypothesis synonymous with each other?At least that is what all the dictionaries which I came across says.

Joshua : Technically speaking,Bible contains themes and elements from Middle East,so we know that Christianity came from there.Much like how Buddhism contains Indian themes while it spread all over Asia.Both Buddhism and Christianity acknowledges that they came from India and Israel/Palestine respectively.While Vedic texts acknowledge that Vedic culture spread from Kurukshetra/Brahmavarta which is a region within India.As for conversion part,there are many factors.For e.g why did China and other Asian regions adopted Buddhism,a completely foreign religion ad made it an important part of their culture?Some questions are better without answers :-) Regards,--AryaBharatiya (talk) 14:41, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

"Some questions are better without answers" - now that's indeed :-) !!! Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 14:58, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Aye :-) --AryaBharatiya (talk) 15:15, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Well, I am signing off this section because it has become totally unfocused. Some strong claims have been made with no evidence whatsoever. As far as I am concerned, nothing has been said that remotely questions the IAmt. - Kautilya3 (talk) 16:35, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Well,Kautilya,we discussed about archaeological continuity in India,misidentification of steppe cultures as PIE/II,genetic continuity in India,flaws in elite dominance etc....all of them raises doubts over current AMT scenario.Best regards--AryaBharatiya (talk) 01:16, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

You did succeed in raising doubts in my mind; that's almost worth a Barnstar. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 05:06, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

Dear Joshua,I'm honored!--AryaBharatiya (talk) 08:02, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

Aryans and the Indus Valley Civilisation

Now what a coincidence, this maay be a book we're all interested in: Asko Parpola (2015), The Roots of Hinduism: The Early Aryans and the Indus Civilization, Oxford University Press: " Parpola's comprehensive assessment of the Indus language and religion is based on all available textual, linguistic and archaeological evidence, including West Asian sources and the Indus script. The results affirm cultural and religious continuity to the present day" Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 13:35, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Yes,I'm aware of this book.There is a free preview available on google books.From the contents,it looks like it a compilation of his past works,which of many are discussed already by Lal and Sethna back in 90's.

Regards,--AryaBharatiya (talk) 14:22, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Maybe there should be a main article on "Indo-Aryan origins" or something like that, and also a subsidiary article on "Local continuity theory" or something similar. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 15:00, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

I think we already have those on Indigenous Aryans article and Aryan migration debate article. TBH I think these two articles must be merged into this main article or Out of India article. Sure,it will be long,but it would be better if we have all the details in one page keeping in mind that Wiki is used by many students and other laymen,who would not notice articles with similar contexts which contains different/additional information.Best wishes,--AryaBharatiya (talk) 15:18, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

Indo-Aryan migration debate was first called "Indigenous Aryans - Overview of arguments". It was split-off because the article was very long, with extensive arguments which are actually not suited for an encyclopedia, but which are relevant for Wikipedia, given the never-ending arguments on the topic. Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 05:10, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

NB: the lead of the debate-article is some sort of intro, but it focuses on the Indigenists; the continuity-argument is mentioned, but only as in favor of the indigenists. We're not finished yet with this topic... Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 05:13, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

I see.Well,two long books by Bryant didn't settle the IAMT debate,so that speaks how much long the discussions could go on.I think both articles should be shortened as much as possible and merged together.The basic explanations are enough for Wiki viewers since most of them would not look into deeper issues like we do.We should try to avoid old works like on genetics and add newer finds.Best wishes,--AryaBharatiya (talk) 08:13, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

I was going through WiKi-pages related to the main-article, like BMAC, Andronovo culture, Cemetery H culture, etc. I observed that all these pages appear monotonous with similar repetitive maps, and with very little explanation. I feel that adding descriptive text and images will make these articles interesting. I invite your suggestions. Secondly, in my view, the word "Aryan" may be either dropped or suitably replaced with a non-controversial term. Because, "Aryan" attracts unwanted attention from conflicting groups. Regards. Itharaju (talk) 18:47, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

Genetics Section is WP:OR

We discussed this stuff previously HERE with even admin @Dougweller: agreeing that it is OR. WP: OR states "you must be able to cite reliable, published sources that are directly related to the topic of the article." Directly related is even bolded. None of the genetics studies mention Aryan Migration. Migrations occurring 40,000 years ago have nothing to do with Aryan Migration, which is a specific hypothesis with a specific timetable. Lastly, the well known academic books on Indian history don't discuss Aryan Migration/Indigenous Aryans using genetics studies.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 15:22, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Vic, I checked those studies; they are relevant to this topic. To quote the OR-guideline, as yoy did before: "you must be able to cite reliable, published sources that are directly related to the topic of the article." As you know very well, opponents of the IAmt often refer to genetics, to argue that is rejected etc. Genetecs do show that there wasn't a major influx of genetic material around 1500 BCE; the IAmt does give arguments why small group of people can influence a culture, including language-shift. Therefor, this section is directly related to the topic. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 17:09, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Please quote where Reich mentions Aryan migration. See the comments of Dougweller.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 17:38, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Singh triumphantly remarked that this research has "debunked" the "Aryan Invasion Theory", a statement which is happily quoted by opponents. See also the subsection on "Pre-Indo-Aryan origins". Anyway, if we're going to argue on this section, I propose to go through this stuff, to see what the (their?) merits are (this is not completely correct English...); we can work together on this quite well, I think. Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 18:39, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I ask again: please quote where Reich mentions Aryan migration.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 18:41, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm reading the web-article now; Reaich et al. (2009) is not the only publication referred, though. Did you read the subsection on "Pre-Indo-Aryan origins"? Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 18:45, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

"Many Indian and European groups speak Indo-European languages, while the Adygei speak a Northwest Caucasian language. It is tempting to hypothesize that the population ancestral to ANI and CEU spoke “Proto-Indo-European”, which has been reconstructed as ancestral to both Sanskrit and European languages38, although we cannot be certain without a date for ANI-ASI mixture." [6] Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 18:49, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Indo-Aryans is the name used for Indo-European speakers that migrated to India from around 2000 BC onwards. They were a branch of Indo-Iranians. They are theorised to have originated near the Ural river and spread throughout west Eurasia. So, any genetic results that relate Indian populations to west Eurasians are relevant to Indo-Aryan migration theory. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 19:08, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Yeah but ANIs date to 40,000 years ago. That relatedness to western populations is way before Aryan migrations. Even JJ knows that.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 19:11, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Sorry my dear! You are misunderstanding things. "ANI" is the name given to a bunch of genetic markers ("haplogroups," as they call them). How old they are is of no consequence. What matters is when they appeared in India. When they started mixing with ASI genes, we can be sure that they have appeared in India. That was around 2000 BC. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 19:22, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

ANIs settled in India 40,000 years ago.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 19:25, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Any reliable source for that? -- Kautilya3 (talk) 19:38, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

You can read some of the coauthors of these very same studies HERE.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 19:47, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, newspapers are not reliable sources for either science or history. - Kautilya3 (talk) 19:51, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

These are direct quotes from some of the authors! And you have not supported your assertion at all that this original research is relevant.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 19:53, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

I know they are direct quotes from the authors. I am shocked by their shamelessness unprofessional statements. But they can't get such statements past the peer review. As for relevance, I mentioned it right at the beginning. I don't feel like repeating myself! - Kautilya3 (talk) 20:10, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Relax. ANI existed in India 40,000 years ago, no doubt about that. Reich says "it's tempting," yet it's clear that it's quite unlikely that those "original ANIs" spoke an Indo-European language - but hey, that is OR! Anyway, Reich refers to IAmt, but that's not the main point; the main point is that this research is directly related to IAmt (Singh uses it as an argument against it) and the relation of northern Indians to Europeans, and that Reich also refers to IAmt. NB: Metspalu et al. (2011) do refer to IAmt, as do Klyosov & Rozhanskii (2012). And see also Indians are not descendants of Aryans, says new study, New research debunks Aryan invasion theory and Aryan Invasion Theory used for Divide and Convert : Exposed by fresh Genetic research. Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 20:12, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Fruit of the poisonous tree. I am not going anywhere near those news reports! - Kautilya3 (talk) 20:33, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

JJ, please quote where Reich mentions Aryan migration. The quote you provided doesn't mention Aryan migration.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 21:53, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Correct, he's referring to a an "ancestral population" and to linguistics, c.q. "Proto-Indo-European." Odd presumption; as far as I know, no linguist would dare to date back proto-Indo-European to 40,000 BCE. But Singh, his co-researcher, does refer to IAmt. And you yourself are probably quite aware that Reich's and Singh's findings are puzzling in the light of any notion of "migration" of Indo-Aryans, and the question how many people you need to effect a language-shift. It is not without reason that Anthony and others have adresses this question. See also Metspalu et al. (2011), Shared and Unique Components of Human Population Structure and Genome-Wide Signals of Positive Selection in South Asia, AJHG, Volume 89, Issue 6, 9 December 2011, Pages 731–744 journal summary full text: "Modeling of the observed haplotype diversities suggests that both Indian ancestry components are older than the purported Indo-Aryan invasion 3,500 YBP." Best regards, Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 05:03, 27 June 2015 (UTC)

@Joshua Jonathan: You must quote Singh in the article to establish the relevance of the Reich study. Or you must delete the Reich study entirely.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 07:07, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

Done. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 07:18, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

I can't accept it. Once again, fruit of the poisonous tree. Please give me some time. I will be happy to make the needed connections. Cheers, Kautilya3 (talk) 08:48, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

I don't think you know what fruit of the poisonous tree means. I agree with Joshua Jonathan's edits.VictoriaGrayson^Talk 15:25, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

Of course, I do. I am American. In any case, it is still not a reliable source. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 15:47, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

Methodical issues

Sorry if this is too off-topic, but the discussions and debates on here make me think that you folks may value an outside perspective from a Finno-Ugrist (who is ethnic Saami, and a specialist on Saami prehistory) on the general problem of synthesising historical linguistics with archaeology here. This should be required reading for anyone seriously interested in reconstructing prehistorical ethnolinguistic developments and language geography. It's really worth reading, IMHO, for all its clarity of argument. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 18:51, 12 July 2015 (UTC)

Race science

@VictoriaGrayson: interesting, but I think it needs some context, to make clear how this is related to the development of the IAmt. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 04:25, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Source for IAMt being controversial

The source for the sentence "The debate about the origin of Indo-Aryan peoples is controversial," says:

"While scholars agree that these epics probably have their roots in the events that took place in period following the entry of the Indo-Aryan speaking nomadic tribes into northwestern India around 1200 B.C., their historicity is highly controversial."

Doesn't it says "historicity of epics is controversial" instead of "debate about the origin of Indo-Aryan peoples is controversial?" — Abhinav Yd (talk) 15:12, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

No, unfortunately, the origin of the Indo-Aryan people itself is controversial. See Indigenous Aryans for details. Cheers, Kautilya3 (talk) 15:19, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

Okay, it maybe. But the source doesn't seems to imply the same. It is inappropriate to cite it as a source for this sentence. — Abhinav Yd (talk) 15:47, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

You are right. I will look for a proper source. Cheers, Kautilya3 (talk) 16:01, 3 August 2015 (UTC)