Title: The Harappans and Aryans
Author: M K Dhavalikar
Publisher: Aryan Books International, 2018 (First)
ISBN: 9788173056123
Pages: 227
When John Marshall unearthed the remains of Harappan civilization in the 1920s, he found – or rather thought he had found – clear elements of non-Aryan characteristics such as the absence of horse and iron and also an urban setting for the culture. Clever intervention by missionary-turned-anthropologists had successfully established an Aryan-Dravidian dichotomy by the end of nineteenth century. This led Marshall to propose that the Harappan civilization was engendered by the Dravidians on the laughable logic that whatever is not Aryan must be Dravidian. This assertion had no basis in fact. Archeologically, no trace of artefactual continuity is established between Harappa and the supposedly Dravidian-populated South India. The Harappan language, though not yet deciphered, stands no comparison at all with the Dravidian languages. The Harappans ate wheat and barley while the south Indians continue to eat rice. Even in the face of these logical arguments, a few scholars support Marshall’s cause and claim that the Dravidians established the Harappan civilization. The controversy still rages and we need many more scholars to put in their contribution to the debate. Madhukar Keshav Dhavalikar is a retired professor of archeology at the Deccan College, Pune. He is a field expert, having carried out excavations at many ancient sites which include Inamgaon, Prabhas Patan and Kuntasi among others. He has published over one hundred research papers and thirty books on archeology. In this book, Dhavalikar argues that the Harappan civilization was an Aryan construct and after the breakup of the civilization due to environmental factors, the Harappan-Aryans spread to other parts of north, central and eastern India and launched the second urbanization during the beginning of the historic period in the lifetime of Buddha and Mahavira.
Dhavalikar’s aim is to establish the connecting link between the proto-historic Harappan and the early historic Aryan urbanizations separated by a thousand years. His arguments are logical and may be plausible. He has explained away even the toughest challenges like the absence of horse and iron in a convincing manner. The horse reached India by the Late Harappan stage from west Asia and that’s why it is not depicted in seals made in the Mature Harappan phase, but found in large measure in Vedic texts composed in the Late Harappan period. The downfall of the urban phase is attributed to desiccation caused by global cooling that set in by about 2000 BCE and lasted for a millennium. At the same time, some hypotheses seem to be out of order. He postulates that Harappa was probably a monarchical state with a large, well-defined territory spanning 1.5 million square km. It exhibited occupational specialization in society with a variety of crops. The uniformity of customs at different ends of the land attests to a uniform state. The author also thinks that a rudimentary caste system was in existence at Harappan sites, judging from the demarcation of urban real estate into citadel and different shades of lower towns. This is a little farfetched. Some form of separation based on profession is seen in all societies and the dwelling places mirror this division. But arguing that the division into classes was sealed by birth in a specific class – as in caste societies – is not proven by available evidence.
This book introduces a plausible yet highly speculative sequence of events that led to the downfall of the Harappan civilization. Around 2200 BCE, a cataclysmic tectonic movement took place in the Himalayan foothills. This changed the course of rivers. The Sutlej river diverted its flow from Saraswati (present day Ghaggar-Hakra) and emptied its discharge to the Chenab river. Meanwhile, Yamuna also changed its course to withdraw from Saraswati and link up with Ganga further east, as it still does. This made the Saraswati go dry and the towns on its banks lost their vitality. However, this does not explain why other centres like Harappa or Mohenjodaro declined. To compound the misfortune, from around 2000 BCE, environmental degradation set in on a global scale and many parts became arid due to global cooling. Harappans were then scattered to distant corners of India and west Asia. Societies in other regions of India were still in the Mesolithic or even Neolithic stages at that time. Harappans taught them plough agriculture, cultivation of wheat and barley, copper-bronze technology, wheel-turned pottery, cremation of the dead and also Prakrit, an Indo-Aryan language.
In his bid to prove the identity of Harappans as Aryans, Dhavalikar examines a few aspects that are seemingly pointed against his theory. There are no confirmed traces of the horse in the Mature Harappan phase. It was a rarity in the Late phase too, since there was no agricultural use for the animal. Its use became more widespread in the era of migration to the Ganga basin. Scholars associate the horse inseparably to Aryans and the Rig Veda mentions it 215 times while the bull finds mention only 176 times. However, the author points out that the Aryans did not bring the horse to India, but was traded with west Asia by the end of the third millennium BCE. Fire worship was fairly common in India even in pre-Harappan sites like Mehrgarh in Baluchistan. Its universal adoption in Mature Harappan period is attested by the elaborate fire altars with remains of animal bones found in Kalibangan. In the Rig Veda, the largest number of hymns is addressed to Agni (fire). Anyhow, this book does not pursue the lead of fire worship to Zoroastrianism in Persia which looks like a serious slip.
The author’s credentials as an accomplished archeologist are beyond doubt, but his attempt to combine fact with fiction casts a shadow of inconsistency to the whole effort. Dhavalikar tries unconvincingly to reconcile ancient Indian concepts of chronological phases like Kali Yuga to historical notions. He calculates the beginning of Kali Yuga to 3110 BCE by counting 95 generations of kings from Puranic genealogy. In this irrational attempt, he arbitrarily assigns a regnal term of eighteen years to each king so as to coincide the beginning of Kali Yuga to the date of scholarly consensus of the onset of Harappan civilization. Interestingly, this date is extended to supposed references in the Bible too. This book wonders at the coincidence of the year 3104 BCE mentioned in the Bible as the year of God’s creation of the world. This assertion is quite strange as there no such references in the Bible. Bishop Ussher of England in the early modern age had estimated the Creation as happening in 4004 BCE from the genealogical lines listed in the Bible. This is far too distant from the author’s estimation.
The spread of Harappans/Aryans from the land of five rivers to the east and west is covered in some detail. They established their prominence as far as west Asia and Iran. The treaty between Hittites of Anatolia and Mitanni in Syria of fourteenth century BCE, found and known as the Boghazkoi Inscription of central Turkey mentions Rig Vedic gods such as Indra, Mitra, Nasatya and Varuna. This migration phase in India is characterized by the Rig Vedic picture of a rural society featured by subsistence farming, stock-raising and hunting-fishing. The fall from the great urban period cannot be more striking. Dhavalikar takes a dig at the Aryan invasion theory with an analysis of ancient languages. Prakrit was the language of the Harappans and it is an Indo-Aryan tongue. Rig Veda has borrowed many words from it. He also claims that Dravidians too had migrated to India from Elam in Persia in the fourth millennium BCE. He accepts that the Aryans had come from central Asia, but affirms that they made the Harappan civilization in all its glory.
The book includes some references to the author’s political opinion which is to be highly deplored in an academic treatise such as his hostility to communal reservation in government jobs in India. He terms it an irony of fate that people of the upper castes now want to turn into backward castes. At the same time, he makes a prescient observation that innovation had never been an Indian quality. The artifacts stood unchanged for thousands of years with no change for the better. There is no difference in bullock carts as depicted in Harappan terracotta seals and the modern ones still used in Indian villages.
The book is recommended.
Dhavalikar’s aim is to establish the connecting link between the proto-historic Harappan and the early historic Aryan urbanizations separated by a thousand years. His arguments are logical and may be plausible. He has explained away even the toughest challenges like the absence of horse and iron in a convincing manner. The horse reached India by the Late Harappan stage from west Asia and that’s why it is not depicted in seals made in the Mature Harappan phase, but found in large measure in Vedic texts composed in the Late Harappan period. The downfall of the urban phase is attributed to desiccation caused by global cooling that set in by about 2000 BCE and lasted for a millennium. At the same time, some hypotheses seem to be out of order. He postulates that Harappa was probably a monarchical state with a large, well-defined territory spanning 1.5 million square km. It exhibited occupational specialization in society with a variety of crops. The uniformity of customs at different ends of the land attests to a uniform state. The author also thinks that a rudimentary caste system was in existence at Harappan sites, judging from the demarcation of urban real estate into citadel and different shades of lower towns. This is a little farfetched. Some form of separation based on profession is seen in all societies and the dwelling places mirror this division. But arguing that the division into classes was sealed by birth in a specific class – as in caste societies – is not proven by available evidence.
This book introduces a plausible yet highly speculative sequence of events that led to the downfall of the Harappan civilization. Around 2200 BCE, a cataclysmic tectonic movement took place in the Himalayan foothills. This changed the course of rivers. The Sutlej river diverted its flow from Saraswati (present day Ghaggar-Hakra) and emptied its discharge to the Chenab river. Meanwhile, Yamuna also changed its course to withdraw from Saraswati and link up with Ganga further east, as it still does. This made the Saraswati go dry and the towns on its banks lost their vitality. However, this does not explain why other centres like Harappa or Mohenjodaro declined. To compound the misfortune, from around 2000 BCE, environmental degradation set in on a global scale and many parts became arid due to global cooling. Harappans were then scattered to distant corners of India and west Asia. Societies in other regions of India were still in the Mesolithic or even Neolithic stages at that time. Harappans taught them plough agriculture, cultivation of wheat and barley, copper-bronze technology, wheel-turned pottery, cremation of the dead and also Prakrit, an Indo-Aryan language.
In his bid to prove the identity of Harappans as Aryans, Dhavalikar examines a few aspects that are seemingly pointed against his theory. There are no confirmed traces of the horse in the Mature Harappan phase. It was a rarity in the Late phase too, since there was no agricultural use for the animal. Its use became more widespread in the era of migration to the Ganga basin. Scholars associate the horse inseparably to Aryans and the Rig Veda mentions it 215 times while the bull finds mention only 176 times. However, the author points out that the Aryans did not bring the horse to India, but was traded with west Asia by the end of the third millennium BCE. Fire worship was fairly common in India even in pre-Harappan sites like Mehrgarh in Baluchistan. Its universal adoption in Mature Harappan period is attested by the elaborate fire altars with remains of animal bones found in Kalibangan. In the Rig Veda, the largest number of hymns is addressed to Agni (fire). Anyhow, this book does not pursue the lead of fire worship to Zoroastrianism in Persia which looks like a serious slip.
The author’s credentials as an accomplished archeologist are beyond doubt, but his attempt to combine fact with fiction casts a shadow of inconsistency to the whole effort. Dhavalikar tries unconvincingly to reconcile ancient Indian concepts of chronological phases like Kali Yuga to historical notions. He calculates the beginning of Kali Yuga to 3110 BCE by counting 95 generations of kings from Puranic genealogy. In this irrational attempt, he arbitrarily assigns a regnal term of eighteen years to each king so as to coincide the beginning of Kali Yuga to the date of scholarly consensus of the onset of Harappan civilization. Interestingly, this date is extended to supposed references in the Bible too. This book wonders at the coincidence of the year 3104 BCE mentioned in the Bible as the year of God’s creation of the world. This assertion is quite strange as there no such references in the Bible. Bishop Ussher of England in the early modern age had estimated the Creation as happening in 4004 BCE from the genealogical lines listed in the Bible. This is far too distant from the author’s estimation.
The spread of Harappans/Aryans from the land of five rivers to the east and west is covered in some detail. They established their prominence as far as west Asia and Iran. The treaty between Hittites of Anatolia and Mitanni in Syria of fourteenth century BCE, found and known as the Boghazkoi Inscription of central Turkey mentions Rig Vedic gods such as Indra, Mitra, Nasatya and Varuna. This migration phase in India is characterized by the Rig Vedic picture of a rural society featured by subsistence farming, stock-raising and hunting-fishing. The fall from the great urban period cannot be more striking. Dhavalikar takes a dig at the Aryan invasion theory with an analysis of ancient languages. Prakrit was the language of the Harappans and it is an Indo-Aryan tongue. Rig Veda has borrowed many words from it. He also claims that Dravidians too had migrated to India from Elam in Persia in the fourth millennium BCE. He accepts that the Aryans had come from central Asia, but affirms that they made the Harappan civilization in all its glory.
The book includes some references to the author’s political opinion which is to be highly deplored in an academic treatise such as his hostility to communal reservation in government jobs in India. He terms it an irony of fate that people of the upper castes now want to turn into backward castes. At the same time, he makes a prescient observation that innovation had never been an Indian quality. The artifacts stood unchanged for thousands of years with no change for the better. There is no difference in bullock carts as depicted in Harappan terracotta seals and the modern ones still used in Indian villages.
The book is recommended.
Rating: 3 Star
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