THE HARAPPA / VEDA DISCUSSION (2002)

Michael Witzel Harvard University

The Hindu Open Page Historical divide: archaeology and literature Tuesday, Jan 22, 2002 N.S. RAJARAM Indology grew out of attempts to interpret Indian sources from European perspective. Its legacy is archaeology without literature for the Harappans and a literature without archaeology for the Vedic Aryans. Any rewriting of history must begin by bridging this unnatural gulf.

INDOLOGY, WHICH prominently includes history of the Vedic Age, is the result of a historical accident. In 1784, Sir William Jones, an English jurist in the employ of the British East India Company, began a study of Sanskrit to better understand the legal and political traditions of the Indian subjects. As a classical scholar, he was struck by the extraordinary similarities between Sanskrit and European languages, especially Latin and Greek. He went on to observe: "... the Sanscrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of wonderful structure, more perfect than Greek, more copious than Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either, yet bearing to both of them a stronger affinity, both in the roots of the verbs and in the forms of grammar, than could possibly have been produced by accident; so strong indeed, that no philologer could examine them all three without believing them to have sprung from the same source." Though he was not the first European to recognise this connection that honour belongs probably to Filippo Sassetti, a Florentine merchant living in Goa two centuries earlier Jones was the first to express it in scholarly terms. With this dramatic announcement Jones launched two new fields Indology and comparative linguistics, notably Indo-European linguistics. To account for this similarity, some scholars postulated that the ancestors of Indians and Europeans must at one time have lived in the same region and spoken the same language. They called this the Aryan language and their common homeland the Aryan homeland. Following the Nazi misuse of the word Aryan as a race, and the atrocities that accompanied it, the term has fallen into disfavour. The preferred term today is Indo-European. According to this theory, the ancestors of the Indians who used Vedic Sanskrit to compose the Vedas and other related literature hailed from a land outside India. Their original homeland has been placed in locations from Germany to Chinese Turkestan, that is, everywhere except India where the Vedic language and its literature have found the fullest expression and endured the longest. This is the background to the famous Aryan Invasion Theory (AIT) that has dominated Indian history books for over a century. Based on various arguments, but strongly influenced by biblical beliefs, scholars like F. Max Mueller assigned a date of 1500 BC for the Aryan invasion and 1200 BC for the composition of the Rigveda, the oldest member of the Vedic corpus. The Bible is said to assign the date October 23, 4004 BC for the Creation and 2448 BC for the Flood. This was in the background when he gave 1500 BC as the date of the Aryan invasion. Max Mueller himself in a letter to the Duke of Argyle, then acting Secretary of State for India, asserted: "I regard the account in the Genesis (of the Bible) to be simply historical." In his

defence, it must be recognised that he was by no means dogmatic about his theories. Towards the end of his life, in response to some critics, Max Mueller wrote: "Whether the Vedic hymns were written in 1000, 1500 or 2000 or 3000 BC, no power on earth will ever determine." Mismatch What is remarkable in all this is the fact that the foundations of ancient Indian history were being laid by scholars who were not historians but linguists. In keeping with the political conditions of the age the heyday of European colonialism it was inevitable that colonial and Christian missionary interests should have intruded on their work. Even Max Mueller, during the first half of his career, saw it his duty to advance the interests of Christian missionaries, though, towards the end of his life, he became a convert to Vedanta. In addition, most of them had no scientific background witness their belief in the Biblical Creation Theory. There was also no archaeology to guide them. All these were soon to change. Beginning about 1921, Indian and British archaeologists working under Sir John Marshall revealed the existence of the ancient cities of Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro in the Punjab and Sindh. Further excavation showed that they were part of a vast civilisation spread over most of North India and even beyond. This is now famous as the Indus Valley or the Harappan civilisation. They were flourishing in the period from c. 3100 BC to 1900 BC, or more than a thousand years before the postulated Aryan invasion. Scholars from a wide range of disciplines including literature, archaeology, architecture and even mathematics, began to study the archaeological remains for clues to the identity and nature of the civilisation. At first sight, the discovery of the Harappan civilisation, spread over the same geographical region as described in the Vedic literature, seemed to invalidate the Aryan Invasion Theory. The natural conclusion seemed to be that Harappan archaeology represented the material remains of the culture described in the Vedic literature. But for reasons that are too complex to detail here, prominent historians soon rejected the idea of the Vedic identity of the Harappan civilisation. They insisted that the Harappans were a pre-Vedic (and non-Vedic) people who were defeated by the invading Aryans and forced to migrate en masse to South India, later to be known as Dravidians, speaking languages that are supposedly unrelated to Sanskrit. Through this device, historians sought to preserve the Aryan Invasion Theory and reconcile it with the existence of a much older civilisation in the Vedic heartland. In this exercise it should be noted that a theory postulated by linguists in the previous century prevailed over archaeological evidence. No evidence of invasion This soon ran into contradictions. Archaeologists found no evidence of any invasion or warfare severe enough to account for the uprooting of such a vast civilisation. On the other hand, the decline of the Harappan civilisation could be attributed to natural causes in particular, ecological degradation due to the drying up of vital river systems and also floods. It is now known that a major contributor was a severe 300year drought (2200 1900 BC) that struck in an immense belt from the Aegean to China. Recent research has shown that the rainfall in some areas diminished by as much as 20 per cent. The Harappan was one of several ancient civilisations to feel

the impact of this ecological catastrophe; others similarly affected were Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia to the west and China to the east. The theory of Harappans as Dravidians has also proved to be far from satisfactory. The Harappans, who were supposed to be the original Dravidian speakers, were a literate people. There are some four thousand examples of their writing from sites like Harappa, Mohenjo-Daro, Lothal, Kalibangan and others, as well as dozens in West Asia. Yet, the earliest examples of South Indian (or Dravidian) writing use a version of the Brahmi script, which originated in North India. This leaves us in the extraordinary situation where the migrating Harappans took their language but not the script that they had themselves invented. And they waited more than a thousand years to begin their writing, borrowing from a North Indian script for the purpose. In the light of all this, the situation regarding the primary sources of ancient India may be summarised as follows: no satisfactory explanation has been found to account for the separate existence of Harappan archaeology and the Vedic literature, both of which flourished in the same geographical region. On the one hand, there is Harappan archaeology, the most extensive anywhere in the world, but no Harappan literature. On the other, there is the Vedic literature, which exceeds in volume all other ancient literature in the world combined several times over, but no Vedic archaeological remains. So we have archaeology without literature for the Harappans and literature without archaeology for the Vedic Aryans. This is all the more puzzling considering that the Harappans were a literate people while we are told that the Vedic Aryans knew no writing but used memory for preserving their immense literature. This means only the literature of the illiterates has survived. In the light of this incongruity, one may say that as long as this gulf between archaeology and literature remains unbridged, there can be no such thing as history. Neither the Harappans nor the Vedic Aryans have a historical context, but only archaeological and literary sources hanging as loose ends. So the first step in any writing (or rewriting) of ancient history should be a systematic programme to rationally connect Harappan archaeology and the Vedic literature. These are the primary sources; the theories that are now in textbooks are secondary, based on the perceptions of scholars of the colonial era. More seriously, they contradict the archaeological evidence. Vedic-Harappan connection Fortunately some progress is being made in accounting for both Harappan archaeology and the Vedic literature, though, to a large extent, it owes to the work of outsiders. Some Vedic scholars have noted that Harappan remains are replete with sacred Vedic symbols like the swastika sign, the `OM' sign and the sacred ashvattha leaf (Ficus Religiosa). No less dramatic is the discovery of the American mathematician and historian of science, A. Seidenberg, tracing the origins of Egyptian and Old Babylonian mathematics to Vedic mathematical texts known as the Sulbasutras. As Seidenberg observed: " ... the elements of ancient geometry found in Egypt (before 2100 BC) and Babylonia (c. 1900 1750 BC) stem from a ritual system of the kind observed in the Sulbasutras." This means that the mathematics of the Sulbasutras, which are Vedic texts, must have existed long before 2000 BC, i.e., during the Harappan period. This is clear also from a technical examination of Harappan archaeology, which displays skill in town planning and geometric design, showing that Harappans must have had access to the Sulbasutras. This gives a

scientific link between Vedic literature (Sulbasutras) and Harappan archaeology. (The Sulbasutras should not be confused with popular books on Vedic mathematics. These are modern works that have little to do with the Vedas). All this shows that progress can be made in explaining Harappan archaeology and the Vedic literature if one is prepared to follow a multidisciplinary, scientifically rigorous approach. The present incongruous situation of mismatch between archaeology and literature is attributable to two factors. First, an attempt to preserve a theory created on the basis of insufficient evidence before any archaeological data became available. Next, the fact that even this theory and the foundation that it rests on were created by linguists and other scholars whose understanding of science and the scientific method left much to be desired. Correcting past errors Several historians have rightly expressed concern that history may soon be written by individuals who lack the necessary knowledge of the historical method. But far more serious is the fact that what is found in textbooks today is based on theories created by men and women who had no qualifications to write about them. They are based not on the primary sources, but explanations that seek to fit the data to a particular Nineteenth century worldview the Eurocolonial. The immediate task before Indian historians is to get back to the fundamentals, ignoring the authority of scholars from the past, no matter how great their reputations. Sri Aurobindo suggested that the problem lies in the failure of Indian scholars to develop independent schools of thought. In his words: "That Indian scholars have not been able to form themselves into a great and independent school of learning is due to two causes: the miserable scantiness of the mastery in Sanskrit provided by our universities, crippling to all but born scholars, and our lack of sturdy independence which makes us over-ready to defer to European (and Western) authority." This is not to suggest that we should either deny or reject the findings of Western scholarship. Only we should not accept them uncritically as authority figures. They were products of their time and environment and the resulting weaknesses should be recognised. Their contributions remain substantial, but cannot be treated as primary knowledge. No less a person than Swami Vivekananda once said: "Study Sanskrit, but along with it study Western sciences as well. Learn accuracy, ... study and labour so that the time will come when you can put our history on a scientific basis... How can foreigners, who understand very little of our manners and customs, or our religion and philosophy, write faithful and unbiased histories of India? ... Nevertheless they have shown us how to proceed making researches into our ancient history. Now it is for us to strike out an independent path of historical research for ourselves, ... It is for Indians to write Indian history." His advice holds as good today as it did a century ago when he gave it to a group of students. The recovery of history must begin with a thorough study of the primary sources. The first step is to close the unnatural gap between archaeology and literature. N.S. RAJARAM (The writer is the author with David Frawley of the book Vedic Aryans and the Origins of Civilisation)

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Jan 29, 2002

Indus Civilisation and Vedic society MICHAEL WITZEL The Open Page write-up by N.S. Rajaram (Historical divide: archaeology and literature, January 22) is a serious misrepresentation of the results of various fields of scholarship. Certainly, the writing of ancient Indian history "must begin with a thorough study of the primary sources. The first step is to close the unnatural gap between archaeology and literature." However, such study, which is not altogether new, has to begin without prejudices of any kind, such as Rajaram's wrong presuppositions. There is little overlap between the archaeology of the Indus Civilisation (its script cannot be read yet) and early Vedic texts. For a good reason. The oldest Vedic text, the Rigveda, is full of quick, spoked-wheel horse-drawn chariots (invented around 2000 BCE), and obviously, of domesticated horses (first clearly identified in the Kachi Plains of the Indus, at 1700 BCE), but it does not yet know of iron (introduced in the northwest around 1200/1000 BCE). Annoying details Clearly, the Rigveda must fall between these dates. However the Indus (Harappan) Civilisation is dated by all archaeologists between 2600 (not 3100!) and 1900 BCE. No wonder there is geographical but not a temporal overlap between the two. Further, in spite of recent rewriters of history, whatever the pastoral Rigveda describes does not fit the fully developed cities of the Harappan Civilisation: these are two different worlds. How to explain this `gap' is another matter, with which scholars still struggle. Whether the decline of the Indus Civilisation was due to drought or a number of separate, coinciding, and self-reinforcing reasons is still undecided. Rajaram, however, simply overlooks such annoying details by adducing various isolated features in mono-lateral fashion, features which do not add up and are in fact to be contradicted by the various sciences that he evokes against mere students of the humanities (such as me). For the details, such as on geometry, astronomy, archaeology, Puranic king lists, language, etc., see EJVS 7-3 (in Electronic Journal of Vedic Studies, http://users.primushost.com/ india/ejvs/). That the Harappans lost their script and language and took over an Indo-Aryan language (now developed into Punjabi, Sindhi, etc.) has parallels in other areas. Witness the descendants of the great Maya Civilisation who mostly speak Spanish now and have long lost their script. Their civilisation was disintegrating on its own when the Spanish arrived, who did not have to resort to the same brutal methods they used in Mexico and Peru. Civilisations do die when under strains of various sorts. Why then such a "simple" solution, a "systematic programme to rationally connect Harappan archaeology and the Vedic literature"? No Aryans were needed for the demise. The earliest Aryan-like culture in the subcontinent may be the Gandhara Grave Culture of N. Pakistan (starting around 1700 BCE), well within the time frame

mentioned above. The "Aryans", perhaps Pathan-like seasonal pastoral migrants from Afghanistan, merely exploited a new opportunity in the then less agricultural Indus Valley, and set off a wave of acculturation based on their more effective pastoralism. No Hun-like "invasion" (the model of the 19th century scholars) is needed, though one has to take into account a whole range of processes, from peaceful acculturation to forceful take-over, in the various parts of the Northwest. As history teaches, one size does not fit them all. Unilateral points The several unilateral points and the new theories built on them by Rajaram are quickly destroyed by the various sciences, such as his pre-Indus Rigveda with chariots and horses in the subcontinent before their time. Any linguist will tell him that the Indo-Aryan languages (from Punjabi to Sinhala and Bengali), Dravidian (Tamil, Telugu, etc.), Munda (Santali, etc.) belong to three completely different families that share only loan-words from Sanskrit or Prakrit, just like all European languages have theirs from Latin. Still, no Kannada or Santali speaker will understand a Punjabi, just as little as a Portuguese can make out anything from Finnish or Basque. But then, linguistics is a `petty conjectural science' as he likes to say. All his "proofs" (the ubiquitous swastika, the `literate' Harappans, seafaring Rigvedic people, the age of the Sulbasutras, Vedic literature as larger than "all other...ancient literature...combined...", etc.) disappear once one takes a closer look (details in EJVS vol. 7-3, 2001, as above). Again, the Harappans must not "have had access to the Sulbasutras" the Egyptians built their giant pyramids or a completely new, wellplanned town such as Amarna, without their help, having learned from trial and error. To what extent Rajaram must go to make the overlap between Vedic and Harappan, is exposed in Frontline, Oct. 13 and Nov. 11, 2000: http://www.flonnet.com/fl1720/fl172000.htm The historical background is wrong as well. Indology is not an "attempt to interpret Indian sources from [a] European perspective" , instead, it is an attempt to let the sources speak for themselves, irrespective of later Indian or European interpretations. In other words, just like Sinology, Egyptology, etc., it is a work in progress. Even poor old Max Mueller is misrepresented again. His history is not derived from the Bible. Anybody who actually reads his letters (not just excerpts) will see that he was, as a young man, an opportunist who wrote one "Christian" letter to his pious donor and a completely "non-Christian" letter upon the death of young sister... to his own mother. To put Indology down to "Eurocolonial attitudes" is much too facile, in fact, pure propaganda. Non-Western scholars (say, of Japan) do not agree with Rajaram's "new history" either see: "Was there an Aryan invasion at all" (in Japanese language): Kokusai Nihon Bunka Kenkyu Senta Kiyo. (Nihon Kenkyu) 23, March 2000. MICHAEL WITZEL Department of Sanskrit, Harvard University

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Feb 05, 2002 Vedic-Indus debate: save Indian civilisation today If the BJP and the VHP want to ensure that modern Indian civilisation is creative and dynamic, it will not be through historical debate. They should call for an immediate halt to English-medium education at all levels and the insidious class division it creates, and promote dynamic modern civilisational creativity in the Indian people's languages. The Open Page discussion on Indus and Vedic society by N. S. Rajaram (January 22) and Michael Witzel (January 29) is not finished. Rajaram's main thesis seems to be that the Indus Civilisation was a direct linear antecedent to Vedic society and classical Indian civilisation. Witzel is correct that this is too facile and appears to be an argument driven by ideology. But neither Rajaram nor Witzel discusses language much, except that Rajaram ridicules the claim that the Indus Civilisation had a Dravidian-type language saying that it is strange that the people would have lost their script. He suggests, without evidence, that it was Indo-Aryan speaking. Witzel is correct in saying that the population of the Indus Valley lost their language and script and took over an IndoAryan language which has now developed into Punjabi, Sindhi, etc. Scholars who have devoted many years to the study of the Indus script mostly agree that all indications are that it was Dravidian-like. This is the conclusion of scholars in Finland, Russia, England, Czech Republic, the U.S., Pakistan and India. Some earlier ones, like Father Heras, and recently Finnish scholars, have spent decades studying the 600 script symbols, their possible grammatical positions, and the cultural associations. It is a minority of people who are themselves speakers of Indo-Aryan languages, who assert that the Indus people must have spoken a language like that of their own! Linguistic evidence The evidence that the Indus language was Dravidian-like is overwhelming, both circumstantial and linguistic. First, there are the Brahui people, over a million who live in east-central Baluchistan. This writer has looked into the matter himself while in Baluchistan; the language is certainly Dravidian at its core. How did it get there? Nobody has seriously suggested that the Brahuis moved there from peninsular India; rather Brahui language and culture got isolated in those hills while major changes took place in Sindh and Punjab plains. And we should note the place names of Dravidian origin over Pakistan and western and central India. Many place names have the ending aar (river), or include the words mala (mountain), kandh (hill), kotta (wall or fort), besides of course uur, pura and others. Rajaram would do well to study the Dravidian Etymological Dictionary

which compiles the vocabularies of some 20 Dravidian languages, and note the geographic implications. The word uur (town) almost certainly goes back to the earliest civilisations in Mesopotamia one of the numerous indications that the basic features of civilisation (i.e. urban life) in the Indus region diffused there from what are now Iraq and Iran. Probably Dravidian languages also had antecedents to some extent in those regions. This is the thesis of a book Dravidians and the West (Lahovery), and though it makes bolder assumptions than would be allowed by the strict procedures of many historical linguists, nevertheless it presents overwhelming suggestions. If it is accepted that the hundreds of native American languages branched off from three main stems (Greenberg), and if similar efforts showing that all the languages of North Asia and Europe could have branched off from a few prototype languages, then the above suggestions about the origin of Dravidian languages should also be accepted. Rajaram thought it was strange that the Indus people lost their script. There is nothing historically strange in that the script was already weakened as the Indus Civilisation people established their many settlements in Gujarat about 2000 BC. But several of the symbols, such as swastika, fish and trident, were retained in culture and scratched onto pottery. It is absolutely clear (F. Southworth) that Marathi, though classified now as an Indo-Aryan language, is built on a Dravidian-underlying stratum. This is true to some extent for Gujarati and Sindhi also, and for that matter Punjabi and all western Indo-Aryan languages, which are universally acknowledged by historical linguists to have considerable Dravidian influence in phonetics, vocabulary and syntax. It is clear also that Dravidian languages diffused over much of Madhya Pradesh there are the place names, besides many ("tribal") peoples who still speak Dravidian languages and whose historical traditions say they moved from western to central and east-central India. Dravidian languages diffused from Maharashtra through Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, while Telugu had branched off the language tree somewhat earlier. Language displacement It is nothing unusual in history that Indo-Aryan speech overwhelmed Dravidian in western South Asia. Such tendencies are everywhere. Semitic languages overwhelmed other language groups over much of the Near East about 2000 BC, but this doesn't mean that the pre-Semitic people were killed off; rather they were often absorbed into different political-economic systems. Semitic speech later overwhelmed Egypt, then most of North Africa, because it was thought to be the vehicle of advancement. This is the usual stuff of history. In Pakistan, the Burushaski language is related to none other, isolated in the high Hunza valley. It might be a relic of both pre-Dravidian and pre-Indo-Aryan speech in Punjab. The Dardic languages, including Kashmiri, are apparently descended from the first wave of Indo-European speech to enter South Asia, but these then got isolated in the Himalayas during the diffusion of Indo-Aryan. Indo-Aryan itself got overwhelmed in western Pakistan by the later arriving Persian-related languages such as Pashto and Baluchi. These changes may happen by invasion, but also by dribbles of more mobile or more politically powerful people moving in or by their

cultures being considered so modernising that the existing inhabitants lose their language. A different language displacement was going on in eastern India. Underlying Bengali is a Munda-type language, of which Bengali today retains many linguistic and cultural evidences. There is absolutely no evidence that Dravidian speech underlies Bengali, Oriya, or Assamese (Grierson, writing on this a century ago, was wrong). The Munda languages (Mon-Khmer group) reflect diffusion of cultures from Southeast Asia thousands of years BC which had mastered horticulture (rice, bananas, turmeric, taro, etc.) and therefore enabled humans to proliferate and diffuse into eastern and central Ganga plains and east-central India with all their cultigens prior to the diffusion there of both Dravidian and Indo-Aryan. And in Southeast Asia, it was only a thousand or so years ago that Burmese, Thai and Lao languages from South China overwhelmed the Mon-Khmer languages in most of Myanmar, Thailand and Laos, not to speak of Vietnam where it happened in the south only a couple centuries ago. And before diffusion of the Mon-Khmer, the Malay languages had been more widespread. Most Southeast Asian people today accept that various underlying streams have formed their cultures and languages. So the people of India today should gladly acknowledge, as Witzel says, that Dravidian, Munda and Indo-Aryan are distinct underlying streams and the 4th one is the Tibeto-Burmese stream in the north and east. Classical Indian Civilisation had creative achievements, which are remarkable enough, without a bogus claim that it is exclusively descended from the Indus Civilisation. The real issue The real issue now is not rewriting history, but how to reinvigorate Indian civilisational creativity in modern concepts. What is to be done about the fact that six Indian languages have more native speakers than French, but in these languages there is hardly anything produced that makes a worldwide mark in modern concepts and science. I want to emphasise that practically no people in world history have made a lasting civilisational mark using the language of a minority elite; either the language of the people develops as the vehicle of modernisation (like all of the languages of Europe when they threw off Latin, and like Korean in recent decades) or that language fades as a minority elite and then the bulk of the people adopt an outside language for modernisation. The people of India should have made the choice 50 years ago. A firm decision then should have been taken that the people's languages are the vehicles of modernisation, and to be used as the medium of modern education at all levels. Then all modern currents of thought, science, and creativity would flow through the whole population as happens in all the European and East Asian languages today. The genius of civilisation would flow from the whole population, with far less class division. If the BJP and the VHP want to ensure that modern Indian civilisation is creative and dynamic, it will not be through historical debate. They should call for an immediate halt to English-medium education at all levels and the insidious class division it

creates, and promote dynamic modern civilisational creativity in the Indian people's languages. CLARENCE MALONEY

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Feb 19, 2002 Theory and evidence N.S. RAJARAM A historical theory must account for all the evidence and not selectively accept and ignore data. Further, a man-made theory cannot substitute for primary data.

ALBERT EINSTEIN once said: "A theory must not contradict empirical facts." He was speaking in the context of science, especially how historians of science often lacked proper understanding of the scientific process. As he saw it the problem was: "Nearly all historians of science are philologists (linguists) and do not comprehend what physicists were aiming at, how they thought and wrestled with these problems." When such is the situation in physics where problems are clear-cut, it is not surprising to see issues in a subject like history being much more contentious. This is particularly the case when trying to understand the records of people far removed from us in time like the creators of the Vedic and Harappan civilisations. As a result of some recent historical developments like European colonisation and Western interest in Sanskrit language and linguistics, several myths and conjectures, through the force of repetition, have come to acquire the status of historical facts. It is time to re-evaluate these in the light of new evidence and more scientific approaches. When we come to these myths, none is more persistent than the one about "No horse at Harappa." This has now been supplemented by another claim that the spoke-wheel was unknown to the Harappans. The point of these claims is that without the horse and the spoke-wheel the Harappans were militarily vulnerable to the invading Aryan hordes who moved on speedy, horse-drawn chariots with spokewheels. This claim is not supported by facts an examination of the evidence shows that both the spoke-wheel and the horse were widely used by the Harappans. (The idea seems to be borrowed from the destruction of Native American civilisations by the Spanish and Portuguese `conquistadors'. The conquistadors though never used chariots). As far as the spoke-wheel is concerned, B.B. Lal, former Director General of the Archaeological Survey of India, records finding terracotta wheels at various Harappan

sites. In his words: "The painted lines (spokes) converge at the central hub, and thus leave no doubt about their representing the spokes of the wheel. ... another example is reproduced from Kalibangan, a well-known Harappan site in Rajasthan, in which too the painted lines converge at the hub. ... two examples from Banawali (another Harappan site), in which the spokes are not painted but are shown in low relief" (The Sarasvati Keeps Flowing, Aryan Books, Delhi, pages 72-3). It is also worth noting that the depiction of the spoke-wheel is quite common on Harappan seals. Horse and Vedic symbolism The horse and the cow are mentioned often in the Rigveda, though they commonly carry symbolic rather than physical meaning. There is widespread misconception that the absence of the horse at Harappan sites shows that horses were unknown in India until the invading Aryans brought them. Such `argument by absence' is hazardous at best. To take an example, the bull is quite common on the seals, but the cow is never represented. We cannot from this conclude that the Harappans raised bulls but were ignorant of the cow. In any event, depictions of the horse are known at Harappan sites, though rare. It is possible that there was some kind of religious taboo that prevented the Harappans from using cows and horses in their art. More fundamentally, it is incorrect to say that horses were unknown to the Harappans. The recently released encyclopedia The Dawn of Indian Civilisation, Volume 1, Part 1 observes (pages 344-5): "... the horse was widely domesticated and used in India during the third millennium BC over most of the area covered by the IndusSarasavati (or Harappan) Civilisation. Archaeologically this is most significant since the evidence is widespread and not isolated." This is not the full story. Sir John Marshall, Director General of the Archaeological Survey when Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro were being excavated, recorded the presence of what he called the `Mohenjo-Daro horse'. Giving salient measurements, comparing it to other known specimens, he wrote: "It will be seen that there is a considerable degree of similarity between these various examples and it is probable the Anau horse, the Mohenjo-Daro horse, and the example of Equus caballus of the Zoological Survey of India, are all of the type of the `Indian country bred', a small breed of horse, the Anau horse being slightly smaller than the others." (MohenjoDaro and the Indus Civilisation, volume II, page 654). It is important to recognise that this is much stronger evidence than mere artefacts, which are artists' reproductions and not anatomical specimens that can be subjected to scientific examination. Actually, the Harappans knew the horse and the whole issue of the `Harappan horse' is irrelevant. In order to prove that the Vedas are of foreign origin, (and the horse came from Central Asia) one must produce positive evidence: it should be possible to show that the horse described in the Rigveda was brought from Central Asia. This is contradicted by the Rigveda itself. In verse I.162.18, the Rigveda describes the horse as having 34 ribs (17 pairs), while the Central Asian horse has 18 pairs (36) of ribs. We find a similar description in the Yajurveda also. This means that the horse described in the Vedas is the native Indian breed (with 34 ribs) and not the Central Asian variety. Fossil remains of Equus Sivalensis (the `Siwalik horse') show that the 34-ribbed horse has been known in India going back tens of thousands of years. This makes the whole argument based on "No horse at Harappa" irrelevant. The Vedic horse is a native Indian breed and not the Central

Asian horse. As a result, far from supporting any Aryan invasion, the horse evidence furnishes one of its strongest refutations. All this suggests that man-made theories (like "No Harappan horse") and those in linguistics cannot be used to override primary evidence like the Vedic Sarasvati (described below) and the dominant oceanic symbolism found in the Vedas. To see this we may note that South Indian languages like Kannada and Tamil have indigenous (desi) word for the horse kudurai suggesting that the horse has long been native to the region. The same is true of the tiger (puli and huli) and the elephant (aaney). Contrast this with the word for the lion simha and singam that are borrowed from Sanskrit, indicating that the lion was not native to the South. A man-made theory in linguistics, because it is not bound by laws of nature, can be made to cut both ways. It cannot take the place of evidence. Primary evidence In any field it is important to take into account all the evidence, especially evidence of a fundamental nature. This can be illustrated with the help of what we now know about the Vedic river known as the Sarasvati. The Rigveda describes the Sarasvati as the greatest and the holiest of rivers as ambitame, naditame, devitame (best of mothers, best of rivers, best goddess). Satellite photographs as well as field explorations by archaeologists, notably the great expedition led by the late V.S. Wakankar, have shown that a great river answering to the description of the Sarasvati in the Rigveda (flowing `from the mountains to the sea') did indeed exist thousands of years ago. After many vicissitudes due to tectonic and other changes, it dried up completely by 1900 BC. This raises a fundamental question: how could the Aryans who are supposed to have arrived in India only in 1500 BC, and composed their Vedic hymns c. 1200 BC, have described and extolled a river that had disappeared five hundred years earlier? In addition, numerous Harappan sites have been found along the course of the now dry Sarasvati, which further strengthens the Vedic-Harappan connection. As a result, the Indus (or Harappan) Civilisation is more properly called the Indus-Sarasvati Civilisation. The basic point of all this: we cannot construct a theory focusing on a few relatively minor details like the spoke-wheel while ignoring important, even monumental evidence like the Sarasvati river and the oceanic symbolism that dominates the Rigveda. (This shows that the Vedic people could not have come from a land-locked region like Afghanistan or Central Asia). A historical theory, no less than a scientific theory, must take into account all available evidence. No less important, a manmade theory cannot take the place of primary evidence like the Sarasvati river or the oceanic descriptions in the Rigveda. This brings us back to Einstein "A theory must not contradict empirical facts." Nor can it ignore primary evidence. N.S. RAJARAM

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Mar 05, 2002 Harappan horse myths and the sciences The horses found in the early excavations at Mohenjo-Daro and Harappa do not come from secure levels and such `horse' bones, in most cases, found their way into deposits through erosional cutting and refilling, disturbing the archaeological layers.

In the Open Page of February 19, N.S. Rajaram posits a truism "A theory must not contradict empirical facts," but he then does not deliver on the `empirical facts.' As a scientist, he must suffer to be corrected, bluntly this time, by a mere philologist and Indologist. Philology, incidentally, is not the same as linguistics, as he says, but the study of a civilisation based on its texts. In order to understand such texts, one must acquire the necessary knowledge in all relevant fields, from astronomy to zoology. It is precisely a proper background in zoology, particularly in palaeontology, that is badly lacking in Rajaram's, the scientist's, account. Instead, it is he, and not his favourite straw man, the Indologist, who has created some new "myths and conjectures ... through the force of repetition." Let us deconstruct them one by one. Harappan horses? To begin with, he claims that "both the spoke-wheel and the horse were widely used by the Harappans." He quotes S.P. Gupta, without naming him, from a recent book (The Dawn of Indian Civilisation, ed. by G.C. Pande, 1999). According to Gupta the horse (Equus caballus) "was widely domesticated and used in India during the third millennium BC over most of the area covered by the Indus-Sarasvati (or Harappan) Civilisation. Archaeologically this is most significant since the evidence is widespread and not isolated." Nothing in this assertion is correct, even if or rather because it comes from an archaeologist and inventive rewriter of history, S.P. Gupta. For example, the horses found in the early excavations at Mohenjo-Daro and Harappa do not come from secure levels and such `horse' bones, in most cases, found their way into deposits through erosional cutting and refilling, disturbing the archaeological layers. Indeed, not one clear example of horse bones exists in the Indus excavations and elsewhere in North India before c. 1800 BCE (R. Meadow and A. Patel 1997, Meadow 1996: 405, 1998). Such `horse' skeletons have not been properly reported from distinct and secure archaeological layers, and worse, they have not been compared with relevant collections of ancient skeletons and modern horses (Meadow 1996: 392). Instead, well recorded and stratified finds of horse figures and later on, of horse bones (along with the imported camel and donkey), first occur in the Kachi plain on the border of Sindh/E. Baluchistan (c. 1800-1500 BCE), when the mature Indus Civilisation had already disintegrated. Even more importantly, the only true native equid of South Asia is the untamable khur (Equus hemionus, onager/half-ass) that still tenuously survives in the Rann of Kutch. Both share a common ancestor which is now put at ca. 1.72 million years ago (while the first Equus specimen is attested already 3.7 mya.). The differences between a half-ass skeleton and that of a horse are so small that one needs a

trained specialist plus the lucky find of the lower forelegs of a horse/onager to determine which is which, for "bones of a larger khur will overlap in size with those of a small horse, and bones of a small khur will overlap in size with those of a donkey." (Meadow 1996: 406). To merely compare sizes, as Rajaram does following the dubious decades old Harappan data of Marshall, and then to connect the long gone "Equus Sivalensis" with the so-called "Anau horse", resulting in the "Indian country" type, is just another blunder, but Rajaram, the scientist, is not aware of it. Proper judgment is not possible as long as none of the above precautions are taken, and when as is often done just incomplete skeletons or teeth are compared, all of which is done without the benefit of a suitable collection of standard sets of onager, donkey and horse skeletons. Rajaram and his fellow rewriters of history thus are free to turn any local half-ass into a Harappan horse, just as he has already done (see Frontline, Oct./Nov. 2000) with his half-bull. Further, the archaeologists claiming to have found horses in Indus sites are not trained zoologists or palaeontologists. When I need to get my teeth fixed I do not go to a veterinarian or a beauty salon. Typically, S.P. Gupta (1999) does not add any new evidence, and just repeats palaeontologically unsubstantiated claims that are, to quote Rajaram, "myths and conjectures... through the force of repetition." The Siwalik equid In addition, Rajaram conjures up another phantom, the Siwalik horse: "fossil remains of Equus Sivalensis (the `Siwalik horse') show that the 34-ribbed horse has been known in India going back tens of thousands of years." Standard palaeontology handbooks (B.J. MacFadden, Fossil Horses, 1992) would have told him that the Siwalik horse, first found in the northern hills of Pakistan, is not just "going back tens of thousands of years" but is in fact 2.6 million years old. However, it has long died out during the last Ice Age, as part of the late Pleistocene megafaunal extinction of about 10,000 years ago (i.e. at the end of the Late Upper Pleistocene, 75-10,000 y.a.: it is reportedly found in middle to late Pleistocene locations in the Siwaliks and in Tamil Nadu, and recently, as a "Great Indian horse" in Andhra, 75,000 y.a.). But there is, to my knowledge, no account of a Siwalik horse that even remotely approaches the date of the Indus Civilisation nor does Rajaram quote any authority to this effect. Nevertheless, in order to bolster his claim for the antiquity of the "Vedic horse (as) a native Indian breed", he connects this dead horse with the Rigvedic one, which is described as having 34 ribs (Rigveda 1.162.18). But, while horses (Equus caballus) generally have 18 ribs on each side, this can individually vary with 17 on just one or on both sides. This is not a genetically inherited trait. Such is also the case with the equally variable (5 instead of 6) lumbar vertebrae, as found in some early domestic horses in Egypt (2nd. mill. BCE) and in the closely related modern Central Asian Przewalski horse (which shares the same ancestor, 620-320,000 years ago, with the domestic horse/Equus ferus). As for the number 34, numeral symbolism may play a role in this Rigveda passage dealing with a horse sacrificed for the gods. The number of gods in the Rigveda is 33 or 33+1, which obviously corresponds to the 34 ribs of the horse, that in turn is

speculatively brought into connection with all the gods, many of whom are mentioned by name (Rigveda 1.162-3). But this is mere philology, not worthy of "scientific" study... In sum, even S. Bokonyi, the palaeontologist who sought to identify a horse skeleton at the Surkotada site of the Indus Civilisation, stated that "horses reached the Indian subcontinent in an already domesticated form coming from the Inner Asiatic horse domestication centers" just as they were imported into the ancient Near East about 2000 BCE. Any zoological handbook would have told the scientist Rajaram the same (MacFadden 1992). In addition, the identification the Surkotada equid as horse by S. Bokonyi is disputed by R. Meadow and A. Patel (1997). Even if this were indeed the only archaeologically and palaeontologically secure Indus horse available so far, it would not turn the Indus Civilisation into one teeming with horses (as the Rigveda indeed is, a few hundred years later). A tiger skeleton in the Roman Colosseum does not make this Asian predator a natural inhabitant of Italy. In short, to state that the "Vedic horse is a native Indian breed and not the Central Asian horse" is just another fantasy of the current rewriters of Indian history. Nevertheless, Rajaram even repeats some of his own "myths and conjectures, (which) through the force of repetition, have come to acquire the status of historical facts," namely the old canard that "depictions of the horse are known at Harappan sites, though rare" a case of fraud and fantasy that has been exploded more than a year ago in Frontline (Oct./Nov. 2000). Apparently, he thinks, along with other politicians, that repeating an untruth long enough will turn it into a fact. Spoke-wheeled chariots Rajaram, in dire need of `Rigvedic' horse-drawn chariots for the Harappan period, then introduces spoked wheels into the Indus Civilisation: "terracotta wheels at various Harappan sites. ... The painted lines (spokes) converge at the central hub, and thus leave no doubt about their representing the spokes of the wheel." The handful existing specimens of such terracotta disks may indeed look, even to a trained archaeologist, like a spoked wheel especially when he wants to find Aryan chariots, just like Aryan fire altars, all over the Indus area. But, they may just as well have been simple spindle whorls, used in spinning very real yarn, not wild Aryan tales. Further, "spoked wheel patterns" occur in cultures that never had the wheel, such as pre-Columbian North American civilisations. In other words, all of this proves nothing as long as we do not find a pair of these "spoked wheels" in situ, along with a Harappan toy cart. Normally, the wheels of such toy carts are of the heavy, full wheel type (that is made of three interlocked wood blocks). Rajaram then asserts, for good measure, that the "depiction of the spoke-wheel is quite common on Harappan seals." This refers to the wheel-like signs in Harappan script. Unfortunately, these "wheels" can easily be explained as unrelated artistic designs (like in the N. American case). Worse, they mostly are oblong ovals, not circles. A Harappan businessman using a cart with such wheels would have gotten seasick pretty soon. They are unfit for travel and for the discerning reader's consumption.

Instead, the rich Rigvedic materials dealing with the horse-drawn chariot and chariot races do not fit at all with Indus dates (2600-1900 BCE) and rather put this text and its chariots well after c. 2000 BCE, the archaeologically accepted timeframe of the invention of the spoke-wheeled chariot in the northern steppes and in the Near East. Again, Rajaram's fantasised "Late Vedic" Indus people have scored a "first": they invented the chariot long before archaeologists can find it anywhere on the planet! "Aryan" chariots There is no need to go deeply into his building up the straw man of Aryan invasions (i.e. immigration of speakers of Indo-Aryan), involving a need to "prove that the Vedas are of foreign origin." No one today maintains such a theory anyhow. Instead, the Rigveda is a text of the Greater Punjab, indicating a lot of local acculturation but using a language and poetics that go back to the earlier Indo-Iranian period in Central Asia (c. 2000 BCE). Equally misleading is his caricature: "without the horse and the spoke-wheel the Harappans were militarily vulnerable to the invading Aryan hordes who moved on speedy, horse-drawn chariots with spoke-wheels." As has been mentioned here a few weeks ago, nobody today claims that the Indo-Aryan speakers arrived on the scene when the mature Indus Civilisation still was flourishing and destroyed it, it in whatever fashion. Instead, there is a gap of some centuries between the two cultures, as the descriptions of ruins and simple mud wall/palisade forts (pur) in the Rigveda indicate. Vedic texts tell us that the pastoralist Indo-Aryan nobility fought from chariots, and the commoners on horseback and on foot, with the local people (dasyu) of the small, post-Harappan settlements who, like the Kikata, are said not even to understand "the use of cows." Next to warfare there also was peaceful acculturation of the various peoples in the Greater Punjab, as is shown by the Rigveda itself. As for a chariot use, a brief study of ancient Near Eastern warfare would have done the `historian' Rajaram some good. It is clear to even a superficial reader that after c. 1600 BCE the Hyksos, Hittites, etc., used such chariots, not just for show and sport but also in battle, such as in the famous battle of Kadesh between the Hittites and Egyptians in 1300 BCE. Chariots were in fact used as late as in Alexander's battle with Poros (Paurava) in the Punjab, or by the contemporary Magadha army with its 3,000 elephants and 2,000 chariots. Why then all this diatribe about the "Aryan" use of chariots in favourable, flat terrain? (Not, of course, while "thundering down the Khyber Pass"!) Foray into linguistics Mercifully, Rajaram has spared us, this time, his usual assaults on the "pseudoscience" of linguistics, and instead tries his own hand at it, and teaches us some Dravidian: kudirai `horse,' which should prove that the horse has been native to South India forever. However, his foray into linguistics is incomplete and misleading. First, Tamil kutirai, Kannada kudire, Telugu kudira, etc. have been compared by linguists, decades ago, with ancient Near Eastern words: Elamite kutira `bearer', kuti `to bear.' The Drav. words Brahui (h)ullii `horse' and Tam. ivuLi are derived from `half-ass, hemion' (T. Burrow in 1972). Both words, far from being `native South Indian', thus were coming in from the northwest.

Second, other Indian language families have such `foreign' words as seen in Munda (Koraput) kurtag, (Korku) gurgi, kurki, (Sabara/Sora) kurtaa, (Gadaba) krutaa, which are all derived from Tibeto-Burmese, for example Tsangla (Bhutan) kurtaa, Tib. rta. We know that Himalayan ponies have always been brought southwards by salt traders and with them, of course, their names. There also is the independent and isolated Burushaski (in N. Pakistan) with ha-ghur, cf. Drav. gur- in Telugu guRRamu, Gondi gurram, etc., and the Austro-Asiatic Khasi (in Shillong) kulai, Amwi kurwa', etc., all of which again point to a northern origin. (For details see: EJVS 5-1, Aug. 1999, http://users.primushost.com/india/ejvs, or: International Journal of Dravidian Linguistics, 2001). Far from magically proving, with one Dravidian word, that the "native Indian horse" has been found in the South since times immemorial, the "man made theory" of linguistics --just as the hard facts of palaeontological science rather indicate that the words for `horse' were imported, along with the animal, from the (north)western (Iranian) and northern (Tibetan) areas. Genetics now add another facet. The domesticated horse seems to have several (steppe) maternal DNA lines (Science 291, 2001, 474-477; Science 291, 2001, 412; cf. Conservation Genetics 1, 2000, 341-355), which fits in very well with the several northern Eurasian words for it mentioned above. The Eastern Central Asian words must be added; they all probably derive from Proto-Altaic *mori (as in Mongolian morin, Chinese ma, Japanese uma, and as surprisingly also found in Irish marc, English mare). The Harappan "Sarasvati" The case of the Vedic Sarasvati river (the modern Sarsuti-Ghagghar-Hakra) is complex and cannot be dealt with in detail (see, rather, EJVS 7-3, section 25). It must be pointed out, however, that the Rigvedic Sarasvati is a river on earth, a `river' in the sky (Milky Way), and a goddess, and as such Sarasvati is described in superlative terms, once as flowing `from the mountains to the sea' (samudra). However, this word has several meanings that must be kept apart: `confluence, lake, mythical ocean surrounding the earth'; the sky, too, is called a `pond'! To commingle all of this as samudra `Indian Ocean' is bad philology. In addition, far from emptying into the Rann of Kutch then, the Harappan Sarasvati (`having lakes'), disappears as Hakra in the dunes around and beyond Ft. Derawar in Bahawalpur, after showing signs of a delta (playa) and of terminal lakes, just like its Iranian namesake in the Afghani desert, the Haraxvaiti (Helmand) with its Hamun lakes. Further, simple satellite photographs also do not show when a river dried up, as the Ghagghar-Hakra has indeed done several times in its different sections in recent millennia. This was shown in detail for the Indus and Vedic periods by the former director of Pakistani archaeology, Rafique Mughal, in his book Ancient Cholistan (1997). Rajaram again is simply wrong as a scientist in asserting that the river conveniently "dried up completely by 1900 BC." Reality is much more complex. Actually, much of this has been known since Oldham and Raverty (1886, 1892). (Thus, I myself have printed a Sarasvati map, based on a lecture of 1983, before the overquoted satellite photos of Yash Pal et al. were published in 1984). However, we need many more close observations such as Mughal's, with archaeologically vouched

dates for the individual settlements along the various sections and several courses of the river. Finally, the "oceanic descriptions" of the Rigveda imagined by Rajaram and many other rewriters of history (such as S.P. Gupta, Bh. Singh, D. Frawley) are based, again, on bad philology: their "data" are taken from Vedic mythology, floating in the night time sky, and the like! Or was Bhujyu abducted on another first, a Vedic airship? MICHAEL WITZEL Harvard University

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Mar 12, 2002 There is an urgent need to jettison from our textbooks the unproved statements on Indian civilisation and consign them to academic polemics, and keep the power mongering self-seeking Taliban politicians out of educational field.

THE READERS have been following closely the debate on Harappan civilisation, published in The Hindu in its Open Page. The latest article by Michael Witzel (March 5) seems to be taking a partisan view. Archaeologists have found certain artefacts and scholars are trying to infer the meaning of the findings and in the process express divergent views. Such debates are welcome to advance our knowledge academically, no matter where it comes from. Unfortunately, Witzel's present article reads personal rather than an academic presentation. For example, he ridicules the other writer N.S. Rajaram personally by repeating his name time and again, with personal digs in every mention. Witzel is not free from the same fault that he attributes to Rajaram, as in the example of horse in Harappan sites. He states the horse bones found in the early excavations at Mohenjodaro and Harappa do not come from secure levels, and such horse bones "found their way into deposits through erosion cutting and refilling, disturbing the archaeological layers." Neither does he say how he arrived at this conclusion nor has he cited any report in support of his view. What ever the case may be, it only shows that horse bones were actually found in the excavations at Harappan sites. In order to justify his stand he writes that Marshal's Harappan data are "dubious and decades old." One cannot throw away the data presented by Marshal as it is the earliest available archaeological report and it is not possible at this point of time to say suddenly that Marshal has not reported that layers that were eroded and disturbed in places where horse bones have been found. One may ask Witzel to state on what basis he says that the layers that yielded horse bones in more than one site as at Mohenjodaro and Harappa were eroded and disturbed and the bones got mixed up? Does he want us to believe that in both the sites, the same layers yielding horse bones got mixed up in eroded layers? There are

three major excavations conducted at Mohenjodaro and Harappa namely by Marshal, Mackey and Mortimer Wheeler. Reports of excavations George F Dales, who was the last in the series to investigate the sites, published his findings "Some unpublished, forgotten or misinterpreted features on Mohenjodaro" in the book Harappan Civilisation, published by the American Institute of Indian Studies, 1982. He has stated that the reports of all the three great excavations including that of Wheeler are "incomplete and suffer from serious losses." Dales states that there is "no end to speculation that these claims have aroused but it is impossible to reach objective conclusions with the published details." It is not at all possible to assess that the layers were disturbed unless other factual evidences are shown to approve the disturbed conditions. Michael Witzel also states that conclusions cannot be arrived at with incomplete bones. Yes. However there cannot be two sets of standards in dealing with the matter. For example, he questions the views of Rajaram, but does not show whether R. Meadow, whose conclusions he supports, based his views on "a full skeleton or full sets of onager, donkey, or horse skeletons." Further it is known that there are very rare examples where the full skeletons of animals have been found in excavations. Are we not aware that most of the reconstructions of dinosaurs are based not on full skeletons? Archaeologists reconstruct several cultures with broken pottery. At one place he admits that clear examples of horse bones are found in Harappan civilisation after 1800 BCE, which still falls in the late Harappan period. Witzel has a dig at archaeologists that they are not zoologists or palaeontologists to comment on animal bones. This would apply equally to Witzel who is not a trained archaeologist to comment on this science. No archaeologist is expert in all fields but certainly consults experts before expressing his comments on which he has no expertise. Problems are complex To sum up Witzel's arguments proceed on the following lines: (1) No horse bone has been found in Harappan sites. (2) When pointed out that they are found in some instances, it is said they are only fragments and not full skeletons. (3) When pointed out they were found in more than one site it is said the layers in which they were found ought to have been eroded ones or disturbed. (4) When pointed out that the reports of horse bones were not by present day archaeologists but by the early pioneers it is said that those are dubious and decades old. (5) When pointed out they were reported by archaeological excavators then comes the argument that archaeologists are not trained zoologists and palaeontologists to comment on horse bones (though by the same argument no credence can be placed on Witzel's opinion as he is neither an archaeologist nor a palaeontologist). Such arguments are brought under reductio ad absurdum by logicians. More examples of wilful rejections of points can be cited throughout the article but suffice to say that for an unbiased reader, the whole article reads purely a personal attack on an individual writer and exhibits certain amount of impatience to listen to other view. This does not mean that I agree with either of the views on the Aryan problem except stating that we are yet not in a position to go with either of the views for lack of evidence and would prefer to wait for further discoveries.

The debate has undoubtedly focused on one aspect of Harappan civilisation: the problems are complex and the data available are inadequate to come to any conclusion. The vital question that is not in the debate by the general reader is that in the past 50 years of India's independence, the unproved inferential views of these scholars, some of which have been proved totally wrong as in the case of "the total massacre of the Harappans by the invading barbaric Aryans", are fully incorporated in our school textbooks, right from the third or fourth standards. Wheeler dramatised this theory vehemently that invading Aryans destroyed the Harappan civilisation and within ten years he was proved totally wrong by new finds of several Harappan sites spread in space and time. And yet millions of children of India have been indoctrinated and brainwashed with these views for the past five decades, and that has caused immense damage to scientific knowledge. Is there any one party in India today which will repent for this incalculable damage? Are we justified in continuing to brainwash our generations of children? Is it not time that we remove these from school books and confine such debates to post-graduate community of the country and our children are told only the factual history. A perusal of the books would show enormous imbalances in representing regional and dynastic histories. It may be seen, for example, that South Indian history receives inadequate representation. The rule of the Pallavas, Cholas or Chalukyas that lasted for over four hundred years each and had glorious achievements in all fields gets summary representation, when compared with Mughal rule and the Colonial rule that did not last even half that period. South India has witnessed exemplary democratic institutions at the village level for several centuries in the medieval period that is yet to be brought to the notice of the children. Surely there is no proportionate representation. While the Western history gets exalted position in all fields, the history of South East Asia like Indonesia, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam and even China does not even get a cursory mention. There is clearly an urgent need to jettison from the books the unproved statements on Indian civilisation and consign them to academic polemics, keep the power-mongering self-seeking Taliban politicians out of educational field, and seek a proportionate place for Indian civilisation in our textbooks. In fact Witzel has agreed to the need to revise Indian history in his earlier article, which should be entrusted to a body of unbiased and balanced academic body free from racial, religious or political bias. R. NAGASWAMY

Former Director of Archaeology, Tamil Nadu

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, May 21, 2002 Horses, logic and evidence MICHAEL WITZEL We can certainly agree to rewrite sections of ancient Indian history, but this has to be done on the basis of new facts, not of new myths or of incomplete archaeological or zoological data. It is the duty of scholars to point out such new myths before they enter the new textbooks.

The recent discussions (Open Page, January-March 2002) on the supposed total overlap, or rather, the incidental connections between the Harappan (Indus) Civilisation and the Vedic texts have been submerged by current political events. However, one grand claim follows another with regard to India's ancient past, and these are frequently supported by certain politicians. This ranges from the Gulf of Cambay finds (where one piece of wood, found in swift currents, is used to date the site to 7500 BCE!) to the usefulness of the study of astrology, now introduced at many universities. Most recently, the Ministry of Defence has approved a study of India's Machiavelli (Kautilya's Arthas'aastra, a multi-layered text of c. 300 BCE to 100 CE) for matters of conventional, biological and chemical warfare. In this intellectual climate it is not futile to add my notes of late March on the Harappan/Vedic question (see http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/witzel/Harveda.htm), now slightly updated. Rewriting craze This certainly is not the end of the important discussion of the current ethnocentric "rewriting" craze, a phenomenon that has begun already with the "reinterpretation" of Vedic texts by Dayanand Sarasvati in the 19th century (s'veta dhuuma `white smoke' = locomotive). Indeed, the phenomenon should be studied in much more detail, and also comparatively, by drawing in similar developments in other cultures, Asian (http://www.umass.edu/wsp/methodology/antiquity/index.html), or other. However, to conclude the interrupted discussion on imaginary Indus horses, I resubmit the following contribution. The vexed question of the `Harappan horse' does not seem to go away. I am glad to see that my last paper in Open Page (March 5, 2002) has elicited a strong reaction, this time (March 12) from a professional archaeologist, R. Nagaswamy, the former Director of Archaeology, Tamil Nadu. He has narrowed down the long debate about the Indus and Vedic civilisations to the question of horses in the archaeological record, about which more below. To begin with, Nagaswamy and I certainly agree about the need of `rewriting' ancient Indian history from time to time. This is a normal procedure in historiography when new data have been discovered that result in the need for new interpretations.

I also agree that this "should be entrusted to an unbiased and balanced academic body free from racial, religious or political bias" as well as to individual, well prepared scholars who can contribute their insights. Certainly, we can also agree that "South Indian history has received inadequate representation" so far. However, it will be difficult to "confine such debates to post-graduate community of the country and our children are told only the factual history." What is factual history? And how does one decide this? Obviously, interpretation of various types of data is involved here, and the results of such discussions printed in history books will be based on extensive debate and a certain amount of scholarly consensus. Interpretations We both would also agree that such interpretations should not be long discarded ones, e.g., those of M. Wheeler ("Indra stands accused" referring to the destruction of the Indus cities). However, they should also not be such as the recent fantasies of N.S. Rajaram (et al.), whose "decipherment" of the Indus script and all interpretations that flow from this are a priori wrong because he uses the wrong direction of the script, a direction that was securely established decades ago by the former Dir. Gen. of Archaeology, B.B. Lal (see I. Mahadevan, at the Indian History Congress, Dec. 2001, and in EJVS 8-1, http://users.primushost.com/india/ejvs/issues.html). "Digs" at the writings of persons such as Rajaram thus have their well-justified reasons. Especially so, as he had recently been appointed by the Minister of HRD as a member of the ICHR, a position he turned down after strong disapproval in the Indian press. Such appointments spell the end of scientific history writing and open the door to Raamraaj fantasies galore. Second, there is the vexed question of the "Harappan horse". Though merely being a philologist and something of a linguist, I have read the relevant scientific literature, and I have additionally asked some scientist colleagues, just to be 100 per cent sure. For my last piece in Open Page I consulted archaeologists and archaeozoologists, upon whose advice I have changed two or three sentences. I showed my piece, for example, to my colleague at Harvard, R. Meadow. He is both an archaeologist and an archaeozoologist (one who studies animal bones from archaeological sites). In addition, he happens to be a Director of the Harappa Archaeological Research Project, where he has been digging for more than a decade; he also knows first hand many other early sites, e.g., Mehrgarh and Pirak in Baluchistan. Amusingly, it is exactly the very sentence that the archaeologist Nagaswamy criticised that I changed based on input from the Harappan archaeologist R. Meadow, namely that horse bones are likely to have "found their way into deposits through erosion cutting and refilling, disturbing the archaeological layers." Nagaswamy complains that "neither does he say how he arrived at this conclusion nor has he cited any report in support of his view." Unfortunately my references for this were cut by editors; here are the details: R. Meadow in: The Review of Archaeology, 19, 1998, 12-21; R. Meadow in: D.R. Harris (ed.) The Origins and Spread of Agriculture and Pastoralism in Eurasia.1996, 390-41. UCL Press, London; R. Meadow and A. Patel in: South Asian Studies,13, 1997, 308-315. Here for Nagawamy then are the references to the still elusive "Harappan horse." If Nagaswamy had read such relevant technical literature himself he would have seen why the archaeozoological situation is as bad as I described it. But since he has

not, he perfectly exemplifies the case I made, namely that archaeologists do not necessarily know enough of archaeozoology, and their judgments thereof can be flawed. For example, the volume edited by G.M. Pande, The Dawn of Indian Civilisation (Delhi 1999) mentions many times just "horses," without any further specification of equid type or any discussion. But, this kind of statement is believed at face value, as I have seen, by both the general and scholarly public. Unfortunately Nagaswamy has also not checked the archaeological sources well enough. When he says that "there are three major excavations conducted at Mohenjodaro and Harappa namely by Marshal, Mackey and Mortimer Wheeler... George F. Dales, who was the last in the series to investigate the sites..." (1982), apart from contradicting himself within a few words, he simply overlooks decades of excavations at Harappa (and elsewhere!), excavations that have been reported in archaeological publications and even in a recent generally available synthesis by J. M. Kenoyer, Ancient Cities of the Indus Valley Civilisation, Oxford University Press 1998. All of this should perhaps not surprise. As far as I can see, R. Nagaswamy has proficiently published on Tamil literature, culture, and archaeology, including even one excavation report (about Vasavasamudram), written together with Abdul Masjeed in 1978. This lacuna may be the reason why he resorts to a discussion of "logic" instead. However, the evaluation of archaeological/archaeozoological detail cannot be reduced to "logic" by comparing various sentences from my paper, as he does: "Such arguments are brought under reductio ad absurdum by logicians". Instead, to state it clearly one more time: what we need is absolute security (to the degree scientifically possible) with regard to identification of the bones themselves, radiocarbon dates directly on the bones in question, and a detailed understanding of the archaeological context from which they come. It is evidence that counts, not a "logic game". Nagaswamy even distils from my paper that "it only shows that horse bones were actually found in the excavations at Harappan sites." But, this is precisely what was and still is under discussion! Even if we accept the identifications as true horse of material from the old excavations (and this still needs to be rechecked by specialists using the original material), we lack the other two pieces of information context and direct date that are necessary to securely interpret the cultural meaning of those identifications. Context and stratification As scholars know, archaeology just as palaeontology (or linguistics) is all about location, context, and stratification. An isolated horse skeleton, complete or not, just shows that a horse was present in that location at some time in the past. As an example, a nearly complete camel bone (humerus) was found at Harappa about a metre below the surface together with artifactual remains that could be assigned by archaeologists to the last part of the "mature" Harappan period (ca. 2200-1900 BC). A direct radiocarbon date on the bone itself, however, came out to be 690 CE, more than two thousand years later (Meadow 1996 & 1998): a clear case of a deposit effected "through erosion cutting and refilling." If, in addition, that find is not recorded in detail and actually reported in print (a common lack in Indian archaeology of the past few decades, as recently bemoaned by officials and in the press a few weeks ago) it is almost worthless just as in linguistics a modern

Sanskrit word like kendra "centre" could go back to a formation based on the modern English `centre' or could be derived from a Greek word (kentron), which is the case, as it is already attested by Varahamihira at 550 CE. The levels are clear here. But bones from old and not well recorded excavations (Nagaswamy himself quotes some doubts in Dales' review of Indus excavations!), bones that in addition have not been radiocarbon dated and may not have been correctly identified through comparison with modern specimens, just do not provide suitable evidence. The alleged find of a horse or camel bone at Harappa without details of the identification, the context, and a direct date then is open to question: yesterday's Afghan or Sikh sipahi's half-horse can be turned into tomorrow's full Harappan horse... In sum, in the sciences we cannot work with data that do not conform to strict procedures and methods, such as those delineated above. Third, as for the discussion of various equids (true horse, ass, half-ass/onager), Nagaswamy complains that I do "not show whether R. Meadow ... based his views on a full skeleton or full sets of onager, donkey, or horse skeletons." Again Meadow (and I, quoting him) has explained fully in his 1996-1998 papers why such detailed comparison is necessary, and that good collections of modern specimens, necessary to compare such finds, are only just now being established in South Asia itself. Fourth, when true horses are indeed found, finally, in the Kachi Plain of East Baluchistan (part of the Indus Valley) at c. 1800 BCE, this does not make them Harappan, as Nagaswamy maintains: "...1800 BCE, which still falls in the late Harappan period". A study of the Pirak data would show that these sites are postmature-Harappan and have a very different material culture inventory than the earlier Harappan sites in the same area. To lump all cultures from 3500 to 1500 BCE together as "Harappan" (or even as "Sarasvati" well before its actual first naming in Sanskrit!) is not correct, and opens the door to all sorts of unscholarly rewritings of ancient history, in other words, to new myth making. In sum, in my recent Open Page article, I intentionally preferred to err on the side of caution: Advised by specialists, I specified the conditions that are necessary to identify horses, and I did not simply follow the conclusions of various writers as to the nature of one set of bones or the other. To repeat it one final time: we need the bones in contention (1) to come from well stratified deposits the formation of which is understood, (2) to be carefully identified with the reasons for their identification published in detail, and (3) to be directly radiocarbon dated if possible. At the present time, these conditions have not been met well, and all conclusions must be explicitly preliminary or else they can only be called speculative or misleading. If this stance is called "taking a partisan view", then I may gladly be called partisan. This certainly is better than to find, with Rajaram et al., horses (or "fire altars") all over the early subcontinent (see Frontline, Oct./Nov. 2000). Such writers see horses everywhere. To sum it up once more, we can certainly agree to rewrite sections of ancient Indian history, but this has to be done on the basis of new facts, not of new myths or of incomplete archaeological or zoological data. It is the duty of scholars to point out such new myths before they enter the new textbooks. MICHAEL WITZEL (assisted by Richard Meadow) Harvard University

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Jun 18, 2002 Vedic literature and the Gulf of Cambay discovery It is sad to note how intellectuals in India are quick to denigrate the extent and antiquity of their history, even when geological evidence like the Sarasvati River or archaeological evidence like the Harappan and Cambay sites are so clear.

THE RECENT find of a submerged city in the Gulf of Cambay, perhaps as old as 7500 BC, serves to highlight the existence of southern sources for the civilisation of ancient India. The Gulf of Cambay find is only the latest in a series that includes Lothal (S.R. Rao), Dholavira (R.S. Bisht) and others in Gujarat. These discoveries have been pushing the seats of ancient Indian civilisation deeper into the southern peninsula. We should not be surprised if more such sites are discovered in South India, especially the coastal regions, for the south has always played a significant if neglected role in ancient India going back to Vedic times. I have argued for such a coastal origin for Vedic civilisation in my recent book Rig Veda and the History of India. This is largely because of the oceanic character of Vedic symbolism in which all the main Rig Vedic Gods as well as many of the Vedic rishis have close connections with samudra or the sea. In fact, the image of the ocean pervades the whole of the Rig Veda. Unfortunately many scholars who put forth opinions on ancient India seldom bother to study the Vedas in the original Sanskrit and few know the language well enough to do so. The result is that their interpretation of Vedic literature is often erroneous, trusting out of date and inaccurate interpretations from the Nineteenth century like the idea that the Vedic people never new the sea! Literary evidence The Rig Veda states that "All the hymns praise Indra who is as expansive as the sea" (RV I.11.1) Agni wears the ocean as his vesture (RV VIII 102.4-6). The Sun is called the ocean (RV V.47.3). Soma is called the first ocean (RV IX.86.29). Varuna specifically is a God of the sea (RV I.161.14). These are just a few examples of out of well over a hundred references to samudra in the Rig Veda alone, including references to oceans as two, four or many (RV VI.50.13). This is obviously the poetry of a people intimately associated with the sea and not of any nomads from land-locked Central Asia or Eurasia. Vedic seer families like the Bhrigus are descendants of Varuna, the God of the sea as the first Bhrigu is called Bhrigu Varuni Bhrigu, the son of Varuna. The teachings of Varuna to Bhrigu are found in the Taittiriya Upanishad and Taittiriya tradition of the Yajur Veda, which has long been most popular in South India. The recent find at sea in the Gulf of Cambay is near Baroach or Bhrigu-kachchha, the famous ancient city of the very same Bhrigus. These oceanic connections extend to other important Vedic rishis as well. In the Rig Veda, Agastya, who became the main rishi of South India, has twenty-five hymns in

the first book of the Rig Veda and is mentioned in the other books as well. He is the elder brother of Vasishta who himself has the largest number of hymns in the text (about a hundred), those of the seventh book. Both rishis are said to have been born in a pot or kumbha, which may be a vessel or ship (RV VII.33.10-13). Vasishta is specifically connected to Varuna who was said to travel on a ship in the sea (RV VII.88.4-5). Both Vasishta and Agastya are descendants of Mitra and Varuna, the God of the sea. Vishvamitra in the Rig Veda (IIII.53.16) mentions the sage Pulasti, who was regarded as the progenitor of Ravana and Kubera and whose city, Pulasti-Pura was located in ancient Sri Lanka. He is mentioned along with Jamadagni, another common Rig Vedic sage and the father of Parshurama, the sixth incarnation of Lord Vishnu, before Rama and Krishna, whose main sphere of activity was in the south of India. Manu himself, the Vedic primal sage and king, is a flood figure and the Angirasas, the other main seer family apart from the Bhrigus, join him in his ship according to Puranic mythology. Southern peoples like the Yadus and Turvashas were said to have been glorified by Indra (RV X.49.8) and are mentioned a number of times in the Rig Veda as great Vedic peoples. So we have ample ancient literary evidence for the Vedic seer and royal families as connected with the ocean and southern regions. The Cambay site is in the ancient delta of the now dry Sarasvati River, one branch of which flowed into the Gulf of Cambay, showing that this site was part of the greater Sarasvati region and culture, which was the main location for Harappan cities in the 3300-1900 BCE period. Such an ocean front was important for maritime trade for the inland regions to the north. In this regard, important Vedic kings like Sudas were said to receive tribute from the sea (RV I.47.6). When the Greeks under Alexander came to India in the Fourth century BCE, the Greek writer Megasthenes in his Indika, fragments of which are recorded in several Greek writings, mentioned that the Indians (Hindus) had a record of 153 kings going back over 6400 years (showing that the Hindus were conscious of the great antiquity of their culture even then). This would yield a date that now amounts to 6700 BCE, a date that might be reflected in the Gulf of Cambay site which has been tentatively dated to 7500 BCE. So the old Vedic-Puranic king lists may not be that far off after all! Material evidence A few scholars, like Witzel in the United States in spite of such massive evidence as the Sarasvati River and its intimate connection to Vedic literature still try to separate Vedic culture from India and attribute it to a largely illiterate and nomadic culture that migrated into India from the northwest of the country in the postHarappan period (after 1500 BCE). Ignoring all other evidence that connects the Vedic and Harappan, they point out the importance of the horse in the Rig Veda and argue that not enough evidence of horses has been found in Harappan sites to prove a Vedic connection. They fall back upon this one shot argument to ignore any other evidence to the contrary. However, one should note that these invasionists or migrationists are even more deficient in horse evidence to prove their own theory. There is no trail of horse bones

or horse encampments into ancient India from Afghanistan during the 1500-1000 BCE period that is required for their theory of Aryan intrusion. In fact, there is no solid evidence for such a movement of peoples at all in the form of camps, skeletal remains or anything else. Those who claim that Vedic culture must have originated outside India because of its lauding of the horse are even more lacking in horse evidence. The real problem is not `no horse at Harappa' but `no horse evidence, in fact no real evidence of any kind, to prove any Aryan migration/invasion'. It has been convincingly shown that what the Rig Veda with its seventeen-ribbed horse (RV I.162.18) describes is a native Indian breed and not any Central Asian or Eurasian horse that has eighteen ribs. The Rig Veda mentions many Indian animals like the water buffalo (Mahisha), which is said to be the main animal sacred to Soma (RV IX.96.6), which does occur commonly on Harappan seals. The humped Brahma bull (Vrisha, Vrishabha), another common Harappan depiction, is the main animal of Indra, the foremost of the Vedic Gods. Elephants are also mentioned. Most of the animals depicted on Harappan seals are mythical, not zoological specimens anyway. Most common is a one-horned animal that is reflected in the one-horned boar or Varaha of the Mahabharata and the boar incarnation of Lord Vishnu. Many other Harappan depictions are of animals with multiple heads or halfanimal/half-human figures. This is similar to the depictions in Vedic imagery which largely consist of mythical animals of this type. For example, Harappan seals portray a three-headed bull-like animal. Such an animal is described in the Rig Veda (III.56.6). A smokescreen The horse issue is meant as a smokescreen to avoid facing the facts of the Sarasvati River and the many new archaeological sites in India. These show no such break in the continuity of civilisation in the region as an Aryan invasion/migration requires, including the existence of fire altars and fire worship from the early Harappan period. Vedic and Puranic literature itself records the shift of the centre of culture from the Sarasvati to the Ganga at the end of the Vedic period, referring to the drying up of the river. Scholars like Witzel would have the Vedic people coming into India after the Sarasvati was already gone and yet making the river their ancestral homeland and most sacred region! Vedic literature is the largest preserved from the ancient world, dwarfing in size anything left by other cultures like Egypt, Greece or Babylonia. The HarappanSarasvati urban civilisation of India was by far the largest of its time (3100-1900 BCE) in the ancient world spreading from Punjab to Kachchh. We can no longer separate this great literature and this great civilisation, particularly given that both were based on the Sarasvati River, whose authenticity as a historical river before 1900 BCE has been confirmed by numerous geological studies. This great Vedic literature requires a great urban culture to explain it, just as the great Harappan urban culture requires a literature to explain it. Both come from the same region and cannot be separated.

Finally it is sad to note how intellectuals in India are quick to denigrate the extent and antiquity of their history, even when geological evidence like the Sarasvati River or archaeological evidence like the Harappan and Cambay sites are so clear. However one may interpret these, the truth that civilisation in India was quite ancient and profound cannot be ignored. I don't think there is any other nation on earth that would be so negative if such ancient glories were found in their lands. DAVID FRAWLEY

The Hindu Open Page MICHAEL WITZEL Tuesday, Jun 25, 2002

A maritime Rigveda? How not to read ancient texts To impute modern/medieval meanings when reading the Rigveda is a dangerous undertaking as it is with all archaic texts, from Homer to the Bible to Confucius. Even Shakespeare, who wrote a mere 400 years ago, is not always immediately accessible to readers of modern English. In last week's Open Page, David Frawley or, as he likes to refer to himself, Pandit Vamadeva Shastri, who makes part of his living teaching "Vedic astrology" and providing private "astrological consultations, mainly along medical or spiritual lines" (http://www.vedanet.com/consultations.htm, http://www.vedicsoftware.com/training.htm), once more tried to establish the hoary antiquity and continuity of Indian civilisation from early post-glacial times onwards. He tried to forge a link between the supposed cities at Cambay at 7500 BCE, the Indus Civilisation (2600-1900 BCE) and the Vedic texts. It is unscientific and can easily be falsified on the basis of the available evidence (and with the help of Occam's razor). Though virtually every other sentence in last week's write-up is demonstrably wrong, not all items can be discussed here in detail, and I will have to restrict myself to the main points. Bad philology Frawley complains that "many scholars who put forth opinions on ancient India seldom bother to study the Vedas in the original Sanskrit and few know the language well enough to do so." However, sure as he is of his own understanding of the Rigveda (RV), this is an amateurish, naive reading of the text, to say the least. His interpretations insert later meanings into this highly archaic and highly poetical text. Frawley's `innovative' thesis of a maritime nature of Vedic culture is diametrically

opposed to the commonly held opinion of historians and philologists alike, of a landlocked Rigveda, composed in the Greater Panjab. A key point is Frawley's understanding of the word samudra as `ocean'. This translation may be natural to a modern or medieval reader, but it does not take into account the linguistic, philological and mythological investigations of the term that have been carried out at great length for some 150 years. Frawley is unaware of, or unwilling to access this discussion, from C. Lassen (1847) to H. Lueders (1951-59) and to K. Klaus. Importantly, the last survey and summary by K. Klaus (1985, 1986, 1989) was written when this scholar still was unaware of and not biased by the then intensifying discussion in India about the Sarasvati river. In the Rigveda (and later on, in the Vedic texts at large), we have to distinguish at least three different types of samudra: 1. The "confluence of rivers" from sam `together' + udra, from the old r/n stem seen in English water, Old Norse watn, Greek hudoor, Sanskrit udan-, udr- (cf. udra `water animal, otter'). Such a confluence can be that of the Panjab rivers (as seen in most passages of the RV), a large lake such as the terminal lakes in the desert, and at least theoretically also the ocean. 2. Indeed, it is the mythical ocean at the end of the world that is meant a few times. This idea is not unusual as even landlocked people have the idea that the world is surrounded, as in the Puranas, by an ocean. This is also seen in the Iranian hendu (Avesta, Yasna 57.29 = Skt. sindhu!) situated at the two ends of the world (Witzel 1984), on the oldest Mesopotamian map, or in the Greek circular ookeanos of Homer. The Muni (RV 10.136.5) dwells "on the eastern and western ocean." But the RV also has four oceans (RV 9.33.6, 10.47.2), and the Atharvaveda has a `northern, upper' one (11.2.25). What might it this be in India: G. Tilak's Polar Sea, the home of his Aryans? Rather, it is the `upper', heavenly ocean at night (see below). We also find, just as in Mesopotamia and elsewhere, a mythical (salty) ocean at the time of creation, RV 10.190 1 sqq. 3. The heavenly "ocean" is seen at RV 6.58.3 with `golden boats in the sea, in the Antariksha'; it is also called a heavenly `pond' (saras) in a Yajurveda Samhita Brahmodya. Many stories in the RV take place in the night time sky, notably that of Varuna's ship, or the voyage of Bhujyu (Oettinger 1988). All of this should have been well known since Lueders (1951-59) and Kuiper (summarised in 1983). If we try to find a real, terrestrial ocean, that is the Arabian Sea or the Bay of Bengal, this may be possible only in a few passages, all discussed by Klaus (1986-9). Importantly, had the Rigvedic poets personally known the ocean and the long range maritime trade that Frawley desperately wants to discover, they should have mentioned, at least in passing, such typical features of the ocean as its salinity or its tides. We do not hear of it. Further, the Rigvedic poetic diction concerning the samudra is exactly the same as that used for the rivers: swelling, spreading, growing (at snow melt in spring). Even in post-RV texts (Katha 17.17, Maitrayani 2.10.1, Vajasaneyi Samhita 17.4) it is a sweet water plant, Blyxa actandra (avakaa), that is connected with the samudra: "we cover you, Agni, with the avakaa (plant) of the samudra"!

In sum, in the personal experience of the Rigvedic poets we can find only the confluence of the Panjab rivers, the mythical or "night time" ocean, but apparently not the Arabian Sea or the very distant Bay of Bengal. To impute modern/medieval meanings when reading the RV therefore is a dangerous undertaking as it is with all archaic texts, from Homer to the Bible to Confucius. Even Shakespeare, who wrote a mere 400 years ago, is not always immediately accessible to readers of modern English. Frawley's discussion represents a simplistic approach to myth and mythology. Very briefly, god Varuna is not just the lord of the ocean, as he is now, but in the RV he is, much more importantly, the chief (raajan) of the Adityas, the group gods reinforcing Law and Order (Rta, later on called Dharma). Therefore it does not matter at all that the RV sage Bhrigu supposedly is a descendent of the "sea god" Varuna, or that certain rishis like Vasistha have been born from a pot which is a long way from a ship! Or, Manu's flood myth is widely spread, not just in Mesopotamia and the Bible, but in a large area from the African Sahel belt to Hawaii(!) and the Amazon. There is nothing typically Rigvedic about all of this. Incidentally, he does not even get his history of Vedic S'aakhaas right: the Taittiriyas may have been South Indian at least since Gupta times, but their Samhita and Brahmana texts clearly point to their homeland in U.P. (Witzel 1987). There also is obvious misinformation in his Open Page article, e.g. when "kings like Sudas were said to receive tribute from the sea (RV I.47.6)." The hymn does not contain any such thing; instead the Ashvin deities are asked to bring "us" riches from the samudra or heaven(!) Or, that "Harappan seals portray a three-headed bull-like animal. Such an animal is described in the Rig Veda (III.56.6)" Frawley probably meant verse 3, not 6. But, the whole hymn plays on the number `3' and there is nothing special to the bull in verse 3, with 3 heads, 3 udders(!!), and 3 (not 4!) stomachs. Antiquity frenzy Be that as it may, Frawley's elaborations in the last Open Page are, as is more and more commonly seen now, due to the increasing zeal to prove the hoary age and "continuity" of Indian civilisation ever since the Ice Age. In this kind of antiquity frenzy (see http://www.umass.edu/wsp/methodology/antiquity/index.html), even a little fudging is welcome, for example in the case of the Cambay finds. It has been pointed out by competent scholars and lay persons from the very beginning that a dredged piece of wood carbondated to c. 7500 BCE, amusingly one found in an area with strong currents, does not make for proof of a contemporary "city" whose outlines are supposed to be seen on some sonar pictures. Having secured this unique piece of "evidence," Frawley connects it straightaway with the "Harappan cities in 3300-1900 BCE" conveniently forgetting that at 3300 BCE Harappa was just a village and that planned settlement with a grid network of streets began only by 2600 BCE. Similarly shaky is another piece of early "evidence", that of Megasthenes, the Greek ambassador to the Maurya court (c. 300 BCE). He tells us that 153 Indian kings go back to c. 6700 BCE, thus, with Frawley, right back to a date "reflected in the Gulf of Cambay site." Ancient `kings' of what? Of Neolithic villages? Secondly, all such

dynastic schemes are built, in India, on the principle of putting one dynastic list before another, even if these `royal' houses reigned as contemporaries (Witzel 1990). The application of the method could still be seen in process in the Rajatarangini of Kashmir, in M.A. Stein's time, a mere hundred years ago! Just as his philological expertise, Frawley's historical acumen is seriously lacking. Yet, he has other arrows in his quiver, "material evidence", thus "hard core" natural science. That should convince us! Alas, his use of "material evidence" suffers from the same type of shortcomings, notably, a lack of scientific background reading and from misreporting. For example, I have never advocated "to separate Vedic culture from India" but I have described (also above!) the RV as an already genuine South Asian text of the Greater Panjab, even if its Indo-Iranian antecedents lie outside the subcontinent (but so does the Greek poetry of Homer, that is outside of Greece). I also do not subscribe to a "one shot argument" (note the Wild West terminology!) about missing Indus horses, "that not enough evidence of horses has been found in Harappan sites to prove a Vedic connection..." and I do not "ignore any other evidence to the contrary." There is, instead, a host of other evidence, from the lack in the Rigveda of Harappan style big cities, large buildings, great baths, ocean going ships, long distance trade, to a completely differing spiritual world (deities, myths, rituals). As for the ever-elusive Harappan horse, Frawley believes that the "Rig Veda with its seventeen-ribbed horse (RV I.162.18) describes ... a native Indian breed and not any Central Asian or Eurasian horse that has eighteen ribs." Again, had he read the literature or even the Open Page this year, he would have seen that the number of ribs and lumbar vertebrae is not a genetic feature but a variable trait in horses, as duly pointed out by me here between January and April. Incidentally, this is an interesting case. Over the past two years I have watched, with some amusement, how "Vedic Harappan" enthusiasts have convinced themselves on various email lists about this "native Indian horse with 17 ribs" without any scientific study quoted; by now, it is part and parcel of "Sarasvati folklore" and Harappan "urban myth" but it is not found in zoological handbooks. It also is simply not true, as Frawley alleges, that there is "no trail of horse bones or horse encampments ... during the 1500-1000 BCE period," through Afghanistan/E. Iran, of the speakers of Indo-Aryan (Vedic). What about the finds of horses and horse implements exactly on the right track down from the steppes, at Pirak in E. Baluchistan (c. 1800 BCE) and in the Gandhara Grave Culture around 1400 BCE? Even though the area between E. Iran (Khorasan) and the Panjab plains is largely archaeologically unexplored for the mid-second millennium BCE, we already have the clearly intrusive Pirak and Gandhara cultures. (Steppe influence is also seen in the Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex). In addition, the study of male genes (Y chromosome) is now beginning to detail the ancient movements of groups and tribes. Further, comparative linguistics is beginning to provide a layer of loan words, found both in Old Iranian and Vedic, that have been taken over from the Bactria Margiana Archaeological Complex (2400-1600 BCE), that is before their respective movement into Iran and the Greater Panjab (Witzel 1995, 1999). Therefore, instead of Frawley's supposed "smokescreen" of Indologists and historians denying to accept his supposed "no such break in the continuity" between the Indus and the Vedic cultures, his (pseudo-Vedic) Harappan "fire altars", the "shift of the centre of culture from the Sarasvati to the Ganga at the end of Vedic period," all

these developments have their own explanations. This would need further discussion that cannot be given here in detail (but has been supplied already a year ago in EJVS 7-3, see http://users.primushost.com/india/ejvs/issues.html, a criticism that has not been dislodged by Frawley et al.). Frawley further alleges: "Witzel would have the Vedic people coming into India after the Sarasvati was already gone and yet making the river their ancestral homeland and most sacred region!" This is, of course, not at all what I have written: the Rigvedic homeland of the Indo-Aryans was the Greater Panjab (Witzel 1995), and only post-Rigvedic economic, social and political processes in the emerging Kuru Realm were at the root of the shift of the Vedic "centre" to the Kuruksetra area, on the eastern outskirts of the Rigvedic Panjab (see Witzel 1997, further details in a book forthcoming in India). Frawley has not studied, or indeed read, about the complex forces at work during this foundational period of Indian civilisation that set the framework for most social and religious formations to come, often until today (Witzel, EJVS 1-4, 1995, EJVS 5-1, 1999) Frawley's `vision' In the end, Frawley simply repeats his Mantra (mildly contradicting his own current fascination with a southern, oceanic Rigveda) that "We can no longer separate this great literature and this great civilisation, particularly given that both were based on the Sarasvati River" ... "Vedic literature requires a great urban culture to explain it, just as the great Harappan urban culture requires a literature to explain it." This "vision" is plainly impossible: geographically there may be a degree of overlap, but it is one set apart by centuries of intervening cultural developments; and there is comparatively little overlap as far as the nature of the material and spiritual cultures of both civilisations are involved. (No one denies that certain Indus elements, particularly on the village and folk level, continue during the Vedic period). However, in spite of some recent creative, but not philologically informed, writing to the contrary (such as seen in G.C. Pande, ed., The Dawn of Indian Civilisation, 1999), nothing in the Vedic texts indicates the Harappan urban culture reflected in archaeology. Just because the Indus Civilisation lacks large written texts (as seen in the Near Eastern, Chinese or the Maya cultures) this does not require this gap be filled by the next best texts, those of the Veda. Instead, the archaeological, literary and linguistic facts have to be accepted, even if they are not pleasant for one's fantasies of great post-glacial cities and the cradle of world civilisation in the Gangetic basin. Thus, there is no need to lament with D. Frawley/Pt. Vamadeva Sastri: "It is sad to note how intellectuals in India are quick to denigrate the extent and antiquity of their history... I don't think there is any other nation on earth that would be so negative if such ancient glories were found in their lands." He again overlooks another important trait in Indian civilisation, present since the Rigvedic Brahmodya type discussions, that is a consistent spirit of inquiry and debate (vivaada). No one is convinced, as the constant back and forth on this very Open Page shows, by a monolateral and monolithic "vision" of an elusive Golden Age that is now increasingly imposed on schools and universities. My publications referred to above can be found at: http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/witzel/mwpage.htm. MICHAEL WITZEL , Harvard University

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Jul 02, 2002 From Harappan horse to camel Those who put a break to rewrite history in some form or other are thoughtless and object even before the rewriting is begun. Let the rewriting be entrusted to impartial, competent scholars urgently and let the books come out and if there are errors in the writings or wilful distortions there are enough intellectuals in India who can stand up boldly and demand their removal. IT IS interesting to read the response of Michael Witzel, Harvard University, to my article on Harappan horse, published in The Hindu (May 21, 2002) and I am glad to note that he agrees with many points raised by me, but some of the basic issues still remain. The main thrust of Witzel's argument was that no horse is represented either in seals or as bones in Harappan sites, and that the horse played a vital role in Vedic society, and hence the Harappan civilisation cannot be a Vedic society. The other important point he raises is the linguistic evidence and argues that acceptable evidence is not found for conceding the Vedic claim. Ignoring the language he employs to ridicule his opponents, there is a need for the protagonists of Vedic school to meet the points raised by him. Carbon dating bones While we are on the Harappan horse, he cites the example of a camel found in a Harappan site, dated to 2200-1900 BC by the earlier excavators, which now has been dated directly by Carbon 14 method to 690 BC, showing the earlier claim was wrong. When such scientific evidences are found there should be no hesitation in accepting the new evidence and discarding the earlier view. Regarding the question of dating bones by Carbon 14, I consulted my friend Dr. Paul Craddock, a leading scientist of the British Museum Laboratory, (who incidentally appeared as an expert witness in the London Nataraja case on behalf of India) who gives the latest position as follows: "In many ways the dating of bone is now preferred to the dating of wood or charcoal, and is carried out quite routinely. This is because in most circumstances a bone found in an archaeological deposit, be it burial or hidden, will have been alive recently before its deposition and thus the date of the death of the bone will be fairly close to the date of deposition. With charcoal, the situation is often very different and there is no way of telling whether it came from the outer parts of a short lived tree or was laid down in the centre of some hardwood, centuries before the tree was felled and utilised. If the charcoal derives from the timbers of a burning building the timbers could have been in place for centuries or could have been part of a repair done the week before. The intrinsic error on carbon dates of bones is no different from any other material containing carbon and is the result of sample size and the actual practicalities of the method. Similarly the calibration of the date obtained from radiocarbon years to calendar years is exactly the same. As I explained above the relation between the time of death for the bone and the time of its deposition in most cases will be relatively short, making bone a good material for dating. "As I am sure, you know, bone consists of two main components, the largely inorganic apatite and collagen. The apatite attracts calcium carbonate from ground

waters and is thus not suitable for dating, but can be easily separated by acid dissolution from the collagen. The latter is made up of proteins, and should be suitable for dating. There is, however some danger that the protein will have suffered from bacteriological attack, which would affect the date obtained. This could be detected by carrying out amino acid profiling; the various amino acids are affected by bacteria attack differently. Also one could separate and date one particular amino acid, using the accelerator mass spectrometry method, which only requires a tiny sample (AMS dating is rapidly taking over from conventional counting methods all over the world). However, amino acid separation is slow and costly, and for most bone samples is not necessary (only really if one is dealing with Palaeolithic bones over 10,000 years old)." C14 dating deserves to be given credence. Yet to be rechecked However regarding the earlier find of horse bones by early archaeologists, Witzel says that "Remains of horses claimed by early archaeologists in the 1930s were not documented well enough, to let us distinguish between horses, hemiones, or asses." (Frontline, October 13, 2000, P. 7). But this seems to be contradicted by his own statement "Even if we accept the identifications as true horse material from the old excavations and this still needs to be rechecked by the specialists using original material ... " (The Hindu, May 21). It clearly shows that original material has not yet been rechecked by a specialist till date, and it would be appropriate not to come to any conclusion at this stage in support of either claim, rather than assert as what Witzel claims. The scientific evidence is yet to come and it would be necessary to wait for the same. Colonial writers Witzel insists on vehemently attacking the present political climate and rulers responsible for the revisionist history writings in India, and their Hindutva leanings and in this he exhibits his political intention. This seems irrelevant to academic interest, and exposes himself to possible, similar counter allegation, but we would like to keep our esteem for the Harvard University as a symbol of academic greatness and not politics. As he is a good academician he could avoid such an approach for, after all history writing in India is a legacy inherited from the British colonial writers who dinned into our ears, for nearly one hundred and more years, from 1850 to almost 1950 (even two decades after Independence) how to project the political rule as the summum bonum of virtuosity. They made us read about the glory of England, all the British Governors-General, the Lord Governors and collectors like Lord Duffrin, Lord Hardinge, and such others, whose presence was of utter inconsequence, but as the greatest event in our history. This writer himself studied in the 1940s in the secondary schools, the history of the British political rulers as the glory of India. Three fourths of our history books were filled then with the greatness of colonial powers and most of the other parts filled with Mughal contribution with very little of Indian life. Not a single liberal voice was raised about this trend at any point of time then. Some shrewd historians exploited this trend after Independence, rewrote history to bolster the political leaning of the rulers and fully cornered the favours. They did nothing to remove the imbalance in the presentation of the regional histories, instead wrote hypothetical theories. These political favours did not change till the late 1990s when a different political ideology took over the reins of power and the new one has applied a break to the "old

shattered, rattling goods train" and attempted to change the track. The track however continues. Ethnic craze is imported Witzel also bemoans the "ethinic centred craze" for rewriting history. This is also not especially Indian, and is only a copy of, or reaction to the Euro centred Western university tradition. Just a few days back, a professor of a British university came out with an academic theory, calling it a (pseudo) psychological analysis, that the "White race is superior to the black race and that there is nothing wrong in claiming racism as natural and multi-culturalism is wicked madness." This theory, propounded by Prof. Geoffrey Sampson, who incidentally belonged to the Tory party, claims right to voice such an obnoxious theory under the guise of academic freedom and the university pleads helpless. Witzel emphasises the importance of linguistic science that certainly cannot be questioned by any. There are two claimants to the Indus language, the Vedic and the Dravidian. The protagonists of Dravidian language spearheaded by Dr. Asko Parpola and Iravatham Mahadevan argue the language of the Harappans is Dravidian, though they differ among themselves on each other's readings. Witzel seems to be in agreement with Parpola. How confident or conclusive are the Dravidian linguists about their theories may be seen from the following. Asko Parpola, who came out with the theory, later discarded it so much so when asked about his first approach, he himself says that "he has given up the earlier reports as they were written in the first flush of enthusiasm, premature and incautious." This Mahadevan calls "rare intellectual courage" to abandon the paradigm central to the earlier model of decipherment and is virtually a new beginning. Reviewing Asko Parpola's present hypothesis Mahadevan says "his (Parpola's) decipherment based on the hypothesis has not been taken seriously, because of his lack of familiarity with the Dravidian languages and linguistics." (http/ harappa.com/script/maha0.html) That dismisses the leading authority on Dravidian hypothesis for Indus culture in the world. The only other leading Dravidian expert on Indus script is Mahadevan himself. We may see how his following views are relevant in this connection. "In my earlier papers (1970, 72 and 73) I had proceeded on the assumption that the frequent terminal signs of the Indus script probably represented grammatical suffixes and their values could be ascertained through the method of homophones. The concordance does not bear this theory. I am now inclined to the view that the frequent terminal signs were most probably employed in an ideographic sense." Mahadevan concludes, "his method is speculative?" Speculative theories Thus both these Dravidian protagonists keep changing their own methods frequently and float speculative theories. The one vital question that is not addressed by them is that how the Dravidian linguistic theory based on prevalent languages could be applied to a civilisation that lived 4500 years ago. It is known that the earliest language among the Dravidian group of languages is Tamil that has an impressive corpus of literary works that could be dated at the most not earlier than first century BC. The recent numismatic discoveries and archaeological findings have brought the date of the early Tamil literature rather close, based on Roman contacts. None of the early written records like Tamil (Brahmi) inscriptions found so far, could be dated

earlier than 2nd century BC. The latter already shows impressive and indisputable mixture of Prakrit language integrated into Tamil. That leaves hardly two or three Tamil words, like Chola, Pandya, found in the Asokan inscriptions that could be securely dated to 3rd century BC. One should not forget that we are looking for indisputable evidence as in the case of Harappan horse, and so what and where is the Dravidian language? What is its structure and how much of it is chronologically dated to even 500 BC, (granting a few centuries for the development of Tamil language, and its classical structure) not to speak of 1000 BC or the beginning of the Harappan age 3000 BC? Which of the Dravidian language, Central Dravidian, or North Dravidian group, is dated securely to have existed in pre-Christian era? Whether the date of the Brahui language found in Baluchistan, said to belong to the Dravidian language group, is dated scientifically with the help of dated inscriptions or artefacts? The existence of Dravidian language before say 3rd-4th centuries BC is purely based on conjectural inference. How a language, the existence of which is not known by any verifiable means for over three thousand years except in hypothesis, could be accepted as the language of Harappans? It is clear that the rejection of Dravidian theory is far more logical than the absence of Harappan horse, for one cannot have two standards for evaluating evidence. The conflicting writings on Harappan horse and Vedic or Dravidian speculation are so voluminous and the issues are so complex that there is need to continue the dialogue, but not include them in school textbooks. When I suggested earlier that only factual history should be given in school textbooks, I clearly meant that the points like the presence of horse, the Vedic or non-Vedic, Dravidian or non-Dravidian nature of Harappans, the invasion theory of Aryans are all speculative and not factually proven history and there is no need to include them in our textbooks and brainwash our children either way. Imbalances I would like to end this with the note that Witzel agrees with me that there are imbalances in the present textbooks and there is a need to rewrite Indian history books. The Harappan and Vedic phases are only parts of the long Indian history and there are several other important gaps in the other parts, in the presentation of regional history and the great contribution of India to the whole of South East Asia in every field of activity like history, philosophy, writing, art, administration, religion, philosophy, architecture and the way of life, for over one thousand four hundred years and where it survives even to this day in some form, but has remained blacked out to our children all these years which need to be incorporated immediately. Those who put a break to rewrite history in some form or other are thoughtless and object even before the rewriting is begun. Let the rewriting be entrusted to impartial, competent scholars urgently and let the books come out and if there are errors in the writings or wilful distortions there are enough intellectuals in India who can stand up boldly and demand their removal. There exists a vibrant democracy and alert media that can take care of corrections. What eludes one's comprehension is that even before the exercise has begun every attempt is made to obstruct this legitimate process. One thing may be lastly mentioned that the errors or distortions likely to creep in in rewriting history are not going to be as damaging to scientific knowledge as those of the past 150 years of colonial writing. R. NAGASWAMY , Former Director of Archaeology

The Hindu Tuesday, Jul 09, 2002 Open Page

Cosmology in Rigveda the third premise History is indeed recorded in the Rigveda, as well as in the Epics, but one has to use correct cosmic formulas to make this discovery, bearing in mind that the ancients were not at all concerned with keeping records for posterity as we do today. THE RECENT articles of David Frawley and Michael Witzel concerning a possible historic content in the Rigveda have opened up areas that need to be explored. It is an undeniable fact that the work of scholars such as Frawley has dealt a blow to the upholders of the Aryan Invasion Theory (AIT), the colonial-inspired speculation on the origins of Indian civilisation. It was simply the product of a mindset that had to justify colonisation and wholesale destruction of ancient cultures. Finally it is being laid to rest and other voices are heard. However, in the effort to disprove the quasi-defunct theory of a civilisation imported from perhaps Central Asia, the defenders of the age and place of the Sarasvati Civilisation have also missed the point. David Frawley's conjectures regarding the numerous references to oceans and seas in the Rigveda are a case in point. While offering suggestive evidence that the composers of the hymns did not descend into the subcontinent from a landlocked region, Frawley's interpretation of the Rigveda as a purely historic document fails to take into consideration that the text is the product of the vision of rishis, `poets', according to Witzel. We cannot overlook this fact in seeking to unravel its mysteries. It is curious that apart from Sri Aurobindo (The Secrets of the Veda), few are willing to accept the Vedic symbols for what they are. Thus, the true character of the text is lost, and the true historic value that the Rigveda does indeed contain. But this historic content has to be discovered on the basis of the language the rishis employed. In this regard, I find Witzel has been more faithful to the original sense and purpose than Frawley. Sea imagery For example, let us consider the sea imagery. Frawley and others have used it to reinforce their theories. However, lacking the proper preparation, scholars cannot appreciate the cosmological character of the Rigveda. In a cosmological context and none will deny the cosmic moorings of Vedic culture the sea is the cosmic ocean in which the galaxies and systems are immersed. In some cases it is the ecliptic of our particular solar system in which the planets (`ships', `golden boats') navigate. This does not displace the theories of a more mundane interpretation because, similar to dream experiences, the images chosen by the subject as `symbols' in the night time experience are usually taken from the physical world he or she knows in the waking state. We find this cosmic intent corroborated by Witzel. His reading of the references to oceans and seas is closer to the mark than Frawley's. He quotes Rigvedic references

to the `four oceans', or the `eastern and western oceans'; or else the Atharvaveda `northern, upper ocean'. All of these are clear and unmistakable pointers to the cosmological content of the Veda. They cannot be interpreted otherwise, as Frawley has sought to do. Specifically, they are references to the cardinal points on which the Earth is balanced as she voyages through the cosmic sea in orbit of the Sun. The Atharvaveda mention of the northern ocean is especially meaningful since that would refer to the Capricorn north cardinal point, precisely the `upper hemisphere' in cosmic harmonies, which still today holds pride of place in Hindu culture. Witness the annual celebration of the Makar Sankranti, the Sun's apparent entry into Capricorn (PNB, 1975, 1981, 2001, 2002). This month/sign, Capricorn, is further honoured in the Veda itself since it is in that month of the twelve that the Aryan warrior is victorious. The ancient dictum of Hermes Trismegistos can be applied here: `As above, so below.' The `above' is the cosmic ocean that may well find its reflection in the physical ocean the rishi knows so well in his experience of life in ancient Bharat. The sea, the river, the ocean were and remain such vibrant parts of the culture that their incorporation in the hymns does suggest that the Vedic people did not descend upon the subcontinent from some land-locked location; which in any case finds no mention in the Rigveda, to my knowledge. But unless taken in its cosmic perspective, much of the true meaning is lost. Nor can the formulas involving cosmic energies (the Gods and Goddesses) of the Veda be applied today as they had been in the ancient past. For instance, Frawley refers to the births of Agastya and Vasishta as `born in a pot or kumbha', the Sanskrit word. He interprets this as `a vessel or a ship' to reinforce his theory of a seafaring civilisation. To begin, I must indeed agree with Witzel that for a civilisation at home with the oceans as Frawley sustains, one fails to understand why the rishi would need to make Agastya emerge from a pot if indeed he had been born at sea! A pot is a pot and a ship is a ship! An important clue More to the point, in making this deduction Frawley misses an important clue. Kumbha in the Rigveda is what it still is today, thousands of years after the hymns were recorded: the zodiacal sign Aquarius, the Water Carrier, who, from the jar he carries, dispenses upon the whole world the waters of a divine substance; it is known in Sanskrit as Kumbha. This is the same Kumbha that gives its name to the worldfamous Mela we celebrate year after year during the very same zodiacal month of Kumbha (PNB, 1978, 1981, 2001, 2002). A point needs to be made here. Myths evolve from the cosmic script, and not the reverse. In the Indian context regarding the Kumbha Mela, mythology tells us that the precious amrit from the Moon was taken in a jar back to Earth. Where drops of this immortalising substance fell, the ground was sanctified. Thereafter, celebrations were held in those locations according to specific planetary progressions. We can recognise here elements of the same cosmic script in the pictograph of the Aquarius Water Carrier. Indian scholars will contend that these zodiacal figures are equally `imports', similar to an `imported civilisation'. Therefore, those who seek to support their theories of an indigenous culture will argue that the zodiac as we know it today was brought to

India by the Greeks, long after the Rigveda was penned; and that therefore its symbols cannot possibly be found in the Veda. These arguments are easily countered. A simple perusal of the praises to Vishnu (RV, I, 154) will prove that the so-called Western Zodiac was not only fully known in Vedic times but that it was a fundamental part of the culture (PNB, 1981). Vishnu's famous three strides (to measure the universe) cannot be more revealing. The first `step' is like a lion (Leo), according to the Veda; the second is a bull (Taurus); the third, and most revealing of all, is the Friend. This is the same Aquarius of Agastya's birth, which is also known as the sign of the Friend. More conclusively, they are given in their correct backward moving order, and are Vishnu's own zodiacal domains because of their quality of PRESERVATION (`Fixed' in zodiacal terminology, stable, balancing). This is just one among many explicit references in the Rigveda to the tropical zodiac with the same symbols still in use throughout the world, except in India. To further illustrate their universal reach, we find the very same images recorded in The Revelation of St John (Chapter 12, 7.), written on the Greek island, Patmos, around 70 AD (PNB, 1976). With respect to that same cosmic sea the visionary sees four `beasts' therein: the first is a Lion, the second is a Calf, the third is a Man, and the fourth an Eagle. If the Eagle, the fourth sign, was left out of Vishnu's measuring it is because this Eagle is Garuda, his own carrier. He begins his measuring from that point in the wheel, also known as Scorpio, and takes `three steps'. Scorpio, otherwise known as the zodiacal Eagle, would be the fourth in correct sequence, similar to John's text. Vested interests The stumbling block in discovering the tropical zodiac in the Rigveda is another `lobby' we have to contend with: vested interests of the `Vedic Astrologers'. Witzel begins his rejoinder to Frawley by providing us with the latter's credentials as a prominent practitioner of this school, an `unacademic' pursuit. I must take the matter a step further by reminding both Frawley and Witzel that the composers of the hymns did not have credentials that would satisfy contemporary academia. Their method of discovery was through Yoga, which opened up vistas as wide and as deep as the cosmic oceans of which they sang. To fathom the meaning of such texts it is clear that academic credentials are simply not enough; others are demanded. To begin, since the hymns reveal an indisputable cosmic content, surely this would be the best approach. But this is where the various `lobbies' come in with their vested interests. Frawley will not be able to make use of the zodiacal clues such as the births of Agastya and Vasishta from a `kumbha' precisely because of his Vedic Astrology proficiency. Let it be clear that I make this point not to lend weight to Witzel's contention that this lessens Frawley's qualifications as a scholar, but rather that this involvement limits his perception. Vedic Astrology is actually a misnomer. It has little to do with the Veda and should rather be called post-Vedic astrology (PNB, 2001, 2002). Though this would be a lengthy discussion and cannot be treated in this brief space, it has to be mentioned since it is responsible for the very clear cosmological/zodiacal content of the Veda to

be missed. The propagators of so-called Vedic Astrology ignore references to the tropical zodiac simply because they refuse to believe that this zodiac, with the same hieroglyphs and pictographs we use today, can form a part of the Veda. This is another un-Vedic `import', it is believed, a foreign imposition of a much later date, and hence it cannot be found in the ancient Veda. What they fail to admit is that their so-called Vedic Astrology finds no place at all in that Veda! The Rigveda is replete with references to what is now considered a tropical zodiac import and in no way related to the sidereal zodiac in vogue for the past 1000 years in India. This is another case in point to support Frawley's closing statement, also quoted by Witzel but for different reasons. Frawley justifiably laments the fact that India, unlike any other nation on Earth, is so `negative' regarding the `ancient glories of its land'. Following Frawley's line, we must then question why India has such difficulty accepting the true origins of the zodiac used throughout the world today, clear traces of which are rooted in its own most ancient sacred text, thereby throwing an entirely new light on the subject of its origin as well as its age? This might well make India the originator of that cosmic script, and not Mesopotamia as currently believed. It would further clarify much of what is considered `history', such as the kumbha of Agastya's birth, mentioned above. Even more significantly, with this cosmological key, the Epics tell a very different story. Their `history' is revealed. There can be no doubt that Witzel has dealt the knock-out punch, at least for this round. His reading of the text is closer to the original conception, though he has no cosmological foundation to interpret the images accurately. Nonetheless, by calling the Vedic ocean `mythical', and the description of the night time sky as that `ocean', he has pointed readers in the right direction. His reading of the text is certainly closer to the ancient spirit. I have given here only a few hints of the cosmological content of the Rigveda (for further discussion, see www.aeongroup.com) . However, I must close by stating that history is indeed recorded in the Veda, as well as in the Epics, but one has to use correct cosmic formulas to make this discovery, bearing in mind that the ancients were not at all concerned with keeping records for posterity as we do today. Their concern was the vast movement of consciousness and the oneness of micro and macrocosm; and the eternal character of the cosmos is what adds a timeless value to the language they used to compose the hymns. If we learn that language we can easily understand what appear to be cryptic phrases. However, we must also bear in mind that the Rigveda is not a textbook or a manual. It is a collection of praises, hymns, in a free-flowing language whose multi-dimensions are largely ignored today. But in the Vedic Age, as the scripture reveals, this language was universal and required no elaboration. To make a connection with that ancient culture, we have to live the same inner experience, leaving aside the methods of scholarship for a while, as well as all our conditioned preferences and vested interests, if we want those symbols of another age to speak to us once again. PATRIZIA NORELLI-BACHELET, Director, Aeon Centre of Cosmology

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Jul 16, 2002 Witzel's vanishing ocean If one can interpret the Rigveda in the Witzel sense, ignoring the obvious and logical meaning of terms, then there is no telling what the Veda can be turned into. THE TERM samudra is a common term for ocean in Sanskrit going back to the Rigveda, the same way as agni is a common term for fire or apas for water. Yet Michael Witzel, in his recent Open Page (June 25) response to an article of mine on the Vedic period, would have us believe that samudra in the Rigveda does not mean the sea, which he claims the Vedic people had never seen. This is in spite of the fact that samudra is mentioned over 150 times in the text. It is frequently referred to along with ships (nava), waves (urmi) and the confluence of greater rivers like Sindhu and Sarasvati which did reach the sea. On this basis, Witzel also claims that the God Varuna, who is called the lord of samudra in the Rigveda, cannot mean the lord of the ocean as he is in later Hindu thought! Witzel mentions that the Vedic samudra is mainly the ocean of the air (antariksha). Such a metaphor of the sky as an ocean is common among maritime peoples and would be expected from the Vedic rishis who were also poets (kavis). It does not disprove that the Vedic people knew of the actual ocean but only that it was the basis of their world-view. Witzel, who claims to be a Vedic scholar, should know that all the Vedic deities have three forms relative to the three worlds of the Earth, Atmosphere and Heaven. The ocean is no different. The Rigveda also speaks of heavenly (the sun) and atmospheric (lightning) forms of agni or fire, which cannot be used to deny that the Vedic people ever saw an earthly fire! Similarly, all the main Vedic Gods of Indra, Agni, Soma and Surya have oceanic symbolisms. No one would use the ocean as such a great image if they had no real knowledge of it. Saltiness of the sea Witzel claims that the Rigveda doesn't mention the saltiness of the sea or the tides. The Rigveda doesn't mention the salt at all, even relative to Salt range in the Panjab, in which region Witzel would put the Vedic people. However, the Vedas do mention in a hymn to Varuna, how the rishi Vasishta was struck with thirst in the middle of the waters (RV VII.89.4), suggesting the inability to drink the salty water of the sea. The Rigveda frequently mentions the waviness of the ocean (RV IV.58, 1,11) and the back and forth movement of waves experienced while in a ship on the sea (RV VII.88.3). It refers to how the Maruts, the wind-gods, bring the waters of the rain from the ocean (RV V.55.5). It mentions how Soma or Indu (the moon) stirs the ocean with the winds (RV IX.84.4). The Rigveda (RV VII.49) speaks of the waters, the eldest of which is the ocean (samudra jyestha), mentioning waters that are heavenly, that flow, that are dug and

are spontaneous, whose goal is the sea (verse 2), in which King Varuna dwells (verse 4). Clearly the Vedic people knew the difference between the earthly and heavenly waters. One wonders how Witzel himself would translate such common Vedic statements as `samudrayeva sindhava' meaning `as rivers to the sea.' Perhaps he would render it as `as rivers flowing into the atmosphere'! Or perhaps in his view, sindhu doesn't mean river either but a current of air. Even Griffith, a Nineteenth century colonial scholar who tried to foster this idea that samudra does not mean ocean, nevertheless regularly translates the term as ocean or sea in his version of the Rigveda. Anything else does violence to the text! Witzel would place the Vedic people in Panjab around 1500 BCE as migrants from Afghanistan, which requires that they cross the rivers of the Panjab, yet he would have them regard the Panjab rivers as samudra or their `sea', having them fail to note that such rivers do flow south, which is not that hard for anyone to observe, particularly during the rainy season. This is the only type of earthly ocean Witzel would allow the Vedic people to know. He also brings the Vedic people into the Sarasvati region (Kurukshetra) in the postHarappan era after the Sarasvati river dried up and its many cities were already long abandoned. He fails to explain why the Vedic people would make the Sarasvati, the easternmost Panjab river, then devoid of water, as their central and immemorial homeland, describing this river that flowed west of the Yamuna (RV X.75.1) as a great river pure in its course from the mountains to the sea (RV VII.95.5)! Witzel fails to see any urban side to the Rigveda that would connect it with an urban culture like the Harappan. However, the term pur for city (a term that obviously means city in Greek thought, ie. Pura = Polis) is common throughout the text. Both the Vedic people and their enemies have a hundred cities (satapura, RV VI.48.8; RV II.14.6). There are also references to temples or buildings with a thousand pillars (sahasra sthuna, RV II.41.5; RV V.62.6) or a thousand doors (sahasra dvara, RV VII.88.5). Greater continuity The real reason beyond Witzel's statements is that the maritime nature of Vedic culture refutes his interpretation of the Rigveda as a product of migrants from Central Asia. In this regard, Witzel, like a fossil in time, is just carrying on Nineteenth century European scholarship, ignoring the new evidence of the Sarasvati river, the many new Harappan sites and the much greater continuity for Indian civilisation that has been discovered since. If one can interpret the Rigveda in the Witzel sense, ignoring the obvious and logical meaning of terms, then there is no telling what the Veda can be turned into. There are many more inaccuracies in his statements and in his depictions of my views, but I think this is enough for the reader to get a sense of what he represents. Today there is a new Vedic scholarship that understands the Vedic connection with Indian civilisation and honours Vedic spirituality. This is the Vedic scholarship of the future as we move into a new planetary age that recognises our spiritual heritage as

a species which India as a civilization has preserved perhaps better than any other country through such great teachings as the Vedas. DAVID FRAWLEY

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Aug 06, 2002

Philology vanished: Frawley's Rigveda I Like all scholarship, Vedic philology is constantly updated, tested and re-examined. Peer review and criticism alone take care of this. Authors of Frawleyan type `innovative' interpretations usually do not carry out a countercheck of other possibilities and of gaps in the evidence, causing severe criticism. In the Open Page of July 16, Dr. David Frawley, "American Institute of Vedic Studies", has tried to sustain his interpretation of samudra `ocean' in the Rigveda. Let us see where a close study of the texts, that is the well-tested method of philology, will take us. Understanding old texts Philology is the investigation of a civilisation based on its texts; it takes into account all necessary information from other sciences, from astronomy to zoology. Reliance on its principles has worked well in deciphering the texts of long lost cultures such as those of Egypt, Mesopotamia, or the Maya. The method has been tested and retested over the past 200 years. So why not with regard to ancient Indian civilisation? For, the past is an alien land. Rigvedic culture is not the same as that of modern Indians, just as little as modern Taiwan Chinese have the culture of Confucius or of the Shang realm. In India, the undeciphered Indus script has disappeared early in the second millennium BCE and many of the ancient subcontinental languages have disappeared, just as Sumerian, etc., from Mesopotamia. However, those of the ancient Panjab are still visible in the c. 4 per cent of non-Sanskritic loan words in the Rigveda (F.B.J. Kuiper, Aryans in the Rigveda, 1991). Largely, they represent a prefixing language ("Para-Munda", Witzel 1999), like the Austro-Asiatic Munda (Jharkhand, etc.) and Khasi (Meghalaya). This means, incidentally, that R. Nagaswamy's assertion (Open Page, July 2) that I support Parpola's claim for a Dravidian speaking Indus civilisation is wrong (EJVS 5-1, Witzel 1999). A Dravidian language substrate appears only in the later parts of the Rigveda. Contrary to Frawley's claim, the direct link to the Indus civilisation has thus been lost both in script and in language.

However, the archaic language of the Rigveda has been preserved by Vaidik Brahmins. But the Vedic language, like all others, did change, from the Rigveda to the Upanishads. Compare modern English with that of Old English of some 1000 years ago (fader ure, du bist in heofnum... "Our father, you are in heaven"). The Rigveda has many grammatical forms that had simply disappeared by the time of Panini. He and Sayana do not know, e.g., of the injunctive (e.g. han: Indro 'him han). The same kind of changes is found in the meaning of Vedic words (pace Frawley): brihat does not mean `big' but `high', pur not `city' but `small fort', graama not `village' but `wagon train, circled when resting', raajan not `king' but `chieftain', paapa not `sin' but `evil'. The same can apply to samudra: etymologically, it means nothing but a collection (sam) of water (udr-). This could be a pond, a lake, a confluence, and (later on) "the big pond' (as we call the Atlantic), the "ocean." Close study is required of the whole range of meanings in the Rigveda and of their context. We cannot simply plug in the desired result into the very formulation of the question, and then force each passage accordingly, as Frawley does consistently, without any countercheck. He simply feels that the `logical meaning' of a word suffices. To translate graama by `village' may seem `logical', but it will not fit the Rigveda, nor even the much later Brahmana texts! (W. Rau, Zur vedischen Altertumskunde 1983; Rau, in: M. Witzel, Inside the Texts, Beyond the Texts. 1997). The deciphering process Our aim should be to represent what the authors of the texts themselves thought, the "spirit of the times," not what we (want to) see in them now. Our personal and civilisational maayaa has to be overcome by using philology: by constantly reexamining proposals, by countercheck of other possibilities, and by well-founded worldwide peer criticism. We do not stand still as Frawley so nicely puts it: "Witzel, like a fossil in time, is just carrying on Nineteenth century European scholarship, ignoring the new evidence..." Like all scholarship, Vedic philology is constantly updated, tested and re-examined. Peer review and criticism alone take care of this. Authors of Frawleyan type `innovative' interpretations usually do not carry out a countercheck of other possibilities and of gaps in the evidence, causing severe criticism. It has always proven better to start from the premise "we do not know", especially in a case (samudra) that has been controversial for long. Plugging in a modern concept (`ocean') leaves too many loose ends (below). Each one of them must be explained, and well within the realm of reason, not by added, auxiliary assumptions. Occam's razor will speedily apply. Further, we have to cross-examine all contemporary "witnesses". If a new interpretation does agree with the same basic meaning at all occurrences, and if any exceptions cannot easily be explained, the new theory does not hold. Spotty discussion, be they by Sayana, Max Mueller, Aurobindo, or Pt. Frawley, does not count. If readers or Frawley do not believe, say, the latest detailed studies by K. Klaus (Samudra in: Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenlaendischen Gesellschaft 1989), Altindische Kosmologie nach den Brahmanas dargestellt 1986, Die Wasserfahrzeuge im vedischen Indien 1989) then they have to check all Rigveda passages themselves, and come back for detailed peer criticism. Importantly, the (immediate) context of each passage has to be studied, which is seriously lacking in Frawley: at first in the Rigveda, then in "neighbouring" texts, e.g. the Yajurveda or the closely related Zoroastrian Avesta, though with a great degree

of caution. A straightforward jump to Epic, Classical (Kalidasa) or modern Sanskrit is not allowed. All must fit in as to form a coherent body of reliable translations. A wrong one will stick out like the proverbial sore thumb, such as the combination of Frawley's samudra `ocean' with the Rigvedic small river boats and mythical imagination about God Varuna's heavenly palace (below). A thorough study will then tell us, in each case, whether the new/proposed assumption is (a) correct, (b) wrong, or (c) that the materials available do not suffice to decide. The now increasingly touted "adhikaara defence" maintains that only (traditionally educated) persons of Indian descent can understand their ancient texts. There are certain conservative, patriotic or chauvinistic elements in all civilisations who claim such unique access to their texts, as if understanding had come with their mothers' milk, not with serious (and cross-cultural) study. Being a local person in any such culture has its advantages, and its disadvantages. This tension would need a detailed discussion at another time. If the adhikaara defence were true, it would not have been possible to have successfully interpreted Egyptian and Maya texts. Or are only ancient Indian texts to be exempted from any such study? The philological method helps to overcome any civilisational biases, and worldwide peer criticism leads to confirmation of results. Samudra revisited To return to the Rigvedic samudra. Last time, I had proposed four or five individual meanings (seriously misrepresented and cut short in Frawley's answer on July 16), basing myself largely on Klaus (1986-9) and by taking into account the other very detailed book by H. Lueders (Varuna, 1951-9), a 720 page study of Varuna and the ocean, and also my own studies, summarised in "Sur le chemin du ciel" (Bulletin des Etudes indiennes 2, 1984). This, incidentally, includes many of the religious and spiritual concepts that Patrizia Norelli-Bachelet (Open Page, July 9) missed in my last article. The field of meanings of samudra starts from the main and etymological (sam-udr-a) one, a "collection of waters", indicating : 1. confluence of the (Panjab) rivers, 2. terminal lake (in the Rajasthan/Cholistan desert, like the Afghani Hamun lakes, cf. Avest. apo han-jagmana, han-tacina), 3. heavenly "pond," heavenly "ocean", 4. mythical primordial (salty) ocean and the mythical ocean at the end of the world, 5. some vague notes about a very distant ocean (Arabian Sea?). As late as in the Buddhist Pali Canon (c. 3rd century BCE) samudda still meant "a (large quantity of) water, e.g., the Ganges," next to "sea, ocean." These meanings must be compared and tested with Frawley's "innovative" interpretation of "ocean everywhere in the Rigveda." His interpretations, in his selected "star witness" passages and in his other writings, indicate a complete lack of method: Rigveda passages are discussed without regard to the (immediate) context; they are read ad hoc in splendid isolation, just like fundamentalist (Bible, etc.) interpreters do everywhere. Further, there is no literary and mythological study not to speak of comparative literature, mythology, or linguistics. Instead, modern and medieval concepts are plugged in. The auxiliary sciences, of course with the exception of his "Vedic astrology," are disregarded, even his hobby, medicine. There is lack of simple nature observation, of Vedic ritual, of previous Vedic research (Rau 1983), and of some recent archaeology (M. R. Mughal, Ancient Cholistan 1997). Instead, we get "logical", "spiritual", "astrological" or "yogic" interpretations (Frawley, Hymns from the golden age: selected hymns from the Rig Veda, with yogic interpretation, 1986). Worse,

Frawley's arguments conform to the classical vicious circle: he already knows what samudra means and plugs it in everywhere, regardless of context. The predictable result is: input = output. QED. (to be concluded) MICHAEL WITZEL Harvard University http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/witzel/mwpage.htm

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Aug 13, 2002

Philology vanished: Frawley's Rigveda II The public should not be misled by the glib, fashionable advocating of "innovative" theories that may fall in line with the present cultural climate in certain sections of the Indian and NRI public. LEAVING ASIDE all of Frawley's polemics, let us now take a close look at Frawley's "star witness" passages, comparing his "ocean" with the proposed meanings: "collection of waters, etc." 1. Frawley: "... how the rishi Vasishta was struck with thirst in the middle of the waters (RV VII.89.4), suggesting the inability to drink the salty water of the sea." He completely neglects the context. Verses 1-2 speak of the extended body or limbs of Vasistha, his illness, his wish not to die early. As has long been seen, this refers to Varuna's punishment of dropsy (oedema), which causes the body to swell; even then, Vasistha is thirsty though he stands in water. Varuna is not just a god of samudra but the main overseer of Rta ("dharma", RV 7.87!) and of truthful behaviour (A. Meillet, Journal Asiatique 10, 1907, etc.). Vasistha had inadvertently committed some evil act against Rta and fears Varuna's punishment (7.88.5-6). Vasistha stands in water as acts of truth or oaths involve touching or drinking of sweet water. Not the ocean, but sweet waters are meant. 2. Frawley: "The Rigveda frequently mentions the waviness of the ocean (RV IV.58, 1,11) and the back and forth movement of waves experienced while in a ship on the sea (RV VII.88.3)." Any pond or lake can have waves. Varuna's ship (7.88.3) in the sky floats in the realm of pure mythology. But, tides do not visibly occur in ponds and lakes and are consequently missing in the Rigveda.

3. Frawley: " [RV] mentions how Soma or Indu (the moon) stirs the ocean with the winds (RV IX.84.4)." This Soma hymn speaks about Soma drops (indu), as Soma/Indu `moon' is only post-Rigvedic. Soma preparation is described with extensive Rigvedic hyperbole. The (small!) Soma vessel is compared to a samudra, Soma drops to rushing waters, horses. Thus, no ocean or moon here, just Soma juice dripping in a modest pot creating "waves"! The image of the wind may stem from experiencing breezes at any lake. The moon does not create winds. 4. Frawley: "The Rigveda (RV VII.49) speaks of the waters, the eldest of which is the ocean (samudra jyestha), mentioning waters ... whose goal is the sea (verse 2), in which King Varuna dwells (verse 4)." This mythological hymn deals with the waters coming from the primordial salty (sal-ila) ocean (Engl. salt), from which the earth first arose, that still surrounds it and also exists in the night sky (Kuiper, Ancient Indian cosmogony, 1983, Witzel 1984). This concept is found from Old Egypt to Japan and the Americas, even in extremely landlocked regions. Varuna dwells in the mythical heavenly ocean, in the world-rimming one, and in sweet waters. The waters beyond the vault of the sky (Lueders 1951-9, Witzel 1984) come forth, purified, from the salila ocean, just like the Avestan waters, purified in the Puuitika lake (Videvdad 5.16), descend as sweet waters (Witzel 1984), as the "shining, purified, heavenly waters ... having the samudra/samudras as their aim." The Bahuvrihi compound samudrajye'stha (not two words!) means "someone who has samudra(s) as overlord." Nowhere is it obvious that the samudra(s) are the Arabian Sea, and not confluences, terminal lakes, or the heavenly samudra. 5. Frawley: "The [Rigveda] refers to how the Maruts, the wind-gods, bring the waters of the rain from the ocean (RV V.55.5)." This is more difficult to understand, unless one makes the Rigvedic Sarasvati flow right into the Arabian Sea, which is not the case (R. Mughal, Ancient Cholistan 1997). The southwest monsoon brings rain from the Bay of Bengal but in Gujarat (and the peninsula also) from the Arabian Sea. Did the Rigvedic people, who do not mention Gujarat, the Deccan or Bengal, hear of the ocean from their neighbours? However, the Maruts have been explained as mar-vat "blowing from the sea" (mar/maru, Latin mare `sea', Engl. mere). They appear in Near Eastern sources of c. 1500 BCE as the Marut(t)as (K. Balkan, Kassitenstudien, 1954), along with other pre-Rigvedic words (Witzel 1999). This may reflect the earlier habitat at the Caspian/Aral seas, from where they would have brought rain (Avesta: Yasht 8. 32-34). While clouds may seem to rise from any large body of water, the concept of the ocean as origin of the rain clouds is found only in post-Rigvedic texts. The Maruts could also bring rain from the world-rimming ocean or from beyond the sky (Lueders 1951-9). Frawley's translation is ahistorical (rain concept, sea-going Sarasvati) and thus not compelling. As for Frawley's question: "how Witzel himself would translate ... `samudrayeva sindhava' meaning `as rivers to the sea.' Perhaps ... as `as rivers flowing into the atmosphere"? The latter concept (heavenly river, Milky Way, Sarasvati; later the Ganga) does of course exist (Witzel 1984). However, this Indra stanza (8.6.4) can simply mean "like the streams to their confluence." Just as all tribes submit to Indra, the various female streams `bend' to their master, the male Indus river, when uniting with him (cf. 3.33.10). In sum, the exact meaning of samudra in each of Frawley's "key" Rigveda passages is a matter of detailed study (much abbreviated here), and his naive substitutions of `logical' meanings do not work. Samudra has all the meanings indicated above, perhaps including a few hear-say remarks about the distant Arabian Sea.

The perennial Sarasvati Frawley repeats the inadequate translation already criticised last time: "the Sarasvati, the easternmost Panjab river, then devoid of water, ...[was] a great river pure in its course from the mountains to the sea (RV VII.95.5)!" He then relates the modern myth that the Rigvedic Sarasvati flowed into the Arabian Sea. But, there were at least three consecutive "Sarasvati" channels in prehistoric times (B.P. Radhakrishna et al., Vedic Sarasvati, 1999). As for the third, westernmost channel, the Sarsuti-Ghaggar-Hakra, Mughal's work (1997) indicates repeated drying up and reflooding by Satlej waters of certain of its sections. Originally, the river ended in a heavily populated delta near Ft. Derawar, with seasonally changing terminal lakes (samudra), like the Afghan Hamun lakes. Therefore the Afghani Harax-vaitii has the same name as the Saras-vatii "she who has (many) ponds/lakes". As for her praise by Vasistha (7.95.5), even today the upper course (Sarsuti) is not devoid of water. The stanza smacks of the typical hyperbole. It cannot be excluded altogether that Vasistha, apparently an immigrant from East Iran, is reminded here of the Haraxvaiti (lower Helmand) that flows into the Hamun samudra. Some other of Frawley's "key" quotes show full "innocence" of previous studies. Spirituality does not help in questions of literary style or material culture. He says: "the term pur for city (... city in Greek thought, ie. Pura = Polis) is common throughout the text. Both the Vedic people and their enemies have a hundred cities (satapura, RV VI.48.8; RV II.14.6). There are also references to temples or buildings with a thousand pillars (sahasra sthuna, RV II.41.5; RV V.62.6) or a thousand doors (sahasra dvara, RV VII.88.5)." But, pur does not yet mean `city' in the Rigveda, rather temporary mud wall and palisade enclosures that keep cattle and people safe (Rau, The Meaning of pur in Vedic Literature, 1976; pur-a is not Rigvedic, and Greek pol-is was at first just a fortification!). Frawley must show that Rau's (unmentioned) interpretation is wrong, otherwise his mere opinion carries no weight. The Rigvedic people and their often half-mythical enemies (S'ambara's mountain forts at 2.14.6) have "a hundred forts" (s'ata pur, not a compound, not Epic pura!), spread between Kabul and the Ganga. Frawley again ignores poetic hyperbole that uses 100, 1000 in the sense of "many" (EJVS 7-3, W. Wuest, Stilgeschichte und Chronologie des Rgveda, 1928). Thus, RV 6.48.8 has 100 forts next to 100 winters (years). Without cities, also no "temples" or "buildings with a thousand pillars ... or doors", poetical hyperbole again! Even the great Indus Civilisation did not have buildings with 1000 pillars. The mythical dwelling (2.41.5) of Mitra and Varuna, called raajan and samraajan, has more pillars than the rather flimsy Vedic one, and Varuna's has 1000 doors (7.88.5). RV 5.62.6 speaks of Mitra and Varuna's reign (ksatra) that rests on 1000 pillars, poetry again! Alternative, new scholarship? If Frawley were not so pretentious ("new Vedic scholarship that understands ... and honours Vedic spirituality.... Vedic scholarship of the future..."), one might simply chalk up all of this to the naivet of a self-taught interpreter of difficult archaic texts. Such "parallel" or "alternative scholarship" has been sent, time and again, to the dung heap of history. To advance beyond being "alternative" it has to adopt stricter procedures and methods. Frawley et al. are welcome and free to understand and reinterpret the Rigveda any way they want, but this is not "new scholarship." The public should not be misled by the glib, fashionable advocating of "innovative" theories that may fall in line with the present cultural climate in certain sections of

the Indian and NRI public. Such new "theories" are based on uninformed and context-less translations and interpretations (EJVS 7-3). Bible Belt-like, Frawley habitually picks out a (half-)phrase and bends it his way. But, to quote the Pandit himself: "If one can interpret the Rigveda in th[is]... sense ... then there is no telling what the Veda can be turned into." (Concluded) MICHAEL WITZEL Harvard University http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/witzel/mwpage.htm

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Aug 20, 2002 Witzel's philology

Witzel has removed the Rigvedic Aryans from all but the corner of north India according to his philological conclusions. Though the Rigveda mentions samudra, the common Sanskrit term for ocean over 150 times, as the goal of all rivers, as endless in extent and as containing great waves, Witzel will not credit them with knowing the ocean because according to him they didn't portray samudra with the correct salt content! Though the Rigveda is centred on a great river called Sarasvati located between the Yamuna and Sutlej (Shutudri) that flows to the sea, Witzel would turn the real Sarasvati into a small runoff stream in Afghanistan. That the Indian Sarasvati is the site of the great majority of Harappan ruins doesn't count for him either. While Witzel denied that there was any monsoon mentioned in the Rigveda, when I showed him references, he conveniently placed this Vedic monsoon in the Caspian Sea. He has also located great Vedic sages like Vasishta and Agastya in Afghanistan and nearby Iran, though people in these regions seem to have no record of them or their teachings.

Vanishing Dravidians

What does Witzel think happened in ancient India instead? According to Witzel, the Harappans were a Para-Munda people related to the current aborigines of the country. It was they who produced the great cities and the seals of the Indus civilisation, neither Aryans nor Dravidians who were both intruders from Central Asia. To quote a long article of his on this subject, "The language of the pre-Rigvedic Indus civilisation, at least in the Panjab, was of a (Para-) Austro-Asiatic nature (Early Sources for South Asian Substrate Languages by Michael Witzel, Mother Tongue, Special Issue, Oct. 1999, pg. 17)." He further claims that "This means Haryana and Uttar Pradesh once had a Para-Munda population that was acculturated by the IndoAryans" (p.46). Note the former barbaric invading Aryan hordes have now been reduced to clever perpetrators of `acculturalisation.' How does Witzel know all this? Has he produced any decipherment of the Indus seals? No, he hasn't dared to. Has he found any ancient Munda records of this type? They are no ancient Munda records of any type. Are his conclusions based upon skeletal remains? No, it all based on his philology. As aboriginal people, the Mundas have no written records or recorded history. Where they came from and what they spoke in the Harappan era is quite speculative. Such problems don't bother Witzel. His philology can reconstruct unrecorded languages over a period of five thousand years and can override what geology or archaeology might otherwise indicate. With his Munda Harappa, Witzel has the Dravidians entering into Sindh from Iran about the same period as he has the Vedic Aryans coming into the Panjab from Afghanistan (c. 1500 BCE). Like the Vedic Aryans he deems them to be illiterate semi-nomads. "The Dravida entered South Asia from the Iranian highlands. Their oldest vocabulary (Southworth and McAlpin) is that of a semi-nomadic, pastoral group, not of an agricultural community" (pg. 27). Later he states, "Dravidians were not a primary factor in the population of the Indus civilisation," and "the Dravidians apparently were just as foreign to Sindh and its agriculture as the Indo-Aryans to the Panjab" (pg. 37, note this entire section on Dravidian Immigration). He claims the evidence for this is all in the philology, mainly from reconstructing proposed Dravidian and Munda loan words in Vedic texts. Yes, in the Witzel world it was the aborigines that produced the great civilisation of ancient India and both the Aryans and Dravidians were later uncivilised immigrants from Central Asia who conquered them, stole their culture, replaced their languages and gave them no credit! He has the Dravidians supplanting the Harappan people in Sindh just as the Aryans supplanted them in Panjab. From there he has the Dravidians migrate south, while the Aryans mainly went east, both remarkably preserving their own languages and becoming the dominant peoples of their areas, though originally just small groups of illiterate nomadic migrants! Not content with one Aryan invasion/migration, Witzel requires a second Dravidian invasion/migration to go along with it! In a non-published proposal of his, he even says that the Munda languages also came to India from S.E. Asia! It seems that anywhere in the world but India can produce languages or peoples. While these aborigines produced the great Harappan cities and lost all remembrance of their literature and civilisation, he allows the great Vedic literature no real civilisation of its own. The Dravidians fare no better. Their Sangam literature is later and by his account even more suspect than the Vedas.

Witzel quotes favourably a statement at the beginning of this rather long article about India's role as "the cultural diffusion cul-de-sac of Asia" (p.1), an idea that has "kept me occupied on and off over the past few years." This sums up Witzel's view of Indian civilisation it is the cultural backwater and dead end of Asia, where wandering nomads can go no further, with no real civilisation of its own. Not surprisingly Witzel has little appreciation for the Vedas, Vedanta, Yoga, Buddhism or anything else India has produced. His extensive bibliographies on ancient India seldom refer to any Indian scholars, and certainly avoid mentioning any yogis like Aurobindo who have different views. You would never find Witzel chanting Om, practicing Yoga or in any other way honouring the great traditions of the region. His anti-India views reflect those of the colonial era which he is continuing. For this reason Witzel is mainly honoured by Marxists in India whose political agenda favours rejecting anything great not only in the Vedas but in Indian civilisation as a whole, which many Marxists following Marx himself see as an invention of the British. However, no one who really studies and loves the Vedas will be fooled by such theatrics. There is much more to the Vedas than Witzel's philology. For my more detailed response to Witzel, please note the web site, http://www.bharatvani.org/davidfrawley/ReplytoWitzel.html or www.vedanet.com. DAVID FRAWLEY

The Hindu National Tuesday, Dec 03, 2002

New light on south Indian civilisation By Our Special Correspondent Bangalore Dec. 2. The discovery of long-forgotten underwater settlements off the coast of Mahabalipuram in Tamil Nadu by American marine archaeologists has pushed the antiquity of civilisation in South India by a few millennia and showed a link with Vedic civilisation. This was stated here on Monday by the noted American scholar in the Vedas and Hinduism, David Frawley, while presenting a video demonstration on the underwater archaeological discoveries in the Gulf of Cambay in Gujarat and off the Mahabalipuram coast. Dr. Frawley (Pandit Vamadeva Shastri) is the Director of the American Institute of Vedic Studies at Santa Fe, New Mexico, U.S.

He was speaking along with Navarathna Rajaram, engineer and historian, who has `deciphered' the Harappan seals. Dr. Frawley said fishermen along the Mahabalipuram coast had been mentioning the existence of temples and other structures beneath the Bay of Bengal. It had now been corroborated by underwater videography. He stressed the southern links of the civilisation of ancient India, and said that the Vedic civilisation was older than those of Mesopotamia and other regions held to be the most ancient by Western scholars by at least 4,000 years. The finding of a submerged city in the Gulf of Cambay near Broach, which was perhaps as old as 7,500 BC, had pushed the seats of ancient Indian civilisation deeper into the southern peninsula. It would be no surprise if more such sites were discovered in South India, especially in the coastal regions for the South had always played a significant if neglected role in ancient India from the Vedic times. The Gulf of Cambay find was only the latest in a series that included Lothal (discovered by S.R. Rao) and Dholavira (R.S. Bisht). Dr. Frawley argued that the Vedic civilisation had maritime connections like most other civilisations. Rejecting the Aryan-Dravidian divide theory still adhered to by a section of historians, he quoted from the Rig Veda to point out that its most prominent sage, Vasistha, was the younger brother of Agasthya, the most prominent sage of South India. The Aryans and the Dravidians were the same people. The linguistic diversity of India was not surprising as it was a country of continental proportions. There were similar diversities in Europe. Ancient India's ties with East Asia and Southeast Asia were much closer than those with Central Asia and Europe. Dr. Frawley reminded those stating that there was no evidence of the existence of horse in the Harappan civilisation, that no such evidence was available even in the land of the horse: Iran and Afghanistan. About this, Dr. Rajaram said John Marshall, who did the pioneering excavations at Mohenjadaro and Harappa, had even provided the measurements of the Harappan horse. In a joint statement, the two scholars said that though the people of India were living at a time of exciting discoveries, they were concerned that there appeared to be some political pressure to deny students the benefit of those findings. An example was the discovery of the Vedic river, Saraswathi, which was one of the major triumphs of 20th century archaeology. It was an exciting story of satellite photography and archaeology working together to shed light on the Vedic tradition. ``Our children should take pride in such discoveries.

Yet we are told that vested interests in some States are directing teachers and textbook writers not to mention the Sarawathi river.'' It was a throwback to the 16th century when Galileo was told by the Church not to teach the solar system. Such anti-intellectual attitudes should have no place in education, they said.

The Hindu Opinion Wednesday, Dec 04, 2002 Opinion - Letters to the Editor

Rewriting history Sir, I was disappointed to read the reported remarks on India being the only former colony not to rewrite history: Reassessing earlier historical writing is an ongoing process in all civilizations. David Frawley and N.S. Rajaram are wrong in claiming that India "has failed to rewrite the history dictated by its former colonial masters". Historiography has not stopped in 1947. Specifically, N.S. Rajaram's "decipherment" of the Harappan seals is not taken seriously by any serious scholar: He even gets the direction of the script wrong. Frawley's "maritime basis of Vedic civilisation" is a similar figment of imagination, dissected at length in the Open Page of The Hindu this summer. The report uncritically follows Frawley's fantasy of identifying the Harappan (Indus) and the Vedic civilisation. The dry bed of the Saraswati and "so also the river "Rishadvati" have been known for more than 100 years. Frawley's "150 references to the ocean in the Rig Veda alone" were dismissed in the Open Page, for lack of the necessary scholarly (Vedic) knowledge. Rajaram's claim of an early "movement of people from India to outside" is based on the wrong translation of "one" Purana passage. His "archaeological and linguistic evidence of this in Iran and Central Asia" is found only in his fertile mind. Michael Witzel, Cambridge, U.S. Sir, This has reference to your comprehensive report of the work on the latest discoveries and their implications that David Frawley and I presented at a conference in Bangalore ("New light on south Indian civilisation,' Dec. 3). It is time the nation recognised the contribution of the South from the earliest times. I would, however, like to offer a few clarifications. The underwater discoveries in the Gulf of Cambay were made by Indian divers of the National Institute of Ocean Technology and not American marine archaeologists. Also, Graham Hancock, who produced the video on the findings, is a British writer and not an American. The report also gives me credit for deciphering the Indus (Harappan) script, which is not entirely correct. It is mainly the work of Dr. Natwar Jha, a Vedic scholar living in Mau near Varanasi. I am happy that your correspondent

reported the fact that Sir John Marshall had given measurements of the "MohenjoDaro horse" as far back as 1931. This is only one of many pieces of evidence showing that the claim of ``No horse at Harappa'' is baseless. Marshall had also observed that what he called the "MohenjoDaro horse" was the smaller "Indian country bred". N.S. Rajaram, Bangalore

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Jan 21, 2003

An ecological view of ancient India We need to look at the civilisation of India according to geographical and ecological imperatives that are far more certain than historical speculation conditioned by simplistic ideas of ethnicity, linguistics or migrations. Ecology is beginning to define how we look at the world and how we look at ourselves. Each geographical region in the world constitutes a special ecosystem an interrelated habitat for plants and animals shaped by climate and terrain. These ecological factors have a strong effect upon culture as well. As part of nature ourselves, society arises out of an ecological basis that we cannot ignore. Most civilisations, both in their advance and decline, reflect how people manage the ecosystems in which they live along with their natural resources. Human culture derives largely from its first culture, which is agriculture, our ability to work the land. This depends largely on water, particularly fresh water that is found in rivers, and flat land that can be easily irrigated. However, so far we have looked at history mainly in a non-ecological way, mainly trying to define it according to political, economic or racial concerns. Our account of ancient history particularly that of India has not given adequate regard to ecological factors. It has put too much weight on migration, as if culture came from the outside, rather than on the characteristics and necessities of the ecosystems in which people live and must rely upon for developing a sustainable way of life. The Aryan invasion theory is such a product of the pre-ecological age of historical theory that emphasised the movements of peoples over the natural development of culture within well-defined geographical regions. Nineteenth century thought the product of a colonial age found it easy to see culture as something brought in by intruders, rather than as something developed by the inhabitants of a region who had to develop suitable methods to harness their natural resources as shaped by the ecology around them.

River systems It is a well known fact that the main civilisations of the ancient world of Egypt, Mesopotamia, India (Indus Valley), and China were possible only because of the great river systems around which they grew up. The rivers made these civilisations possible, not simply human invention or any special ethnic type that migrated there. If we examine these four great river centres of early civilisation it is clear that the largest and most ideal river region in the world for developing civilisation is India. Egypt grew up around one great river, the Nile that flowed through what was otherwise a dry, rainless desert. Mesopotamia had two rivers but only of moderate size, the Tigris and the Euphrates, flowing through a large desert as well. Both Egypt and Mesopotamia were located in subtropical regions that provided abundant warmth and sunshine for crops, but otherwise suffered from the limited size of their river banks that were their sole steady water supply. China had a large but unpredictable river system, the Yellow River, which frequently overflowed its banks in various floods. It also received abundant rain. But it was centred in a cold northern region, with a limited growing season. Ancient India, on the other hand, had a massive nexus of numerous great rivers from the Indus in the west to the swamplands of the Gangetic delta in the east. It had both a warm subtropical climate and seasonal abundant rains. This river region included relatively dry regions of the west to the very wet regions of eastern India affording an abundance of crops both in type and quantity. The Indian river system was much larger in size and in arable land, and better in climate than perhaps all the other three river regions put together. No other ecosystem in the world could so easily serve to create an agricultural diversity or the cultural richness that would go with it. Ecologically speaking, north India was the ideal place in the world for the development of a riverine civilisation via agriculture. Bounded by the Himalayas in the north, and lower mountains on the west, east and south, this north Indian river plain is a specific geographical region and ecosystem, whose natural boundaries could easily serve to create and hold together a great civilisation. It was also ideal for producing large populations that depend upon agriculture for their sustenance. This same network of rivers was ideal for communication and trade. Not surprisingly, the Rigveda, the oldest book of the region, is full of praise for the numerous great rivers of the region, the foremost of which in early ancient times was the Sarasvati, which flowed east of the Yamuna into the Rann of Kachchh, creating an unbroken set of fertile rivers from Punjab to Bengal. This Vedic goddess of speech was a river goddess. The Vedic idea of One Truth but many paths (Rigveda I.164.46) probably reflects this experience of life of many rivers linked to the one sea. The main point of this article is that if we really want to understand the development of civilisation in ancient India we cannot ignore such ecological and geographical factors. Ancient India was the ideal ecological region for the development of civilisation in the ancient world. Therefore, we should look to an indigenous development of civilisation in the region. We need not import its people, animals, plants, culture or civilisation from the outside, particularly from barren and inhospitable Central Asia, for example, which would not have been suitable to India and which is separated from it geographically by very hard to cross mountain and desert barriers. New approach

It is time to take a new ecological look at the Vedas, which so far have not been examined adequately ecologically but have been approached mainly according to linguistic, Marxist or Freudian concerns that easily miss the obvious geography or ecology of the text. If we do this, we will discover that even the oldest Vedic text, the Rigveda, clearly describes a region of many vast rivers flowing to the sea, the most important of which was the Sarasvati. The climate that it describes of great rains and monsoons, the symbolism of the great God Indra, is also clearly that of India. The flora and fauna mentioned including the Brahma bull, water buffalo and elephant and its sacred trees of the Pipal, Ashvatta and Shamali is also that of India. The fall of the Indus or Harappan culture, just as was the case for many in the ancient world, was owing to ecological factors, something that Nineteenth and early Twentieth century migrationist views of history completely missed. It occurred not because of the destruction wrought by the proposed Aryan invaders but by ecological changes brought about by the drying up of the Sarasvati River around 1900 BCE. This did not end civilisation in the region but caused its relocation mainly to the more certain waters of the Ganga to the east. Such a movement is reflected in the shift from Vedic literature that is centred on the Sarasvati to the Puranic literature that is centred on the Ganga. The great north Indian river system from Punjab to Bihar is perhaps the greatest breadbasket or agricultural centre in the world. Any humans in the region would have been aided by the land, the waters and the climate, affording them a great advantage in the development of language and culture as well. The natural resources provided by the riverine ecosystem of north India could uphold great civilisations over the centuries. From it the peoples and literature of the region had adequate support from nature to sustain their cultural traditions. Southern river regions The type of civilisation developed on the rivers of north India could easily connect with the cultures developing on the rivers in the south of the country that shared a common climate and geographical ties. The other main great river region for India is the basins of the Krishna and Godavari rivers in the southeast of India, mainly Andhra Pradesh. This provides another important agricultural centre in the ancient world, which has also not been examined properly. Another important river area is the Narmada and Tapti rivers in Gujarat and Maharashtra. As these were nearby the delta of the Sarasvati, they could have been an extension of it (which is perhaps why the Bhrigu Rishis of this region are so important in Vedic literature). That the civilisation of north India could have had connections with these southern cultures is also ecologically based. For this we must consider the ecological factors that existed when agriculture began to arise in the world around 10,000 BCE. Before the end of the Ice Age north India was much drier and cooler in climate. This means that if there was any pre-Ice Age basis for agriculture in north India it would have more likely come from these more suitable southern river regions which had better rainfall at that time. We need to look at the civilisation of India according to geographical and ecological imperatives that are far more certain than historical speculation conditioned by simplistic ideas of ethnicity, linguistics or migrations. In this regard the study of the Sarasvati river system by the geologists of India and linking it to the Sarasvati river

as lauded in Vedic literature is probably the key. Civilisation is like a plant that owes its existence to the land on which it grows. We cannot ignore this important fact either for our past or for our future. The current Government of India plan to link all the great rivers of the country represents such a responsible ecological approach which, including reconstituting the old Sarasvati river channel, links the great future of the country with its great past. DAVID FRAWLEY

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Feb 11, 2003 Ecology, rhetoric or dumbing down? I As long as the scholarly world has not agreed on any of the many dozens of "decipherments" of the Indus seals, much of the prehistory of the subcontinent remains steeped in mystery, in spite of ever-expanding archaeological data. WE ALL are now well aware, in many parts of the world, of the ongoing cultural wars, the protracted fight for the "soul" of India. Much of this is concerned with the early history of the subcontinent, and the interpretation that is given to one and the same body of known facts. Analysis should proceed according to well-established internationally adhered norms, otherwise we get local mythology, perpetuated as "history" just as the Bible, Homer and some Greek records served as early European "history" before we could read the ancient Egyptian and Mesopotamian inscriptions. Obviously, as long as the scholarly world has not agreed on any of the many dozens of "decipherments" of the Indus seals, much of the prehistory of the subcontinent remains steeped in mystery, in spite of ever-expanding archaeological data. The recent article by Frawley (Open Page, January 21) had the stated aim of adding something new to this discussion, an ecological dimension. Frawley is, of course, neither a biologist nor a geographer nor a historian or textual scholar by training, but a spiritualist and "Vedic" astrologist. As we will soon find out, his article is but a new way to say the same old things, while using the currently fashionable term "ecology." As could be expected, after reading the series of articles in last year's Open Pages, all his hobby horses show up (more below). New ecology? To begin with, it is a platitude that "society arises out of an ecological basis" and that "most civilisations... reflect how people manage the ecosystems in which they live along with their natural resources." Frawley bitterly complains about the lack of such

ecological discussion of India's (pre)history. This completely overlooks the attention paid to it in past works on Indian history. One may open any recent books on Indian archaeology or history and one will find quite a lot of discussion of the ecological, geographical and climatic phenomena that have shaped the subcontinent. For example, Kulke & Rothermund (1986, new German ed. 1998, "ecology and history" p.10-24) extensively discuss and stress the various regional features of the subcontinent and the several nuclear centres depending on it. Allchin's et al. (1995) chapter 2 is called "The environmental context"; Kenoyer (1998: 27-30) has "The Environmental Setting" and "Climate," and B.B. Lal has a more vaguely termed section "The face of the land" (1997, 6-14); even the somewhat dated classic by A.L. Basham (The Wonder That Was India, 1954) starts with "The Land of India" (with p. 1-4). Clearly, Frawley is pushing in open doors, while it is not clear whether he has read or just selectively forgotten such books. Ecology is but a pretext: he aims at something else, for example at the linguistic materials used, in part, to reconstruct Indian prehistory. These are complex, specialised topics that Frawley is clearly uncomfortable with as they impinge on his "spiritual" and "yogic" and "astronomical" understanding of the Veda and of early Indian culture. Frawley's real aim are some previous approaches to the Vedic and Harappan (Indus) period: "It is time to take a new ecological look at the Vedas, which so far have not been examined adequately ecologically but have been approached mainly according to linguistic, Marxist or Freudian concerns that easily miss the obvious geography or ecology of the text." Again, we must disappoint him. Scholars have done so since the beginnings of modern Indology (C. Lassen 1847). Not quite unexpectedly, due to their materialistic theories, some Marxist Indologists have paid special attention to the economic basis and its factual, ecological underpinnings. For example, the East German K. Mylius with two doctorates, in the sciences and in philosophy has written on the homeland of the Shatapatha Brahmana and of Middle Vedic Literature according to text-internal observations of nature and geography. And the undersigned, now often mistaken as a Marxist, too, has stressed, from this thesis onwards, the geographical and related aspects of the Vedas. His small book on Old Indian history (March 2003) therefore has an introductory chapter called "Die Umwelt: Regionen, Klima und Wirtschaft" (ecology: regions, climate, economy). But, as indicated, Frawley really is up to something else: "we will discover that even the oldest Vedic text, the Rigveda, clearly describes a region of many vast rivers flowing to the sea, the most important of which was the Sarasvati." Finally, we are back to last Summer's discussion... Frawley repeats the same hackneyed, but unproved theories. I will use this occasion to pick up briefly the thread of August 20, when I was travelling to several conferences in Asia and Europe and could not answer his article. Frawley, clearly angered about my repeated debunking of his writings, has of late taken to selective quotation, out of context the oldest trick in the book of any politician or to simple falsification: I did not deny, as F. says, that samudra can (very) occasionally mean the Arabian Sea; I have not placed the "real Sarasvati as a "small [sic!] runoff stream in Afghanistan," rather said that the Haryana Sarasvati has an (older) sister there; I did not say that the RV does not know the monsoon, rather that most of the Rigvedic Gandhara-Panjab does not have it, just as today.

Frawley also tries to make fun of linguistic investigations which he cannot carry out himself: he does not know that parent languages have successfully been reconstructed even 5000 years after the fact. And verified by inscriptions (Hittite, Mycenean) found much later. Much worse, he belittles the modern Munda/Santali populations of Jharkhand and surroundings as jungle tribes who could not have had a higher state of material civilisation than that found in recent, premodern times. Has he forgotten people like the Chiapas or Quiche Maya subsistence farmers who have little or no idea about the great civilisation their ancestors had just 500 years ago? According to Frawley, I maintain that "the aborigines that produced the great civilisation of ancient India and both the Aryans and Dravidians were later uncivilised immigrants from Central Asia who conquered them, stole their culture, replaced their languages and gave them no credit!" Can one be more polemical? Yes: he quotes, again out of context, my reference (EJVS 1999) to India as "the cultural diffusion cul-de-sac of Asia," an idea that has "kept me occupied on and off over the past few years." This quote, stemming from a colleague, referred not to the later great civilisations of India but to the early Stone Age settlement and to the remnant languages of the subcontinent. I had added: "we may have missed the lower strata of prehistory after all!" a fact which is now, just four years later, indicated by one genetic discovery after another. And, of course, I have never said nor will I say that "(India) is the cultural backwater and dead end of Asia, where wandering nomads can go no further, with no real civilisation of its own." That is Frawley's fantasising about me... How does he know that "You would never find Witzel chanting Om, practising Yoga or in any other way honouring the great traditions of the region?" One does not need to "chant Om" all the time to honour India's culture; there are many other ways to do so, including the setting right of fantasies of the many Frawleys that abound now. His parting shot: "Witzel is mainly honoured by Marxists in India." I suppose that was meant as the death knell (in America)? Leaving aside this purely polemical, if not political, rubbish, I return to his account of "Indian ecology." Frawley's "ecology" Unfortunately, Frawley gets the facts about his new hobby horse wrong several times. Clearly, ecology or even basic geography is a recently acquired, non-spiritual taste with him. For example, he maintains that the "north Indian river plain is a specific geographical region and ecosystem," which overlooks the many distinguishing factors commonly stressed by geographers. Even though many plants and animals are found all over the vast area between Peshawar and Dacca, the rainstarved and winter-cold upper Indus area has quite another ecology than the wet and frequently flooded Bihar and Bengal; the areas close to the Himalayas have one different from those close to the Vindhyas; the upper Doab is different from the lower Gangetic plains, and so on. South Asia is quite diverse, just as any other subcontinent of Asia such as the European or the S.E. Asian one. Or, he repeats the certainly patriotic but thoroughly indigenist misconception that this area was an "ideal place to live," a sentiment certainly not shared by those who flee the Delhi sandstorms and summer heat to the Himalayas, as did some of the ancient Vedic Brahmins (Yaska Gairiksita), the Moghuls, or even the present Kashmir Government with its two capitals. As the East Iranians put it in their Videvdad (Avesta): "as the fifteenth (of 16 Aryan lands) Ahura Mazda created the Seven Rivers (Hapta Hendu)... (with) untimely illnesses and untimely heat." But, Frawley

does not deal with geographical, ecological realities, rather with imagined and idealised conceits of a golden past. He continues that the "largest and most ideal river region in the world for developing civilisation is India" and follows this up by vague, incorrect generalisations about ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia and China, "(which was) was centred in a cold northern region, with a limited growing season." He overlooks that exactly the same has happened in South Asia: the rain-starved Indus area had wheat as its staple and double cropping arose only later, in the post-Harappan period, and towards the east of the Indus plain just as in China rice was added to the fare in the more southern areas. (To be concluded) MICHAEL WITZEL , Harvard University http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/witzel/mwpage.htm

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Feb 18, 2003

Ecology, rhetoric or dumbing down? -- II Simple solutions to complex problems may be appealing to many, and are successful in politics. But they are not suitable in scholarship, where manifold facts do not allow for a one-fits-all theory that takes care of complex subjects such as Indian prehistory. DAVID FRAWLEY (Open Page, January 21) practises armchair ecology and history. This is true of his insistence that ancient civilisations, from the Nile to the Huang Ho, grew up on large rivers. Not that this is an exactly revolutionising idea. It was preached to all of us in high school, and the idea was in fact so ingrained that a great "link" culture, the Bactria Margiana Cultural Complex which evolved along the river deltas of this area, was largely overlooked until very recently. Equally so, neither the Olmec, Aztec, Maya, nor the Chibcha or Inca civilisations developed along large streams. Instead, they used clever ways to implement local irrigation in often very adverse climatic conditions. This was also how Mesopotamian, BMAC and subcontinental agriculture arose. Archaeologists would tell Frawley that the agricultural civilisations started out from the hills surrounding the great plains, both in Mesopotamia and S. Asia, and not in the flood plains of the Indus or the Tigris. In India, settled agricultural life began in places like Mehrgarh in E. Baluchistan (6500 BCE-), and slowly spread from these primitively but effectively irrigated hill areas over the Indus plains. Worse, Frawley's "Sarasvati" (Ghaggar-Hakra, with its delta lakes in Bahawalpur, cf. K.S. Valdiya River Sarasvati that disappeared, 2001) was reached still later (G. Possehl, Indus Civilization 2002: 34). However, Frawley simply imagines "water that is found in rivers, and flat land that can be easily irrigated."

He also wants to identify such beneficial, primordial riverine plains in the lower Gangetic valley where he imagines Vedic kingdoms at 10,000 BC and the "cradle of world wide civilisation" (Rajaram & Frawley 1995). "Ecologically speaking, north India was the ideal place in the world for the development of a riverine civilisation via agriculture." If so, why not in the geographically and ecologically very similar Congo or Amazon plains? Clearly, there are other factors in play as well. Frawley does not take notice. However, the lower Gangetic plains made the change from the Stone Age to settled, agricultural life only very late: the land east of Kausambi/Allahabad became Neolithic around 1500 and Chalcolithic around 700 BCE (V.N. Misra, Journal of Biosciences 26, 2001; http://www.ias.ac.in/jbiosci/nov2001/533.pdf), and some areas near Benares were even in deep in the Mesolithic then. Indian civilisation simply did not emerge from the lower reaches of the Gangetic valley, with its sure monsoon and abundant, if often flooding, rivers. The Sarasvati and South India Frawley's imagination, however, conjures up another mirage that is not supported by archaeology, a southern origin of Indian agriculture: "agriculture began to arise in the world around 10,000 BCE. Before the end of the Ice Age north India was much drier and cooler in climate. This means that if there was any pre-Ice Age basis for agriculture in north India it would have more likely come from these more suitable southern river regions which had better rainfall at that time." As mentioned, the beginnings of agriculture in India, only around 6500 BCE, lie elsewhere, in Baluchistan. The peninsula became Neolithic only from c. 2500 BCE onwards. However, Frawley has found a way to explain South Indian civilisation as well even while contradicting himself in the process. For, differently from his "southern origins of agriculture" around 10,000 BCE, he then says that the south must have got its culture from the Ganga via the Sarasvati, which "in early ancient times ... flowed east [sic!] of the Yamuna into the Rann of Kachchh." From the supposed lower Sarasvati it is not far to the south, to the "Narmada and Tapti rivers in Gujarat and Maharashtra.... nearby the delta of the Sarasvati." Of course, in those early days, there simply was no agriculture that could be transported southwards, and in the Harappan and Vedic periods the "Sarasvati" ended in delta lakes in the deserts of the Panjab, near Ft. Derawar (Possehl 2002). Also, one of the three older "Sarasvatis" may have indeed have emptied into the Rann (Valdiya 2001), but it did so well before agriculture, when both N. and S. India were still in the deep Stone Age. The early farming societies that arose in the hills (Baluchistan, 6500 BCE) spread to the upper Ghaggar-Hakra "Sarasvati" only much later. Further, S. India remained Neolithic down to the beginnings of the historical period, when a rapid shift to the Iron Age and to state formation took place, due to trade influences with the north and overseas (just as repeated, a little later, in S.E. Asia under Indian cultural, "elite kit" influence). All of this is well represented by the earliest Tamil inscriptions (I. Mahadevan, Early Tamil Epigraphy, Chennai & Harvard, March 2003) and by the genius of southern bards, collected in the Sangam texts just as similar developments are captured by northern bards in the Mahabharata. Clearly Frawley's imagination of an "ecological Sarasvati" North-South link simply is wrong; instead, we can observe a gradual spread of agriculture, out of Sindh, to the

Gujarat/Maharashtrian Malwa and Jorwe cultures (c. 1700-900 BCE). In view of the rather different climatic and thus agricultural conditions (millet!) in the Deccan, it is just another fantasy to maintain: "cultures developing on the rivers in the south of the country ... shared a common climate." All these ecological misconceptions apart, Frawley's paper still contains several much more serious glitches. Culture - agriculture - spirituality? Frawley thinks that "Human culture derives largely from its first culture, which is agriculture." This may be a nice (Latin) "etymology," worthy of a Kratylos, Yaska, or rather a P.N. Oak, but it is a plain, uninformed fallacy. Worse, Frawley maintains that "Any humans in the region would have been aided by the land, the waters and the climate, affording them a great advantage in the development of language and culture." It is news to any anthropologist or historian that agriculture was the first culture which humans developed, and that "language development" depends on agriculture and the intake of wheat, millet or rice. Both taken together, he presents us with a wholly new theory of human development: "You speak and think what you eat." Vaidika that he is, he nevertheless missed his Upanishadic "proof" (Chandogya Up. 6.7.5: `mind consists of food' annamayam ... manah) for this amazing theory. By contrast, it is well-known that early Homo sapiens had developed highly complex systems of thought already by c. 30,000 BCE, as the evidence of the Stone Age rock paintings clearly shows, from Spain, France, the Sahara, Central India (Bhimbetka) to Australia and South Africa. The same can be seen in people who still live in Stone Age hunting or pastoralist societies. They all possess complex orally composed texts and rituals. For example, the Amerindian or Australian aborigines have long ritual texts, and the pastoralist, Turkic speaking Kirghiz have their Manas epic with 20,0000 verses, twice as long as the Mahabharata and still only partially printed. All of this was created without daily cereal intake that Frawley requires for the development of language and culture. If spiritual development depended on the state of agriculture, America would be the most spiritual country in the world... As always, Frawley's view is myopic, Indo-Centric, innocent of crucial (comparative) evidence or he simply leaves out inconvenient data that do not support his pet ideas. Frawley's "ecological" melange of great plains, rivers and a balmy climate cannot but lead him to one, predictable conclusion. "Therefore, we should look to an indigenous development of civilisation in the region. We need not import its people, animals, plants, culture or civilisation from the outside, particularly from barren and inhospitable Central Asia, for example, which would not have been suitable to India and which is separated from it geographically by very hard to cross mountain and desert barriers." All Eurasians, South Asians included, have moved out of Africa, crossing the deserts and mountains of E. Iran, and such relations are also known right at the beginnings of settled life. Renfrew and Bellwood established migration pathways from Mesopotamia of wheat, barley, sheep, and cattle, reaching India by 6000 BCE. In Sanskrit, wheat is called godhuuma "cow smoke" an early popular etymology again worthy of a P.N. Oak, but hardly an original local designation. Instead, it is

derived from the West Asian (Hittite, etc.) khant, and more directly from the predecessor of Iranian (Avest.) gant-uma (Witzel, EJVS 1999). Frawley's "inhospitable" Iranian "desert barriers" have not stopped anyone. In the third millennium BCE trade between Mesopotamia and India proceeded overland and by sea; in addition, millet was first introduced from Africa and was adopted then, by and large, in the dryer areas of the Deccan. The archaeo-botanist D. Fuller (London) has shown that southern Indian crops such as mung bean and foxtail millet appeared in the Deccan at 2800 BCE, but wheat and barley only about 2200 BCE. They were "held up" for some 3000 years in the northwest, before monsoon-tolerant wheat could be developed (Science Magazine 294, 2001, 989). Indigenism Nothing of all of this in Frawley. What he presents is just currently fashionable "indigenist" propaganda, contradicted by what any serious archaeologist tells us, and in the case of Mesopotamia even written documents of the third millennium BCE. South Asia was neither then, nor later on, isolated from the rest of the world. Frawley's indigenism, or shall we say, "Indo-Centrism," is clearly stated: "so far we have looked at history mainly in a non-ecological way, mainly trying to define it according to political, economic or racial concerns" ... with "too much weight on migration, as if culture came from the outside, rather than on the characteristics and necessities of the ecosystems." Ecology apart, certain plants (wheat, millet) and animals (horse, camel) clearly have been imported from the west, from outside India, as linguistics, archaeology, genetics and palaeontology combined tell us (for earliest Indian horses, see now R. Meadow in Journal of Indo-European Studies 2003). Some indigenists, Frawley included, however, simply know better against all of world-wide science. No scholar, of course, maintains that everything has been imported. People import what they find useful. There are many South Asian success stories of domestication as well, such as Frawley's "Brahma bull" (that then made it into early Africa) or a host of local plants. Yet, we must recognise that India was not isolated even then from the steady current of transcontinental exchanges. This negates Frawley's now fashionable claim that any acknowledgment of outside influence must be due to "nineteenth century thought the product of a colonial age (which) found it easy to see culture as something brought in by intruders." He forgets traders. This sentence is, as expected, just the prelude to the Frawleyan mantra: "the Aryan invasion theory ... (as) a product of the pre-ecological age." Let us not go there again, as this is nothing but polemics. How will Frawley's indigenist books measure up 50 years from now or indeed even today? In sum What we get in this article is old indigenist fare in a new, disposable, bio-friendly ecological wrapping. The "new" view remains contradictory, woefully uninformed in many of the humanities and sciences involved, and is simply fantastic in many respects. Frawley's is a simple-minded, monolateral view of history and, in the light of his "thought from food" discovery, even of spirituality, though coming from a staunch, self-avowed spiritualist. The allegedly "simplistic ideas of ethnicity, linguistics or migrations" have been replaced by a view of human development that

is simplistically linear, monomaniac and clearly ahistorical as far as India is concerned. His effort aims at a dumbing down of readers for the nth time. Simple solutions to complex problems may be appealing to many, and are successful in politics. But they are not suitable in scholarship, where manifold facts do not allow for a one-fits-all theory that takes care of complex subjects such as Indian prehistory. The study and writing of history should be guided by deliberations based on scholarship, not by religiously or politically motivated fashion. (Concluded) MICHAEL WITZEL , Harvard University http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/witzel/mwpage.htm

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Mar 18, 2003

Paradigm shift in history Like physics a century ago, historical research today is in the midst of a paradigm shift. New methods need to be devised for dealing with data from sources like underwater archaeology, ecology and satellite photography. THE HISTORY of India, especially of ancient India, is now in the midst of a major debate. This is over new data as well as new methods that they demand. When the study of ancient India by Europeans began in the late Eighteenth century, the driving force was the European discovery of Sanskrit and the extraordinary affinity between it and European languages, especially Latin and Greek. This resulted in new academic disciplines like comparative linguistics and Indo-European studies. It gave rise also to philology, a discipline devoted to the reconstruction of history and culture based on the comparative study of ancient languages such as Sanskrit, Greek, Latin and others. Philology and theology In the light of this, it is natural that the most influential figures in writing Indian history, especially ancient history, happened to be philologists rather than historians in the real sense. They put their stamp on the historical method also. According to Ralph T.H. Griffith, the well-known translator of the Rigveda, "The great interest of the Rgveda (sic) is historical rather than poetical. As in its original language we see the roots and shoots of the languages of Greek and Latin, of Kelt, Teuton and Slavonic, so the deities, the myths, and the religious beliefs and the practices... the comparative history of the religions of the world would have been impossible without the study of the Veda."

The passage is revealing in more ways than one. Philologists and historians of religion saw the Rigveda less as a literary work than as a source of philology and history, especially history of religion. As a result, right from the beginning, the field of linguistics (philology) and Indian history and culture often called Indology became inseparable from religion. And because of the perceived value of the Vedas as source in the study of religions, it soon attracted theologians like Bishop Caldwell and Reverend W.W. Hunter, who continue to exert their influence on Indology. The work of these pioneers both linguists and theologians has left its imprint on the historical method and historiography. Even secular scholars like Max Muller could not escape the influence of theology. The real point is not that Nineteenth century scholars resorted to theological methods and beliefs that go with them, but the continued persistence of such methods and arguments well into the Twentieth century. For example, Murray Emeneau writing as late as 1954 asserted: "At some time in the second millennium BC, probably comparatively early in the millennium, a band or bands of speakers of an Indo-European language, later to be called Sanskrit, entered India over the northwest passes. This is our linguistic doctrine, which has been held for over a century and a half. There seems to be no reason to distrust the arguments for it, in spite of the traditional Hindu ignorance of any such invasion." The fact that such an argument invoking a "linguistic doctrine" as authority could be made a scholarly field in the face of confessed lack of evidence bears testimony to the influence of theology on history. Observing such doctrinaire approaches, the Greek scholar M. Kazanas recently noted: "Several scholars indulge in semantic conjurings saying that various names in the RV (Rigveda) refer to places and rivers in Afghanistan, Baluchistan, Iran, etc., but... such interpreting (turning facts into metaphors and symbols, and vice versa) one can prove anything." (`Indigenous Indo-Aryans and the Rigveda' in: The Journal of Indo-European Studies, Vol. 30, Number 3 and 4, Fall/Winter 2002.) This should not be seen as just disagreement over facts and conclusion, but as getting to the heart of the current debate over methodology between a heritage based on linguistics and theology and an approach that seeks to place empirical data at the bottom of any theory. This phenomenon is more a commentary on human behaviour than objective research. Also, it is by no means limited to history. Even physics, a subject in which empirical data is paramount, has not been exempt from it. Max Planck, one of the founders of modern physics, observed in 1936: "An important scientific innovation rarely makes its way by gradually winning over and converting its opponents: it rarely happens that Saul becomes Paul. What does happen is that its opponents gradually die out and that the growing generation is familiarised with the idea from the beginning." All this highlights a crucial point: when confronted with new data that contradict an established theory, its proponents tend to ignore or rationalise the contradictions with ingenious arguments, or "turning facts into metaphors and symbols" as Kazanas puts it. This becomes more and more complex as data from new fields like geomorphology, satellite photography and genetics have to be dealt with as is the case today. As a result, arguments become highly convoluted taking one further and further from reality. This can be understood by looking at the growing body of knowledge about the Vedic river known as the Sarasvati.

The Sarasvati example The Rigveda gives great importance to a river known as the Sarasvati. While the Ganga receives only one mention, the Sarasvati is mentioned at least 60 times. Vasishta, the seer of the seventh book of the Rigveda (7.95.5) describes Sarasvati as the river (and goddess) that brought prosperity to the "progeny of Nahusha" (Nahusha was one of the ancestors of the Bharatas, who were also known as the Purus and later as the Kurus). He also describes the Sarasvati as "purest among the rivers, flowing from the mountains to the sea." According to Bharadwaja of the sixth book (6.61.2), the Sarasvati in her course through the mountains "crushed boulders like the stems of lotus plants." From all this we learn that the Sarasvati was the greatest river, the most holy and also nourished large populations. This idea finds expression in the following famous verse by Gritsamada (2.41.16): ambitame, naditame, devitame Sarasvati. ("Sarasvati, best of mothers, best river, best goddess.") There is now no river answering to this description. This led scholars to dismiss it as the imagination of poets. This is still the position of some scholars who insist that philology must have the final say in any debate. More to the point, beginning in 1978, evidence for the Sarasvati became available in the form of satellite images acquired by earth-sensing satellites launched by NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) and ISRO (Indian Space Research Organisation). These images showed traces of paleo-channels that lay along the course of the Sarasvati river described in the ancient literature. They showed an ancient river channel ranging in width from 6 to 8 kilometres, exceeding 14 kilometres in places. Once satellite data established the existence of the Sarasvati, several archaeologists, notably the late V.S. Wakankar, undertook the task of locating its course on the ground by correlating satellite data with ground observations. This and the succeeding investigations showed that the Sarasvati river described in the Rigveda is not a myth but a great river that flowed in a course more or less parallel to the Indus but to the east of the Sutlej. After going through many vicissitudes, the Sarasvati dried up completely around 1900 BC, except for a few minor seasonal streams along its former course. Nonetheless, some scholars continue to use arguments, mainly philological, to claim that the river never existed. At the same time, they gave no explanation for the abundant data attesting to its existence but insisted on the validity of their theory. All this has an important lesson to offer. Like science, history must also progress. Progress is always driven by new discoveries that expose the shortcomings of old theories. To take an example, the Michelson-Morley experiment to determine the velocity of light gave rise to Einstein's Theory of Relativity. Also, at crucial points in history, progress comes in quantum jumps rather than in a smooth flow. Paradigm shift This invariably results in a "paradigm shift" that leaves aside old theories and methods. Any such shift leads to new methodologies like the mass-energy equivalence and the uncertainty principle that lie at the foundation of modern physics. This also calls for new disciplines. This appears to be the situation in history today.

Noting this, Dr. B.P. Radhakrishna, President of the Geological Society of India and the editor of the authoritative volume Vedic Sarasvati: Evolutionary History of A Lost River in Northwest India (Geological Society of India) remarked in a recent editorial: "Evidence on the antiquity of Indian civilisation is considerable and can no longer be ignored. Archaeologists have no right to claim any monopoly of interpretation. Findings of other disciplines must also be taken into consideration. ... Geoarchaeology, an emerging field in earth science, has a very important role to play in unravelling the prehistorical evolution of man and civilisation in South Asia. We should build up a strong indigenous school of research in this vital area, with modern tools of underwater sampling, videography and mapping. Only then, can we come out with bold hypothesis to alter the entrenched `semi-colonial' perspectives of history and prehistory that will stand the test of time." This is part of the paradigm shift. It demands new paradigms and a fresh outlook not tied to the past. It is also the challenge before the next generation of historians. N.S. RAJARAM , ([email protected])

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Apr 01, 2003

'Paradigm shift' in history? I Frawley may `love' India all the way he wants, but if he really wants to understand, he must at least begin to study the required sciences, be they anthropology, linguistics, philology, biology or geography. Of course, he does not see the need as he already knows the `secrets' of the Veda. IN MY last contribution (Open Page, February 11, 18), I mentioned the battle for the "soul of India," and N. S. Rajaram (March 18) actually echoes this by pointing out that "the history of ancient India is now in the midst of a major debate." However, what had started as a serious discussion in Open Page in January 2002, has now deteriorated, with D. Frawley's (a.k.a. Vamadeva Shastri) last contribution of March 4, to email-like loudness and abuse, without any answer to the criticism offered, due to lack of arguments. Again, he quotes selectively the oldest trick in the book and twists words, like the run of the mill American tort lawyer. Ad hominem attacks always are an admission of weakness, which I trust readers have noticed. Such diatribes, insinuations, and prevarications are not really worth a detailed rebuttal and I have deliberated on this during a long trip across the Pacific. Yet, an answer seems necessary, after all, in view of the actual defamation contained in Frawley's outpourings, before we can move on to the intellectual topic in question: the presently propagated "innovative, paradigm shifting" view of Indian history (Frawley, Rajaram, et al.) Frawley's piece betrays a large degree of personalisation. As a historian of ideas, I write about content, not about persons. I am not interested in the ephemeral

Vamadevas, Rajarams, or Talageris of the present decade. They only get dragged in when they propose particularly outrageous unscientific ideas that damage scholarly research and thus, incidentally, the international standing of India. This stance has earned me some hatred, daily seen in my email, often with attached destructive viruses, but so be it. Insinuation In Frawley et al.'s "battle" apparently all means are right. They are extremely happy to have found one simple translation "mistake" in 30 years of publications (which rather concerns a point of interpretation, where scholars have differed, see EJVS 7-3 and 7-4 (http://users.primushost.com/{cedil}india/ejvs/issues.html). Frawley's characterisations are often due to ignorance of my work: "Witzel's background is purely as a linguist." Just a brief look at my web site (http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/{cedil}witzel/mwpage.htm) could have taught him otherwise. The same holds for: (He has) "(n)ever written about Indian culture or Bharatiya samskriti in a positive light." All too often, Frawley has received his wisdom in pre-distilled email messages of his friends that lead to his misconceptions. He insinuates that I have (only) "recently done some articles on the Vedic religion" (actually, since 1972), "to show what it really was and to counter the many distortions about it that exist today (probably made by Hindus!)." Insinuation, again: scholars are concerned, on and off, with distortions that are found in books and even on the web, from wherever they may come. In sum: his is an omnium gatherum of selective quotes with very polemic aims, a procedure also favoured by his friend Rajaram (below). Frawley now even tries denunciation with the Government, complaining about the "numerous contemptuous remarks that Witzel makes against Indians, Hindus, India and the Indian government." Like his self-centred friends, he confuses criticism of the Golden Age fantasies of certain writers like him with that of all Hindus, all Indians, or the Indian Government. He overlooks should his maligning succeed that a Vedic specialist/Indologist can always go elsewhere: the ancient cultures of the hills of N.E. Afghanistan, N. Pakistan, Nepal, and those of the Brahmins of Sri Lanka, Thailand, Cambodia, and Bali all are very important and congenial for my research. Deviating for a moment, it is useful to remind the government of one point that is usually neglected. European scholars have worked in the areas just named for decades, without any political problems; they were often supported, instead, by official agreements. This has not really been possible in India ever since Nehru's time. In the above countries, governments have not confused our field research into religion, customs, languages, etc., with the famous "foreign hand," imagined at every other occasion in India, which has generated enormous restrictions on academic research just now seriously reinforced. German Orientalists have an Institute in Beirut/Istanbul but none was possible in India, a country they have cultivated (and indeed loved) for the past 200 years. Therefore, they have worked, instead, in Nepal, the only Hindu kingdom left, with consistently good cooperation since 1970. I have myself negotiated, in 1977, a government agreement allowing us to work anywhere in Nepal in all fields of the humanities and sciences. By contrast, when I tried to merely contact the Union Education Ministry in 1992, I was immediately rebuffed by some low level officer. Such people with limited imagination overlook that any such Oriental Institute is good cultural propaganda for the nation hosting it. Nepal has

gained among the past two generations of scholars many genuine and influential friends in academia and beyond, from Berlin to Washington and Tokyo. I have made this point many times privately, to no avail. Returning to Frawley's piece, it is especially amusing to read that one can only write about the Veda from an insider's point of view, such as he claims for himself: "(Witzel) neither believes in nor practises the Vedic religion" (how does he know that?) "nor has ever shown any respect for its great ancient or modern teachers, much less sought to be a disciple in any Vedic tradition or lineage." Had he actually read my publications he would have seen that I have "praised and respected," among others, Vasishtha, Yajnavalkya, the Buddha, and Panini. He asserts that I do "not claim a deeper study of Indian philosophy, yoga, or spirituality" and pompously admonishes me that if I am "truly interested in real spirituality... India can provide him with quite enough teachers and teachings." Little does he know that I have sat at the lotus feet of the late Rajguru of Nepal, studying Mimamsa philosophy, the traditional key to the Vedas, all while speaking in Sanskrit. American culture Frawley claims to be at the very centre of Indian/Hindu tradition, to be a Vedic Pandit and Astrologer. As such, he already knows what the Veda says. By contrast we, the philologists, are engaged in a constant endeavour to come ever closer to the original (not just the medieval) meaning of the texts. However, for all of his Vaidika training, he still has not understood where he comes from: out of America, that is from a culture where mothers have to keep telling their children "I love you" and where some of these may complain "my mother never told me that she loved me." Imagine this in Asia or Europe, where nobody would think it necessary to say so, as it is tacitly understood, expected, and experienced daily. Action, not empty, perfunctory assertion, counts. However, Americans, be they Tom, Dick or George II, need constant reassurance: "Your dress, your book, your country is great! And, we are on your side!" No wonder then that Frawley constantly insists on verbally expressing his "love for India" and that he misses such empty assertions in my writing. In my own local German culture such flattery is commonly regarded as the (polite) lie that it is, and it is viewed with deserved suspicion or even derision. Americanisation, also in this respect, is not a universal panacea, even if it comes from a "Vedic Pandit." With Krishna, it is action that counts. Must I always add, in Frawley's fluent American, "I have loved and savoured Indian music, painting, philosophy, literature, etc., since High School?" And why should I have devoted all of my adult life to the study of ancient India out of hate, since age 16 or so? Incidentally, with very little prospect to become "rich and famous," as they repeat here daily. And, why should I have worked in South Asia for nearly six years at a stretch, with my young family, in the still very medieval Kathmandu of the Seventies? At universities unlike at Frawley's ashram we want to understand, not just retell or praise, the matter we study. We want to know how Indian culture "works." One may have a great love for music but, at the same time, no real understanding of Raga and Tala not to speak of the various Shruti systems. Frawley may "love" India all the way he wants, but if he really wants to understand, he must at least begin to study the required sciences, be they anthropology, linguistics, philology, biology or geography. Of course, he does not see the need as he already knows the "secrets" of the Veda: "the world of Vedic scholarship does not require them (foreign

Indologists) to explain the secrets of the Vedas, which clearly they don't even suspect, much less know." This is the optimistic but unproved insider's view. Buoyed by such confidence, he prefers just to chant OM. His home-bred limitations are also seen in his characterisation of certain ethnicities as "primitives" (Open Page, March 14, Munda "aboriginals" Aug. 20), alleging that I regard "both (Aryan and Dravidian) peoples as equally primitive and as not having even developed agriculture much less any civilisation of their own," or when he speaks of "uncivilised, primitive nomadic tribes." Witness his repeated equation of material civilisation, even agriculture, with culture: the usual American conflation of material with spiritual (religious, poetic, etc.) culture, "civilisation." Finally, Frawley is another example of certain American "Gurus" who combine "spirituality" with business (and, quite a few of them, notoriously, also with sex), and who are followed by men in business suits who manage their wealth, derived from gullible people. Frawley has mixed his own brand of "Vedic spirituality" with payments required for his astrology consultations. As an "insider," he imposes a certain set of beliefs and attitudes, increasingly so about early Indian history, in "missionary," un-Hindu fashion. Amusingly, this kind of catechism-like ukase has often been deplored by some of the more nationalistic circles in India as "Abrahamic" (i.e. of Jewish-Christian-Muslim outlook). Indian tradition has always stressed multiple ways to approach truth or the Ultimate, but Frawley knows and requires us to believe his dicta, and thus, he threatens me with the usual condemnations in chauvinistic websites and with his very own denunciation, addressed to the NRIs and the Indian government barely falling short of "Abrahamic" threatening with brimstone and hell fire. In short: "India does not need people like Witzel to save its soul" as if I had ever proposed to do so. (One among more than one billion? From my small office in Cambridge, Mass.?) Yet, this "insider" is certainly not listening to his self-elected Vaidik tradition. The Kashmirian Katha Shiksha Upanishad, first edited and translated by Witzel (1977/1979), or the closely related Taittiriya Upanishad (1.11), that many still know by heart, would have told him: "Speak the truth, behave according to Dharma, ... one should not be negligent of truth ... if there should be Brahmans competent to judge... not harsh (in behaviour),... as they may behave themselves... so you should behave !" Writing stories & rewriting history What all of this is really about is the battle about the view of (Old) Indian History. I had never thought that the subject of the Veda would become a bone of political contention. However, ever since my summary historical papers on the Rgveda in 1995, I have been attacked by "patriotic" internet and other personages (see EJVS 7-2, intro.) and my comfortable stay in the ivory tower has been abruptly terminated. In their new nationalistic view of history, Frawley, Rajaram, et al. (O.P. March 4, 18) cannot stomach that something in Indian culture could have come from the outside, especially not the "Aryans." In Frawley's words, I believe that "people and culture must come to India from the outside ... regardless of how many peoples and cultures India is able to produce." How do you "produce" a people?

Instead, serious researchers have told us that we all descend from the so-called African Eve and that early Homo sapiens has entered the subcontinent at 75,000 BCE, or by 30,000 BCE at the latest, after crossing the Red Sea and South Arabia (mtDNA M, and Y chromosome IV and V), and that these people proceeded to S.E. and E. Asia along the now submerged coastlines. Later on, many waves of immigrants have entered the subcontinent (Y Chrom. III, IX from the Near East, Central Asia, etc.) but they have hardly proceeded further (cul-de-sac, which has angered Frawley, O.P. Aug. 20). He better face the newly emerging genetic facts. Actually, all the subcontinents of Asia, the European, S.W., South, S.E. and East Asian ones, have constantly been entered and criss-crossed by new waves of peoples. This early influx was followed in recorded history, from 519 BCE onwards, by one wave of immigrants or invaders after the other. The speakers of the Old Indo-Aryan language (Vedic), too, must have come from somewhere in Central Asia/Iran as their language reflects cool climate plants and animals. The same Central Asian loan words for village life and religious items as in Rgvedic are also found with the Mitanni-Indo-Aryans in N. Iraq and N. Syria (1450-1350 BCE), whose language and religion is very close to, but slightly older than Rgvedic. Frawley et al. also overlook or deny the well-known reminiscences of Afghanistan and Central Asia in the Rgveda (all summarised in EJVS 7-3). All of this simply cannot be allowed by indigenists as it affects their fantasised "Vedic Harappan" period, their "Sindhu-Sarasvati civilisation." Frawley complains that I let the Rgvedic poet Vasishtha lead King (chieftain) Bharata out of Eastern Iran into India which I have not written. His own American background leads him to allege that I am "influenced by the story of how biblical Moses led the Jews out of Egypt into Israel, ... while the Bible remembers such an exodus, no such Vedic or Puranic records exist." He forgets about Central Asian reminiscences, worse, and that the biblical account is now regarded by archaeologists as pure myth. Similar scenarios hold for the Dravidian languages especially if indeed related to the Nostratic ones (Afroasiatic, Georgian, Uralic, Indo-European, Altaic) and as most of their agricultural vocabulary seems closely related to Sumerian (Blazek & Boisson, Archiv Orientalni 60, 1992, 16-37). To no avail, says Frawley: "(Witzel) regards both peoples (Aryans and Dravidians) as equally primitive and as not having even developed agriculture much less any civilisation of their own." No tribe on this planet is "primitive" a 19th century, colonialist's term strangely surviving in this spiritualist's vocabulary: e.g., the Stone Age Australians have a complicated social system, mythology (dream time) and oral literature, just as the Old Indo-Aryans or Dravidians. Therefore, I "equate the sophisticated and advanced Vedic literature with the compositions of uncivilised, primitive nomadic tribes" such as those of the early Rgveda with that of the earliest Indo-European or other tribes. Frawley has indeed repeatedly offended Austro-Asiatic peoples such as the Munda or Khasi (O.P. Aug. 20), disqualifying them (O.P., Feb. 11). (To be concluded) MICHAEL WITZEL (www.fas.harvard.edu/{cedil}witzel/mwpage.htm)

The Hindu Open Page Tuesday, Apr 08, 2003

Paradigm shift' in history? - II Scholarship is not local but universal. Those who want to turn it back in indigenous fashion may succeed for a while but their pronouncements will eventually be thrown out on the dung heap of history. The history of a great civilisation such as the Indian one does not deserve to be hijacked by narrow parochial, nationalistic, chauvinistic or political interests. A truly international approach is needed, with input from many sides. SCHOLARS STILL know nothing definite of the language of the Indus (Harappan) civilisation, and have not taken a close look at the early substrate language(s) preceding the Rgveda (EJVS 5-1) as well as at the Indus words found in the Sumerian Near East (both are not Dravidian). Any Indian language family, now present or completely lost, can have been spoken there (Proto-Burushaski, ProtoMunda, Masica's Gangetic "language X", etc.). But, for Frawley et al. the Indus language was Sanskrit, and they cannot accept old, local people as originators of the Indus civilisation. Well, Sumerian, Akkadian, Elamite have disappeared, too. He also complains (Open Page, March 4) bitterly about my view that certain persons or tribes have entered later than the bulk of the Indo-Aryans. While there are some textual and linguistic indications that the Rgvedic Vasishtha is a late immigrant from an Old Iranian (Avestan) speaking territory (the two languages are almost dialects of each other), I do not recall to have written that "Agastya, the ... greatest Vedic sage of ... south India, (was) in fact Iranian." Instead, I have classified his name, with others, as local Indian, though non-Indo-Aryan. (Neither South India, Sindh, Gujarat, etc., are mentioned in the Rgveda). Frawley's most ridiculous charge is that, according to me, "Buddhism itself might even be an Iranian heresy, not anything really Indian." This is a pure fabrication. We have discussed the Shakya/Saka connection in the professional Indology list. I have pointed to a Saka (Central Asian) origin of the Shakya tribe of Kapilavastu/Lumbini, but I have expressively stated ([email protected], Nov. 5 and 7, 2002), that the Shakya had been Indianised. Frawley has again derived his wisdom from his co-fighters' predigested email summaries. Incorrect conclusion By now it must be obvious that Frawley speaks from an ethnocentric, indigenous, indeed Indo-centric world view shared by the current rewriters of history, such as S.P. Gupta, S.S. Misra, Rajaram, K. Elst. They are struggling, along with their

various political counterparts, to capture "the soul of India." Obviously, I cannot do that, nor do I want to. As a historian of ideas, I record and discuss even those of the persons just named. Such struggles for the soul of India are not new. In my recent small Indian history (in German) I have detailed similar developments after the Mauryas, leading to the re-invention and restoration of a new-found, restrictive Hindu identity under the Guptas. However, this expansive topic would need a detailed discussion that cannot be included here. Occasionally, we should indeed learn from history... This brings us from the incidental, curious opinions of Frawley to the "theoretical" paper of Rajaram (Open Page, March 18), who claims a deep division over the "history of India, especially of ancient India... This is over new data as well as new methods that they demand." Rajaram's piece is, as usual, just as exasperatingly wrong in many of its details as in its major points. Like an undergraduate paper, it starts from a wrong premise, supplies faulty and incomplete materials, and necessarily reaches an incorrect conclusion. This is perhaps to be expected from a technologist turned amateur historian, after retirement some twelve years ago. Rajaram simply cannot get his facts right, not even those as simple as the history of scholarship in the 19th/20th century, when he overstresses the role of IndoEuropean linguistics (his "philology") in the study of old India. Rather, philology is the study of a particular civilisation based on its texts, not "a discipline devoted to the reconstruction of history and culture based on the comparative study of ancient languages." He still lives in the 19th century as almost all those he quotes, just like his crown witness N. Kazanas (below). Worse, "theologians like Bishop Caldwell and Reverend W.W. Hunter ... continue to exert their influence on Indology." Already 35 years ago, as a student, I vaguely heard just of Caldwell, and only as the first scholar of the Dravidian language family. Even more ridiculously, he says that "secular scholars like Max Muller could not escape the influence of theology." Until now Rajaram had pictured Mueller, based on just two opportunistic sentences in his letters, as a missionary type the same Mueller who lost out, due to his liberalism, in the election for the Oxford Sanskrit chair against Monier Williams as he was not trusted by the then still locally dominant British clergy. Some decades earlier (1831), his contemporary, the German philologist K. Lachmann, had undertaken a critical philological comparison of the mutually disagreeing four official versions of the biblical New Testament, and an Indologist, P. Deussen, could already write, at the end of the 19th century, a history of the scientific, and no longer religious study of biblical (and other ancient) texts. Selective quotations Rajaram, innocent of such historical details "too bad for the facts!" continues his fantasy of religious influence on 19th/20th century philology and linguistics by quoting a single passage written by M. B. Emeneau (1954): "At some time in the second millennium BC ... a band or bands of speakers of an Indo-European language, later to be called Sanskrit, entered India over the northwest passes. This is our linguistic doctrine." While the choice of the word "doctrine" is not felicitous, but understandable in the context, Rajaram again uses, just like his friend Frawley, a "method" of selective quotations. The now 99-year-old Emeneau only writes (still!) about linguistics; he is co-author, with Th. Burrow, of the magnum opus, the

Dravidian Etymological Dictionary certainly a work without any theology if there is one. Rajaram, however, has no idea how comparative Dravidian or Indo-European, or any other field of linguistics, works: "a scholarly field in the face of confessed lack of evidence bears testimony to the influence of theology on history." Apparently linguistic evidence and method is too complicated for him ("convoluted," as he says). He still has no idea that Hittite or Mycenean data actually prove (EJVS 7-3) how well the early predictions of linguistics have worked for languages that have been discovered only much later. A method that can make falsifiable predictions is part of, well, science. Further, the study of language is largely empirical, and languages change over time in empirically visible fashion, recorded and explained by comparative linguistics (not by "philology"!) Therefore Rajaram's perceived opposition in the "current debate over methodology between a heritage based on linguistics and theology [sic!] and an approach that seeks to place empirical data at the bottom of any theory" is a doubly wrong one. It is not one shared by serious specialists from archaeology to Indology. Indeed, the almost complete lack of comparative historical linguistics (as well as comparative religion) is a serious but very real gap in current scholarship in India leading to many unchecked statements as those of Rajaram et al. Even the lone Indian Indo-Europeanist, the late S.S. Misra, unfortunately was much behind the current state of the art and has produced a truly indigenous version of IndoEuropean studies that nobody, from San Francisco to London and Tokyo regards as science (see EJVS 7-3). Not surprisingly, Rajaram quotes a kindred spirit, a declared non-specialist, the Greek "philosopher" and head of a New Age institution in Athens, N. Kazanas, about linguistic procedure. He alleges: when "data ... contradict an established theory, its proponents tend to ignore or rationalise the contradictions with ingenious arguments, or "turning facts into metaphors and symbols" as Kazanas puts it. This becomes more and more complex as data from new fields like geomorphology, satellite photography and genetics have to be dealt with as is the case today. As a result, arguments become highly convoluted taking one further and further from reality." Of course, Rajaram habitually suppresses, just like Frawley, contradictory evidence and discussion: one should read the many devastating answers by diverse specialists to Kazanas' paper (Journal of Indo-European Studies, JIES, 30-31, 2002-3). Such arguments may appear convoluted to a linguistic ignoramus all sciences are complex for an outsider but they are simple and clear for initiated specialists. I do not write about relativity theory, and Rajaram should not pose as a linguist or philologist: the unfortunate results are seen in his fantastic "decipherment" of the Indus seals ("mosquito", "house in the grip of cold," etc.), and they include his ingenious computer graphics that turn the hind parts of an Indus half bull into a full Vedic horse, along with a conveniently "deciphered" inscription speaking of the Vedic sun horse (see Frontline, Oct./Nov., 2000). A new Purana? All of Rajaram's discussion of linguistics/"philology" and the alleged influence of theology on history writing, detailed above, is merely the setup for his introduction of the concept of "paradigm change." Since past history writing was "marred" he offers the banal truism: "Like science, history must also progress" and envisions a

paradigm change that would involve the natural sciences. This "shift leads to new methodologies, ... that seek to place empirical data at the bottom of any theory," as if empirical data had never been used like this before. Obviously, B.P. Radhakrishna, quoted by him, is right in saying that scholars of just one field, e.g., "Archaeologists have no right to claim any monopoly of interpretation. Findings of other disciplines must also be taken into consideration." But all of them, including texts, inscriptions, art, philology, linguistics, biology, climatology, geography, astronomy, etc. have always provided their share, wherever possible, to the elucidation of ancient Indian history. So where is Rajaram's sudden "paradigm change"? And more importantly, where should that lead to? Rajaram again quotes Radhakrishna: "We should build up a strong indigenous school of research in this vital area, with modern tools of underwater sampling, videography and mapping." Certainly, the more scientific data, the better. But, simple dredging, such as recently done in the Gulf of Cambay that delivered one carbon dated piece of wood, moved by the swift currents of the gulf, cannot ascertain the date of a much-touted, alleged 8th millennium "city" (whose buildings are simply derived from some scanning). As prominent scientists have pointed out, evidence from actual underwater archaeology is necessary. However, Radhakrishna continues: "Only then, can we come out with bold hypothesis to alter the entrenched `semi-colonial' perspectives of history and prehistory." It is unclear what he really means by this. His papers in the book "Vedic Sarasvati" (together with S.S. Mehr, 1999) rather point to a bold "patriotic" view, which chimes in with Rajaram's "paradigm change." Of course, both Rajaram and Frawley have contributed to this book. The question remains: which paradigm? Rajaram et al.'s schemes lead to an indigenist version, one that excludes evidence of comparative, outside data they do not like. Thus, the imported steppe animal, the horse, must be Indian, just as the invention of the horse-drawn chariot (first attested near the Urals/Mesopotamia only around 2000 BCE); the early Indo-Iranian loan words into Uralic are neglected just as Dravidian loan words taken from Sumerian agriculture (details in EJVS 7-3). This is not just simple "patriotic" indigenism, or building up of "a strong indigenous school of research," it is Indo-centrism. What will Rajaram's "challenge before the next generation of historians" lead to if these proceed in this blinkered fashion? I suspect: a new, Bharatiya Purana. The currently increasing self-reflection and assertion of "national" features would lead to a narrow "patriotic" view of history, just as the Gupta time Puranas (composed after c. 320 CE) were a step backwards to a narrow mythological view of the world, after several enlightened centuries that saw free exchange with the outside world in trade and ideas. International reaction to such a new Purana-like historiography will be the same as that to S.S. Misra's Indo-centric Indo-European linguistics or N.I. Marr's Soviet linguistics: either derision or benign neglect. Data-based approach Scholarship is not local but universal. Those who want to turn it back in indigenous fashion may succeed for a while but their pronouncements will eventually be thrown out on the dung heap of history. The history of a great civilisation such as the Indian one does not deserve to be hijacked by narrow parochial, nationalistic, chauvinistic or political interests. A truly international approach is needed, with input from many sides. For example, the Japanese scholar N. Karashima, with his meticulous, strongly

data-based approach, has done so for the history of South India, against various "fashionable" theories. What is needed is not just a "bold" indigenous theory but calm, methodological, and systematic investigation, aided by all relevant disciplines. It is in this context that we must view the current battle for the "soul of India." It is raging in the Indian media, in various sections of the general public, and among various groups of scholars. However, a detailed analysis of this trend must be postponed to another contribution that would take into account the general framework of the times: such as a narrow postcolonial reaction, general selfsearching, and rampant re-invention of tradition. (Concluded) MICHAEL WITZEL , www.fas.harvard.edu/{cedil}witzel/mwpage.htm

THE HARAPPA/VEDA DISCUSSION (2002) Since January 2002, the prominent Indian Newspaper, THE HINDU (OPEN PAGE, published on every Tuesday) has carried an extensive discussion on the relation between the Harappan (Indus) Civilization (2600-1900 BCE) and the Vedic Civilization (c. 1500-500 BCE). This discussion has dealt among others, with the question of an overlap or even an identification between both cultures, as recently championed by some rewriters of Indian history. One of them, the scientist turned historian, N.S. Rajaram, of Harappan Horse Fraud fame (FRONTLINE, 2000), fired the first volley. All articles of this year's exchange are listed below. Note: Reliable information on the Vedas is rare to find on the internet. Therefore it is useful to refer to the 100 pp. survey, linked above (Vedic civilization). It was written in 1992/3, but has not been published to far beyond some samizdat distribution among friends and students. About half of it will now come out in a volume edited by A. Sharma, Studies on Hinduism, Univ. of S. Carolina Press 2003. The present version will be updated, eventually. 1/22/02 N.S. Rajaram : Historical divide: archaeology and literature http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/01/22/stories/2002012200020100.ht m 1/29/02 M. Witzel Indus Civilisation and Vedic society http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/01/29/stories/2002012900080100.ht m

2/5/02 Clarence Maloney : Vedic-Indus debate: save Indian civilisation today http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/02/05/stories/2002020500210100.ht m

2/19/02 N.S. Rajaram: Theory and evidence http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/02/19/stories/2002021900040100.ht m 3/5/02 M. Witzel : Harappan horse myths and the sciences http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/03/05/stories/2002030500130100.ht m

3/12/02 R. Nagaswamy: Harappan horse http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/03/12/stories/2002031200190100.ht m

5/21/02 M. Witzel (assisted by Richard Meadow): Horses, logic, and evidence http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/05/21/stories/2002052100060200.ht m

6/18/02 David Frawley: Vedic literature and the Gulf of Cambay discovery http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/06/18/stories/2002061800030200.ht m 6/25./02 M. Witzel : A maritime Rigveda? How not to read ancient texts

http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/06/25/stories/2002062500030200.ht m 7/2/02 R. Nagaswamy : From Harappan horse to camel http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/07/02/stories/2002070200110200.ht m 7/9/02 Patrizia Norelli-Bachelet : Cosmology in Rigveda the third premise http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/07/09/stories/2002070900110200.ht m 7/16/02 D.,Frawley: Witzel's vanishing ocean http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/07/16/stories/2002071600070200.ht m 8/6/02 M. Witzel Philology vanished: Frawley's Rigveda I http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/08/06/stories/2002080600070200.ht m

8/13/02 M. Witzel: Philology vanished: Frawley's Rigveda II http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/08/13/stories/2002081300020200.ht m 8/20/02 D.Frawley: Witzel's philology http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2002/08/20/stories/2002082000120200.ht m

Note: The last article by Frawley, especially his various allegations, selective quotations and the resulting distortions, certainly is in need of some answer; I will come back to the whole question at an opportune occasion. -MW. -- PS. : see now below, Feb.11, 2003, and in detail: April 1, 2003

Rajaram and Frawley, however, continue their quest for the remotest imaginable, hoary date of "Indian Civilization" (cf. the Antiquity Frenzy elsewhere), as seen at: 12/3/02: The Hindu, (Nation): New light on south Indian civilisation http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/2002/12/03/stories/2002120302010900.htm Answered on 12/4//02 by M., Witzel: Rewriting History http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/2002/12/04/stories/2002120400321003.htm

1/21/2003 D.Frawley: An ecological view of ancient India http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2003/01/21/stories/2003012100110200.ht m 2/11/2003 M. Witzel Ecology, rhetoric or dumbing down? -- I http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2003/02/11/stories/2003021100060200.ht m 2/18/2003 M.Witzel : Ecology, rhetoric or dumbing down? --II http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2003/02/18/stories/2003021800050200.ht m

3/18/2003 N.S. Rajaram: Paradigm shift in history http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2003/03/18/stories/2003031800050200.ht m

4/1/2003 M.Witzel :'Paradigm shift' in history? I http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2003/04/01/stories/2003040100110200.ht m 4/8/2003 M. Witzel: 'Paradigm shift' in history? II http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/op/2003/04/08/stories/2003040800010200.ht

Full uncut text of: Answer to Nagaswamy, by Michael Witzel (assisted by Richard Meadow): Horses, logic, and evidence To THE HINDU, OPEN PAGE 3/21/02 Horses, logic, and evidence The vexed question of the 'Harappan Horse' does not seem to go away. I am glad to see that my last paper in OPEN PAGE has elicited such a strong reaction, this time from a professional archaeologist, Dr. R. Nagaswamy, the former Director of Archaeology, Tamil Nadu. He has narrowed down the long debate about the Indus and Vedic civilizations to the question of horses in the archaeological record, about which more below. To begin with, Nagaswamy and I certainly agree about the need of 'rewriting' ancient Indian history from time to time. This is a normal procedure in historiography when new data have been discovered that result in the need for new interpretations. I also agree that this "should be entrusted to an unbiased and balanced academic body free from racial, religious or political bias" as well as to individual, well prepared scholars who can contribute their insights. Certainly, we can also agree that "South Indian history [has] receive[d] inadequate representation" so far. However, it will be difficult to "confine such debates to post-graduate community of the country and [as to assure] our children are told only the factual history." What is factual history? And how does one decide this? Obviously, interpretation of various types of data is involved here, and the results of such discussions printed in history books will be based on extensive debate and a certain amount of scholarly consensus. We both would also agree that such interpretations should not be long discarded ones, e.g., those of M. Wheeler ("Indra stands accused" referring to the destruction of the Indus cities). However, they should also not be such as the recent fantasies of N.S. Rajaram (et al.), whose "decipherment" of the Indus script and all interpretations that flow from this are a priori wrong because he uses the wrong direction of the script, a direction that was securely established decades ago by the former Dir. Gen. of Archaeology, B.B. Lal (see also I. Mahadevan, at the Indian History Congress, Dec. 2001, and in EJVS 8-1, http://users.primushost.com/~india/ejvs/issues.html) "Digs" at the writings of persons such as Rajaram thus have their well-justified reasons. Especially so, as he has recently been appointed by the Minister of HRD as a member of the ICHR, just after I sent in my last piece. Such appointments spell the end of scientific history writing and open the door to Raamraaj fantasies galore.

However, since I am neither an Indian citizen nor a professional historian, I refrain from further comment. Second, there is the vexed question of the "Harappan horse". Though merely being a philologist and something of linguist, I have read the relevant scientific literature, and I have additionally asked some scientist colleagues, just to be 100% sure. For my last piece in OPEN PAGE I consulted archaeologists and archaeozoologists, upon whose advice I have changed two or three sentences. I showed my piece, for example, to my colleague at Harvard, R. Meadow. He is both an archaeologist and an archaeozoologist (one who studies animal bones from archaeological sites). In addition, he happens to be a Director of the Harappa Archaeological Research Project, where he has been digging for more than a decade; he also knows first hand many other early sites, e.g., Mehrgarh and Pirak in Baluchistan. Amusingly, it is exactly the very sentence that the archaeologist Nagaswamy criticized that I changed based on input from the Harappan archaeologist R. Meadow, namely that horse bones are likely to have "found their way into deposits through erosion cutting and refilling, disturbing the archaeological layers." Nagaswamy complains that "neither does he say how he arrived at this conclusion nor has he cited any report in support of his view." Unfortunately my references for this were cut by editors; here are the details: R. Meadow in: The Review of Archaeology, 19, 1998, 12-21; R. Meadow in: D.R. Harris (ed.) The Origins and Spread of Agriculture and Pastoralism in Eurasia.1996, 390-41. UCL Press, London; R. Meadow and A. Patel in: South Asian Studies,13, 1997, 308-315. Here for Nagawamy then are the references to the still elusive "Harappan horse." If Nagaswamy had read such relevant technical literature himself he would have seen why the archaeozoological situation is as bad as I described it. But since he has not, he perfectly exemplifies the case I made, namely that archaeologists do not necessarily know enough of archaeozoology, and their judgments thereof can be flawed. For example, G.M. Pande's book (The Dawn of Indian Civilization,Delhi 1999, quoted earlier) mentions many times just "horses," without any further specification of equid type or any discussion. But, this kind of statement is believed at face value, as I have seen, by both the general and scholarly public. Unfortunately Nagaswamy has also not checked the archaeological sources well enough. When he says that "there are three major excavations conducted at Mohenjodaro and Harappa namely by Marshal, Mackey and Mortimer Wheeler... George F. Dales, who was the last in the series to investigate the sites..." (1982), apart from contradicting himself within a few words, he simply overlooks decades of excavations at Harappa (and elsewhere!), -- excavations that have been reported in archaeological publications and even in a recent generally available synthesis by J. M. Kenoyer, Ancient Cities of the Indus Valley Civilization. Oxford 1998. All of this should perhaps not surprise. As far as I can see, R. Nagaswamy has proficiently published on Tamil literature, culture, and archaeology, -- including even one excavation report (about Vasavasamudram), written together with Abdul Masjeed in 1978. This lacuna may be the reason why he resorts to a discussion of "logic" instead. However, the evaluation of archaeological / archaeozoological detail cannot be reduced to "logic" by comparing various sentence from my paper, as he does: "Such

arguments are brought under reductio ad absurdum by logicians". Instead, to state it clearly one more time: what we need is absolute security (to the degree scientifically possible) with regard to identification of the bones themselves, radiocarbon dates directly on the bones in question, and a detailed understanding of the archaeological context from which they come. It is evidence that counts, not a "logic game". Nagaswamy even distills from my paper that "it only shows that horse bones were actually found in the excavations at Harappan sites." But, this is precisely what was and still is under discussion! Even if we accept the identifications as true horse of material from the old excavations (and this still needs to be rechecked by specialists using the original material), we lack the other two pieces of information -- context and direct date -- that are necessary to securely interpret the cultural meaning of those identifications. As scholars know, archaeology just as paleontology (or linguistics) is all about location, context, and stratification. An isolated horse skeleton, complete or not, just shows that a horse was present in that location at some time in the past. As an example, a nearly complete camel bone (humerus) was found at Harappa about a meter below the surface together with artifactual remains that could be assigned by archaeologists to the last part of the "mature" Harappan period (ca. 2200-1900 BC). A direct radiocarbon date on the bone itself, however, came out to be 690 CE, more than two thousand years later (Meadow 1996 & 1998): a clear case of a deposit effected "through erosion cutting and refilling." If, in addition, that find is not recorded in detail (and actually reported in print!) it is almost worthless, just as in linguistics a modern Sanskrit word like kendra"center," could go back to a formation based on the modern English 'center' or could be derived from a Greek word, (kentron)-- which is the case, as it is already attested by Varahamihira at 550 CE. The levels are clear here. But bones from old and not well recorded excavations (Nagaswamy himself quotes some doubts in Dales' review of Indus excavations!), bones that in addition have not been radiocarbon dated and may not have been correctly identified through comparison with modern specimens, just do not provide suitable evidence. The alleged find of a horse or camel bone at Harappa without details of the identification, the context, and a direct date then is open to question: yesterday's Afghan or Sikh sipahi'shalf-horse can be turned into tomorrow's full Harappan horse... In sum, in the sciences we cannot work with data that do not conform to strict procedures and methods, such as those delineated above. Third, as for the discussion of various equids (true horse, ass, half-ass/onager), Nagaswamy complains that I do "not show whether R. Meadow ... based his views on a full skeleton or full sets of onager, donkey, or horse skeletons." Again Meadow (and I, quoting him) has explained fully in his 1996-1998 papers why such detailed comparison is necessary, and that good collections of modern specimens, necessary to compare such finds, are only just now being established in South Asia itself. Fourth, when true horses are indeed found, finally, in the Kachi Plain of East Baluchistan at c. 1800 BCE, this does not make them Harappan, as Nagaswamy maintains: "...1800 BCE, which still falls in the late Harappan period". A study of the Pirak data would show that these sites are post-Mature-Harappan and have a very different material culture inventory than the earlier Harappan sites in the same area. To lump all cultures from 3500 to 1500 BCE together as "Harappan" (or even as "Sarasvati" -- before its actual naming!) is not correct, and opens the door to all

sorts of unscholarly rewritings of ancient history, in other words, to new myth making. In sum, in my recent OPEN PAGEarticle, I intentionally preferred to err on the side of caution: Advised by specialists, I specified the conditions that are necessary to identify horses, and I did not simply follow the conclusions of various writers as to the nature of one set of bones or the other. To repeat it one final time: we need the bones in contention 1) to come from well stratified deposits the formation of which is understood, 2) to be carefully identified with the reasons for their identification published in detail, and 3) to be directly radiocarbon dated if possible. At the present time, these conditions have not been met well, and all conclusions must be explicitly preliminary or else they can only be called speculative or misleading. If this stance is called "taking a partisan view", then I may gladly be called partisan. This certainly is better than to find, with Rajaram et al., horses (or "fire altars") all over the early subcontinent (see Frontline,Oct./Nov. 2000). Such writers see horses everywhere, just as some see Krishna everywhere: "He who sees me everywhere and sees everything in me..." (Bhagavad-Gita 6. 30) Or at least, Rajaram did so. By now, in messages sent to his followers, he has twice has given up pursuing any further discussions. To sum it up once more, we can certainly agree to rewrite sections of ancient Indian history, but this has to be done on the basis of new facts, not of new myths or of incomplete archaeological or zoological data. It is the duty of scholars to point out such new myths before they enter the new textbooks. And with this, I leave the field to the scientists. Michael Witzel (assisted by Richard Meadow) Harvard University