Talk:Out of India theory

Can we link http://www.indoeurohome.com/ or is that over the top? It's a beautiful specimen of kookery, the man is even proudly displaying a letter from Jan Puhvel politely returning his 'material' calling his stuff 'erudite esoterica' :o)

The relationship between the Cypriot script and early Chinese phonitics and radicals points to some parts of this script having been formed before the exodus of the Indus Valley (link to that page below). The sign that started me to look at the Ecliptic stars is the sign next to zo it is the the same sign used today for Aquarius.

This chap is a riot, there can be no doubt he could decipher a 3-years-old's doodles as Vedic Sanskrit dab (ᛏ) 16:31, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Ah yes, this is WIN's latest bit of "evidence" isn't it. I had a quick look at it the other day, but it seemed barely decipherable! I'll add it to external links. Paul B 10:22, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

only if we add this to Category:Pseudoscience -- I realize the 19th century proposals were perfectly defensible, and we need to take care to distinguish between serious but obsolete theories and this sort of hilarious quackery :) dab (ᛏ) 13:43, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Siting this website is not written as some evidence by me. Your words as wrong & mis-leading in totality. There are many points which goes against AIT / AMT. Why I don't find any comment on that ? Because you are just negating valid against points , mine or any `against AIT/AMT theory' scholars. Why don't you write instead and not skip that against points in talk pages of AIT and AMT. WIN 06:06, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

your words do not even parse WIN, far from making any sort of point beyond spreading an aura of surrealism. dab (ᛏ) 08:10, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

AIM link

Nobleeagle, your description of

The Aryan Invasion model suggests that an Aryan race, which originiated from outside India, were the creators of the Vedas and the original speakers of Sanskrit.

smacks of the 19th century. No-one would speak of an "Aryan race" today, and no-one would claim the immigrating Indo-Aryan speakers were "the creators of the Vedas and the original speakers of Sanskrit". These are either strawmen consciously set up to be shot down, or else "anti-IAM" polemicists really think this is what is proposed, in which case it is no wonder they feel uncomfortable with it. It would be correct to state that the immigrating Indo-Aryan speakers were the linguistic ancestors of the later (Indian!) people who established the Vedic schools 1,000 years later, and that Sanskrit is a refined language based on the vernacular of this early people. This is so different from the childish notion of a conquering Vedic Aryan race that I don't know what else to say if it doesn't impress itself on you. I think the problem is that Hindu culture is lacking a sense of history, which makes it impossible for people to wrap their minds around the concept of historical change. They are capable of imagining the proposition of the intrusion of a fully formed Vedic/Sanskritic culture, an idea which they rightly discard immediately, but they seem quite uncapable of conceiving of the genesis of Vedic/Sanskritic culture within India in the early Iron Age. After reading so much of this stuff on Wikipedia, I really think that this is what lies at the bottom of this almost comical impassé: scholars propose Vedic culture formed, in India, 1800-1000 BC. Hindu nationalists hear "Vedic culture originated in Central Asia" and are outraged. dab (ᛏ) 08:43, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

Look, the article I was sourcing was talking about the apparent 19th century version. I believe that under WP:OR, we shouldn't be misrepresenting the context of a particular view or article. In anycase, Dr. Agarwal's point was that Vedic culture originated long before 1500 BC, which is still around when scholars proposed it originated. Nobleeagle (Talk) 07:04, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

that's precisely what I mean. 40000 BC, 7000 BC and 4000 BC is all the same to these authors, and all equally "Vedic", just as long as "Vedic" predates the Bronze Age and recorded history anywhere else :) this renders the term "Vedic" essentially meaningless. There is no inkling of historical depth here, everything was frozen in some eternal Vedic Golden Age for countless millennia up to 1900 BC. Then the Sarasvati dried up, everything collapsed, and history began. dab (ᛏ) 08:03, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

keep on topic

Nobleeagle, please try to avoid adding the exact same tired material already sprawled over Indo-Aryan migration, Sarasvati river, etc. If we turn this into another article about IVC and Sarasvati, there is no reason not to merge it back. These arguments don't hold any more water for being reiterated on ten different Wikipedia articles. This article is supposed to discuss the Out of India part, i.e. movement of I-A (or PIE) speakers outside India. Thus, discuss evidence from outside India that supports such a movement. This isn't the "Everything happened Inside India" article. We are only interested in cities dating to 7000 BC if some author or other has suggested that it is the locus of Proto-Indo-European. dab (ᛏ) 08:00, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

To tell you the truth, Stephen Knapp relates every ancient Hindu temple or ancient Indian city back to the Out of India theory, I realised that when I was reading some of his essays and extracts. There are many cases I've read while reading on the internet which I've simply disregarded as I thought they didn't prove anything. I'll try and keep on topic. I was wondering if you could add some stuff on the linguistic issues with the theory, ie. why linguists don't consider the OIT possible. Sometime in the future I'll create a Political Controversy section and can then detail the Hindutva bias that is sometimes found. Nobleeagle (Talk) 08:04, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm just concerned that this will replicate Aryan Invasion Theory (history and controversies) all over again: do try to refer to that article whenever you are discussing material already covered over there. I am sorry, but I do think we need some minimal distinction of honorable scholarship from foaming crackpottery here: this Stephen Knapp is so far over the lunatic fringe that discussing him among more conservative approaches (it is possible to discuss OIT in serious terms, and it has been, back in the 19th century) just creates the impression that the whole topic is a gallery of cranks. Let's try to cite reputable publications in archaeological and linguistic journals separate from the din of self-styled decipherers and discoverers of Neolithic Bharato-Aryans. dab (ᛏ) 08:10, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Please see WP:BLP. Bakaman _Bakatalk 03:01, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

I think some of the stuff on the AIT would be better off if it were shortly summarized there and sent over here. The cradle of civilization stuff is related to this theory more than that theory. We also need to work out how to write about the Hindutva bias without linking back to the Hindutva bias against the AIT. Opposition to the AIT and support for the OIT are often connected. Nobleeagle (Talk) 07:40, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

surprisingly enough, our resident Hindutva crowd neglected to talk about an OIT almost completely: We get months of bickering over "AIT", but it was left to Paul and me to create the bleeding OIT article. They support it once they hear of it, of course, just as they'll support the Anatolian hypothesis as obviously true as soon as they are informed that it might give them IVC Aryans. The problem is that these people know what they want to believe and then merely sift actual evidence into "supporting the truth" and "not supporting the truth", a posteriori, so that all authors speaking the "truth" are defended automatically, no matter if they are actual scholars or just raving lunatics. This is much like dealing with biblical literalists, the hallmark of fundamentalism, and has nothing to do with scholarship, even if the occasional scholarly source is waved about. See 'Bakaman' just above for a quaint example, parroting what actual editors told him over at Witzel's article (as if we were writing some biography here). Half of the time, these editors fail the Turing test completely, we might as well be dealing with an armada of chatterbots unleashed from an underground BJP headquarters :o) dab (ᛏ) 08:47, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Alright it looks like Dab knows how to rant about Hindu users. Hah a "chatterbot from the BJP Hq", what a joke. I guess the BJP mustered them to fight the Aryan race.Bakaman _Bakatalk 02:12, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

If AIT is called as " Christian motives of British Raj", then how it feels Dab. You are always spouting against opposers of AIT/AMT as if opposers are not intelligent enough and all intelligence lies with AIT supporters. I have already told about your `one way thinking' and shallow level of logical understanding in talk page of Indo Aryan Migration.

Something similar to OIT is always said by all Hindu Brahmins during reciting Shrimad Bhagvat much much before advent of AIT theory.( brahmins are told to be nearest to Aryans as per AIT/AMT. What a pitty for AIT supporters ! ) That means all Hindu Brahmins are biggest "chatterbot from the BJP Hq" much much much before BJP !!! I warn you to be in control as you or your gang is deleting rectification of your mis-guiding words from OIT article, in which you don't believe at all. You are now crossing limits of civilized behaviour. — Preceding unsigned comment added by WIN (talk • contribs) 04:36, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I don't want to make this a Hindu vs non-Hindu fight or something like that. I think everyone needs to present sources, the Basis of the Theory section I have expanded is full of sources, unlike the Overview section on the AIT page. Suggestion that a theory is pseudoscience must be sourced. We don't care whether you and Paul B are experts, if you haven't wrote a book about the subject or written something credible somewhere else then honestly I don't care. Please begin presenting sources. The way I go with OR is put a tag for a few days and if there is no source then I shall remove the sentence, consider the tag a message that this sentence is on probation. I'm sure sources will be found, but just want to make it happen quicker. Alright? Nobleeagle (Talk) 07:42, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Terming oppositon to AIT/AMT as something Hindu nationalism is done by AIT supporters. But, it's a fact that during Western colonization period, conversion was an additional religious side effect.So, Hindu Indian or any Western scholar in Sanskrit, who knows about Hinduism and Sanskrit should not be termed as `Hindu Nationalism' as I don't know of any Indian Muslim who is well verse with Sanskrit and Hinduism. WIN 12:46, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

not quite. pseudoscience is characterized by remaining unnoted in academia. Therefore, the absence of any expert criticism is a hallmark of pseudoscience. If you want to discuss a publication as a notable contribution to a subject, it is up to you to provide evidence that it is indeed respectable. "reliable sources" does not mean "it has been printed":

Editors have to evaluate sources and decide which are the most reliable and authoritative. For academic topics, every field has an established system of reviews and evaluations that can be found in scholarly journals associated with that field.

it is unacceptable to lump together actual scholarly discussions of a topic with random crackpottery from outside the peer-reviewing process. It is up to you to establish that your source qualifies as scholarly. Labelling a statement as "pseudoscience" is in fact a courtesy, saying that its scholarly status has not been established. If this is in doubt, it would be perfectly alright to remove the statement altogether. This has nothing to do with my personal expertise (which may allow me to locate proper sources more quickly, but which is does not carry weight by itself on Wikipedia at all). I am open to two possibilities: a) treat this as an academic topic, such as it is, and ignore crackpots like Knapp in favour of discussion of proper literature; b) include mention of Knapp and similar stuff, clearly labelled as standing completely outside serious scholarly debate. Case b) will warrant categorization as "pseudoscience/archaeology", but I am also happy to leave this stuff unmentioned altogether, also. (ᛎ) qɐp 08:47, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Criticism Section

Shouldn't this article have a criticism section written from the consensus perspective of historical linguistcs? As it stands, all sorts of supporting statements are advanced in the article which are linguisticly meaningless (i.e. Sanskrit is ... a grammatically complex and highly refined language. OIT supporters believe that the idea that Sanskrit is a language originating with Central Asian nomadic people is highly impossible -- consensus lingustics rejected any linkage between grammatical complexity and technological attainments several decades ago.) I appreciate that OIT supporters reject consensus opinion, and in some cases may misunderstand/misrepresent it, but shouldn't it get a voice here? -Ben 20:12, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

You could add a criticism section and fill it with well-sourced material. But note that what you call consensus is rejected by a number of voices and media sources on the subject. Nobleeagle (Talk) 07:13, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

It may be rejected by "media sources", or by an overwhelming majority of the Indian population, or even by a majority of Indian linguists (though that would surprise me). But some note should be made of OIT's non-mainstream status within the non-Indian community of professional linguists. -Ben 12:23, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

This is a bizarrely POV article

I've tried to refrain from getting too involved further in the encroachment of hindutva propaganda and rewriting of history through wikipedia, but this article is really too much. It's full of nonsense, POV ramblings, and stuff that contradicts the rest of wikipedia. On a first read through I noticed:

1. use of the term "Aryan Invasion Theory" to describe current theories on the migration of Indo-Aryan culture into South Asia. This seems to be a hallmark of Hindutva propaganda; presumably because its easier to attack your opponent by setting up strawman versions of them from 100+ years ago.
2. another hallmark of Hindutva propaganda on this subject: the idea that "year after year", new evidence is uncovered that shows that the whole business of the "AIT" was invented by evil "britishers". This is completely false. The vast majority of the linguistic community outside of India does not consider the idea of the ingress of Indo-Aryan languages into India to have been discredited or disproved.
3. whats "monosyllabic agglutinative language" supposed to mean?! Agglutinative by definition means words are made up of more than one agglutinated morpheme syllables.
4. bizarre assumption that astronomical "data" in religious texts carries more weight in linguistics than actual linguistic evidence.
5. racist assertion that Sanskrit is better than other languages and that the people of Central Asia could never have come up with something that "refined".
6. a belief that genetics can be used to dismiss linguistics. Genetic evidence has also found almost no Central Asian (or South Asian, for that matter) admixture among Europeans either, but that doesn't mean they don't speak Indo-European languages.

I've added the totally disputed tag. Let's try to represent this theory properly: a mostly discredited early description of Indo-European language origins that has recently gained some support in India for political reasons. --Krsont 11:36, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

of course. but any intelligent reader will figure this out from the mere propaganda overkill, so no harm is done :) If anyone wants to clean this up: be aware that this is not the "anti AIT" article, it is the "OIT" article, i.e. opinions of "AIT is wrong" are irrelevant here, we want opinions about the movement out of India. "out of" does not equal "not into". dab (ᛏ) 12:36, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

OK, I'll go through these one by one:

1. With the AIT linking, if the Indo-Aryan migration hypothesis suggests that the Aryans entered India in 1500 BC, it shouldn't make a difference. Nowhere here are mentioned the old theories of chariots and things like that. Please refer me to specific bits where a link is made that directly refers to content of the historical Aryan invasion theory and I'll fix it.
2. One thing needs to be made clear, linguistics isn't the only thing involved in this study. Archaeological, Archaeoastronomical, genetic etc. all have their particular roles. It is mentioned that the theory is rejected by linguists.
3. I didn't add that, that was added by User:Paul Barlow here, he is a known opponent of the OIT.
4. Does it say that? That it is more important? It just says that the OIT relies on other sources of data as opposed to linguistic data. I am getting the assumption that you believe linguistics are more important than historical texts and archaeological finds.
5. Are you referring to the quote by Sir William Jones?
6. Again it doesn't say that genetics is more important, just that it has been used.

Now if you notice, every time I make a point on this article that may raise controversy, it is adequately sourced by various groups of people, from the BBC to Koenraad Elst to (as Dab put it) lunatic Stephen Knapp. Yet you present no source as to your idea that linguistics is more important than all other forms of evidence presented to this page. Nobleeagle (Talk) 05:37, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

I think you may not be completely aware that this article is supposed to discuss a view on the history of the spread of the Indo-European languages. It is as such first and foremost an article dealing with historical linguistics. OIT supporters must argue that PIE was spoken in India, and that early IE speakers emigrated from India at some point. Just saying "Sanskrit is much too cool to have been spoken in Central Asia, and IVC was much too cool for Dravidians" (the usual latently racist 'anti-AIT' argumetn) does not address that at all. I see no scenario proposed for such migration out of India, which is the very thing this article should address. 4000 BC "Shiva" temples have nothing whatsoever to do with OIT, because Shiva is not reconstructed as a PIE deity. 3000 BC Soma vessels or 3000 BC chariots (haha) would be much more to the point. dab (ᛏ) 09:36, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Right, I'll work on that, but what you are saying isn't based on a Factual Accuracy Dispute. It's simply based on the idea that the article does not address its main points. As for "Sanskrit is much too cool to have been spoken in Central Asia, and IVC was much too cool for Dravidians", there is no mention of Dravidians on this page and neither is there a racist concept that Central Asians couldn't speak a refined language. It's just that this is based on a source in which Frawley says that the idea of a nomadic and primitive external Aryan force speaking such a refined language is improbable. If that is all you have to say then I shall remove the tag. Nobleeagle (Talk) 07:00, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

yes, you are making sense. My gripe is that the article polemicizes about tangentially related issues instead of addressing its topic (but note it wasn't me who added the tag). The dispute would be about mentioning crackpot authors like Frawley or Knapp together with academic authors. I'm fine with mentioning them under a separate "pseudoscience" or "propaganda" header. Or else leave them out altogether and concentrate on serious literature. You will also appreciate that nobody claims that actual, 'refined' Classical Sanskrit was spoken by proto-Indo-Aryans, either at the Oxus or at the Indus. Sanskrit became Sanskrit ('refined') inside India, during the early 1st millennium BC, evolving out of what before was simply a dialect of early Indo-Aryan. But trust Frawley to set up such a strawman (being, again, a crackpot author). As long as people close their eyes to the historical evolution of Sanskrit, they will be unable to discuss the historical depth of its literature. dab (ᛏ) 07:44, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

again, the Harappan chronology is fine, but it is wrong to state that "the OIT" assumes things about the Vedas wrt IVC (while it is Frawley that does, including, apparently, weird things like claiming the RV is Neolithic). This isn't "OIT". An "OIT" chronology would suggest dates for emigration of pre-Indo-Aryans from India. A proper "OIT" would state, for example (I am making this up, as it were 'writing for the enemy', looking for the best way to make the claim, assuming you do want to make the claim at any cost),

• Pre-Harappan: Early and Middle PIE, separation of Proto-Anatolian
• Early Harappan: Late PIE, separation of non-Indo-Iranian dialects; Satemization (spreading from India?)
• Mature Harappan: Proto-Indo-Iranian ("Aryan").
• 1900 BC: Iranians leave India. Proto-Indo-Aryan.
• 1700 BC: Mitanni leave India. Early Rigveda

that would be an "OIT" scenario. This would be considered extremely unlikely by mainstream scholars, but it couldn't be dismissed with a laugh. If Early Harappan was indeed the PIE Urheimat, it would also make sense to say that IVC was "Aryan", it would give you continuity in India without any invasions and, and a Sanskrit that is the main direct successor of PIE (for staying conservative and in situ). Nothing that is anything like such a coherent scenario emerges from your kooky sources, and I really see no discussion of "OIT" here (except for Schlegel, who would no doubt have come up with something like that had he been aware of the IVC). Note that "OIT" doesn't necessarily entail the (untenable) claim of a Neolithic Rigveda or even the (hardly tenable) claim of a Mature Harappan Rigveda. OIT would most likely claim Mature Harappan as Aryan (Indo-Iranian) Urheimat. dab (ᛏ) 08:16, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm taking a break...I'll continue work tomorrow...thanks for your input. Nobleeagle (Talk) 08:31, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

While I thank you for making an attempt to create a chronology for a theory you do not support. What you have presented above is unsourced original research and cannot be added to the article without an accompanying tag. Thus I will look for sources. At the moment all I've got is that Indo-Aryans spread to Persia (thus the splitting up of Proto-Indo-Iranian) and Central Asia. Nobleeagle (Talk) 01:37, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

I found Koenraad Elst's chronology and (apart from the period in which the Vedas were composed) it was quite similar to yours. Nobleeagle (Talk) 00:27, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Accusations of "pseudoscience" and "propaganda"

I'm afraid that, in the absence of sources to back up this claim, this constitutes a violation of WP:OR, as well as a potential WP:BLP violation that is defamatory. Therefore, I have put fact tags there and, if somebody does not provide a reference from a legitimate academicsource/peer-reviewed journal/notable scholarly text that Knapp has been accused by many academics of pseudoscience/propaganda then I am within the bounds of wiki polcy to remove that sentence as it is a violation of 2 wikipedia policies. As of my signature time I shall wait for 48 hours as a courtesy. Thank you.Hkelkar 12:44, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

look, if this is going to be an article about a bona fide theory of Indo-European origins (albeit possibly obsolete, see Schlegel), Knapp has no place at all in the article. He is so far from any sort of peer reviewed that even mentioning him in passing is a joke. There are two options: stick to peer reviewed academic discourse, which will mean Knapp is out of the window and Frawley must be qualified as extremely fringy, or we turn this into the "Hindutva propaganda and Indo-European" article and put it in Category:Propaganda. I am happy to oblige and remove discussion of Knapp altogether for now. If you are unhappy with this, it is your responsibility to produce an academic review of Knapp. dab (ᛏ) 15:12, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm afraid that, unless you can provide sourced academic refs that attest that OIT is political propaganda, all this is OR. Since Knapp does not have peer-reviewed publications, I am not opposed to not mentioning him.However, unless you can provide verifiable sources that target specific claims, we have a violation of WP:AGF,WP:BLP and WP:OR.Hkelkar 18:47, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, this page itself is WP:OR in that several disparate sources arguing different things have been thrown together under a neologism of an article title. I cant imagine how categorising this as pseudoscience is what violates OR rather than the article itself. Hornplease 22:17, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

That is a vague accusation and, in turn, is OR without WP:Reliable Sources. Categorizing anything as pseudoscience without third aparty verification is WP:OR ab-initio.Almost everything in this article is cited and uncited OR has been removed.Hkelkar 23:13, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

If you read the sources, Hornplease, you will see that every source relates to the Out of India theory (or a model showing the spread of IE languages out from India) specifically. It is thus NOT OR. As to "cant imagine how categorising this as pseudoscience is what violates OR rather than the article itself", perhaps you have misinterpreted WP:NOR, it says in a nutshell that articles may not contain any new analysis or synthesis of published arguments, concepts, data, ideas, or statements that serves to advance a position.. Your categorizing of Knapp and Frawley as pseudoscientific authors is your analysis of the arguments they put forward towards to Out of India theory. Nobleeagle (Talk) 00:45, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I know nothing of Knapp or Frawley, though I would hesitate to call authors pseudoscientific, only non-notable, if indeed they are, on which I have no opinion as yet. My observation was on the structure of the article. I find it difficult to believe that (a) the phrase "Out of India Theory" is not a neologism - the phrase itself is not sufficiently cited and (b) that there is not an artificial unity brought to all these views by presenting them under the same heading, without analysing the differences that were no doubt inherent in views from different ields of inquiry and at different times. That is what I feared was OR about the article - that was the 'new synthesis' that the policy page declares. I did not intend to take a position on the scientific virtue of the statements themselves, merely pointing out that saying the statement "this article is pseudoscience" is OR is hardly fair, when the article is perilouosly close to OR itself. But, if it makes you feel better, ignore that statement, and concentrate on avoiding points (a) and (b) above. Hornplease 07:16, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

I think I have seen some authors talk of the Out of India term, while others have called it the Proto-Vedic Continuity Theory. Nobleeagle (Talk) 23:20, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Map

I want to know about Photo displayed as IE language expansion out of India ( put by anyone ). Central & Eastern India expansion is shown as post 2000 BC. And, main IE dates in NW & W India shows gap of around 6,000 to 4,000 years. Do you agree that language spread took same time from Sindhu-Saraswati basin area to Western Europe and Central & Eastern India ? Is it logical to think in that line ? Do you agree that it was as difficult for people to move from NW & W India to C & E India as from NW & W India to Western Europe ? This picture is utterly false. It is based on AIT/AMT. WIN 10:07, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

I created it. It is based on Koenraad Elst. It is not a simple matter of Aryans saying they want to invade everything and anything around them. They split off for reasons...demographic expansion, internal rivalry etc. etc. In most of these cases they saw the Hindu Kush as a suitable place to travel to. With the drying up of the Sarasvati and the decline of the IVC, the Aryans began interacting with the Dravidians, who were not backward and to this date exist in large numbers. The two groups overran the Veddoid tribes of South Asia and to some extent South East Asia. I don't know why, but Elst does not use the evidence of Aryan settlements on the Gangetic plains around 3000 BC and I can't do anything about that. It's hard to believe but to avoid OR I created a map based on that source and that source only. Nobleeagle (Talk) 22:51, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

In Ramayan, Sita was from Mithila ( current Eastern U.P./ Bihar and parts of Nepal ). In Mahabharat, Rukmani ( wife of Krishna ) was from Vidarbha ( Nagpur area of Maharashtra ). In Rig-Ved, early periods mentioning Mandals like 6,3,7,Early I mentions Kasi which is one of most religious place for Hindus. Name of Kashi ( or Varanasi ) is same since Rig-Vedic time. WIN 06:33, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

it is unclear what is the origin of the dates given in the map. the article text discusses Elst's scenario, but the dates in the map seem to disagree with the dates in the article body. Elst apparently assumes a 6th millennium PIE near the Indus valley, with a spread to Central Asia (5th millennium?) and later Anatolia (3rd millennium?), but it is unclear where the "pre-6000 BC" and "8000 BC" dates are taken from. What do we mean by "pre-6000 BC"? Of course all of Eurasia was inhabited since much earlier, but per Elst's scenario, this would lie in the pre-PIE period. If the map is to be consistent with Elst's "emerging scenario", the "pre-6000" and "8000" dates should be replaced by "5000 BC" (PIE). Note that this would give us a credible (close to mainstream) time depth for PIE, and "OIT" would just reverse the direction of migration, without needing to make far out claims about chronology at the same time, which is a good thing. dab (ᛏ) 08:14, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

I might upload the map again. I made a mistake while reading Elst's scenario and attributed 6th millenium BC to 6000 BC instead of 5999-5000 BC as it is meant to be. What you are reading as 8000 BC is meant to be 6000 BC but it got stuffed up so I'll have to fix that and adjust it to 5000 BC. Of course I wouldn't date anything at 8000 BC. The first split of PIE from the Indus Valley was dated to the 6th millenium BC, thus I am assuming that the PIE were in the Indus Region before this breakup, which is why I used Pre-6000 BC (which I am now changing to Pre-5000 BC). Thanks for pointing that out. Nobleeagle (Talk) 23:03, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

I have no objections then :) I am in fact grateful that we now cover this perfeclty reasonable scenario, it is a refreshing breeze of sanity after all the Pleiades-and-Saraswati-cruft. dab (ᛏ) 10:15, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

If Saraswati is some cruft then why there is complete mis-match for time period of said Rig-Vedic Saraswati and actual geographical findings ? And, don't tell that Rig-Vedic Saraswati was Afghani river Harahvaiti. It's is easy to term something as cruft due to your inability to adjust with newer archiological findings.

You will rejoice with finding of Troy on Turkey coast but when in India there are plenty of places corresponding to Vedic, Ramayan and Mahabharat periods with same naming & legends for thousands of years. But then it is some fabulus stories and cruft for you. WIN 06:29, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Question regarding a paragraph

The following sentense is confusing:

... The examination of 300 skeletons from the Indus Valley Civilization and comparison of those skeletons with modern-day Indians by Kenneth Kennedy has also been a supporting argument for the OIT. Kennedy claims that the Harappan inhabitants of the Indus Valley Civilization are no different from the inhabitants of India in the following millennia. This suggests that the Aryan people were indigenous to India or similar in skeletal structure to the Harappans.[19] ...

This comment is totally illogical. It does not prove at all that ancient Aryans were similar to the ancient Harappans. Let me give you an example:

if we compare the skelettons of ancient inhabitants of South America with those of the modern population of South America, we will find many similarities. That's because the majority of modern South Americans are direct descendants of the ancient population. But it would be wrong to claim that the "old inhabitants of South America were almost identical to Spanish Europeans, because modern South Americans also speak Spanish".

Only because the modern populations of Europe or India speak Indo-European languages, it does not mean that they are direct descendants. "Language replacement" by a "ruling minority group" could also be a convincing explanation.

Assuming that modern Indians are not direct descendants of the ancient Aryans, but only "linguistic descendants" (through "language replacement") and direct descendants of the ancient population of India, it's no surprise that the skelettons have similarities. While modern Indians are descendants of the originial, Non-Indo-European population of India, their ancestors had adopted the language and religion of the small Indo-European speaking elite.

Tājik 00:17, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Tajik,this is subject of Aryan Invasion and regarding this we have lots of sentences to read in AIT and Aryan Migration talk pages. Do read from all archieves. OIT is based on the one major point that there was no Aryan Invasion of ancient India and so called effects of it in India. Now, if there is some similarity between Sanskrit and other IE languages then it might be due to other way round. For any Aryan Invasion or Migration there are neither any literally records nor in traditions of any Indian people. Where as for ancient Indians moving out of India, you will find plenty of literally records. Spanish invasion of South America example would have been good example to justify your points if Aryan Invasion would have been proved to be true. WIN 04:28, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Actually, there are some sources in the Vedas or in the Gathas that point toward a migration of the Indo-Iranians from Central Asia, including the Zend Avesta - Vendidad: Fargard 1 ("... There (Airyanem Vaejah - "Land of the Aryans") are ten winter months there, two summer months; and those are cold for the waters, cold for the earth, cold for the trees ..." [1]), a discription of the cold steps of Central Asia. There are also discriptions of warfare of the semi-nomadic Vedic and Avestan populations against urbanized people who - very obviously - were not "Arya".

Besides that, this theory does not explain two major question: the horse has always played a major role in IE societies, even in the Vedas. However, there were no horses in India at the time of the suggested "migration out of India". This theory also fails to explain how a highly civilized people such as the Harappans (the aleged ancestors of the IE) could turn itself into a backward nomanic society (the IE of Europe and Iran were nomads and semi-nomads, as well as the Aryas of the Vedas)?! This does not make any sense. Nomadic peoples become urban and "civilized", and not vice versa.

This article is interesting, but it is totally one sided.

Tājik 23:55, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

POV

This article is biased through and through and has clearly been written by proponents of the OIT. It uses weasel words, it used biased and unreliable sources, it doesn't represent the general consensus of Indo-Eeuropeanists and it misrepresents linguistic fact (linguistic data does not support for example any notion of Sanskrit being hiighly refined, or the improbability of it having evolved from a language of "primitive" people (sic), and linguistic evidence isn't "soft" evidence that can be used for whatever purpose) I have added a POV tag.Maunus 06:47, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

half of it is pure quackery. that wouldn't be so bad if it didn't mix up the nonsense with the reasonable parts, the reader could still stick to the latter. But mixing up respectable 19th century scholarship, Elst's tendentious speculations and complete loonies like Frawley, Knapp and anonymous websites makes it essentially useless.

"OIT supporters believe that the idea that Sanskrit is a language originating with Central Asian nomadic people who have been described as "primitive", is very improbable"

— this is from Frawley's "Sanskrit is supposed to be the language of primitive invaders", so first of all it belongs in the Frawley section. What "OIT supporters"? Schlegel? And then Frawley doesn't even himself call the invaders "primitive", he alleges that "AIT supporters" allege that invaders were "primitive", so it remains unclear who "has described" Indo-Iranians as "primitive" in the first place. Frawley doesn't understand the first or last thing about linguistics of course, he is just piling on rhetorics. therefore this article has just two possibilities:

• separate the loony stuff (Frawley, Knapp and friends) into a separate "popular/religious literature" section, and keep the main part focussed on scholarly discussion (peer-reviewed linguistic journals and the like; Schlegel, and if you like Elst, characterized as an isolated minority opinion)
• tag the whole article as pseudoscientific Hindutva propaganda and be done with it

but do not keep mixing up reasonable arguments with all this batshit. It will not do to imply that "OIT" has any academic support worth mentioning as the article does at present. If I am personally prepared to treat "OIT" on equal footing with the Anatolian hypothesis, I am being (a) very kind to "OIT" for the sake of peace, and (b) very unkind to Renfrew. A proper encyclopedic treatement would file "OIT" closer to things like "Troy was in England!1" or "Ithaka was Paliki!" or "Atlantis was in Britain or Antarctica or India!1" -- these are nb all published theories that could be defended on Wikipedia with just as much zest as OIT if just their supporters thought it worthwhile. Such support would not render them a iota more notable in an encyclopedic sense. dab (ᛏ) 07:21, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

For Western world, finding of Troy mentioned in ancient book was a puzzle. But, in India you will find so many places name, city name , river name or kingdom name used very much till today. All these names links from Veda,Purana , Ramayana and Mahabharat. Even legends and stories associated with these names are part of that particular area and associated with that Veda, Purana , Ramayana or Mahabharata. This is called Continuous Civilization. Dab is trying to equate Sanskrit scriptures & it's legends with those Troy in Britain kind of stuff. This is really rediculous of that person who always tries to downgrade India. Dab, I or others have asked many questions in talk pages of AIT or AMT. Try to answer that with some sense and logic ( something very hard to find from you ) - instead of your garbage equations. WIN 10:35, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

--> here's what I mean with "zest" :) it is you who are 'downgrading' the rich and multi-cultural history of India with your single-mindedness. "continuous civilization" since 6000 BC, yeah sure. dab (ᛏ) 11:23, 3 October 2006 (UTC)