Who Were the Aryans? Memory, Myth, and Meaning in Indian History
Aryans the so-called Aryans (Sanskrit arya. Old Iranian airya) were Indo-European tribes who migrated from Eastern Europe to Central Asia and beyond in the third millennium B.C.E. They were patriarchal warriors who brought powerful male gods with them as they migrated eventually into Greece, Anatolia, the Fertile Crescent, Iran, and India.
The Harappan civilization began to decline by about 1900 B.C.E. and was overrun by northern nomads in about 1500 B.C.E. These nomads, called Aryans, began the Vedic culture in India, a culture with a caste social system.
In fact, on the Indian Subcontinent the early influx of Aryans, who arrived in waves from the north sometime between 1500 and 1300 B.C.E. (in what historians alternately describe as “invasions” and “migrations”), accounted for the importation of much of the foundations of future Indian culture, such as the language of Sanskrit. The Aryans themselves in time fully integrated with the darker resident populations of the valleys of the Indus and Ganges rivers.
The Aryans were originally nomads who directed sheep and cattle to different grazing grounds according to the season. Some of their descendants in northern India continued to practice the old way of life into the 21st century. Most of the Vedic people began to settle down as they spread eastward and southward. By the 800s b.c.e. they had formed many small tribal territories called janapadas across northern India. The janapadas were constantly at war with one another, and the stronger ones absorbed the weaker ones until 16 were left in the late 700s b.c.e. These territories were called mahajanapadas. Their power extended south to the Godavari River, which flows west to east, almost bisecting India.
The Aryan (meaning “noble ones”) tribes were led by aggressive warrior aristocrats on horse-drawn chariots armed with good-quality copper and bronze weapons. The Aryans formed the military into a separate class, led by the nobility. They organized their army by tribe, clan, and family in units of 180 men. Chariots led the charge and guarded the rear. The chariots did not rush into battle but organized to give each other protection, with the least experienced charioteer encouraged to learn from the more seasoned soldiers.
Like many other occasions historical facts are debatable, according to some scholars the earlier verses describe the Sanskrit speakers settled in north-west India, with no hint of migration from outside, so they had clearly been there for some time. They call themselves Aryans, literally ‘noble ones’ (an Indo- European word which survives in the names of Iran and Eire). Their lands stretch from the Kabul river to the Oxus, along the North-West frontier. Later hymns in the series suggest that by then they had spread into the ‘Seven Rivers’, today’s Punjab.
Other scholars also described them differently. According to these scholars, the Aryans are probably the most famous of these Indo-European-speaking groups. The word Aryan is often used as if the Aryans were a single tribe, but the ancient Indian writers who wrote down the oral history of the Aryans about 500 B.C.E. used the word arya to describe the languages spoken by the nomads, not their tribe. The word Aryan comes from the word arya. The Aryans were probably several different tribes.
Most scholars agrees that it was a fighting race; they knew the lance, the javelin, and shield. Government was patriarchal; a man had but one wife; as head of the family he was for his wife, his children, and his servants at once priest, judge, and king. In all the countries settled by the Aryans they have followed this type of life—patriarchal, martial, and pastoral.
However, according to Durant, these Aryans were rather immigrants than conquerors. But they brought with them strong physiques, a hearty appetite in both solids and liquids, a ready brutality, a skill and courage in war, which soon gave them the mastery of northern India. They fought with bows and arrows, led by armored warriors in chariots, who wielded battle-axes and hurled spears. They were too primitive to be hypocrites: they subjugated India without pretending to elevate it. They wanted land, and pasture for their cattle; their word for war said nothing about national honor, but simply meant “a desire for more cows.
Whatever the history was, the reconstructive narrative would be highlighted some aspect agreement that, probably it was out of the interaction of different cultures that the civilizations of classical India would emerge. On the other hand, it’s not denied that their arrival laid the foundation for Hindu civilization. The Vedas, Upanishad, and other scared texts were written in Sanskirt. However, Aryan philosophy and culture have deeply influenced Indian thought, literature, and spirituality.
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