[tied] The insufficiency of OIT (was:Re: Of cows and living)

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, george knysh <gknysh@...> wrote:

>
>
>
> --- mkelkar2003 <smykelkar@...> wrote:
>
> > >
> > > GK: You don't seem to get it. Klejn assumes
> > > nothing of the kind. He simply points out that the
> > > affinities between the analyzed remnants of the
> > > Catacomb culture and the civilization described in
> > the
> > > Rig Veda is not accidental.
> >
> > Just like Klejn (1984) you are over looking the fact
> > that the text of
> > the Rig Veda does not provide any evidence of
> > presummed "invasions"
> > "migrations," "trickles" what ever one choses to
> > call them.
>
> *****GK: Neither does the Scythian Foundation Legend
> for the Scythians. So the absence of any such
> reference in the Rig Veda does not prove that the
> Indo-Aryans developed as an autochthonous group.

The absence in Scythia foundation legend does not mean the
"Indo-Aryans" were not an authchtonous group!

> We have to use other indicators. Those mentioned by Klejn
> are pretty good (a combination of indubitable
> archaeological and linguistic facts).*****

Use astronomy, geology, and mathmatics for instance. The Rig Veda
refers to the River Sarasvati which geologists say dried up around
1900 BCE long before the supposed invisble trickles. See page 66 of
proto vedic continuity.doc

>
>
> The Rig
> > Veda and Vedic civilization is *perfectly
> > compatible* with Indus
> > Sarasvati Civilization i.e "Harrapa."
>
> *****GK: I don't think so. Where is the military
> war-chariot Harappan aristocracy? Where are the
> prototypes of latter-day temples for the worship of
> Vedic deities?

This time please read my review of McIntosh (2001) p. 21 of proto
vedic continuity.doc. The archaeologist are no longer bowing down to
the linguisti fantasies.

" The Australian linguist R. M. W. Dixon (1997) has given new life to
the importance of linguistic convergence first advocated by Trubetskoy
(1968, 1939). Dixon (1997: 3) convincingly argues that migrations
which trigger linguistic (and cultural) divergence are rare, the more
normal situation being linguistic and I daresay cultural, convergence
(Lamberg-Karlovsky 2002, p. 74)."

As for chariots Agarwal (2006),

"Archaeologists B. K. Thapar and Rafique Mughal mention that a sherd
depicting a canopied cart with spoked wheels was unearthed from
pre-Harappan levels at Banawali. R.S. Bisht reports that at Banawali,
a pot sherd depicting a canopied cart with spoked wheels was found at
pre-Indus levels. Bisht is the excavator of the site. This shows that
the Harappans apparently possessed the relevant technology to fashion
light vehicles with spoked wheels. Chariots as such are not attested
in the archaeological record of the Indian subcontinent till about the
middle of first millennium BCE,"

If the chariots were brought in by the trickling "Indo-Aryans" then
why are they not attested for a full 1000 years after their supposed
arrival? In any case the introduction of a new technology does not
mean sweeping linguistic and cultural changes.





Harappa was a brilliant "middle class

> type" civilization, speaking and writing an unknown
> language (pehaps Dravidian, perhaps Munda, perhaps X)
> which imploded for a variety of reasons.

That is correct. The language is *unknown*; and "unknown" includes
Indo-Aryan! See Subhash Kak's work on the Indus script as cited by
Bryant (2001)

Bryant, Edwin (2001), The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture, New
York, London: Oxford University Press.

Kak's frequency analysis of the Indus signs shows that there are good
indications that the script is a pre cursor to the later Brahmi. But
the issue of the script is still pending.



Its physical

> heirs (the Late Harappans) were reorganized as a
> "Vedic" society under the religious and political
> influence of incoming Indo-Aryans. The notion of a
> mass religious conversion (with political and
> linguistic implications) seems quite plausible.*****
>
> The geography
> > of the Rig Veda
> > has been firmly placed in the North West part of
> > South Asia. See my
> > review of McIntosh (2001), Whether or not the Rig
> > Veda is compatible
> > with any other culture is irrelavant. Occam's razor
> > applies.
>

> >
> > Would any one care to define what is
> > "Indo-European."

You did not answer my question! Who/What exactly *is* "Indo-European?"
Let us review the facts.

1. A very ancient text Rig Veda is in an "Indo-European" language.

2. The text itself does not say its composers are foreign or were once
foreign to their present locations.

3. The text has been preserved faithfuly for thousands of years like a
tape recording by the people of the Indian Subcontinent.

4. Every single flora and fauna mentioned in the text occur in the
Indian subcontinent, all the rivers are still present except the
Sarasvati which has dried up.

5. The one and only ancient grammarian of any "Indo-European"
language, the legendary Panini once lived in South Asia,

6. There is no evidence of any other language ever been spoken in
North Western South Asia except the "Indo-Aryan." There is a clear
religious, genetic, archaeological continuity in the region from very
ancient times (Kenoyer, McIntosh, Lal, Schaffer, Litchentstein and a
host of other archaeologist have repeatedly confirmed this.)

May I ask, what then disqualifies the people of the INDIAN
subcontinent for the "coveted" membership into this "elite"
INDO-european club?


very single

> > flora and fauna mentioned in the Rig Veda occurs in
> > the Indian
> > Subcontinent (Lal 2005, 2002). River Sarasvati has
> > been traced by
> > the geologists as it once flowed from "moutains to
> > the sea" just like
> > the Rig Veda mentions. See my review of McIntosh
> > (2001), p. 22 of
> > proto vedic continuity.doc.
>
> *****GK: The Rig Veda was "autochtonized", just as the
> Scythian Foundation Legend, or the much later Kyivan
> Foundation Legend.

Let us not assume things unless they are corroborated by evidence.


No one should deny that the

> physical basis of the Vedic civilization was
> overwhelmingly "local". But the key political ideas of
> Vedic society were not. Just as those of later Muslims
> were not.*****

If my aunt had a moustache I would call him/her/it my uncle.

>
> *****GK: Much in humanistics is hypothetical. There
> are excellent hypotheses (like that of Klejn for
> instance) and there are very bad hypotheses, like
> OIT.*****
>

The idea of an Indo-European family with a dozen separate branches
emerging fully finished from an even imaginary center may be, just may
be, a very bad hypothesis that is not sustainable in view of the
emerging evidence. Please read p. 16 and p. 23 of proto vedic
continuity theory.doc Thanks!

m. kelkar

> __________________________________________________
> Do You Yahoo!?
> Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
> http://mail.yahoo.com
>