Someone wrote:-
> It could also be copper-arsenic naturally occurring alloy or a
> copper pyrite. So, Me-luhh-a may refer to an area from where such
> copper (refined, washed, or copper pyrite) was obtained?
and others refuted this.
I have read of a Sanskrit word "mleccha-" meaning "lower-class", as
distinct from "arya-" = "upperclass". I suspect that "mleccha" or
"meluhha" or similar was the Indus Valley civilization's name for
itself and its people, before the Indo-Aryans came. Sumeria traded
with the Indus Valley Civilization (sometimes called the
Sarasvati-Sindhu Valley Civilization) and would have learnt of this
name. When the Indo-Aryans took over the Indus Valley, the area's
existing natives would have been pushed down the social scale and
their name for themselves along with it.