This is what cultural solidarity is all
about. The followers of one model of society and religion are classified as
"friends" (a:rya-), while those who subscribe to other cultural norms become
"foes, foreigners" (dasyu-), no matter if they are linguistically related or
not. The same pattern is found among the Iranians: in the Avesta the term
<airiia-> is reserved for the East Iranians. At least some of the North
Iranians applied it to themselves (possibly excluding other Iranians). There is
no evidence, however, that <arya-/a:rya-> was ever intended as a
collective designation for all ancient Indo-Iranian peoples. Its use
developed from social and cultural to political and (occasionally)
ethnonymic in a world where there were always "us" and "them".
Piotr
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, February 06, 2002 7:17 AM
Subject: [tied] Re: Accepted cognates of Arya?
A consideration of all the occurrences of the word in RV shows that it
is used practically always for Puru-Bharatas and their allies. Never for the
other Vedic tribes.