Hi Centrix Vigillis. So far only the hypothesis has been framed, the evidence has not even been systematically examined to prove or disprove this theory.
Evaluation would require
1. Go through the Veda (at two days per mandala needs 20 days just for reading the Rig once in English, followed by the Sama, Yajur, Atharva, at least Satapatha Brahmana because easily available online, and the complete Apasthamba sutras (Srauta, Sulba, Dharma et al). Just a read through in English would require about a year - since I did this about 20 years ago, these are factual estimates.
It is also exceptionally boring reading - especially the Brahmana and Sutras.
2. Go through the Avesta (closest example with oral transmission). This should take about a fortnight for a very superficial read through - again I had done this a while ago
3. Evaluate the population dynamics of a herding community described in Rig Veda. Guesstimates I can search online, but any real research based info would require some serious digging and anthropological research - I am sure somebody has done it, but not easily available online.
4. Evaluate the painted gray ware people for their population density, possibility of agriculture. This I know is not available online and would need library and museum visits - Although I can access this, it is a lifetimes work.
5. Try to correlate the Veda with the painted grayware - this would also need serious scholarship.
6. Try to correlate the Veda with the Mitanni artifacts - again this would need a major investigation. Since cuneiform texts of the Mitanni agreements with Egypt etc are available, I am sure this has already been done - but still - you never know. One needs to dig out manuscripts of such evaluations - and the Mitanni language as well.
7. Look for evidence of a serious large agricultural empire within the Veda - something similar to the Achemenid empire - which might indicate Mitanni origin
Obviously we are looking at about 20 PhDs worth of work here - clearly impossible.
Only the last is possible on a simple read through in English and so I will try to attempt this online over here - and we can see where we get.
But before starting on a fairly vast waste of time (cause thats what it is) - it would be useful to formulate a few alternate hypotheses which can be evaluated at the same time.
1. The Mitanni theory: Now this theory above is based on 4 flimsy grounds
a) That the Rig is ancient i.e 2000 BC
b) That it would not be so large without a big empire to start it
c) That writing is needed to start its seed - available to the Mitanni
d) That they mention Indra, Varuna, Mitra and other Gods.
2. Another similar empire theory:
We can always reject the Mitra Varuna Indra mentions in Mitanni as coincidence - to my mind a pretty big coincidence, but still possible because Indo Aryan Gods are similar in nature - so why not in name.
In that case we can move the story forward to 1200 BC and discard the Sintashta and the Mitanni.
So we just need to look for a somewhat big empire around 1200 BC possibly in Iran or Baluchistan (displaced there by the Assyrians?). So the timing would coincide with the movements of the Medes and the Persians. We can say these were the eastern cousins of the Persians, distantly related to the Mitanni (hence same Gods) and they came to Punjab.
Alternatively, we can even look for the empire and major settlement in Punjab itself - i.e. the Painted Grayware people, . But this time we would look for
a) Bigger populations requiring agriculture
b) Writing. We know they didnt write on their pottery, but still possible. If old persian could exist, why not an old Rig Vedic script.
3. Painted Grayware as the Rig Vedic Aryans. Now this is the classical theory of every evaluation by Indologists. We need to critically evaluate it to find elements which disprove - rather than prove - the theory (since it is the accepted theory).
A lot of Indian scholars have done this, but have had the agenda to prove an out of India hypothesis - a lot of which on even superficial reading is just ludicrous nonsense (Pushing the Rig Veda to 3000 BC and into the Indus valley civilization, Persians came from India and other such attempts).
So we need a more sensible critical analysis looking for more subtle points which might indicate a mistake in the analysis. Other aspects of Vedic people also need to be looked for
a) Were they co-existing with local populations? We know local people other than Vedic people existed in India - but where and how were they living? What are the clues from the Veda and from other archeological digs?
b) Were the local people practicing a shifting agriculture similar to current tribals of India ? Did the Vedic people prey on these locals? This would greatly enlarge the possibility of big populations, since on herding alone, only a very thin population density can be achieved. Evidence for this might be present within the Veda.
c) Where did the IVC people go? It is clear from other places like the Incas of Peru that a big civilization can decline and the remnants can reach very low population densities and forget their identities. It is also likely that the IVC migrated east into India - but there are no remnants and none of the typical IVC artifacts. What is the evidence from archeological digs from later IVC sites regarding the way of life of the people after decline of IVC? What would be the points of contact between the painted grayware people and the IVC remnants? Or did the IVC just vanish?
d) When did the Rig Vedic people start their own agriculture? Did they even start it - or did the non-Vedic people start it in Bihar and expand their own population - which would greatly diminish the Vedic people (since herders can never compete with agriculture for population growth except to become overlords). Since Vedic religion basically ended in Royal patronage by 500 BC onwards, when large scale agriculture started - this is an important possibility which we can call
5. The predator hypothesis.
In this hypothesis, the Vedic people lived in Punjab and preyed on the local people who did shifting agriculture. Vedic people only herded and raided. So this permitted a bigger population than possible with herding alone. People lived in separate villages - Vedic villages separate and local village separate. Locals were kept poor and could neither produce ceramic pottery not metal implements - over which the Vedic people kept their monopoly.
Because of this predation, despite Punjab being rich and fertile agricultural land, there was no large scale development of agriculture. The Vedic people refused to do agriculture. The local people were never allowed to do agriculture except on a small scale like shifting agriculture.
It is infact very strange that agriculture started in Bihar and not in Punjab. ALthough IVC has deminstrated that huge populations could be raised in Punjab, it did not happen again until Bihar. But after Bihar, it suddenly starts in a big way all over north India.
In this theory, the Vedic people maintained their superiority by horse breeding, chariots and use of iron weapons. Locals were not allowed animal husbandry, horse raising, ceramics, iron metallurgy or even large scale agriculture which can allow their population to increase. This explains why there are no artifacts left behind.
Because of this, it took 600 years and people reaching Bihar for large scale agriculture to start. Once it started, the Vedic people's life collapsed. However the Brahmins re-invented themselves and continued to flourish. This would explain a lot of the caste system which evolved when larger cities were created - and to this day the villages of India show many of these features, except that there is large scale agriculture.
4. The late compilation theory.
This is the most attractive of the alternative theories. Since writing came to India in 300 BC, why not push all its scriptures to compilation at this time. This would solve multiple problems
a) Writing problem is to some extent solved
b) Since compilation is so late, there would be multiple versions of the same text which would have altered over a millenium of oral transmission. When compiled so late, each of these would have seemed like a different part and hence would have been collected together into a massive text - within which the same thing would be repeated multiple times. Since we know this is seen within the Rig, a serious evaluation of this possibility is needed
c) A compilation after 200 years of Budhism and when Hinduism is under serious attack (since Ashokan empire was Budhist) would represent a clear and present threat to the Brahmins. So they would be bound to use the new technique of writing to their presumed advantage - not only documenting every version of Veda but demonstrating its importance in written text - and this would result in a greatly enlarged and complex Veda. Since Budhist texts in Prakrit were also being written at the same time, it would mean competitive writing - and use of Sanskrit as an esoteric language not available to normal people.
d) This would also push the compilation of the Veda quite close to the period when the Epics and the Puranas were being written. So if all of these writing activities occurred from say 300 BC to 100 BC it would explain multiple attributes of the epics and puranas.
i) Much of the Epics Puranas were clearly written and enlarged when non-Aryan Hindu influences were predominant. Probably the Kings were not Aryan - and we know this to be true in Nanda, Sunga and other periods
ii) Puranas keep on explaining inconsistencies in the Veda and the epics. If both were being compiled together, it would be necessary to explain the inconsistencies - which would become expressed in the Brahmanas and the Puranas.
iii) It would however not explain why the Vedas were still preserved in its original form - except that it was preserved as a esoteric practice to justify the Brahmin's existence.
iv) Vedic religion was completely recast by 200 BC into a more recognisable form of modern Hinduism. But the Veda completely retain their original form - this is explainable if they were in any way being transmitted orally and faced resistance to change when being written down.
v) The resistance to change would justify the importance of the Brahman - since if anyone could write anything they wanted, non-Brahmins could also write up a lot of new stuff. The Brahmins definitely wrote a lot of new stuff into the Epics and Puranas, but they preserved the original Veda because only they knew it - and kept it secret. So the secrecy part might also be a late event - and not central to the original Rig composition which could then be in writing.
vi) Despite the resistance to change, the daily and other rituals (Havans, ceremonies, marriage functions etc which we perform) - despite its predominantly Vedic nature - has many additions of later Hinduism like Krishna worship, Vinayakar worship etc - which are clear superimpositions. Examination of these ceremonies (mostly in the Taithiriya Brahmana with which I am familiar) might provide some insight into these alterations. Similarly, adaptation of the original Kriyas of the Veda for temple worship would also give insight into these changes (since every temple has these rituals and perform them regularly)
Proving the late compilation theory would require examination of the Epics and Brahmanas. Put together they are about 50 times the size of the Veda. This is not feasible.
What is feasible is examination of the Rig Veda Samhita for
a) Multiple repetition. This would indicate that different versions have been incorporated again and again, unnecessarily enlarging it
b) Interpolations. This can be easily looked for. Anything smacking of
i)Budhism,
ii)Jainism,
iii)Upanishadic thought
iv) Later Hindu (Bhakti) thought which might be present around 200 BC when the Epics and Puranas were being written and the Bhagavad Gita was being written.
That means any attributes of Vishnu other than the three all encompassing strides, any attributes of Rudra other than as father of the Maruts, any comments on Krishna which is positive (purging of some of the negative comments of Krishna - though not all have been purged I know - of course cannot be looked for now - you cannot look for what is not there !!)
Despite that, purging of a lot of hatred of locals from the Rig is possible if it were being written when the locals were ascendant. One needs to look for vestiges of purging.
c) Interpolations would need to be looked for in the 7th and 10th Mandala particularly since that is where the controversial stuff is.
d) Looking through the Brahmanas and Sutras for similar features is more difficult - because of later interpolations being more likely. And the tediousness of the job.
Defining the problem explains why no Indologist after the British and the Germans have attempted any of it. Most Indians would regard the Veda, Epics and Puranas with veneration. Communist and Tamil historians would have anti Brahminical agendas and would be dictated by what their comments would achieve in politics rather than dispassionate evaluation.
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