![Andronovo culture](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0c/Andronovo_culture.png)
Indo-Iranian peoples, also known as Indo-Iranic peoples by scholars,
and sometimes as Arya or
Aryan
Aryan or Arya (, Indo-Iranian *''arya'') is a term originally used as an ethnocultural self-designation by Indo-Iranians in ancient times, in contrast to the nearby outsiders known as 'non-Aryan' (*''an-arya''). In Ancient India, the term ' ...
s from their self-designation, were a group of
Indo-European peoples
The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the overwhelming majority of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and the northern Indian subcontinent. Some European languages of this family, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, Dutch ...
who brought the
Indo-Iranian languages
The Indo-Iranian languages (also Indo-Iranic languages or Aryan languages) constitute the largest and southeasternmost extant branch of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family (with over 400 languages), predominantly spoken i ...
, a major branch of the
Indo-European language family
The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the overwhelming majority of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and the northern Indian subcontinent. Some European languages of this family, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, Dutch ...
, to major parts of
Eurasia
Eurasia (, ) is the largest continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. Primarily in the Northern and Eastern Hemispheres, it spans from the British Isles and the Iberian Peninsula in the west to the Japanese archipelago a ...
in the second part of the 3rd millennium BCE. They eventually branched out into
Iranian peoples
The Iranian peoples or Iranic peoples are a diverse grouping of Indo-European peoples who are identified by their usage of the Iranian languages and other cultural similarities.
The Proto-Iranians are believed to have emerged as a separat ...
and
Indo-Aryan peoples
Indo-Aryan peoples are a diverse collection of Indo-European peoples speaking Indo-Aryan languages in the Indian subcontinent. Historically, Aryan were the Indo-European pastoralists who migrated from Central Asia into South Asia and intr ...
, predominantly in the
geographical subregion of
Southern Asia.
Nomenclature
The term ''
Aryan
Aryan or Arya (, Indo-Iranian *''arya'') is a term originally used as an ethnocultural self-designation by Indo-Iranians in ancient times, in contrast to the nearby outsiders known as 'non-Aryan' (*''an-arya''). In Ancient India, the term ' ...
'' has long been used to denote the ''Indo-Iranians'', because ''Arya'' is indeed the self-designation of the ancient speakers of the
Indo-Iranian languages
The Indo-Iranian languages (also Indo-Iranic languages or Aryan languages) constitute the largest and southeasternmost extant branch of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family (with over 400 languages), predominantly spoken i ...
, specifically the
Iranian
Iranian may refer to:
* Iran, a sovereign state
* Iranian peoples, the speakers of the Iranian languages. The term Iranic peoples is also used for this term to distinguish the pan ethnic term from Iranian, used for the people of Iran
* Iranian lan ...
and the
Indo-Aryan peoples
Indo-Aryan peoples are a diverse collection of Indo-European peoples speaking Indo-Aryan languages in the Indian subcontinent. Historically, Aryan were the Indo-European pastoralists who migrated from Central Asia into South Asia and intr ...
, collectively known as the Indo-Iranians. Despite this, some scholars use the term Indo-Iranian to refer to this group, though the term "Aryan" remains widely used by most scholars, such as
Josef Wiesehofer Josef may refer to
*Josef (given name)
*Josef (surname)
* ''Josef'' (film), a 2011 Croatian war film
*Musik Josef
Musik Josef is a Japanese manufacturer of musical instruments. It was founded by Yukio Nakamura, and is the only company in Japan spe ...
,
Will Durant
William James Durant (; November 5, 1885 – November 7, 1981) was an American writer, historian, and philosopher. He became best known for his work '' The Story of Civilization'', which contains 11 volumes and details the history of eastern a ...
, and Jaakko Häkkinen.
Population geneticist
Population genetics is a subfield of genetics that deals with genetic differences within and between populations, and is a part of evolutionary biology. Studies in this branch of biology examine such phenomena as adaptation, speciation, and popu ...
Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza
Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza (; 25 January 1922 – 31 August 2018) was an Italian geneticist. He was a population geneticist who taught at the University of Parma, the University of Pavia and then at Stanford University.
Works
Schooling and po ...
, in his 1994 book ''The History and Geography of Human Genes'', also uses the term Aryan to describe the Indo-Iranians.
History
Origin
The early Indo-Iranians are commonly identified with the descendants of the
Proto-Indo-Europeans
The Proto-Indo-Europeans are a hypothetical prehistoric population of Eurasia who spoke Proto-Indo-European (PIE), the ancestor of the Indo-European languages according to linguistic reconstruction.
Knowledge of them comes chiefly from t ...
known as the
Sintashta culture
The Sintashta culture (russian: Синташтинская культура, Sintashtinskaya kul'tura), around 2050–1900 BCE, is the first phase of the Sintashta–Petrovka culture. or Sintashta–Arkaim culture,. and is a late Middle Bronze Ag ...
and the subsequent
Andronovo culture
The Andronovo culture (russian: Андроновская культура, translit=Andronovskaya kul'tura) is a collection of similar local Late Bronze Age cultures that flourished 2000–1450 BC,Grigoriev, Stanislav, (2021)"Andronovo ...
within the broader Andronovo horizon, and their homeland with an area of the
Eurasian steppe
The Eurasian Steppe, also simply called the Great Steppe or the steppes, is the vast steppe ecoregion of Eurasia in the temperate grasslands, savannas and shrublands biome. It stretches through Hungary, Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova and Transnistri ...
that borders the
Ural River
The Ural (russian: Урал, ), known before 1775 as Yaik (russian: Яик, ba, Яйыҡ, translit=Yayıq, ; kk, Жайық, translit=Jaiyq, ), is a river flowing through Russia and Kazakhstan in the continental border between Europe and Asia ...
on the west, the
Tian Shan
The Tian Shan,, , otk, 𐰴𐰣 𐱅𐰭𐰼𐰃, , tr, Tanrı Dağı, mn, Тэнгэр уул, , ug, تەڭرىتاغ, , , kk, Тәңіртауы / Алатау, , , ky, Теңир-Тоо / Ала-Тоо, , , uz, Tyan-Shan / Tangritog‘ ...
on the east (where the Indo-Iranians took over the area occupied by the earlier
Afanasevo culture
The Afanasievo culture, or Afanasevo culture (Afanasevan culture) (russian: Афанасьевская культура ''Afanas'yevskaya'' kul'tura), is the earliest known archaeological culture of south Siberia, occupying the Minusinsk Basin a ...
), and
Transoxiana
Transoxiana or Transoxania (Land beyond the Oxus) is the Latin name for a region and civilization located in lower Central Asia roughly corresponding to modern-day eastern Uzbekistan, western Tajikistan, parts of southern Kazakhstan, parts of Tu ...
and the
Hindu Kush
The Hindu Kush is an mountain range in Central and South Asia to the west of the Himalayas. It stretches from central and western Afghanistan, Quote: "The Hindu Kush mountains run along the Afghan border with the North-West Frontier Provinc ...
on the south.
Based on its use by Indo-Aryans in
Mitanni
Mitanni (; Hittite cuneiform ; ''Mittani'' '), c. 1550–1260 BC, earlier called Ḫabigalbat in old Babylonian texts, c. 1600 BC; Hanigalbat or Hani-Rabbat (''Hanikalbat'', ''Khanigalbat'', cuneiform ') in Assyrian records, or ''Naharin'' in ...
and Vedic India, its prior absence in the Near East and Harappan India, and its 19th–20th century BCE attestation at the Andronovo site of
Sintashta
Sintashta (russian: Синташта́) is an archaeological site in Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia. It is the remains of a fortified settlement dating to the Bronze Age, ''c''. 2800–1600 BC, and is the type site of the Sintashta culture. The site ha ...
, Kuzmina (1994) argues that the chariot corroborates the identification of Andronovo as Indo-Iranian. dated a
chariot burial
Chariot burials are tombs in which the deceased was buried together with their chariot, usually including their horses and other possessions. An instance of a person being buried with their horse (without the chariot) is called horse burial.
Fin ...
at
Krivoye Lake
Krivoye Ozero is a small lake in the Chelyabinsk Oblast of Russia, southeast of Magnitogorsk, near the Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country located mainly in Central Asia and partly i ...
to about 2000 BCE, and a
Bactria-Margiana burial that also contains a foal has recently been found, indicating further links with the steppes.
[; Kuzmina (1994), Klejn (1974), and Brentjes (1981), as cited in ]
Historical linguists broadly estimate that a continuum of Indo-Iranian languages probably began to diverge by 2000 BCE, if not earlier,
preceding both the
Vedic
upright=1.2, The Vedas are ancient Sanskrit texts of Hinduism. Above: A page from the '' Atharvaveda''.
The Vedas (, , ) are a large body of religious texts originating in ancient India. Composed in Vedic Sanskrit, the texts constitute the ...
and
Iranian
Iranian may refer to:
* Iran, a sovereign state
* Iranian peoples, the speakers of the Iranian languages. The term Iranic peoples is also used for this term to distinguish the pan ethnic term from Iranian, used for the people of Iran
* Iranian lan ...
cultures. The earliest recorded forms of these languages,
Vedic Sanskrit
Vedic Sanskrit was an ancient language of the Indo-Aryan subgroup of the Indo-European language family. It is attested in the Vedas and related literature compiled over the period of the mid- 2nd to mid-1st millennium BCE. It was orally preser ...
and
Gathic Avestan
Avestan (), or historically Zend, is an umbrella term for two Old Iranian languages: Old Avestan (spoken in the 2nd millennium BCE) and Younger Avestan (spoken in the 1st millennium BCE). They are known only from their conjoined use as the scrip ...
, are remarkably similar, descended from the common
Proto-Indo-Iranian language
Proto-Indo-Iranian, also Proto-Indo-Iranic is the reconstructed proto-language of the Indo-Iranian/Indo-Iranic branch of Indo-European. Its speakers, the hypothetical Proto-Indo-Iranians, are assumed to have lived in the late 3rd millennium B ...
. The origin and earliest relationship between the
Nuristani languages
The Nuristani languages, formerly known as Kafiri languages, are one of the three groups within the Indo-Iranian language family, alongside the much larger Indo-Aryan and Iranian groups. They have approximately 130,000 speakers primarily in ea ...
and that of the Iranian and
Indo-Aryan groups is not completely clear.
Expansion
First wave – Indo-Aryans
Two-wave models of Indo-Iranian expansion have been proposed by Burrow (1973) and . The Indo-Iranians and their expansion are strongly associated with the
Proto-Indo-European
Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. Its proposed features have been derived by linguistic reconstruction from documented Indo-European languages. No direct record of Proto-Indo-E ...
invention of the
chariot
A chariot is a type of cart driven by a charioteer, usually using horses to provide rapid motive power. The oldest known chariots have been found in burials of the Sintashta culture in modern-day Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia, dated to c. 2000&nbs ...
. It is assumed that this expansion spread from the
Proto-Indo-European homeland
The Proto-Indo-European homeland (or Indo-European homeland) was the prehistoric linguistic homeland of the Proto-Indo-European language (PIE). From this region, its speakers migrated east and west, and went on to form the proto-communities o ...
north of the
Caspian sea
The Caspian Sea is the world's largest inland body of water, often described as the world's largest lake or a full-fledged sea. An endorheic basin, it lies between Europe and Asia; east of the Caucasus, west of the broad steppe of Central Asia ...
south to the
Caucasus
The Caucasus () or Caucasia (), is a region between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, mainly comprising Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and parts of Southern Russia. The Caucasus Mountains, including the Greater Caucasus range, have historically ...
,
Central Asia
Central Asia, also known as Middle Asia, is a subregion, region of Asia that stretches from the Caspian Sea in the west to western China and Mongolia in the east, and from Afghanistan and Iran in the south to Russia in the north. It includes t ...
, the Iranian plateau, and the
Indian subcontinent
The Indian subcontinent is a list of the physiographic regions of the world, physiographical region in United Nations geoscheme for Asia#Southern Asia, Southern Asia. It is situated on the Indian Plate, projecting southwards into the Indian O ...
.
=The Mitanni of Anatolia
=
The Mitanni, a people known in eastern
Anatolia
Anatolia, tr, Anadolu Yarımadası), and the Anatolian plateau, also known as Asia Minor, is a large peninsula in Western Asia and the westernmost protrusion of the Asian continent. It constitutes the major part of modern-day Turkey. The re ...
from about 1500 BCE, were of possibly of mixed origins: a
Hurrian
The Hurrians (; cuneiform: ; transliteration: ''Ḫu-ur-ri''; also called Hari, Khurrites, Hourri, Churri, Hurri or Hurriter) were a people of the Bronze Age Near East. They spoke a Hurrian language and lived in Anatolia, Syria and Northern ...
-speaking majority was supposedly dominated by a non-Anatolian,
Indo-Aryan elite.
There is linguistic evidence for such a
superstrate
In linguistics, a stratum (Latin for "layer") or strate is a language that influences or is influenced by another through contact. A substratum or substrate is a language that has lower power or prestige than another, while a superstratum or sup ...
, in the form of:
* a
horse training
Horse training refers to a variety of practices that teach horses to perform certain behaviors when commanded to do so by humans. Horses are trained to be manageable by humans for everyday care as well as for equestrian activities from horse ra ...
manual written by a Mitanni man named
Kikkuli Kikkuli was the Hurrian "master horse trainer 'assussanni''of the land of Mitanni" (LÚ''A-AŠ-ŠU-UŠ-ŠA-AN-NI ŠA'' KUR URU''MI-IT-TA-AN-NI'') and author of a chariot horse training text written primarily in the Hittite language (as well as an O ...
, which was used by the
Hittites
The Hittites () were an Anatolian people who played an important role in establishing first a kingdom in Kussara (before 1750 BC), then the Kanesh or Nesha kingdom (c. 1750–1650 BC), and next an empire centered on Hattusa in north-centra ...
, an
Indo-European Anatolian people;
* the names of Mitanni rulers and;
* the names of gods invoked by these rulers in treaties.
In particular, Kikkuli's text includes words such as ''aika'' "one" (i.e. a cognate of the Indo-Aryan ''eka''), ''tera'' "three" (''tri''), ''panza'' "five" (''pancha''), ''satta'' "seven", (''sapta''), ''na'' "nine" (''nava''), and ''vartana'' "turn around", in the context of a horse race (Indo-Aryan ''vartana''). In a treaty between the Hittites and the Mitanni, the
Ashvin
Ashvin or Ashwin or Ashwan (; bn, আশ্বিন; hi, आश्विन; or, ଆଶ୍ୱିନ; Malay/Indonesian: ''Aswin''; Thai: ''Asawin''), also known as Aswayuja, is the seventh month of the lunisolar Hindu calendar, the solar Tam ...
deities
Mitra
''Mitra'' ( Proto-Indo-Iranian: ''*mitrás'') is the name of an Indo-Iranian divinity from which the names and some characteristics of Rigvedic Mitrá and Avestan Mithra derive.
The names (and occasionally also some characteristics) of these t ...
,
Varuna
Varuna (; sa, वरुण, , Malay: ''Baruna'') is a Vedic deity associated initially with the sky, later also with the seas as well as Ṛta (justice) and Satya (truth). He is found in the oldest layer of Vedic literature of Hinduism, such ...
,
Indra
Indra (; Sanskrit: इन्द्र) is the king of the devas (god-like deities) and Svarga (heaven) in Hindu mythology. He is associated with the sky, lightning, weather, thunder, storms, rains, river flows, and war. volumes/ref> I ...
, and
Nasatya
The Ashvins ( sa, अश्विन्, Aśvin, horse possessors), also known as Ashwini Kumara and Asvinau,, §1.42. are Hindu twin gods associated with medicine, health, dawn and sciences. In the ''Rigveda'', they are described as youthful div ...
are invoked. These
loanwords
A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language. This is in contrast to cognates, which are words in two or more languages that are similar because the ...
tend to connect the Mitanni superstrate to Indo-Aryan rather than
Iranian languages
The Iranian languages or Iranic languages are a branch of the Indo-Iranian languages in the Indo-European language family that are spoken natively by the Iranian peoples, predominantly in the Iranian Plateau.
The Iranian languages are grouped ...
– i.e. the early Iranian word for "one" was ''aiva''.
=Indian subcontinent – Vedic culture
=
The standard model for the entry of the Indo-European languages into the Indian subcontinent is that this first wave went over the Hindu Kush, either into the headwaters of the
Indus
The Indus ( ) is a transboundary river of Asia and a trans-Himalayan river of South and Central Asia. The river rises in mountain springs northeast of Mount Kailash in Western Tibet, flows northwest through the disputed region of Kashmir, ...
and later the
Ganges
The Ganges ( ) (in India: Ganga ( ); in Bangladesh: Padma ( )). "The Ganges Basin, known in India as the Ganga and in Bangladesh as the Padma, is an international river to which India, Bangladesh, Nepal and China are the riparian states." is ...
. The earliest stratum of
Vedic Sanskrit
Vedic Sanskrit was an ancient language of the Indo-Aryan subgroup of the Indo-European language family. It is attested in the Vedas and related literature compiled over the period of the mid- 2nd to mid-1st millennium BCE. It was orally preser ...
, preserved only in the
Rigveda
The ''Rigveda'' or ''Rig Veda'' ( ', from ' "praise" and ' "knowledge") is an ancient Indian collection of Vedic Sanskrit hymns (''sūktas''). It is one of the four sacred canonical Hindu texts (''śruti'') known as the Vedas. Only one Sh ...
, is assigned to roughly 1500 BCE.
From the Indus, the
Indo-Aryan languages
The Indo-Aryan languages (or sometimes Indic languages) are a branch of the Indo-Iranian languages in the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family. As of the early 21st century, they have more than 800 million speakers, primarily ...
spread from c. 1500 BCE to c. 500 BCE, over the northern and central parts of the subcontinent, sparing the extreme south. The
Indo-Aryans
Indo-Aryan peoples are a diverse collection of Indo-European peoples speaking Indo-Aryan languages in the Indian subcontinent. Historically, Aryan were the Indo-European pastoralists who migrated from Central Asia into South Asia and intr ...
in these areas established several powerful kingdoms and principalities in the region, from south eastern
Afghanistan
Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...
to the doorstep of
Bengal
Bengal ( ; bn, বাংলা/বঙ্গ, translit=Bānglā/Bôngô, ) is a geopolitical, cultural and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the eastern part of the Indian subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal, predom ...
. The most powerful of these kingdoms were the post-Rigvedic Kuru (in Kurukshetra and the Delhi area) and their allies the Pañcālas further east, as well as
Gandhara
Gandhāra is the name of an ancient region located in the northwestern region of the Indian subcontinent, more precisely in present-day north-west Pakistan and parts of south-east Afghanistan. The region centered around the Peshawar Vall ...
and later on, about the time of the
Buddha
Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha, was a śramaṇa, wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism.
According to Buddhist tradition, he was ...
, the kingdom of
Kosala
The Kingdom of Kosala (Sanskrit: ) was an ancient Indian kingdom with a rich culture, corresponding to the area within the region of Awadh in present-day Uttar Pradesh to Western Odisha. It emerged as a janapada, small state during the late Ve ...
and the quickly expanding realm of
Magadha
Magadha was a region and one of the sixteen sa, script=Latn, Mahajanapadas, label=none, lit=Great Kingdoms of the Second Urbanization (600–200 BCE) in what is now south Bihar (before expansion) at the eastern Ganges Plain. Magadha was ruled ...
. The latter lasted until the 4th century BCE, when it was conquered by
Chandragupta Maurya
Chandragupta Maurya (350-295 BCE) was a ruler in Ancient India who expanded a geographically-extensive kingdom based in Magadha and founded the Maurya dynasty. He reigned from 320 BCE to 298 BCE. The Maurya kingdom expanded to become an empi ...
and formed the center of the
Mauryan empire
The Maurya Empire, or the Mauryan Empire, was a geographically extensive Iron Age historical power in the Indian subcontinent based in Magadha, having been founded by Chandragupta Maurya in 322 BCE, and existing in loose-knit fashion until 1 ...
.
In eastern
Afghanistan
Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...
and some western regions of
Pakistan
Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...
,
Indo-Aryan languages
The Indo-Aryan languages (or sometimes Indic languages) are a branch of the Indo-Iranian languages in the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family. As of the early 21st century, they have more than 800 million speakers, primarily ...
were eventually replaced by
Eastern Iranian languages
The Eastern Iranian languages are a subgroup of the Iranian languages emerging in Middle Iranian times (from c. the 4th century BC). The Avestan language is often classified as early Eastern Iranian. As opposed to the Middle Western Iranian diale ...
. Most Indo-Aryan languages, however, were and still are prominent in the rest of the
Indian subcontinent
The Indian subcontinent is a list of the physiographic regions of the world, physiographical region in United Nations geoscheme for Asia#Southern Asia, Southern Asia. It is situated on the Indian Plate, projecting southwards into the Indian O ...
. Today, Indo-Aryan languages are spoken in
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
,
Pakistan
Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...
,
Bangladesh
Bangladesh (}, ), officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the eighth-most populous country in the world, with a population exceeding 165 million people in an area of . Bangladesh is among the mos ...
,
Nepal
Nepal (; ne, नेपाल ), formerly the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal ( ne,
सङ्घीय लोकतान्त्रिक गणतन्त्र नेपाल ), is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is mai ...
,
Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...
, Fiji,
Suriname
Suriname (; srn, Sranankondre or ), officially the Republic of Suriname ( nl, Republiek Suriname , srn, Ripolik fu Sranan), is a country on the northeastern Atlantic coast of South America. It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north ...
and the
Maldives
Maldives (, ; dv, ދިވެހިރާއްޖެ, translit=Dhivehi Raajje, ), officially the Republic of Maldives ( dv, ދިވެހިރާއްޖޭގެ ޖުމްހޫރިއްޔާ, translit=Dhivehi Raajjeyge Jumhooriyyaa, label=none, ), is an archipelag ...
.
Second wave – Iranians
The second wave is interpreted as the Iranian wave.
The first Iranians to reach the
Black Sea
The Black Sea is a marginal mediterranean sea of the Atlantic Ocean lying between Europe and Asia, east of the Balkans, south of the East European Plain, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia. It is bounded by Bulgaria, Georgia, Roma ...
may have been the
Cimmerians
The Cimmerians (Akkadian: , romanized: ; Hebrew: , romanized: ; Ancient Greek: , romanized: ; Latin: ) were an ancient Eastern Iranian equestrian nomadic people originating in the Caspian steppe, part of whom subsequently migrated into West A ...
in the 8th century BCE, although their linguistic affiliation is uncertain. They were followed by the
Scythians
The Scythians or Scyths, and sometimes also referred to as the Classical Scythians and the Pontic Scythians, were an Ancient Iranian peoples, ancient Eastern Iranian languages, Eastern
* : "In modern scholarship the name 'Sakas' is reserved f ...
, who are considered a western branch of the Central Asian
Saka
The Saka ( Old Persian: ; Kharoṣṭhī: ; Ancient Egyptian: , ; , old , mod. , ), Shaka (Sanskrit ( Brāhmī): , , ; Sanskrit (Devanāgarī): , ), or Sacae (Ancient Greek: ; Latin: ) were a group of nomadic Iranian peoples who hist ...
s.
Sarmatian
The Sarmatians (; grc, Σαρμαται, Sarmatai; Latin: ) were a large confederation of Ancient Iranian peoples, ancient Eastern Iranian languages, Eastern Iranian peoples, Iranian Eurasian nomads, equestrian nomadic peoples of classical ant ...
tribes, of whom the best known are the
Roxolani
The Roxolani or Rhoxolāni ( grc, Ροξολανοι , ; la, Rhoxolānī) were a Sarmatian people documented between the 2nd century BC and the 4th century AD, first east of the Borysthenes (Dnieper) on the coast of Lake Maeotis (Sea of Azov), a ...
(Rhoxolani),
Iazyges
The Iazyges (), singular Ἰάζυξ. were an ancient Sarmatian tribe that traveled westward in BC from Central Asia to the steppes of modern Ukraine. In BC, they moved into modern-day Hungary and Serbia near the Dacian steppe between th ...
(Jazyges) and the
Alani
The Alans (Latin: ''Alani'') were an ancient and medieval Iranian peoples, Iranian Eurasian nomads, nomadic pastoral people of the North Caucasus – generally regarded as part of the Sarmatians, and possibly related to the Massagetae. Modern ...
(Alans), followed the Scythians westwards into Europe in the late centuries BCE and the 1st and 2nd centuries CE (The
Age of Migrations
The Migration Period was a period in European history marked by large-scale migrations that saw the fall of the Western Roman Empire and subsequent settlement of its former territories by various tribes, and the establishment of the post-Roman ...
). The populous Sarmatian tribe of the
Massagetae
The Massagetae or Massageteans (Ancient Greek: ; Latin: ), also known as Sakā tigraxaudā (Old Persian: , "wearer of pointed caps") or Orthocorybantians (Ancient Greek: ; Latin: ),: As for the term “Orthocorybantii”, this is a translati ...
, dwelling near the Caspian Sea, were known to the early rulers of Persia in the
Achaemenid
The Achaemenid Empire or Achaemenian Empire (; peo, wikt:𐎧𐏁𐏂𐎶, 𐎧𐏁𐏂, , ), also called the First Persian Empire, was an History of Iran#Classical antiquity, ancient Iranian empire founded by Cyrus the Great in 550 BC. Bas ...
Period. At their greatest reported extent, around 1st century CE, the Sarmatian tribes ranged from the
Vistula River
The Vistula (; pl, Wisła, ) is the longest river in Poland and the ninth-longest river in Europe, at in length. The drainage basin, reaching into three other nations, covers , of which is in Poland.
The Vistula rises at Barania Góra in ...
to the mouth of the
Danube
The Danube ( ; ) is a river that was once a long-standing frontier of the Roman Empire and today connects 10 European countries, running through their territories or being a border. Originating in Germany, the Danube flows southeast for , pa ...
and eastward to the
Volga
The Volga (; russian: Во́лга, a=Ru-Волга.ogg, p=ˈvoɫɡə) is the List of rivers of Europe#Rivers of Europe by length, longest river in Europe. Situated in Russia, it flows through Central Russia to Southern Russia and into the Cas ...
, bordering the shores of the
Black
Black is a color which results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without hue, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness. Black and white have o ...
and
Caspian Caspian can refer to:
*The Caspian Sea
*The Caspian Depression, surrounding the northern part of the Caspian Sea
*The Caspians, the ancient people living near the Caspian Sea
*Caspian languages, collection of languages and dialects of Caspian peopl ...
seas as well as the
Caucasus
The Caucasus () or Caucasia (), is a region between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, mainly comprising Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and parts of Southern Russia. The Caucasus Mountains, including the Greater Caucasus range, have historically ...
to the south. In the east, the Saka occupied several areas in Xinjiang, from Khotan to Tumshuq.
The
Medians
The Medes ( Old Persian: ; Akkadian: , ; Ancient Greek: ; Latin: ) were an ancient Iranian people who spoke the Median language and who inhabited an area known as Media between western and northern Iran. Around the 11th century BC, th ...
,
Persians
The Persians are an Iranian ethnic group who comprise over half of the population of Iran. They share a common cultural system and are native speakers of the Persian language as well as of the languages that are closely related to Persian.
...
and
Parthia
Parthia ( peo, 𐎱𐎼𐎰𐎺 ''Parθava''; xpr, 𐭐𐭓𐭕𐭅 ''Parθaw''; pal, 𐭯𐭫𐭮𐭥𐭡𐭥 ''Pahlaw'') is a historical region located in northeastern Greater Iran. It was conquered and subjugated by the empire of the Med ...
ns begin to appear on the
Iranian plateau
The Iranian plateau or Persian plateau is a geological feature in Western Asia, Central Asia, and South Asia. It comprises part of the Eurasian Plate and is wedged between the Arabian Plate and the Indian Plate; situated between the Zagros ...
from c. 800 BCE, and the
Achaemenid
The Achaemenid Empire or Achaemenian Empire (; peo, wikt:𐎧𐏁𐏂𐎶, 𐎧𐏁𐏂, , ), also called the First Persian Empire, was an History of Iran#Classical antiquity, ancient Iranian empire founded by Cyrus the Great in 550 BC. Bas ...
s replaced
Elamite
Elamite, also known as Hatamtite and formerly as Susian, is an extinct language that was spoken by the ancient Elamites. It was used in what is now southwestern Iran from 2600 BC to 330 BC. Elamite works disappear from the archeological record ...
rule from 559 BCE. Around the first millennium CE, Iranian groups began to settle on the eastern edge of the Iranian plateau, on the mountainous frontier of northwestern and western
Pakistan
Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...
, displacing the earlier
Indo-Aryans
Indo-Aryan peoples are a diverse collection of Indo-European peoples speaking Indo-Aryan languages in the Indian subcontinent. Historically, Aryan were the Indo-European pastoralists who migrated from Central Asia into South Asia and intr ...
from the area.
In
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe is a subregion of the Europe, European continent. As a largely ambiguous term, it has a wide range of geopolitical, geographical, ethnic, cultural, and socio-economic connotations. The vast majority of the region is covered by Russ ...
, the Iranians were eventually decisively assimilated (e.g.
Slavicisation
Slavicisation or Slavicization, is the acculturation of something Slavic into a non-Slavic culture, cuisine, region, or nation. To a lesser degree, it also means acculturation or adoption of something non-Slavic into Slavic culture or terms. Th ...
) and absorbed by the
Proto-Slavic
Proto-Slavic (abbreviated PSl., PS.; also called Common Slavic or Common Slavonic) is the Attested language, unattested, linguistic reconstruction, reconstructed proto-language of all Slavic languages. It represents Slavic speech approximately ...
population of the region, while in Central Asia, the
Turkic languages
The Turkic languages are a language family of over 35 documented languages, spoken by the Turkic peoples of Eurasia from Eastern Europe and Southern Europe to Central Asia, East Asia, North Asia (Siberia), and Western Asia. The Turkic languag ...
marginalized the
Iranian languages
The Iranian languages or Iranic languages are a branch of the Indo-Iranian languages in the Indo-European language family that are spoken natively by the Iranian peoples, predominantly in the Iranian Plateau.
The Iranian languages are grouped ...
as a result of the
Turkic expansion
The Turkic peoples are a collection of diverse ethnic groups of West, Central, East, and North Asia as well as parts of Europe, who speak Turkic languages.. "Turkic peoples, any of various peoples whose members speak languages belonging to t ...
of the early centuries CE. Extant major Iranian languages are
Persian
Persian may refer to:
* People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language
** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples
** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...
,
Pashto
Pashto (,; , ) is an Eastern Iranian language in the Indo-European language family. It is known in historical Persian literature as Afghani ().
Spoken as a native language mostly by ethnic Pashtuns, it is one of the two official languages ...
,
Kurdish
Kurdish may refer to:
*Kurds or Kurdish people
*Kurdish languages
*Kurdish alphabets
*Kurdistan, the land of the Kurdish people which includes:
**Southern Kurdistan
**Eastern Kurdistan
**Northern Kurdistan
**Western Kurdistan
See also
* Kurd (dis ...
, and
Balochi besides numerous smaller ones.
Ossetian, primarily spoken in
North Ossetia
North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating direction or geography.
Etymology
The word ''north'' is ...
and
South Ossetia
South Ossetia, ka, სამხრეთი ოსეთი, ( , ), officially the Republic of South Ossetia – the State of Alania, is a partially recognised landlocked state in the South Caucasus. It has an officially stated populat ...
, is a direct descendant of
Alanic
Alanic is a sports and fitness clothing brand headquartered in North Hollywood, California, USA. Alanic corporate offices are located at 1/49 Lemana lane, Sydney, Australia. It has been the official supplier of the Miami Marathon USA, Vancouve ...
, and by that the only surviving Sarmatian language of the once wide-ranging East Iranian dialect continuum that stretched from Eastern Europe to the eastern parts of Central Asia.
Archaeology
Archaeological culture
An archaeological culture is a recurring assemblage of types of artifacts, buildings and monuments from a specific period and region that may constitute the material culture remains of a particular past human society. The connection between thes ...
s associated with Indo-Iranian expansion include:
* Europe
**
Poltavka culture
Poltavka culture () was an early to middle Bronze Age archaeological culture which flourished on the Volga-Ural steppe and the forest steppe in 2800—2200 BCE.
The Poltavka culture emerged as an eastern outgrowth of the Yamnaya culture, ne ...
(2500–2100 BCE)
**
Abashevo culture
The Abashevo culture (russian: Абашевская культура, Abashevskaya kul'tura) is an early Bronze Age, ca. 2300–1850 BC, archaeological culture found in the valleys of the Volga and Kama River north of the Samara bend and into t ...
(2300–1850 BCE)
**
Srubna culture
The Srubnaya culture (russian: Срубная культура, Srubnaya kul'tura, ua, Зрубна культура, Zrubna kul'tura), also known as Timber-grave culture, was a Late Bronze Age 1850–1450 BC cultureParpola, Asko, (2012)"Format ...
(1850–1450 BCE)
* Central Asia
**
Andronovo horizon (2000–1450 BCE)
***
Sintashta
Sintashta (russian: Синташта́) is an archaeological site in Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia. It is the remains of a fortified settlement dating to the Bronze Age, ''c''. 2800–1600 BC, and is the type site of the Sintashta culture. The site ha ...
-Petrovka-Arkaim (2050–1750 BCE)
*** Alakul (2100–1400 BCE)
*** Fedorovo (1400–1200 BCE)
*** Alekseyevka (1200–1000 BCE)
**
Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex (2200–1700 BCE)
**
Yaz culture
The Yaz culture (named after the type site Yaz-Tappe, Yaz Tepe, or Yaz Depe, near Baýramaly, Turkmenistan) was an early Iron Age culture of Margiana, Bactria and Sogdia (ca. 1500–500 BC, or ca. 1500–330 BC). It emerges at the top of late Br ...
(1500–1100 BCE)
* Indian subcontinent
**
Ochre Coloured Pottery culture
The Ochre Coloured Pottery culture (OCP) is a Bronze Age culture of the Indo-Gangetic Plain "generally dated 2000–1500 BCE," extending from eastern Punjab to northeastern Rajasthan and western Uttar Pradesh.
Artefacts of this culture show s ...
(2000–1500 BCE)
**
Cemetery H culture
The Cemetery H culture was a Bronze Age culture in the Punjab region in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, from about 1900 BC until about 1300 BC. It is regarded as a regional form of the late phase of the Harappan (Indus Valley ...
(1900–1300 BCE)
**
Swat culture
In the United States, a SWAT team (special weapons and tactics, originally special weapons assault team) is a police tactical unit that uses specialized or military equipment and tactics. Although they were first created in the 1960s to ...
(1400–800 BCE)
**
Painted Gray Ware culture
The Painted Grey Ware culture (PGW) is an Iron Age Indian culture of the western Gangetic plain and the Ghaggar-Hakra valley in the Indian subcontinent, conventionally dated 1200 to 600–500 BCE, or from 1300 to 500–300 BCE It is a successo ...
(1200–600 BCE)
* Iranian Plateau
** Early West Iranian Grey Ware (1500–1000 BCE)
**
Late West Iranian Buff Ware
Late may refer to:
* LATE, an acronym which could stand for:
** Limbic-predominant age-related TDP-43 encephalopathy, a proposed form of dementia
** Local-authority trading enterprise, a New Zealand business law
** Local average treatment effect, ...
(900–700 BCE)
suggests the following identifications:
Language
![Lenguas indoiranias](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/74/Lenguas_indoiranias.PNG)
The
Indo-European language
The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the overwhelming majority of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and the northern Indian subcontinent. Some European languages of this family, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, Dutch ...
spoken by the Indo-Iranians in the late 3rd millennium BCE was a
Satem language
Languages of the Indo-European family are classified as either centum languages or satem languages according to how the dorsal consonants (sounds of "K", "G" and "Y" type) of the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European language (PIE) developed. An e ...
still not removed very far from the
Proto-Indo-European language
Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. Its proposed features have been derived by linguistic reconstruction from documented Indo-European languages. No direct record of Proto-Indo-E ...
, and in turn only removed by a few centuries from
Vedic Sanskrit
Vedic Sanskrit was an ancient language of the Indo-Aryan subgroup of the Indo-European language family. It is attested in the Vedas and related literature compiled over the period of the mid- 2nd to mid-1st millennium BCE. It was orally preser ...
of the
Rigveda
The ''Rigveda'' or ''Rig Veda'' ( ', from ' "praise" and ' "knowledge") is an ancient Indian collection of Vedic Sanskrit hymns (''sūktas''). It is one of the four sacred canonical Hindu texts (''śruti'') known as the Vedas. Only one Sh ...
. The main phonological change separating Proto-Indo-Iranian from Proto–Indo-European is the collapse of the
ablauting vowels ''*e, *o, *a'' into a single vowel, Proto–Indo-Iranian ''*a'' (but see
Brugmann's law
Brugmann's law, named for Karl Brugmann, is a sound law stating that in the Indo-Iranian languages, the earlier Proto-Indo-European ' normally became in Proto-Indo-Iranian but in open syllables if it was followed by one consonant and another vow ...
).
Grassmann's law and
Bartholomae's law
Bartholomae's law (named after the German Indo-Europeanist Christian Bartholomae) is an early Indo-European (PIE) sound law affecting the Indo-Iranian family. It states that in a cluster of two or more obstruents (stops or the sibilant ), any one ...
were also complete in Proto-Indo-Iranian, as well as the loss of the labiovelars (kw, etc.) to k, and the Eastern Indo-European (Satem) shift from palatized k' to ć, as in Proto–Indo-European *k'ṃto- > Indo-Iran. *ćata- > Sanskrit śata-, Old Iran. sata
"100".
Among the sound changes from Proto-Indo-Iranian to
Indo-Aryan is the loss of the voiced sibilant ''*z'', among those to
Iranian
Iranian may refer to:
* Iran, a sovereign state
* Iranian peoples, the speakers of the Iranian languages. The term Iranic peoples is also used for this term to distinguish the pan ethnic term from Iranian, used for the people of Iran
* Iranian lan ...
is the de-aspiration of the PIE voiced aspirates.
Religion
Despite the introduction of later
Vedic
upright=1.2, The Vedas are ancient Sanskrit texts of Hinduism. Above: A page from the '' Atharvaveda''.
The Vedas (, , ) are a large body of religious texts originating in ancient India. Composed in Vedic Sanskrit, the texts constitute the ...
and
Zoroastrian
Zoroastrianism is an Iranian religion and one of the world's oldest organized faiths, based on the teachings of the Iranian-speaking prophet Zoroaster. It has a dualistic cosmology of good and evil within the framework of a monotheistic on ...
scriptures, Indo-Iranians shared a common inheritance of concepts including the universal force ''*Hṛta-'' (
Sanskrit
Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...
''
rta
RTA may refer to:
Media
* Radio and Television Arts, program at Ryerson University, Toronto, Canada
* Radio Television Afghanistan
** RTA TV, an Afghan channel
* Radiodiffusion Télévision Algérienne
* Real time attack, a game speedrun
Scienc ...
'',
Avestan
Avestan (), or historically Zend, is an umbrella term for two Old Iranian languages: Old Avestan (spoken in the 2nd millennium BCE) and Younger Avestan (spoken in the 1st millennium BCE). They are known only from their conjoined use as the scrip ...
''
asha
Asha (; also arta ; ae, 𐬀𐬴𐬀, translit=aṣ̌a/arta) is a Zoroastrian concept with a complex and highly nuanced range of meaning. It is commonly summarized in accord with its contextual implications of 'truth' and 'right(eousness)', 'ord ...
''), the sacred plant and drink ''*sawHma-'' (Sanskrit ''
Soma
Soma may refer to:
Businesses and brands
* SOMA (architects), a New York–based firm of architects
* Soma (company), a company that designs eco-friendly water filtration systems
* SOMA Fabrications, a builder of bicycle frames and other bicycle ...
'', Avestan ''
Haoma
''Haoma'' (; Avestan: 𐬵𐬀𐬊𐬨𐬀) is a divine plant in Zoroastrianism and in later Persian culture and mythology. ''Haoma'' has its origins in Indo-Iranian religion and is the cognate of Vedic ''soma''.
Etymology
Both Avestan ''haoma'' ...
'') and gods of social order such as ''*
mitra
''Mitra'' ( Proto-Indo-Iranian: ''*mitrás'') is the name of an Indo-Iranian divinity from which the names and some characteristics of Rigvedic Mitrá and Avestan Mithra derive.
The names (and occasionally also some characteristics) of these t ...
-'' (Sanskrit ''
Mitra
''Mitra'' ( Proto-Indo-Iranian: ''*mitrás'') is the name of an Indo-Iranian divinity from which the names and some characteristics of Rigvedic Mitrá and Avestan Mithra derive.
The names (and occasionally also some characteristics) of these t ...
'', Avestan and Old Persian ''
Mithra
Mithra ( ae, ''Miθra'', peo, 𐎷𐎰𐎼 ''Miça'') commonly known as Mehr, is the Iranian deity of covenant, light, oath, justice and the sun. In addition to being the divinity of contracts, Mithra is also a judicial figure, an all-seeing ...
'', ''Miθra'') and ''*bʰaga-'' (Sanskrit ''
Bhaga
''Bhaga'' is the Vedic god of wealth, as well as a term for "lord, patron" and "wealth, prosperity". He is an Āditya, a group of societal deities who are the sons of Aditi. Bhaga's responsibility was to make sure that people received a share o ...
'', Avestan and Old Persian ''Baga''). Proto-Indo-Iranian religion is an archaic offshoot of
Indo-European religion
Proto-Indo-European mythology is the body of myths and deities associated with the Proto-Indo-Europeans, the hypothetical speakers of the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European language. Although the mythological motifs are not directly attested ...
. From the various and dispersed Indo-Iranian cultures, a set of common ideas may be reconstructed from which a common, unattested proto-Indo-Iranian source may be deduced.
The pre-Islamic religion of the
Nuristani people
The Nuristanis, formerly known as Kafiristanis, are an ethnic group native to the Nuristan Province of northeastern Afghanistan and Chitral District of northwestern Pakistan. Their languages comprise the Nuristani branch of Indo-Iranian langua ...
and extant religion of the
Kalash people
The Kalasha (Kalasha: کالؕاشؕا, romanised: ''Kaḷaṣa)'', or Kalash, are an Indo-Aryan indigenous people residing in the Chitral District of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan. The Kalash population in Pakistan numbers only in ...
, is mostly based on the original religion of the Indo-Iranians.
Michael Witzel
Michael Witzel (born July 18, 1943) is a German-American philologist, comparative mythologist and Indologist. Witzel is the Wales Professor of Sanskrit at Harvard University and the editor of the Harvard Oriental Series (volumes 50–80).
Witze ...
theorises that these religions might share some elements with
Shinto
Shinto () is a religion from Japan. Classified as an East Asian religion by scholars of religion, its practitioners often regard it as Japan's indigenous religion and as a nature religion. Scholars sometimes call its practitioners ''Shintois ...
, one of the national religions of
Japan
Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...
, which according to him may contain some Indo-Iranian influence owing to contact presumably in the steppes of
Central Asia
Central Asia, also known as Middle Asia, is a subregion, region of Asia that stretches from the Caspian Sea in the west to western China and Mongolia in the east, and from Afghanistan and Iran in the south to Russia in the north. It includes t ...
at around 2000 BCE. In Shinto, traces of these can be seen in the myth of the storm god
Susanoo
__FORCETOC__
Susanoo (; historical orthography: , ) is a in Japanese mythology. The younger brother of Amaterasu, goddess of the sun and mythical ancestress of the Japanese imperial line, he is a multifaceted deity with contradictory chara ...
slaying a serpent
Yamata-no-Orochi
, or simply , is a legendary eight-headed and eight-tailed Japanese dragon/serpent.
Mythology
Yamata no Orochi legends are originally recorded in two ancient texts about Japanese mythology and history. The 712 AD transcribes this dragon name ...
and in the myth of the dawn goddess
Ame-no-Uzume
is the goddess of dawn, mirth, meditation, revelry and the arts in the Shinto religion of Japan, and the wife of fellow-god Sarutahiko Ōkami. She famously relates to the tale of the missing sun deity, Amaterasu Omikami. Her name can also be p ...
.
Most Indo-Iranians today follow
Abrahamic
The Abrahamic religions are a group of religions centered around worship of the God of Abraham. Abraham, a Hebrew patriarch, is extensively mentioned throughout Abrahamic religious scriptures such as the Bible and the Quran.
Jewish tradition ...
and
Dharmic
Dharma (; sa, wikt:धर्म#Sanskrit, धर्म, dharma, ; pi, dhamma, italic=yes) is a key concept with multiple meanings in Indian religions, such as Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Sikhism and others. Although there is Untranslatabili ...
religions.
Development
Beliefs developed in different ways as cultures separated and evolved. For example, the cosmo-mythology of the peoples that remained on the Central Asian
steppes
In physical geography, a steppe () is an ecoregion characterized by grassland plains without trees apart from those near rivers and lakes.
Steppe biomes may include:
* the montane grasslands and shrublands biome
* the temperate grasslands, ...
and the Iranian plateau is to a great degree unlike that of the Indians, focused more on groups of deities (''*daiva'' and ''*asura'') and less on the divinities individually. Indians were less conservative than Iranians in their treatment of their divinities, so that some deities were conflated with others or, conversely, aspects of a single divinity developed into divinities in their own right. By the time of
Zoroaster
Zoroaster,; fa, زرتشت, Zartosht, label=New Persian, Modern Persian; ku, زەردەشت, Zerdeşt also known as Zarathustra,, . Also known as Zarathushtra Spitama, or Ashu Zarathushtra is regarded as the spiritual founder of Zoroastria ...
, Iranian culture had also been subject to the upheavals of the Iranian Heroic Age (late Iranian Bronze Age, 1800–800 BCE), an influence that the Indo-Aryans were not subject to.
Sometimes certain myths developed in altogether different ways. The
Rig-Vedic Sarasvati
Saraswati ( sa, सरस्वती, ) is the Hindu goddess of knowledge, music, art, speech, wisdom, and learning. She is one of the Tridevi, along with the goddesses Lakshmi and Parvati.
The earliest known mention of Saraswati as a god ...
is linguistically and functionally cognate with Avestan
*Haraxvaitī Ārəduuī Sūrā Anāhitā. In the Rig-Veda (6,61,5–7) she battles a serpent called Vritra, who has hoarded all of the Earth's water. In contrast, in early portions of the Avesta, Iranian *Harahvati ''is'' the world-river that flows down from the mythical central Mount Hara. But *Harahvati does no battle — she is blocked by an obstacle (Avestan for obstacle: ''vərəθra'') placed there by
Angra Mainyu
Angra Mainyu (; Avestan: 𐬀𐬢𐬭𐬀⸱𐬨𐬀𐬌𐬥𐬌𐬌𐬎 ''Aŋra Mainiiu'') is the Avestan-language name of Zoroastrianism's hypostasis of the "destructive/evil spirit" and the main adversary in Zoroastrianism either of th ...
.
Cognate terms
The following is a list of
cognate
In historical linguistics, cognates or lexical cognates are sets of words in different languages that have been inherited in direct descent from an etymology, etymological ancestor in a proto-language, common parent language. Because language c ...
terms that may be gleaned from comparative linguistic analysis of the
Rigveda
The ''Rigveda'' or ''Rig Veda'' ( ', from ' "praise" and ' "knowledge") is an ancient Indian collection of Vedic Sanskrit hymns (''sūktas''). It is one of the four sacred canonical Hindu texts (''śruti'') known as the Vedas. Only one Sh ...
and
Avesta
The Avesta () is the primary collection of religious texts of Zoroastrianism, composed in the Avestan language.
The Avesta texts fall into several different categories, arranged either by dialect, or by usage. The principal text in the litu ...
. Both collections are from the period after the proposed date of separation (c. 2nd millennium BCE) of the Proto-Indo-Iranians into their respective Indic and Iranian branches.
Genetics
R1a1a (R-M17 or R-M198) is the sub-clade most commonly associated with Indo-European speakers. Most discussions purportedly of
R1a origins are actually about the origins of the dominant R1a1a (R-M17 or R-M198) sub-clade. Data so far collected indicates that there are two widely separated areas of high frequency, one in the northern
Indian subcontinent
The Indian subcontinent is a list of the physiographic regions of the world, physiographical region in United Nations geoscheme for Asia#Southern Asia, Southern Asia. It is situated on the Indian Plate, projecting southwards into the Indian O ...
, and the other in
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe is a subregion of the Europe, European continent. As a largely ambiguous term, it has a wide range of geopolitical, geographical, ethnic, cultural, and socio-economic connotations. The vast majority of the region is covered by Russ ...
, around
Poland
Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...
and
Ukraine
Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...
. The historical and prehistoric possible reasons for this are the subject of on-going discussion and attention amongst population geneticists and genetic genealogists, and are considered to be of potential interest to linguists and archaeologists also.
Out of 10 human male remains assigned to the Andronovo horizon from the Krasnoyarsk region, 9 possessed the
R1a Y-chromosome
haplogroup
A haplotype is a group of alleles in an organism that are inherited together from a single parent, and a haplogroup (haploid from the el, ἁπλοῦς, ''haploûs'', "onefold, simple" and en, group) is a group of similar haplotypes that share ...
and one
C-M130 haplogroup (xC3). mtDNA haplogroups of nine individuals assigned to the same Andronovo horizon and region were as follows: U4 (2 individuals), U2e, U5a1, Z, T1, T4, H, and K2b.
A 2004 study also established that during the Bronze Age/Iron Age period, the majority of the population of
Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country located mainly in Central Asia and partly in Eastern Europe. It borders Russia to the north and west, China to the east, Kyrgyzstan to the southeast, Uzbeki ...
(part of the Andronovo culture during the Bronze Age), was of west Eurasian origin (with mtDNA haplogroups such as U, H, HV, T, I and W), and that prior to the 13th–7th century BCE, all Kazakh samples belonged to European lineages.
See also
*
Proto-Indo-Iranian language
Proto-Indo-Iranian, also Proto-Indo-Iranic is the reconstructed proto-language of the Indo-Iranian/Indo-Iranic branch of Indo-European. Its speakers, the hypothetical Proto-Indo-Iranians, are assumed to have lived in the late 3rd millennium B ...
*
Proto-Dravidian language
Proto-Dravidian is the linguistic reconstruction of the common ancestor of the Dravidian languages. It is thought to have differentiated into Proto-North Dravidian, Proto-Central Dravidian, and Proto-South Dravidian, although the date of diversi ...
*
Satemization
Languages of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European family are classified as either centum languages or satem languages according to how the dorsal consonants (sounds of "K", "G" and "Y" type) of the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European langu ...
*
Ariana
Ariana was a general geographical term used by some Greek and Roman authors of the ancient period for a district of wide extent between Central Asia and the Indus River, comprising the eastern provinces of the Achaemenid Empire that covered the ...
*
Aryavarta
*
Dravidian peoples
The Dravidian peoples, or Dravidians, are an ethnolinguistic and cultural group living in South Asia who predominantly speak any of the Dravidian languages. There are around 250 million native speakers of Dravidian languages. Dravidian spe ...
*
Aryanization
Aryanization (german: Arisierung) was the Nazi term for the seizure of property from Jews and its transfer to non-Jews, and the forced expulsion of Jews from economic life in Nazi Germany, Axis-aligned states, and their occupied territories. I ...
*
Indo-Aryan migrations
The Indo-Aryan migrations were the migrations into the Indian subcontinent of Indo-Aryan peoples, an ethnolinguistic group that spoke Indo-Aryan languages, the predominant languages of today's North India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lank ...
Notes
References
Citations
Sources
*
*
*
* .
* Jones-Bley, K.; Zdanovich, D. G. (eds.), ''Complex Societies of Central Eurasia from the 3rd to the 1st Millennium BCE'', 2 vols, JIES Monograph Series Nos. 45, 46, Washington D.C. (2002), , .
* .
*
* .
* .
* .
* .
*
* .
* Chopra, R. M., "Indo-Iranian Cultural Relations Through The Ages", Iran Society, Kolkata, 2005.
Bibliography
* Guarino-Vignon, P., Marchi, N., Bendezu-Sarmiento, J. ''et al.'' Genetic continuity of Indo-Iranian speakers since the Iron Age in southern Central Asia. ''Sci Rep'' 12, 733 (2022).
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-04144-4
* Vasil'ev, I. B., P. F. Kuznetsov, and A. P. Semenova. "Potapovo Burial Ground of the Indo-Iranic Tribes on the Volga (from original:"Potapovskii kurgannyi mogil'nik indoiranskikh plemen na Volge") (1994).
External links
{{Wikiquote
The Origin of the Pre-Imperial Iranian Peopleby Oric Basirov (2001)
The Origin of the Indo-IraniansElena E. Kuz'mina. Edited by J.P. Mallory (2007)
Ancient peoples of Asia
Nomadic groups in Eurasia
Indo-European peoples