The History of Antiquity, Vol. 4 (of 6)Duncker, Max
History
The History of Antiquity, Vol. 4 (of 6)
Duncker, Max
History, Ancient
This juxtaposition of two populations, of which one is in possession of
the best districts in the country, while of the other only fragments
are in existence (combined masses are not found except in the most
inaccessible regions),--the indications supplied by these invocations,
according to which the light-coloured population on the Indus was in
conflict with the "Black-skins,"--the fact that the light-coloured
population, both on the Ganges and the coasts of the Deccan, has always
taken up an exclusive and contemptuous position towards the darker
tribes existing there, justify the conclusion that the whole region from
the Indus to the mouths of the Ganges, from the Himalayas to Cape
Comorin, once belonged to the dark population, and that the Aryas are
immigrants. These immigrants partly drove back the ancient population,
and confined it in hardly accessible mountains or morasses, partly
forced it to submit to their rule and accept their civilisation, partly
allowed it to live among them, as now, in a despicable and subordinate
position. In historical times we can trace this process, by which the
old population was driven back or civilised, on the coasts of the Deccan
and in Ceylon. From the position of the remnant of this population on
the Ganges, and these invocations of the Aryas, which spring from a time
when they were not yet established in the land of the Ganges, we may
conclude that a similar process went on in a severer form on the Indus.
Following the example of the Indians, modern science collects the
languages of these inhabitants of India, who are found under and among
the Aryas, so far as they at present exist, under the names of the
Nishada and Dravida languages.[5] The language of the Brahuis to the
west of the Indus,--they were settled there, or at least retired from
thence, at the time of the immigration of the Aryas,--the Canaresian,
the Malayalam, the language of the Tamilas, of the Telingas, the Badaga
of the inhabitants of the Nilgiri, on the southern apex of the Deccan,
are closely related, but to which of the great stems of language they
are to be apportioned is not determined.[6]
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