People of Ancient India

The people of ancient India were known for their rich cultural heritage, deep philosophical insights, and significant contributions to science, art, and literature. They lived in a diverse society that was structured around kingdoms, clans, and varied social systems. Ancient Indians practiced religions like Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism, which greatly influenced their way of life. They excelled in fields like mathematics, astronomy, medicine (Ayurveda), and architecture, leaving behind remarkable achievements such as the concept of zero and the construction of monumental temples. Their society was deeply spiritual, valuing wisdom, art, and the pursuit of knowledge.

The People of ancient India

Introduction

History is a record of the achievements of man. The history of India should, therefore, properly begin with the account of the earliest settlers in the country. Unfortunately, we know very little of the people that inhabited the land before the advent of the Aryans, the forefathers of the high-class Hindus of the present day. They settled in this country more than four thousand years ago, and are the earliest race in India of whom we possess any written record. Generally speaking, therefore, the history of India begins with the immigration of the Aryans.

The Pre-Aryan settlers in India

Recent researches have, however, thrown some light on the period of Indian history preceding this notable event. The few isolated facts that have so far been established do not, of course, enable us to reconstruct anything like a connected history of this age, but we can glean some interesting information regarding the earlier settlers of India. In the first place, it is now certain that, long before the Aryans had appeared on the scene, India was successively occupied, at remote intervals, by various bands of people, differing in language, manners, and customs, and belonging to various grades of civilization.

(1) The Palaeolithic men

The earliest of these settlers are known as Palaeolithic (from Greek words meaning ‘old stone’) men from the fact that rude tools of chipped stone, used by them, constitute the only remnants, hitherto known, of this class of men. They might, of course, have been preceded by other races, but no trace of any such people exists to-day, and the Palaeolithic men are regarded as the carliest settlers in India. These men belonged to a very primitive stage of civilisation. They did not know the use of metals and had no idea of cultivation. They probably did not even know how to make a fire and lived on the fruits of trees and the animals and fish, which they killed by means of their stone implements. They lived in natural caverns and never constructed tombs of any kind.

(2) The Neolithic men

The next group of people who settled in India are called Neolithue (from a Greek word meaning ‘new stone’). “They did not altogether give up the use of tools merely chipped, but most of their implements, after the chipping had been completed, were ground, grooved, and polished, and thus converted into highly finished objects of various forms, adapted to diverse purposes.” These people belonged to a far advanced state of civilisation. They made houses, domesticated animals, and cultivated lands. They made potteries, and constructed tombs, some of which have come to light in our days. They seem to have also been acquainted with the elements of the art of painting.

It is difficult to decide whether the Neolithic men are descendants of the Palaeolithic. But it appears to be certain that these Neolithic people included the forefathers of the many savage peoples of India, like the Saontals, the Kols, the Mundas, etc., who live in wild mountain tracts today. It is also equally certain that the language of these people, at least of a large section of them, belonged to the Tibeto-Chinese and Austric families. The Munda languages, belonging to the latter class, are now spoken by a large number of people scattered in Säontal Parganas, Chotanagpur, Central Provinces, Madras and the slopes of the Himalaya mountains.

(3) Men of the Copper age

The Neolithic men were probably superseded by another group, who introduced the use of copper, and are hence known as the’men of the copper age. But we know hardly anything about them.

(4) The Dravidians

• (a) Last of all came the people who are known by the generic term ‘Dravidians’, from the Indian word ‘Dravida. Their language is now represented by Tamil, Telugu, Kanarese, Malayalam, Tuluva, and Oraon languages spoken by peoples living in the Vindhya region and the southern peninsula. A tribe in Baluchistan, called the Brahui, speaks a tongue allied to the above languages, and this fact is of very great importance in determining the original home of the Dravidians.
• (b) For a long time the Dravidians were supposed to be the aborigines of India, but the existence of a Dravidian tongue in Baluchistan and the ‘undoubted similarity of Sumerian and Dravidian ethnic types’, have led some scholars to suppose that the Dravidians originally belonged to Western Asia, and invaded India through Baluchistan. Some scholars are, however, still of opinion that the Dravidians originally belonged to India, and spread through Baluchistan to Western Asia.
• (c) But whatever we may think of their origin, it seems to be certain that the Dravidians predomi- nated both in Northern and Southern India before the Aryan conquest of this country. For, ‘Dravidian characteristics have been traced alike in Vedic and classical Sanskrit, in the Prakrits or early popular dialects, and in the modern vernaculars derived from them. It is equally certain that the Dravidians possessed a civilization of a very high order.
• (d) They were conversant with the use of metals, and erected buildings and forts. They constructed boats, and navigated the rivers and seas in pursuit of trade and commerce. Their language and literature were in a fairly developed condition, and influenced the Aryan tongue when the two came into contact. The Dravidian religion also was advanced far beyond the primitive state, and some of their gods were adopted by the Aryans.

(5) The Aryans

The Dravidians were firmly settled in different parts of Northern and Southern India more than four thousand years ago, when the fair-complexioned Aryans gradually advanced from the north-west, across the Hindu Kush mountains, and entered India through Afghanistan.

Struggle between The Dravidians and The Aryans

• (1) The Dravidians naturally resisted the newcomers with all their might, and a fierce and protracted struggle ensued. It was not merely a struggle between two nationalities, but a conflict between two types of civilization. The Dravidians had to fight for their very existence, and there are several passages in the Rigveda which indicate the severity of the struggle. But all in vain.
• (2) History has repeatedly shown that sons of India, born and brought up in her genial soil, are no match for the fresh hardy mountaineers of the north-western regions who poured into the country at irregular intervals. The Dravidians proved no exception to the rule. They laid down their lives in hundreds and thousands on various battlefields, and ultimately succumbed to the attack of the invaders, They put up indeed a brave fight. but the Aryans destroyed their castles, burnt their houses, and reduced a large number of them to slaves
• (3) The hard-won victory enabled the Aryans gradually to occupy the whole of the Panjab, and ultimately to conquer the whole of Northern India. The vanquished natives, the Dravidians as well as the remnants of their predecessors, mostly submitted to them, and became the Dasas; but large bodies of Dravidians found shelter in the south, and some of the other tribes retreated towards the north, south, and east, and maintained a precarious existence in inaccessible mountains. Their descendants, the Kols, Bhils, Gonds, and many Himalayan tribes, are still to be found in the fastnesses to which their ancestors were driven by the Aryans about four thousand years ago.

The origin of the Aryans

• (1) The Aryans who thus obtained a footing on Indian soil had a previous history. They belonged to a very ancient stock of the human race, and lived for a long period with the forefathers of the Greek, the Roman, the German, the English, the Dutch, the Scandinavian, the Spanish, the French, the Russian, and the Bulgarian nations. This is best shown by the fact, that some a words, denoting essential ideas of civilised man, are still used in common by their descendants, although removed from one another by hundreds of miles and thousands of years.
• (2) Thus the Sanskrit words Pitar and Matar are essentially the same as pater and mater in Latin, pater and meter in Greek, father and mother in English, and vater and mutter in German, all denoting the most notable of the earliest notions of mankind viz., that of the parents. The community of language has led many scholars to suppose that the Aryans, who conquered India, belonged to what may be called the parent stock of the many nations named above, famed in the ancient and the modern world.
• (3) This is not, however, a very logical conclusion, for the community of language does not necessarily prove the community of blood. The Bengali language, for example, is now spoken by people of diverse nationalities. The only certain conclusion, therefore, is that the forefathers of all these nations lived for long in close intimacy at a certain region.
• (4) The locality of this region and the time when the different groups of people separated, are alike uncertain and subject of a keen and protracted controversy. The generality of opinion is, that they lived somewhere in central Asia. But some would place them still further north. in the Arctic regions, while others locate them in the regions now occupied by Austria, Hungary and Bohemia.

Conclusion

Anyhow, one or more of these groups separated from the rest, and proceeded towards India. In course of time, some of them settled into the province now known as Persia, and developed a civilization of which distinct traces are still to be seen among their descendants, the Parsis of the present day. The remaining clans crossed the Hindu Kush and occupied the Panjab after driving away the Dravidians as has already been narrated.

(FAQ) about the people of ancient people?