The Age of INDIA'S OLDEST BOOK: What They Won't Tell You

Summary

Highlights

• The Rig Veda is the oldest Sanskrit text and crucial to Hinduism's evolution. 📜
• It has connections to Indo-Iranian cultures and languages. 🌏
• Dating controversies stem from political and ideological motives. 🧐
• Extreme dating claims often disregard scientific and contextual evidence. 🚫
• The Saraswati River's geography is a hot topic in Rig Veda dating discussions. 🌍

Key Takeaways

• The Rig Veda is a cornerstone in understanding ancient Indian history and Hinduism. 📚
• Dating the Rig Veda is controversial, with claims ranging from the Indus Valley era to far earlier. 🗓️
• Scholars use linguistic evidence to narrow down the Rig Veda's age. 🧐
• The Saraswati River plays a central role in debates about the Rig Veda's dating. 🌊
• Praise poetry in the Rig Veda could lead to misinterpretations of its literal content. 🎶

Overview

Chapters

• 00:00 - 01:00: Introduction The chapter introduces the significance of the Rig Veda, emphasizing its importance not only to Hindus or India, but to the entire world. It is acknowledged as one of the oldest surviving texts in history and is the oldest known Sanskrit text. The Rig Veda holds a crucial place in discussions about the history of South Asia and the broader Indo-European language family. The text is noted for its historical role in highlighting connections between ancient Indian and Old Iranian peoples.
• 01:00 - 02:30: Background of the Rig Veda The chapter titled 'Background of the Rig Veda' explores the Rig Veda's significance in the development of Hinduism. It is characterized as a part of the Indo-European genre of praise poetry and also as a precursor to the Indian poetic style known as kavya. The chapter emphasizes the Rig Veda's role in providing insights into historical periods that remain largely mysterious. Additionally, the text touches on the discrepancies found in online claims regarding the dating of the Rig Veda, which contribute to ongoing debates and confusion.
• 02:30 - 04:00: Composition and Structure of the Rigveda This chapter explores various assertions about the age of the Rigveda, highlighting the range from young to very old. It aims to clarify extreme positions on the book's age and describes how scholars work to narrow down its actual date.
• 04:00 - 07:00: Dating the Rigveda: Controversies and Evidence In this chapter, part of the 'Myths of Ancient History' series, the speaker introduces the topic of controversial dating of the Rig Veda, an ancient text, and how extreme dates are often proposed due to political or religious ideologies. The speaker highlights the importance of understanding what historians believe about such subjects to avoid being misled by pseudohistorical ideas. The chapter sets the stage for exploring the contrasting views on the actual dating of this ancient text.
• 07:00 - 12:00: Geographical and Cultural Context of the Rigveda The chapter titled 'Geographical and Cultural Context of the Rigveda' provides background on the Rig Veda, emphasizing its significance as the oldest and most revered of the Vedas, which are the sacred texts of Hinduism. The Rigveda's foundational role is highlighted, as it underpins the development of the later Samaveda and Yajurveda. The chapter touches on the various stages of development the Rigveda has undergone.
• 12:00 - 14:30: Misinterpretations and Literalism in Understanding the Rigveda The chapter discusses the structure of the Rigveda, explaining that it is composed of four parts: the Samhita, the Aranyakas, the Brahmanas, and the Upanishads. The Samhita is the oldest part and consists of hymns, mantras, and prayers dedicated to deities. The Brahmanas are commentaries attached to each Samhita.
• 14:30 - 16:00: Conclusion The conclusion chapter discusses key aspects of ancient religious texts and their timelines. It explains how sacrificial rituals are detailed and their symbolism is covered in the Samhita. The Brahmanas, important historical texts, are traced back to between 900 and 700 BCE. Additionally, the Aranyakas, known as 'forest books,' delve into the esoteric interpretations of these texts and are believed to be composed around 700 BCE. Finally, the chapter touches upon the Upanishads, which explore themes of meditation, consciousness, philosophy, and metaphysics. The earliest Upanishads are dated between 1000 and 500 BCE.

The Age of INDIA'S OLDEST BOOK: What They Won't Tell You Transcription

• 00:00 - 00:30 For regular videos on ancient cultures and forgotten civilizations, please subscribe. In the context of ancient history, the Rig Veda is an important document, not just for Hindus or for India, but for the whole world. It is among the world’s oldest surviving ancient texts and is the oldest Sanskrit text. It is pivotal in any discussion about the history of South Asia or of Indo-European languages in general. It sits at a significant juncture in history, pointing back to an earlier connection with Old Iranian peoples and forward
• 00:30 - 01:00 to the development of Hinduism. It is, on the one hand, a part of the Indo-European genre of praise poetry and on the other the root of an Indian style of poetry called kavya. It sheds light on the historical periods that come before and after it, periods that are still shrouded in mystery. Sadly, it is not widely enough discussed. Online you will see many assertions made about the date of the Rig Veda, ranging from very
• 01:00 - 01:30 young to very old. Mind you, there is room for debate about this. But in today’s episode we are going to look at some of the more extreme assertions in regard to the book’s age, so that it becomes clearer what can be ruled out. Then I will tell you how scholars narrow down the date of the book.
• 01:30 - 02:00 Welcome to the Myths of Ancient History series, in which popular pseudohistorical ideas about the ancient past are exposed. But in calling them out, I also will tell you what historians believe about a subject and why they believe it, because the more factual information you have, the less susceptible you will be to being misled by the fakers. Today we will be talking about extreme dates given to the great ancient text, the Rig Veda. These propositions usually are made owing to political or religious ideologies.
• 02:00 - 02:30 First a little background on the book. The Rig Veda is one of the Vedas. The Vedas are the most sacred texts of Hinduism. There are four Vedas: the Rigveda, the Yajurveda, the Samaveda, and the Atharvaveda. The Rigveda is the oldest of the Vedas and forms the basis of the later Samaveda and Yajurveda. The composition of the Rigveda has gone through several stages of development. For example,
• 02:30 - 03:00 the Rigveda, like every Veda, is composed of four parts: the Samhita, the Aranyakas, the Brahmanas, and the Upanishads. Samhita translates to “union” or “put together” or “collection.” It is the oldest part or layer of the Vedas. A Samhita is a collection of hymns, mantras, and prayers dedicated to deities. Attached to each Vedic Samhita is a Brahmana. A Brahmana is a commentary on a Samhita, which
• 03:00 - 03:30 contains details on how to perform sacrificial rituals and explains the symbolism and meaning of the Samhita. Historians date the Brahmanas to between 900 and 700 BCE. The Aranyakas, or “forest books,” teach the esoteric meaning of the texts. They are estimated to have been composed around 700 BCE. Finally, the Upanishads deal with meditation, consciousness, philosophy, and metaphysics. The earliest Upanishads are estimated to have been composed between 1000 and 500 BCE, but
• 03:30 - 04:00 many of them are from a later period. So the Rigveda Samhita is the core of the Rigveda, the oldest part, and it is the one we are going to concentrate on. So from now on, when I say the Rigveda, know that I mean the Rigveda Samhita. The Rigveda Samhita has a total of 1028 hymns, or suktas. The Rigvedic hymns have invocations asking the gods for riches, cattle, long life, sons, and victory in battle. Some of them
• 04:00 - 04:30 describe rituals, rites of passage, and cosmic events. The average length of a hymn is about ten verses, but they range from 1 to 58 verses. There are 10,462 verses in the Rigveda. The term “Rig” in Rigveda refers to a verse, in fact. It is well known that the Vedas were orally transmitted for centuries before they were written down. Ancient and medieval texts actually specify not to write down the Vedas. The Vedas
• 04:30 - 05:00 are called shruti, meaning that which is heard, passed from the gods (it is believed) to the Brahmins (the priests) and then from generation to generation. This distinguishes them from other Hindu religious texts known as smirits, meaning that which is remembered. Specifically, priestly schools called shakhas transmitted the Vedas orally. Different Shakhas specialised in learning specific Vedic texts. When I speak of the date of the Rigveda Samhita, I am speaking
• 05:00 - 05:30 about the date that the songs were composed orally, not the date that they were written down for the first time. An argument made by some Tamil-speaking people (from southern India) is that the Rigveda is a recent text. They say that the oldest surviving copies are from around 1000 CE. They also say the Sanskrit language itself is a late invention, pointing out that the earliest written Sanskrit inscriptions (using the Brahmi script) is from the 1st century
• 05:30 - 06:00 BCE: the Ayodhya Inscription of Dhana and the Ghosundi inscription. In contrast, Ashokan rock edicts dating to the 3rd century BCE were written in Prakrit using Brahmi script, and Tamil Brahmi inscriptions predate any written evidence for Sanskrit. But here is the problem. We can’t date a text by how old the oldest surviving copy is, nor can we date a language by how old the earliest written text in the language
• 06:00 - 06:30 is. This is because language and writing are two different things. Yes, a written text would tell us the latest possible date for the emergence of a language, but not the earliest possible date, because language can exist without writing. The oldest copy of a book is simply the oldest copy of a book. It tells us the latest possible date for the publication of the book, but not the earliest possible date. In ancient India, writing was done on
• 06:30 - 07:00 palm-leaf manuscripts, which could degrade easily. Hence a huge volume of written work did not survive. And when it comes to texts that started out as oral compositions, we certainly can’t date by written versions. I should add that we do have evidence of Sanskrit being written down before the 1st century BCE from the noted grammarian Panini’s important Sanskrit grammar book, the Ashtadhyayi. Panini is credited with standardising Sanskrit to
• 07:00 - 07:30 the form we know it today. When did he write this book? Scholars put the 4th century BCE as the latest possible date of the book, because in it he several times mentions a coin, called a niṣka, which was in circulation in the 4th century BCE. In his book, Panini speaks about “lipi,” a word for script and describes “lipikaras,” which translates to scribes. This tells us people in India were familiar with writing down Sanskrit at least as far back as his time, which predates the surviving Sanskrit inscriptions.
• 07:30 - 08:00 But we have even earlier material evidence for the existence of Sanskrit and Rigvedic deities, which comes surprisingly from the Middle East. In a treaty between the Hittites and Mitanni from about 1380 BCE, Rigvedic deities Indra, Varuna, Mitra, and Ashvins are invoked. This has led scholars to conclude the ruling class of Mitanni, also known as Maryannu, were either Indo-Aryans or closely related to them. Indo-Aryans of India and
• 08:00 - 08:30 the Maryannu probably lived together at some point before branching out in opposite directions. An even older text, dating to 1400 BCE, a horse training manual by Kikkuli in the Mitanni kingdom, gives us several Vedic Sanskrit words, including the numerals. The manual was written in Hittite and Vedic Sanskrit. These texts predate Sanskrit and Tamil inscriptions by more than a millennium. So this claim that Sanskrit is a newer language flies in the
• 08:30 - 09:00 face of clear evidence. The language of the Rigveda is Vedic Sanskrit, a form of the language earlier than Panini. In fact, it is the earliest known form of Sanskrit. Sanskrit is a member of a group of languages called Indo-Aryan, and the Indo-Aryan languages are members of a larger group called Indo-Iranian, which in turn are part of a much larger Indo-European language family. Historical linguistics has shown that Sanskrit
• 09:00 - 09:30 can be traced back to earlier languages, and the hypothetical language believed to be the ancestors of all Indo-European languages is something linguists call proto-Indo-European. This language was spoken around 4500-2500 BCE. This means that Sanskrit must have emerged after this time period. And yes, I realize that is a 2,000-year uncertainty. This is because there is no sure-fire way to determine the rate of language change.
• 09:30 - 10:00 But here is how we get those dates. Scholars have pointed out that there are cognate words in the various Indo-European languages for copper, but none for bronze or iron. So they deduce that the splitting up of Proto-Indo-European happened after copper was in use but before bronze was. So the period of the dispersal of the languages is probably between 4500 and 2500. This makes sense considering that we see our first evidence of the descendant
• 10:00 - 10:30 languages shortly after that. An Indo-European language called Anatolian is attested in Akkadian trading documents of about 1900. Clearly, any dating for Indo-Aryan must be posterior to the dispersal of the Indo-European languages and also after the split of Indo-Iranian. So the terminus post quem (the earliest possible date) for the appearance of Vedic Sanskrit is about 3000-2500 BCE. The terminus ante quem date (the latest possible date) we can
• 10:30 - 11:00 be more definite about: Indo-Aryan itself is attested in the Mitanni kingdom, as I mentioned before, probably by 1600-1500 BCE, so Indo-Aryan was already a distinct linguistic entity by about 1500 BCE at the latest. Vedic Sanskrit existed as a spoken language after the emergence of Indo-Aryan but before the emergence of Classical Sanskrit in the time of Panini. That is the period when we expect the Rigveda Samhita as an oral collection
• 11:00 - 11:30 to have been completed. And we also need to allow time for the other Vedas and the Samhitas, Brahamas, Aranyakas, and Upanishads to have been composed after the Rigveda but before Panini. But even within these limits, the date is still a matter of controversy. We have many centuries to play with. The biggest of these controversies is whether hymns of the Rigveda were composed during the time of the Indus Valley Civilization or afterward. The Indus Valley Civilization, or Harappan
• 11:30 - 12:00 civilization, and the Rig Vedic culture developed around the same geographical region. The question is: Did they exist in the same period of time? And if they did exist at the same time, are the two cultures the same culture? Keep in mind these are two different questions. In an attempt to determine whether they are the same culture, people have compared the culture described in the Rigveda with the culture found archaeologically in the IVC. There are certain similarities between the two. Both societies had farming and pastoralism.
• 12:00 - 12:30 But Vedic people relied mostly on barley, whereas the Indus people relied mostly on wheat. We do not know how important cattle were for the Indus people, but from the seals, we can guess they played a prominent role in Harappan society. On the other hand, we know cattle were extremely important for the Rigvedic people. Battles were fought over cattle. Time was measured in terms of cattle. Dusk was known as godhuli and the morning was known as samgava, with
• 12:30 - 13:00 the root words go and gava referring to cows. The Rigvedic people were also horse breeders. Horse domestication is believed to have occurred in Central Eurasia, with all modern horses being traced to that location. You can watch my interview with Ludovic Orlando for more details. The mention and importance of horses in Rigvedic society indicate the Indo-Aryans
• 13:00 - 13:30 knew horse domestication. We have not found strong evidence for horse domestication in the Indus Valley civilization yet. Sometimes you will see people point to what might be horse bones, but the identification is unclear, because only a small part of the animal is preserved. And even so, the discovery of a horse or two does not necessarily indicate widespread use of horses, which is what Rigvedic society had. The IVC may have acquired some
• 13:30 - 14:00 through their trade contacts, but certainly, horses were not integral to Harappan life as it was to the Rigvedic society. Horses are used to draw chariots and wagons in the Vedic age. The spoked wheel chariots, known as rathas, were integral to battles described in Rigveda. The Indo-Aryans clearly distinguished between the spoked wheel chariot or ratha and the solid wheel carts or sakata. From terracotta models of carts found in the
• 14:00 - 14:30 Indus valley, we can say they were familiar with solid wheel wagons, but not so much with spoked wheel war chariots. At a place called Sinauli, what appear to be chariots were found in burials, which have been carbon dated to around 1900 BCE, but they have solid wheels. The people of the Indus valley lived in a highly urbanized society, whereas the Rigvedic people were organized into socio-political units based on kinship, primarily in villages. Thanks to the Vedas, we have a clear picture
• 14:30 - 15:00 of the Vedic society. Socio-political divisions included the jana, vish, grama, griha, and kula. Jana translates to a tribe; vish refers to a clan; grama in modern Sanskrit means village, but in the Rigvedic context, the reference was to a mobile group of individuals, kula meant a family, and the head of the family was known as the kulapati. Griha meant abode or home. However, our ideas about the Harappan society
• 15:00 - 15:30 are based on the similar size of the houses seen in the cities. Houses of the same dimension had led some scholars to propose there was no social hierarchy and that it was an egalitarian society. But this is debatable. Other scholars have suggested the presence of more grave goods in certain burials as evidence of classes in Harappan society. People have often pointed to IVC iconography in an attempt to equate IVC religious beliefs
• 15:30 - 16:00 and practices with later Hindu beliefs and practices. The problem with this kind of argument is that it doesn’t consider the possibility that exposure to IVC religious customs may have influenced people who lived in the area, including Rigvedic peoples. In other words, it could indicate contact, but not necessarily identity. It would be much easier if we knew for sure what languages were spoken in Harappan society.
• 16:00 - 16:30 If one of them was Indo-Aryan, this would indicate the possible existence of Rigvedic people at the time. The topic of the Indus script divides scholars, and I have done a video on this already. Some scholars argue that the Indus script is not a writing system at all. Others say the Indus script is evidence of an established writing system that is yet to be deciphered. But the Rigveda does not mention a writing system existing in its culture. The Mitanni evidence fits smoothly with a date of about 1500 BCE for the Rigveda in
• 16:30 - 17:00 India: maybe some Indo-Aryans settled in the Near East shortly before, or while, others were settling in India. But of course, the parallels between the Mitanni documents and the Rigveda do not necessarily demonstrate simultaneity. Unfortunately, because we are dealing with only a few words in these documents, we can’t determine just how much correspondence there is between the Indo-Aryan of the Mitanni and that of the Rigveda.
• 17:00 - 17:30 I probably should bring up the fact that the hymns of the Rigveda Samhita were composed over a period of time. So how long was that period? There are clues in the book itself. First, a little bit about its structure. The Rigveda Samhita is composed of ten mandalas. In English, we often call the mandalas “books,” but the literal meaning of “mandala” is cycle. Each mandala is a cycle in the sense that it is a collection of hymns. Within a mandala, the Rigvedic hymns are arranged in groups according to a deity. First comes
• 17:30 - 18:00 the hymns dedicated to Agni, the fire god. Next are hymns dedicated to Indra, the chief deity of the Vedic pantheon linked to rain and thunder. Then we have hymns for other gods. But also the arrangement of hymns in Rigveda follows a pattern of a decreasing number of stanzas. The earlier hymns have more stanzas than the succeeding ones. This arrangement pattern is part of the original collection, and so is vital for us because it makes it easy to detect which hymns have been added
• 18:00 - 18:30 later. Mandalas 2-7 are the oldest of the Rigveda. Mandalas 1, 8, 9, and 10 are believed to be later compositions. The earlier mandalas (2-7) are said to have been composed by rishis or sages such as Gritsamada, Vishvamitra, Vamadeva, Atri, Bharadvaja, and Vasishta. Interestingly, each rishi is associated with a clan. Gritsamada, who composed the 2nd Mandala, lived during the reign of king Divodasa of the Bharata clan. Vishwamitra, the composer of the third Mandala, was with king Sudas of the Bharata clan. Vamadeva, the composer of the fourth Mandala, was with Trasadasyu of the Puru clan. The bulk of the Rigveda represents only 5 or 6 generations of kings and rishis associated with the Bharata and Puru clans. So the original collection is believed to come from the period when the Purus and Bharatas were dominant. This would come between the Battle of the
• 18:30 - 19:00 Ten Kings and the rise of the Kuru kingdom. We believe the Rigvedic texts were composed after king Sudas’ victory in the Battle of the ten Kings, because, well, the Rigveda mentions the battle, but not as late as the Kuru Kingdom era, because Sudas and his grandsons are mentioned, but hardly any later kings are mentioned. In the core Rigvedic texts, the Kuru dynasty is mentioned only once. So scholars believe
• 19:00 - 19:30 the Kuru kingdom rose during the later Vedic period. The Kuru Kingdom was the center of the familiar epic the Mahabharata and the great Kurukshetra war. What is the Battle of the Ten Kings, and how did it affect the composition of the Rigveda? In the 7th Mandala of the Rigveda, this important battle results in the expansion of the early Vedic society. The Bharata tribe, led by Sudas, takes on a confederacy of clans led by the
• 19:30 - 20:00 Purus, who were erstwhile allies of the Bharatas. Sudas celebrates the victory by performing a horse sacrifice ceremony, thus sealing the status of the Bharata clan as the major power of Northern India and extending the borders of the early Vedic culture to the Yamuna river. This led to the composition of hymns to suit what scholars describe as the “Bharata collection,” Mandalas 2-7. The Kanva collection, Mandala 8, which refers to poems composed by rishi
• 20:00 - 20:30 Kanva was stylistically different from the Bharata collection and added a little later. The Kanva collection may have been excluded initially since Kanva sided with the Purus. But later, when intermarriage and alliance were restored between the Bharata and Puru tribes, the Kanva collection became integral to the Rigvedic hymns. Mandala 9 consists of hymns about the Soma ritual, also added later.
• 20:30 - 21:00 The most recent mandalas are 1 and 10. The Kuru dynasty led by King Parikshit, towards the end of the Rigvedic age, united the Vedic tribes, poets, and priests to come together and collect the Rigvedic texts. We find evidence of this effort from the 10th Mandala of the Rigveda, which is also known as the “book of additions.” The collection of the new hymns tells us about several individual poems that entered Rigveda during the late Bharata
• 21:00 - 21:30 period. The style of poetry deviates from the original Mandalas 2-7 and resembles the mantras of the later Vedas. The 10th Mandala of the Rigveda has 191 hymns, the same as the 1st Mandala. This has led some scholars to believe the 10th Mandala was modeled after the 1st Mandala to maintain a balance of the “outer frame” books, which surround the core texts (2-7). The outer frame here refers to the first and last Mandalas, which are later compositions. Thus, we see a transition from the Rigvedic
• 21:30 - 22:00 age to the rise of the Kuru Kingdom and a transformation in the composition of Vedic hymns. The Kuru Kingdom thus can be credited with the completion of the Rigveda Samhita and also with the Samhitas of the other Vedas. So when was this? Well, the first Veda to mention the use of iron technology is the Atharvaveda Samhita. Iron is not in the Rigveda. If the Atharvaveda was produced during the Kuru Kingdom, that
• 22:00 - 22:30 means the Kuru Kingdom existed around the time of the introduction of iron. This would also correspond to the earliest evidence of iron smelting in India, which is found between 1300-1000 BCE. The Kuru Kingdom is estimated to have formed around 1200. The Rigvedic period, therefore, would have lasted until the introduction of iron.
• 22:30 - 23:00 We should hesitate to place the Rigveda too much earlier than the Atharvaveda on linguistic grounds, because although the language is earlier, it is not sufficiently different to warrant an interval of too many centuries. This is why scholars generally place the composition of all the Rigvedic hymns between 1900 and 1200 BCE. I told you about the extreme on one end of the Rigveda, placing it way later than the
• 23:00 - 23:30 date scholars give it, but there are extremes on the other end as well. And I’m not talking simply about people who date the Rigveda to the period of the IVC. I mean people who date it to well before any archaeological evidence of urban states in India or the world, before the appearance of bronze technology in the world, and before the advent of writing in the world. People like David Frawley, who dates it to around 6000 BCE, and whose ideas I discussed generally in another video, and Nilesh Oak, who dates parts of the Rigveda
• 23:30 - 24:00 to 22,000 BCE. They aren’t no-names either. Even though they are amateurs in history, they have a significant following among Hindus. This qualifies as the kind of popular misinformation this series discusses. These commentators marshall a number of arguments for their dating, but there is one argument that keeps coming up, and which I get in the comments all the time, an argument that purports to be indisputable evidence that the Rigveda
• 24:00 - 24:30 is much older than the date that scholars give it and should be enough to void all the evidence I have just given you. And this relates to the Saraswati River. To explain this, I need to go over briefly the geographical setting of the Rigveda. The Rigveda was composed in the Sapta Sindhu region, also known as the Land of the Seven Rivers, which include the River Indus and its five tributaries and the River Saraswati.
• 24:30 - 25:00 This region corresponds to the Punjab region in present-day India and Pakistan. But they are not the only rivers mentioned in the Rigveda. In the Northwestern region, we find mention of rivers such as Kubha, the present-day Kabul river, Suvā́stu or Swat river, and Tr̥ṣṭā́mā, which some scholars identify with Gilgit. This shows the boundaries of Rigvedic culture existed as far as the Northwestern region of the Indian subcontinent extending to Afghanistan.
• 25:00 - 25:30 In the east, we have rivers such as Ganga, Yamuna, and Asmanvati (present-day Assan) showing the Rigvedic sphere of influence existing as far east as the Gangetic plains. The Rigvedic texts were composed on the banks of these rivers. The Saraswati has become a sort of national icon in India because the Indus River is in Pakistan, and naturally many people in India see the Harappan civilization as theirs too. So they focus on the Saraswati River, which once existed within the borders of present-day
• 25:30 - 26:00 India. Some people even go so far as advocating a name change for the Indus Valley Civilization, arguing that it should be called the Indus-Saraswati Civilization. But we are going to concentrate on the Saraswati in the context of Rigvedic society. According to some, the Rigveda could not come from 1900-1200 BCE, because the Saraswati River did not exist at that time. Discussion about this river has been going on for some time, but recent
• 26:00 - 26:30 scientific studies have caused some stir, because people are claiming the scientific evidence shows that the Saraswati did not exist at this time. The argument that the Saraswati was dried by the 2nd millennium BCE was popularized in the book The Lost River, by Michael Danino. You can find advocates of this argument all over the internet.
• 26:30 - 27:00 This sound cut and dry. But let’s take a closer look at the history of this river.
• 27:00 - 27:30 Today, it is commonly accepted that the Ghaggar and Hakra rivers, which flow now only during
• 27:30 - 28:00 monsoon season, are to be identified with the Saraswati river mentioned in the Rigveda. There are alternative suggestions, but the Saraswati seems to fit the descriptions in the Rigveda the best, and this is why the identification is generally accepted. Numerous studies over the past few decades have been able to trace the original course of the Ghaggar-Hakra riverbed, so we have a good idea of where the river flowed, though
• 28:00 - 28:30 research into what was going on to the north of it, such as what Himalayan rivers were feeding it, is still ongoing. We also have a good idea of the age of the river. A study published in 2020 reports evidence of fluvial activity, in the area that the Saraswati ran through, as early as 172-174 thousand years ago. Most research on the river, however, has focused on the period of the Indus Valley Civilization,
• 28:30 - 29:00 which peaked between 2600 and 1900 BCE, because scientists and archaeologists have been searching for a reason for the decline of the IVC, and it was thought maybe a change in climate had something to do with it. Maybe the drying up of the Saraswati had something to do with it. Now keep in mind that the mature period of the IVC comes immediately before the suggested date range of the composition of the Rigveda. A study conducted near the site of the ancient
• 29:00 - 29:30 IVC city of Bhirrana, published in 2016, revealed that Bhirrana was settled as early as 9-7,000 years ago nest to the Saraswati when the Saraswati was being fed by an intensified monsoon, but that after 7,000 years ago, the river went into decline. Nevertheless, Bhirrana continued to grow and was an important city after that. So clearly the failing river was not the cause
• 29:30 - 30:00 of Bhirrana’s decline. Bhirrana went into decline later. The authors suggested maybe the IVC collapsed for other reasons, such as shifting crop patterns. An important study in 2017 shed new light on the history of the Saraswati. Using optically stimulated luminescence dating, the researchers determined that the Sutlej river, which fed the Saraswati, had shifted its course (to where it is now), and this caused the Saraswati
• 30:00 - 30:30 to go into decline. This shift was completed around 8,000 years ago, long before the mature period of the IVC. “Indus urban settlements,” they write, “thus developed along an abandoned river valley rather than an active Himalayan river.” A paper published in 2020 summarised the results so far. I will leave links to these studies below the video, by the way. The authors assess the situation as follows: “There is enough
• 30:30 - 31:00 data to say that the Saraswati / Ghagghar-Hakara river flowed in NW Indian plains and gradually dried up between 15 and 4.3 ka. The river course, however, kept on flooding and aggrading to the upland level by silt-clay sediments.” What they mean is by “kept on flooding” is that while the river was no long perennial after 4.3 thousand years ago, it still flooded during monsoon season. They continue, “The view that the Saraswati river was the lifeline
• 31:00 - 31:30 of Indus civilization may not be tenable in light of new results suggesting considerable drying up of Saraswati river during 15-5 ka much before the advent of mature Indus civilization 4.5-4.4 ka BP.” At the same time, a new study was published refining further our understanding of the life of the river. They found that the river was perennial and receiving water from the Himalayas during 80 and 20 thousand years
• 31:30 - 32:00 ago, and again during 9 and 4.5 thousand years ago. The reason why there was a rejuvenation was because that was when the Sutlej fed the river. The authors suggest that this period of the revived river is what facilitated the development of the early Harappan settlements. Now so far it looks very clear: After 4.5 thousand years ago, that is 2500 BCE, the river was no longer perennial but annual. That means that during the period when scholars
• 32:00 - 32:30 say the Rigveda was composed, the river would not have flowed year round. But this is what people miss. This is only true for the middle part of the river, the part where the IVC cities were. It is not true for the lower and upper reaches of the river. They write, “Towards the end of the Mature Harappan phase (4.6-3.9 ka), there is a clear evidence of human migrations to the
• 32:30 - 33:00 lower and upper reaches of the river, leaving the middle part sparsely populated (Fig. 3B), which could be attributed to the disorganization of the river as established in this work. The lower reaches of the river, in the Hakra sector, had possibly remained perennial, through a connection from the Sutlej, supporting mature and post-urban Harappan settlements (Fig. 3B).” Notice the figure here. Early Harappan period. The SS is the Sarawati. You can see the Sutlej feeding it. The dots are settlements. Then
• 33:00 - 33:30 you have the Mature Harappan period. Notice that part of the river has dried up, that is, it is only annual now. The Sutlej, however, is feeding the lower reaches. Then you have the post-urban Harappan period, which is the period that scholars date the Rigveda. The middle part of the river is no longer perennial, but the lower and upper reaches are, and the upper reaches here is where Rigvedic society would have existed. You do, in fact, have
• 33:30 - 34:00 a perennial Saraswati river here. Now the main objection to placing the Rigveda in this period is because quotations of the Rigveda seem to indicate that the river was a gigantic raging water monster at the time, and that is not what the river was in the post-urban Harappan period. There are three hymns wholly dedicated to Saraswati. Let’s take a look at an excerpt from one of them.
• 34:00 - 34:30 Yea, this divine Sarasvati, terrible with her golden path, Foe-slayer, claims our eulogy. Whose limitless unbroken flood, swift-moving with a rapid rush, Comes onward with tempestuous roar. And here is an excerpt from another hymn: This stream Sarasvati with fostering current comes forth, our sure defence, our fort of iron. As on a chariot, the flood flows on, surpassing in majesty and might all other waters. Pure in her course from mountains to the ocean,
• 34:30 - 35:00 alone of streams Sarasvati hath listened. Well now, this doesn’t sound the river in the post-urban Harappan period, does it? I suppose it could refer to the time of the monsoon floods, but many people say, no, this is talking about a massive perennial river. It says she is the mightiest of waters. Interestingly, Rigvedic scholars generally are not bothered by this apparent discrepancy.
• 35:00 - 35:30 Why not? That is because they know the Rigveda. The book is full of praise poetry to gods and goddesses. In fact, almost all of the over 1,000 hymns in the Rigveda are dedicated to gods. Saraswati is a goddess herself. Rigvedic scholars Joel Brereton and Stephanie Jamison, in their book The Rigveda: A Guide, describe the hymns this way: “The text is
• 35:30 - 36:00 a vast compendium of divine praise poetry, and the poets endlessly dilate on the qualities and exploits of the gods, address them directly, commanding and cajoling, and use all their verbal skills to conjure up the divine world and its inhabitants and to persuade the gods to do mortal’s bidding.” Many of the deities are associated with natural elements, forces, or phenomena, as is the case with Saraswati, being associated with the river. The praise given to the gods is
• 36:00 - 36:30 usually praise of deeds or praise of attributes, and praise of attributes is the most common. The attribute that is most often praised is power. And when the god’s power is referenced, it doesn’t simply mean physical power. It also refers to capability, energy, mastery, and dominance. Every prominent divine figure is credited with this kind of power, even ones you might not expect to have it, such as the delicate goddess Dawn. It is in this
• 36:30 - 37:00 context that we should understand the poems about Saraswati. Knowing the language of praise poetry, scholars know that a strictly literal interpretation is going to lead us astray. I sing a lofty song, for she is mightiest, most divine of Streams. Sarasvati will I exalt with hymns and lauds, and, O Vasishtha, Heaven and Earth. When in the fulness of their strength the Purus dwell, Beauteous One, on thy two grassy
• 37:00 - 37:30 banks, Favour us thou who hast the Maruts for thy friends: stir up the bounty of our chiefs. So may Sarasvati auspicious send good luck; she, rich in spoil, is never stingy in thought, When praised in Jamadagni’s way and lauded as Vasishtha lauds. We call upon Sarasvan, as unmarried men who long for wives, As liberal men who yearn for sons.
• 37:30 - 38:00 Be thou our kind protector, O Sarasvati, with those waves of thine Laden with sweets and dropping oil. May we enjoy Sarasvan’s breast, all-beautiful, that swells with streams, May we gain food and progeny. Maybe you can see from this what I am talking about. So what are we to make of it when we hear them call Saraswati “mightiest, most divine of Streams”? This is the people’s high praise for their river goddess. It refers
• 38:00 - 38:30 not merely to the might of the physical river, but to the power of the goddess, the power to answer the prayers of the people. If I wrote a hymn to the sun god, for example, and in it I say, “O Sol, greatest and mightiest of all stars in the universe, bless your humble servant,” and some people later reading my prayer start analysing the stars in the universe to see which one is the greatest or strongest, and they say, “Oh, it couldn’t
• 38:30 - 39:00 be this sun. It doesn’t fit the description,” would you say they were on the right track in understanding the hymn? No, I am praising the sun that I know, the sun that I worship and extolling with high praise, not because it is factual, but because this is the way I feel about it. This sun is the greatest sun, because it is the sun that gives me warmth and heat and, according to my belief, many other things that the actual sun probably
• 39:00 - 39:30 doesn’t really do. This is how the people felt about the Saraswati. This stream Sarasvati with fostering current comes forth, our sure defence, our fort of iron. As on a chariot, the flood flows on, surpassing in majesty and might all other waters. (by the way, this description talking about the current coming forth and the flooding sounds like monsoon season, doesn’t it?) Pure in her course from mountains to the ocean, alone of streams Sarasvati hath listened. Thinking of wealth and the great world of creatures, she poured for Nahusha (a king
• 39:30 - 40:00 who prayed to Saraswati) her milk and fatness. Friendly to man he grew among the women, a strong young Steer amid the Holy Ladies. He gives the fleet steed to our wealthy princes, and decks their bodies for success in battle. May this Sarasvati be pleased and listen at this our sacrifice, auspicious Lady, When we with reverence, on our knees, implore her close-knit to wealth, most kind to those she loveth,
• 40:00 - 40:30 These offerings have ye made with adoration: say this, Sarasvati, and accept our praises; And, placing us under thy dear protection, may we approach thee, as a tree, for shelter. For thee, O Blest Sarasvati, Vasishtha hath here unbarred the doors of sacred Order. Wax, Bright One, and give strength to him who lauds thee. Preserve us evermore, ye Gods, with blessings.
• 40:30 - 41:00 Notice that the power of the goddess, represented by the waters, is seen in how she bestows blessings on the people, and not merely blessings that literally come from having a river, but many other things too. To Vadhryasva when he worshipped her with gifts she gave fierce Divodasa, canceller of debts. Consumer of the churlish stingy person, one and all, thine, O Sarasvati, are these effectual boons. She with her might, like one who digs for lotus-stems, hath burst with her strong waves
• 41:00 - 41:30 the ridges of the hills. Let us invite with songs and holy hymns for help Sarasvati who slayeth the Paravatas. Thou castest down, Sarasvati, those who scorned the Gods, the brood of every Briaya skilled in magic arts. Thou hast discovered rivers for the tribes of men, and, rich in wealth! made poison flow away from them. May the divine Sarasvati, rich in her wealth, protect us well, Furthering all our thoughts with might; Whoso, divine Sarasvati, invokes thee where the prize is set,
• 41:30 - 42:00 Like Indra when he smites the foe. Aid us, divine Sarasvati, thou who art strong in wealth and power: Like Pushan, give us opulence. Yea, this divine Sarasvati, terrible with her golden path, Foe-slayer, claims our eulogy. Whose boundless unbroken flood, swift-moving with a rapid rush, Comes onward with tempestuous roar. (how literal is this description, and is this year round or annual?)
• 42:00 - 42:30 She hath spread us beyond all foes, beyond her Sisters, Holy One, As Surya spreadeth out the days. Yea, she most dear amid dear streams, Seven-sistered, graciously inclined, Sarasvati hath earned our praise. Guard us from hate Sarasvati, she who hath filled the realms of earth, And that wide tract, the firmament! (here we see Saraswati’s participation in creation, but how literal are we to take this? She has filled the realms of earth with her water?
• 42:30 - 43:00 Filled the firmament of heaven?) Seven-sistered, sprung from three fold source, the Five Tribes’ prosperer, she must be Invoked in every deed of might. Marked out by majesty among the Mighty Ones, in glory swifter than the other rapid Streams, Created vast for victory like a chariot, Sarasvati must be extolled by every sage. Guide us, Sarasvati, to glorious treasure: refuse us not thy milk, nor spurn us from thee. Gladly accept our friendship and obedience:
• 43:00 - 43:30 let us not go from thee to distant countries. We today, with our modern mindset, might be tempted to look at ancient poetry with scientific goggles, but this is an anachronistic approach, and it suffers from a devotion to extreme literalism. By literalism I mean that the exact wording of a text is assumed to carry the whole weight of its meaning. Once in my YouTube comments, I got into a disagreement with someone about the Babylonian
• 43:30 - 44:00 empire. They said that because Nebuchadnezzar was called the king of the whole world, this must mean that the Babylonian empire spanned the entire globe. He was arguing this unironically. What was his mistake? An inability to see that his was figurative language. Hyperbolic language. Extreme literalism assumes every word is straightforward. It means what it says. Mind you, in some texts are to be read literally. The news, for example, communicates
• 44:00 - 44:30 in a style that is meant to convey facts. A literal reading is appropriate and necessary. But extreme literalism will often disregard the genre of a text, the author’s intention, and literary conventions. And often it will take passages out of context. One thing you will notice whenever anyone points to evidence for the Saraswati being a large, perennial river in the Rigveda, is that they will just give you snippets. They take the words out
• 44:30 - 45:00 of context. This is because literalism often ignores context. To them, context is irrelevant. The words mean the same thing regardless. And dishonest people won’t want anyone else to see the context. This is one of the reasons I have shown you the context. Then people go one step further, and not only do they interpret the text literally, they then try to use science to analyze it. Matching up the geological and hydrological history
• 45:00 - 45:30 of the Saraswati river to religious poetry about the goddess Saraswati in an attempt to date it is not actually scientific at all. And it shows disrespect for the text and the authors’ intentions. Let me be clear: I am open to the idea that the Rigveda could be older, maybe even by a few centuries. Right now the evidence points away from that, but we could find something that will change all that. The argument about the Saraswati river, however, is not the kind
• 45:30 - 46:00 of evidence that holds much water, if you’ll forgive the pun. Remember that it is primarily an exegetical argument, not a scientific one, because no one has any disagreement about the science related to the river. The disagreement is over the interpretation of the Rigveda. And its interpretation disregards genre, intention, literary conventions, and context. Thank you for watching all the way to the end. If you want to see more on the history
• 46:00 - 46:30 of ancient India, check out my video on the sunken city of Dwarka. I will leave a link for you. If you liked this video, please give it a thumbs up. This is an audience-supported channel, so if you would like to help keep it alive, please consider donating with a Super Thanks, or if you want to do it on a regular basis, please become a channel patron at patreon.com/WorldofAntiquity. You might like my little e-booklet, "Why Ancient History Matters. It's designed to persuade
• 46:30 - 47:00 people that the subject is important, even in the modern world. You might also wish to use it to help spread the word, so feel free to share it with someone you know. It's free for anyone who wants it. I've left the link in the description box below the video for you to grab a copy. Catch you later!