(A response to Rama’s Realm – Indocentric Rewritings of Early South Asian Archaeology and History^[i], by M. Witzel)

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The long-promised, not highly awaited, chronicle from Michael Witzel of revisionism in modern Indian thought is finally here, appropriately titled Rama’s Realm (appropriate from his POV). The paper articulates Witzel’s long-standing desire to call out the “wave of indigenously minded revision and rewriting” of Indian history and archaeology. Titles such as indigenism and revisionism are frequently used to dismiss Indian historical writing. They seem to imply that all attempts are compromised from the get-go, subservient to an agenda of Indian nationalism. Further, they portray that the established paradigms emerge from objective, impartial scholarship. In fact, if any attempt to rewrite Indian history is indigenist, then Witzelian discomfort with these is reputationist. Decades of careers, tenures, university seats and book deals have descended from current frameworks for Indian history. It’s amusing that in Witzel’s chronicle of Indian scholarship, he does not find it peculiar that only in India do we have a book titled ‘Which of Us Are Aryans.’ In fact, when we understand reputationism, we see it as not peculiar at all. Reputationist circles thrive on mutual back-scratching, cross-referencing and opponent-gaslighting just as much, if not more, as they accuse revisionists of.

Let us concede, a philologist of Witzel’s stature and experience is an old war-dog. He’s taken on Kazanas, Elst, Kak, Talageri, Sethna and more. So this latest piece must be understood as an expert one, coming from the mind of a veteran well-familiar with the modern Indian mind. But equally, does it come from a reputationist-par-excellence, a past master of tautologies, strawmen and hypocritical intellectualism. Witzel cannot help but reveal this in the introduction itself, where he props the strawman that “it is further claimed that all human civilisation originated in India in c. 10,000 BC.” No serious scholar claims this, even if it appeals to many non-academics in India. But it helps reputationists to club this strawman with the archaeologically true- “Indian civilisation has enjoyed an unbroken continuity from 7500 BC onward.” This second statement, when nuanced, has demonstrable veracity. But clubbing it with the first statement allows a reputationist to paint serious Indian claims with the brush of absurdity. This concerning trend ought to be contextualised with some famous examples of reputationist dubiousness.

Of Imagined Immigrants in the Ṛgveda

Witzel claims to have found ample evidence of migration into India in Vedic literature. Among the ones he deigns to be specific on is the example of Vasiṣṭha as an immigrant across the Sindhu, into India, found in RV 7-33-1 to 7-33-3. Readers are invited to check this across available English language translations- Griffith, Wilson, Jamison-Brereton. These verses are being uttered, figuratively, by Indra, who declares that Vasiṣṭha has invited him here, across the Sindhu. But the Sindhu in this sūkta is not the Indus, and the river in question is easily identified as Yamunā instead. The sūkta is part of a larger collection of Ṛgvedic hymns referencing the famous dāśarājña campaigns of Sudās, and in 7-33, Sudās is on the Yamunā leg of his campaigns. In fact, there are no references to Sindhu in all of Maṇḍala 7.

Amāvasu Migrated West

Another evidence of migration into India was found by Witzel in the Baudhāyana Śrautasūtra and unravelled by BB Lal^[ii]. In an example of the blind cross-referencing where reputationists critique indigenists, Witzel’s error was “faithfully followed” by RS Sharma. Initially a proud reputationist discovery, it seemed to confirm that a section of people migrated east into India, while another remained at home in the west^[iii]. This was touted as a definitive reputationist victory, as many are, but Lal demonstrated how incorrect Witzel’s translation was. The correct translation in fact states that “Amāvasu migrated westwards,” an indigenist victory if singular vague references were taken such, as reputationists desperately do. Credit where due, Witzel acknowledges his error here and is disappointed at indigenist refusal to let the matter go.

Dancing with Bank Clerks

Witzel’s biggest battle though has been with the man who has single-handedly won the AIT debate, as Elst^[iv] rightly puts- Shrikant Talageri. So heavy lie Talageri’s victories, that Witzel’s writings inevitably contain the words ‘bank clerk’ ever since. They must since the typical reputationist playbook is as such-

• Begin with discrediting the agenda. So works are first declared indigenist or revisionist to imply that objectivity is compromised.
• Discredit the author of that work. So Talageri is just a bank clerk who does not understand linguistics. Koenraad Elst’s understanding of philology is poor, and Nicholas Kazanas did not properly understand PIE reconstructions.
• Engage in pedantic undermining, so that it becomes more pertinent whether we call it “Slavic,” “Slavonic” or “Balto-Slavic” than what the relevant conclusions are. Should we be similarly concerned when Witzel calls Persian a local language (for India)?
• As a corollary of the above, establish one’s own supreme and complete expertise in the linguistic field.
• Nitpick or make strawman arguments that ignore the real points. So Talageri is criticised for using anukramaṇīs (though their data is accepted to be a part of the Ṛgveda) and Kazanas for misunderstanding Saptasaindhava. But no refutation is given of Talageri’s analysis through internal chronology, or of Kazanas’ Preservation Principle.
• Deny/dismiss/refute all non-linguistic arguments such as horses, fire-altars, Sarasvatī. The reputationist suddenly understands archaeology, geology and equid anthropology better than experts of those fields, all the while dismissing those who (allegedly) do not comprehend his own.
• Falsify data- the case of “Amāvasu went west.”

When tangoing with Talageri, Witzel’s roundabouts are the stuff of legend. In his writings, the latter speculated that the Bhalāna tribe of the Ṛgveda could be cognate with the Bolan Pass, and the Baloch people. When Talageri incorporated this and extended the analysis to other tribes including the Pāktha, Witzel forgot his own earlier connection when critiquing Talageri! In Witzel’s tango with Talageri over the meaning of Ṛgvedic Jahnāvī and śiṃśumāra, he forgot that he too identified śiṃśumāra with the Gangetic dolphin in his own papers. These and other flip-flops are well-chronicled by Kazanas^[v], who concluded that “apart from anything else, W did not read T’s book in full.”

Such then is the context of reputationist concerns over ‘revisionist,’ ‘nationalistic,’ and ‘indigenist’ narratives of Indian history. Let us note that Talageri does not claim the origin of all human civilisation in India in 10,000 BCE and does not even stake a claim in the argument of an unbroken continuity from 7,500 BCE. For all the reputationist dismay at bank clerks rewriting history, Talageri’s specific conclusions- derived from mainstream frameworks of Witzel’s disciplines- stand unchallenged and even misunderstood.

In Rama’s Realm, Witzel begins with contextualising Indian nationalism and revisionism. Playbook traits are easily evident- “irrational claims of modern science in the Vedas” are presented to the reader instead of intellectually honest discussions on the mathematics, geometry, astronomy, metallurgy, medicine and other sciences evident in ancient Indian literature. It will be too much to expect an honest reputationist refutation of the findings in Subhash Kak’s paper on ancient Indian astronomy^[vi], for example. For the vast landscape of connections between ancient Indian thought and the edge of modern science, we need not blame Indian indigenism over much. These were as evident to Schrodinger^[vii] as they were to Capra^[viii]. The point is not to deny a range of pseudoscientific and patently absurd claims with currency in India, the point is to highlight equally the lacuna in reputationist literature against genuine examinations of ancient Indian history and knowledge.

We are left therefore with the usual generalisations and distortions. Gowalkar’s “children of the soil” is found to be “clearly reminiscent of contemporary fascism.” Savarkar’s vision of a Hindu rāṣṭra is alleged to desire a “homogenous Hindu population adhering to Hindu religion and culture.” Askance a priori at any finding of continuity in ancient India, the reputationist seems to begrudge it even now. It is therefore a problem that Sita Ram Goel’s son, PK Goel, started Aditya Prakashan- which now sells books cheaply and widely. This kind of Rāma’s realm concerns the reputationist. Other attributes of this Rāma’s realm are detailed by Witzel in the paper, so we address them under the headers they appear.

Theory, Procedure and Practice in Rewriting

Witzel alleges that under Indian revisionism, “any type of ancient immigration is scientifically refuted”. This is a strange characterisation, for he then says that “in support of the idea of South Asia being an attraction to outsiders, any imaginary reason is brought up”. We cannot be sure what the real allegation here is. Any theory on linguistic, culture or technological origins must necessarily speculate, if not theorise, on reasons for population dispersal. There are theories that argue that agricultural revolutions trigger an outward dispersal of populations, while others contend that they attract immigration instead. Further, serious Indian thought is not in the business of rejecting “any type” of ancient immigration! Even mythological Indian thought, if the Purāṇas are to be characterised such, describes invasions by peoples it calls Śākas, Hūṇas, Yavanas and more.

It concerns Witzel that Indian revisionists refer to Afghanistan as Hindu territory. But this is neither a political nor an invasionist claim. It simply alludes to references to Gāndhāra in the Ṛgveda (1-126-7), in the Mahābhārata, and then as part of the empire for rulers such as Chandragupta. In this context, when Indian writers speak in generalisations, they are comfortable referring to Afghanistan as erstwhile Hindu. There is neither aggression nor modern political antagonism in this. The claim is in fact inclusivist. Even when ancient Gāndhāra was part of Persian or Greek empires, indigenists have no problem regarding it as part of the realm.

The allegation that all revisionists “want to proceed scientifically, marshalling a host of evidence that seems to point in the direction of their aims” must be examined with help of two cases. For one, the reputationist zeal to point at genetic evidence as tautological confirmations is a prime demonstration of proceeding scientifically, marshalling evidence that points in an aimed direction. Second, Parpola’s^[ix] marshalling of the Sinauli evidence towards proving existing paradigms pieces of evidence that all sides proceed scientifically, marshalling a host of evidence that seems to point in the direction of their aims. This is but one example of Witzel seeming to begrudge in indigenists what is but common across the spectrum.

This is demonstrated when he despairs- “Scholars in the mainstream are seen as clinging to hold-out positions, which will disappear as soon as their authors die”. This is indeed why we speak of reputationism, but Witzel’s characterisation of revisionists is what both sides allege for the other- confusing the issue by raising irrelevant points, misrepresenting other’s views, ad hominem attacks. None of this actually addresses what needs addressing- salient points in debates on Indian history. We wonder what’s remarkable or problematic about both sides of a debate having the same complaints about the other. On the Indo-European origins and dispersal issue, that both reputationists and indigenists are guilty of this is documented by Bryant^[x]. For specific lacunae in the indigenists takes on the IE issue, Witzel points to two things.

1. The horse argument- an old bear in the IE debate. To Witzel, the “RV is full of horses, chariots, and horse races,” but he gives not a single reference for this. This itself is curious, the philologist would rather not give us single evidence of something the RV is full of and instead launches into an extended discussion on the archaeological and zoological realities of horse evidence in India. There is a reason for this, demonstrable to anyone who can research the text. The horse, chariots and horses races are near absent in the early Ṛgveda, where temporal concepts of an early and later Ṛgveda are well-established since the days of Oldenberg^[xi]. Take the entire dāśarājña, a historical account that to Witzel forms the core events that inspired the Mahābhārata. There are no horses or chariots in the dāśarājña hymns, except in mythological reference to Indra or as horse-heads given as war booty^[xii].
2. This gains a new dimension in Witzel’s second gripe, where he refers to KD Sethna’s Karpasa and an obsolete chronology for ancient or Vedic history. Witzel is correct when he says that the spoked chariot was invented near 2000 BCE, or that domesticated horses were likely imported post-1800 BCE. This is entirely compatible with the correct internal chronology of the Ṛgveda, where the horse and spoked chariots are absent in the early Ṛgveda. When we place the Ṛgvedic duration broadly from 2600 BC to 1900/1700 BC, it explains why spoked chariots appear in the later Ṛgveda. There is in fact no major incompatibility with indigenist narratives of Indian history. Witzel simply decides to address the incompatible ones. That then is his choice, not an innate quality of what he claims to be describing. In fact, given that Witzel frequently laments that indigenists rely on outdated colonial narratives, and are unaware of modern developments, it’s curious that he makes no mention of names such as Benedetti^[xiii], Semenenko^[xiv] and Tonoyan-Belyayev^[xv]. These are contemporary scholars, none of them Indian, who endorse some kind of autochthonous or indigenous theory. We get more detail on this in the next section.

The Aryan Invasion

We begin here by making concessions that may please the reputationist. There are problems in Hindu society that are for it to confront and resolve- and no amount of allusion to foreign invasions or conquest can absolve us of what we must see within ourselves. Our lament of colonial narratives of Indian history cannot be an apologia for the intrinsic ails of our society. And indeed, Sanskrit was not the mother language of all Indo-European languages.

This last point is where the Aryan debate begins, for the crux of it is a linguistic theory. We do not dismiss the theory, nor can we be ignorant about the scientific underpinnings of comparative linguistics. But we can also point out what Mallory and Adams^[xvi] conceded-

“The picture provided by the reconstructed lexicon is not very informative concerning the physical environment of the speakers of the ancestral language, although there have been scholars enough who have tried to press the slender evidence into revealing the precise location (or type of location) inhabited by the Proto-Indo-Europeans.”

Against this simple reality, it seems that Witzel’s problem is that there are those who continue to marshal evidence for an Indian homeland when they should sit contend with the conclusions of Witzel and his reputationist colleagues. In fact, Mallory goes as far as conceding-

“A solution to the IE problem will more than likely be as dependent on a re-examination of the methodology and terminology involved as much as on the actual data themselves.”

Reputationists can thus continue to find faults in indigenist arguments and theories, but we fail to see what’s inherently problematic in the attempt itself.

Witzel asserts that “if invasion of IA speakers is not (yet) visible in the archaeology, it must be stressed that such movements rarely leave clear physical traces.” This is the great intellectual deceit of “yet,” famously and rightly called out by Kazanas. It seems to say that “there is no evidence, nor should any be expected. But if some is found, we will happily claim it in our favour.” This is of course done in the case of the horse argument, where Witzel is happy to elaborate the lacunae in Indian archaeological record. But when confronted with the reality that the period post-1500 BCE, the so-called Aryan arrival, does not contain a preponderance of horse bones either, the reputationist would remind us that linguistic migrations are rarely, if ever, found in the archaeological record.

Why then the lengthy elaboration on the horse issue? If the presence of archaeological evidence is not salient on linguistic matters, then its absence isn’t either. It’s in this vein that reputationists dismiss the Sarasvatī evidence, or the findings of fire-altars in Indian archaeology prior to 1500 BCE. Accepting such evidence would indeed force a revision of established paradigms, but when the reputationist uses the deceit of “yet” he concedes that he is indeed holding out. This is why Witzel is confident that the discovery of steppe cultural traits in the Indian subcontinent is only a matter of time. But when he points to the entry of steppe nomads into the BMAC in 1600/1500 BCE, he leaves unaddressed the following:

• BMAC ancestry has not been found in the Indian subcontinent. (The reputationist will add- yet.)
• The path by which steppe ancestry arrived into India is uncertain.
• This ancestry is not found in Zoroastrian priests, nor did it accompany the arrival of IE in Greece- thus delinking it from IE dispersals.

The reality is that on the Aryan issue, the question that indigenists are asking is- what did the so-called Aryans bring? On the issue of language, it’s not only Indians who challenge the established narratives or deny the theory of steppe origins. Tonoyan-Belyayev goes as far as saying that the “language of the Mature Harappan period was lexically and grammatically close to or identical with Rigvedic and, to a lesser degree, Samavedic and Atharvavedic, but as for its phonology, it was significantly different.” The debates are far from settled, and that Indian thought in the meantime ranges across a spectrum, from the absurd to the legitimate, is scarcely the existential issue that Witzel paints it to be. In fact, he recognises that the only thing indigenism is really contesting is the use of ancient history to find modern divides in India. What is the problem with such indigenism? Does modern England find divisions between ādivāsi Englishmen and later invaders? Is American nationalism inherently fascist, pushes as it does beyond historical divides? To call for a modern, united and integrated USA is not problematic, but Witzel would rather that there be no such trends in India. It is better, seemingly, that we have books like Which of Us Are Aryans.

Revisionist Variations

Witzel identifies three strands of revisionism prevalent in India today:

• A mild school, which claims the origins of Ṛgveda and Indo-Aryans in the Greater Punjab area. Witzel calls this the autochthonous or indigenous school.
• The out of India school, which asserts that India is the ultimate PIE homeland.
• The devabhāśā school, which asserts that Sanskrit, the language of the gods, is the mother of all IE languages.

Of course, if one were to paint a landscape of European thought and literature on the same issue, one will find mild as well as outrightly racist or chauvinistic versions. So Witzel’s classification is neither remarkable nor uniquely Indian. What is left unaddressed is a very specific finding on the matter of PIE origins and dispersals, which is Talageri’s recorded evidence of the last five IE branches on the banks of the Paruṣṇī river, in the time of Sudās of the Ṛgveda. The finding is chronologically independent, which means that whether you place the Ṛgveda in 2500 BCE or in 1500 BCE, you must explain what the other 4 Eastern IE branches were doing in the Punjab region. Reputationism has no response to this. It would instead direct your attention to other debates in Indian chronology, such as the date of the Mahābhārata. There are multiple views on this, and Kak has well chronicled the cases for 3102 BCE vs. 1900 BCE vs. 1400 BCE^[xvii]. This is an acknowledged debate, and once again we fail to find what’s inherently problematic about it. We may ignore the narratives that Witzel deems “untouched by enlightenment,” and ask instead what refutes the more rational ones, such as a timeline compatible with any that Witzel may produce.

The Indus Script

We grant here that there is a lack of consensus decipherment. It is no secret that generations of scholars have been apriori dissuaded from investigating any linkage between Sanskrit and the Indus script, but that there are attempts nonetheless is problematic to the reputationist. There is a range of speculations on the nature of the Indus script, so there is no clear reason to single indigenist ones out. Let us concede that the script is as yet undeciphered, and that consensus decipherment will force the revision of many a historical narrative. Let us also observe the stark absence in Witzel’s piece of any reference to Tonoyan-Belyayev’s recent work, which even argues that Dravidian exists as an adstrate to Indo-Aryan, not a substrate. The matter remains open, which is fair. We may move on.

Antiquity Frenzy

That 3102 BCE as the start of Indian history was a paradigm set in the 6th century is acknowledged even by Kak, so we’re not sure why Witzel continues to critique the high-chronology framework. There are compatible-chronology frameworks for Indian history, which violate no archaeological or linguistic certainties. In a typical example of the reputationist playbook, Witzel critiques the 3102 BCE paradigm but has no response to the 1900 BCE/1500 BCE paradigm. Yes, there are debates in Indian chronology, and all kinds of narratives abound. When you deal with a geography that indeed finds archaeological continuities from at least 7000 BCE, there are bound to be many explanations- some ranging at the edge of absurdity. So what? Why must the reputationist get frenzied about this? Go ahead, ignore Frawley’s high chronology or Nilesh Oak’s fanciful dates. But indigenism will await refutations of Talageri or Kak’s chronologies.

Witzel summarises the current antiquity frenzy as such. From 10,000/7000 BCE was the Vedic civilisation, ranging to 3200 BCE. 3200-1900 BCE was the Indus Valley civilisation, and it declined post-1900 BCE owing to the Sarasvatī’s decline. Witzel of course finds problems with any indigenist take on the Sarasvatī, which is to be expected of reputationism. But the reality is that even global models such as the 4.2 kiloyear event commencing 2200 BCE give reasons for a general decline during that period. The Sarasvatī is just one explanation, and no one seriously claims it to be all defining. In any case, Sastry and Kalyanasundaram^[xviii] chronicle that by 1900 BCE the Sarasvatī had stopped meeting the ocean- but it had not entirely disappeared. The disappearance itself was a gradual process.

Out of India

This of course is Witzel’s biggest gripe, for in its full form (Talageri, Elst, Kazanas, Tonoyan-Belyayev) it hits at the core fields- comparative linguistics, PIE reconstruction and philology. The field is too vast to succinctly summarise, but this writer makes an attempt here^[xix]. It’s pertinent to remember that OIT is not championed by indigenists alone. Semenenko and Tonoyan-Belyayev call it the out-of-South-Asia theory, but their conclusions are just the same. Perhaps because they cannot be dismissed as bank clerks, there is no mention of them at all. And perhaps because Witzel has previously addressed Talageri^[xx], in this piece he makes only a vague reference to some evidence in the Purāṇas. Here Witzel finally elaborates on Subhash Kak, but while he dismisses Kak’s work as loosely scientific, there is no specific refutation made.

Even if we are to dismiss OIT, or submit to the large consensus view that there is no certifiable way of determining an ultimate PIE homeland, we again wonder what exactly is Witzel’s problem with there being theories of Indian origins. Even without them, the steppe theory is not alone. There are theories of origin for both eastern and western Anatolia, both. And recent work by Nichols brings the homeland to BMAC. It appears that more than refuting specific cases of the OIT/OSAT, Witzel would rather that none such theory exist, to begin with.

Ek Rājya, Ek Rāṣṭra

After the above Witzelian account of the kind of Rāma’s realm indigenists are trying to create/narrate, we are still left wondering what the real problem is. This becomes clear in the last section, where Witzel describes the indigenist view as that of “one people, one realm, on religion” and a significant addition- “one leader.”

This is the great unravelling, for none of the revisionist writers Witzel quotes front any vision of “one leader.” This “significant addition” appears more to pander to modern Modi-aversion than to any true analysis of Indian revisionist history. Witzel goes further, for he sees in this revisionism shades of para and proto-fascist history. We are thus brought back to the present- where we are told to be fearful of the rise of Nazi Hindutva, or of Hindu fascism. But pressed to the wall, there is an utter failure to describe what exactly is fascist about modern India, or indeed even about absurd revisionist narratives. Witzel himself refers to the claims of Graham Hancock, who he would dismiss as pseudoscientific. Even so, this does not make Hancock a fascist. So why would Frawley or Nilesh Oak be fascist, simply because they find an Indian civilisation before 10,000 BCE? This is the part not explained.

What it all comes down to is a simple point- India is not allowed to have an indigenous grand narrative. For all the chronicle Witzel gives of indigenism in Indian writing, we are met with not a single example of fascist or exclusivist thought. Yes, Savarkar’s concepts of pitṛbhu and punyabhu raise questions on the nature of Indian Muslims and Christians, but even here a scholar of Witzel’s expertise fails to articulate the fascism of such a question. When Savarkar asked whether Indian Muslims and Christians would accept India as their punyabhu, he also pointed to Chinese and Thais who do consider it a punyabhu. These are nuanced issues on the nature of identity in India, and every nation has these. Most citizens of modern USA would trace their pitṛbhu, within a few generations upwards, to outside their nation’s geography. But they find meaning and identity in the American war for independence, in the war against slavery, in the world wars their country fought, and even in the historical injustices, it must still grapple with. It is their punyabhu, and it makes them loyal to the homeland. For Witzel, no such discussion is allowed in India- but examples of Indian/Hindu fascism are entirely lacking.

Indeed, when Witzel concludes with the general but coloured- “as long as there are free elections, independent publishers, and a free press, and as long as they are not muzzled, as once before in recent times, by a new dictator,” we realise that the real problem is that Indians seem to have a growing voice in the narratives of India, that is Bhārata. Rāma’s realm is fascist, but it cannot be demonstrated how. Yet?

References

^[i] https://www.academia.edu/19380740/Ramas_realm

^[ii] Lal, BB. Testing Ancient Indian Traditions: On the Touchstone of Archaeology. Aryan Books International.

^[iii] Witzel, M. Rig Vedic History: Poets, Chieftains and Polities. https://www.academia.edu/713988/R_gvedic_history_poets_chieftains_and_polities

^[iv] Pragyata, 2018. https://koenraadelst.blogspot.com/2020/04/ait-and-science-of-linguistics.html

^[v] Kazanas, N. Indo-Aryan Origins and Other Vedic Issues. Aditya Prakashan.

^[vi] Kak, S. On Astronomy in Ancient India. Indian Journal of History of Science, 1987, https://www.academia.edu/45160955/On_Astronomy_in_Ancient_India.

^[vii] Kak, S. The Wishing Tree: Presence and Promise of India. Aditya Prakashan.

^[viii] Capra, Fritjof. The Tao of Physics. Harper Collins.

^[ix] Vol. 8 No. 1 (2020): Studia Orientalia Electronica, https://journal.fi/store/article/view/98032

^[x] Bryant, E. The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture. Oxford University Press.

^[xi] Oldenberg, H. Prolegomena on Metre and Textual History of the Rigveda. Motilal Banarsidass.

^[xii] Pandey, A. A New Reading of the Dāśarājña, or Battle of Ten Kings, in the Ṛg Veda. https://www.academia.edu/44619611/A_New_Reading_of_the_Dāśarājña_or_Battle_of_Ten_Kings_in_the_Ṛg_Veda

^[xiii] Benedetti, G. The Chronology of Puranic Kings and Rigvedic Rishis in Comparison with the Phases of the Sindhu-Sarasvati Civilization. https://www.academia.edu/7683313/The_Chronology_of_Puranic_Kings_and_Rigvedic_Rishis_in_Comparison_with_the_Phases_of_the_Sindhu_Sarasvati_Civilization

^[xiv] Semenenko, AA. The Absence of the Sword from the Rigveda and Atharvaveda and the Problem of Indo-Aryans’ Origins. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.2563192Semenenko, AA. The Absence of the Sword from the Rigveda and Atharvaveda and the Problem of Indo-Aryans’ Origins. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.2563192

^[xv] Tonoyan-Belyayev, IA. Five Waves of Indo-European Expansion from the South Asian Urheimat: An OIT Model. https://www.academia.edu/36998766/Five_waves_of_Indo_European_expansion_a_preliminary_model_2018_

^[xvi] Mallory, JP and Adams, DQ. The Oxford Introduction to PIE and the PIE World. Oxford University Press.

^[xvii] Kak, S. On the Chronological Framework for Indian Culture. Indian Council of Philosophical Research, 2000. https://www.ece.lsu.edu/kak/chro.pdf

^[xviii] Sastry and Kalyanasundaram. Sarasvati in the Mahabharata – A Study. International Conference on Sarasvati River, 2019. https://www.academia.edu/38369132/Sarasvatī_in_the_Mahābhārata_A_Study_Sastry_and_Kalyanasundaram_2019_pdf

^[xix] Pandey, A. Bhāratīya Wanderlust- a Defence of the Out of India Model for PIE Origins and Dispersals. https://www.academia.edu/46965053/Bha_rati_ya_Wanderlust_A_Defence_of_the_Out_of_India_Theory_of_Proto_Indo_European_Origins

^[xx] Witzel, M. The Incredible Wanderlust of the Rigvedic Tribes Exposed by S Talageri. https://www.academia.edu/18428668/The_Incredible_Wanderlust_of_the_Rgvedic_Tribes_Exposed_by_S_Talageri