Saraswati

Saraswati

This article does not contain any original research. It borrows freely from various sources that are acknowledged in individual footnotes. Raja Ravi Varma’s famous painting has been reproduced in several web sites. This version is also taken from the net and so is the Balinese painting at the end of the article.

Fact, fiction and speculation have a habit of blending together when one looks at ancient India. In this article I have put forward my point of view – it is not accepted historical dogma and neither is it original. It is speculative and interesting as it has many facets. Enjoy the read!

ámbitame nádītame dévitame sárasvati, "best mother, best river, best goddess" – Rig Veda

The Rig Veda is generally said to have been composed between 1700 – 1100 BCE[1] by the Aryans who are said to have invaded India from Central Asia around that time.

The Saraswati River is one of the main rivers described in the Rig Veda. It is mentioned several times while the Ganga is mentioned only once.

Geological evidence has established that the river that is understood to be the Saraswati dried up completely around 1900 BCE i.e. earlier than the date when the Rig Veda was composed and earlier than the date of the Aryan invasion.

Strange isn’t it?

Clearly, these dates and events don’t tie up. There are three possibilities:

1.    The Rig Veda was composed earlier than what is the generally accepted date.

2.    The date of the Saraswati’s drying up is more recent.

3.    The river understood to be the Saraswati today is not the river referred to in the Rig Veda.

In order to get a perspective on this conundrum, it is necessary to examine several interrelated facets.

1.    What are the facts about the Saraswati River?

2.    The Aryan invasion – Who really were the ‘Aryans?’ Did they actually exist at all?

3.    The Indus Valley civilization. Where and when?

4.    Rig Vedic rivers and cataclysmal geological events.

5.    When was the Rig Veda composed? How old is Indian civilization?

The commonly held belief today is that the Saraswati River originated in the Bandarpunch massif in Western Garhwal and flowed down through Haryana, Punjab, Rajasthan and Gujarat into the Arabian Sea following a course roughly parallel to the Indus. The Sutlej and the Yamuna were tributaries to the Saraswati in those days (prior to 1900 BCE). The river has been identified as the Ghaggar Hakra River which is little more than a rain fed rivulet today near Chandigarh.[2] Around 1900 BCE[3] a series of earthquakes violently changed the topography of the river systems. The Sutlej turned west and eventually became a tributary of the Indus while the Yamuna turned eastwards and joined the Ganga at Allahabad. Gradually, the Saraswati dried up as the flow of water became progressively less. This cataclysmic event had huge repercussions on the development of Indian civilization as we will see below.

Civilization in India began with the Indus Valley civilization also referred to as the Harappan Civilization after one of the principal sites (now in Pakistan). The accepted dates for the civilization are 3300 BCE – 1300 BCE. The civilization was widespread with major sites being found on the Indus River as well as on the Saraswati. In fact the number of sites on the course of the Saraswati are actually far higher than the Indus. The civilization started declining around 1800BCE and by 1700BCE most of the cities had been abandoned. It was initially thought that the Indus Valley Civilization declined due to an invasion from the North West by the so called ‘Aryans’[4] However, that view has now been largely discredited. In fact the whole ‘Aryan Invasion’ theory has been questioned by a number of Indian historians. Maybe they did not exist at all! It may be that our colonial masters[5] thought it expedient to foster the illusion that Indian civilization was a western transplant courtesy the convenient Aryans![6]

What is more likely is that the drying up of the Saraswati and the change of climate (in prehistoric times the Indus valley was far more wet and verdant than it is today. The climate changed to more cool and dry, paving the way to a decline in agriculture and food availability). The inhabitants of these cities (at the peak, the Indus Valley civilization was estimated to have close to 5 Mn people) started migrating eastwards laying the foundation for the settlement of the Gangetic plain.

It is clear from the foregoing that the hymns about the Saraswati in the Rig Veda were therefore composed earlier than what is currently accepted as fact. They must have been composed before 1900 BCE as the river is described as a mighty stream with a lot of water. Who wrote them? And when were they actually written?

It is difficult to imagine that the people who lived on the banks of the Saraswati did not write about it. Instead the ‘Aryans’ arrived and composed the most evocative and emotional poetry after being rough nomads in Central Asia! This is really difficult to imagine. It’s far more likely that the Rig Veda was composed by the Indus Valley people themselves at a time when the bounteous rivers gave them a wealth of benefits. If we are to accept this thought, the date of the Rig Veda gets pushed back at least before 1900BCE. How far back is then the question?

Astronomical references in the Rig Veda[7] as well as correlation with the Puranic lists of kings point to an earlier date for the war described in the Mahabharat. In addition, there are a section of scholars who believe that the Saraswati dried up in two phases. Around 3000 BCE when the flow became insufficient to reach the sea and the river ended in a place referred to as Vinashsthan. Thereafter it dried up completely in 1900 BCE as mentioned above. Since the Rig Veda refers to the river flowing down to the sea it is postulated that the date of the composition is before 3000 BCE. Perhaps the original composition was around that time but was updated and embellished in later years with the astronomical references being kept intact. Suffice it to say that there is enough evidence to support the view that the Rig Veda was and other Vedic literature was composed well before the so called ‘Aryans’ made their mythical entrance into India.

One of the strange features of ancient Indian History as most of us have studied it is that there is a strange gap between the Indus Valley Civilization and the Vedic age[8]. It is almost as if there is no link at all between these civilizations. They were both highly developed and existed with a few centuries gap between them at best. The accepted view, of course, is that the Aryans conquered the people of the Indus valley and that the latter fled towards the South and the West. There is a more tenuous view that refers to them as the precursors to the Dravidian people of South India. The Aryans, after destroying the Indus valley civilization turned eastwards and it was they who settled the Gangetic plain. This view is also relies on the traditional historical view that there is very little in common between the Indus valley civilization and the Vedic age. In reality this is not true at all and there is considerable continuity between the two civilizations.

There are two aspects to this continuity[9], tangible and intangible. Tangible continuity exists in architecture, weights and measures (for which the Indus valley people were renowned) which survived with few modifications till the introduction of the metric system in the 20^th Century! The list is long. Finally the script. The Indus valley script is yet to be deciphered. It disappeared around 1800 BCE and it was only in the fifth century BCE that the first historical script, Brahmi emerged. Most scholars have said that Brahmi is derived from a Semitic script but there are intriguing discoveries in Bet Dwarka and Daimabad that point to an evolution and simplification of the Indus script that could be a transition to Brahmi. Secondly, intangible continuity exists in many forms. For instance the Swastika (held to be an ‘Aryan’ symbol) actually originated In Harappa. Lingas have been found in Harappa and other sites pointing to an early worship of Shiva. Fire worship is another area that holds even today. Yoga originated in the Indus valley.

As B.B. Lal puts it “Even today there is no walk of life in which we cannot discern the grass-roots features of this ancient (Harappan) civilization: be it agriculture, cooking habits, arts, crafts, games, ornaments, toiletry, religious practices or social stratification.”

The mystery of the lost Saraswati is an intriguing tale. Our history has been written by our colonial masters, the British, who obviously had their own motivations and limitations. While most of this article rests on speculative foundations there is considerable merit in focusing more on our own history. There is every possibility that ancient India holds many secrets and learning that has been lost along with the Goddess of learning – Saraswati.

Postscript

The Indus valley civilization had considerable trade with the civilizations of Mesopotamia and others in the Middle East. Indus valley seals have been found there and conversely evidence of trade has also been found in the Indus port of Lothal. Perhaps in keeping with the intangible nature of the Saraswati tale the fact that Balinese Hindus accord primacy of worship to Dewi Saraswati is an indicator that Indus Valley ideas spread even further than their tangible trade.

                                                               Dewi Saraswati – Bali

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[1] Max Meuller and others quoted in Wikipedia.

[2] A contrary view is held by Rajesh Kochar who believes that the Rig Vedic Saraswati was actually the Helmand river of Southern Afghanistan.

[3] The Lost River – Michel Danino details these geological events.

[4] Sir Mortimer Wheeler propagated this view based on the discovery of 37 skeletons found in Mohenjodaro. However this theory has been largely discredited as of now.

[5] It was actually Max Meuller (a German) who first propagated the Aryan Invasion theory. It found many takers in the British Colonial administration.

[6] The ‘No Aryan Invasion theory’ is certainly not accepted fact. It has many detractors especially since there is a similarity between North Indian languages and those in Europe. There is also commonality between the Zend Avesta of the Zoarastrians and the Rig Veda. The traditional view is that the Aryans while migrating from their Central Asian homelands also went to Iran and Europe and thus there is a common root. The believers in the No Aryan Invasion theory feel that it is equally possible that language and traditions originated in India and travelled westwards not the other way around. It is also possible that language and traditions can travel even without a physical migration of people.

[7] Astronomical code of the Rig Veda – Subhash Kak

[8] Romilla Thapar has said that after the collapse of the Indus Valley civilization, ‘the material culture shows no continuities’

[9] The Lost River – Michel Danino