ANTHROPOLOGY OF ASIA 50 



less affected by the newcomers (Dravidians, Aryans, 

 etc.), than one might think I 1 



With this reconstruction of ours is in accord what 

 Chanda has written of the people found by the Aryans 

 at the time of their descent into India : since it seems 

 that the Aryans really found themselves confronted by the 

 Veddaic people, the Dravidians remaining rather in the 

 second line. I draw the following facts from Chanda. 



The Dasyus, or N on- Aryans of Vedic India, are the 

 true Aborigenes r they are the fifth order of Vedic society, 

 namely the Nishadas, who are mentioned in the most 

 ancient literature and also afterwards in the Mahabharata 

 (XII, 59, 94-97) in the following terms : " The Nishadas, 

 that is, these malicious tribes living in the hills and 

 forests." But more important are the Puranic legends : 

 in the Bhagavata Purana (IV, 14, 44) the Nisadas are 

 described as " black as crows, very low in stature, with 

 short arms, having high cheek bones, low topped nose," etc. 

 In the Vishnu Purana (I. 13) the same Nisadas are 

 described as of " the complexion of a charred stake, with 

 flattened features and dwarfish stature." Evidently they 

 were too numerous to be made slaves en bloo and the 

 Aryans confined themselves to despise them and to 

 describe them unfavourably : in their description the 

 anthropologist discerns the protomorphic equatorial 

 characters : low stature, very dark pigmentation and 

 platyrrhiny. The present Bhils and Gonds who live in the 

 Vindhya hills against which was the Aryan struggle 

 often present such characters. 



1 This is in accord with what Biasutti writes (op. cit., p. 101), " The Veddaic 

 stratum, in form often much modified but always recognisable, has in this region a 

 habitat almost continuous." 



According to CHANDA (op. cit., p. 1, et seq.), it has been erroneously asserted 

 that the Sudras represented the aborigines while they are none other than slaves, 

 and they could also be Aryans, because in the Vedic period the Aryans fought 

 not only against the Dasas or Dasyus but also among themselves. 



