Could Alexanders invasion of india be the Aryan Invasion?

[ALifetimeToWaitFor....]

Invasion of India


Coin commemorating Alexander's campaigns in India, struck in Babylon around 323 BC.
Obv: Alexander standing, being crowned by Nike, fully armed and holding Zeus' thunderbolt.
Rev: Greek rider, possibly Alexander, attacking an Indian battle-elephant, possibly during the battle against Porus.
With the death of Spitamenes and his marriage to Roxana (Roshanak in Bactrian) to cement his relations with his new Central Asian satrapies, in 326 BC Alexander was finally free to turn his attention to India (a term which referred to an area in Ancient Pakistan at the time of Alexander). Alexander invited all the chieftains of the former satrapy of Gandhara to come to him and submit to his authority. Ambhi, ruler of Taxila, whose kingdom extended from the Indus to the Hydaspes (Jhelum), complied. But the chieftains of some hilly clans including the Aspasios and Assakenois sections of the Kambojas (classical names), known in Indian texts as Ashvayanas and Ashvakayanas (names referring to their equestrian nature) refused to submit.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seleucid_Empire

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_the_great#Invasion_of_India

 

[Burchfam]

When Alexander arrived in India, he found a colony of Frisians settled in the Punjab who had been there over a thousand years. This is according to the Oera Linda Book.

 

[Ðanisty]

I'm not sure...I'd have to know more about the Aryan Invasion to really speculate. What I can say is that Alexander was not a ruthless barbarian. He was indeed a conqueror, but his methods were really progressive for the time. He attempted to unify all the lands he conquered. He adopted the Persian custom of prostration and even required his own Greek soldiers to participate which was essentially unheard of. He adopted customs from all the lands he conquered and he did so to try to unify everyone. By the time he reached India though, his men pretty much just wanted to go home and refused to go any further. That's why he turned around and went back (through the Gedrosian desert which nearly killed them all, Alexander included).

I can also say that Alexander earned a lot of respect from the lands he conquered. He took Darius's mother in after the battle at Gaugamela and treated her quite well. When he conquered a territory, he allowed the people in power to continue governing that land provided only that they acknowledge that he was king. He was pretty nice for a conqueror.

 

[kiwimac]

Note that the 'Aryan Invasion' is really the "Indo-Aryan Speaking Peoples" invasions. And most modern scholarship puts the first of those invasions around the time of the fall of the Harappan Culture in about 1500 BCE.

 

[Burchfam]

Note that the 'Aryan Invasion' is really the "Indo-Aryan Speaking Peoples" invasions. And most modern scholarship puts the first of those invasions around the time of the fall of the Harappan Culture in about 1500 BCE.

The Frisian settlement in the Punjab apparently took place in 1550 BC.

 

[arthra]

Well I always thought that this aryan invasion theory was based maybe on linquistics that Sanskrit, Zand and Greek were related and so.. So where was the homeland of the Aryans ...anywhere from Iran to Aryavarta or northern India... Alexander came later. Most dictionaries used to have a section called Indoaryan words that were believed to be the common or root words of an ancient aryan language...maybe so.

 

[kiwimac]

Yes,

Sanskrit, Old Avestan and Greek are related. The first two moreso than the last. Certainly the initial effect of the IASPS invasion was to knock India backwards from a settled agricultural community into one which was making the transition from nomadism to agriculturalism.

 

[Ody]

Note that the 'Aryan Invasion' is really the "Indo-Aryan Speaking Peoples" invasions. And most modern scholarship puts the first of those invasions around the time of the fall of the Harappan Culture in about 1500 BCE.

And it is believed to be the cause of the fall of Harappa