The Exile Effect

The Biblical narratives are very clear about certain events like the Exodus, the origin of the Israelites, and Joshua’s military conquest of Caanan. There was a PBS documentary – Bible’s Buried Secrets (1, 2) – which found no evidence of Exodus, no evidence of Joshua’s conquest and that the Israelites were not migrants from outside, but natives of Caanan. Now the focus on the origins of Israel has shifted from the Late Bronze and Iron ages to the Persian period. According to one paper, “The earlier assumption that Israel emerged as a social entity before the 6th century b.c.e. has been labeled a ‘myth’. ”
The earlier assumptions are now being questioned because the biblical narrative was not able to withstand examination by archaeological data.
According to the PBS documentary, the Hebrew Bible was formed during the Babylonian exile.

Israelites were reminded that they had broke the covenant with God and hence were incurring his wrath. Still this was not taken seriously till the time the Babylonians exiled the Caananites. It was during this exile that one of the scribes of that era, known as “P”, took all the previous revisions and created the present version of the Bible. The documentary suggests that the Abraham story was created then, by this scribe, to enforce the concept of the covenant. The scribe lived in
Babylon and Abraham was placed in the nearby Ur; Abraham’s goal was to reach the promised land, so was the dream of the exiles. [Bible’s Buried Secrets (2/2)]

Some people think of this period as the origin of Israel, but a new paper on the Persian origins makes it clear on what exactly happened after the exile.

Yahwism after the Exile experienced discontinuity of iconographic practices and matured as it consolidated its sacred literature.Stern (2001: 29) insists that “upon the return from exile, the Jews purified their worship. Jewish monotheism was at last consolidated.” This assumes that there were no iconographic representations of Yahweh
after the Babylonian deportation. The archaeological and textual evidence supports pentateuchal Yahwism as the official, normative religion that was practiced by the majority, even though there are some iconographic representations from the Persian period that require more detailed discussion. The Persian period seems to be the time when the prohibition on representation of Yahweh was particularly widespread. Pentateuchal Yahwism thrived and became the norm that would be followed by the world’s major religions: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. [The Persian Period and the Origins of Israel: Beyond the “Myths”]

Smithsonian on Indus Script

Ever since Rao et al. published that the Indus script showed the structure of a formal language, a new debate on the topic was initiated. There were some hostile reactions to this paper. Now, Smithsonian has published an article on the topic which presents the findings in a positive way.

After publishing the paper, Rao got a surprise. The question of which language family the script belongs to, it turns out, is a sensitive one: because of the Indus civilization’s age and significance, many contemporary groups in India would like to claim it as a direct ancestor. For instance, the Tamil-speaking Indians of the south would prefer to learn that the Indus script was a kind of proto-Dravidian, since Tamil is descended from proto-Dravidian. Hindi speakers in the north would rather it be an old form of Sanskrit, an ancestor of Hindi. Rao’s paper doesn’t conclude which language family the script belongs to, though it does note that the conditional entropy is similar to Old Tamil—causing some critics to summarily “accuse us of being Dravidian nationalists,” says Rao. “The ferocity of the accusations and attacks was completely unexpected.” [Can Computers Decipher a 5,000-Year-Old Language?]

A Talk on Indus People and their Script

In April 2009, “a team of Indian scientists reports in Friday’s issue of Science journal that the Indus script has a structured sign system showing features of a formal language.” One of the authors of that paper is giving a talk at IISc on June 9th at 10 am (e-mail from Ranjith).

NIAS LITERARY, ARTS AND HERITAGE FORUM
Cordially invites you to a lecture entitled
Indus People and their script
By
Prof. Mayank Vahia
Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai
On Tuesday, 9th June, 2009, at 10.00 am
in
J R D Tata Auditorium,
National Institute of Advanced Studies,
Indian Institute of Science Campus,
Bangalore 560 012

Abstract

Indus Valley Civilisation was the first truly urban civilisation with several cities with population of 20,000 people or more at its peak. It flourished in the Western part of the Indian Subcontinent from around 7000 BC to 1900 BC with a peak period of 2500 BC to 1900 BC when it went into a decline. The hallmark of this civilisation is the miniature seals on which they produced truly magnificent art work and wrote in small cryptic notes. Their writing has been enigmatic and since their first discovery some 130 years ago, it is still not clear if it is linguistic writing or not. Our recent work has shown that not only is the writing similar to linguistic writing but detailed structure of writing can be clearly seen. We will discuss the issue of Indus writing in the context of the Civilisation and our recent work.

About the speaker

Prof. Mayank Vahia is an astronomer at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai. After having spent 3 decades in space astronomy instrumentation, his recent interests in growth of astronomy in India has taken him to study various aspects of India’s history and prehistory with special emphasis on astronomy and intellectual growth of the Indian civilisation.

Hope some of you will be able to attend this talk and blog about it.

Appearance of Modern Human Behavior

“Modern humans have been around for at least 160,000 to 200,000 years but there is no archaeological evidence of any technology beyond basic stone tools until around 90,000 years ago. In Europe and western Asia this advanced technology and behaviour explodes around 45,000 years ago when humans arrive there, but doesn’t appear in eastern and southern Asia and Australia until much later, despite a human presence. In sub-Saharan Africa the situation is more complex. Many of the features of modern human behaviour — including the first abstract art — are found some 90,000 years ago but then seem to disappear around 65,000 years ago, before re-emerging some 40,000 years ago.[High Population Density Triggers Cultural Explosions]

So why did those cultural and technological explosions happen at those particular moments in time? Was it a boost in brain power or advance in language? It turns out that the answer is population density.

The research, which is published in the June 5 issue of the journal Science, suggests that tens of thousands of years ago, as human population density increased so did the transmission of ideas and skills. The result: the emergence of more and more clever innovations. [Party Animals: Early Human Culture Thrived in Crowds – Yahoo! News]

And

Using genetic estimates of population size in the past, the team went on to show that density was similar in sub-Saharan Africa, Europe and the Middle-East when modern behaviour first appeared in each of these regions. The paper also points to evidence that population density would have dropped for climatic reasons at the time when modern human behaviour temporarily disappeared in sub-Saharan Africa.[High Population Density Triggers Cultural Explosions]

Here is the original paper

The Poisons of Mithridates

(via Wikipedia)

During the reign of Hatshepsut (1479 to 1458 B.C.E.), one of the female Pharaoh’s of Egypt, a series of poisonings happened in Thebes. The queen had signed a peace agreement with Libyans and three scribes died during the ceremony. This was followed by the death of many others, which coincided with the escape of a known poisoner from prison. How Judge Amerotke, the Chief Judge from the Halls of Two Truths, solves the mystery is the story of P. C. Doherty’s excellent historical murder mystery – The Poisoner of Ptah
The author’s note at the end of the book has a section on known poisoners of the ancient world including the the most famous one — Mithridates VI of Pontus — who lived in the first century B.C.E. It is believed that he got his knowledge of poisons and antidotes from India, among other sources.
Mithridates VI who ruled the kingdom of Pontus from 119 to 63 B.C.E, was a contemporary of Julius Caesar, but he troubled Rome to no end. Between 89 B.C.E and 63 B.C.E, three Mithridatic wars were fought between Roman legions and Mithridates VI.
Though he was a brave warrior, Mithridates feared one thing: death by poisoning. So a team of doctors – Scythian shamans – always accompanied him. He also took preventive care by consuming a small amount of poisons with his food to give him immunity. This in fact resembles the plan that Chanakya devised for Chandragupta Maurya.
Even before Chanakya, preventive measures for poisoning was known in India. According to Manusmriti, a king was to eat food mixed with antidotes against poison. The king was also required to wear gems which destroy poison^[1]. Both Charaka and Susruta had written about antidotes; one called Mahagandhahasti had sixty ingredients^[2].
According to Chanakya those who are cruel, lazy and devoid of any affection for their relatives shall be recruited as poisoners. These poisoners were to spy on the indoor activities of officials by getting jobs, adopting a disguise or working as entertainers. But poisoners, probably those not working for the state, who harmed others were considered anti-social elements. Such poisoners were to be exiled^[3].
Chanakya also wrote about destroying an enemy army using poisons. A spy in the enemy camp, disguised as a wine seller, was allowed to poison the army. Chanakya discusses various strategies for this: first the poisoner was to distribute unadulterated wine, and when the army chiefs were drunk, given poisoned wine. Or cheap food could be sold to the aggressor with poison mixed or women could buy food from a merchant into a vessel which had poison, nag a bit about the high price and put the material back into the merchant’s ware^[3].
The king was to eat only freshly cooked food only after physicians and helpers had tested it for poisons. Chanakya gives a list of poisons and various effects and ways by which poisons could be identified in food. To prevent poisoning, entertainers were forbidden from using poisons in their shows. He noted that “a single assassin could achieve with weapons, fire or poison, more than a fully mobilized army.^[3]”
Mithridates was erudite and read many texts. Also Indian medicine was well known and admired in Rome and it is possible that Mithridates came to know these details from them^[2].
During those times people believed that there was a universal antidote — theriac — which could cure all poisons. To find this theriac, Mithridates experimented various concoctions;a painting by Robert Thorn shows Mithridates testing poisons on a prisoner. He finally came up with a mixture of fifty-four antidotes which was named mithridatium. The formula for this antidote was preserved by Pliny the Elder, Galen and Andromachus the Elder, the physician of Nero. Theriac was quite popular during even during the Middle ages till the 19th century, though it was not Mithridatic formula that was being used.
Mithridates’ last day on earth took an ironic turn when he wanted to die by poisoning and failed. Mithridates’ army was defeated by Pompey in 65 B.C.E, but the king escaped with this two daughters to his castle near the Bosphorous. As the Roman soldiers were closing in, he shared a vial of poison with his daughters, who died immediately. But Mithridates, who was conditioned by poison was unaffected. Finally he fell on the sword of one of his bodyguards and committed suicide^[3].
References:

Manusmriti translated by G. Buhler
Greek Fire, Poison Arrows and Scorpion Bombs by Adrienne Mayor (suggested by P.C. Doherty via e-mail)
Kautilya – The Arthashastra
University of California chronicle By University of California (1868-1952)

Hostile Reactions

In 2004, the Dover, Pennysylvania, school board decided to teach students an alternative to evolution called Intelligent Design.

Because Darwin’s Theory is a theory, it continues to be tested as new evidence is discovered. The Theory is not a fact. Gaps in the Theory exist for which there is no evidence. A theory is defined as a well-tested explanation that unifies a broad range of observations. Intelligent Design is an explanation of the origin of life that differs from Darwin’s view. The reference book, Of Pandas and People, is available for students who might be interested in gaining an understanding of what Intelligent Design actually involves.[Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District]

Promptly a law suit was filed and an opening witness at the trial was Kenneth Miller, a Brown University biologist and leading proponent of evolution. During the trial he had to face not just the lawyers, but the public as well. Lot of people expressed hostile reactions — via letters, via e-mails, via phone. He was told he would spend eternity in hell. He was told he was not respecting God. He was asked how he could be a Christian and believe Darwin — all from folks who read the book of Genesis literally^[1].

Such hostility exists not just between scientists and people who want to enforce their religious beliefs on others, but also between proponents of the Aryan migration/trickle down theory and non-believers. Anyone who opposes the external origins of Aryans can pick one of these labels: “Hindu fundamentalist”, “revisionist” or “fascist”. Any supporter of the external origins of Aryans is either a “colonialist-missionary” or one who harbors “racist-hegemonial” prejudices.^[2] Edwin Bryant’s The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture: The Indo-Aryan Migration Debate has a great collection of polemical reactions from both sides.

This is one of those debates where even tenured professors do what Jamal did to watch his favorite actor. Also this kind of language is common in Indian History mailing lists where proponents of various theories display juvenile behavior to much amusement. If you think, quite naively, that to demolish a theory you just to counter the interpretation of data, you are wrong. Not in this field. So when a recent paper on Indus script was published, it was countered with the statement (among other things) that the authors of the paper are Dravidian nationalists.

Before 2004, the Rao et al. paper would not have gathered any attention. (Of course the Indus system is a language script! Why are you discussing it?) But that year, Steve Farmer managed to persuade two others — one of whom, Michael Witzel, is a well-respected authority in the field — to add their names to his thesis that it is not a language. The resulting manuscript was absurdly and unprofessionally bombastic in its language, while containing essentially nothing convincing. Regardless of the work of Rao et al, their hypothesis would have died a natural death — but Rao et al do have Farmer et al to thank for enabling them to publish their work, with its obvious conclusions, in a prestigious journal like Science. Farmer et al are so rattled that they promptly post an incoherent, shrill, content-free, ad hominem rant on Farmer’s website. Sproat even shows up on my previous post, leaving a chain of comments that reveal that he has neither understood, nor cares to understand, the argument. [More Indus thoughts and links]

As Kenneth Miller writes in his book, finally bad science will fail. Intelligent Design was thrown out by the courts since the advocates could not present any peer-reviewed articles or evidence for intelligent design or proof of scientific research or testing. The Aryan Invasion Theory was discredited and discarded and now the Illiterate Harappan hypothesis is being questioned. No amount of polemics can stop that.
Now compare that to a response by Iravatham Mahadevan

References:

Only a Theory: Evolution and the Battle for America’s Soul by Kenneth Miller
A Survey of Hinduism by Klaus K. Klostermaier
The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture: The Indo-Aryan Migration Debate by Edwin Bryant

Chandragupta Maurya or Chandragupta?

Reader Kedar asked two questions recently

There is a huge gap between Mahabharata (3100 BCE, 2450 BCE, 1500 BCE) and the Mahajapadas. What happened there?
Who was the contemporary of Alexander of Macedonia? Chandragupta Maurya or the Guptas? Do Mahavira, Buddha and Adi Shankara belong to an earlier period?

We will look at (2) today and deal with (1) later.
At the International Conference on Indian History, Civilisation and Geopolitics 2009, Dr Subramanian Swamy gave the valdedictory speech on the need to defalsify Indian history. In this speech, Dr. Swamy stated that most dates related to Indian history – Rigveda, Mahabharata, Buddha, Asoka — are wrong. This happened because European historians identified Sandrocottus, mentioned by Megasthenes, as Chandragupta Maurya. This Sandrocottos was a contemporary of Alexander and from associated calculations, the date of Chandragupta Maurya’s coronation was found. Based on this point, Asoka’s corononation was calculated, so was the time of Buddha.
But according to Swamy, the correct dates are as follows

However, on the basis of these calculations we can say that Gupta Chandragupta was “Sandrocottus” c.327 B.C. His son, Samudragupta, was the great king who established a unified kingdom all over India, and obtained from the Cholas, Pandyas, and Cheras their recognition of him. He also had defeated Seleucus Nicator, while his father Chandragupta was king. On this calculation we can also place Prithu at 6777 B.C. and Lord Rama before that. Derivation of other dates without discussion may also be briefly mentioned here: Buddha’s Nirvana 1807 B.C., Maurya Chandragupta c. 1534 B.C., Harsha Vikramaditya (Parmar) c. 82 B.C.[Non-random-Thoughts: ‘De-falsify Indian history’ — Dr Subramanian Swamy]

Thus, a case is presented that Western historians distorted Indian history and it is our responsibility to correct it. So let us accept for a moment that Buddha lived in 1807 BCE. We don’t have archaeological evidence of the cities and kingdoms mentioned in Buddhist texts dating to that period.
If Rama lived in 6777 BCE, he belonged to the Neolithic age and would have fought with axe heads and chisels. This Rama would be vastly different from the one portrayed in Ramayana, like King David. The Tel Dan Stele mentions David’s existence, but archaeology has found that he would have been not a king, but a petty warlord of a small chiefdom with few settlements. So did this Neolothic Rama’s exploits survive as a mnemohistory, like how David’s lives in the Torah?
Whether due to colonial bias or not, we have certain dates and there is an effort to propose new ones. But these new ones have to take into consideration the social order of the time and also be backed up by archaeology.

Indus Script: A Formal Language

This picture shows a Harappan seal with five inscriptions or characters, which have been undeciphered. In fact there are many decipherments, but no scholarly consensus. One of the disputes is at a fundamental level: do these markings belong to a language or were the Harappans illiterate?
Finally, in a breaking news moment, we have an answer.

Now, a team of Indian scientists reports in Friday’s issue of Science journal that the Indus script has a structured sign system showing features of a formal language. Using mathematical and computational tools, researchers show that the script has well-defined signs, which begin and end texts, with strong correlations in the order in which the signs appear.[Scientists inch closer to cracking Indus Valley script – Home – livemint.com]

According to Asko Parpola, an expert on Indus seals

“It’s a useful paper,” said University of Helsinki archaeologist Asko Parpola, an authority on Indus scripts, “but it doesn’t really further our understanding of the script.”
Parpola said the primary obstacle confronting decipherers of fragmentary Indus scripts — the difficulty of testing their hypotheses — remains unchanged. [Artificial Intelligence Cracks 4,000-Year-Old Mystery | Wired Science from Wired.com]

Also

J. Mark Kenoyer, a linguist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, says Rao’s paper is worth publishing, but time will tell if the technique sheds light on the nature of Indus script.
“At present they are lumping more than 700 years of writing into one data set,” he says. “I am actually going to be working with them on the revised analysis, and we will see how similar or different it is from the current results.”[Scholars at odds over mysterious Indus script – life – 23 April 2009 – New Scientist]

Additional Reading:

Hatshepsut and Mistress of the Lioness

Thutmose III and Hatshepsut (via Wikipedia)

Recently the Public Radio Station in Boston had a one hour discussion on one of the rare female pharoah’s of Egypt — Hatshepsut (1479 to 1458 B.C.E.) — who ruled 150 years before Akhenaten, the monotheist pharoah. National Geographic had a cover story as well.

Though a woman, in one temple carving she is shown born as a boy. She would also walk in a striding pose, like males instead of keeping the legs close together, like other Egyptian women. Some statues depicted her with a beard. It was as if she was trying to convince the world that she was male. Her motivation for doing so is known.
Her mummy was discovered almost a century back, but remained unidentified. She was called KV60a.

KV60a had been cruising eternity without even the hospitality of a coffin, much less a retinue of figurines to perform royal chores. She had nothing to wear, either —no headdress, no jewelry, no gold sandals or gold toe and finger coverings, none of the treasures that had been provided the pharaoh Tutankhamun, who was a pip-squeak of a king compared with Hatshepsut.
And even with all the high-tech methods used to crack one of Egypt’s most notable missing person cases, if it had not been for the serendipitous discovery of a tooth, KV60a might still be lying alone in the dark, her royal name and status unacknowledged. [The King Herself]

Hatshepsut was not the first woman to rule Egypt, but she ruled more than all other women — for 21 years. She erected four granite obelisks at the temple of Karnak. This animation takes the viewer from eastern Karnak across the sacred lake to the shrine of Thutmose III, who would succeed Hatshepsut.

After her death, around 1458 B.C., her stepson went on to secure his destiny as one of the great pharaohs in Egyptian history. Thutmose III was a monument maker like his stepmother but also a warrior without peer, the so-called Napoleon of ancient Egypt. In a 19-year span he led 17 military campaigns in the Levant, including a victory against the Canaanites at Megiddo in present-day Israel that is still taught in military academies. He had a flock of wives, one of whom bore his successor, Amenhotep II. Thutmose III also found time to introduce the chicken to the Egyptian dinner table.
In the latter part of his life, when other men might be content to reminisce about bygone adventures, Thutmose III appears to have taken up another pastime. He decided to methodically wipe his stepmother, the king, out of history. [The King Herself]

While Egypt had other female Pharoah’s, it was believed that Caanan had only male rulers. But now a recently found plaque depicts an image of the first female “king” of the region.

The plaque itself depicts a figure dressed as royal male figures and deities once appeared in Egyptian and Canaanite art. The figure’s hairstyle, though, is womanly and its bent arms are holding lotus flowers — attributes given to women. This plaque, art historians suggest, may be an artistic representation of the “Mistress of the Lionesses,” a female Canaanite ruler who was known to have sent distress letters to the Pharaoh in Egypt reporting unrest and destruction in her kingdom. [Was A ‘Mistress Of The Lionesses’ A King In Ancient Canaan?]

This lady, a contemporary of Akhenaten, is displayed in male iconography as well. she is dressed as a male and archaeologists think she too ruled as a king.

See Also: Hatshepsut gallery in National Geographic, Digital Karnak: Animations from UCLA of the Karnak temple.

The origins of Crucifixion and Resurrection myth

In the early days of Christianity, the practice was to appropriate pagan practices and celebrations. The Roman emperor Constantine presided over the First Council of Nicaea and it was there that Dec 25 was picked as the birth date of Yeshua. During those times, two important pagan festivals were celebrated – the first one starting on Dec. 17 honored Saturn, a major Roman deity of agriculture and harvest and the second one starting on Dec 25, celebrated the birth of Mithras, the Persian god of light. Constantine combined both and we now have Christmas.[Dec 25, 326 CE | varnam]

Now it turns out that even the story of crucifixion and resurrection has a pagan connection. According to Valerie Tarico, “it is an historicized version of a very ancient myth from Mesopotamia.” In the Sumerian tradition it is called “The Descent of Inanna” and “The Descent of Ishtar” in the Babylonian version.

Let’s start with the first part of the myth. Inanna and Jesus both travel to a big city, where they are arrested by soldiers, put on trial, convicted, sentenced to death, stripped of their clothes, tortured, hung up on a stake, and die. And then, after 3 days, they are resurrected from the dead. Now there are, to be sure, a number of significant differences between the stories. For one thing, one story is about a goddess and the other is about a divine man. But this is a specific pattern, a mythic template. When you are dealing with the question of whether these things actually happened, you have to deal with the fact that there is a mythic template here. It doesn’t necessarily mean that there wasn’t a real person, Jesus, who was crucified, but rather that, if there was, the story about it is structured and embellished in accordance with a pattern that was very ancient and widespread.[Valerie Tarico: Ancient Sumerian Origins of the Easter Story]