Origin and Historical Development
Around 1500 BC several waves of Aryan immigration took place in north west India. Many of the names of the Indo-Aryan deities (e.g. Agni, Indra, Varuna) are almost synonymous with deities in Persian, Greek and Roman mythology (see Proto-Indo-European religion). Through a slow process of hybridisation the Indo-Aryan deities were merged into the many local cults, a process that spread from the north west to the east and south of the subcontinent through the movement of "fortune-seekers, traders or teachers", and still continues today in some parts of India.
Read more about this topic: Hindu Deities
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