Indo-Aryan Migration

Models of the Indo-Aryan migration discuss scenarios of prehistoric migrations of the proto-Indo-Aryans to their historically attested areas of settlement in the northwest of the Indian subcontinent. Claims of Indo-Aryan migration are drawn from linguistic, genetic and even archaeological sources, as well as from a multitude of data stemming from Vedic religion, rituals, poetics as well as some aspects of social organization and chariot technology. According to Shaffer, archaeological evidence for a mass population movement, or an invasion of South Asia in the pre- or proto- historic periods, has not been found. At best, there is evidence of small-scale migrations approaching South Asia.

Indo-Aryan language derives from an earlier Proto-Indo-Iranian stage, usually identified with the Bronze Age Sintashta and Andronovo culture north-east of the Caspian Sea. Migration of Proto-Indo-Iranian speakers to and within Northwestern parts of South Asia is consequently presumed to have taken place in the Middle to Late Bronze Age, contemporary to the Late Harappan phase (ca. 1700 to 1300 BCE). Linguistics has been the primary basis of Aryan Immigration theories; no evidence of massive migration has been found through examination of skeletal remains. The ancient Harappans were not markedly different from modern populations in Northwestern India and present-day Pakistan. Craniometric data showed similarity with prehistoric peoples of the Iranian plateau and Western Asia, although Mohenjodaro was distinct from the other areas of the Indus Valley.