that though society was or aimed at being Aryan, its religion is older than that of the so-called Aryan invasion. The god of the Rigvedic Indo-Europeans is Indra, the thunder god, who fills in later developments an entirely minor role, apparently being absorbed into the Hindu pantheon, just as the minor gods of primitive tribes have been, retaining, however, his personal identity by virtue of a social prestige or privilege which other tribal gods have lost in the process of assimilation. The historical Hindu religion first appears not in the Punjab, which must be regarded as the area most completely occupied by the Indo-European invaders, but to the east of it in the Brahmarshidesha, where stable fusion between these Indo-European invaders and the previous inhabitants probably took place. When alien cultures and religions fuse to form a new culture or religion, it will not be found that this fusion takes place where the intrusive culture is strong enough to predominate. It will rather appear, away from the centre where the intrusion is strongest, in some area where the previous culture was strong enough to resist complete suppression and make its influence felt on the new one. . . . This appears to have been the case in India, where the important position of Shiva, Vishnu, and Kali, as compared to the unimportant one which Indra now holds, signalizes the triumph of the older gods. The religious history of pre-vedic India was probably similar and parallel to that of the eastern Mediterranean and of Asia Minor. Professor Tucci points out9 that though the moon does not appear to have been an independent divinity, ancient lunar cults have been assimilated by Devi in the forms of Durga, Kali and Tripurasundari. The cult of snakes, and the worship of a mother goddess, were probably brought in by earlier invaders of Mediterranean or of Armenoid race, speaking no doubt a Dravidian language, whose religion must also be associated with fertility cults, phallic symbolism, the deva-dasi cult, and probably human sacrifice. Recent discoveries in Crete have revealed a remarkable snake cult associated with the symbol of the double axe. With Mesopotamia, too, we must perhaps associate a moon god and sun goddess, whose sex was changed with a change from matrilineal to patrilineal descent perhaps under the influence of the Rigvedic invaders. It is worth pointing out that the deification and worship of kings, very typical of the Hindu attitude to kingship, is stated by Langdon10 to be characteristic of Sumerian religion in contrast to Semitic. It would also appear not characteristic of the religion of the Rigveda, but on the contrary to be connected ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 9In a note on 'Traces of Lunar Cult in India' in Rivista degli Studi Orientals Vol. XII (1930), fasc. IV, quoted in The Indian Antianary for January 1932, p. 17. 10 J.R.A.S., 1931, p. 367. |