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Art and Culture of Tamilnadu
R. Nagaswamy
Appendix I
WILSON THE TRANSLATOR OF THE ṚG VEDIC HYMNS ON
VEDIC SOCIETY AND THE DASYUS
It has been a favourite notion with some eminent scholars that the Hindus, at the period of the composition of the Ṛg Vedic hymns, were a nomadic and pastoral people. This opinion seems to rest solely upon the frequent solicitations for food and for horses and cattle which are found in the hymns, and is unsupported by any more positive statements. That the Hindus were not nomads is evident from the repeated allusions to fixed dwellings, villages and towns; and we can scarcely suppose them to have been in this respect behind their barbarian enemies the overthrow of whose numerous cities is so often spoken of. A pastoral people they might have been to some extent; but they were, also, and perhaps, in a still greater degree, an agricultural people, as is evidenced by their supplications for abundant rain and for the fertility of the earth, and by the mention of agricultural products, particularly barley. They were a manufacturing people; for the art of weaving, the labours of the carpenter, and the fabrication of golden and of iron mail are alluded to; and, what is more remarkable they were a maritime and mercantile people.
Not only are the sūktas familiar with the ocean and its phenomena, but we have merchants described as pressing earnestly on board ship, for the sake of gain and we have a naval expedition against a foreign island or continent (dvīpa) frustrated by a shipwreck. They must, also, have made some advance in astronomical computation; as the adoption of an intercalary month, for the purpose of adjusting the solar and lunar years to each other, is made mention of Civilization must have, therefore, made considerable progress; and the Hindus must have Spread to the Sea coast, possibly along Sindhu or Indus, into Cutch and Gujarat, before they could have engaged in navigation and commerce. That they had extended themselves from a more northern site, or that they were a northorn race, is rendered probable from the peculiar expression used, on more than one occasion, in soliciting long life, when the worshipper asks for a hundred winters (himas); a boon not likely to have been desired by the natives of a warm climate. They appear, also to have been a fair complexioned people, at least, comparatively, and foriegn invaders of India; as it is said that Indra divided the fields among his white-complexioned friends, after destroying the indigenous barbarian races: for such, there can be little doubt, we are to understand by the expression Dasyu, which so often recurs, and which is often defined to signify one who not only does not perform religious rites, but attempts to disturb them, and harass their performers: the latter are the Āryas, the Ārya, or respectable, or Hindu, or Āryan race. Dasyu, in later language, signifies a thief, a robber and Ārya, a wealthy or respectable man: but the two terms are constantly used, in the text of the Veda, as contrasted with each other, and as expressions of religious and political antagonists; requiring, therefore, no violence of conjecture to identify the Dasyus with the indigenous tribes of India, refusing to adopt the ceremonial of the Āryas, a more civilized, but intensive, race, and availing them selves of every opportunity to assail them, to carry off their cattle, disturb their rites, and impede their progress-to little purpose, it should seem, as the Āryas commanded the aid of Indra, before whose thunderbolt the numerous cities, or hamlets, of the Dasyus were swept away.