We, the Indians, are still known as Indu people — People from the moist land…

When I had been to Taiwan I was instantly asked if I was an “Indu”. This was my first encounter with the word “Indu” in a foreign land. This brought to my mind that there is no wrong in it if we are being called Indian. It appears to me that at home we don’t call each other as Bengali, Tamil or Hindu…It is always the neighbors or outsiders who identify us with our ethnicity with certain name. They reach our ethnicity via our surname, language, native region name etc. So Indu came handy to me. Secondly, being a Bengali and living by the side of fields I also encountered many types of Indūra-Mouse in my early part of life, every one must have encountered likewise who lived by the fields. I will bring about how old these words like Indu and Indūra could be. This is a long awaited article which I had been pursuing for years. In some way or the other, I then believed that, the vedic land around Saraswati was known as Indu. But, why? This question has been persistently there on my mind, pressing hard to connect with the past for when did this happen and when did we lose it from our ethnographic memories. I found an interesting map on the net from the empire of the Moguls by H. Moll geographer which has remembered Indostan instead of Hindustan. This again strengthened my views on we being called Indu people.

The land of Soma-Indu

Normally we assign Indu to be White like camphor, white moon, numerical assignement to number 1 etc. Ṛg-veda consistently gives us Soma as Indu. The land of Soma has been interpreted by many scholars and researchers and there is no denying to it. I am tabulating and trying to understand the meaning of Indu (not soma) found in Ṛg-veda, for whether this paved way to the contemporary name India from Indu ( SE Asian memory) – Indae (Greek records).

Note that this page will be updated as and when new evidence pops-up. One can revisit this page to quench their thirst.

	Indu
Mandala-Sukta-Mantra	Sukta	Veda
03.040.004 08.013.016 06.041.001 01.016.006	इन्दवः— गीले–with (सुताः) उत्तमप्रकार से पाक आदि संस्कार से युक्त, सु॒तास॒  इन्द॑वः (सुतासः) हमारे सम्पादित=उपार्जित (इन्दवः) उत्तम-२ पदार्थ इन्द॑वः सु॒तास॑ : (सुतासः) उत्पन्न किये गये (इन्दवः) सोमलता आदि के जल  इन्द॑वः सु॒तासो॒ (इन्दवः) और सब पदार्थों को गीला करनेवाले रस हैं, (सुतासः) उत्पन्न किये हैं	Old New Old New
08.051.010	सु॑वा॒नास॒ इन्द॑वः	New
09.113.007, 008, 009, 010	इ॒न्दो॒ इति॑ । परि॑ । स्र॒व॒ ॥ (flow Indu, for Indra)	New
1st, 4rth, 7th, 9th (is dominated),	इ॒न्दो॒ इति॑ ( comes 103 times, and many a times with स्र॒व॒)	Old & New
2nd, 6th, 7th &10th	सरस्वति	Old & New
Later texts	Indusaa is referred to as Sindhu/Saraswati and Indujaa is referred for Narmada river	Other than Vedas
10.191.001 01.128.001	इ॒ळस्प॒दे – अतः (pada paatha–iḷaḥ ǀ pade ǀ–इडः-पदे समिध्यसे) पृथिव्याः “इडा पृथिवीनाम” [निघ० १।१] , इरा  f. (also इरा, AV. xv, 2, 3 ) (closely allied to इडा and इळा), ( it appears to me iryati, ilyati- the moving earth or the river morphodynamics which changes the habitable areas by the side of rivers- from इर्  cl. 6. P. इरति, to go ([cf. इल्]), Nir. ) was well known to Ṛgvedic people. This word इडः is definitely different from Ilāspada (इलास्पद)	New
1st, 8th, 9th	श॒र्य॒णाव॑ति॒ सोम॒मिन्द्र॑: पिबतु वृत्र॒हा । बलं॒ दधा॑न आ॒त्मनि॑ करि॒ष्यन्वी॒र्यं॑ म॒हदिन्द्रा॑येन्दो॒ परि॑ स्रव ॥RV 09.113.001 श॒र्य॒णाऽव॑ति (ब्रह्मरन्ध्ररूपे सरसि मध्ये। –ब्रह्मरन्ध्ररूप सरोवर के मध्य) शर्यण  m. pl. ‘thicket of reeds’, N. of a district in Kuru-kṣetra, Sāy.  on RV. viii, 6, 39.  शर्यणावति=विनाशवति।	New

We see a pattern that इन्दवः (plural) and इ॒न्दो॒ इति॑ (singular) appears almost in all the mandalas whether the old or in the new ones. Conspicuously, this word is absent in 5th mandala which is assigned to a new family book. It is quite assuring that the Aitereya Brahmana (of the Atris whom 5th mandala belongs) continued in parallel for a while with the advancement of new vedas—Yajur and Atharva which contains many information in regard to new additions of sukta in the 6th and 3rd mandala, as stated by Shrikant Talageri, “The Aitareya Brahmana, attached to the Ṛg-veda, testifies that 6 hymns in Book 3 were added to the collection later. These hymns, according to the Aitareya Brahmana (VI.18), are III.30-31, 34, 36, 38, 48.” To me also, right now, it appears that the book 5 is the new addition by the new family who took charge of completing the RgVeda’s 1st Mandala also. In future we will see the repercussions of the fifth Mandala without the name IndavaH and Saraswati. Keeping this information aside for a while, lets see the meaning of Indu

"इन्दु−लौकिक संस्कृत में यह केवल चन्द्रवाचक होता है, परन्तु वेद में सोम और सर्वपदार्थवाचक भी होता है। यहाँ यह विलक्षणता जाननी चाहिये कि परमदेव और पदार्थ के नाम एक ही धातु से बने हुए हैं। "इदि" धातु से इन्द्र और इन्दु दोनों शब्द बनते हैं।" This suggests that Indu stands for Soma as well as for omnipotent. Overall, lets see what lexicographers present us.

Lexicographers give away इन्दु  m. (√ उन्द्, Uṇ. i, 13 ; probably fr. इन्द् = √ उन्द्, ‘to drop’ [see p. 165, col. 3, and cf. इन्द्र]; perhaps connected with बिन्दु, which last is unknown in the Ṛg-veda, BRD. ), Ved. a drop (especially of Soma), Soma, RV. ; AV. ; VS. 

Westergaard Dhatupatha links:3.26
इन्द्  cl. 1. P. इन्दति, ऐन्दत्, इन्दाम्बभूव, इन्दितुम्, to be powerful; ‘to see’ [Goldst.]; perhaps = √ उन्द्, ‘to drop?’ (the meaning ‘to be powerful’ seems to be given by native lexicographers merely for the etymology of the word इन्द्र q.v.), Dhātup. iii, 26 ; Nir. ; Vop. [ here the western authorship appears to be very correct, The formation of the word “Indra” and its powerfulness might have corrupted the actual meaning of “ind” and which probably reminisced the meaning of उन्द् . उन्द् a or उद् cl. 7. P. उनत्ति (RV. v, 85, 4 ) : cl. 6. P. उन्दति (p. उन्दत्, RV. ii, 3, 2  : Impv. 3. pl. उन्दन्तु, AV. vi, 68, 1; 2 ) Ā.उन्दते (AV. v, 19, 4 ; उन्दां चकार, उन्दिष्यति &c., Dhātup. xxix, 20 ) “to flow or issue out”, spring (as water); to wet, bathe, RV. ; AV. ; ŚBr. ; KātyŚr. ; ĀśvGṛ. ; PārGṛ.  &c.: whether this is not suggesting trickling out of spring, moist land? Lets see if we find any hint from other word which is not Rgvedic but can be very old.

The Hint

Lets see the etymology of Indūra now which has a similar construct as of Indu.

इन्दूर  m. a rat, a mouse ([cf. उन्दुर, उन्दुरु]), L. I was thinking that why on earth would a Rat get undura name , Rat is also called undura, undūra which appears to come from the Root “und-√ उन्द्,,” which means to flow or issue out, spring (as water); to wet, bathe. Now lets see what rats like. Uda, udani and odati have come in Ṛg-veda as Rats are particularly attracted to moisture that’s near areas where they can get the other things they need. That means they look for water in dark, cramped areas where they can drink at their leisure. A build-up of moisture is a big attraction for rats, though it is commonly overlooked as a source of a rodent problem.

We see that there is a pattern that the Indavaḥ name which is present in almost all the mandalas but Saraswati is present only in 4 mandalas. Rest of the mandalas were definitely knowing Saraswati but it appears as or with a different connotation and name. Probably Indu or Indusaa. Also now it’s getting clear on why our land would have been called Land of Soma or Land of Indu and later why it metamorphosed into Hindu-Kush region. Let’s get deeper now into agri-culture in Ṛgveda. Since Indūra has to do or be present where the grain and fields are, lets see into the history of Indūra.

इन्दूर—Indū’ra’—’ra’—rattus—rodents

इन्दूर  m. a rat, a mouse ([cf. उन्दुर, उन्दुरु]), L. 

Dr. Premendra Priyadarshi writes,

1. Mus lived only in north India since 900,000 years back, (1) as a commensal of Homo erectus and later of Homo sapiens sapiens (Ferris, 1983)
2. Mus diverged into three principal species, viz. Mus musculus domesticus, M. musculus musculus and M. castaneus by 500,000 years back (Geraldis, 2008; Din, 1996), and all the species continued to live in India.(3) In India, Homo erectus lived then. When Homo sapiens sapiensinhabited India in about 100,000 ybp or earlier, these species became adapted to live in and around human dwellings (Boursot, 1993).(4) Mice probably felt safer there. 
3. “Mus dunni, a small mice, native of northeast India and Rattus nitidus, a native of Nepal, are ricefield pests of Indonesia. These all species originated in India. (10) Bandicoot-rat, Bandicota bengalensis, a noted rice-field pest in Indonesia originated in Mahanadi delta in association with buffalo.(11)”, and “Protracted commensality of Mus m. domesticus in India indicates that  Homo sapiens sapiens was doing ‘some primitive farming‘ or foraging and storing food since much before actual onset of Neolithic migration.” Indians of that era had possibly a settled life and home and they depended on cereal, fruit and tuber diet. Initially, population was small, and land abundant. Hence cultivation was not needed. Man used to harvest ripe grains (rice, barley, millets) from wild fields and store them. This stored food kept Mus domesticus tied to the Indian households. Pestering of human households by mice forced man to use more and more burnt clay pottery, and it must have prompted him to invent and use metal pottery much later in history.”

I agree with the observations of Dr. Premendra Priyadarshi as Premathilake et al has also noted about the wild Rice found from Sri Lanka in 47,000 yBP, which was then a part of India. The Savannah conditions during Pleistocene times were dominating throughout India till some portion of Sri-Lanka. This would mean that wild rice was available throughout pan India river sides and would have been haven for the variety of wild rice. We also find very interesting Araṇyānī sukta in Ṛg-veda which gives similar imagery as stated by Dr. Priyadarshi, “Initially, population was small, and land abundant. Hence the cultivation was not needed. Man used to harvest ripe grains (rice, barley, millets) from wild fields and store them.”….And wherever the storage appears there appear the Rodents. Mūṣa itself is mentioned in the Rg veda, the oldest name as Mus is conceived by the Latin as it is.

Indūra—Inhabitant of moist land and the connection with Araṇyānī sukta

With the help of the word Indu as a prefix in Indūra one would baffle why such prefix which means white would be attested to a domestic mouse which is usually black-gray in color. Only Indu + uras/ira ( उरस्–breast, chest= Himalayan Chestnut white-bellied rat?; The species is known to scatter-hoard seeds in forests of eastern Himalayas) makes sense. The proper etymology of Indūra is also lost in deep antiquity just like the word Indu( whether from Ind or und). Although a variety of colors including Albino is noted in The Heredity of Coat Color in Mice, Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and SciencesVol. 40, No. 2 (Jul., 1904), pp. 61-163 (103 pages), either with the belly and breast or with white tone/ the whole albino texture. In any case, the word Indu which also means snow white like Camphor makes absolute sense now, it was the case of much snowy Hindu Kush region and probably Hindu is the corrupted name of Indu.

• It gives us three idea about the word Indu :-
• Indūra comes from und- means moisture which is loved by the rodents.
• From a Himalayan species whose belly is camphor white.
• And Rattus belonging to the land of Indu- Soma begot its name Indūra due to the ancient place name Indu

All of them make sense for the name of rodent. I brought up this fact to show

• Deep antiquity and emergence of rodents from India.
• For a long time from deep antiquity Indu word may have been in use for the people of India by the outsiders

Do we have any ethnographic memory where people are known by their place names

There is an interesting fact which comes from one ethnic memories, i.e., “Undira Bi”¹. In certain parts of Ratnagiri district in Maharashtra a special festival in honor of the rats, the favorite conveyance of lord Ganesha is generally observed on Bhadrapada shuddha 5, called “Undira Bi“, the second day of the mouse. On this day food is offered to an image of the mouse along with an image of Ganapati. The food offerings made to the image are then taken to the fields next day and the crumbs are thrown in with the standing crops. It is believed that by doing this field mice will be appeased and not damage the standing crops. Ratnagiri area is dominated by Saraswat Brahmanas who had come from the region alongside of River Saraswati from distant past and remeber their place of origin by naming themselves as Saraswats. They brought the culture of names of people adhered to their homeland and thus we find Usgaonkar, Pabelkar, Dongaonkar, Kelkar surnames of people from the places Usgaon, Pabel, etc. Undira is the older version of Indūra and thus synonymical. It appears to me that Saraswats must be the first people who named Undira-mouse and gave us this word when they held their habitation by Saraswati river. Why I brought this to notice, it was to note how places get their names.

Saramā — Śuna — Śunāsira—Kṣetra— Agriculture —Undūra

I believe and dwell upon, that somewhere during 60,000 to 40,000 BCE as the lower limit, our archaic people began to cultivate in “small areas” along the riversides where flooding was bringing alluvial soils, but much of the paleo channels were lying vacant due to the split and shift of Yamuna towards east and since the intense cold season shrunk the width of the river also, this gave rise to the opportunity for seasonal cultivation, which in turn gave rise to rodents living by the side of moist land within the human habitation range. This may have continued till the good monsoon times when people started moving away from the dominating habitation alongside of rivers, since the replenished ponds and bigger lakes served them well for the whole year, and these were the times probably from 19,000-14000 BCE at the advent of Last Glacial Maximum, the time of calendrical reforms due to abrupt increase of cold and monsoons ( cf. Indra-Skanda dialogue in MBH), in the search of new land and opportunities. Now we get a clue to their keenest observation of flooding of rivers. They were minutely observing flooding of rivers. They had started mingling word Śuna with plough and star. But initially when? We have an interesting evidence of Sirius as a new year beginning in Egypt and they viewed this as flooding of the Nile from 3000 BCE which is still relevant what we had experienced in previous cycles of visibility of Sirus from 32deg N, either during 29000 BCE We already see the earliest evidence of wild rice, as of now, going till 47.8ka (Premathilake et al), thus later appears more appropriate where observation of Sirius from higher latitudes may have got connected with Irrigation and Agriculture.

I conjecture that Saramā was a wolf or very early form of a Dog. She is also called Deva-Śuni in the later commentaries. By observing the activities of dogs like digging etc the earliest humans may have learnt digging and toiling of earth thus when the stars, which got associated with the beginning of rains, were given the name Śunāsira. Now you would be wondering why I brought up Śunāsira. Naming a plough as Śunāsira itself make one feel to be present in deep antiquity. I brought up this to understand the pattern of river beds and rodents which gave away the word Indu for its people. Do we find evidence of Sarama, Śunāsira, undIra and kṣetra and their association with ‘plough’-‘early Agriculture’ and Irrigation of land via flooding? For more information what pattern do we find in Ṛg-veda, lets see.

शुना-सीर m. du. N. of two rural deities favourable to the growth of grain (prob. personifications of ‘share’ and ‘plough’; but identified by Yāska with Vāyu and Āditya, by others with Indra and Vāyu or Indra and Sūrya).

		स॒रमा॑
देवता :- इन्द्र:	04.016.008	अ॒पो यदद्रिं॑ पुरुहूत॒ दर्द॑रा॒विर्भु॑वत्स॒रमा॑ पू॒र्व्यं ते॑	स॒रमा॑
देवता :- विश्वेदेवा:	05.045.007 05.045.008	ऋ॒तं य॒ती स॒रमा॒ गा अ॑विन्द॒द्विश्वा॑नि स॒त्याङ्गि॑राश्चकार ॥( change of swara) उत्स॑ आसां पर॒मे स॒धस्थ॑ ऋ॒तस्य॑ प॒था स॒रमा॑ विद॒द्गाः ॥ (Shrikant Talageri doesn’t take 5th mandala as old one)	स॒रमा॒
		शु॒न—शुना॑सीरा
देवता :- शुनासीरौ	04.057.005 04.057.008	शुना॑सीरावि॒मां वाचं॑ जुषेथां॒ यद्दि॒वि च॒क्रथु॒: पय॑: । तेने॒मामुप॑ सिञ्चतम् ॥ शु॒नं न॒: फाला॒ वि कृ॑षन्तु॒ भूमिं॑ शु॒नं की॒नाशा॑ अ॒भि य॑न्तु वा॒हैः ।  शु॒नं प॒र्जन्यो॒ मधु॑ना॒ पयो॑भि॒: शुना॑सीरा शु॒नम॒स्मासु॑ धत्तम् ॥ [IV. 1-14, 16-29, 33-36, 38-47, 49, 51-54 (47 hymns, 456 verses). are old one, here Shrikant Talageri keeps 04.057 as new redacted sukta, which appears Okay since this sukta has Śuna, Śunasira. ] Agriculture is a later phenomena.	शु॒न शुना॑सीरा
		क्षेत्र॑स्य॒ पति॑
देवता :- क्षेत्रपतिः	04.057.001 04.057.002 04.057.003	क्षेत्र॑स्य॒ पति॑ना व॒यं हि॒तेने॑व जयामसि । गामश्वं॑ पोषयि॒त्न्वा स नो॑ मृळाती॒दृशे॑ ॥ क्षेत्र॑स्य पते॒ मधु॑मन्तमू॒र्मिं धे॒नुरि॑व॒ पयो॑ अ॒स्मासु॑ धुक्ष्व ।  क्षेत्र॑स्य॒ पति॒र्मधु॑मान्नो अ॒स्त्वरि॑ष्यन्तो॒ अन्वे॑नं चरेम ॥	क्षेत्र॑स्य॒ पति॑
देवता :- विश्वेदेवा:	10.066.013	क्षेत्र॑स्य॒ पतिं॒ प्रति॑वेशमीमहे॒ विश्वा॑न्दे॒वाँ अ॒मृताँ॒ अप्र॑युच्छतः ॥	क्षेत्र॑स्य॒ पतिं॒
देवता :- विश्वेदेवा:	07.035.010	शं न॑: प॒र्जन्यो॑ भवतु प्र॒जाभ्य॒: शं न॒: क्षेत्र॑स्य॒ पति॑रस्तु श॒म्भुः ॥ Old veda by Shrikant Talageri [ VII. 1-14, 18-30, 34-54, 56-58, 60-65, 67-73, 75-80, 82-93, 95, 97-100 (87 hymns, 641 verses), but this doesn’t appears correct to me that 35 is an old Sukta, it should be the new and redacted one, as Agriculture is a later phenomena	क्षेत्र॑स्य॒ पतिं॒
देवता :- पवमानः सोमः	09.091.006	शं न॒: क्षेत्र॑मु॒रु ज्योतीं॑षि सोम॒ ज्योङ्न॒: सूर्यं॑ दृ॒शये॑ रिरीहि ॥	क्षेत्र॑
		दु॒च्छुना॒ [ दुष्टा शुना दुच्छुना दुर्गतिः–times when the auspicious Śuna is unable to produce] Procyon and Sirius have moved away from Summer solstice point, when? MBH times? No, Lower limit 32,000 BCE. We already saw Ikṣvāku Bṛhadratha going back to 34,500 BCE and his presence is in 1st and 10th mandala. This is a sudden memory of Śuna-plough becoming inauspicious or unusable. Note that the word Śuna is employed for Dogs as well.
देवता :- अश्विनौ देवता :- अग्निः	01.116.021 01.189.005	निर॑हतं दु॒च्छुना॒ इन्द्र॑वन्ता पृथु॒श्रव॑सो वृषणा॒वरा॑तीः ॥ मा नो॑ अ॒ग्नेऽव॑ सृजो अ॒घाया॑वि॒ष्यवे॑ रि॒पवे॑ दु॒च्छुना॑यै ।	दु॒च्छुना॒
देवता – बृहस्पतिः देवता – इन्द्रस्त्वष्टा	02.23.06 02.32.02	बृह॑स्पते॒ यो नो॑ अ॒भि ह्वरो॑ द॒धे स्वा तं म॑र्मर्तु दु॒च्छुना॒ हर॑स्वती॥(swara change) मा नो॒ गुह्या॒ रिप॑ आ॒योरह॑न्दभ॒न्मा न॑ आ॒भ्यो री॑रधो दु॒च्छुना॑भ्यः।	दु॒च्छुना॒ , दु॒च्छुना॑भ्यः (swara change)
देवता :- दुदुम्भिः	06.047.030	अप॑ प्रोथ दुन्दुभे दु॒च्छुना॑ इ॒त इन्द्र॑स्य मु॒ष्टिर॑सि वी॒ळय॑स्व ॥ (redacted?) (doubtful to be in the earliest Mandala)	दुच्छुना ; दुर्गतिः
देवता :- विश्वेदेवा:	05.045.005	एतो॒ न्व१॒॑द्य सु॒ध्यो॒३॒॑ भवा॑म॒ प्र दु॒च्छुना॑ मिनवामा॒ वरी॑यः । (Śuna with Saramā in the same sukta, this mantra appears to be redacted single mantra)	दु॒च्छुना॑

definitions of Śuna, Śunaa

शुन  m. (prob. fr. √ शू or श्वि, and connected with शूर, शूष &c.) ‘the Auspicious one’, N. of Vāyu, Nir.

of Indra, ĀśvŚr.

शुनम्  ind. happily, auspiciously, for growth or prosperity, RV. ; AV.

(दु) शुना; आकारान्तोऽयं, शुना गतिः (टुओश्वि गतिवृद्ध्योः), दुष्टा शुना दुच्छुना दुर्गतिः। न तु ‘दुच्छ्वा’ इत्यस्य षष्ठ्यन्तं रूपं दुच्छुनामिति।

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Thus from the above study we arrive at an easy consensus that IndavaH was indeed wetter river beds appropriate for wild farming and harvesting. The earliest name Indusaa and Indujaa for the rivers do suggest so, ain’t it. We definitely were identified as Indu people and thus this appears in the ethnographic memories around the world. Is it not the time to come out of Indians being snake charmer notions alone and get into rodents as the carrier of Indu civilization across the world. World’s oldest farming can be found in India from around 16000 BCE this has been covered by Shri Anil Suri in Indiafacts.org. I will come back on clothing and Acheulian culture connection in Ṛg-veda. But for now, by default we are not called the Indu people but we belonged to the most rich moist land of Sapta Sapta Sindhavaḥ- the fan-pan of Saraswati. Since Indavaḥ is mentioned in almost all the mandalas the memory of Saraswati’s association with moistness changed into white and snow like which even prevailed in a Saraswati strotam written by Agastya– Remember “yaa kundendu tushaara haara dhavalaa…The word Indu remained in Kundendu. Am I just making stories….?

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Footnotes

[1] S. M. Michael, The Origin of the Ganapati Cult.