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80
AN EARLY HISTORY OF ORISSA
Secondly, the harpoons, another outstanding type in the copper hoards, have a resemblance to certain tools depicted in the cave-paintings of Mirzapnr in Uttara Pradesh. If these similarities have any significance, it would appear that the authors of the copper hoards were once associated with the areas just stated. At present, these tracts are known to be chiefly occupied by the Mundas, Santhalas and other tribes belonging to the Proto-Austroloid group of the Indian population. Can it then be said that the ancestors of these tribes were responsible for the copper hoards ?
The archaeological evidence available at present is indeed too meagre to answer the question, but literary evidence may be of some interest here. The Velic Aryans, on reaching the plains of northern India, encountered certain aboriginal tribes whom they called the Nish das and described them as having a dark complexion, short stature and flat nose (anās). Since, more or less the same physical features characterize the proto-Austroloid tribes, the question posed above should appear to gain support from the Vedic literature itself. But looking to the cultural equipment of these tribes at the present day, one wonders if their ancestors were capable of producing the highly-evolved implements some 3000 years ago. Such an objection, however, is subjective rather than objective, and may lose its force when it is recalled that the mighty cities of Harappa and Mohenjo-daro were never reproduced by the cultural heirs of that civilization.
1. Macdonell & Keith --Vedic Index, London, 1912, Vol. I,
pp. 453.4 ; R. Chanda-The Indo Aryan Raees, Rajashahi, 1916, Vol. I, pp. 4-11 ; These references would make it clear that the Nishidas were too powerful to be enslaved or expelled en masse. The aryans were compelled to meet them half way.
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