ABSTRACT
THE great river systems of Northern India determined the course of Aryan conquests j when we survey the course of these rivers, we comprehend the history of Aryan conquests during ten centuries. And when we have traced the course of the Indus and its tributaries, and of the Ganges and the Jumna as far as Benares and North Behar, we have seen the whole extent of IndoAryan world as it existed at the close of the Epic Period, or about 1000 B.C. Beyond this wide tract of Hindu kingdoms lay the whole extent of India yet unexplored or rather unconquered by the Aryans, and peopled by various aboriginal tribes. A wide belt of this Non-..Aryan tract, surrounding the Hindu world to the east, south, and west, was becoming known to the Hindus about the very close of the Epic Period. South Behar, Malwa, and a portion of the Deccan and the regions to the south of the Rajputana desert, formed a wide semicircular belt of country, as yet not Hinduised, but becoming gradually known to the Hindus, and therefore finding occasional mention in the latest works of the Brahmana literature, as regions peopled by Satuas, i.e., living creatures, hardly human beings We can imagine hardy colonists penetrating into this encircling belt of unknown and uncivilised regions, obtaining a mastery over the aborigines wherever they went, establishing some isolated settlements on the banks of fertile rivers, and presenting to the astonished barbarians some of the results
of civilised administration and civilised life. We can imagine also saintly anchorites retiring into these wild jungles, and fringing the tops of hills or fertile valleys with their l.oly hermitages, which were the seats of learning and of sanctity, AndIastly, adventurous royal huntsmen not unoften penetrated into these jungles: and unhappy princes, exiled by their more powerful rivals, often chose to retire rrom the world and took up their abodes in these solitudes.. In such manner was the belt of Non-Aryan country gradually known to the Hindus, and we will cite a passage or two which will show ho.w far this knowledge extended, and how the civilised Hindus named the different aboriginal tribes. dwelling in this tract, probably in the eleventh century B.C.
