Origin and Genetics of the Dravidians

in India and many of the surrounding countries today ethnically speaking the majority of the population belongs to one of the many Indo Arion people groups the furthest eastern half of the indo-european family however to the south the people speak a highly divergent language family called your vidiian a term derived from ancient Sanskrit not known to be related to any other group in the world so far and although there is considerable overlap in the culture and heritage between davidians and indo-aryans south asians are well aware of many of the general societal differences between the two peoples which usually delineates the demarcation between north and south so is there such thing as the Dravidian race the answer as in most anthropological issues is far more complicated than people give it credit for who would like to think many anthropologists are split but almost no one in the professional field ever uses the term Dravidian race to describe this people group as it's not entirely accurate the Dravidians are an ethno-linguistic group and the same manner slabs or bantu or indeed the indo-aryans yet they have a very distinguished racial origin that have confounded Indian and Western scholars for years with conflicting oftentimes politically charged explanations the oldest known evidence to the origins of the Covidien family as a dialect point as Harappan spoken roughly five to six thousand years ago in Malaya or the Indus Valley Civilisation in modern India and Pakistan which if not a member of the Dravidian language family itself most likely diverged from it in the not-too-distant past and it's even been proposed they could have been further related to either elamite a language isolate formally located in southern Iran or possibly even Sumerian and Mesopotamia another language isolate although elamite has the most professional credibility though not entirely confirmed whatever the case it would appear that the ancestors of the Dravidians were descended from old Western Eurasians and intermarried with the original inhabitants of the subcontinent who could have belonged to a number of ethno-linguistic groups yet were physically and ethically distinct from Western or Eastern Eurasians a group dubbed as Australia Lloyd van wood or simply southern Eurasian the Australian oi type despite their surface level similarities to sub-saharan Africans are much more closely related genetically to Eastern Eurasians from whom they split off from a couple tens of thousands of years ago after their exit from Africa and because of genetic drift these groups are actually the most genetically disparate from Africans than all other races it only makes sense considering they were some of the first migrants to leave the continent mostly travelling along the coastline of the Indian Ocean settling in the Arabian Peninsula South Asia and the lost land masses of sunderland a large landmass that encompass Southeast Asia and Sahul a large island connecting Australia Tasmania and New Guinea so it would appear that the bulk of Dravidians even before the arrival of the indo-aryans in the north definitely had genetic connections to ancient Middle Easterners and haplogroups that are associated with the ancestral South Indian population are those that belong to the original Australian oyk population as well as those brought by the Dravidian migrants from their original homeland the most obvious example of indigenous South Asians predating any known migrations would have to be the Sri Lankan Vedas the Vedas of Sri Lanka are accepted to be members of the indigenous race of Sri Lanka even before the Dravidian Tamils are into Orient's and holly's and have a quite noteworthy appearance being the purest example of pre Western Eurasian migration at least to Sri Lanka being very similar to the Australian Aborigines and appearance with quite a large brow Ridge wide set nostrils and quite coarse hair although linguistically assimilated into the Sri Lankan society they formerly spoke a language distinct from the Dravidian into Orion or austroasiatic languages which has as of yet not been identified due to only fragments appearing in the veda language described as a mix of Sinhalese and their original mystery language horn Africans such as Kishida and Hebei Jie groups also have quite the distinct look having a large amount of admin from ancient and newer migrants from Eurasia and North Africa thus developing their own phenotype over thousands of years and some say that the Hebei sheis especially errant trans have a certain physical affinity to South Indians and are often mistaken as such if it wasn't further naturally curly hair they probably wouldn't even be considered the same races other sub-saharan Africans at all in mainstream vernacular which is why earlier anthropologists basing their observations mostly off skull shape and body type classified horn Africans Andrew vidiians under the Caucasian racial group albeit with heavy African and Australia admixture respectively additionally if you look at people a partial Aborigine poppin or Melanesian ancestry especially those of part European or Asian heritage as well it becomes very clear to see the origins of the subcontinent as they have a striking resemblance to South Asians which is suggestive of their origins as the fusing of the Bey's of western eastern and southern Eurasians now there is the question of whether there has always been phenotypic differences between the people of north and south India and that's certainly more difficult to answer and definitely more of a touchy subject however we can say without a doubt there would have been at least some degree of variation in genetics and appearance there at the region before the development of the two dominant cultures we see there today the Andaman is a southern eurasian group isolated for tens of thousands of years on the animais islands clearly have a different phenotype than the indigenous athlean of Malaysia's interior the new gritos of the Philippines were out of a sea tribes of India such as the karaage Rula and Chen Chu who have almost no admixture from Western Eurasia that would have been derived from the surrounding into orion intermediate populations and even these groups have varying appearance by tribe due to their relative isolation keep in mind that the Dravidian and indo-aryan languages have a large amount of shared vocabulary due to thousands of years of contact and there has been extensive intermarriage between these two people groups throughout their existence with the ethnic groups of Tamil Nadu and the Sri Lankan Tamils having the highest degree of original southern Eurasian admixture of the non adivasi Dravidian speaking groups do not only to their geographic position but various historic factors as well an even more radical proposition actually posits that Dravidians might have had a linguistic and minor genetic connection to the Korean and Japanese languages from ancient Indian migrants not really accepted by most mainstream linguists yet with a surprisingly high amount of support from Korean and Japanese historians and there's actually evidence of historical interactions between ancient Indians and these North East Asians dating back thousands of years although sometimes the issue of South Asian genetics and culture is simplified by myself in the past as well as simply North versus South I would revise that to divide the subcontinent into roughly three regions instead the south genetically split between mostly be much older indigenous population and other ancient migrants from the Middle East the Northwest who have the largest amount of genetic similarity to Southwest Asia and highest degree of step Eurasian ancestry from the indo-aryan migration and lastly the Northeast who have a lesser degree of Western Eurasian admixture than the former and far more Eastern Eurasian admixture than either group mentioned due to their proximity to the Orient there will always be exceptions however due to the complexity of inner regional migration social pressures such as the caste system and extensive intermixing over literally thousands of years as I mentioned in an earlier video South Asia is what Latin America would become in a couple thousand years where virtually everyone would be interconnected to a certain extent but there would still be genetic and cultural divisions when it comes to the modern Dravidians of today outside of southern India and northern Sri Lanka there are still indigenous pockets scattered throughout northeast India Bangladesh Nepal and even as far away as Pakistan and Afghanistan with debrie people bordering the bay Lucian passions however due to extensive intermixing this Dravidian speaking group is almost entirely assimilated into the neighboring people groups and many no longer consider themselves to be ethnically distinct the groups in southern India however are still very much live in vibrant with the four main languages spoken being kannada malayalam telugu and tamil I'll go a plethora of much smaller languages and ethnic groups do exist and as previously mentioned this generally defines the region of southern India although this is not without complications although the vast majority of travillian peoples are adherence to Hinduism with Dravidian customs clearly being very influential in the founding of the religion there are also considerable Christian and Muslim minorities interestingly the Christians of the malayali speaking state of Kerala actually predate Christianization of some parts of Europe by over a thousand years and are the result of serious speaking Orthodox Christians coming from the Middle East and settling in this region although their genetic impact was relatively small and the community only uses the Syriac language and religious ceremonies and there are an equally large number of Muslims in this region especially Kerala as well with many Dravidian speaking Muslims in both India and Sri Lanka claiming ancestry from the Middle East mostly Arabs or Persians although only making up around a quarter and fifth of Sri Lanka and Indians populations respectively a percentage which is dropping quickly in the latter due to lower birth rates worldwide Dravidians numbers some 300 million with a large diaspora outside their traditional region of settlement in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands Malaysia and Singapore South Africa the Mascarene archipelago and more recently the Gulf Arab states so in conclusion some people claim that the Dravidians in indo-aryans of South Asia are one people and from a cultural religious and historical standpoint a case can be made but in terms of genetics and appearance the region is much more of a spectrum than anywhere else on earth perhaps having phenotypes of just near any group imaginable although the Dravidians may be a minority in the region today they had an impact on just near every recognisable South Asian custom tradition and belief and were instrumental in the development in the modern nations we see there today so let me know your thoughts on the origins and development of India's most ancient surviving people and impact on the entirety of the subcontinent and beyond and for today's Paul tell me which Dravidian diaspora group is the most interesting to you and as always thank you all for watching this is Ben Mason and I'll see you next time

Channel: Masaman

Views: 723,247

Keywords: masaman, Origin of the Dravidians, Dravidians, Dravidian, Dravidian Languages, Dravidian People, South India, South Indian People, India, Indian History, South Indian History, South Indians, Genetics of India, History of India, Desi People, Dravidian Race, Tamil, Telugu, Kerala People, Malayali, Karnataka, Indian People, Indians, Indian Genetics, Origins of Dravidians, Indo-Aryans, Origin and Genetics of the Dravidians, Genetics of the Dravidians

Id: -Pru9nMTbc8

Length: 11min 18sec (678 seconds)

Published: Fri May 10 2019