Editing Aryan race (section)

== Invention of the Aryan race ==
=== Racial association of the term Aryan ===
{{See also|Aryan}}
The term "[[Aryan]]" was originally used as an [[ethnocultural]] self-designative identity and epithet of "noble" by [[Indo-Iranians]] and the authors of the oldest known [[religious texts]] of ''[[Rig Veda]]'' and ''[[Avesta]]'' within the Indo-Iranian branch of Indo-European language family—Sanskrit and [[Iranian languages|Iranian]], who lived in [[History of India|ancient India]] and [[History of Iran|Iran]].{{sfn|Anthony|2007|pp=9–10}} Although the Sanskrit ā́rya- and Iranian *arya- descended from a form *ā̆rya-, it was only attested to the Indo-Iranian tribes.{{sfn|Fortson|2011|p=209}}{{sfn|Fortson|2011|p=22}} [[Benjamin W. Fortson IV|Benjamin W. Fortson]] states that there may have been no term for self-designation of Proto-Indo-Europeans, and no such [[morpheme]]s has survived.{{sfn|Fortson|2011|p=22}} [[J. P. Mallory]] et al. states although the term "Aryan" takes on an ethnic meaning attesting to Indo-Iranians, there is no grounds for ascribing this semantic use to the Proto-Indo-European reconstruction of lexicon ''*h₂eryós'' i.e. there is no evidence that the speakers of proto-language referred to themselves as "Aryans".<ref>{{cite book|publisher=[[Oxford University Press]]|title=The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Proto-Indo-European World|author1=[[J. P. Mallory]]|author2=[[Douglas Q. Adams]]|isbn=9780199296682|date=August 2006|url=https://global.oup.com/ukhe/product/the-oxford-introduction-to-proto-indo-european-and-the-proto-indo-european-world-9780199296682?cc=ca&lang=en&|chapter=Proto-Indo-European Society|page=266}}</ref> However, in the 19th century, it was proposed that ā́rya- was not only the tribal self-designation of Indo-Iranians, but self-designation of Proto-Indo-Europeans themselves, a theory rejected by modern scholarships.{{sfn|Fortson|2011|p=209}}{{sfn|Fortson|2011|p=22}} "Aryan" then came to be used by scholars of the 19th century to refer to Indo-Europeans.{{sfn|Fortson|2011|p=209}} The now-discredited and [[Historical revisionism#Chronological revisionism|chronologically reconstructed]] [[North European hypothesis]] was endorsed by such scholars who situated the PIE homeland in northern Europe,{{sfn|Fortson|2011|p=209}} which led to the association of "[[Proto-Indo-Europeans]]", originally a hypothesized linguistic population of [[Eurasia]]n PIE speakers, with a new, imagined biological category: "a tall, light-complexioned, blonde, blue-eyed race" - supposed [[phenotypic trait]]s of [[Nordic race]].<ref name="Villar91" />{{Sfn|Mallory|2015|p=268}}{{Sfn|Arvindsson|2006|p=43}}{{sfn|Anthony|2007|p=9}} The [[Anglicisation|anglicized]] term "Aryan" then developed into a purely racialist meaning implicating Nordic racial type.{{sfn|Anthony|2007|p=9}}{{sfn|Fortson|2011|p=209}} However, modern scholarship of Indo-European studies use "Aryan"  and "Indo-Aryan" in their original senses referring to Indo-Iranian and Indic branch of Indo-Europeans.{{sfn|Fortson|2011|p=209-210}}

Classification of human races based on the now-pseudoscientific study of phenotypical differences developed during the nineteenth century and evidence in support of such theories were sought from the study of language and reconstructions of language families.<ref name="cashmore97">{{cite book|publisher=[[Routledge]]|doi=10.4324/9780203437513|isbn=978-0203437513|first=Ellis|last=Cashmore|title=Dictionary of Race and Ethnic Relations|url=https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.4324/9780203437513/dictionary-race-ethnic-relations-professor-ellis-cashmore-ellis-cashmore|edition=4|year=1997|chapter=Language, race, and ethnicity|page=198|author-link=Ellis Cashmore}}</ref> Scholars of this era established the ethnological term "Aryan" as the race that had spoken the Proto-Indo-European language, and in this context, the term was often used as a synonym for "Indo-Europeans".<ref name="cashmore97" />

Scholars point out that, even in ancient times, the Aryan identity as asserted in the ''Rig Veda'' was [[Vedic period|cultural]], [[Historical Vedic religion|religious]], and [[Vedic Sanskrit|linguistic]], not racial; nor do the ''Vedas'' contemplate [[Racial hygiene|racial purity]].{{sfn|Bryant|2001|pp=60–63}}{{sfn|Anthony|2007|p=11}}{{sfn|Witzel|2008|p=21}} The Rig Veda affirms a [[Ritual purification|ritualistic barrier]]: an individual is considered Aryan if they [[Yajna|sacrifice]] to the right gods, which requires performing traditional prayer in the traditional language, and does not connote a racial barrier.{{sfn|Anthony|2007|p=11}} [[Michael Witzel]] states that term Aryan "does not mean a particular ''people'' or even a particular 'racial' group but all those who had joined the tribes speaking [[Vedic Sanskrit]] and adhering to their cultural norms (such as ritual, poetry, etc.)".{{sfn|Witzel|2008|p=21}} Scholars state that the historical Aryans, the [[Vedic period]] [[Bronze Age]] tribes who lived in [[Iran]], [[Ancient history of Afghanistan|Afghanistan]], and the northern [[Indian subcontinent]]—composers of the Rig Veda and Avesta—were unlikely to be blond or blue-eyed, contrary to the proponents of Aryanism and Nordicism.{{sfn|Anthony|2007|p=10}}{{sfn|Witzel|2008|pp=10–11}}

=== North Europe hypothesis and archaeological affirmation ===
The racial interpretation of ''Aryans'' stems from the now-discredited [[Culture-historical archaeology|culture-historical archaeology theory]] of [[Gustaf Kossinna]], who asserted a one-to-one correspondence between [[archaeological culture]] and [[Race (human categorization)|archaeological race]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://repository.uwtsd.ac.uk/id/eprint/1543/1/JK4.pdf|publisher=[[University of Wales]], Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies|year=2020|page=14|first=John T.|last=Koch|title=Celto-Germanic: Later Prehistory and Proto-Indo-European vocabulary in the North and West|access-date=6 April 2022|url-status=bot: unknown|archive-date=12 April 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220412005308/https://repository.uwtsd.ac.uk/id/eprint/1543/1/JK4.pdf}}</ref>{{sfn|Zvelebil|1995|pp=42–44}} According to Kossinna, the continuity of a "culture" exposits the continuity of a "race" which lived continuously in the same area, and the resemblance of a culture in a younger layer to a culture from an older layer indicates that the autochthonous [[tribe]] from the homeland had migrated.{{sfn|Arvindsson|2006|p=143}} Kossinna developed an ethnic paradigm in archaeology called [[settlement archaeology]] and practiced the nationalistic interpretation of German archaeology for the [[Third Reich]].{{sfn|Jones|1997|page=2}} The obsolete North European hypothesis was endorsed by Kossinna and [[Karl Penka]], including German nationalists, which was later used by the Nazis to condone their genocidal and racist state policies.<ref name="Villar91">{{cite book |last=Villar |first=Francisco |url=https://www.mulino.it/isbn/9788815127068 |title=Los Indoeuropeos y los origines de Europa: lenguaje e historia |publisher=Gredos |year=1991 |isbn=84-249-1471-6 |location=Madrid |pages=42–47 |language=es |author-link=Francisco Villar}}</ref>{{sfn|Zvelebil|1995|p=34}} Kossinna identified the [[Proto-Indo-Europeans]] with the [[Corded Ware culture]], and placed the [[Proto-Indo-European homeland]] in [[Schleswig-Holstein]].{{sfn|Arvindsson|2006|pp=142–143}} He argued a [[diffusionism|diffusionist]] model of culture, and emphasised the racial superiority of [[Germanic peoples]] over [[Roman people|Romans]] ([[Roman Empire]]) and [[French people|French]], whom he described as destroyers of culture as compared to Germanics.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Arnold |first1=Bettina |date=July–August 1992 |title=The Past as Propaganda: How Hitler's Archaeologists Distorted European Prehistory to Justify Racist and Territorial Goals |journal=[[Archaeology (magazine)|Archaeology]] |publisher=[[Archaeological Institute of America]] |pages=30–37 }}</ref> Kossinna's ideas have been heavily criticised for its inherent ambiguities in the method and advocacy for the ideology of a [[Master race|Germanic master race]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Veit |first=Ulrich |author-link=:de:Ulrich Veit |year=2012 |chapter=Kossinna, Gustaf |chapter-url=https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780199735785.001.0001/acref-9780199735785-e-0237 |editor-last=Silberman |editor-first=Neil Asher |editor-link=Neil Asher Silberman |title=The Oxford Companion To Archaeology |url=https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780199735785.001.0001/acref-9780199735785 |edition=2 |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |isbn=978-0199735785 }}</ref>

=== Earliest utilization of Aryan race ===
[[File:Meyers map ('Caucasian races').jpg|thumb|upright=1.0|A nineteenth-century edition of the [[Meyers Konversations-Lexikon]] shows the ''[[Caucasian race]]'' (in shades of grayish blue-green) as comprising ''Aryans'', ''[[Semitic race|Semites]]'', and ''[[Hamitic|Hamites]]''. ''Aryans'' are subdivided into ''European Aryans'' and ''Indo-Aryans'' (for those now called Indo-Iranians).<ref name="Lehner15">{{cite book|url=https://brill.com/view/book/edcoll/9789004292932/B9789004292932_005.xml|publisher=[[Brill Publishers]]|date=2015|isbn=978-9004292932|volume=4|title=Race and Racism in Modern East Asia|chapter=4 The 'Races' of East Asia in Nineteenth-Century European Encyclopedias|first=Georg|last=Lehner|doi=10.1163/9789004292932_005|pages=77–101}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.retrobibliothek.de/retrobib/seite.html?id=111177|website=The Retro Library|language=de|title=Meyers Konversationslexikon: Volume 11: Luzula – Nathanael|access-date=15 April 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210422170655/https://www.retrobibliothek.de/retrobib/seite.html?id=111177|archive-date=22 April 2021|url-status=live}}</ref>]]
[[Max Müller]] popularized the term Aryan in his writings on [[comparative linguistics]],<ref>{{cite web | title = Aryan | url = https://www.etymonline.com/word/Aryan | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20230208041034/https://www.etymonline.com/word/Aryan | archive-date = 8 February 2023 | url-status = live | website = [[Online Etymology Dictionary|Etymonline]] | access-date = 10 May 2023}}</ref> and is often identified as the first writer to mention an Aryan race in English.{{sfn|Bryant|2001|p=33}} He began the racial interpretation of the [[Vedic]] passages based upon his editing of the ''Rigveda'' from 1849 to 1874.{{sfn|Bryant|2001|p=60}} He postulated a small Aryan clan living on a high elevation in central Asia, speaking a proto-language ancestral to later Indo-European languages, which later branched off in two directions: one moved towards Europe and the other migrated to Iran, eventually splitting again with one group invading north-western India and conquering the dark-skinned ''[[dasa]]s'' of [[Scythians|Scythian origin]] who lived there.{{sfn|Thapar|1996|pp=5–6}} The northern Aryans of Europe became energetic and combative, and they invented the idea of a nation, while the southern Aryans of Iran and India were passive and meditative and focussed on religion and philosophy.{{sfn|Thapar|1996|p=5}}

Though he occasionally used the term "Aryan race" afterward, Müller later objected to the mixing of the linguistic and racial categories,<ref name="redner19" /> and was "deeply saddened by the fact that these classifications later came to be expressed in racist terms".<ref>{{cite book|title=Mapping Channels between Ganges and Rhein: German-Indian Cross-Cultural Relations|isbn=9781847185877|date=11 July 2008|first1=Jorg|last1=Esleber|first2=Christina|last2=Kraenzle|first3=Sukanya|last3=Kulkarni|publisher=[[Cambridge Scholars Publishing]]|url=https://www.cambridgescholars.com/product/9781847185877|page=62|quote=In later years, especially before his death, he was deeply saddened by the fact that these classifications later came to be expressed in racist terms}}</ref> In his 1888 lecture at [[Oxford]], he stated, "[the] science of Language and the science of Man cannot be kept too much asunder [...] it would be as wrong to speak of Aryan blood as of dolichocephalic grammar",<ref name="redner19">{{cite journal|journal=[[Thesis Eleven]]|publisher=[[SAGE Publications]]|volume=152|issue=1|doi=10.1177/0725513619850915|title=Dialectics of Classicism: The birth of Nazism from the spirit of Classicism|date=16 March 2019|first=Harry|last=Redner|page=22|s2cid=181387481 |url=https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0725513619850915}}</ref> and in his ''Biographies of Words and the Home of the Aryas'' (1888), he writes, "[the] ethnologist who speaks of Aryan race, Aryan blood, Aryan eyes, and hair, is a great sinner as a linguist [...]".<ref>{{cite book|url=https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-1-137-08450-7|publisher=[[Springer Publishing]]|editor=Jon R. Stone|year=2002|title=The Essential Max Müller On Language, Mythology, and Religion|isbn=978-1-137-08450-7|doi=10.1007/978-1-137-08450-7|page=18}}</ref>

European scholars of 19th century interpreted the Vedic passages as depicting battle between light-skinned [[Indo-Aryan migrations|Aryan migrants]] and dark-skinned indigenous tribes, but modern scholars reject this characterization of racial division as a misreading of the Sanskrit text,<ref name="west10" /> and indicate that the Rig Vedic opposition between ''ārya'' and ''dasyu'' is distinction between "disorder, chaos and dark side of human nature" contrasted with the concepts of "order, purity, goodness and light",<ref name="west10">{{cite book|title=Encyclopedia of the Peoples of Asia and Oceania|first=Barbara A.|last=West|page=182|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pCiNqFj3MQsC&pg=PA182|isbn=9781438119137|year=2010|publisher=Infobase }}</ref> and "[[Black-and-white dualism#Religion and mythology|dark and light worlds]]".<ref>{{cite book|title=The Indo-Aryan Controversy: Evidence and Inference in Indian History|publisher=[[Routledge]]|date=2004|first1=Edwin |last1=Bryant|first2=Laurie|last2=Patton|isbn=978-1135791025|page=8|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NDRRNGj17EMC}}</ref>{{sfn|Bryant|2001|pp=60–63}} In other contexts of the Vedic passages the dinstiction between ''ārya'' and ''dasyu'' refers to those who had adopted the [[Historical Vedic religion|Vedic religion]], speaking Vedic Sanskrit, and those who opposed it.{{sfn|Witzel|2008|p=21}}<ref>{{cite book|title=[[The History and Culture of the Indian People]]: The Vedic Age|volume=253|first1= Ramesh C.|last1=Majumdar|author-link=R. C. Majumdar|publisher=[[Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan]]|isbn=9788172764401|page=253}}</ref>

However, increasing number of Western writers of this era, especially among anthropologists and non-specialists influenced by Darwinist theories, contrasted ''Aryans'' as a "physical-genetic species" rather than an ethnolinguistic category.<ref>{{cite book|title=The occult roots of Nazism: the Ariosophists of Austria and Germany 1890–1935|first=Nicholas|last=Goodrick-Clarke|year=1985|publisher=Wellingborough Aquarian Press|author-link=Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke|url=https://ixtheo.de/Record/331828073|page=5|isbn=0850304024}}</ref>{{sfn|Arvindsson|2006|p=61}}

Encyclopedias and textbooks of historiography, ethnography, and anthropology from this era, such as [[Meyers Konversations-Lexikon]], [[Brockhaus Enzyklopädie]], [[Nordisk familjebok]], [[H. G. Wells]]'s ''[[A Short History of the World (H.G. Wells)|A Short History of the World]]'', [[John Clark Ridpath]]'s ''Great Races of Mankind'', and other works reinforced European racial constructions developed on now-pseudoscientific concepts such as [[Race (human categorization)#Early taxonomic models|racial taxonomy]], [[Social Darwinism]], and [[scientific racism]] to classify human races.<ref name="Lehner15" /><ref>{{cite journal | title = Becoming caucasian: Vicissitudes of whiteness in american politics and culture | journal = Global Studies in Culture and Power | date = 4 May 2010 | pages = 89–90 | doi = 10.1080/1070289X.2001.9962685 | url = https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1070289X.2001.9962685 | vauthors = Mattew J | volume = 8 | issue = 1| s2cid = 145003887 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book | title = Blacks and Blackness in European Art of the Long Nineteenth Century | isbn = 9781138310315 | edition = 1 | date = 5 July 2017 | publisher = [[Routledge]] | url = https://www.routledge.com/Blacks-and-Blackness-in-European-Art-of-the-Long-Nineteenth-Century/Childs-Libby/p/book/9781138310315 | page = 21}}</ref><ref>{{cite book | title = Nordicism and Modernity | isbn = 978-3-030-61210-8 | date = 28 November 2020 | publisher = [[Palgrave Macmillan]] | chapter = Introduction: Nordicism, Myth and Modernity | doi = 10.1007/978-3-030-61210-8_1 | vauthors = Gregers F | pages = 1–13 | s2cid = 229648042 | chapter-url = https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-61210-8_1}}</ref>

=== Theories of racial supremacy ===
The term ''Aryan'' was adopted by various [[racists|racist]] and [[antisemitic]] writers such as [[Joseph Arthur de Gobineau|Arthur de Gobineau]], [[Theodor Poesche]], [[Houston Chamberlain]], [[Paul Broca]], [[Karl Penka]] and [[Hans F. K. Günther|Hans Günther]] during the nineteenth century for the promotion of [[scientific racism]], spawning ideologies such as [[Nordicism]] and [[Aryanism]].{{Sfn|Mallory|2015|p=268}}{{Sfn|Arvindsson|2006|p=43}}{{sfn|Anthony|2007|p=9}}{{sfn|Kaufman|Sturtevant|2020|pp=57–58}} The connotation of the term ''Aryan'' was detached from its proper geographic and linguistic confinement as a [[Indo-Iranian languages|Indo-Iranian]] branch of [[Indo-European language family]] by this time.{{sfn|Anthony|2007|p=9}} The inequality of races and the notion of a "superior race" was universally accepted by the scholars of this era, therefore race was referred to "national character and national culture" beyond biological confinement.{{sfn|Santucci|2008|pp=40–41}}

In 1853, Arthur de Gobineau published ''[[An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races]]'', in which he originally identified the Aryan race as the white race,<ref>{{cite web|title=Aryan|url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/Aryan|publisher=[[Encyclopædia Britannica]]|access-date=24 April 2022}}</ref> and the only civilized one, and conceived cultural decline and [[miscegenation]] as intimately intertwined.{{sfn|Arvindsson|2006|p=45}} He argued that the Aryans represented a superior branch of humanity,<ref name="Orsucci">{{cite web|first=Andrea|last=Orsucci|url=http://www.unifi.it/riviste/cromohs/3_98/orsucci.html|url-status=dead|title=Ariani, Indo-Germanic, stirpi mediterranee: aspetti del dibattito sulle razze europee (1870–1914)|language=it|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20020310125529/http://www.unifi.it/riviste/cromohs/3_98/orsucci.html|archive-date=10 March 2002|publisher= Cromohs Journal, [[University of Florence]]|date=2002-03-10}}</ref> and attempted to identify the races of Europe as Aryan and associated them with the sons of [[Noah]], emphasizing superiority, and categorized non-Aryan as an intrusion of the [[Semitic people|Semitic race]].{{sfn|Thapar|1996|p=5}} According to him, northern Europeans had migrated across the world and founded the major civilizations, before being diluted through racial mixing with indigenous populations described as racially inferior, leading to the progressive decay of the ancient Aryan civilizations.{{sfn|Arvindsson|2006|pp=13–50}}{{sfn|Arvindsson|2006|p=45}}

In 1878, German American anthropologist [[Theodor Poesche]] published a survey of historical references attempting to demonstrate that the Aryans were light-skinned blue-eyed blonds.{{Sfn|Mallory|2015|p=268}}

In 1899, [[Houston Stewart Chamberlain]] published what is described as "one of the most important proto-Nazi texts", ''[[The Foundations of the Nineteenth Century]]'', in which he theorized an existential struggle to the death between a superior German-Aryan race and a destructive [[Semitic people|Jewish-Semitic]] race.{{sfn|Arvindsson|2006|p=155}}

In 1916, [[Madison Grant]] published ''[[The Passing of the Great Race]]'', a polemic against interbreeding between "Aryan" Americans, the original [[Thirteen Colonies]] settlers of British-Scots-Irish-German origin, with immigrant "inferior races", which according to him were, [[Polish people|Poles]], [[Czechs]], Jews, and [[Italians]].{{sfn|Anthony|2007|p=9}} The book was a best-seller at the time.{{sfn|Anthony|2007|p=9}}

While the Aryan race theory remained popular, particularly in [[Germany]], some authors opposed it, in particular [[Otto Schrader (philologist)|Otto Schrader]], [[Rudolph von Jhering]] and the ethnologist [[Robert Hartmann (naturalist)|Robert Hartmann]], who proposed to ban the notion of Aryan from anthropology.<ref name=Orsucci/> The term was also adopted by various [[occultist]]s and [[Western esotericism|esoteric ideological systems]] of this era, such as [[Helena Blavatsky]],{{sfn|Goodrick-Clarke|1992|pp=20–21}} and [[Ariosophy]].{{sfn|Goodrick-Clarke|1992|pp=227}}