Kenneth A. R. Kennedy Quotes (1930-2014)

“How could one recognize an Aryan, living or dead, when the biological criteria for Aryanness are non-existent?”

“[Kennedy also notes the anthropological continuity between the Harappan population and that of the contemporaneous Gandhara (eastern Afghanistan) culture, which in an Aryan invasion scenario should be the Indo-Aryan settlement just prior to the Aryan invasion of India:] “Our multivariate approach does not define the biological identity of an ancient Aryan population, but it does indicate that the Indus Valley and Gandhara peoples shared a number of craniometric, odontometric and discrete traits that point to a high degree of biological affinity.””

“Did Aryans exist? This is a question posed by James Shaffer (1984b). He begins his analysis with a review of the idea of Aryans in both western and Indian sour­ces, but concentrates upon evaluation of the claims that the Aryan presence is to be found in the Harappan and/or PGW cultures. He finds several problems in the argument that the ancient Harappans were Aryans. Shaffer notes that the discovery of extensive nonceramic occupations associated with early domestica­tion of animals at Mehrgarh, Baluchistan, date to before 6000 B.C., thereby establishing the antiquity of human occupation of the Indus Valley region and giving strong support to the idea that civilisation arose indigenously in this part of the world. In short, no invasion of more highly endowed populations is called for.”

“The archaeologist who was most influential in this century on the ques­tion of Aryan origins was V. Gordon Childe, author o f The Aryans: a Study of Indo-European Origins, published in 1926. Childe was influenced by linguistic data in his effort to establish a homeland of the ancient people whose Indo-Euro­ pean languages formed a philological bond between his British countrymen and their colonial subjects in India. He was influenced, too, by the “Four Empires” concept which lent a mystical quality to the shift of civilisation from the Near East to northwestern Europe. Gustav Klemm's idea of creative and passive races appealed to Childe, the people of the Orient being characterised as stagnant and degenerate while Europeans were held to be superior in the qualities o f energy, inventiveness and independence. In his biography of Childe Bruce Trigger (1980) observes that national character rather than history and geography were held by Childe to be the causes o f these ethnic differences, prehistoric peoples being asc­ribed the same qualities as their living descendants. Thus racial identity could be discovered from a philological approach, and these data could be employed by the archaeologists to identify the races o f the people whose sites were excavated. Even while admitting that the early developments of agriculture, metallurgy and the sciences came from the speakers of the Semitic languages o f the N ear East, Childe held that when these inventions were adopted by Indo-European popula­tions they were brought to their highest development and into the realm of true civilisation. The Indo-European speakers achieved this not because o f superior intelligence or culture, but because o f the higher qualities of their language which was the hallmark of a more competent mentality.”