Prehistoric India to 1000 B.C. c14.37

c14.37

These opponents of the Aryan onslaught, the despicable enemy who dares deny Indra’s supremacy in heaven and on earth, are referred to as the dasyus or dāsas. They have black complexions, no noses to speak of (anāsa), they are ‘of unintelligible speech’ and above all they are infidels. They have no ‘rites’, they are ‘indifferent to the gods’, they ‘follow strange ordinances’, they do not perform the Aryan sacrifices, and they probably worship the phallus. But they are wealthy, with great stores of gold, they are formed into groups or states, and they live in fortified strongholds. Their names may refer to their eventual fate in Aryan eyes, and be related to the root of das, to lay waste: the dwellers in the waste land after conquest.