Caste in India: The Facts and the System c7.s4.16

c7.s4.16

Through whatever evolution its use may later have passed, the word *varṇa* was therefore first employed to distinguish between two different and hostile peoples; it characterized the one by the relative whiteness, the other by the blackness of its skin. If the ‘Āryan Varṇas’ signify in later literature the three castes reputed to be of Āryan stock, the expression was originally used in the singular: the ‘Āryan Varṇa’ was the collective designation of the whole light-coloured race of invaders.