Shudras in Ancient India: A Social History of the Lower Order down to circa A.D. 600 c8.286

c8.286

The next question is whether the Śūdras were an Āryan or pre-Āryan tribe, and if Āryan, when did they come to India? Contradictory views have been expressed on the ethnological classification of the Śūdra tribe. Formerly it was maintained that the Śūdras were an earlier wave of Āryans;⁸ later it came to be held that they were a stem of the pre-Āryan peoples.¹ No evidence has been adduced in support of either view, but in the light of the available data one may be inclined to think that the Śūdra tribe had some affinity with the Āryans. It is interesting to note that they are always bracketed with the Ābhīras,² who spoke an Āryan dialect called Ābhīrī.³ The fact that the people of the śūdra class could understand the Āryan speech in the period of the Brāhmaṇas also may suggest, though remotely, that the Śūdra tribe was acquainted with the Āryan language. Further, the Śūdras are never mentioned in lists of the pre-Āryan peoples, such as Draviḍas, Pulindas, Śabaras etc. They are always located in the north-west,⁴ which, in later times, was an area mainly occupied by the Āryans.⁵ The Ābhīras and the Śūdras were settled near the Sarasvatī.⁶ It is stated that, because of her hostility towards them, the Sarasvatī vanished into the desert.⁷ These references are significant, for along with the Dṛṣadvatī the Sarasvatī marked one of the boundaries of the region known as Ārya-deśa.