Synopsis
The book reveals the mysteries of civilizations concealed in proper and personal names in ancient Indian texts. In a nutshell, using numerous examples of similar names and events, the author establishes that the geographical background and historical contexts of the ancient Indian texts such as the Rig and Atharva Vedas, Samhitas, Brahmanas, Puranas, and even the later two Epics were in the Ancient Near East. The proper names that often indicate the geographical regions are well connected with Asia, Greece, Mesopotamia, Egypt, Syria, and particularly, with the territory called Canaan. Canaan's location in between Mesopotamia and Egypt makes it possible to speculate the Near Eastern geographical background and historical context of the ancient Indian texts. Dr. Liny Srinivasan traces these connections with the help of historical linguistics tools such as systematic changes that may have taken place during history of languages like Sanskrit, Greek and hieroglyphic Egyptian. The toponymic names indicate some of the geographical regions that cover a large area from ancient Syria-Palestine to the coasts of Asia Minor, Egypt and even to Ethiopia. That makes it possible to think of the time of the Hyksos rule of an Empire extending from Egypt to Asia. The Rigveda authors may have been in Egypt during the rules of the Hyksos foreign kings of Egypt. The book will open up some different ways of explorations in history, language, archaeology, and culture. The scholars interested in culture and history of the entire region mentioned above will find the book exciting as this change in concepts has the potential not just to shed some light on the missing links in ancient Indian texts, it could also fill the gaps in the ancient Egyptian and Near Eastern history.
About the Author
Liny Srinivasan received a B.A. from the University of Calcutta, and a M.A. from the University of Poona, India. She then held the position of Lecturer in charge of the Dept. of Geography at Nistarini College, Purulia, India. Liny further received a M.A. from SUNY, Binghamton, NY and a Ph.D. from the University of Pittsburgh, PA, USA both in Geography. She was a Fulbright scholar for research on The Hindu Temples in Calcutta. Liny had the opportunity to associate with Dr. Cyrus H. Gordon and Dr. Constance W. Gordon for seven years. The time was spent for many lively discussions on ancient scriptures, languages and culture of both ancient India and the Near East. After her discovery of Near Eastern Origin of Desi i.e. non-Sanskrit words in major Indian languages, particularly in Bengali and publication of a joint article with Prof. Gordon in Mother Tongue, the Journal of ASLIP in 1995, she published twenty four articles in English and twenty in Bengali, including a book 'Mishor theke asa sabda' showing presence of massive number of Canaanite and Egyptian words in Bengali.
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