To understand the history and present position of India,
it is absolutely necessary to have some acquaintance with
the history of Central Asia. For from Central Asia
(known as Scythia, Tartary, or Turkestan in past times)
India has always been ruled in historic, and presumably
in prehistoric, times.
Some have supposed Bactria, or Balkh, to have been
the site of the Garden of Eden. In long past ages, the
Aryans are thought to have held an
the mountains of the Hindoo Kush.
invaded India, and their descendants form the military,
sacerdotal, and mercantile class of Hindoos in India to
this day. The Brahmin, the Rajpoot, and the Buniah
are the descendants of Aryans of Bactria. The lower
castes and the servile class are the descendants of the
people they subdued.
But the Aryan masters of India in their turn were
subdued from Central Asia in historic times. They were