are south east asians partially indian?

I have highlighted certain notable points for your ease.

The first colonists would thus have needed boats to cross some narrow seas in order to settle this land. But since their ancestors would have required similar craft to cross Bab el Mandeb, no technological improvement would have been required for them to do so.

Dr Pugach, however, also discovered something else. There is a pattern of SNPs in aboriginal Australians that is not found in people from New Guinea or the Philippines. But it is found in some Indians—particularly from the southern part of the subcontinent. That discovery both meshes with the Y-chromosome data and enriches it, because the pattern of the SNP data meant that she and her colleagues could calculate when the Indian genes (and thus the Indians who carried them) arrived in Australia.

The answer is 141 generations ago. Allowing 30 years a generation, that yields a date of 2217BC. Obviously, this is not a precise date. But it is probably good to within a century or two. And that is interesting for two reasons. One is that the 23rd century BC is slap-bang in the middle of the period when Indian civilisation was emerging. The other is that it coincides with a shift in both the culture of Australia and the composition of the continent’s wildlife.

The bronze-age Indus valley civilisation, which reached its peak of development between 2600BC and 1900BC, is less well-known to outsiders than its contemporaries in China and the Middle East, partly because no one has managed to translate its written records. But it was no less successful, and it led—just as those two other areas did—to an urban culture that resonates today.

One technology it managed to develop was seaworthy ships, rather than mere boats, and Indus valley states used them to trade with their Middle Eastern neighbours. Such ships could have provided the means to get to Australia, either deliberately or by accident, for by then the sea had risen close to its modern level.

The shift in Australian life came in three ways that can be seen today. One was that tools changed. It was not a case of metalworking being introduced, so an organised expedition of settlers from one of the Indus valley states can probably be ruled out. Rather, aboriginal culture, which had hitherto depended on the large and relatively crude stone tools of the palaeolithic, suddenly started using the smaller and finer ones of the neolithic. Whether the new arrivals did not know how to work metal, or merely lacked the equipment or sources of ore to do so, remains to be established.

The second shift was gastronomic. Sadly, the archaeological record has yet to reveal tandoori ovens or fossilised chapatis in Australia. But it does show changes at this time in the ways that cycad nuts—an important crop that Australians had long cultivated by the “fire-stick” method of burning vegetation that competes with the trees that bear them—were processed. Such nuts contain toxins. After about 2000BC several methods for removing these toxins, such as leaching them out with water and fermenting them away, spread through Australia. To this day, cycad nuts are familiar food in Kerala, in southern India. There, they are detoxified by being dried in the sun or by the fireside.

The third thing that arrived in Australia at this time was the dingo. The origin of these wild dogs, which are believed to have outcompeted and exterminated the native thylacine (also known as the Tasmanian tiger, because it lingered into modern times on that dingo-free island), has always been obscure, though their resemblance to certain breeds found in India is well known. Dr Pugach’s discovery suggests they may have come directly, on board ship. However, the existence of similar dogs in New Guinea and parts of South-East Asia complicates that explanation.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-21016700

http://www.economist.com/news/science-and-technology/21569688-genetic-evidence-suggests-four-millennia-ago-group-adventurous-indians


Edited by SuryaVajra - 08-Jun-2013 at 13:44

A recent study has shown a major Genetic input to the aboriginal population of Australia from India around 2000 BC---around the time the Indus Saraswathy Civilization collapsed and Vedic people (Mittani and Hitties) started appearing in the middle east.

That means Indian ships reached Australia back then. Which is not surprising as India was propably the only country then with that kind of a naval capability. Remember, they had the worlds first naval dock built of 1 million bricks and maintained colonies in Dilmun , Magan etc 

The relevance of this to the present discussion is that the study also showed that the Dingo was introduced into Australia along with tools and agriculture technology by these immigrants.

Now, it is known however that the Dingo is more closely related to South East asian wild Dog populations than to the Indian wild dog which is not possible had these migrants not been to SE Asia.And if they reached down under, they must also have reached SE Asia easily

Also Brahmi inscriptions have been found in Indonesia as early as 300 BC. So the cultural conntacts are very old.

So its not surprising that there may be a small genetic input in Isolated pockets, but not prominent enough to figure in  many papers I ran through


Lothal Naval dock 2800--1900 BC

Dark skin was probably an adaptation for the climate. Most of the people have lived there for millenia and have large later Chinese migrations (Thailand and Vietnam) and small bits of Indian migrations.

Originally posted by oxydracae No doubt.. South East Asia was a part of Greater India..

It depends on the region. The Pathans have light skin like Europeans, many low-caste Indians have black skin and curly hair, and there are Indians living near the Himalayas who look similar to Chinese

^ and yeah their clothing is also very similar

Originally posted by pdtoler By Indian, do you mean South Asian or Native American?

south asian, since the area is pretty close to India anyways

By Indian, do you mean South Asian or Native American?