Question

Describe about vedic civilization

Answer 1

The Vedic Period or the Vedic Age refers to that time period when the Vedic Sanskrit texts were composed in India. The society that emerged during that time is known as the Vedic Period, or the Vedic Age, Civilization. The Vedic Civilization flourished between the 1500 BC and 500 BC on the Indo-Gangetic Plains of the Indian subcontinent. This civilization laid down the foundation of Hinduism as well as the associated Indian culture. The Vedic Age was followed by the golden age of Hinduism and classical Sanskrit literature, the Maurya Empire and the Middle Kingdoms of India.


Vedic Texts
Linguistically, the texts belonging to the Hindu Vedic Civilisation can be classified into the following five chronological branches:

Rigvedic:

The oldest text of the Vedic Period, Rig Veda has many elements that are common with the Indo-Iranian texts, both in language and in content. One cannot find such similarity in any other Vedic text. It is believed that the compilation of the Rig Veda had stretched over a number of centuries.

Mantra Language:

The period of the Mantra Language includes the time of the compilation of the mantra and prose language of the Atharvaveda (Paippalada and Shaunakiya), the Rigveda Khilani, the Samaveda Samhita and the mantras of the Yajurveda.

Samhita Prose:

The period of Samhita Prose represents the compilation and codification of a Vedic canon. The linguistic changes of this time include the complete loss of the injunctive, the subjunctive and the aorist.


Brahmana Prose:

This period signifies Brahmanas proper of the four Vedas, along with the oldest Upanishads.

Answer 2

Vedic period
The Vedic period, or Vedic age (c. 1500 – c. 500 BCE), is the period in the history of the northwestern Indian subcontinent between the end of the urban Indus Valley Civilisation and a second urbanisation in the central Gangetic Plain which began in c. 600 BCE. It gets its name from the Vedas, which are liturgical texts containing details of life during this period that have been interpreted to be historical and constitute the primary sources for understanding the period.

Early Vedic period

Geographical range
Indian subcontinent
Period
Iron Age
Dates
c. 1500 – c. 1100 BCE (uncertain)
Preceded by
Indus Valley Civilisation
Followed by
Late Vedic period, Kuru Kingdom, Panchala
Late Vedic period

Geographical range
Indian subcontinent
Period
Iron Age
Dates
c. 1100 – c. 500 BCE (uncertain)
Preceded by
Early Vedic culture
Followed by
Brihadrathas dynasty, Haryanka dynasty, Mahajanapadas
The Vedas were composed and orally transmitted by speakers of an Old Indo-Aryan language who had migrated into the northwestern regions of the Indian subcontinent early in this period. The associated Vedic culture was tribal and pastoral until c. 1200 or 1100 BCE and centred in the Punjab. It then spread eastward to the western Ganges Plain, becoming more agricultural and settled, while the central Ganges Plain was dominated by a related but non-Vedic Indo-Aryan culture. The Vedic period saw the emergence of a hierarchy of social classes and the coalescence of peoples into Janapada (monarchical state-level polities).The end of the Vedic period witnessed the rise of Mahajanapada (large, urbanised states) as well as śramaṇa movements (including Jainism and Buddhism) which challenged the Vedic orthodoxy of the Kuru Kingdom.

The Vedic society was patriarchal and patrilineal, and early Vedic Aryans were organised into tribes rather than kingdoms. Economy in the Vedic period was sustained by a combination of pastoralism and agriculture. Vedic religion developed into Brahmanical orthodoxy, and around the beginning of the Common Era, the Vedic tradition formed one of the main constituents of the so-called "Hindu synthesis".

Archaeological cultures identified with phases of Vedic material culture include the Ochre Coloured Pottery culture, the Gandhara grave culture, the Black and red ware culture and the Painted Grey Ware culture.Archaeological cultures associated with Indo-Iranian migrations (after EIEC). The Andronovo, BMAC and Yaz cultures have often been associated with Indo-Iranian migrations. The GGC, Cemetery H, Copper Hoard and PGW cultures are candidates for cultures associated with Indo-Aryan movements.
The commonly accepted period of earlier Vedic age is dated back to the second millennium BCE. After the collapse of the Indus Valley Civilisation, which ended c. 1900 BCE,groups of Indo-Aryan peoples migrated into north-western India and started to inhabit the northern Indus Valley. The Indo-Aryans were a branch of the Indo-Iranians, which—according to the most widespread hypothesis—have originated in the Andronovo culture in the Bactria-Margiana area, in present northern Afghanistan

Some writers and archaeologists have opposed the notion of a migration of Indo-Aryans into India.Edwin Bryant and Laurie Patton used the term "Indo-Aryan Controversy" for an oversight of the Indo-Aryan Migration theory, and some of its opponents.