Sarasvati River

The Sarasvati River (IAST: sárasvatī nadī́) was one of the Rigvedic rivers mentioned in the Rig Veda and later Vedic and post-Vedic texts. The Sarasvati River played an important role in the Vedic religion, appearing in all but the fourth book of the Rigveda.

B

When the [Rig Vedic] hymns were written the focus of Āryan culture was the region between the Jamnā (Sanskrit Yamunā) and Satlaj (Shutudrī), south of the modern Ambālā, and along the upper course of the river Sarasvatī. The latter river is now an insignificant stream, losing itself in the desert of Rajasthan, but it then [in Rig Vedic times] flowed broad and strong...
- Basham, A.L., The Wonder That Was India, third edn, Rupa & Co., Calcutta, 1981, pp. 31-32. quoted in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

Sarasvati's rediscovery, although arguably suggestive of considerable Vedic antiquity, cannot be used to prove absolute synonymity of the Indus Valley residents and the Vedic Aryans.
- Bryant, E. F. (2001). The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture : the Indo-Aryan migration debate. Oxford University Press. chapter 9, p. 169.

Likewise for the interminable discussion on the Sarasvati, although I will note, here, that proposals correlating her with other rivers in Afghanistan or elsewhere are unconvincing to my mind, as are attempts to argue that she ended in a terminal lake rather than the ocean. Kazanas has provided additional philological arguments to support the least complicated opinion, that Sarasvati as known in the Rgveda was a mighty river that flowed to the sea. One can always engage in special pleading to avoid this conclusion...
- Edwin Bryant . "'Somewhere in Asia and No More,' Response to 'Indigenous Indo-Aryans and the Rigveda' by Kazanas." Journal of Indo-European Studies 30.3-4 (2003): 341-353

C

In any case, the Sarasvati-phobia of this group of scholars is inexplicable. If they are upset by the density of distribution of Harappan sites in the region drained by the Sarasvati and get alarmed by the prospect of the Indus civilization being associated with ancient Brahmavarta, basically the land between the Sarasvati and the Drishadvati, that is their problem.
- Dilip K Chakrabarti, Whose Past and Which Past? The Warring Factions of the Ancient Indian Historical Research, also in Dilip K. Chakrabarti, Nation First: Essays in the Politics of Ancient Indian Studies, 2014

The Ghaghar river . . . does not in the heaviest season pass in force beyond Bhatnir . . . and the period when this river ceased to flow as one is far beyond record, and belongs to the fabulous periods of which even tradition is scanty... When the depopulation took place, I am not prepared to say; it must have been long since, as none of the village sites present[s] one brick standing on another, above ground,—though, in digging beneath it, very frequent specimens of an old brick are met with, about 16 inches by 10 inches, and 3 inches thick, of most excellent quality: buildings erected of such materials could not have passed away in any short period. The evident cause of this depopulation of the country is the absolute absence of water.
- Colvin, Major, ‘On the Restoration of the Ancient Canals of the Delhi Territory’, Journal of the Asiatic Society, vol. II, March 1833, p. 107. quoted in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

The most sacred and eastern source of the Sarasvatī is said to be Adi-Badri Kunda north of Katgadh [Kathgarh], while the latter is still remembered to be the place where the sacred stream came out of the hills.
- Alexander Cunningham, quoted in Bhargava, M.L., Geography of Rgvedic India, , p. 71, with reference to Archaeological Survey of India Report, vol. XIV, p. 75. quoted from Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

E

As for Burrow‘s thesis that some place names reflect the names of geographical features to the west, and thus preserve an ancestral home, they once again rather rely on an assumption of Arya migrations than prove it. [...] His cited equivalence of Sanskrit Saraswati and Avestan Haraxvaiti is a case in point. Burrow accepts that it is the latter term that is borrowed, undergoing the usual change of s- > h in the process, but suggests that Saraswati was a proto-Indoaryan term, originally applied to the present Haraxvaiti when the proto-Indoaryans still lived in northeastern Iran, then it was brought into India at the time of the migrations, while its original bearer had its name modified by the speakers of Avestan who assumed control of the areas vacated by proto-Indoaryans. It would be just as plausible to assume that Saraswati was a Sanskrit term indigenous to India and was later imported by the speakers of Avestan into Iran. The fact that the Zend Avesta is aware of areas outside the Iranian plateau while the Rigveda is ignorant of anything west of the Indus basin would certainly support such an assertion.
- ERDOSY 1989: Ethnicity in the Rigveda and its Bearing on the Question of Indo-European Origins. Erdosy, George. pp. 35-47 in ―South Asian Studies‖ vol. 5. London (ERDOSY 1989:41-42). Quoted in Talageri, S. G. (2010). The Rigveda and the Avesta. New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan.

The treatment of the Saraswati evidence forms an interesting case study in the stonewalling of putative pro-OIT evidence by AIT militants, typically outsiders to Indo-European studies such as comparative historian Steve Farmer: they lambast the equating of the Vedic Saraswati with today’s Ghaggar as a paranoid Hindu-nationalist concoction, when actually it was established by a string of Western scholars since the 1850s, in tempore non suspecto. A case study of how this debate has been poisoned by endless political imputations.
- Elst K. Why Indo-Europeanists Have A Duty To Face The Out-Of-India Theory, 2022

G

Often enough it seemed as though, like the river Sarasvatī, the lost stream of the old Sapta-sindhavas, the river of Indian thought had disappeared beneath the surface or had become lost in shallow marshes and morasses . . . But, sooner or later, we see the stream reappear, and then old ideas resume their way.
- Gowen, Herbert H., A History of Indian Literature from Vedic Times to the Present Day, D. Appleton, New York & London, 1931, p. 9, quoted in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

In view of Stein’s statement which had led us to believe that nothing very ancient would be found in the region, it was a great thrill for us when even on the first and second days of our exploration we found sites with unmistakable affinities with the culture of Harappa and Mohenjo-daro. And a few subsequent days’ work convinced us that the Sarasvatī valley had been really a commingling of many rivers, not only geographically, but culturally... ‘the valleys of the Sarasvatī and the Drishadvatī must be regarded as very rich indeed in archaeological remains’.
- Ghosh, A., ‘The Rajputana Desert: Its Archaeological Aspect’, in Bulletin of the National Institute of Sciences in India, 1952, vol. I, pp. 37-42, reproduced in An Archaeological Tour°, p. 101., quoted in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.
- Amalananda Ghosh who discovered Harappan sites along the bed of the Ghaggar

I

Some of the earliest Aryan settlements in India were on the banks of the Saraswati, and the surrounding country has from almost Vedic times been held in high veneration. The Hindus identify the river with Saraswati, the Sanskrit Goddess of Speech and Learning.
- ‘Ratlam’ to ‘Sirmur’, Imperial Gazetteer of India, vol. 12, Trübner & Co., London, sec. edn, 1887, pp. 261-62. quoted in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

K

It is certain... that the Rigveda offers no assistance in determining the mode in which the Vedic Áryans entered India... the bulk at least [of the R V] seems to have been composed rather in the country round the Sarasvati river.
- A. B. Keith quoted in Kazanas, N. (2002). Indigenous Indo-Aryans and the Rigveda. Journal of Indo-European Studies, 30(3-4), 275-334.

Now, it would be ludicrous to claim that the IAs left the common Indo-Iranian habitat, as per the AIT, moved into Saptasindhu and turning the Haraχvaiti name into Sarasvatī gave it to a river there to remember their past while they proceeded to generate the root sṛ and its derivatives to accord with other IE languages. Occam’s razor, which here is conveniently ignored by AIT adherents, commands the opposite: that the Iranians moved away, lost the root sṛ and the name Sarasvatī in its devolved form Haraxvaiti was given to a river in their new habitat.
- Kazanas, N. (2009). Indo-Aryan origins and other Vedic issues. Chapter 9

M

The country bears traces of having once been well inhabited. At no very distant period, the waters of the Guggur [Ghaggar] river reached as far as Sooratgurh, and old wells are numerous as far as Bhatner [Hanumangarh]’...
- Mackeson, F., Major, ‘Report on the Route from Seersa to Bahawulpore’, in Journal of Asiatic Society of Bengal, vol. XIII, January-June 1844, no. 145-50, p. 298-302 quoted in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

[It] revealed an incredibly dense concentration of sites, along the dried-up course of a river that could be identified as the ‘Saraswati’. . . Suddenly it became apparent that the ‘Indus’ Civilization was a misnomer—although the Indus had played a major role in the rise and development of the civilization, the ‘lost Saraswati’ River, judging by the density of settlement along its banks, had contributed an equal or greater part to its prosperity...Many people today refer to this Early state as the ‘Indus-Saraswati Civilization’ and continuing references [in her book] to the ‘Indus Civilization’ should be seen as an abbreviation in which the ‘Saraswati’ is implied.
- McIntosh, Jane R., A Peaceful Realm°, p. 24. in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

It can be stated with certainty that the present Ghaggar-Hakra is nothing but a remnant of the RgVedic Sarasvati which was the lifeline of the Indus Civilization.
- V. N. Misra, 1994, ‘Indus Civilization and the Rgvedic Sarasvatī’, , p. 524. quoted in Bryant, E. F. (2001). The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture : the Indo-Aryan migration debate. Oxford University Press. chapter 9

The Sarasvatī comes between the Jumna and the Sutlej, the position of the modern Sarsūti . . . There are strong reasons to accept the identification of the later and the earlier Sarasvatī throughout [the Rig Veda].
- Macdonell, A.A. & A.B. Keith, Vedic Index, vol. 2, pp. 435-36. quoted in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

Here we see samudra used clearly in the sense of sea, the Indian sea, and we have at the same time a new indication of the distance which separates the Vedic age from that of the later Sanskrit literature. Though it may not be possible to determine by geological evidence the time of the changes which modified the southern area of the Penjāb and caused the Sarasvatī to disappear in the desert, still the fact remains that the loss of the Sarasvatī is later than the Vedic age, and that at that time the waters of the Sarasvatī reached the sea.
- Müller, F. Max, Vedic Hymns, p. 60.in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

O

The waters of the Sarasvati [are] continuous with the dry bed of a great river [Hakra], which, as local legends assert, once flowed through the desert to the sea.
- C.F. Oldham, 1893, quoted in Bryant, E. F. (2001). The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture : the Indo-Aryan migration debate. Oxford University Press. chapter 9

Although the river below the confluence [with the Ghaggar] is marked in our maps as Gaggar, it was formerly the Saraswatī; that name is still known amongst the people.
- C.F. Oldham, 1893 quoted in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

We have also seen that the Vedic description of the waters of the Saraswatī flowing onward to the ocean, and that given in the Mahabharata, of the sacred river losing itself in the sands, were probably both of them correct at the periods to which they referred.
- Oldham, C.F., ‘The Sarasvatī and the Lost River of the Indian Desert’, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, vol. 34, 1893, pp. 49-76.

R

[The Hakra’s drying up] reduced a vast extent of once fruitful country to a howling wilderness, and thus several flourishing cities and towns became ruined or deserted by their inhabitants.
- Raverty, H.G., ‘The Mihrān of Sind and Its Tributaries: A Geographical and Historical Study’, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, vol. 61, no. 1 & extra number (1892), pp. 155-206 & 297-508. quoted in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

More important is the Sarasvatī, the true lifeline of Vedic geography, whose trace is assumed to be found in the Sarsutī, located between the Satlaj and the Jamnā. With the Indus and its five tributaries, it forms the Veda’s “seven rivers”.
- Renou, Louis & Jean Filliozat, L’Inde classique: manuel des études indiennes, vol. 1, Payot, 1947; republ. Librairie d’Amérique et d’Orient, 1985, p. 372. in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

S

The trace of the ancient riverbed was recently found, still quite recognizable, and was followed far to the west. [This discovery] confirmed the correctness of the tradition.
- Louis Vivien de Saint-Martin, 1855 quoted in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

The Ran is the delta of the Hakra, the lost river of Sind.
- Sivewright, Robert, ‘Cutch and the Ran’, The Geographical Journal, vol. 29, no. 5, May 1907, pp. 518-35. quoted in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

Traditional Indian belief recognizes in this well-marked bed the course of the sacred Sarasvatī, once carrying its abundant waters down to the ocean and since antiquity ‘lost’ in desert sands... [The Ghaggar was] still known as the Sarsuti (the Hindi derivative of Sarasvatī) [which] passes the sacred sites of Kurukshetra near Thanesar, a place of Hindu pilgrimage.
- Stein, Sir Aurel, ‘A Survey of Ancient Sites along the “Lost” Sarasvatī River’.quoted in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

T

There is now a desperate salvage operation on, in powerful leftist and "secularist" political circles in India, to put a complete full stop to any further official research on the Sarasvatī (including archaeological and geological investigations), and to launch an all-out Goebbelsian campaign through a captive media to deny that there ever was a Vedic Sarasvatī river in existence in India: the river named in the Rigveda was either completely mythical, or it was the river in Afghanistan, but it definitely was not identical with the Ghaggar-Hakra!
- Talageri, S. G. (2010). The Rigveda and the Avesta. New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan.

To the drying up of the Hakra, or Gliaggar, many centuries ago, in conjunction with moral evils, is ascribed the existing desolation... The vestiges of large towns, now buried in the sands, confirm the truth of this tradition, and several of them claim a high antiquity...
- James Tod, "Annals And Antiquities Of Rajasthan Or The Central And Western Rajput States Of India" [1] quoted in Chakrabarti, D. K., & Saini, S. (2009). The problem of the sarasvati river and notes on the archaeological geography of haryana and indian panjab. Aryan Books International.

Many [Rigvedic] verses celebrate the might of the ancient river Sarasvati, nah priyà priyàsu ‘dearest of all our dear ones’. The word priyá... has the sense of ‘one’s own, that one is used to, or attached to’.
- Thomson, K. (2009). A still undeciphered text: How the scientific approach to the Rigveda would open up Indo-European studies. Journal of Indo-European Studies, 37(1-2), 1-72.

W

The earliest seat of the Hindus within the confines of Hindusthān was undoubtedly the eastern confines of the Panjab. The holy land of Manu and the Purānas lies between the Drishadwatī and Saraswatī rivers, the Caggar [Ghaggar] and Sursooty [Sarsuti] of our barbarous maps. Various adventures of the first princes and most famous sages occur in this vicinity; and the Āshramas, or religious domiciles, of several of the latter are placed on the banks of the Saraswatī . . . These indications render it certain, that whatever seeds were imported from without, it was in the country adjacent to the Saraswatī river that they were first planted, and cultivated and reared in Hindusthān.
- Introduction by HH Wilson, The Vishnu Purāna: A System of Hindu Mythology and Tradition, tr. H.H. Wilson, John Murray, London, 1840, pp. lxvi-vii. in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

This dry bed is indeed the holy river ‘Sarasvatī’ . . .; once upon a time, this was a genuine solitary river which reached the ocean without any tributaries on its long way through the desert.
- Wilhelmy, Herbert, ‘The Ancient River Valley on the Eastern Border of the Indus Plain and the Sarasvatī Problem’, in Vedic Sarasvatī°, p. 99 (partial English translation of ‘Das Urstromtal am Ostrand der Indusebene und das Sarasvatī Problem’, in Zeitschrift für Geomorphologie, N.F. Supplementband 8, 1969, pp. 76-93). in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

From Hindu texts

At a distance of a journey of forty days on horseback from the spot where the Sarasvati is lost (in the sand of the desert), (is situated) Plaksa Prasravaja.
- Pañchavimsa Brahmana (25.10.16). in : Calad, W., 1931 [1982]. Pañchavinmsa Brahmaja. Calcutta: Asiatic Society. quoted in Bryant, E. F., & Patton, L. L. (2005). The Indo-Aryan controversy : evidence and inference in Indian history. Routledge page 65

Sarasvatī’s stream lost in barbarous sandy wastes.
- Kālidāsa, The Loom of Time: A Selection of His Plays and Poems, tr. Chandra Rajan, Penguin Books, New Delhi, 1989, p. 261. quoted in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

When Harsha’s father, the king of Sthānvīshvara, passed away, the people ‘bore him to the river Sarasvatī, and there upon a pyre befitting an emperor solemnly consumed all but his glory in the flames’.
- Bāna, Harsa-Carita, tr. E.B. Cowell, F.W. Thomas, London, 1929, pp. 158 & 160, quoted by Darian, Steven, ‘Gangā and Sarasvatī: An Incidence of Mythological Projection’, East and West, vol. 26, nos 1-2, 1976, p. 155. in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

On the Sarasvatī there are ruined sites called Naitandhava; Vyarna is one of these.
- Lātyāyana Shrautasūtra, 10.18.3, quoted in and translated by Burrow, Thomas, ‘On the Word Arma or Armaka in Early Sanskrit Literature’, in Journal of Indian History, vol. 41, 1963, pp. 159-166. in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

Rigveda

O Gangā, Yamunā, Sarasvatī, Shutudrī, Parushnī, hear my praise! ~ Rigveda

Sarasvati, pure in her course from the mountains to the sea.
- Rigveda, VII, 95, 2, as quoted in David Frawley, "Witzel’s Vanishing Ocean – How to Read Vedic Texts Any Way You Like", in The Hindu (25 June 2002), 'Open Page'

O Sarasvati, lead us on to better, Do not spurn us, do not deprive us of your plenty; Rejoice in our company, and that we’re neighbours, Let us not go away from you to foreign fields.
- Rigveda 6.61.14, as quoted in Thomson, K. (2009). A still undeciphered text: How the scientific approach to the Rigveda would open up Indo-European studies. Journal of Indo-European Studies, 37(1-2), 1-72.

O Gangā, Yamunā, Sarasvatī, Shutudrī (Sutlej), Parushnī (Ravi), hear my praise!
- Rigveda 10.75.5-6
- Quoted in M. Danino, The Lost River: On the Trail of the Sarasvatī (Penguin Books India, 2010)

Mahabharata

Your excellent waters fill this whole universe.
- The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa,, vol. III, Salya Parva, IX.42, p. 117 (slightly altered by Danino) as quoted from Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India..

In some parts (of her course) she becomes visible and in some parts not so.
- The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, tr. Kisari Mohan Ganguli vol. II, Bhisma Parva, VI.6, p. 16. in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

Although the Sarasvatī seems to be lost, yet persons crowned with ascetic success . . . and owing also to the coolness of the herbs and of the land there, know that the river has an invisible current through the bowels of the earth.
- The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, tr. Kisari Mohan Ganguli vol. III,, IX.35, p. 101.in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

The sacred Sarasvatī is the foremost river of all rivers. She courses towards the ocean and is truly the first of all streams.
- The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, tr. Kisari Mohan Ganguli vol. IV, Anusasana Parva, XIII.146, p. 315. in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

Where else is such happiness as that in a residence by the Sarasvatī? . . . All should ever remember the Sarasvatī! Sarasvatī is the most sacred of rivers!
- The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, tr. Kisari Mohan Ganguli vol. III,, IX.54, p. 150. in Danino, M. (2010). The lost river : on the trail of the Sarasvatī. Penguin Books India.

External links

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Sarasvati River