Aryan: Difference between revisions

'''Aryan''' or '''Arya''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|ɛər|i|ə|n}};), or '''Arya''' in [[Proto-Indo-Iranian language|Proto-Indo-Iranian]],<ref>[http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/aryan "Aryan"]. ''[[Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary]].''</ref> [[Proto-Indo-Iranian language|Proto-Indo-Iranian]]: {{lang|iir-x-proto|arya}}) is a term originallyoriginating usedfrom asthe an [[ethnocultural]]ethno-cultural self-designation byof the [[Indo-Iranians]]. inIt ancient times,stood in contrast to the nearby outsiders, knownwhom they designated as '[[Aneran|non-Aryan']] ({{lang|iir-x-proto|an-aryaāryā}}).<ref name=":3" /><ref name=":4" /> In [[Ancientancient India]], the term ''ā́rya'' was used by the [[Indo-Aryan peoples|Indo-Aryans]] of the [[Vedic period]], both as an [[endonym]] (self-designation) and in reference to a region known ascalled "[[Āryāvarta|Aryavarta]]" (''Āryāvarta'';{{Lang-sa|आर्यावर्त}}, '{{Literal translation|Land of the Aryans'}}), where the Indo-Aryantheir culture emerged.{{Sfn|Witzel|2001|pp=4, 24}} InSimilarly, according to the ''[[Avesta]]'' scriptures, ancientthe [[Ancient Iranian peoples|Iranian peoples]] similarly used the term ''airya'' to designate themselves as an [[ethnic group]], and into referencerefer to theira mythicalregion homeland,called "[[Airyanem Vaejah]]" (''Airyanəm{{Lang-ae|𐬀𐬫𐬭𐬌𐬌𐬀𐬥𐬆𐬨 Vaēǰah;''𐬬𐬀𐬉𐬘𐬀𐬵}}, 'expanse{{Literal translation|Expanse of the Aryas'[[Arya or(Iran)|Arya]]}}), 'stretchwhich ofwas thetheir Aryas')mythical homeland.<ref name=":5" /><ref name="Gnoli" /> The [[Wordword stem|stem]] also forms the [[etymological]] source of place names such aslike ''[[Alania]]'' ({{lang|iir-x-proto|Aryāna-}}) and ''[[Name of Iran#Etymology of Iran(word)|Iran]]'' ({{lang|iir-x-proto|Aryānām}}).<ref name="Mallory" />

Although the stem {{lang|iir-x-proto|arya}} may beoriginate offrom the [[Proto-Indo-European language|Proto-Indo-European]] (PIE) origin,<ref name=":2" /> itsit useseems asto anhave ethnoculturalbeen self-designationused isexclusively onlyby attested amongthe Indo-Iranian peoples, andas there is no evidence of itsit usehaving served as an ethnonym amongfor 'the [[Proto-Indo-Europeans']]. In any case, many modern scholars point out that, eventhe inethos of the ancient timesAryan identity, theas ideait ofis beingdescribed anin ''Aryan''the Avesta and the [[Rigveda]], was religious, cultural, and linguistic, and was not racialtied to the concept of race.{{Sfn|Bryant|2001|pp=60–63}}<ref name=":0">{{harvnb|Witzel|2001|loc=p. 24: "''Arya''/''ārya'' does not mean a particular ''people'' or even a particular 'racial' group but all those who had joined the tribes speaking Vedic Sanskrit and adhering to their cultural norms (such as ritual, poetry, etc.)"}}</ref><ref name=":1">{{harvnb|Anthony|2007|loc=p. 408: "The ''Rigveda'' and ''Avesta'' agreed that the essence of their shared parental Indo-Iranian identity was linguistic and ritual, not racial. If a person sacrificed to the right gods in the right way using the correct forms of the traditional hymns and poems, that person was an Aryan."}}</ref>

In the 1850s, the termFrench diplomat and writer [[Arthur de Gobineau]] brought forth the idea of the '[[Aryan race|Aryan]]', wasessentially adoptedclaiming asthat the Proto-Indo-Europeans were superior specimens of humans and that their descendants comprised either a [[Historical race concepts|distinct racial categorygroup]] byor thea aristocraticdistinct Frenchsub-group writerof the hypothetical [[Arthur deCaucasian Gobineaurace]],. who, throughThrough the later workswork of his later followers, such as the British-German philosopher [[Houston Stewart Chamberlain]], influencedthis specific theory by Gobineau proved to be particularly popular among the [[NazismFascism andin raceEurope|European far-right]] and ultimately laid the foundation for [[Nazi racial ideologytheories]], which also co-opted the concept of [[scientific racism]].{{sfn|Anthony|2007|pp=9–11}} UnderIn [[Nazi Germany|Nazi]], and also in [[German-occupied ruleEurope]] (1933–1945)during [[World War II]], theany termcitizen officiallywho appliedwas toclassified mostas inhabitantsan ofAryan Germanywould excludingbe honoured as a member of the "[[Historymaster race]]" of thehumanity. JewsConversely, innon-Aryans were [[Racial policy of Nazi Germany|legally discriminated against]], including [[Jews]], [[Romani people|Roma]], and [[Slavs]] (mostly [[Slovaks]], [[Czechs]], [[Polish people|Poles]], and [[Russians]]).<ref name=":7">{{Cite book|last=Gordon|first=Sarah Ann|url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/9946459|title=Hitler, Germans, and the "Jewish Question"|date=1984|publisher=Princeton University Press|others=Mazal Holocaust Collection|isbn=0-691-05412-6|location=Princeton, N.J.|pages=96|oclc=9946459}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|last=Longerich|first=Peter|url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/610166248|title=Holocaust : the Nazi persecution and murder of the Jews|date=2010|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-280436-5|location=Oxford|pages=83,241|oclc=610166248}}</ref> ThoseJews, classifiedwho were seen as 'non-Aryans,'part especiallyof Jewsthe hypothetical [[Semitic race]],<ref>{{cite web|date=2020|title=Aryan {{!}} Arian, adj. and n.|url=https://oed.com/view/Entry/11296 |website=Oxford English Dictionary|quote=Under the Nazi régime (1933–45) applied to the inhabitants of Germany of non-Jewish extraction. cf. 1933 tr. Hitler's ''Mein Kampf'' in ''Times'' 25 July 15/6: 'The exact opposite of the Aryan is the Jew.' 1933 Education 1 Sept. 170/2: 'The basic idea of the new law is that non-Aryans, that is to say mainly Jews...'}}</ref> were [[Racialespecially policytargeted of Nazi Germany|discriminated against]] before sufferingby the [[Genocide|systematic massNazi killingParty]], knownculminating asin [[the Holocaust]].<ref name=":7" /> andThe Roma, who are of Indo-Aryan origin, were also targeted, culminating in the [[Porajmos]]. The genocides and other large-scale atrocities committedthat inhave thebeen namecommitted ofby [[Aryanism|AryanistAryanists]] supremacist ideologies have led academicsacademic figures to generally avoid using '"Aryan'" as a stand-alone ethnolinguisticethno-linguistic term, whichparticularly hasin beenthe replaced[[Western inworld]], mostwhere cases by '[[Indo-Iranians|"Indo-Iranian]]'" is the preferred alternative, although the [[Indianterm subcontinent|Indic]] branch"Indo-Aryan" is still knownused asto denote the '[[Indo-Aryan peopleslanguages|Indo-AryanIndic branch]]'.<ref name=":6" />

The [[Sanskrit language|Sanskrit]] word ''ā́rya'' ([[wiktionarywikt:आर्य|आर्य]]) was originally an ethnocultural term designating those who spoke [[Vedic Sanskrit]] and adhered to Vedic cultural norms (including religious rituals and poetry), in contrast to an outsider, or ''an-ā́rya'' ('non-Arya').{{sfn|Schmitt|1987}}{{Sfn|Witzel|2001|pp=4, 24}} By the time of the [[Buddha]] (5th–4th century BCE), it took the meaning of 'noble'.{{Sfn|Witzel|2001|p=4}} In [[Old Iranian languages]], the [[Avestan]] term ''airya'' ([[Old Persian]] ''ariya'') was likewise used as an ethnocultural self-designation by ancient [[Iranian peoples]], in contrast to an ''[[Aneran|an-airya]]'' ('non-Arya'). It designated those who belonged to the 'Aryan' (Iranian) ethnic stock, spoke the language and followed the religion of the 'Aryas'.<ref name=":5">{{harvnb|Bailey|1987|loc=: "It is used in the ''Avesta'' of members of an ethnic group and contrasts with other named groups (Tūirya, Sairima, Dāha, Sāinu or Sāini) and with the outer world of the ''An-airya'' 'non-Arya'."}}</ref><ref name="Gnoli">{{harvnb|Gnoli|2006|loc=: "Mid. Pers. ''ēr'' (plur. ''ērān''), just like Old Pers. ''ariya'' and Av. ''airya'', has an evident ethnic value, which is also present in the abstract term ''ērīh'', 'Iranian character, Iranianness'."}}</ref>

** [[Proto-Anatolian language|Anatolian]]: *''ʔor-o-'', 'peer, freeman',{{sfn|Kloekhorst|2008|p=198}} [[Hittite language|Hittite]]: ''arā-'', 'comrade, peer, companion, friend'; ''**** [[arāwa]]-'', 'free from'; ''arawan(n)i-'', 'free, freeman (not being slave)'; ''natta ara'', 'not proper to the community',{{Sfn|Gamkrelidze|Ivanov|1995|pp=657–658}}{{sfn|Mallory|Adams|1997|page=213}}{{sfn|Kloekhorst|2008|p=198}}

**** [[Old Norse]]: ''arjosteʀ'', 'foremost, most distinguished'.{{Sfn|Delamarre|2003|p=55}}{{sfn|Orel|2003|p=23}}<ref>{{Cite book|last=Antonsen|first=Elmer H.|title=Runes and Germanic Linguistics|date=2002|publisher=Walter de Gruyter|isbn=978-3-11-017462-5|pages=127}}</ref>

The term {{lang|ine-x-proto|h₂er(y)ós}} may derive from the PIE verbal [[Root (linguistics)|root]] {{lang|ine-x-proto|h₂er-}}, meaning 'to put together'.{{sfn|Duchesne-Guillemin|1979|p=337}}{{sfn|Mallory|Adams|1997|p=213}} [[Oswald Szemerényi]] has also argued that the stem could be a Near-Eastern loanword from the [[Ugaritic]] ''ary'' ('kinsmen'),{{sfn|Szemerényi|1977|pp=125–146}} **** [[although]] [[J. P. Mallory]] and [[Douglas Q. Adams]] find this proposition "hardly compelling".{{sfn|Mallory|Adams|1997|p=213}} According to them, the original PIE meaning had a clear emphasis on the in-group status of the "freemen" as distinguished from that of outsiders, particularly those captured and incorporated into the group as slaves. In [[Anatolian languages|Anatolia]], the base word has come to emphasize personal relationship, whereas it took a more ethnic meaning among [[Indo-Iranians]], presumably because most of the unfree ({{lang|iir-x-proto|anarya}}) who lived among them were captives from other ethnic groups.{{sfn|Mallory|Adams|1997|p=213}}

[[File:Young avestan geography.png|thumb|Approximate geographical extent of regions inhabited by the [[Arya (Iran)|Arya]] of the [[Avesta]] vis-a-vis other Indo-Iranian peoples during the [[Avestan period|Young Avestan period]] (ca.{{Circa}} 900–500 BCE)]]

The people of the ''[[Avesta]]'', exclusively used the term airya ({{lang-ae|{{script|Avst|[[wiktionarywikt:𐬀𐬌𐬭𐬌𐬌𐬀|𐬀𐬌𐬭𐬌𐬌𐬀]]}}}}, {{Transliteration|ae|airiia}}) to refer to themselves.{{sfn|Kellens|2005}} It can be found in a number geographical terms like the '[[Airyanem Vaejah|expanse of the airyas]]' ({{lang|ae|airiianəm vaēǰō}}), the '[[Avestan geography|dwelling place of the airyas]]' ({{lang|ae|airiio.shaiianem}}), or the 'white forest of the airyas' ({{lang|ae|vīspe.aire.razuraya}}). The term can also be found in poetic expressions such as the '[[Khvarenah|glory of the airyas]]' ({{lang|ae|airiianąm xᵛarənō}}), the '[[Arash the Archer|most swift-arrowed of the airyas]]' ({{lang|ae|xšviwi išvatəmō airiianąm}}), or the '[[Kay Khosrow|hero of the airyas]]' ({{lang|ae|arša airiianąm}}).{{sfn|Bailey|1987}} Although the Avesta does not contain any dateable events, modern scholarship assumes that the [[Avestan period]] mostly predates the [[Achaemenid Empire|Achaemenid period]] of Iranian history.<ref>{{cite book|last=Grenet|first=Frantz |editor-last1=Curtis|editor-first1=Vesta Sarkhosh|editor-last2=Stewart|editor-first2=Sarah |title=Birth of the Persian Empire Volume I|chapter=An Archaeologist's Approach to Avestan Geography |publisher=I.B.Tauris |year=2005|isbn=978-0-7556-2459-1|page=44|quote=It is difficult to imagine that the text was composed anywhere other than in South Afghanistan and later than the middle of the 6th century BC.}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Vogelsang|first=Willem|year=2000|author-link=Willem Vogelsang|title=The sixteen lands of Videvdat - Airyanem Vaejah and the homeland of the Iranians|journal=Persica|volume=16|doi=10.2143/PERS.16.0.511|page=62|quote=All of the above observations would indicate a date for the composition of the Videvdat list which would antedate, for a considerable time, the arrival in Eastern Iran of the Persian Acheamenids (ca. 550 B.C.)}}</ref>

The self-identifier was inherited in ethnic names such as the [[Parthian language|Parthian]] ''Ary'' (<small>pl.</small> ''Aryān''), the [[Middle Persian]] ''Ēr'' (<small>pl.</small> ''Ēran''), or the [[New Persian]] ''Irāni'' (<small>pl.</small> ''Irāniyān'').<ref name="Bailey3">{{harvnb|Bailey|1987|loc=: "In the inscription of Šāpūr I on the Kaʿba-ye Zardošt (ŠKZ), Parth. ''ʾryʾn W ʾnʾryʾn'' (''aryān ut anaryān''), Mid. Pers. ''ʾyrʾn W ʾnyrʾn'' (''ērān ut anērān''; cf. Armenian ''eran eut aneran'') comprises the inhabitants of all the known lands ... In the singular Parth. ''ʾry'', Mid. Pers. ''ʾyly'', Greek ''arian'' occurs in a title: ''ʾry mzdyzn nrysḥw MLKʾ'', *''ary mazdēzn Narēsahv šāh'' (Parth. ŠKZ 19); ''ʾyly mzdysn nrsḥy MLKʾ'' (Mid. Pers. version 24), Greek ''arian masdaasnou'' ... New Persian has ''ērān'' (western, ''īrān''), ''ērān-šahr''. In the Caucasus, Ossetic has Digoron ''erä'', ''irä'', Iron ''ir'', with Dig. ''iriston'', Iron ''iryston'' (the i-umlaut modifying the vowel ''a''-, but leaving the -''r''- untouched), [and] the ancestral ''Alān''."}}</ref>{{Sfn|Mayrhofer|1992|pp=174–175}} The [[Scythian languages|Scythian]] branch has ''[[Alans|Alān]]'' or {{lang|ira-x-proto|Allān}} (from {{lang|iir-x-proto|Aryāna}}; modern ''Allon''), ''[[Rhoxolani|Rhoxolāni]]'' ('Bright Alans'), ''Alanorsoi'' ('White Alans'), and possibly the modern [[Ossetian language|Ossetian]] ''Ir'' (<small>adj.</small> ''[[Iron people|Iron]]''), spelled ''Irä'' or ''Erä'' in the [[Digorian dialect]].<ref name="Bailey3"/><ref name="Mallory">{{harvnb|Mallory|Adams|1997|loc=p. 213: "Iran ''Alani'' (< *''aryana'') (the name of an Iranian group whose descendants are the Ossetes, one of whose subdivisions is the ''Iron'' [< *''aryana''-)), *''aryanam'' (pl.) ‘of'of the Aryans’Aryans' (> MPers ''Iran'')."}}</ref><ref name="Alemany">{{harvnb|Alemany|2000|loc=pp. 3–4, 8: "Nowadays, however, only two possibilities are admitted as regards [the etymology of ''Alān''], both closely related: (a) the adjective *''aryāna''- and (b) the pl. *''aryānām''; in both cases the underlying OIran. ajective *''arya''- 'Aryan' is found. It is worth mentioning that although it is not possible to give an unequivocal option because both forms produce the same phonetic result, most researchers tend to favour the derivative *''aryāna''-, because it has a more appropriate semantic value ... The ethnic name *''arya''- underlying in the name of the Alans has been linked to the Av. ''Airiianəm Vaēǰō'' 'the Aryan plain'."}}</ref> The [[Rabatak inscription]], written in the [[Bactrian language]] in the 2nd century CE, likewise uses the term ''ariao'' for 'Iranian'.{{Sfn|Gnoli|2006}}

Racially-oriented interpretations of the Vedic ''Aryas'' as "fair-skinned foreign invaders" coming from the North led to the adoption of the term ''Aryan'' in the West as a [[Historical race concepts|racial category]] connected to a supremacist ideology known as [[Aryanism]], which conceived the [[Aryan race]] as the "[[superior race]]" responsible for most of the achievements of ancient civilizations.{{Sfn|Bryant|2001|pp=60–63}} In 1888 [[Max Müller]], who had himself inaugurated the racial interpretations of the ''[[Rigveda]]'',{{Sfn|Bryant|2001|p=60}} denounced talk of an "Aryan race, Aryan blood, Aryan eyes and hair" as a nonsense comparable to a linguist speaking of "a dolichocephalic dictionary or a brachycephalic grammar".{{Sfn|Mallory|1989|p=269}} But an increasing number of Western writers, especially anthropologists and non-specialists influenced by [[Darwinism|Darwinist]] theories, came to see the ''Aryans'' as a "physical-genetic species" contrasting with the other human races – rather than as an ethnolinguistic category.{{Sfn|Goodrick-Clarke|1985|p=5}}{{Sfn|Arvidsson|2006|p=61}} During the late-19th and early-20th centuries, noted anthropologists [[Theodor Poesche]] and [[Thomas Henry Huxley|Thomas Huxley]] quoted from the [[Rig Veda]] to suggest that the Aryans were blond and tall, with blue eyes and [[dolichocephalic]] skulls.{{Sfn|Mallory|1989|p= [https://archive.org/details/189942876InSearchOfTheIndoEuropeansJPMallory/page/n268/mode/1up 268-269]}}{{Sfn|Arvidsson|2006|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=idTPDI6l0mkC&pg=PA43 43]}} Western anthropologists have continued to refine this idea since the 20th century, while some have dissented.<ref>{{harvnb|Bryant|2001|pp=[https://books.google.com/books?id=Y2jfHlinW4UC&pg=PA60 60–63]}}</ref> Hans Heinrich Hock has questioned that the Aryans were blond or light skinned, since, in his view, "most of the [Vedic] passages may not refer to dark or light skinned people, but dark and light worlds".<ref>{{harvnb|Bryant|Patton|2005|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=fHYnGde4BS4C&pg=PA8 8]}}</ref> However, according to [[Elena Efimovna Kuzmina|Elena Kuzmina]], there is ample evidence from the [[Avesta]] and the [[Rig Veda]] that the Aryans did have light eyes, light skin, and light hair.{{sfn|Kuzmina|2007|loc=pp. 171-172: "The Aryans in the [[Avesta]] are tall, light-skinned people with light hair; their women were light-eyed, with long, light tresses... In the [[Rigveda]] light skin alongside language is the main feature of the Aryans, differentiating them from the aboriginal [[Dasa|Dáśa-Dasyu]] population who were a dark-skinned, small people speaking another language and who did not believe in the Vedic gods... Skin color was the basis of social division of the Vedic Aryans; their society was divided into social groups [[Varna (Hinduism)|varṇa]], literally ‘color’'color'. The varṇas of Aryan priests ([[brahmin|brāhmaṇa]]) and warriors ([[Kshatriya|kṣatriyaḥ]] or [[Raja|rājanya]]) were opposed to the varṇas of the aboriginal Dáśa, called ‘black'black-skinned’skinned'..."}}

Through the works of [[Houston Stewart Chamberlain]], Gobineau's ideas influenced the [[Nazism and race|Nazi racial ideology]], which saw the "[[Aryan race]]" as innately superior to other putative racial groups.{{sfn|Anthony|2007|pp=9–11}} The Nazi official [[Alfred Rosenberg]] argued for a new "[[Blood and soil|religion of the blood]]" based on the supposed innate promptings of the Nordic soul to defend its "noble" character against racial and cultural degeneration. Rosenberg believed the [[Nordic race]] to be descended from [[Proto-Indo-Europeans|Proto-Aryans]], a hypothetical [[Prehistory|prehistoric]] people who dwelt on the [[North German Plain]] and who had ultimately originated from the lost continent of [[Atlantis]].{{refn|group=note|[[Alfred Rosenberg|Rosenberg, Alfred]], "[[The Myth of the 20th Century]]". The term "Atlantis" is mentioned two times in the whole book, the term "Atlantis-hypothesis" is mentioned just once. Rosenberg (page 24): "''It seems to be not completely impossible, that at parts where today the waves of the Atlantic ocean murmur and icebergs move along, once a blossoming land towered in the water, on which a creative race founded a great culture and sent its children as seafarers and warriors into the world; but if this Atlantis-hypothesis proves untenable, we still have to presume a prehistoric Nordic cultural center.''" Rosenberg (page 26): "''The ridiculed hypothesis about a Nordic creative center, which we can call Atlantis – without meaning a sunken island – from where once waves of warriors migrated to all directions as first witnesses of Nordic longing for distant lands to conquer and create, today becomes probable.''" Original: Es erscheint als nicht ganz ausgeschlossen, dass an Stellen, über die heute die Wellen des Atlantischen Ozeans rauschen und riesige Eisgebirge herziehen, einst ein blühendes Festland aus den Fluten ragte, auf dem eine schöpferische Rasse große, weitausgreifende Kultur erzeugte und ihre Kinder als Seefahrer und Krieger hinaussandte in die Welt; aber selbst wenn sich diese Atlantishypothese als nicht haltbar erweisen sollte, wird ein nordisches vorgeschichtliches Kulturzentrum angenommen werden müssen. ... Und deshalb wird die alte verlachte Hypothese heute Wahrscheinlichkeit, dass von einem nordischen Mittelpunkt der Schöpfung, nennen wir ihn, ohne uns auf die Annahme eines versunkenen atlantischen Erdteils festzulegen, die Atlantis, einst Kriegerschwärme strahlenförmig ausgewandert sind als erste Zeugen des immer wieder sich erneut verkörpernden nordischen Fernwehs, um zu erobern, zu gestalten."}} Under Rosenberg, the theories of [[Arthur de Gobineau]], [[Georges Vacher de Lapouge]], Blavatsky, [[Houston Stewart Chamberlain]], [[Madison Grant]], and those of [[Hitler]],<ref>Mein Kampf, tr. in The Times, 25 July 1933, p.&nbsp;15/6</ref> all culminated in [[Racial policy of Nazi Germany|Nazi Germany's race policies]] and the "[[Aryanization (Nazism)|Aryanization]]" decrees of the 1920s, 1930s, and early 1940s. In its "appalling medical model", the annihilation of the "racially inferior" ''[[Untermensch]]en'' was sanctified as the excision of a diseased organ in an otherwise healthy body,<ref>{{citation|last=Glover|first=Jonathan|chapter=Eugenics: Some Lessons from the Nazi Experience|editor-last=Harris|editor-first=John|editor2-last=Holm|editor2-first=Soren|title=The Future of Human Reproduction: Ethics, Choice, and Regulation|location=Oxford|publisher=Clarendon Press|year=1998|pages=57–65}}</ref> which led to the [[Holocaust]].[[File:ArnoBrekerDiePartei.jpg|thumb|220x220px|[[Arno Breker]]'s sculpture ''Die Partei (The Party)'', depicting a Nazi-era ideal of the "Nordic Aryan" racial type|left]]According to [[Nazism and race|Nazi racial theorists]], the term "Aryans" (''Arier'') described the [[Germanic peoples]],<ref>Davies, Norman (2006). ''Europe at War: 1939–1945 : No Simple Victory'', p. 167</ref> and they considered the purest Aryans to be those that belonged to a "[[Nordic race]]" physical ideal, which they referred to as the "[[master race]]".{{refn|The ''American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language'' states at the beginning of its definition, "[it] is one of the ironies of history that ''Aryan''<!--source is in italics-->, a word nowadays referring to the blond-haired, blue-eyed physical ideal of [[Nazi Germany]], originally referred to a people who looked vastly different. Its history starts with the ancient [[Indo-Iranians]], peoples who inhabited parts of what are now <!-- THIS IS INSIDE A LITERAL QUOTATION --> [[Greater Iran|Iran]], [[Afghanistan]], Pakistan and India. <!-- THIS IS INSIDE A LITERAL QUOTATION -->"<ref name="AHD">{{citation|last=Watkins|first=Calvert|chapter=Aryan|title=American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language|edition=4th|year=2000|location=New York|publisher=Houghton Mifflin|isbn=0-395-82517-2|quote=...when [[Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel|Friedrich Schlegel]], a German scholar who was an important early [[Indo-European studies|Indo-Europeanist]], came up with a theory that linked the Indo-Iranian words with the German word ''Ehre'', 'honor', and older Germanic names containing the element ''ario-'', such as the [[Suebi|Swiss]] {{sic}} warrior [[Ariovistus]] who was written about by [[Julius Caesar]]. Schlegel theorized that far from being just a designation of the Indo-Iranians, the word ''*arya-'' had in fact been what the Indo-Europeans called themselves, meaning [according to Schlegel] something like 'the honorable people.' (This theory has since been called into question.)|url=https://archive.org/details/americanheritage0000unse_a1o7}}</ref>|group=note}} However, a satisfactory definition of "Aryan" remained problematic during [[Nazi Germany]].<ref>Ehrenreich, Eric (2007). ''The Nazi Ancestral Proof: Genealogy, Racial Science, and the Final Solution'', pp, 9–11</ref> Although the physical ideal of Nazi racial theorists was typically the tall, [[blond|blond haired]], and [[Eye color|lightblue-eyed]] Nordic individual, such theorists accepted the fact that a considerable variety of hair and eye colour existed within the racial categories they recognised. For example, [[Adolf Hitler]] and many Nazi officials had dark hair and were still considered members of the [[Aryan race]] under Nazi racial doctrine, because the determination of an individual's racial type depended on a preponderance of many characteristics in an individual rather than on just one defining feature.<ref>"The range of blond hair color in pure Nordic peoples runs from flaxen and red to shades of chestnut and brown... It must be clearly understood that blondness of hair and of eye is not a final test of Nordic race. The Nordics include all the blonds, and also those of darker hair or eye when possessed of a preponderance of other Nordic characters. In this sense the word "blond" means those lighter shades of hair or eye color in contrast to the very dark or black shades which are termed brunet. The meaning of "blond" as now used is therefore not limited to the lighter or flaxen shades as in colloquial speech. In England among Nordic populations, there are large numbers of individuals with hazel brown eyes joined with the light brown or chestnut hair which is the typical hair shade of the English and Americans. This combination is also common in Holland and Westphalia and is frequently associated with a very fair skin. These men are all of "blond" aspect and constitution and consequently are to be classed as members of the Nordic race." Quoted in Grant, 1922, p. 26.</ref> In September 1935, the Nazis passed the [[Nuremberg Laws]]. All Aryan Reich citizens were required to prove their Aryan ancestry; one way was to obtain an ''[[Ahnenpass]]'' ("ancestor pass") by providing proof through baptismal certificates that all four grandparents were of Aryan descent.<ref>Ehrenreich, Eric (2007). ''The Nazi Ancestral Proof: Genealogy, Racial Science, and the Final Solution'', p. 68</ref> In December of the same year, the Nazis founded ''[[Lebensborn]]'' ("Fount of Life") to counteract the falling Aryan birth rates in Germany, and to promote [[Nazi eugenics]].<ref name="bissell">{{cite news |last=Bissell |first=Kate |title=Fountain of Life |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4080822.stm |access-date=30 September 2011 |publisher=BBC Radio 4 |date=13 June 2005}}</ref>

* {{Cite book|last=Alemany|first=Agustí|title=Sources on the Alans: A Critical Compilation|date=2000|publisher=Brill|isbn=978-90-04-11442-5}}

* {{Cite book|last=Anthony|first=David W.|title=[[The Horse, the Wheel, and Language: How Bronze-Age Riders from the Eurasian Steppes Shaped the Modern World]]|publisher=Princeton University Press|year=2007|isbn=978-0691058870|author-link=David W. Anthony}}

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