Dard people
The
Dards are various ethnic groups living in
Afghanistan,
Pakistan and a few scattered villages in a remote region of
Ladakh district, itself a remote region of Indian-controlled
Jammu and Kashmir (
Dah Hanu). The term
Dard is due to
Herodotus who described a land of the
Dardikae in the
Hindukush.
The people of Northernmost
Pakistan are mostly Dards, although this term is not used by any of the groups themselves, and include the people of
Chitral,
Gilgit,
Kohistan and upper
Swat.
There are also Dardic groups in Afghanistan such as the
Pashai and the Kohistanis. The
Nuristanis were previously considered to be Dards but are today classified as a distinct group.
The
Kashmiri speaking people of the Kashmir valley are also considered Dards, but they do not consider themslves Dards.
The vast majority of Dardic peoples are Muslims (
Sunni,
Shia and
Ismaili) but there are a few who have retained their ancient religions. Amongst these groups are the
Kalasha and the
Dards of Ladakh.
The Dards of
Dah Hanu are nominally
Buddhist but also worship their own Pantheon of gods. They have an
Indo-European appearance in contrast to the predominant Tibeto-Mongol inhabitants of most of
Ladakh. They live in very primitive conditions even when judged by the standards of
Ladakh.
Parpola (1999) identifies "Proto-Dardic" with "Proto-Rigvedic", suggesting that the Dards are the direct descendents of the bearers of early
Rigvedic culture ca. 1700 BC, pointing to features in certain Dardic dialects that continue peculiarities of
Rigvedic Sanskrit, such as the gerund in
-tvī (p. 189).
*
Dardic languages*
Dards, Dardistan, and Dardic: an Ethnographic, Geographic, and Linguistic Conundrum*Asko Parpola, 'The formation of the Aryan branch of Indo-European', in Blench and Spriggs (eds),
Archaeology and Language III, London and New York (1999).
* http://www.pugmarks.com/d-india/hanu.htm
