 Distribution of Munda language speakers in India | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
|---|---|
| India, Bangladesh | |
| Languages | |
| Munda languages |
The Munda peoples of eastern and central parts of the Indian subcontinent are any of several Munda speaking ethno-linguistic groups of Austro-asiatic language family, formerly also known as Kolarian, and spoken by about nine million people.
According to linguist Paul Sidwell, pre-Munda languages arrived on the coast of Odisha from Southeast Asia about 4000-3500 years ago (c. 2000 – c. 1500 BCE), [1] [2] during the late Bronze Age, at the time of decline of the Indus Valley Civilization in Northwest India. The Munda people spread from Southeast Asia and mixed extensively with local Indian populations. [3] Robert Parkin notes that the term "Munda" did not belong to the Austroasiatic lexis and is of Sanskrit origin. [4]
Mitsuru Sakitani suggests that Haplogroup O1b1, which is common in Austroasiatic people and some other ethnic groups in southern China, and haplogroup O1b2, which is common in today Japanese, Koreans and some Manchu, are the carriers of Yangtze civilization (Baiyue). [5] Another study suggests that the haplogroup O1b1 is the major Austroasiatic paternal lineage and O1b2 the “para-Austroasiatic” lineage of the Yayoi people. [6]
According to Chaubey et al., "Austro-Asiatic speakers in India today are derived from dispersal from Southeast Asia, followed by extensive sex-specific admixture with local Indian populations." [7] According to Riccio et al., the Munda people are likely descended from Austroasiatic migrants from Southeast Asia. [8] [9]
According to Zhang et al., Austroasiatic migrations from Southeast Asia into India took place after the last Glacial maximum, circa 10,000 years ago. [10] Arunkumar et al. suggest Austroasiatic migrations from Southeast Asia occurred into Northeast India 5.2 ± 0.6 kya and into East India 4.3 ± 0.2 kya. [11]
Tätte et al. 2019 estimated that the Austroasiatic language speaking people admixed with Indian population about 2000-3800 year ago which may suggest arrival of south-east Asian genetic component in the area. Munda-speaking people have high amount of East Asian paternal lineages O1b1 (~75%) and D1a1 (~6%), which is absent from other Indian groups. They found that the modern Munda-speaking people have about 29% East/Southeast Asian , 15.5% West Asian and 55.5% South Asian ancestry on average. The authors concluded that there was a mostly male-dominated migration into India from Southeast Asia. Modern people in Laos, Cambodia and Malaysia were found to represent the ancestral group, which migrated into India, and spread the Austroasiatic languages. [12] Munda peoples are genetically closely related to Mah Meri and Temuan people of Malaysia. [13]
Some ethnic groups do not natively speak any of the Munda languages, but genetic evidence suggest gene flow of some Munda genetic lineages. [14]
The Austroasiatic languages are a large language family spoken throughout mainland Southeast Asia, South Asia and East Asia. These languages are natively spoken by the majority of the population in Vietnam and Cambodia, and by minority populations scattered throughout parts of Thailand, Laos, India, Myanmar, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Nepal, and southern China. Approximately 117 million people speak an Austroasiatic language, of which more than two-thirds are Vietnamese speakers. Of the Austroasiatic languages, only Vietnamese, Khmer, and Mon have lengthy, established presences in the historical record. Only two are presently considered to be the national languages of sovereign states: Vietnamese in Vietnam, and Khmer in Cambodia. The Mon language is a recognized indigenous language in Myanmar and Thailand, while the Wa language is a 'recognized national language' in the de facto autonomous Wa State within Myanmar. Santali is one of the 22 scheduled languages of India. The remainder of the family's languages are spoken by minority groups and have no official status.
Australo-Melanesians is an outdated historical grouping of various people indigenous to Melanesia and Australia. Controversially, some groups found in parts of Southeast Asia and South Asia were also sometimes included.
The Munda languages are a group of closely related languages spoken by about nine million people in India, Bangladesh and Nepal. Historically, they have been called the Kolarian languages. They constitute a branch of the Austroasiatic language family, which means they are more distantly related to languages such as the Mon and Khmer languages, to Vietnamese, as well as to minority languages in Thailand and Laos and the minority Mangic languages of South China. Bhumij, Ho, Mundari, and Santali are notable Munda languages.
The Gondi (Gōṇḍī) or Gond people, who refer to themselves as "Koitur", are an ethnolinguistic group in India. Their native language, Gondi, belongs to the Dravidian family. They are spread over the states of Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Uttar Pradesh, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, and Odisha. They are listed as a Scheduled Tribe for the purpose of India's system of reservation.
The fifteen Katuic languages form a branch of the Austroasiatic languages spoken by about 1.3 million people in Southeast Asia. People who speak Katuic languages are called the Katuic peoples. Paul Sidwell is the leading specialist on the Katuic languages. He notes that Austroasiatic/Mon–Khmer languages are lexically more similar to Katuic and Bahnaric the closer they are geographically. He says this geographic similarity is independent of which branch of the family each language belongs to. He also says Katuic and Bahnaric do not have any shared innovations, so they do not form a single branch of the Austroasiatic family, but form separate branches.
The Munda people are an Austroasiatic-speaking ethnic group of the Indian subcontinent. They speak Mundari as their native language, which belongs to the Munda subgroup of Austroasiatic languages. The Munda are found mainly concentrated in the south and East Chhotanagpur Plateau region of Jharkhand, Odisha and West Bengal. The Munda also reside in adjacent areas of Madhya Pradesh as well as in portions of Bangladesh, Nepal, and the state of Tripura. They are one of India's largest scheduled tribes. Munda people in Tripura are also known as Mura.
Genetics and archaeogenetics of South Asia is the study of the genetics and archaeogenetics of the ethnic groups of South Asia. It aims at uncovering these groups' genetic histories. The geographic position of the Indian subcontinent makes its biodiversity important for the study of the early dispersal of anatomically modern humans across Asia.
Haplogroup R is a widely distributed human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) haplogroup. Haplogroup R is associated with the peopling of Eurasia after about 70,000 years ago, and is distributed in modern populations throughout the world outside of sub-Saharan Africa.
The People of Assam inhabit a multi-ethnic, multi-linguistic and multi-religious society. They speak languages that belong to four main language groups: Tibeto-Burman, Indo-Aryan, Tai-Kadai, and Austroasiatic. The large number of ethnic and linguistic groups, the population composition, and the peopling process in the state has led to it being called an "India in miniature".
The Ho people are an Austroasiatic Munda ethnic group of India. They call themselves the Ho, Hodoko and Horo, which mean 'human' in their own language. Officially, however, they are mentioned in different subgroups like Kolha, Mundari, Munda, Kol and Kolah in Odisha. They are mostly concentrated in the Kolhan region of Jharkhand and Odisha where they constitute around 10.7% and 7.3% of the total Scheduled Tribe population respectively, as of 2011. With a population of approximately 700,000 in the state in 2001, the Ho are the fourth most numerous Scheduled tribe in Jharkhand after the Santals, Kurukhs, and Mundas. Ho also inhabit adjacent areas in the neighbouring states of Odisha, West Bengal and Bihar bringing the total to 806,921 as of 2001. They also live in Bangladesh and Nepal.
Mundari (Munɖari) is a Munda language of the Austroasiatic language family spoken by the Munda tribes in eastern Indian states of Jharkhand, Odisha and West Bengal. It is closely related to Santali. Mundari Bani, a script specifically to write Mundari, was invented by Rohidas Singh Nag. It has also been written in the Devanagari, Odia, Bengali, and Latin writing systems.
The peopling of India refers to the migration of Homo sapiens into the Indian subcontinent. Anatomically modern humans settled India in multiple waves of early migrations, over tens of millennia. The first migrants came with the Coastal Migration/Southern Dispersal 65,000 years ago, whereafter complex migrations within South and Southeast Asia took place. West-Asian (Iranian) hunter-gatherers migrated to South Asia after the Last Glacial Period but before the onset of farming. Together with ancient South Asian hunter-gatherers they formed the population of the Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC).
Y-DNA haplogroups in populations of South Asia are haplogroups of the male Y-chromosome found in South Asian populations.
Proto-Austroasiatic is the reconstructed ancestor of the Austroasiatic languages. Proto-Mon–Khmer has been reconstructed in Harry L. Shorto's Mon–Khmer Comparative Dictionary, while a new Proto-Austroasiatic reconstruction is currently being undertaken by Paul Sidwell.
In human mitochondrial genetics, haplogroup M18 is a human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) haplogroup. It is an India-specific lineage.
The father tongue hypothesis proposes the idea that humans tend to speak their father's language. The hypothesis is based on a 1997 proposal that linguistic affiliation correlates more closely with Y-chromosomal variation than with mitochondrial DNA variation. The initial work was performed on African and European samples by a team of population geneticists, led by Laurent Excoffier. On the basis of these, and similar findings by other geneticists, the hypothesis was elaborated by historical linguist George van Driem in 2010 that the teaching by a mother of her spouse's tongue to her children is a mechanism by which language has preferentially been spread over time. Focusing on prehistoric language shift in already settled areas, examples worldwide show that as little as 10–20% of prehistoric male immigration can cause a language switch, indicating an elite imposition such as may have happened with the appearance of the first farmers or metalworkers in the Neolithic, Bronze and Iron Ages.
The study of the genetics and archaeogenetics of the Gujarati people of India aims at uncovering these people's genetic history. According to the 1000 Genomes Project, "Gujarati" is a general term used to describe people who trace their ancestry to the region of Gujarat, located in the northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent, and who speak the Gujarati language, an Indo-European language. They have some genetic commonalities as well as differences with other ethnic groups of India.
Various genetic studies on Filipinos have been performed, to analyze the population genetics of the various ethnic groups in the Philippines.
Southeast Asia was first reached by anatomically modern humans possibly before 70,000 years ago. Anatomically modern humans are suggested to have reached Southeast Asia twice in the course of the Southern Dispersal migrations during and after the formation of a distinct East Asian clade from 70,000 to 50,000 years ago.
This article summarizes the genetic makeup and population history of East Asian peoples and their connection to genetically related populations, as well as Oceanians and partly, Central Asians and South Asians, which are collectively referred to as "East Eurasians" in population genomics.
The term 'Munda' is of Sanskritic origin and therefore not original in any sense to Austroasiatic speakers, although it has come to be used by one tribe as an alternative to their own term 'Horo' (Le. Roy's group; cf. Pfeffer above, p. 154; also Parkin 1990: 17, 23).
