Neanderthals weren’t just ignorant cavemen
Like so many other things, it started with something rather trivial – an e-mail post from my good friend Aroon bearing news of the discovery of a 51,000-year-old toe bone of a large deer in a cave in Germany.
What was unique about this toe bone were its carvings – they had a pattern to it. The German archaeologist opined that “It’s clearly a decoration with a kind of symbolic character. … You might even call it the initial start of art, something which was not done by accident, but with a clear plan in mind.” That discovery was evidence that Neanderthals weren’t just ignorant cavemen, as scientists once believed, but clearly capable of artistic or symbolic expression.
The idea of Neanderthals and advanced art threw my imaginative brain cells into a tizzy. In my mind’s eye, I saw the clear stamp of gorillas and Chimpanzees in images of Neanderthals from National Geographic and elsewhere.
I particularly remembered the movie Planet of the Apes. I started wondering if Neanderthals could be the ancestors of the present-day apes. It’s not surprising they were capable of such wonderful art!
Simian engineers did not monkey around
Weren’t the Monkeys of the Ramayana often highly sophisticated? Hanuman (who spoke immaculate Sanskrit), Angad, and Sugriva? Didn’t the Monkeys in the Ramayana leave the greatest example of engineering achievement from the ‘Pre-Ancient’ World in the Ram Setu connecting India and Sri Lanka?
So, I concluded that Neanderthals evolved into the Monkeys of Ramayana of the Treta Yuga and later mutated (degenerated!) to the present-day apes. There’s no mention of monkeys in the Mahabharata which occurred in the Dwapar Yuga which followed the Treta Yuga and lasted for 864,000 years, according to our hallowed Puranas.
Children of Immortal Bliss
Now how about Rama, Sita, Lakshmana, and the rest?
They ‘could not be’ relegated to the same ancestry as lowly monkeys but had to belong to a different (superior) species. These beings shared some similarities, some human failings – just like us. They had God-like attributes like the Rishis of yore who dominated the earth in the Satya Yuga. These Rishis wrote our Vedas, the ancient wisdom.
I surmised that Rama, Lakshmana, and the others were descendants of these Rishis but mutated (degenerated) to more humanlike attributes. (I have lately grown very fond of the word ‘mutation’ and the concept, thanks to Covid-19). So, we humans (Homo Sapiens) are proud descendants of these ancient Rishis. Didn’t Swami Vivekananda call us the Children of Immortal Bliss?
It won’t be out of place to talk about the Satya Yuga and the venerable Rishis who dominated an era that lasted for 1,728,000 years. The Rishis were exceptional entities, ‘almost gods,’ possessed of exceptional, almost supernatural powers. The incomparable Vedas and spiritual masterpieces they wrote expressed the highest ‘truths’ in a complex and incomprehensible language. They could travel in space and appear simultaneously in two places. This, I am told, can be explained by Quantum Mechanics, echoes of which appear in obscure passages in the Vedas.
And they did all this sitting in jungles or beside the rivers on hallowed Indian soil (partially and unfortunately now occupied by Pakistan).
The origin of Rakshas
A big puzzle remained. Who was the third great entity, the Rakshas? They’re variously described as giants or demons. A friend, Sushil (you need highly intelligent, resourceful friends for such mammoth imaginations), resolved the issue easily.
Sushil led me to the Denisovans. This group, slightly different from the Homo Sapiens and Neanderthals, were discovered relatively recently. Their skeletons are taller than 7 feet, even the women. One skeleton was 9’ 2“ tall. They had relatively large teeth – in one case a double row of teeth and fit extremely well with our perception of Rakshas – tall, large teeth, ferocious looking. Rakshas identified in both Treta and Dwapar Yugs seems to have petered out as Kali Yug arrived. But they appear to have left some of their genes which occasionally manifest in some men and groups exhibiting demonic qualities.
A setback in my theory
I was quite gleeful about my theory that the Banors (Monkeys) and Rakshas of Indian Mythology fit so well with our standard understanding of anthropology. Then a sudden jolt knocked me out. It came from my good friend Aroon, who first got me started.
Aroon is a stickler for time frames and exactitude. Obsessed! He insisted that our Puranas say that wise Rishis dominated the Satya Yug for 1,728,000 years, followed by the Treta Yug (the Ramayana era) which lasted for 1,296,000 years. Dwapar Yug, ( the Mahabharata period) came next and lasted for the next 864000 years; and finally, Kali Yug, our present time, which started in 3102 BC is slated to have a lifespan of 432,000 years.
These time frames don’t appear to have any resemblance to modern science which says that the earliest Homo Sapiens, Neanderthals, and Denisovans, all arrived between 200,000 and 300,000 years ago.
“Your grand theory will just not cut it,” Aroon insisted.
My Holy Grail
That demoralized me. But just as I began drowning my sorrows in whiskey, I had an Aha! moment! I figured out the mystery of it all.
The Rishis established the Time Scale of the Yugs based on the logarithmic scale, a complex non-linear formulation–not the simple ‘10’ or ‘e’ one is used to (Rishis never did anything simple!) As for documentation, you just needed to know where to look in the Vedas – in some obscure sloka. The ancient Rishis were very smart people. They invented it all. We never tire of preaching to the world that they invented ZERO. Without the ‘zero’, there would be nothing–right?
I came out of my gigantic mental exercise thoroughly exhausted but immensely satisfied. I had finally figured out my GRAND UNIFIED THEORY OF HINDU MYTHOLOGY AND ANTHROPOLOGY. Sophisticated monkeys from the Ramayana regressed to present-day apes, the Rakshas originated from the Denisovans, and the venerable Rishis of yore were kind enough to let us mutate from them.
My biggest breakthrough came from reconciling the Puranic Time Scale of the Yugs – a complex logarithmic formulation – with our mundane linear scale of days, months, and years.
Like all great theories, there were gaping holes in my own for future thinkers to ponder – see the famous Missing Link of Darwin; the Black Holes of Modern Astrophysics, or Einstein’s elusive Grand Unified Theory. I hold out immense hope for that future within our very own coterie of brilliant thinkers ingrained with highly sophisticated Hindutva ideology and powerful imaginations. And why not? Haven’t they and their kin taught us about India’s glorious past? India stands unique in the history of humankind as the inventors of air travel (Pushpak Rath); guided missiles; and plastic surgery (Ganesha’s head) eons before the modern age!
