The Indo-Aryans and the closely related Indo-Iranians descended from the Proto-Indo-Iranian culture which had developed on the Eurasian steppes north of the Caspian Sea (roughly, modern-day Kazakhstan). The Indo-Aryan migration from these steppes into the Indus Valley began in around 1900 BCE. The nomadic pastoralists who set off from their grassy homeland referred to themselves as Arya (“compatriot,” and, later, “noble”), and to their territory in the Indian subcontinent as Aryavarta (“Land of the Arya”).

At around the same time, their cousins the Indo-Iranians descended onto the Iranian plateau. In the sacred texts of Zoroastrianism, known as the Avesta, the Ancient Persians speak of themselves as Airya, from which derives “Iran.”

The Indo-Aryans and Indo-Iranians used Arya or Airya as a........

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