Editing Names for India (section)

== India ==
{{Further|India (Herodotus)}}
[[File:Herodotus world map-en.svg|thumb|India was the lower [[Indus River|Indus]] basin in [[Herodotus]]'s view of the world.]]

The English term is from [[Ancient Greek|Greek]] ''Indikē'' (cf. Megasthenes' work [[Indica (Megasthenes)|Indica]]) or {{transliteration|grc|Indía}} ({{wikt-lang|grc|Ἰνδία}}), via Latin transliteration {{lang|la|India}}.<ref>{{citation |last=Harris |first=J. |title=Indography: Writing the "Indian" in Early Modern England |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IUtrAQAAQBAJ&pg=PT8 |year=2012 |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan US |isbn=978-1-137-09076-8 |page=8}}</ref><ref>{{citation |last=Mukherjee |first=Bratindra Nath |author-link=B. N. Mukherjee |title=Nationhood and Statehood in India: A historical survey |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MTGKAAAAMAAJ |date=2001 |publisher=Regency Publications |isbn=978-81-87498-26-1 |page=3}}: "Apparently the same territory was referred to as Hi(n)du(sh) in the Naqsh‐i‐Rustam inscription of Darius I as one of the countries in his empire. The terms Hindu and India ('Indoi) indicate an original indigenous expression like Sindhu. The name Sindhu could have been pronounced by the Persians as Hindu (replacing ''s'' by ''h'' and ''dh'' by ''d'') and the Greeks would have transformed the latter as Indo‐ (Indoi, Latin Indica, India) with ''h'' dropped..."</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.worldhistory.org/article/203/etymology-of-the-name-india/|title=Etymology of the Name India|newspaper=World History Encyclopedia|date=13 January 2011}}</ref>

The name derives from [[Sanskrit]] {{transliteration|sa|Sindhu}}, which was the name of the [[Indus River]] as well as the lower Indus basin (modern [[Sindh]], in Pakistan).<ref>{{citation |last=Mukherjee |first=Bratindra Nath |author-link=B. N. Mukherjee |title=Nationhood and Statehood in India: A historical survey |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MTGKAAAAMAAJ |date=2001 |publisher=Regency Publications |isbn=978-81-87498-26-1 |page=3}}: "In early Indian sources Sindhu denoted the mighty Indus river and also a territory on the lower Indus."</ref><ref name="Eggermont Sindhu">{{harvp|Eggermont, Alexander's Campaigns in Sind and Baluchistan|1975|p=145}}: "''Sindhu'' means a stream, a river, and in particular the Indus river, but likewise it denotes the territory of the lower Indus valley, or modern Sind. Therefore, the appellation ''Saindhavah'', means "inhabitants of the lower Indus valley".... In this respect Sindhu is no tribal name at all. It denotes a geographical unit to which different tribes may belong."</ref>

[[Franklin Southworth|Southworth]] suggests that the name ''Sindhu'' is in turn derived from ''Cintu'', a [[Dravidian languages|Dravidian]] word for [[date palm]], a tree commonly found in Sindh.<ref>Southworth, Franklin. [https://www.academia.edu/7336735/The_Reconstruction_of_Prehistoric_South_Asian_Language_Contact The Reconstruction of Prehistoric South Asian Language Contact] (1990) p. 228</ref><ref>Burrow, T. [https://dsalsrv04.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/app/burrow_query.py?qs=īntu&searchhws=yes Dravidian Etymology Dictionary] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210301115537/https://dsalsrv04.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/app/burrow_query.py?qs=%C4%ABntu&searchhws=yes |date=1 March 2021 }} p. 227</ref>

The [[Old Persian]] equivalent of {{transliteration|sa|Síndhu}} was {{transliteration|peo|Hindu}}.<ref>{{citation |last=Thieme |first=P. |chapter=Sanskrit ''sindu-/Sindhu-'' and Old Iranian ''hindu-/Hindu-'' |editor1=Mary Boyce |editor2=Ilya Gershevitch |title=W. B. Henning memorial volume |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=e3UBAAAAMAAJ |year=1970 |publisher=Lund Humphries |pages=447–450 |isbn=9780853312550 }}</ref> [[Darius I]] conquered Sindh in about 516 BCE, upon which the Persian equivalent {{transliteration|peo|Hinduš}} was used for the province at the lower Indus basin.<ref name="Eggermont Hindush"/><ref name="Dandamaev Hindush"/> [[Scylax of Caryanda]] who explored the Indus river for the Persian emperor probably took over the Persian name and passed it into Greek.<ref>{{citation |last1=Mouton |first1=Alice |last2=Rutherford |first2=Ian |last3=Yakubovich |first3=Ilya |title=Luwian Identities: Culture, Language and Religion Between Anatolia and the Aegean |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=a_B8VOPZlYIC&pg=PA450 |year=2013 |publisher=BRILL |isbn=978-90-04-25341-4 |ref={{sfnref|Mouton, Rutherford & Yakubovich, Luwian Identities|2013}}}}</ref> The terms {{transliteration|grc|Indos}} for the Indus river as well as "an Indian" are found in [[Herodotus]]'s Geography.<ref>{{citation |title=Herodotus, with an English Translation by A. D. Godley, Volume II |publisher=William Heinemann |location=London |year=1921 |url=https://archive.org/details/herodotuswitheng02herouoft |at=III.97–99}}</ref> The loss of the [[aspirated consonant|aspirate]] /h/ was probably due to the dialects of Greek spoken in [[Asia Minor]].<ref>{{citation |last=Horrocks |first=Geoffrey |title=Greek: A History of the Language and its Speakers |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BwHPKIUXKGsC |date=2009 |edition=Second |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |isbn=978-1-4443-1892-0 |pages=27–28}}: "Note finally that the letter H/η was originally used to mark word-initial aspiration... Since such aspiration was lost very early in the eastern Ionic-speaking area, the letter was recycled, being used first to denote the new, very open, long e-vowel [æ:] ... and then to represent the inherited long e-vowel [ε:] too, once these two sounds had merged. The use of H to represent open long e-vowels spread quite early to the central Ionic-speaking area and also to the Doric-speaking islands of the southern Aegean, where it doubled up both as the marker of aspiration and as a symbol for open long e-vowels."</ref><ref>{{citation |last=Panayotou |first=A. |chapter=Ionic and Attic |editor1=A.-F. Christidis |title=A History of Ancient Greek: From the Beginnings to Late Antiquity |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-83307-3 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WJbd0m6YaFkC |year=2007 |page=410}}: "The early loss of aspiration is mainly a characteristic of Asia Minor (and also of the Aeolic and Doric of Asia Minor)...In Attica, however (and in some cases in Euboea, its colonies, and in the Ionic-speaking islands of the Aegean), the aspiration survived until later... During the second half of the fifth century BC, however, orthographic variation perhaps indicates that 'a change in the phonetic quality of [h] was taking place' too."</ref> Herodotus also generalised the term "Indian" from the people of lower Indus basin, to all the people living to the east of Persia, even though he had no knowledge of the geography of the land.<ref>{{citation |last=Arora |first=Udai Prakash |chapter=Ideas of India in Ancient Greek Literature |editor=Irfan Habib |title=India — Studies in the History of an Idea |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AyhuAAAAMAAJ |year=2005 |publisher=Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers |isbn=978-81-215-1152-0 |page=47}}: "The term 'Indians' was used by [[Herodotus]] as a collective name for all the peoples living east of Persia. This was also a significant development over [[Hecataeus of the Sindi|Hekataios]], who had used this term in a strict sense for the groups dwelling in Sindh only."</ref>

By the time of [[Alexander the Great|Alexander]], {{transliteration|grc|Indía}} in [[Koine Greek]] denoted the region beyond the Indus. Alexander's companions were aware of at least India up to the Ganges delta ([[Gangaridai]]).<ref>{{harvp|Eggermont, Alexander's Campaigns in Sind and Baluchistan|1975|pp=13-14}}</ref><ref name=Mukherjee/> Later, [[Megasthenes]] included in India the southern peninsula as well.<ref name=Mukherjee>{{citation |last=Mukherjee |first=Bratindra Nath |author-link=B. N. Mukherjee |title=Nationhood and Statehood in India: A historical survey |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MTGKAAAAMAAJ |date=2001 |publisher=Regency Publications |isbn=978-81-87498-26-1 |pages=3–4}}</ref>

Latin {{lang|la|India}} is used by [[Lucian]] (2nd century CE).{{citation needed|date=November 2018}} {{lang|ang|India}} was known in [[Old English language]] and was used in [[Alfred the Great|King Alfred]]'s translation of [[Paulus Orosius]]. In [[Middle English]], the name was, under French influence, replaced by {{lang|enm|Ynde}} or {{lang|enm|Inde}}, which entered [[Early Modern English]] as "{{lang|en-emodeng|Indie}}".  The name "India" then came back to English usage from the 17th century onward, and may be due to the influence of Latin, or Spanish or Portuguese.{{citation needed|date=November 2018}}

Sanskrit [[wikt:इन्दु|''indu'']] "drop (of [[Soma (drink)|Soma]])", also a term for the [[Moon]], is unrelated, but has sometimes been erroneously connected.{{citation needed|date=September 2023}}