Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies - DUBOIS, Abbé Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies, Dubois | Page 141

SUPPOSED ARABIAN SETTLEMENTS
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have been the bravest, not to say the only, warrior that
peaceful Egypt had to boast of for a period of more than
sixteen centuries, and they also lead one to believe that
he was the greatest of all conquerors, with an empire
extending from the Danube to the Ganges. But his Indian
conquests were as temporary and unstable as those of his
illustrious rival Alexander the Great much later on in the
world's history.
As to the settlements that the Arabs are supposed to
have made in India, according to some authors, I think
only superficial students will be found ready to believe in
them. The fact that they are nomads, who have always
lived a wandering life within reach of India, gives some
appearance of reality to the theory. Some indeed believe
that the caste system was borrowed from them, since it
but, as a matter of fact, it is a custom
still exists in Arabia
common to all the ancient races of the earth.
I do not trace the origin of the Brahmins either to
Egypt or to Arabia, and I believe them to be the descen-
dants not of Shem, as many argue, but of Japheth. Accord-
ing to my theory they reached India from the north, and
I should place the first abode of their ancestors in the
neighbourhood of the Caucasus.
Two famous mountains situated in Northern India,
known as Great Meru (Maha-Meru) and Mount Mandara
(Mandara Parvata), are frequently mentioned in their old
books and in their prayers, liturgies, and civil and religious
ceremonies. These mountains, which I believe to be one
and the same under slightly different names, are so far
away that their precise whereabouts is unknown to the
Brahmins of to