"Ancient Indians" Topic

Hi all,

As the opponents of Alexander the Great, would anyone be able to say what skin tone the ancient Indians he fought against would have had? I know that a number of the tribes from the Punjab area came from the Russian steppes, hence the lighter tones. (According to my girlfriend, who's family is from that area ) So would the more darker/southern indian tones be more appropriate? Any suggestions/help/information would be greatly appreciated

Thanks
Ryan

Well if you look at tapestries and pottery from this era, the people are of a caramel coloured skin. Not exceptionally dark, but discernably darker than someone of say Greek descent.
Sorry no citation, or sources, but if you have netflix, watch Alexander the great by nat Geo, they show paintings from India from this time while talking about Alexanders war with India.

Darker skin. Some lighter skinned Aryans had come down into NE India, but most 'white' immigration comes with the Sakas, Partians, Huns, Moslems, Turks and is thus later, so Alexander's opponents would have been mainly dark skinned.

I'm 4000 miles from home at the moment and my library but I'm sure one of my books on the period said that of the Indians that fought Alexander there were some units of Forest Indians who were darker skinned than the rest of the Indian army.

Period eyewitnesses comment that the white muslin garments contrasted starkly with the Indian dark skin tone.

Arrian, probably using Megasthenes or Nearchus, says the northern Indians resemble the Egyptians while the southern Indians are as dark as the 'Ethiopians'. Those who live on the near side of the Indus are lighter skinned than other Indians.

Here's JJ's reference
"The Indians wear linen garments, as Nearchus says, the linen coming from the trees of which I have already made mention. This linen is either brighter than the whiteness of other linen, or the people's own blackness makes it appear unusually bright."

I think it was herodotus who reported that the indians were the same skin colour as the egyptians.

Thank you for the references and suggestions. They're greatly appreciated!

I'll be able to use my girlfriend's skintone for when I paint my late 19th century Indian troops, though! lol

"I think it was herodotus who reported that the indians were the same skin colour as the egyptians."

Looks like it was Herodotus who says the southern Indians were as dark as Ethiopians. By inference the northerners are lighter skinned but nothing specific as far as I can find.

I've seen some good Indian elephants in 72mm scale. How is that going to look alongsie an army that is 28mm scale?

I've seen some good Indian elephants in 72mm scale. How is that going to look alongsie an army that is 28mm scale?

?Como? You mean 72mm, or 1/72nd?

If you REALLY meant to say 72mm, then they'd be kind'a like the monstrous elephant-like creatures, the Oliphaunts, or mūmaks, in J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings ------ they'd be HUGE!

If on the other hand you meant to say 1/72nd scale, 1/72nd is roughly 20mm scale IIRC. So opposite of the above, they'd be dwarfs…

1/72 is more like 23-24mm, so a heffalump at the larger end of the size range in 1/72 might not look too bad in 28mm…

…on the other hand, 28mm is more like 32mm, so it's going to look rather tiny!

!/72 is the old one ink = 6 ft scale. So a man is gong to be 22.5 mm. A 28mm man is nearly 25% bigger than that and worse still 25% bigger is a whopping 100% greater volume… so your 1/72 elephants would look like babies .

If I had a dime for every time someone asked this question…