Arctic Home of the Vedas

The Arctic Home in the Vedas is a book on the origin of Aryanic People by Bal Gangadhar Tilak, a mathematician turned astronomer, historian, journalist, philosopher and political leader of India. It propounded the idea that the North Pole was the original home of Aryans during the pre-glacial period which they had to leave due to the ice deluge around 8000 B.C. and had to migrate to the Northern parts of Europe and Asia in search of lands for new settlements. In support to his theory, Tilak presented certain Vedic hymns, Avestic passages, Vedic chronology and Vedic calendars with interpretations of the contents in detail. The Arctic Home in the Vedas has been cited in the works of Julius Evola, Savitri Devi, Rene Guenon, Jean Haudry and John G. Bennett. M.S. Golwalkar, in his 1939 publication We or Our Nationhood Defined, famously stated that “Undoubtedly we — Hindus — have been in undisputed and undisturbed possession of this land for over eight or even ten thousand years before the land was invaded by any foreign race.” Golwalkar was inspired by Tilak’s The Arctic Home in the Vedas. Gowalkar took over the idea of 10,000 years, arguing that the North Pole at that time was located in India.