punjab culture and middle east

[Shah-Jehan]

only effinity is there with Pakistani Punjab .. indian Punjabis are different

right....even the modern name of the region "Punjab" derived from conglomeration of the Persian/Farsi word Punj meaning five and ab meaning water in reference to the 5 great rivers in the region.

[gum_dum]

right....even the modern name of the region "Punjab" derived from conglomeration of the Persian/Farsi word Punj meaning five and ab meaning water in reference to the 5 great rivers in the region.

Yes, i believe if not for sikhsm then Indian punjab today would have been one big Haryana state. They are not punjabis in historical sense which always meant people from country of 5 rivers. They barely have 2 and are known as doabis. Their culture is sikhsm which have nothing to do with punjabi culture. Its just a 300 years old religion, punjab culture is thousands of years ago. Sikh live in their own buble.

[Berlin88]

The extreme Northwest of the Indian subcontinent has always been open to Iranic influences since ancient times. This predates the advent of Islam brought by Turkics and later Persians.

The "extreme Northwest" area historians refer to would correspond to modern day Pakistan [Kashmir, Sind, Baluchistan, Punjab, N.W.F.P.] but its presumed by historians that the Achaemenids and Sasanians had cultural links with western India far south as Maharashtra too. http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/gujarat Outside of cultural influences, the Dasht-e-Lut and Dasht-e-Kavir deserts in Iran provided strong barriers to human gene flow.

West Asian influences on India (modern nation-state) were historically, and still are confined mainly to the western peripheries of South Asia which face towards the Arabian Sea (Gujarat-Konkan coast with infamous Gulf of Cambay and further south, Malabar coast of Kerala). Arab and Persian merchants, refugees, mercenaries and travelers from Red Sea and Persian Gulf regions, entered India first through the ports of Broach in pre-Islamic times, and then through the Gulf of Cambay during Ibn Batuta's time. Aside from Malabar in the south, these were their entry points into India.

Then also, Zoroastrian refugees of Iran immigrated to the western peripheries of South Asia (Sindh, Gujarat) because the Thar desert and Hindu Kush presented formidable barriers to movement due to hostile environments there. Baghdadi Jews, Europeans and Armenian Christians from Julfa entered India through Surat.

"Indus Valley and later in the time of Bahram II, the Sassanian Empire comprised "the lands at the middle course of the Indus and its mouth, Katch, Kathiawar, Malwa and the adjoining hinterland of these countries."

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=...gL&redir_esc=y

[Chocolate_Hound]

Meh, Punjabi culture is still fundamentally Indian. Turbans though are a Persian invention, so it is clear that the two regions have had significant contact with each other. They live in a transition zone with the Middle East however, so I could imagine they are familiar with Islamic cultures, sort of how Greeks are familiar with Turks. So Punjabis aren’t MENA, but they are well aware of MENA culture.

[Chocolate_Hound]

They’re not that similar. Turbans were a Persian invention but the Sikh style is visibly different from the Muslim version. Punjabis in almost all respects are closer to other Indians than they are even to Persians. They are their own thing, they don’t remind me anything of Muslims.

[Corporate_Demolisher]

India has nothing to do with the Middle East. Arabs probably have more in common with Southern Europeans than they do with Indians.

[Chocolate_Hound]

black wolf dude don't b fooled by the Pakistani troll.. Pakistanis have nothing to do with Punjabi culture... people don't even know there are Punjabis in Pakistan.. Punjabi culture is what it is because of Sikhs... ask any neutral... we have nothing to do with middle east.. our culture influences others not the other way round. turbans been worn in india way before than in middle east. Punjabi is other name for Sikhs.

Actually turbans aren't worn in India at all except in Punjab. Sikhs make up only 1% of the country's population. Most denominations involving Hinduism, Jainism, etc. do not require any sort of headdress for the men. Turbans were a Persian invention, so it's clear the influence in North India is a result of Iranic exposure.

But obviously as MENA is such a broad region it heavily depends on which groups we're comparing them to. Levantines? Very little if any similarities. Likewise with Turks.