From Enclosure to Lineage: Reinterpreting Gotra as a Material-Social Institution in Early India
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2026
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| author | gemsofindology |
| author_facet | gemsofindology |
| contents | <p>This study re-examines the concept of gotra, conventionally understood as a genealogical lineage marker, by asking whether it originated as an abstract descent category or emerged from material-social organization. The analysis employs a triangulated methodology integrating contextual philology of early Vedic texts, historical linguistics tracing the transition from Sanskrit gotra to vernacular forms such as goth, archaeological and anthropological evidence on enclosure-based pastoral settlements, and — as a new contribution — architectural evidence tracing the domestic logic of enclosure from Harappan first-floor entry configurations to the ethnographically documented backdoor access of Nayar women in Kerala. The findings indicate that early Vedic usage situates gotra within a semantic field of cattle, enclosure, and containment rather than lineage. Linguistic continuity in North Indian vernaculars preserves this enclosure meaning. Visual evidence from Harappan seals and bronzes demonstrates that women were the central managers of the cattle economy from which gotra derived. The study further proposes that the resource-economics mechanism — specifically, the transition from communal abundance to accumulable scarcity — drove the abstraction of gotra from a matrilineally determined enclosure membership into a patrilineally transmitted lineage category. The later Brahmanical interpretation of gotra as lineage is thus identified as a secondary abstraction, not the original semantic core, and its patrilineal direction of transmission is identified as a product of the scarcity-driven transition, not its origin.</p> <p>Keywords: Gotra, cattle enclosure, goth, Harappan archaeology, matrilineal transition, Nayar, Dravidian kinship, resource economics, patrilineal abstraction, vernacular semantics</p> <p> </p> <p> </p> |
| format | Recurso digital |
| id | zenodo_https___doi_org_10_5281_zenodo_19875935 |
| institution | Zenodo |
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| publishDate | 2026 |
| publisher | Zenodo |
| record_format | zenodo |
| spellingShingle | From Enclosure to Lineage: Reinterpreting Gotra as a Material-Social Institution in Early India gemsofindology gotra cattle enclosure goth nayar matrilineal matrilineal transition patrilineal abstraction <p>This study re-examines the concept of gotra, conventionally understood as a genealogical lineage marker, by asking whether it originated as an abstract descent category or emerged from material-social organization. The analysis employs a triangulated methodology integrating contextual philology of early Vedic texts, historical linguistics tracing the transition from Sanskrit gotra to vernacular forms such as goth, archaeological and anthropological evidence on enclosure-based pastoral settlements, and — as a new contribution — architectural evidence tracing the domestic logic of enclosure from Harappan first-floor entry configurations to the ethnographically documented backdoor access of Nayar women in Kerala. The findings indicate that early Vedic usage situates gotra within a semantic field of cattle, enclosure, and containment rather than lineage. Linguistic continuity in North Indian vernaculars preserves this enclosure meaning. Visual evidence from Harappan seals and bronzes demonstrates that women were the central managers of the cattle economy from which gotra derived. The study further proposes that the resource-economics mechanism — specifically, the transition from communal abundance to accumulable scarcity — drove the abstraction of gotra from a matrilineally determined enclosure membership into a patrilineally transmitted lineage category. The later Brahmanical interpretation of gotra as lineage is thus identified as a secondary abstraction, not the original semantic core, and its patrilineal direction of transmission is identified as a product of the scarcity-driven transition, not its origin.</p> <p>Keywords: Gotra, cattle enclosure, goth, Harappan archaeology, matrilineal transition, Nayar, Dravidian kinship, resource economics, patrilineal abstraction, vernacular semantics</p> <p> </p> <p> </p> |
| title | From Enclosure to Lineage: Reinterpreting Gotra as a Material-Social Institution in Early India |
| topic | gotra cattle enclosure goth nayar matrilineal matrilineal transition patrilineal abstraction |
| url | https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19875935 |