"True, the tradition, which is found in Epics, Puránas and astronomers, which knows nothing of an invasion but, on the contrary, has the IAs spreading out with their culture in all directions, and which places the R V (its arrangement) just before 3102, appears to be late, within, say, 1st-6th centuries CE. But we must not ignore the weighty evidence of the classical sources (the Megasthenes report c 312- 280 BC) giving related chronologies. Arrian (Indika 1, 9), Pliny (VI, 21, 4) and Solinus (52, 5)—all give dates of 6000+ for Indian royal genealogies: so this aspect of the tradition is at the very latest of the 4th century BC. I am not claiming here that the tradition is necessarily correct in all (though it could be in most of) its aspects but only that it is not as late as it seems at first sight."