"This great uncertainty, which may seem surprising, is due to the fact that no trace of an invasion is noted on the ground, that no cultural transformation is marked by the presence of archaeological material whose origin could be assigned to peripheral regions. Expressions like elite dominance or infiltration, despite their great evocative power, are only rhetorical devices. They do not succeed in masking our current incapacity to account for a supposed historical phenomenon... In neither of the two regions, steppe and oasis, do we find archaeological material which can be without discussion attributed to Indo-Iranians, or to Indo-Aryans, or to Iranians."