Who are the People of Kashmir? 

Love you Kashmir and beloved Kashmiri people from a Persian and Iranian 💙

I’m a Kashmiri Pandit Brahmin from a long line of Kashmiri natives. We have a scrapbook for at least 6 generations. My great grandmother was a fiery redhead, I’ve got cousins who are ginger and while I am dark haired for whatever reason I have loads of red hair in my beard

Conspiracy theory: Mason and Paul from Masaman and LangFocus are the same person

Kashmir valley people are so so beautiful and unique looking

Regions like this interest the hell out of me. The meeting of such different cultures ethnicities and phenotypes and also people left over from the past is always an interesting thing.

i'm glad you didn't ruin the video just to avoid offending someone somewhere in the internet.

I was in Kashmir last June. Beautiful place.

When narrating history, one side must be offended. But the reality must always be told. Good job!

Thanks for making an unbiased report on people of Kashmir,it was informative and we'll researched. Good job keep it up! P.S This is coming from an ethnic Kashmiri(koshur) .

Kashimir people are beautiful.

I am a Kashmiri living in Kashmir and I learned a few things from this video today. I dont know to what degree he is right, but yes, Kashmiris do look different from the surrounding people....

I'm half Kashmiri through my father (Pakistani), and I know very little about my heritage so this was really informative - thank you!

I had a friend from Kashmir and she looked very European

You didn’t mention autosomal dna testing! Haplogroups are fine but the answer to why they look european has been established by genome wide analysis if ancient Proto Indo European yamnaya skeletons which were European by modern racial definitions. Kashmiri people have 20%+ european ancestry!

i’m afghani and i took a dna test and turned out to be 61% south asian (consisting of afghani and pakistani descent) and 29% northern indian ( had ancestors that lived in Punjab and Western India). and i’m convinced I have kashmiri descent in me. i am very light in complexion just like the unique diverse diaspora of Kashmiri people and the dna results back it up.

The people of Kashmir sometimes remind me of the Iberian Peninsula, the Basque regions of Spain and the people from the various countries that touch the Mediterranean Sea.

Who are the people of Kashmir? They are only people to have a national anthem written by Led Zeppelin.

Kashmiris look very similar to Afghans and tajiks. Love from Tajikistan

We Kashmiris have always wanted freedom and have always asked for complete independence of Kashmir (except most kashmiri Hindus who have always betrayed their brothers in Kashmir for their religion) We are sick and tired of curfews and killings every other day.

My family is from Azad Kashmir, district Mirpur. Linguistically mirpuris speak photrawri this is closely related to punjabi, but regardeded by some as a language in its own right. Looks wise my family show the full range from Chinese looking ( me), to very fair to dark complections. There is alot of linguistic variation in Azad Kashmir. For example hinko speakers in Muzafrabad. My general reflection is that kashmiris in Azad kashmir closely resemble the Pakistani populations on the pakistan side of the border. Kashmir like the subcontinent has a rich history. Lets all celebrate that. Both Pakistan and india should come together to find a solution that ends the sufferring of kashmiris. And respects the territorial integrity of Kashmir. I would love to be able to visit sirinager.

great video!!! you didnt offend anybody. being a kashmiri, i can relate to what you said. as for the question, dardic people (kashmiris, shina, kho people, kalashas) are unique, inhabiting a region surrounded by indo-aryans (punjabis, sindhis, potoharis) and iranics (pakhtoons, balochs, tajiks). this small area has many different ethnicities living within (wakhis, kho, shina, burushos, baltis, kashmiris, dogris, ladakhis, drokpa etc. The language families are dardic (kashur, khowar, shina) iranic (wakhi, pashto) language isolate (burusho) sino-tibetan (balti, ladakhi) indo-aryan (punjabi, pahari, gojri)

I’ve been to Kashmir twice. The last time I went was June 2017. I was the only western tourist there.

1:10 Omg that child's eyes are BEAUTIFUL. They're Golden!!!!

Kashmir has a ancient culture going back 5000 years. It is mentioned in the Mahabharata.

Great video man, I'm a Australian born in Gilgit-Balsistan. Trying to understand the whole religious, ethnic, political issue in Kashmir is a real struggle and you've done well. Don't worry too much about being politically correct, there's no way you can discuss this topic without offending one group or another. Education on the issue is biased and national rhetoric on both sides is through the roof. Also regarding the Burusho, the language is pronounced 'Brushaski' the first u being silent. Otherwise epic work Man

Beautifully made content. The effort put into the research is clear for those who know

Hey man. I'm a black guy in KCMO. I just want to thank you for being as honest as you can on all your videos. Thanks.

I continuly come back for ur videos. Great content and some of the best presentations I've seen. Keep it up man!

To me, Kashmiri Pandits don't look Dardic. They look like pandits from Punjab and Haryana, but with fairer skin, which is understandable given the cold high altitude climate.

+Masaman I was born in Kashmir and i had Blue eyes with hazelish tint and my hair is light brown. It is common to more people than you think in Kashmir , My family moved to Shimla ( India ) from Kashmir in 2004 and that also includes my relatives and we have no connection to Americans or British People but everyone in our family is while and have either blue or hazel eyes and brown hair

I have only heard and seen Kashmir through a very small window of knowledge. The people seem so unique, but for some reason hidden from the media. Yah loves Kashmir and all her tribes!

Love Kashmir ...May God bless all kashmirian💚❤

Dude your channel answers all the questions ive always had about ethnicity and genetics around the world. It is fantastic sir, keep up the good work!

I had met my friend rohan. He was from kashmir, he had green eyes.

Kashmir.. stay happy and peaceful. To whichever country u belong. God bless u with lots of happiness and prosperity. I'm from India and we believe in love and peacefulness. Jay Hind.

Kashmir people look somewhat European. That must be why the area is part of the stretch known as Indo-European.

New subscriber here, love your stuff. Indoeuropeans in East Asia are a fascinating subject on their own, especially the Yuezhi and how they ended up creating an empire all the way over at India. It should be a great topic for your next video.

Love your truth and respect your research. Keep up the good work.

Great Video!

Iam.also kashmiri bhat /But IN PUNJAB LOVE YOU KASHMIRIS ♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️YOU ARE LOVELY KASHMIRIS .....YOU ARE BEST ♥️♥️♥️♥️

Mason: You know we haven't had a shitstorm in a while

Oh, let the sun beat down upon my face And stars fill my dream I'm a traveler of both time and space To be where I have been To sit with elders of the gentle race This world has seldom seen They talk of days for which they sit and wait All will be revealed Talk in song from tongues of lilting grace Sounds caress my ear And not a word I heard could I relate The story was quite clear Oh, baby, I been blind Oh, yeah, mama, there ain't no denyin' Oh, ooh yes, I been blind Mama, mama, ain't no denyin', no denyin' All I see turns to brown As the sun burns the ground And my eyes fill with sand As I scan this wasted land Try to find, try to find the way I feel Oh, pilot of the storm who leaves no trace Like sorts inside a dream Leave the path that led me to that place Yellow desert stream Like Shangri-la beneath the summer moon I will return again As the dust that floats finds you We're moving through Kashmir Oh, father of the four winds fill my sails Cross the sea of years With no provision but an open face Along the straits of fear Oh, when I want, when I'm on my way, yeah And my feet wear my fickle way to stay Ooh, yeah yeah, oh, yeah yeah, But I'm down oh, yeah yeah, oh, yeah Yeah, but I'm down, so down Ooh, my baby, oh, my baby Let me take you there Come on, oh let me take you there Let me take you there

So well done! We appreciate your work. I will share with others on my SM

It's neither Pakistan.. Nor India..... Its only Kashmir

Love their sweaters

Kashmiris are a part of Dardic community, the earliest inhabitants tracing back to Rig-Vedic times. Mostly resembling modern Slavic people, or maybe ancient Tocharians and modern Nuristanis. In the later Vedic ages, as Vedic Kingdoms moved South ward, there were minor additions from Indic regions, still retaining PIE features. Centuries later, India was under various Hindu rulers, and Kashmir formed important portion of their Kingdom. These Hindu rulers in turn were mixtures of PIE, Iranians, and Native Indians, so during their reign all these genes moved to Kashmir, forming combinations. During Mauryan Empire, Seleucid and Bactrain Empires established close ties with India. Kashmir was the route, so again Kashmiris got Greek/Iranian genes from there. By this time native Kashmiris had significant Indic genes, specially among lower castes. Then there were Kushans, Scythians which added to Iranic/Greek features. At the same time there were mixing from plains of India. During Islamisation, Kashmir gained a lot of gene pool from Iran and neighbouring Pashtuns, who in turn had genes from other parts of middle east. This diluted their PIE DNA, and brought in more middle eastern than Slavic/PIE look. Isolated tribes however retained PIE/pre Vedic traits. Mongol/Mughal rule brought in more Persian gene(as opposed to Turkic, because Mughals considered themselves more Persian than Turkic) Turkic-ation of neighbouring Turkestan, Tarim Basin brought some Turkic/Mongolic genes too. At the same time there were continous influx from Indian plains, with clans like Gaddis,Gujjars, Jats, Rajputs continuously moving in and out. Sikh empire brought Kashmir eventually under Dogri rule, who were from neighbouring Rajasthan originally. This made the elite Hindus more closer to mainland India, who by this time were already far-far removed from PIE. Kashmiris in a word, are similar to Afghans, with a bit more Vedic genes due to "lesser extent" of Islamisation and mountainous terrain which prevented any genocide. However this is very different and may vary even from family to family, and there can be a wide array.

I love Kashmir really innocent people of India but politicians don't disturb my Kashmir brother and sister Iam from Chennai Tamilnadu South India

Eurocentrists place waaaaay too much "germanic" phenotype traits on the Greek expansion of Alexander. Greeks themselves have a very low frequency of blonde/light hair and blue/green eyes. even the Romans noted how these traits were extremely common in the Germanic tribes as opposed to the Romans, who came from similar southern European stock as the Greeks.

I assume they are called "Kashmiri".

One of the most underrated channel ❤❤

Much knowledge gained in eleven minutes 😊😊🌹🙏🏻 thank you

Your channel is so interesting! 👍

Kashmir wants freedom, freekashmir

8:19 Conflict...was imminent (about to happen) and not eminent (high-status).

Masaman, I know you wont ever see this comment, but I love the humor tied in with the music; I laughed for ages. I wish backwards time travel was a possibility, if only to see the hundreds of kingdoms and their unique cultures. Hopefully some future AI comp can recreate something similar and animate out out. It will probably be a fucking video game my future kids will play 🇱🇰🇺🇸

Kashmiri here.., thanks for doing this video. How we look like is not as important as our culture and traditions. We are proud of our culture and religion and we will never bow down to Indian colonialism. We want freedom and we will never stop our struggle for freedom.

Thank you very much Mr M God Bless you all.... You made me feel little better today....

We are not pakistani or india. From azad kashmir we want freedom from both countries plz

Being a Pakistani Khasmiri I will say that we are happy to stay in Pakistan. I am living in kashmir happily and I can proudly say we are pakistani. We are Muslim and we want to be with Pakistan as our fore father wanted.

Awesome research and really well presented bru! And it is probably because (as my grandfather used to say) ginger was the original hair colour, but they all diverged later on haha

Mirpuris and Kashmiris have lots of similarities red blond hair and green blue hazel eyes...with the lighter skin

Great understanding about recent & ancient history of Kashmir. 🥁😀

*10th century Kashmiri polymath Abhinavagupta’s description of Kashmir:* Where people normally are poetic and wise, Where even warriors are articulate, Women of cities are lustrous as the moon And charming in their gait, Where accomplished female practitioners of yoga are Bright as the spark of fire Particularly due to the complete opening of the path of the shushumna nerve in them they are also lustrous as the sky in the state of the lunar eclipse Where the wine known as madrika Brings maturity in the talk of love of lovers In which part of the world people get engaged Confidently and unobstructed in the fare of love Where the Gods take interest in remaining engaged in the delight of the chakras and where departs the joy of life and blessedness of liberation where contemplative practiotioners of yoga, munis dwell at various spots And where does Shiva dwell himself all the time. I therefore consider Kashmir As the proper place of yogic accomplishments Siddhi there is no place on the whole of this earth Which may compare with Kashmir in this respect Nor in the respect of contentment or fulfilment of all aspirations.

What a masterpiece!

I believe I’ve read that the Scythian are still around, existing only in the small remnant in the Caucasus: Ossetia.

beautiful people hope they get their independence soon

Damn good look bro Keep up the good academic outlook man !

I think the whole region should get their independence and have their own peaceful state. India, Pakistan, and China should just free these people.

We want freedom man. No nation 'deserves' us. And thanx fr confirming we are different from the rest of south asia.

Much love from Kashmir

They are our cousins...pashtoon and kashmiris are cousins.

I am a Kashmiri with yellow skin and really curly black hair.Mashallah this video explains our history really good, but you forgot one thing that is forgotten about us. We were apart of the lost tribes of Israel, our cousin marriages started because we had been exiled and had no one to do the deed with so cousin marriages started.

Masaman, I have another suggestion: Do a video on "On What On Earth Happened To The Garamantes?" civilization in ancient SW Libya. They were a Berber tribe that developed a little known but advanced society.

love that clair de lune started playing

As someone of South Asian ancestry, I've always been fascinated by Kashmir

I love this. I wish there was more videos on the history of kashmir

hey Mason very interesting video. I served over in Afghanistan with the New Zealand army. We were based in Bamyan province. We saw a lot of European looking Afghani people with ginger and blonde hair and a lot of people with green eyes. I always wondered what their genetic back ground was. Everyone thought they were just part Russian haha.

After watching most of the Masaman videos I am amazed that he knows so much in detail about the subcontinent. Infact he knows more than the common people residing here. Definitely knows infinity times more than our politicians who makes us fight on the basis of color, caste and creed.

Kashmiri are Dardic aryans. They speak Indo european language. But they have culture simliraties with central asia

Love from Kashmir, I am always confused about who i am, thought of getting a DNA test kit, but too expensive. Thanks for this video.

fair complexion and red hairs can be found in native people of Uttar Pradesh too... but very rarely...

Territorial disputes--or all wars, really--are so unfortunate. My dad always tells me about how his parents and sister visited Kashmir in the 70s and how flaking out on that trip was one of his biggest regrets, because he was told how beautiful it was. As a South Indian-American I've never visited North India (or should I say North-South-Asia? lol) but if I do, Kashmir would be first on my list. Such beauty in their land, clothing, culture, etc. As for the poll, I'd guess that the Kashmiri people possess phenotypes that most closely resemble those of the original Indo-Aryan people, and were able to maintain these traits due to isolation in that mountainous region, just like you suggested. Anyone interested in Kashmiri culture should go to their local Indian grocery store and look for Kashmiri tea! It's typically served with chopped pistachios and it's very fragrant and delicious.

Oh, can you do a dna basics video, on how to understand the subject as a whole?

Finally a RU-vidr who will address disputes territories as they are. Literally every other RU-vidr will pull the most basic map from Google images and slap it on their video showing Azad Kashmir as a permannet part of Pakistan and Aksai Chin as a permanent part of China. It's not. It's disputed and this was never settled. These areas need to be shown with dotted lines and the context understood. Exactly like what he did in this video. Thanks!!

Could you please do a video about the people of Cyprus and their origins?

Literally no dard I have met has claimed to be Greek. That myth spawns entirely from Christian missionaries who idealized their likeness to Europeans and thought spreading that might help proselytize them. Keep in mind these are the same people who wanted to export antisemitism to the then United India by labelling Pashtuns as Jews - so go figure.

No Naition deserves kashmir The people of kashmir deserve to be Free From India pakistan and china.. No country loves/wants the people of kashmir..they only want the land of kashmir because of its strategic importance and also because of its natural resources..

I really like your video's Masaman. very informative.

Hey I really wanna thank you for the content you are providing us. It's always very detailed and it's clearly visible that you put a lot of effort into every video, easily one of the best info channels on YT. Much respect and love bruh

Sometimes we kashmiris (Indian side of it) are indistinguishable from turkish (not turkic) people .But still most of the population has reletively lighter coloured skin and eyes.

Seclusion, when an ethnic group gets seperated from main group due to any barrier physical or man-made they get isolated and mostly retain their original trait but changes might occur due to mutation in genes but is limited to the isolated population and they appear different from the main group.

I suspect that an attempt to return Kashmir to independent status might be the more sane course of action. When you have three major powers, all adjacent to the territory, making conflicting claims, the chances of a peaceful resolution where one power prevails over the others approaches negligible. Let every power step back and let the Kashmiri fashion their own future.

The comments section might turn into a battlefield between Indians and Pakistanis

They are not Pakistani or Indian . . They look very similar to the people of Afghanistan, Iran and other Persians.

Your treatment seemed apolitical and fair to me, thanks

I dont know from where we come to this beautiful part of the world, but the thing i know is that Kashmir belongs to the people of Kashmir, we want Freedom from all India,Pakistan,China,,,,,,,Kashmiris r peace loving people we want Peace & Freedom for ourselves,,,,,,,,,,,, we want Kashmir to be an Independent Separate Country,,,,,,,,,,,, #ONLYKASHMIR🍁✌

Can you do a video about the Nuristani people of Afghanistan please?

This was one of your most interesting videos the nuck part could have been left out

Can you do the genetics of Nepal?

You finally reviewed my favorite Led Zeppelin song kudos😉😻👌🤗😜🤘