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Although their origins are unknown, it is claimed that the Burusho people "were indigenous to northwestern India and were pushed higher into the mountains by themovements of the Indo-Aryans, who traveled southward sometime around 1800 B.C."[4]
Prior to the modern era, the area in which most Burusho now live was part of theprincely state ofHunza under theBritish Raj, until becoming part of Pakistan.[12]
Medical researchers believe that peace, harmony and less exposure to stress in the lives of the Hunza people is linked to their longer life spans. The lack of urban harms, the healthy way of life, moderate use of fruits and vegetables and other factors contribute to the health and long life of this people.[14]
Independent writers have refuted theselongevity myths,[15] citing a life expectancy of 53 years for men and 52 for women, although with a high standard deviation.[16]
A group of 350 Burusho people also reside in theIndian union territory ofJammu and Kashmir, being mainly concentrated in Batamalu, as well as in Botraj Mohalla, which is southeast ofHari Parbat.[8] This Burusho community is descended from two former princes of the British Indian princely states ofHunza andNagar, who with their families, migrated to this region in the 19th century A.D.[8] They are known as theBotraj by other ethnic groups in the state,[8] and practiceShiite Islam.[17]Arranged marriages are customary.[18]
Since thepartition of India in 1947, the Indian Burusho community have not been in contact with the Pakistani Burusho.[19] TheGovernment of India has granted the Burusho communityScheduled Tribe status, as well asreservation, and therefore, "most members of the community are in government jobs."[8][17] The Burusho people of India speakBurushashki, also known as Khajuna, and their dialect, known as Jammu & Kashmir Burushashski (JKB), "has undergone several changes which make it systematically different from other dialects of Burushaski spoken in Pakistan".[17] In addition, many Jammu & Kashmiri Burusho are multilingual, also speakingKashmiri andHindustani, as well asBalti andShina to a lesser extent.[17]
OtherY-DNA haplogroups reaching considerable frequencies among the Burusho arehaplogroup J2, associated with the spread of agriculture in, andfrom, the NeolithicNear East,[26][27] andhaplogroup C3, of East Eurasian male origin and possibly representing the patrilineage ofGenghis Khan. Present at lower frequency are haplogroupsO3, also of East Eurasian male lineage, andQ Siberian male origin,P,F, andG.[27] DNA research groups the male ancestry of some of the Hunza inhabitants with speakers ofPamir languages and other mountain communities of various ethnicities, due primarily to the M124 marker (defining Y-DNA haplogroup R2a), which is present at high frequency in these populations.[31] However, they have also anEast Asian genetic contribution, suggesting that at least some of their ancestry originates north of the Himalayas.[32] No Greek genetic component among the Burusho have been detected in tests.[33][34]
Healthy living advocateJ. I. Rodale wrote a book calledThe Healthy Hunzas in 1948 that asserted that the Hunzas, noted for their longevity and manycentenarians, were long-lived because they consumed healthyorganic foods, such as driedapricots andalmonds, and had plenty of fresh air and exercise.[35] He often mentioned them in hisPrevention magazine as exemplary of the benefits of leading a healthy lifestyle.
Dr. John Clark stayed among the Hunza people for 20 months and in his 1956 bookHunza - Lost Kingdom of the Himalayas[36] writes: "I wish also to express my regrets to those travelers whose impressions have been contradicted by my experience. On my first trip through Hunza, I acquired almost all the misconceptions they did: The Healthy Hunzas, the Democratic Court, The Land Where There Are No Poor, and the rest—and only long-continued living in Hunza revealed the actual situations". Regarding the misconception about Hunza people's health, Clark also writes that most of his patients had malaria, dysentery, worms, trachoma, and other health conditions easily diagnosed and quickly treated. In his first two trips he treated 5,684 patients.
^abWest, Barbara A. (19 May 2010).Encyclopedia of the Peoples of Asia and Oceania. Infobase Publishing. p. 139.ISBN9781438119137.Another, more likely origin story, given the uniqueness of their language, proclaims that they were indigenous to northwestern India and were pushed higher into the mountains by the movements of the Indo-Aryans, who traveled southward sometime around 1800 B.C.E.
^Hunzai, A. N. N., Burushaski Research Academy, & University of Karachi. (2006). Burushaski Urdu Dictionary - Volume 1 / بروشسکی اردو لغت - جلد اول (الف تا څ). Bureau of Composition, Compilation & Translation, University of Karachi. ISBN 969-404-66-0Archive.org
^Berger, Hermann (1985). "A survey of Burushaski studies".Journal of Central Asia.8 (1):33–37.
^Hall, Lena E. (28 October 2004).Dictionary of Multicultural Psychology: Issues, Terms, and Concepts. SAGE. p. 12.ISBN9781452236582.Among the Burusho of India, the parents supposedly negotiate a marriage without consulting the children, but often prospective brides and grooms have grown up together and know each other well.
^Ahmed, Musavir (2016)."Ethnicity, Identity and Group Vitality: A study of Burushos of Srinagar".Journal of Ethnic and Cultural Studies.3 (1):1–10.doi:10.29333/ejecs/51.ISSN2149-1291.The community has no contact with their Burushos of Gilgit-Baltistan since 1947, when partition of India and Pakistan necessitated the division of the erstwhile princely state of Kashmir. No participant was ready to move to Hunza/Nagar if provided a chance.
^Kivisild, T.; et al. (2003), "The Genetic Heritage of the Earliest Settlers Persists Both in Indian Tribal and Caste Populations",The American Journal of Human Genetics,72 (2):313–32,doi:10.1086/346068,PMC379225,PMID12536373
^abR. Spencer Wells et al., "The Eurasian Heartland: A continental perspective on Y-chromosome diversity," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (28 August 2001).
Underhill, Peter A. (2015), "The phylogenetic and geographic structure of Y-chromosome haplogroup R1a",European Journal of Human Genetics,23 (1):124–131,doi:10.1038/ejhg.2014.50,PMC4266736,PMID24667786
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