n.
Prehistoric people who settled in Iran and northern India.
From their language, also called Aryan, the Indo-European languages of South Asia are descended. In the 19th century there arose a notion, propagated by the count de Gobineau and later by his disciple Houston Stewart Chamberlain , of an "Aryan race": people who spoke Indo-European , especially Germanic , languages and lived in northern Europe. The "Aryan race" was considered to be superior to all other peoples. Although this notion was repudiated by numerous scholars, including Franz Boas , the notion was seized on by Adolf Hitler and made the basis of the Nazi policy of exterminating Jews, Gypsies (Roma), and other "non-Aryans." See also racism .