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Originally Posted by
maddhan1979
in Indian context could people be recognized based on facial features, etc., It is hard to say because of wars, movement of people but mostly people carried recognition based on words which may have been used by at different times in different contexts.
In feudal times societies which fought wars together lived in close units of big villages, this also holds true for people of large scale migrations. In ancient times small villages were most made by people fleeing wars, thieves, decoits, people hiding their identities from other tribes, such villages were also located near quick escape areas to facilitate fast movement through water systems, etc. 500 different kingdoms also meant that there were frequent wars between rival kingdoms, which also meant lot of scope for thieves, decoits, criminals, etc. Escaping with the loot after the armies faught wars would not have been easy as in ancient times there were only a few routes which one could travel through the forests. So, escaping with loot through water ways would have been easiest way to travel and then hiding in the areas near the river would have been another strong point, such habitations would not have been too close to the river but close enough for the loot to be carried inland. Such population easily emerged/merged into small villages downstream from main battle areas of ancient past near all the big rivers of northwestern India. Such population mostly comprised of people who were not involved in wars and could have been from any given identity as the main purpose of such a population was to live on the exploits left after wars.