Jat

Meanings

1. A member of an Indo-European ethnic group of people native to Northern India and Pakistan (including large populations living in the EU, US, Canada, Australia and UK), that have attributes of an ethnic group, tribe and a people.
2. A member of an Indo-European people living in Punjab, northwestern India and Pakistan.
3. An Indo-Scythian (Saka) descendant of the Scythian Massagetae and Getae tribes.

1. Alternative spelling of yat (“letter or vowel”).

Etymology

From Hindi जाट (jāṭ), ultimately from Sanskrit जर्तिक (jartika), of further unknown origin. Initially the name of a low-ranking foreign Vahika tribe mentioned in some Sanskrit-language Hindu texts such as the Rigveda and the Mahabharata's Karna Parva, its descendant names, from Ashokan Prakrit *𑀚𑀝𑁆𑀝 (*jaṭṭa), were later used to refer to various different low-ranking groups of peoples living in the region now known as Punjab. Many other theories about the origin of this name exist, but are unproven and speculative; see Getae for one such example.