There is good reason to believe from the names of places and from local tradition that the Munda tribes were once spread over Bihar and parts of the Ganges Valley; and if the Kolis are an offshoot of the Kols, as is supposed, they also penetrated across Central India to the sea in Gujarat and the hills of the western Ghats.

The presumption is that the advance of the Aryans or Hindus drove the Mundas from the open country to the seclusion of the hills and forests.

The Munda and Dravidian languages are shown by Sir G.Grierson to be distinct groups without any real connection.
Though the physical characteristics of the two sets of tribes display no marked points of difference, the opinion has been generally held by ethnologists who know them that they represent two distinct waves of immigration, and the absence of connection between their languages bears out this view.

It has always been supposed that the Mundas were in the country of Chota Nagpur and the Central Provinces first, and that the Dravidians, the Gonds, Khonds and Oraons came afterwards.

The grounds for this view are the more advanced culture of the Dravidians; the fact that where the two sets of tribes are in contact those of the Munda group have been ousted from the more open and fertile country, of which, according to tradition, they were formerly in possession; and the practice of the Gonds and other Dravidian tribes of employing the Baigas, Bhuiyas and other Munda tribes for their village priests, which is an acknowledgment that the latter as the earlier residents have a more familiar acquaintance with the local deities, and can solicit their favour and protection with more prospect of success.