Ariya: (adj.--n.) [Vedic arya, of uncertain etym. The other Pali forms are ayira & ayya]

1. (racial) Aryan D II.87.

2. (social) noble, distinguished, of high birth.

3. (ethical) in accord with the customs and ideals of the Aryan clans, held in esteem by Aryans, generally approved. Hence: right, good, ideal. [The early Buddhists had no such ideas as we cover with the words Buddhist and Indian. Ariya does not exactly mean either. But it often comes very near to what they would have considered the best in each].

anariya (adj. & n.) not Ariyan, ignoble, undignified, low, common, uncultured

When the commentators, many centuries afterwards, began to write Pali in S. India & Ceylon, far from the ancient seat of the Aryan clans, the racial sense of the word ariya was scarcely, if at all, present to their minds. Dhammapala especially was probably a non-Aryan, and certainly lived in a Dravidian environment. The then current similar popular etmologies of ariya and arahant also assisted the confusion in their minds. They sometimes therefore erroneously identify the two words and explain Aryans as meaning Arahants. In other ways also they misrepresented the old texts by ignoring the racial force of the word. Thus at J V.48 the text, speaking of a hunter belonging to one of the aboriginal tribes, calls him anariya-rupa. The C. explains this as "shameless", but what the text has, is simply that he looked like a non-Aryan. (cp "frank" in English).