In quest of the truth

There was no matter nor anti-matter, there was no air nor sky.
There was no death nor immortality, there was no day nor night.
There was darkness and chaos, everything a void and formless.
Then arose desire, the primal of all traits, discovering existent in
non-existent.
They traversed the void and saw what lies within, mighty forces
and free energy.
Then one wonders, when was it born and who created the universe,
for even the Gods were created later.
Was this created by the Supreme Being, who controls everything?
He surely knows, or maybe not.

Nasadiya Sukta, paraphrased

Contents
Introduction
The tale of twins – Mehrgarh and Bhirrana
The dawn of civilisation – The Great Harappan cities
What is in a name?
The burden of literacy
The pioneers of engineering
The age of enterprise – Harappan traders
Royalty, aristocracy or bureaucracy?
Horse-riding Aryans Vs forces of nature
The gifts of Saraswati
The altars of prayer
Beyond the Vindhyas – Undiscovered history
Dating oral traditions – in the realm of unknown
The age of Mahajanapadas
Greeks at the gates of India
The battle of Hydaspes
India as seen by the Greeks
The port cities of Indian Ocean
The age of empire-building
With the Monsoon – ancient trade routes of India
Syncretic India
The trans-national kingdom
Of assimilation and integration
Empire of Deccan
India’s gifts to the world – performing arts
India’s gifts to the world – Storytelling
India’s gifts to the world – medicine
India’s gifts to the world – Astronomy
India’s gift to the world – Mathematics
India’s gifts to the world – philosophy
India’s gifts to the world – language
Foreign pilgrims in India – Faxian
Foreign pilgrims in India – Xuanzang
The last empire of ancient India
The age of transition – the cycle of life
At the cusp of change
 To
The seekers
Introduction
Do we know everything? Do we know what truth is? Is science the truth?
Or is God the truth? Does the truth lie in sacred books, or does it lie in
fiction?
Things people say or write may not be the truth. For we do not know what
the truth is, but still the quest of truth has been on, since time immemorial.
We have been looking for it everywhere, within ourselves and in others, and
in the cosmic realm and in idols. No one has found it. No one knows
whether we will ever find it. For the truth is abstract, formless, subjective or
perhaps fictitious.
Fiction is stranger than the truth, it exists, perhaps, in the realms of the
unknown, the unfathomable. But we also know that those who show the
courage of traversing the unknown are rewarded with discoveries and
inventions. The journey into the unknown leads us to new lands and
exposes us to new people. The journey into the unfathomable makes us
wiser. The churning of the unknown throws up both amruta and visha. It is
for us to pick what we want and discard what we don’t. Should the abstract
and formless nature of truth stop us from writing? Probably not.
The quest for truth spills over to our quest of our history. An old civilisation
like ours has passed down countless legends, folklores and myths over
generations. Some we believe in, some we don’t, some we acknowledge
and some we reject. Some myths turn out to be facts, and some facts retreat
and become myths. But none of these ever-changing truths stop us from
exploring our past.
The myth that ours is an ancient civilisation became a fact when the ruins of
Harappa were proved to be thousands of years old. The myth of Saraswati
became a fact when satellite imagery and study of palaeochannels of
Ghaggar-Hakra established that it once drained an area similar to Indus. The
fact of Aryan invasion retreated into the mythical realm when no
archaeological or genetic evidence was found to substantiate it. But all
these new knowledge should not stop us from exploration. The day we
accept that we now know what the truth is, we would also stop receiving
new information. We will put a stop to our curiosity and learning and would
get stuck in a loop, going over the same set of information over and over
again.
There are many scholars, historians and archaeologists, who have presented
new ideas, countered ideas and presented information after comparison and
analysis. The information presented here on Indian history is an attempt to
understand the past in the light of new information. I have made an attempt
to connect the dots from information presented in isolation, to make sense
for history enthusiasts. This work is by no means a claim to academic
scholarship but simply a compilation of information available. My attempt
is to make history interesting, without using the academic language.
I have attempted to make reading history enjoyable yet authentic. The
analogies or inferences I have drawn are based on the apparent relationship
between the past and the present. I have endeavoured to be as objective as
possible, without looking at facts from any ideological lens.
This book is an attempt in going beyond the academic history of India. We
have read a lot about the dynasties, wars, conquest and economy. Seldom
do we come across the non-political history of India. What were the Indians
doing when they were not fighting a war? What was the contribution of
Indians to the society they lived in and the world around them? How
foreign cultures viewed India and its diversity? These are questions that
need to be answered.
For long, our history books have given disproportionately larger space to
the history of north India and its rulers. We read more about the history and
politics of the Mauryan and Guptas but have little information on what the
people of Peninsular India were doing at that time. For instance, we are told
about the mighty Mauryan Empire and its exploits but are seldom told that
while the Mauryans were busy expanding their territories, the traders in
south and western India were building economic ties with places as far
away as Rome and China.
We read about the cultural influence of India on its neighbours as a
footnote, while the real story is full of adventure and enterprise of people
from eastern India. We hardly come across the seafarers of Kalinga and
Muziris who took Indian produce and culture halfway across the world,
sometimes at a great economic cost to their foreign trade partners.
The non-political contribution of India in philosophy, medicine, literature,
mathematics and astronomy has become the subject of ridicule and
mocking, rejected as a ‘nationalist’ fantasy. The connection between Indian
philosophy and achievements in science, mathematics and arts is hardly
acknowledged or recognised.
This book brings all the lesser-known aspects of Indian history into its folds
and presents to the readers an account of Indian history that goes beyond
popular kings and their exploits.
 Acknowledgements
I thank Dr. B. R. Mani, former Director General of National Museum,
Delhi. His insights on various aspects of the Kushan rule, its extent and
extensive archaeological findings helped me understand the enormous
contribution of the Kushans in areas of religion, trade and social life during
their rule.
I am grateful to Dr. Amarendra Nath, former Director at Archaeological
Survey of India, for his help and guidance in understanding the archaeology
of various Harappan sites, the process of exploration, excavation and
preservation. I also thank him for providing me with his insights through
the various papers he wrote on the Harappan practices of internment. His
work has yielded significant information on various aspects of the
Harappan lifestyle, especially in the Saraswati–Drishadvati valley.
I thank my dear friend Elina Majumdar for taking out time to suggest the
flow and structure of this book, which helped me immensely. I would also
like to thank my friend Mayank Gulati for taking time out to help me with
the creatives for the cover and the book trailer. I would have been clueless
had Runa Mukherjee not helped me negotiate the realms of editing. Suvajit
was kind enough to design the graphics for the cover and I can’t thank him
enough.
I am thankful to Kaushik Bose who encouraged me to follow my passion
for history and turn it into a book. I also thank all those people who listened
to my concepts, approach and content and gave their feedback to improve
my work.
I am eternally grateful to my parents who gave me a decent education.
First footprints on Indian soil
We have all read about the rise of Homo sapiens, the modern humans, in the
African Rift Valley. This happened during the last Ice Age, some 200,000
years ago. The early humans were hunter-gatherers and subsisted on game
meat and forest vegetation. Such subsistence required them to move around
in search of food and thus was born the first nomad group. Though we as
the 21st -century humans are well rooted and close-knit as a society, our
nomadic instincts still prevail. Vacations to distant cities and countries, the
desire to camp under the sky, going on a jungle safari, are all probably a
way to satiate our primal instincts to wander.
Modern humans started venturing out of their homes in Africa at the end of
the last Ice Age. The Ice Age was not a long continuous phase, where the
earth was covered in permafrost. There were intermittent periods of warm
climate when the ice melted and some areas received increased rainfall.
These intermittent warm spells were the earliest signs of climate change.
The earliest human migration out of Africa is now estimated to have
happened 130,000 years ago. The new estimates have pushed back the
earliest migration by around 20,000 years. Professor Hans-Peter Uerpmann,
in his research on latest findings of tool kits in the Arabian Peninsula,
believes that climate change was the cause of early migration of humans out
of Africa [1] .
There is no fresh evidence to suggest that the present humans are the
descendants of this group. It is believed that the early migrants either died
out or retreated to their home in Africa, without leaving any genetic
footprints. It is widely accepted that the present humans descended from the
group of migrants, who left Africa around 60,000 years ago [2] in a second
wave of migration.
The warm climate during the last Ice Age saw low sea levels, and much of
the continental shelf that is today submerged was exposed. The strait of
Bab-el-Mandeb, or gate of tears, was as narrow as 4 km [3] during the last
Ice Age. This would have made the crossing far easier than to cross
approximately 28 km distance from Djibouti to the southernmost tip of
what is today Saudi Arabia.
This was most likely how the second wave of humans crossed into Arabia
from east Africa. Another possible route of migration would have been
along the Nile and then across the Sinai Peninsula into modern-day Israel.
The wet climate must have offered them lakes and rivers in what is now a
large box of sand and mountains. The shores, along which the band of
migrants travelled, would have offered food and water all the way up to the
mouths of the Persian Gulf.
The Persian Gulf as we see it today was a shallow inland basin [4] , cut off
from the Indian Ocean. The rivers from Mesopotamia, Arabia and Persia
drained into it but still offered a passage to the coast of Iran. The Strait of
Hormuz, a crucial choke point for much of the global oil flow today, was a
dry mass of land. The basin existed some 74,000 years ago and would have
allowed the early migrants to pass through to the southern coast of Iran and
then onwards to what is now Baluchistan. The Persian Gulf got fully
inundated around 8,000 [5] years ago.
These early bands of migrants would have marched along the Baluchistan
coast into India, populating it in due course. But when did they arrive in
India? There are two competing versions of the story. According to one, the
early humans came to India around 74,000 – 120,000 years ago. The second
version believes that the entry of early humans into the Indian subcontinent
was not earlier than 50,000 – 60,000 years ago.
Recent findings by Professor Chris Clarkson of the University of
Queensland suggest that modern humans were already in Australia between
59,300 and 70,700 years ago. The new dates are a result of dating mortars,
pestles and painting material left behind by early humans at the cave of
Madjedbebe in Australia’s Northern Territory. A second study conducted
jointly by Dr. Kira Westaway of Macquarie University and Dr. Julien Louys
of Australian National University puts the dates of modern human arrival to
between 63,000 and 73,000 years ago. This study is based on dating two
teeth found in Lida Ajer caves of Sumatra in Indonesia. These studies push
back the arrival of humans in South East Asia and Australia by
approximately 20,000 and 15,000 years, respectively.
In India, professor Korisettar (Karnataka University) and Professor Michael
Petraglia (Cambridge University) excavated the Jwalapuram caves in
Kurnool in Andhra Pradesh and found stone tools dating back to 77,000
years ago. They believe that early humans must have arrived in India
between 100,000 and 120,000 years ago. One way or the other, we know
that early humans reached India and then spread further south and southeast
to the Malay Archipelago and eventually to Australia.
The human migration was not a one-time event. We could assume that there
was a constant flow of humans from the Arabian Peninsula to east towards
India and then onwards to South East Asia. Similarly, some of the groups
may have migrated, back to west from India. As long as the sea levels were
low and permitted easy crossing, across what is now the Strait of Hormuz,
there would have been a constant exchange of human population. Such
spurts of migration in different directions led to the development of ncestral
North Indian and Ancestral South Indian groups in the Indian subcontinent.
It was during this time that the humans underwent the Neolithic revolution,
giving birth to the early farming communities, and started domestication of
crops and animals. Though the term ‘revolution’ is no longer favoured by
some archaeologists since it was not a revolution in true sense, the changes
that are attributed to the ‘revolution’ were very slow to come by and did not
happen the way things shape up during a revolution.
The domestication of crops and animals ensured food security and led to a
growth in population. The earliest evidence of a transition from hunting-
gathering to agriculture in Indian subcontinent comes from Mehrgarh in the
Bolan valley of Pakistan. Goats, sheep, barley and wheat were domesticated
in the region as early as 8th millennium BCE, coinciding with first
occupation of the site.
The tale of twins – Mehrgarh and Bhirrana
Mehrgarh was discovered by the French archaeologist Jean-Francois Jarrige
in 1974. The site is believed to have been occupied as early as, between,
7500 BCE to 6000 BCE, making it the oldest Neolithic site in the Indian
subcontinent. Mehrgarh’s archaeological significance lies in the fact that it
is considered to be the precursor of the Harappan civilisation. And it
remained so until 2003-2004, when Bhirrana was discovered and excavated.
The discovery and dating of Bhirrana puts it at par with the Mehrgarh
timeline, suggesting an independent evolution of Neolithic culture in
modern India.
Excavations at the Mehrgarh site have revealed dwelling units of different
sizes along with usage of cotton. Cotton fibres have been found in copper
beads in graves, indicating its widespread use. The site was eventually
abandoned and was not discovered until a flash flood in the 1970s exposed
it.
The buildings excavated at the site are different from what we see in the
Harappan time. The buildings were constructed using hand-moulded mud
bricks [6] . These bricks were long and narrow, measuring 62 x 12 x 8 cm.
The upper face of these bricks had a herringbone pattern made by the brick
layer’s thumb. These patterns are believed to be made in order to provide
for space for the mud mortar between two bricks to set.
We see here that the Neolithic people of Mehrgarh were transitioning
towards a more settled society, using technology not only in agriculture and
animal breeding, but also in other areas like metalwork and weaving. The
introduction of herringbone pattern or the zigzag pattern to ensure the
mortar joins the two bricks properly was a great technological
advancement. This would have rendered the walls stronger and hence
durable. The modern bricks do not have a herringbone pattern on them but
the upper face of modern bricks carries the ‘brand’ or logo. These
brands/logo are always set in a depression, which is used to lock two bricks
with the mortar.
The buildings excavated at Mehrgarh give an indication of a mixed usage.
Some buildings, with six rooms, had no evidence of any domestic activity,
like a fireplace. The units with four rooms, on the other hand, had some
indications of domestic usage. The archaeologists believe that the six-room
units were most likely used for non-residential purposes like storing grain.
The fireplace was circular in shape (sunk in the ground) and in many cases
was found to have small stones in them. This indicates the use of indirect
heating method for cooking. The stones were most probably heated in the
fireplace and were later transferred to the cooking bowls filled with water
and grain/meat. The stones would heat up the water and cook the food.
Stones are capable of storing a lot of heat but it is unlikely that a single
transfer of stone would have cooked the food. Most likely the process was
repeated a few times to cook the food properly. In some areas, clay balls
and triangular clay tablets were also found in the fireplace. The clay tablets
were most likely used for bread making, much like the modern-day tawa is
used.
It is interesting how a millennia-old tradition of indirect heating method of
cooking is still prevalent in many parts of central Asian Steppe. The
Khorkhog of Mongolia is one such example. The Khorkhog is a barbecue
dish, which uses extremely hot stones to cook meat. The meat together with
vegetables and some water is put in a container. Extremely hot stones are
then added to the uncooked meat and the container is sealed off, letting the
heat from the stones to cook the meat and vegetables.
Mehrgarh also provides us with the early signs of town planning. The
Neolithic layout at Mehrgarh was different from contemporary layouts in
western and Central Asia, an indication of its independent evolution as an
early farming community. The houses in Mehrgarh followed a pattern.
Some of them were found to be oriented in the east–west direction while the
others were in the north–south direction. This indicates that the houses
were, perhaps, oriented in these two directions to harness the daylight and
air circulation, a typical feature in the late Harappan town planning.
Another feature of the layout was the space left between the houses. The
spaces were rectangular in shape and allowed for easy circulation. The
western and Central Asian settlements on the other hand were irregular
combinations of small cubicles of various sizes [7] .
Advances in craft and science were also recorded in Mehrgarh. Bead
making had become an industry. Their widespread use in funerary rituals
indicates that beads were a common form of jewellery among both women
and men. The beads were made of different materials like lapis lazuli,
copper, shells and steatite. Some of the materials were not available locally
and were sourced from a different location, an indication of trade in the
Neolithic period.
The excavation of graves has also provided evidence of early dentistry in
the region. At least eleven drilled molar crowns have been recorded on nine
individuals [8] . The drilled crowns were found on both men and women.
One individual had three drilled crowns while another had the same crown
drilled twice. When archaeologists tried to re-enact the antique procedure,
they found that a bow drill tipped with flint head can drill such holes in the
enamel in less than one minute. Dentists today use the same procedure,
better known as the root canal procedure, to relieve pain in a rotten tooth.
Of course, now we don’t have to go through the excruciating pain, thanks to
anaesthesia and mechanised drills.
The dental procedure was, most likely, carried out by well-trained people.
Since nine individuals have been identified with drilled molars, we can
assume that the Neolithic people knew, to some extent, the nature of dental
ailments and their possible cures. With a trained set of people to carry out
the procedures and a number of individuals who have got the procedure
done, we can assume that there was a strong sense of community bonding
among the Mehrgarh population. People looked after each other and
ensured training to perfect the art of dental drilling. It is also likely that they
were treating other ailments with some kind of herbal mix. So the Neolithic
revolution was not only about agriculture, animal breeding or town
planning, but it was also about some advances in medicine.
The changes we see in Mehrgarh are sure sign of people undergoing the
Neolithic revolution. The advances in agriculture, animal breeding, craft
and house building were changing the way the people lived. Some of it is
reflected in the early and mature Harappan phase in terms of town planning
and craftsmanship.
The transition from Neolithic to the Harappan phase was a long and gradual
process. This was also the time of the beginning of the Bronze Age. The
availability of copper and tin in the northern plains of India heralded the
Bronze Age around 3000 BCE. We have seen that the Neolithic people were
using some advanced technology while making beads. Since some beads
were also made of copper, we assume that they knew the art of smelting.
Though fire was extensively used and controlled for the benefit of human
survival, taking it one step further to carry out a complex process like
smelting required breakthrough innovation. Today it may not seem like one
but in 3000 BCE to achieve a high temperature of around 1,000 degrees
would have been an innovation. Though the Neolithic people were smelting
copper, serendipity played its role when they discovered that adding tin to
copper, makes it harder, thus began the Bronze Age. Since we have one of
the earliest evidences from Mehrgarh of a Neolithic civilisation, we should
not assume that the Bronze Age began there. Just as the Neolithic
Revolution was transforming Mehrgarh, there were other places in India
that saw changes.
The spread of early humans across the globe led to many isolated
communities, who evolved from hunter-gatherers to farmers, over a period
of time. We have seen the rise of megalithic culture from different parts of
the world, which were not connected to each other. However, they
originated around the same time. In India, we see this happening at
Mehrgarh and Bhirrana.
The latest proposed chronology of the site (Dikshit and Mani – 2012) has
pushed back the origins of Bhirrana to the same period as that of Mehrgarh.
Early evidence of a Neolithic settlement suggests that the site was occupied
as far back as 7500 BCE to 6000 BCE. Bhirrana is also the site where we
find continuous occupation till the end of the mature Harappan phase,
around 1600 BCE.
The Neolithic phase of Bhirrana is also associated with the use of Hakra
ware pottery. Hakra ware or the mud applique pottery is distinct from the
Harappan pottery. As the name suggests, the pottery was made by applying
mud on a thin, wheel-thrown or handmade pot. Light-incised and deep-
incised potteries have also been excavated at the site. This shows the
gradual process of refinement in pottery from Neolithic to Harappan phase,
where the pottery was smooth and decorated with motifs.
In Bhirrana, the transition from Neolithic phase to early Harappan phase
took 2,500 years. It is estimated that the phase lasted from around 6000
BCE to 4500 BCE. The first signs of Harappan phase appear around 4500
BCE, and the late Harappan period ended around 1600 BCE.
Similarly, continuity has been seen in Rakhigarhi, another Harappan site, in
Haryana. The earliest Neolithic occupation there is traced back to 5550
BCE. The discovery of various stone and bone tools during excavation
supports the view that the site was occupied during the Neolithic times. At
Rakhigarhi, Early Harappan phase starts from 3960 BCE and the mature
phase ends in about 1810 BCE. Interestingly the Early Harappan phase here
overlaps with the Neolithic phase, suggesting a quicker shift.
The findings at Bhirrana are not an isolated find of Neolithic sites in India.
Recent excavations at Rakhigarhi, Kalibangan in the Saraswati-Drishadvati
Valley and other sites in the Aravalli, suggest that the Neolithic culture, i.e.
early farming communities, developed independently and almost
simultaneously over a large geographical area. These early farming groups
subsequently gave rise to the urban phase of the Harappan civilisation. The
earlier hypothesis of emergence of Harappan urbanism in the Indus valley
and its subsequent spread towards east now stands corrected.
It can now be claimed with some authority that the development and
evolution of the early farming communities in the Indian subcontinent was
independent of the developmets in the Indus Valley. The various sites
evolved parallel to each other with some overlap in their timelines. This in
fact also challenges the notion of the eastward flow of the civilisation from
Indus to the Ganga plains.
The dawn of civilisation – The Great Harappan
cities
The excavation works for Harappa began in 1921 when Sir John Hubert
Marshall, Rai Bahadur Daya Ram Sahni and Madho Sarup Vats started the
project. Though the real excavation started in 1921, hints about the
existence of an old city were coming since 1842. The first recorded mention
of Harappa comes from the account of James Lewis, a soldier in the Bengal
Artillery Regiment [9] .
James Lewis deserted the British army in 1827 and took a false identity as
Charles Mason. He became an explorer and travelled widely in
Afghanistan, excavating over 50 Buddhist sites. He was later, given an
official pardon for his act of deserting the army. He was however required
to act as a British spy in Afghanistan in return. Much of his collection of
coins are now housed in the British Museum.
In his 1842, ‘Narrative of Various Journeys in Baluchistan, Afghanistan and
the Punjab’, he mentions an ancient city that the locals talk about. On
seeing a ‘ruinous brick castle’ and a ‘circular mound’, he was told by the
locals that the old city was thirteen kos [10] (a unit of measuring length) long
and was destroyed due to the lust of its sovereign. These castles and mound
later revealed the remains of what we now know as Harappa.
The excavation process was not very easy. As late as 1856, not much was
known about the remains of the city. It was believed that the mound was
perhaps a Buddhist Stupa. At the time, when the British control on India
was nearing a paradigm shift and that some Indian princely states were
preparing for the first war of Independence, the British were engaged in
another act of vandalism, inadvertently though.
The East Indian Railway Company was laying the tracks between Lahore
and Karachi. Two brothers, John and William Brunton, were the engineers
responsible for the project. At the point where the tracks reached what is
now Harappa, the company ran out of ballast. After some scouting for a
stone quarry, they stumbled upon the ruins of Harappa. Such a large horde
of burnt bricks was the ideal source for them. They used the bricks from the
ruins for laying of ballast [11] . Thus, 150 km of the tracks was laid using
thousands of years old bricks.
In 1875, Alexander Cunningham published the findings of the first of the
Harappan seals in his report for the year 1872 – 73, for the Archaeological
Survey of India. Many other seals were found subsequently, and the
excavation work started in earnest in 1921.
After the excavation of Harappa, other sites in Baluchistan, Punjab, Sindh,
Gujarat and Rajasthan were excavated. The exact geographical spread of
the civilisation came to be known much later. It is now estimated that the
Harappan civilisation covered an area of approximately a million square
kilometres, that is just about one-third of the size of India.
When we compare the contemporary civilisations in Egypt and
Mesopotamia, we see that these had all the ingredients of a successful
civilisation, yet were restricted to a narrow corridor along the rivers they
evolved along. Why were these civilisations restricted to a small, narrow
area? A probable reason for the western civilisations’ relatively smaller
extent is the geography in which they were located.
The Nile, after originating in Lake Victoria, enters the Sahara when it leaves
South Sudan at Renk. From there, it flows further north and meets the Blue
Nile at Khartoum in Sudan. The entire stretch from Khartoum to
Alexandria, in Egypt, where it forms the delta before entering the
Mediterranean, is a vast desert. It was however not always so. Sahara
witnessed cyclical changes in its climate, just like other parts of the world
did.
The Sahara witnessed wet weather conditions from 12500 BCE. The
analysis of sediments in the Nile delta shows an increased level of
sediments flowing in from the Blue Nile, indicating increased rainfall in
Ethiopia, where the Blue Nile originates. The wet conditions led to an
expansion of flora and fauna and the Sahara turned into a Savannah-type
grassland. The wet climate peaked around 4000 BCE, following which the
monsoon conditions retreated southwards, turning the Savannah back into a
desert. The hostile climate and desert conditions forced the population to
migrate to the banks of Nile and it stays so even today.
In Mesopotamia too, the population was concentrated along the banks of
Tigris and Euphrates for similar reasons. The area where the civilisation
thrived is sandwiched between the Iraqi desert on the west and the Zagros
mountain range on the east. With not much room to expand, the people of
Mesopotamia settled along the eastern banks of Euphrates and the western
banks of Tigris. Having situated between two rivers is how the civilisation
got its name ‘Mesopotamia’. The Greek word Meso means in between and
Potamos means river.
On the other hand, the northern plains of the Indian subcontinent provided a
vast expanse of almost uninterrupted land for expansion. Most cities of the
Harappan civilisation were situated along one of its major rivers. The ease
of access and abundance of rivers proved to be the reason why it covered as
vast an area, as a million square kilometres.
What is in a name?
Over the past decades, much information has come out on the people, town
planning, trade and agricultural practices of the Indus people. We know that
the people of Indus civilisation were excellent town planners and were able
to create the first sanitation system in the world. We also know that they had
trade relations with their contemporaries in Mesopotamia. We know that
they used a script which despite many attempts remains un-deciphered.
But there is also a lot, which has come to light in recent years and is yet to
make its way to our textbooks. We will attempt to look at these findings and
try to make sense of the existing information. In this section, we will not
delve into the now well-known aspects of the civilisation but try to touch
upon the lesser-known aspects.
Ever since its discovery in the 20th century, we have known the great
civilisation as either the Indus civilisation or the Harappan civilisation. The
fact that the civilisation thrived along a mighty river was a good reason to
name it after that. The first city to be discovered was Harappa and hence
historians and archaeologists also called it the Harappan civilisation.
However, during the past decade or so, we have come across a new
nomenclature of the Indus Valley civilisation. Historians and scholars have
started using, Indus Saraswati civilisation, as the new name. Is this an
attempt to politicise our history or is there a logic to the new nomenclature?
Before we look into the facts and reason behind the nomenclature, it is
important to understand why all the ancient civilisations were named after
rivers. The transition from pastoral nomadism to a settled agricultural living
gave rise to the cities. These cities eventually developed into the four great
civilisations of Egypt, Babylon, India and China. These civilisations
required surplus food to maintain large urban centres and hence required
reliable and steady irrigation. The population living in both the rural and
urban centres also required water for their daily needs. It was only natural
for the early settlers to see river valleys as an ideal place to settle.
The dependence on rivers for survival and discovery of many sites along
the river was probably the reason why these civilisations were named after
the river. The Egyptian civilisation is known as the Nile Valley civilisation,
the Indian civilisation as the Indus civilisation and the Chinese as the
Yangtze and Yellow River civilisations. The case of the Babylonian
civilisation is however interesting. The people of Babylon lived between
two rivers, the Euphrates and the Tigris. The excavators of this civilisation
did not name it the Euphrates-Tigris civilisation, but called it Mesopotamia.
Greek for between rivers. So we see that all the four civilisations were
named after the rivers.
So why are people trying to rename the Indus Valley civilisation? The Indus
is still a mighty river, originating high up in the Tibetan plateau and flowing
into Kashmir and then into the plains of Pakistan, where it eventually meets
the see in Sindh. The other river Saraswati is nowhere to be found and has
been considered a myth for a long time.
There are two reasons why the historians have started using the new
nomenclature. The first is the research that has gone into finding out more
about the mythical Saraswati. And the second being discovery of many
archaeological sites along what is now believed to be the dry bed of
Saraswati.
The Saraswati finds mention in the ancient Indian texts like the Rig Veda
and the Mahabharata. In Rig Veda (Nadistuti Sukta), it is said to have flown
between Yamuna in the east and Sutlej in the west. It has been described as
a mighty river comparable to Indus. In Mahabharata, it has been mentioned
as a river that dries up in the desert sand. Prima facie this indicates a
gradual decline of the river before it completely dried up. But rational
minds will not accept anything that has been written in ancient books. In
today’s age, we need evidence and proof to substantiate our claims. Much
work has been done in this regard in the past decades. But interestingly,
many historians and archaeologists have accepted the existence of
Saraswati even before any evidence was presented.
Sir Aurel Stein, in January 1942, published his work, ‘A survey of ancient
sites along the lost Saraswati River’, in the Geographical Journal [12] .
Michel Danino, Indologist and guest professor at IIT Gandhinagar mentions
a list of geologists, geographers, archaeologists, etc. who have identified the
now seasonal Ghaggar and Hakra rivers with Saraswati. Notable among
them are Max Mueller, HH Wilson, Auerl Stein, Mortimer Wheeler,
Johnathan Kenoyer and Gregory Possehl. Danino has also written a book,
‘The lost river: On the trail of the Saraswati’ making a strong case for
existence of the river in the past.
The available evidence from satellite imagery, excavation, geochemistry
and sedimentology has now conclusively proven the existence of the river.
It is now believed that the ancient Saraswati originated in the Himalayas
and ended up in the sea in what is now the Rann of Kutch. It was an
independent river, different from Indus and had its own tributaries. The
course of the rivers was roughly the same as that of the present Ghagghar in
India, Hakra in Cholistan, Pakistan, and Nara in Sindh/Gujarat.
Now that it is fairly established and accepted that the mythical river
Saraswati was in fact a physical river, our first question has been satisfied.
But still why would we start incorporating the name Saraswati in the old
name of the civilisation? Is it to satisfy the fantasies of our past? To
examine this, we have to see the geography of the Indus civilisation.
It has been estimated that the civilisation was spread across a million square
kilometres, from the Makran coast in Baluchistan to the banks of Ganga in
modern-day Uttar Pradesh. Since the excavations began, 3,741 [13] sites have
been excavated in India and Pakistan. Of these, 2,378 have been identified
along the course of now dried up Saraswati. Of these, 1,602 are from the
Late Harappan period. The Saraswati river has 1,378 or 86% of these Late
Harappan sites.
There are also sites from the urban or mature phase of the civilisation
numbering 360 out of a total of 1,118 sites. The areas around the Saraswati
river account for almost one-third of the sites belonging to the mature phase
of the Indus Valley civilisation. If we consider all the three phases, i.e. the
early, mature and late Harappan phases, the Saraswati region accounts for
almost two-thirds of the number of sites.
Distribution of Harappan sites [14]
Mature
Regions Early Harappan Late Harappan Total
Harappan
Saraswati Valley 640 (62%) 360 (32%) 1,378 (86%) 2,378
(63%)
Uttar Pradesh 2 32 10 44
Himachal, Jammu & 1 - 4 5
Delhi
Gujarat 11 310 198 519
 Pakistan 367 416 12 795
Total 1,021 1,118 1,602 3,741

We see that almost a third of the mature Harappan sites are located in the
Saraswati valley while around 37% of the sites are located in Pakistan,
including the Indus Valley. A little over a quarter (27%) of the sites are in
Gujarat, independent of either the Indus or the Saraswati. Another notable
deduction is the presence of more than 80% late Harappan sites in the
Saraswati Valley. Given the scattered nature of the mature Harappan sites
and an unusual concentration of late Harappan sites along Saraswati, we
can imagine the importance of Saraswati in the Harappan times. It is, hence,
only fair to introduce Saraswati in the nomenclature. Such introduction
cannot be judged as pandering to the fantasies of the so called ‘nationalists’,
especially when we have such compelling evidence from archaeological
finds.
There is however another side of the story. Pakistan in the past 70 years has
failed to protect its prehistoric sites. With a few exceptions, most of the
Harappan sites have been in a state of constant decay, and hardly, any new
excavation has been carried out. Home-grown terrorism, insurgencies and
highly volatile political climate have made it impossible for archaeologists
to carry out any new work. We might have a different view on the density
of Harappan sites, had there been an effort from Pakistan to know more
about its history. But since that is not the case, we have to form our
opinions based on the evidence that is in front of us.
One may like to call the Harappan civilisation as the Indus Saraswati
civilisation or simply Saraswati civilisation, but for the purpose of this
book, we will use the commonly used nomenclature in the archaeological
circles, the Harappan civilisation.
The burden of literacy
Long before the evidence of the material culture of Harappa was excavated,
Alexander Cunningham published his finding of the first stone seal from
Harappa. The seal was that of the mythical unicorn. Since then many
similar unicorn seals have been identified. The unicorn is depicted with a
long and wavy single horn and has a body of a bull. The top of the seal had
an inscription with six characters. If there is any Harappan mystery still
unresolved, it is these characters.
It has been widely accepted that these characters were some form of a script
used by the people. So far, approximately 676 signs of the script have been
identified [15] . The observations on the grouping of the symbols suggest that
the people wrote from right to left. The biggest challenge to understand the
script comes from the paucity of sequences long enough to make any sense.
The symbols have, almost exclusively, appeared on small stone seals,
though there have been exceptions where they also appear on metal plates
or on a wooden board, as in the case of Dholavira. But none of them are
long enough to understand their sequence or syntax.
In the past, the Egyptian Hieroglyphs and the Cuneiform scripts were
deciphered because bilingual and multilingual texts were discovered. The
Egyptian Hieroglyphs were understood once the Rosetta stone was found in
Egypt by soldier in the army of Napoleon in 1799. The cuneiform too was
deciphered once the Behistun trilingual inscriptions were found in western
Iran. There have been no corresponding inscriptions found for the Harappan
script, yet. Since the seals have also been discovered in Mesopotamia and
we know that there were trade relations between the two civilisations, it is
likely that there might, one day, turn up a Rosetta stone for the Harappan
script.
The other reason why some of the ancient scripts were deciphered was the
availability of an extant language related to the script. The Rosetta stone
had ancient Greek text, which was understood well by the historians and
linguists. The Behistun stone had text in Old Persian, which evolved into
Middle Persian and later into the current Persian language. The Old Persian
language also had a strong connection to ancient Avesta (Language of the
Zoroastrians) and Sanskrit. The existence of a related language made a huge
difference in the efforts to decipher the texts.
The case of Harappan script is unfortunate in the sense that we do not know
what language the people spoke back then. Then, the available text is very
short for us to decipher it. Attempts have been made to decipher it using old
Sanskrit and Dravidian languages but without any success so far.
In 2010, Richard Sproat, a research scientist at Google and a linguist (at
Oregon Health and Science University and University of Illinois at Urbana-
Champaign) published a response to the works of R.P.N. Rao (University of
Washington) on Indus script [16] . In his paper, Sproat rubbishes the claims
made by R.P.N. Rao on the Indus script being a proper language. He goes
on to use blanket statements like the techniques used in the study being
‘useless’ and ‘trivially and demonstrably wrong’. Obviously, Rao’s team
published a rebuttal [17] and called out many shortcomings in Sproat’s paper.
I believe that a leisurely reading of the papers by both Rao and Sproat will
be interesting. It will also give us a peek into the world of academic rivalry,
mutual humiliation and sarcasm writing.
The scope of this book does not permit us to delve deep into the workings
of these linguists. What we can do is, understand the work they are doing.
Sproat is of the belief that the Harappan script is not a real language. He
goes on to imply that the Harappan people were indeed illiterate, i.e. had no
real written language. The team of Rao on the other hand firmly believes
that the symbols indeed represent a language. The team, in 2009, came up
with their findings in sciencemag.org. The study was titled ‘Entropic
evidence for Linguistic Structure in the Indus Script’.
The team used conditional entropy to see whether the symbols fell into the
realm of language at all. Conditional entropy measures probabilities based
on conditions, e.g. the probability of variable X given variable Y. In terms
of the Harappan script, it means the probability of a particular symbol
following a given symbol or predicting the next symbol in a sequence. In
English language, for example, we know that there is a high probability that
the letter Q will be followed by the letter U. Such sequencing indicates the
existence of a pattern and hence a system of writing.
For their research, Rao’s team selected five know natural linguistic systems
(Sumerian logo-syllabic system, Old Tamil alpha-syllabic system, Rig
Vedic Sanskrit alpha-syllabic system, English words and English
characters). They also selected four types of non-linguistic systems (two
artificial controlled data sets, human DNA sequence and a bacterial protein
sequence). And finally, they also considered an artificial programming
language, Fortran. The study found out that the conditional entropy of
Harappan inscriptions closely matches those of linguistic systems and
remains far from non-linguistic systems.
Such remarkable work in the field of Harappan linguistics is indeed
fascinating. Equally fascinating is the existence of rival views. But for now,
what we know about the script is that no one can read it. We do not know
what is really written there or if at all anything is written there.
The seals can be compared, in my view, to the present-day identification
documents, for example a driver’s licence. It has numbers, alphabet and
symbols. There are abbreviations like DOB and No. There are short forms
like S/W/D meaning son, wife or daughter of. Then, there are codes
mentioning the type of vehicle the individual is allowed to drive. One will
find it extremely difficult to decipher these ‘codes’ even when one can read
the language. One can also study the credit cards in a similar fashion where
the text is used together with shortened words, which one can read only
with experience and not by merely being able to read the language.
So were the symbols of Harappa mix of alphabet and syllables? Or do they
actually represent a full language? We do not know yet. What we know for
sure is the fact that the Harappan people were fully aware of the writing
system. The evidence that they had extensive trade contacts with
Mesopotamia should imply that they saw the clay tablets being used in
cities like Ur for record keeping. Since the ancient Mesopotamians kept
records of the trade, the Harappan people would have been party to such
trade contracts. They would have known the technology behind the writing
system, i.e. the clay tablet as a writing medium and the reed as the pen.
They would have seen how the clay tablets were then preserved for later
references. Did they not learn such an important art?
In the recent past, we have seen how important inventions and discoveries
travel from one corner of the world to another, on trade routes. The Indian
numerals and zero travelled from the India to the West Asia and eventually
to Europe through traders. Everyone realised the importance of the Indian
numbers and the ease with which they performed complex calculations. The
Roman numerals were soon phased out and the world got its first universal
language (of a kind) in form of the ten digits we use today. Adoption of
paper for writing saw a similar acceptance. In the modern world, thanks to
communication channels, ideas and products travel faster and it takes far
less time to adapt/copy ideas. That is the reason we have clones of Amazon
and Uber everywhere. So why didn’t the Harappans bring this fantastic
piece of art to their cities? We obviously do not have an answer to this, yet.
But we can conjecture, or rather make an educated guess.
We know for a fact that the Rig Veda was passed down the generations
orally. The written forms appeared much later. The oldest being attributed to
have written around 1040 CE. The first instance of recorded history begins
in India with the rock edicts of Ashoka. Written in Brahmi, these are the
first instance when we find a written language. Then, there are wall
inscriptions and pillar inscriptions. Like their counterparts elsewhere in the
world, these are either royal decrees or significant events (like memory of a
donation or commemoration). Writing systems developed soon after the
introduction of Brahmi. The oldest extant manuscript (the Bower
manuscript) in Sanskrit was found in Chinese Turkestan, the troubled
Xinjiang Province in modern China. Written on birch bark the script is
dated to the Gupta Era (5th – 6th century CE). The manuscript contains
treatises on medicine, future telling (by casting a die) and spells to counter
snakebite.
The oldest extant manuscript in the ancient Indian region was discovered in
Bakhshali, Pakistan and dates back to early 3rd century CE.
While we have evidence from the Egyptian and Mesopotamian civilisations
of record keeping, especially in public works and trade, there is none
available for Harappan civilisation. The only written records we get from
that period is that on stone seals. We will not be able to say with confidence,
whether these seals were also some form of record of the trade or contract
that took place at that time.
The first time any text was written on laws was in the early centuries CE.
The various Dharmashastras like the Manusmriti, Yajnavalakya Smriti,
Naradasmriti and Vsihnusmriti were composed between the 2nd century CE
and 7th century CE [18] . The Arthashastra, attributed to Kautilya, is accepted
to have been written between the 2nd and 3rd century BCE. However, there
have been several additions and updates in the text and it might be difficult
to know what the original text contained. Arthashastra makes it mandatory
to record transactions like sale of property by the seller and have witnesses
to the transaction. Much like what we do today. These texts lay down the
basic laws that would have governed the society but we do not find
instances of individual records, like that in Egypt or in Mesopotamia. We
also do not know how the contracts were enforced during that time. Or was
there any need to have a contract at all.
Since we are trying to make an educated guess here, I would take the liberty
to draw an analogy from the trading communities of Medieval north India.
Trade in a large part of India has been carried out on trust. From price
negotiation to payment, everything happened on trust. Though financial
instruments like Hundis were introduced to mitigate the risk of carrying
cash, there were hardly any contracts binding the parties.
Most of the contracts were done over a handshake, literally. The buyer and
seller would shake hands under a gamcha (to maintain secrecy) and agree
on the price in hundreds, thousands or lakhs by using the fingers. This
practice survived well into the twentieth century in the wholesale markets
of Kolkata, among the Marwaris. Dishonouring, even a verbal contract,
comes with a significant risk to reputation and not to mention public
humiliation. Probably, the traders of the Harappa too made contracts on
trust and did not feel the need to document it.
The other aspect of writing was literature. We know from the Egyptian
sources that a specialised class of people called the scribes were trained in
the art of writing. These scribes used hieroglyphs and later the hieratic and
demotic scripts for writing. They wrote down literature including stories,
wisdom texts, funerary texts, textbooks, discourse and dialogues and songs,
etc. These were written on tablets, rocks and papyrus. There are images and
reliefs of scribes holding a papyrus or a tablet and a reed stylus for a pen in
the position of writing. In Mesopotamia, we have the hard evidence of
thousands of clay tablets with cuneiform inscription on them, an indication
of a strong culture of writing.
In the case of Harappans, we do not have any such evidence. The Indus
script, if we can call it that, appears only on seals. In some rare instances
does it occur on metal plates, and in one case, in Dholavira, it occurs on a
wooden panel. The inscription of Dholavira is of special interest due to its
sheer size. The wooden panel on which the sign was mounted measured 3
metres, and each of the ten symbols was about 15 inches high. The
signboard was found at the gates of the city and is probably the largest ever
seen. We do not for sure know what the purpose of the board was. Was it a
welcome sign, was it an instruction, was it the name of the city or was it
simply ornamental? There are no answers.
If the Harappan people were not using clay tablets like their Mesopotamian
counterparts, were they using birch bark to write? That is a possibility, and
in all likelihood, the documents on birch bark would have been lost to
decay. We might, in the course of time, come across some evidence. But till
such time, we can only speculate.
So what is our educated guess based on the current findings? I would say,
we can assume that the Harappan society might have had a formal system
of writing. They probably used birch barks to write on, since clay tablets
would have been impossible to preserve, given the heavy monsoon rains,
unlike in the arid climate of Mesopotamia where the clay tables survived or
in Israel where paper documents are still found from early centuries CE.
The Indian documents that may have written were most likely lost to
climate conditions. The humid and rainy weather of the Indian subcontinent
was not favourable to preserve the birch bark.
The pioneers of engineering
The Harappan civilisation was spread across a vast area of approximately a
million square kilometres. Evidence from palaeobotany and sediment
studies indicates that the northern and north-western parts of India
witnessed varied environmental conditions with alternate dry and wet
spells. Dr. Amarendra Nath, former director of Archaeological Survey of
India, gives an elaborate account (Man and Environment, Vol. XLII, No. 1,
2017) of the changes that took place in north and north-western India in
terms of climate change.
He tells us that there were broadly four palaeoclimatic phases in the region.
The sediment study of existing lakes like Pushkar, Sambhar, Didwana and
Lunkaransar has yielded data that give information on rainfall during the
Holocene period (the current geological period we are in, having started
approx. 11,650 years ago). Phase I was characterised by wind borne
deposits indicating arid conditions. Phase II marks the sedimentation in the
lakes that marks the growth in precipitation rates (up to 25 mm more than
the present times). Phase III saw the introduction of primitive cereal
agriculture, and sediments have carbonised pollens indicating a slash and
burn kind of agriculture. The last two thousand years in phase IV saw three
sub-phases where the first phase saw a sudden increase in precipitation
followed by a dry spell in the second phase and a marginal reversal to wet
climate in the third sub-phase. Similar changes have been witnessed in
Haryana and Punjab too.
We see that the monsoon patterns in India got altered many times since the
early Holocene. This obviously impacted the livelihood of the people, more
so of the early farming communities since they depended heavily on the
rains. As much as half of India still depends on the annual monsoon for
irrigation. We also see that despite the changes in climatic conditions with
spells of wet and dry climate, people still survived and managed large cities
of the Harappan civilisation.
Phase Timeline Climatic condition
I Until 8000 BCE Arid conditions
II 8000 – 7500 BCE Increased precipitation
III 7500 – 3000 BCE Reduced precipitation
IVa 3000 – 1800 BCE Increased precipitation
IVb 1800 – 1500 BCE Reduced precipitation
 IVc 1500 – 1000 BCE Marginal increase in precipitation

To survive altering monsoon conditions, people would have depended on

alternate sources of water. Or better still, known the techniques of water
conservation. When we look at the megacities of India today, we find
almost all of these cities (with the exception of Kolkata) suffer from water
crisis. We are urged to conserve water and even harvest rainwater. So what
did the Harappans do in their time of water crisis?
We find several instances of water conservation. The first among them was
integrated in the town planning process. Excavations have revealed that
most houses had a private well. This was a way to harvest groundwater but
at the same time prevent excessive evaporation. It also made possible for
people to use only what one needed. The concept of having a well within
the house has almost disappeared from most Indian villages. The practice
however continued in many parts of south India where houses built as
recently as the 1950s had private wells. This was particularly useful in the
case of Tamil Nadu where the monsoon is not as strong as in the states on
the western coast.
The wells provided an almost endless supply of water for private
consumption but there were also problems related to the maintenance of the
wells. While it is relatively simple to sink a well, it is extremely expensive
and labour intensive to ensure the quality of water. Water wells are sunk and
lined by stones or bricks to prevent the walls from collapsing. There are
various reasons for the walls to collapse. It can be water seepage during the
rainy season or loosening of soil or tectonic pressures. Whatever the reason
be, the result is polluting of water or the well getting entirely unfit for
drawing of water due to debris. The Harappans found an ingenious solution
for such problems.
They used specially baked bricks to line their wells. The bricks were
trapezoid in shape, i.e. wedge-shaped . The narrow end of the bricks
formed the wall surface. The shape ensured that any pressure on the walls
that might have led to its collapse would be mitigated. In event of a
situation where there was pressure on the walls, the trapezoid bricks would
simply pushed in to get interlocked and hence prevented any damage. The
shape also helped in attaining the circular shape of the well. Or perhaps that
was the reason why all the wells were in a circular shape. Michel Danino in
his book, ‘The lost river: on the trail of the Saraswati’, makes a special
mention of this feat of Harappan engineering.
If one thinks about the art and science of well sinking during the Harappan
times, it will occur that perhaps it was one of the reasons how such large
cities managed to survive despite changing rainfall patterns.
Water was also used in public ceremonies during the Harappan times. We
have evidence in the form of the Great Bath. The public bath is
approximately 12 metres in length and 7 metres is breath. We can’t for sure
say what the real purpose of the bath was, but there is a general consensus
among archaeologists and other scholars that it was used for ritual bathing.
The bath was most likely operational throughout the year, and to prevent the
water from seeping into the ground, special provisions were made. First was
the laying of the floor and walls of the pool. The bricks were laid very close
to ensure minimum space is left for the water to seep in. The bricks were
then layered with a plaster of mud. In the second step, a layer of bitumen or
tar was added. Sealing the surface with bitumen was probably the first
attempt at waterproofing.
Waterproofing in a large part of India is still done using a similar technique.
The roofs, for example, are waterproofed using a layer of bitumen on which
rests a layer of mud and on top of it a layer of slim bricks. The bricks are
finally fixed using cement slip. Though a modern element like cement is
incorporated, the basic idea of waterproofing is still the same.
The large area in which the Harappan civilisation was spread had different
climatic conditions and different topography. While Mohenjo-Daro is
located in the flood plains of Indus, Dholavira is located in what used to be
the Khadir Island. The topography of Dholavira is mostly rocky, compared
to the alluvial soil of Mohenjo-Daro. This was probably the reason why not
many homes in Dholavira had a private well. This was also the reason why
Dholavira comes out as an exception with intensive use of stone in
buildings, as compared to bricks in other sites.
The Dholavira site offers the most ingenious of the water harvesting
systems anywhere in the ancient world. The water requirement of the city
was met by harvesting runaway water from flash floods during the
monsoon. Two seasonal streams, Manhar and Mansar, are still extant. An
elaborate system of storm water drains channelled the water into the
interconnected reservoirs around the city walls, in all four directions, while
it is a rather simple idea to collect water for future use, what is interesting is
the engineering behind it. For the water to flow into the last of the
reservoirs, it was necessary that the first and the last tanks were at a
gradient. There is a gradient of 13 metres [19] between the high and the low
areas from east to west. This ensures that gravity takes on and channels the
water through the interconnected feeding drains from one reservoir to the
next.
Identifying a gradient good enough for water to flow to the last of the
reservoirs requires a good knowledge of mathematics and geometry. We can
assume that the splendid town planners of the Harappan civilisation had an
excellent knowledge of geometry, mathematics, civil engineering and of
course hydrology.
The cascading reservoirs would have also helped in desilting of the storm
water. Deep reservoirs (some of them as deep at 10 metre) ensured that the
silt would settle down and the water became potable. Flights of stairs are
present in all the reservoirs indicating that the water levels went down
during the dry season. People used the stairs to collect water during the lean
season.
Since there was a lot of silt that was brought in by the storm water and
collected at the bottom of the reservoirs, it is likely that there was in place a
standard operating procedure by which the reservoirs were monitored. We
can only imagine that as water in each reservoir went below a certain level,
the municipal workers would desilt it and prepare it for the next season.
While the system of water harvesting did provide for water storage, it is
likely that it also had a system by which it would let go of any additional
water when all the tanks were full. In the absence of such a system, the city
would have been flooded from the runoff water. The Dholavira water
harvesting system was definitely a very advanced system given that in the
twenty-first century, many of our cities still get flooded and most of our
bathroom floors have a pool of water after we bathe. Creating a gradient for
the drains or for the bathroom floor still has to be mastered by modern
engineers.
The age of enterprise – Harappan traders
Civilisations never grow in isolation. The very nature of humans to explore
and interact makes us promiscuous in more ways than one. We want to
move out of our comfort zones and take up challenges that would push our
limits. That is probably the reason why people go on expeditions to north
and south poles, to conquer Everest and set foot on moon.
People of ancient civilisation were no different. They wanted to explore
what lay behind and beyond the natural boundaries of their cities. We have
enough evidence to prove that there were both local and long-distance trade
contacts between civilisations. The brisk business that happened between
the ports of Harappan cities and those in Mesopotamia and Dilmun (modern
Bahrain) is well known. Given the long distances, it is likely that there were
intermediaries in the trade, the early middlemen, who would have traded in
goods, between Harappan cities and West Asia. The earliest evidence we
have of goods travelling thousands of kilometres from the southern tips of
the Western Ghats in India to Egypt is that of peppercorns. The nostrils of
Ramesses II were stuffed with peppercorns when he was mummified in
1213 BCE.
The peppercorns in Egypt indicate that long-distance trading did take place
from Indian cities to as far away as Egypt, then the westernmost civilised
society in the world. The boats of Harappans were most likely unsuitable
for long sea voyages from Lothal to the coast of Oman and then onwards to
Red Sea ports via Aden. The extensive use of Lapis Lazuli in ancient
Egyptian jewellery is another indication of long-distance trade between the
Harappan and Egypt. The British Museum has catalogued (BM number –
EA3077) a second millennium BCE necklace, where Lapis Lazuli is used
along with cowrie shells. We haven’t come across evidence suggesting there
was any sort of direct contact between Harappans and ancient Egyptians.
The peppercorns and precious stones, most probably travelled from India to
Egypt, through a series of intermediaries, over land and sea.
The trade from and within the Harappan cities was also well organised.
Lapis Lazuli was imported from the Badakhshan region (the only source of
Lapis Lazuli in ancient times) of modern-day Afghanistan to various Indus
cities, including Lothal. Copper was transported to various Harappan cities
from mines in Khetri region of modern-day Rajasthan. However, not all of
the copper requirements would have been met by Khetri and it is believed
that some import also happened from the mines in Oman.
The Harappans had an extensive network of internal trade to meet their
domestic requirements. The polished ringstones of Dholavira, which were
used probably as a base for wooden column, have also been found in
Harappa. These ringstones were obviously transported from their place of
origin, either in Dholavira or from some other place to Harappa. There are
two theories on how these were transported. According to Dr. Randall Law
(University of Wisconsin – Madison), the stone objects were transported
either over land or through boats, up the Indus.
Both road transport and river transport would have required a great deal of
planning from selecting the time of journey to the load to be carried on each
bullock cart or boat. The monsoon rains would have made any kind of
travel impossible given the flooding of the plains. The travel, most likely,
happened during the dry period when the rivers have receded and the land
routes had hard surface for the heavy carts to roll on.
The shortest road distance between the cities of Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro
is approximately 680 km (Google maps). This of course is since Google
maps considers distances of motorable roads. Back in the third millennium
BCE, there were no roads and the rivers followed a different course. The
surface distance between the cities would have been slightly different from
the present, but still in the range of 700 – 750 km. To travel such a long
distance on carts would have taken weeks, if not months. The caravans
would have passed through smaller settlements on their way to and from
Harappa. They would have undoubtedly traded with the smaller settlements
and replenished their stocks of food, fodder and water.
The smaller settlements have been excavated around the major sites like
Rakhigarhi, Bhirrana, Harappa, Dholavira. These settlements were most
likely semi-rural and acted as suppliers to the urban centres. Thus far, 3,741
Harappan sites have been identified and not all of them were urban centres
like Dholavira or Rakhigarhi. This is not surprising, given that throughout
history, civilisations, cities, states and empires have shown a mix of urban,
semi-urban and rural settlements. Even today in the twenty-first century,
there are large cities like Delhi, Tokyo, Shanghai and London, but at the
same time, there are smaller settlements which are a mix of semi-urban,
rural or even tribal areas.
The early smaller settlements would have had their dependencies on large
urban centres for trade, and in turn, the urban centres must have depended
on them for raw material, agricultural produce and shelter during long-
distance trade.
For any kind of trade to happen, it is necessary that there exists a diversity
of products. We see that the Harappan settlements had a wide variety of
industries like pottery, bead making, copper and bronze works, rock
sculptors, farmers. The diversity of products was complemented by the
traders who would exchange them along their caravan and hence helped in
the growth of early manufacturing units.
Of all the manufacturing units, bead making is of particular interest. The
Harappans were known for their excellent workmanship when it came to
carnelian beads, some of them were as long as five inches. Made of semi-
precious stone, these beads were extremely popular not only among the
Harappans but also among the Mesopotamians. The beads have been found
in Ur, which proves that the Harappans were exporting them. The export of
stone beads is interesting but what is more interesting is the manufacturing
process. Kenoyer gives a detailed account of bead manufacturing in his
paper, ‘Bead technology at Harappa, 3300 – 1900 BCE: A comparative
summary’. He mentions the use of various techniques used for drilling of
beads from abrasive copper drill bits to pecking for longer beads.
Exceptional skills and training would have been required to work the beads
ranging from 1 to 12 mm in diameter. In the later Harappan phase, we see
production of microbeads ranging between 1 and 2 mm, indicating a
mastery over drilling techniques. The bead makers of the past were
probably paid well and were counted among the most valuable craftsmen,
like the chariot makers in the Vedic period or the investment bankers in the
modern service economy.
Lothal was the only port of the Harappan times, which handled direct
seafaring traffic. The present location of Lothal is approximately 10 km
from the Gulf of Khambat (Gujarat). The Sabarmati river too flowed much
closer to the site in ancient times, thus providing water for the port. Both
the sea and the river have since shifted rendering Lothal a landlocked city.
Excavations at the site have revealed an acropolis (or the citadel or the
upper city) with evidence of workshops and living quarters of various
craftsmen. The brick-lined furnaces, stone anvils, terracotta crucibles and
copper implements excavated there suggest that the site had flourishing
copper smelting units. A bead factory has been discovered where beads
have been found in various stages of completion. The most remarkable
discovery was however the dockyard. It is believed that it is the oldest
dockyard in the world. The dockyard should not be confused with the
natural harbours that were operational during the Bronze Age in
Mesopotamia and Egypt.
The dockyard of Lothal was the first artificial harbour built in the world,
complete with efficient water inlet and outlet mechanism and a lock to
maintain water levels during low tide. The eastern side of the city was
flanked by two structures, the dockyard and a warehouse. S.R. Rao of ASI
explains the layout of the dock as a trapezoid with dimensions of 21 m X 37
m. The dock was supplied with water from one of the ancient tributaries of
Sabarmati (which has since changed course) through a canal. The water
entered the reservoir at the northern end, and excess water was let out
through a narrower canal in the southern end of the reservoir. The reservoir
was a 214 m X 36 m structure lined with baked bricks. The depth measured
approximately 4.3 m.
The interesting feature of the dock is the fact that it is located away from
the main course of the river, thus reducing the silt deposit in the reservoir.
The southern spill over channel had a wooden gate, which could be lowered
or raised to control the water level in the canal. The tidal action would
allow sufficient water to enter the inlet canal for the ships to sluice in during
high tide. The ships would then enter, berth and unload the cargo on the
dock. There was a warehouse, which was most likely used as a transit or
sorting centre for the goods to be then distributed to their rightful owners.
Excavations have unearthed evidence of sea water flowing into the
reservoir. The National Institute of Oceanography has confirmed presence
of marine fossils, salt and gypsum, indicating presence of sea water in the
reservoir. The excavations of S. R. Rao, at Lothal, have also revealed a
Persian Gulf seal from Bahrain, establishing a direct trade link between
ancient India and the Persian Gulf.
One can only imagine the bustle at the busy docks of Lothal in the past and
speculate on what was imported and what was exported. The evidence of
various workshops for manufacturing beads, copper and bronze artefacts,
etc. points to some kind of an export-oriented zone in the city. The zone was
definitely not one of the Special Economic Zones we have today, but was
most likely to have served the export needs of that time.
We can also assume that there must have been people-to-people contacts
and exchange of ideas along with trade relations. The Harappans were
definitely sailing to Dilmun (modern Bahrain) with their merchandise. It
will not be unfair to say that some boats from Dilmun also made their way
to the port of Lothal. The people of Dilmun or perhaps the Sumerians would
have come and interacted with the Harappans. They would have exchanged
stories, food and culture.
We can only speculate on the kind of interactions the Harappans had with
the outside world. What we know is that Lothal must have been one of the
liveliest places during the Bronze Age, like most port cities.
The international trade must have been a profitable venture. Evidence
suggests that both Dilmun and Mesopotamia have yielded many Harappan
finished goods. Pottery, beads, ivory combs, cotton fabric, gold and silver
ornaments are the most commonly found items. There might have been
some food exports too, but we do not have much evidence to support that.
The Harappans were cultivating grapes and is likely that they had mastered
the art of winemaking. Contemporary civilisations like Mesopotamia and
Egypt have shown the evidence of wine consumption. It is hence likely that
the Harappans too were exporting or importing wine to and from the
Mesopotamians. Another likely food export is ghee. It is difficult to
conclusively establish that ghee was indeed exported to Dilmun or
Mesopotamia. What we have is an indirect suggestion. We know that the
Harappans had domesticated cattle and were using them for dairy and meat.
It is likely that with domestication of cow, dairy and milk processing would
have been an established industry.
Ghee is not only popular in the Indian subcontinent but is also widely used
in the West Asia and east Africa. Today, it is sold by local brands in the
West Asia and is widely used in Ethiopia where it is produced locally with
some variation. It won’t be a surprise if the Harappans exported it much like
how olive oil is exported around the world for its aroma and flavour.
With a lot to export and very little to import, the Harappans would have
been in a situation similar to modern China. Had there been actual currency
in circulation during that time the Harappans would have been sitting on a
pile of foreign exchange and Lothal would have easily been the financial
hub of the Harappa–Mesopotamia region. The thing worth noting here is
that India remained an export-oriented country from the Harappan times
until the Europeans took control of the shipping lanes and harbours in the
colonial times.
Apart from the flourishing exports from Lothal, the Harappans also had a
flourishing internal trade. We saw earlier how the various cities might have
exchanged goods over both short and long distances. But once the goods
entered the markets, they were sold or exchanged much like how we do
today. The excavations at various sites have produced a huge corpus of
weights and balances. The weights excavated were made of chert (a form of
sedimentary rock) and were cuboid in shape.
There were two systems used for the weights. The binary system was used
for smaller weights, from 0.856 grams to 13.7 grams. The subsequent
weight was double the previous one, rendering the largest weight to be the
16th ratio of the smallest. In the larger weights, a decimal system was
followed where the largest weight was 100 times the weight of the 16th ratio
[20]
. It is evident that the Harappans were measuring both precious and bulk
items using the weights.
Even today, we have weights to measure precious and bulk items from gold
to potatoes. The Harappan times were probably similar if not the same. The
traders used pan balances to measure the goods. Some of the weights and
balances are displayed in the National Museum in Delhi. The balances have
a striking similarity to the ones that were popular till about late 80s when
shops and vegetable vendors started using the Roberval balances.
The point to note here is that the weights excavated across the Harappan
sites have been found to be of standard measures. They all follow the same
binary and decimal systems and are of same shape. To standardise the
weighing system across a territory of a million square kilometre is no mean
feat. This indicates a strong sense of business and its importance in the
larger scheme of things. But we see standardisation as a common feature in
the Harappan cities. It ranges from standardisation of the brick sizes to
standardising the city layout, drainage planning, location of cemeteries and
kilns and ultimately to weights and measures.
The obsession with precision of the Harappan times has long been lost, and
most of our cities now are unplanned. There are of course exceptions in
Chandigarh or the Lutyens Delhi or some pockets in other cities. But
largely our cities today are unplanned and have grown in an amoebic
fashion. The 21st -century cities like Gurgaon are no exception with their
sorry state of civic amenities and non-existent public infrastructure. Bronze
Age was probably better when it came to Indian cities .
Royalty, aristocracy or bureaucracy?
With all the grand town planning, standardised sanitation works, a thriving
export city, obsessive standardisation of weights, a uniformity in seals
across a vast area, were the Harappans living in a centrally controlled
empire of a sort? This is a very tempting question for historians and
commentators. Can we then draw a parallel and say that the Harappans
were indeed living under a centrally controlled state and hence were able to
achieve the standard practices in social and business life?
As I said, it is a tempting question. After all, all the contemporary
civilisations were monarchies and had large capital cities that housed the
royalty and bureaucracy to control rest of the territory. Before we answer
this very interesting questions, let us see what the hallmarks of an empire or
a centrally controlled state are.
In civilisations contemporary to Harappa, the prime features of an empire
were a large capital city, massive monuments, pictorial and sculptural
representation of the kings and royalty and evidence of warfare. None of
these are visible in the Harappan context. However, in 2018, Dr. S. K.
Manjul, the Superintending archaeologist at ASI, unearthed a true war
chariot in Sanauli. The chariot and associated weapons have been dated
back to 1900 BCE, corresponding with the late Harappan phase.The chariot
was part of a burial site with intricately carved, four-legged coffin. The
tomb was probably a royal burial or perhaps the grave of a person with high
social standing.
The chariot had solid wheels and a long pole to be yoked on to animal. The
wheels were made of wood, without using nails. Individual pieces of wood
fixed into each other using a wedge and groove technique. The wedge and
groove technique is still used in building the chariots for the annual Rath
Yatra at Puri. Along with the chariot, weapons like swords and wooden
shields were also found.
The chariot and associated war equipment found in Sanauli belongs to the
Ochre Coloured Pottery (OCP) culture. The OCP spans a vast area in the
western region of the modern state of Uttar Pradesh. OCP culture was
contemporary of the Harappans, with a distinct material culture. The eastern
and western extents of Harappan and OCP culture overlapped, and it would
be safe to assume that these areas experienced cultural exchange.
Coming back to our discussion on the discovery of war equipment in
Harappan cities, we should look at the discovery of the chariot in the
context of its geographical location. The fact that the chariot, though a true
war chariot, was found in a different material culture, leaves us with an
information gap on whether the Harappans too had similar war equipment.
Conflict or warfare is integral to empire-building. Even for smaller cities to
agree to merge with a relatively larger state, there has to be an initial show
of strength. Since we don’t have that evidence in the case of the Harappan
cities, we are not sure whether there was a Harappan army to conquer and
maintain a large political unit.
In ancient Egypt, we see a social hierarchy where the Pharaoh or the king
sits at the top, followed by other nobility, priests, scribes, soldiers, farmers
and slaves. In ancient Mesopotamia too we have a hierarchical structure of
administration. In Mesopotamia, there was no central administration
(initially) but the independent city states ruled their territories and indulged
in warfare.
Apart from the obvious features of a state, like the king and the nobility,
these ancient civilisations also had a bureaucracy that ran the
administration. The Egyptian scribes were responsible for record keeping.
They kept the records of tax collection and payments. These records tell us
that a system of tax collection was prevalent and it was used to finance
large construction projects like the pyramids and temples.
In West Asia, the city states of Mesopotamia were absorbed into the
Akkadian, Sumerian and Assyrian empires. Thus establishing monarchy in
the region. Archaeological evidence indicate the presence of large
buildings, identified as palaces, in Mesopotamia. The Mesopotamians also
had a system of using slaves and hiring farmers to work on the canals and
irrigation ditches during the floods. Since the floods had become
unpredictable in the region the canal works had to be carried out through
most of the year. Hence the need to maintain a dedicated force of workers in
form of slaves.
The evidence of social hierarchy with the king at the top, tax collection,
existence of palaces and royal tomb, a bureaucracy to maintain records and
run the administration, all indicate to presence of the a monarchical style of
governance. This however is not evident in the Harappan civilisation.
Though we now have evidence in form of the Sanauli burial, suggesting a
definite social hierarchy. This again belonged to a different material culture.
Before one attempts to jump to conclusion, it should be considered that
most of the information we have on Egypt and Mesopotamia is derived
from the extant records found during excavation. In case of Harappa the
script is yet to be deciphered. And we do not know what the seals might
reveal. Physical evidence like palaces and grand tombs are however missing
from the Harappan scene. All the major cities excavated are divided into
upper, middle and lower town. This might indicate a social hierarchy but
falls short of establishing the presence of royalty.
In most upper towns the layout of dwelling units are better planned. The
sanitation is better as compared to middle and lower town and the houses
are more than one story high. This indicates that the upper town was
inhabited by wealthy people. The multi-storeyed buildings obviously
required a better sanitation system since there were more people living in a
smaller area. Despite excavations been carried out for more than nine
decades the archaeologists have not come across a large building that can be
classified as a palace.
Another feature that is missing is the presence of a capital city. Though the
civilisation was spread across a million square kilometres there is not one
single city that could be identified as its capital. On contrary there are many
large cities that have been excavated, which all have strikingly similar
layout and material culture. We cannot, however, say with confidence that
one of them acted as the capital.
We cannot, with confidence, say that the Harappans were maintaining
records and if they did, what were they recording. We do not have evidence
of a royal dwelling place, i.e. a palace in any of the cities. We have not, yet,
excavated a city that would classify as the capital of the Harappan
civilisation. Yet there is concrete evidence of the Harappans following a
highly standardised way of living and had elaborate public works that
require an administrative machinery for their smooth running.
The sanitation system of the cities is one such public work. We know from
our current experience that sanitation system of the city requires a team of
trained workforce that follows a schedule to clean the streets and the
sewage system. The workforce has to be paid and supervised to ensure the
job is done. It is another matter altogether that all major cities in modern
India are dirty despite having the administrative set up to clean them.
Coming back to Harappa, the sanitation system with its network of drains
and soak pits required daily maintenance. The soak pits would have to be
cleaned at least once a day if not more. The terracotta pipes connecting the
bathroom on upper floors to the drains on ground definitely required careful
manufacturing process and subsequent repair and maintenance. These
works would have been done by a team of engineers, who would design the
system and workmen who would do the maintenance works. All these
people would have to be paid for. We can thus say that there was some kind
of a central arrangement within the cities that would monitor and pay for
these works.
We can draw a parallel from the temple tradition of India [21] (The temple
and the state in medieval South India, prof. Kesavan Veluthat), where
merchants and royalty would donate money and land to temples and in
return the temple would pay for maintenance of local infrastructure like
construction and maintenance of irrigation tanks, canals, dams, etc. The
Harappans too would have had such a common source of resources (in form
of grain, sugar, salt, wine, etc.) to pay for the works.
Another mechanism that would have required some kind of administrative
control was the weights and measures system. Archaeologists have found
striking uniformity in the weights and measures excavated from various
places. They follow exactly the same binary and decimal systems with the
same ratios. Again drawing a parallel from today’s world we know that
every state has codified laws which mandate the shop keepers to get their
weights and balances calibrated and certified every year from the
authorities. There are penalties if the weights and balance are not calibrated.
Again an arm of the administration is required to ensure compliance.
Were the Harappan weights controlled by a similar administrative arm? If
yes, then was there a central administrative unit that travelled across to
various cities to ensure compliance? Or were there local units that ensured
compliance in their respective cities? Again we do not have a definite
answer to this. But if we consider the early means of communication, the
geographical spread of the civilisation, distances between the various cities
and finally the number of cities, we can assume that it would have been
impossible for a central unit to travel around and ensure compliances. There
was probably a local unit in each city that ensured this.
Another way to look at the issue is from the trader’s point of view. Since all
the major cities engaged in trade, it was only natural for them to have some
common practices. When precious goods were traded, it made sense that the
unit of weight was same for both the parties. It is likely that the Harappans
would have spontaneously standardised their weights at some point in time.
The standardised weights became so popular and useful that the
Mesopotamians too accepted them and called them the Dilmun standard.
But we can assume that there must have been some kind of an arrangement,
either through a third party or self-imposed, to regularly check for wear and
tear of the weights and replace them to ensure fair trade practice.
So we do not know what the Harappans recorded, there is no palace like
building indicating royal presence and we are not sure how a central
administration, if at all, could have managed an area as large as a million
square kilometre. The available evidence shows that there is not enough
material to suggest a monarchical form of government. There is also scarce
evidence to suggest otherwise. So what should one make out of it? Were the
Harappans the ideal citizens living under the self-imposed code of conduct?
Very unlikely.
We can assume, or make an educated guess rather, that the Harappan cities
were probably governed independent of each other. The smaller cities too
perhaps had independent existence, though under significant economic
influence of the nearest large city. The cities might have had some kind of
administrative units in form of the temple administration of medieval India
or a merchants’ guild, which paid for and supervised the city works.
Whatever it was, it worked extremely well, probably better than the elected
municipalities of our modern cities.
Horse-riding Aryans Vs forces of nature
The Harappan civilisation is said to have declined or collapsed between
1800 and 1700 BCE. The mature phase of Harappa with great cities and
standardised urban planning and sanitation, simply vanished. India would
not see large urban centres for more than a thousand years after the last
bricks of Harappa crumbled. But how did a magnificent civilisation with
engineering and economic excellence vanish?
There were, and still are, multiple theories on why the civilisation declined
or collapsed. The first among them was an invasion. The concept of an
Aryan Invasion of Harappan sites was accepted as far back as 1926-27. The
annual report of ASI for the year 1926-26, edited by John Marshall recorded
the observations of Aurel Stein. He writes, ‘The fact of its chief rivers [the
region of Waziristan], the Kurram and Gumal, as well as the latter’s chief
affluent the Zhob, being mentioned in the famous Nadistuti [Sukta] or River
Hymn of the Rigveda under their ancient Sanskrit names of Krumu, Gomati
and Yavayavati, makes it appear very probable that this region had for some
length of time been in the occupation of Aryan tribes before they descended
from their hills to the conquest of the Indus Valley and the Punjab plains [22]
’.
John Marshall in his 1931 publication of the annual report of the
Archaeological Survey of India, endorsed the Aryan Invasion Theory (AIT).
He believed that the Harappan cities were destroyed between second and
third millennium BCE by the invading Aryans from the north. He also
compared the Harappan invasion with the destruction of the Aegean culture
by the Achaeans. This view persisted for a very long time. Noted historians
like A.L. Basham, Raymond Allchin and Bridget Allchin, whose books the
universities in India still recommend, were among those who further
propagated the Aryan Invasion Theory.
The basic premise of the theory was archaeological excavations and their
correlation with the verses of Rig Veda. John Marshall, during the
excavations at Mohenjo-Daro, stumbled upon the remains of 26 skeletons.
The place where the skeletons were found was marked as Room No. 74.
Such a large number of skeletons at the same place would have naturally
strengthened his belief in a ‘massacre’, that was obviously carried out by
the invading Aryans. Later on, Mortimer Wheeler correlated the massacre
with the hymns of Rig Veda where Indra is attributed to destroying fortified
cities, riding a chariot. He declared, ‘on circumstantial evidence, Indra
stands accused’.
While the archaeological evidence was used by the early historians to
propagate their AIT, a separate debate was already shaping up, which would
further reinforce the AIT. The nineteenth-century witnessed vigorous
debates on the similarities between Indian and European languages. Thomas
Young, a British polymath, in 1813 coined the term Indo-European (IE) to
show similarities between the languages spoken in India and in Western
Europe. By the time Marshall came up with his annual report of 1927, it
was well established that all the languages of Europe, central Asia and India
belong to the IE group. It was also accepted that the ancestral IE originated
somewhere in Central Asia and travelled west to Europe and east to India.
This new angle seemed to have completed the puzzle for the twentieth-
century historians. Marshall declared that the Aryans invaded the
Harappans and Wheeler proposed, Indra destroyed their civilisation. The
theory was corroborated by the hymns from Rig Veda. The evolution of the
IE languages from a central Asian source sealed the discussion; it was said
that the Aryans were most likely the ones who carried proto Sanskrit with
them to India.
There are two ways to understand why the AIT was later on changed to the
Aryan Migration Theory. In the early twentieth century, little was excavated
in the Indus Valley. There was a paucity of material evidence. Moreover, the
methods used for excavation too were primitive. The second point being the
Eurocentric vision of the Colonial world. The theory of evolution by
Darwin was finding acceptance, and survival of the fittest was seen
reflecting in the real world. Europeans had conquered much of the world
and controlled the resources. They were obviously the fittest and hence
superior to the ones they subjugated.
A combination of poor information and a sense of racial superiority must
have given them the idea that the Vedic knowledge could only have been
brought to India by fair-skinned men. They were also finding reasons to
justify the colonisation of India by suggesting that India has been invaded
in the past and it benefitted from it. Extending the logic to the English
conquest of India, the English suggested that their rule can only bring the
best for the country.
Whatever the reasons were for suggesting an army of invading Aryans
destroying the Harappan civilisation, the explanation and reasoning stuck
and was willingly supported by others. But with time new technology
comes in and eventually finds its way in most unexpected places, like in a
trench in Mohenjo-Daro. Later studies of Room No. 74 suggested that the
26 remains were actually from different periods. Those people died at
different times and of different causes, martyrdom in war being not one of
them.
Many other sites were excavated in India and Pakistan, and none so far has
yielded evidence to suggest an invasion. Nayanjot Lahiri, professor of
history at Ashoka University and a former professor at Delhi University, in
her book, ‘The decline and fall of the Indus Civilisation’, provides
compelling reasons to discredit the AIT.
Large bodies of work have been carried out by historians and archaeologists
to counter the AIT. This essentially means that there was no invasion and
destruction of the Harappans by horse-riding Aryan armies. The next logical
step was to change the theory. A new theory, the Aryan Migration Theory
(AMT), was propagated. According to this, the fair-skinned Aryans came
into the Harappan regions in waves, settled there and imposed their
language and culture on the Harappans. Linguistics and Rig Veda are
usually used to corroborate the new theory.
There is however one problem. Now that we know, Indra from Rig Veda did
not really destroy the Harappan cities, the only thing the theory rests upon
is linguistic studies. Lahiri in her book touches upon the subject and argues
that linguistic studies give us the relationship between various languages
but they do not tell us where the language originated. Though she does not
put a case for out of India migration of Aryans or the IE languages, she is
merely making an observation.
Recent archaeological excavations at Bhirrana and Rakhigarhi have thrown
new light on cultural practices of the people. Dr. Amarendra Nath, who
headed the excavations at Rakhigarhi, has written extensively on the
internment or burial practices found in Rakhigarhi. In his paper, ‘Harappan
internments at Rakhigarhi, Haryana’, for Man and Environment (2015), he
brings out the similarities in the burial practices of Harappans to that
mentioned in the Rig Veda. He doesn’t claim that the Harappans were Vedic
people but merely indicates the similarities that exist between the actual
findings and the Vedic texts.
Coming back to the AMT Nayanjot Lahiri in her book questions the
absence of any reference of a homeland in the Vedic texts. Humans
migrating to new land always take with them the memories of their home.
Even ideas travelling from their place of origin take with them the memory
of their land. The Parsis, who came to India fleeing the Islamic purge in
Persia still remember their homeland. The idea of Buddhism that travelled
from the plains of India to Japan in the east still remembers its origin in
India. So why did the Aryans conveniently forget about their origins in
Central Asian steppe? Why there is no mention of the geography or
vegetation or animals of Central Asia in the Vedas? Why are the Rig Vedic
hymns replete with references to rivers and surroundings of north-west
India? This is definitely an anomaly, an anomaly that is surprisingly
manifested in all ten books of Rig Veda.
So what finished off the Harappans? Before we answer this question, we
should ask ourselves a counter question. Were the Harappans really finished
off? Did the Harappan civilisation really collapse? Asking questions always
helps. It also leads us to ideas and concepts that we never imagined could
exist.
As mentioned above, the AIT has for sure turned out to be a false
assumption. In the light of no archaeological evidence found so far, one can
safely assume that there was no invasion. So what happened to the
Harappans? Let us look at the final phase of the civilisation to understand it.
The latter phase of the mature Harappan culture started showing signs of
degeneration at various sites. Various climatic, geological and economic
changes were taking place, impacting the mature Harappan phase. The
Monsoon, as we saw in the earlier section, was fluctuating between high
and low precipitation levels. This obviously had an impact on the people
living in the region. The Monsoon weakened further towards the end of the
mature Harappan period.
Landsat imagery and other studies have confirmed that Saraswati was a
living river during the Harappan times [23] . This has also been corroborated
by the existence of a large number of Harappan sites along its banks or
precisely now its palaeochannel. The river must have weakened over a
period of time before it dried up completely. It is believed that one of the
reasons why Saraswati dried up was changed in the course of Sutlej, near
Ropar in Punjab. Tectonic movements had likely changed its course, and
the waters of Sutlej were no longer captured by Saraswati, and instead, it
became a tributary of Indus. With a perennial feed of water lost to Indus,
the Saraswati would have most likely become a seasonal, monsoon river.
The Monsoon, as we saw, had already weakened to a considerable level,
making it impossible for Saraswati to sustain water during the dry months.
By the secondmillennium BCE, the Saraswati dried out completely. The
impact of this can be seen in the major cities like Kalibangan, which was
virtually abandoned by 1900 BCE [24] . Rakhigarhi and Bhirrana continued
for a few more centuries but eventually they too were abandoned. The
combination of a week monsoon and geological changes in Punjab are
likely to have contributed to the decline of these cities.
Apart from the combination of climate change and tectonic movement,
economic factors too are likely to have played some role. B.B. Lal in his
work, ‘Trade as a factor in rise and fall of the Indus civilisation’, for
Indologica.com, identifies weakening trade as one of the reasons for the
decline of the civilisation. He highlights the relative decrease in availability
of the two hallmarks of Indus trade, the weights and seals. In the upper
levels of excavations (more recent), the number of seals or weights is
considerably less than in the lower levels. This according to Lal indicates a
reduction in trade activities. Moreover, the acropolis, the warehouse and
dockyard of Lothal, which saw great trade activities, fell in complete disuse
by 1500 – 1100 BCE. This indicates that the city survived for a longer
period than those in the Saraswati valley.
So is it wise to assume that the cities of the Harappan civilisation flourished
and then declined at different points in time due to one or a combination of
climatic, tectonic and economic reasons? I would say, yes.
But like all science, archaeology too is evolving. With every new site, there
is likely to come more evidence. With new streams of science joining in, we
are more likely to better understand what the civilisation might have looked
like. But with available evidence, we can say that the chariot-riding Aryans
did not destroy the civilisation. Multiple, non-violent, natural factors are
more likely to have caused a gradual decline of the civilisation.
The gifts of Saraswati
With every end comes a new beginning. The thing with new beginning
though is that it may not always be better than the past. But it is sure a step
in regaining the lost glory, one step at a time. We have seen this several
times in the past. Post-war Germany was made to pay war reparations to the
occupied territories of Nazi Germany. A part of its industry was stripped off
by the Allied powers to deny it any military power in the future. Post-war
Japan was occupied by the Allied forces for almost seven years. During this
time, Imperial Japan was replaced by a republic and a constitution was
forced on the country, which prohibits it from maintaining armed forced
with war capabilities. Article 9 of the Japanese constitution that prevents the
country from waging a war is still in place.
Despite the miseries of war, both Germany and Japan managed to shake off
their past and entered into the league of advanced economies. Harappa went
through a similar phase but without a war. The people of Harappan
civilisation abandoned their cities and went to live rural lives. The resources
that supported an urban life were no longer available. Trade had all but
disappeared. Though rural in nature, the lives of the Harappans is unlikely
to have fallen into poverty.
The post-Harappans lived in small to medium farming communities and
continued to enjoy ornaments made of gold, copper, ivory and semi-
precious stone. This indicates that the people were prosperous and
maintained their relatively high standards of living. The successors of
Harappan civilisation are categorised as the Painted Grey Ware Culture,
after the characteristic pottery where the grey surface of the ceramics was
decorated with black paint. This lasted from around 1200 BCE to about 600
BCE.
During this time, iron was discovered and iron implements started making
way into the society. The new areas were not necessarily located in the
flood plains and hence required a harder metal to plough the land. Iron
provided the right alternate, and as a result, a larger area was brought under
agriculture. The descendants of Harappans expanded and occupied lands as
far away as the Ganga delta in east and the southern peninsular India in
south. With them, they took many Harappan practices. Some of them got so
engrained that they can be seen even today.
The yogic posture is one of them. We know that in the Pashupati seal,
discovered in Mohenjo-Daro, the figure identified as proto-Shiva is seated
in a yogic position. A few burial sites have been excavated in Balathal [25] in
Udaipur district where a body was excavated seated in a yogic position. We
can assume that some yoga must have been practiced in some form in
Harappan times and it is likely that it was further developed later on.
The swastika seal found in Mohenjo-Daro traces back the origins of the
religious symbol to the Harappan times. We do not know what the swastika
meant for the Harappans but today it is a major Hindu ritualist symbol. It
can be assumed that the swastika took over a sacred significance at some
point in time and was probably accorded a high status. We see swastika not
only in the Hindu traditions but also in Jain and Buddhist symbolism. As
Buddhism travelled from India to Sri Lanka and then to Japan in the east, it
took swastika with it. Somewhere between Sri Lanka and Japan, the
swastika got flipped and was represented turning counterclockwise. If one
picks up a tourist map of Tokyo, all the temples are marked with a retro
swastika.
The iconic Dancing Girl of Mohenjo-Daro is another masterpiece from
Harappan civilisation. It was made using the lost-wax technique, which is
still prevalent in India in the form of Dokra. In Orissa, West Bengal and
Jharkhand, the Dokra artefacts can be found in a humble souvenir shop and
also in upmarket emporiums. The art has survived at least 5000 years if not
more.
One of the signs to assess the prosperity of a society is by looking at its art
and leisure activities. While prosperity might mean different things to
different people, the basic idea is to see whether there was surplus food to
sustain families and communities. Once the basic requirement of food is
met, humans start engaging in luxuries like art forms and games. We saw
how the Dancing Girl of Mohenjo-Daro showed us the indulgence of
Harappans in art. Games, more specifically board games, are another
feature that tells us how the Harappans spent their leisure time. The national
museum in Delhi has a collection of dice from the Harappan times, which
surprisingly looks exactly as the one most of us have played with. The
Harappan dice is cuboid like the modern-day Ludo dice. It too has numbers
starting from one to six etched in as circular holes. We do not know whether
the Harappans played Ludo or a variant, but we know they had a board
game, which probably evolved into Pachisi at a later stage. Such is the
popularity of the game that it has found shelf space in toy stores across the
world. In the USA, it is even sold under the brand name, Parcheesi, derived
from the Indian word Pachisi.
In the Harappan gallery of the National Museum, there are various small
pegs on display, which look surprisingly similar to the modern chess pieces.
And they are of different sizes like the modern chess pieces. While the
Harappans abandoned their great cities to settle in farming villages, they
definitely did not forget to take their board games with them. We all know
how popular chess has become around the world. All thanks to the
Harappans, probably.
Another very interesting display at the National Museum is the maze and
ball game. It is made of clay and has two variants. One is a rectangular
version with interconnected furrows, and the other is a circular version with
similar interconnected furrows. The ball of course is missing. Many of us,
as kids, would have played with exactly the same toy made of plastic. A
circular disc with interconnected furrows with a steel ball bearing in it. The
task of the game is to roll the steel ball into the central furrow by tilting the
disc slowly. I remember getting frustrated at the ball not rolling into the
final furrow at the last moment. It surely tests one’s patience and teaches
one to be patient.
Urban India has almost abandoned ceramics, except for the expensive tea
sets and dinner sets we keep for that special occasion. Rural India though
still uses a lot of ceramics, especially the kinds Harappans used. The
Gundiyali terracotta of modern Kutch and the urns displayed in the National
Museum have striking similarities. Just like the Harappan pottery, the
Gundiyali pottery is smeared in red slip and has rich decoration of
geometric patterns in black paint. The diyas we use for Diwali or other
religious ceremonies are still made by pinching the rim, exactly the way
they were made in the Harappan times.
The transition of Harappan art, games and material culture into modern
times is perhaps an indication that all were not lost in the ruins of Indus and
Saraswati. Life carried on in a different place, in a different time. The
material culture and part of our religious traditions are the gifts of Saraswati
that we still cherish.
The altars of prayer
Excavations at Harappan sites have not yielded any text, which might throw
light on the customs and practices of the people. The script of Harappa still
remains un-deciphered and whatever we know about the Harappan society
is based upon observations and in some cases conjecture. One of the most
interesting aspects of the society, which has intrigued historians and
archaeologists, is perhaps the religious affiliation of the Harappans. None of
the excavations have yielded grand temples or tall statues that might hint at
the religious affiliation of the time.
What has been found are large public gathering places like the Great Bath
of Mohenjo-Daro. Kenoyer believes that there is a general consensus on the
Great Bath being a place for ritual purification. People would have used the
water to purify themselves, much like what the modern-day Hindus of India
do when they go for mass river bathing events like the Kumbh. Hindu
tradition has always put a lot of stress on the concept of purification. The
water of Ganga is used in all rituals to symbolically cleanse or purify the
surroundings. Taking a bath in rivers is considered to absolve the bather of
sins. Corpses are washed before they are cremated, so they can cross over to
afterlife in a clean or purified state.
Apart from the Great Bath, fire altars have been excavated in at least two
sites, Kalibangan and Lothal. A 2014 report by the Archaeological Survey
of India, ‘Excavations at Rakhigarhi, 1997-98 to 1999-200’, suggests the
presence of different types of fire altars. The fire altars of Rakhigarhi also
have remains of animal bones, most likely a goat, suggesting sacrifice in the
altar. The report further suggests that in one of the digging trenches, a yoni-
linga style fire altar has been identified. It is a circular altar with one of its
sides having an oblong extension, much like the depiction of a Shivalinga in
temples. Another type of altar had three openings in the circular perimeter.
Two smaller ones facing east and west and a larger one facing south. These
yoni-linga style altars however lacked any animal remains and contained
only ash.
The fire altars of Rakhigarhi have been supplemented with sacrificial
chambers. These are of different sizes and are likely to have been used for
both private and community events. A large number of bone fragments have
been found in these chambers.
The evidence of fire altars from Kalibangan, Lothal and Rakhigarhi
suggests that the Harappans practiced a sacrificial ritual that involved
offering meat and grains to the fire. An elaborate version of these possible
rituals is found in the Rig Veda. The hymns describe various types of altars
involving complex geometric designs and mathematical calculations. They
also prescribe the right kind of oblation and sacrifices to be made to Gods,
via Agni. In the post-Vedic age, the fire rituals underwent a change. Animal
sacrifices disappeared almost completely (with some exceptions in eastern
India, where it still happens). With the rise of the trinity of Brahma, Vishnu
and Mahesh, the rituals too underwent a change and fire altars lost
significance from everyday life. However, the Passover ceremonies like
marriage, childbirth, the thread ceremony and death still entail fire ritual,
i.e. a yagna.
So were the Harappans Vedic people? Or some kind of proto Hindus? It is
not easy to definitively answer this question. We might arrive at an answer
one way or the other but it will be mere conjecture. What we can say is that
many aspects of the Harappan rituals and probably religion have flowed
down to modern times. Significance of the Swastika, the Peepal tree, yoga,
fire altars, and the yoni-linga imagery is very much visible in our modern
version of Hinduism. So there is a definite line of unbroken traditions.
We saw how many aspects of our present-day religion and culture are
influenced by the Harappans and some of them we have simply continued
as such. The Harappans may have moved from urban centres to farming
centres, and they carried on with their cultural traditions without a break, so
much so that certain subsistence activities were elevated to religious rituals.
One such act is still observed in a large part of northern India. The
Harappans were well aware of the annual floods of the rivers. The summer
monsoon would bring torrential rains, and the rivers would carry millions of
tonnes of alluvium with them from the mountains. Once the rivers reached
the plains, they would deposit the alluvium in the flood plains. Post-
Monsoon, once the floods receded in September/October, the Harappans
would come out to sow the Rabi crops. The fresh alluvium, rich in nutrients,
would act as an excellent medium and would require minimum efforts to
plough the land. This exercise would have continued well into the mature
Harappan phase. Once the old sites were abandoned, the Harappans
obviously took this practice with them to the new areas.
In modern times, people across north India, during the Sharad Navratri,
recreate the event. Most households would have a corner where fresh
alluvium from the river would be brought and barley sprinkled over it. It
would grow for ten days, and the saplings would be used for the Dashahara
rituals on the tenth day. The ritual is not restricted to farmers alone but is
carried out by everyone as a symbol of good fortunes in the times to come.
What was essentially a subsistence and business activity was elevated to a
ritualistic status. Perhaps to hold on to the past.
Beyond the Vindhyas – Undiscovered history
Multiple factors resulted in the decline of the Harappan civilisation, and it
eventually gave way to the Painted Grey Ware culture. It is believed to have
lasted from 1200 BCE to 600 BCE. During these years, the descendants of
Harappans established themselves across the Ganga plains and moved south
of Ganga. This was also the period when south India leapfrogged into the
Iron Age. The lack of copper in southern India withheld it from witnessing a
Bronze Age, unlike its northern contemporary. While advent of Iron did
change the way people lived, much remained the same. Stone tools were
still in use, and widespread use of Iron was still a few centuries away. As a
matter of fact, India still hops comfortably between the stone age and the
digital age in its kitchen. The use of grinding tools made of stone, like the
mortar and pestle, the sil-batta of north or the ammik kallu in Tamil Nadu
and the Rubbuva Kallu of Karnataka are all stone tools people still use.
In southern India, the Iron Age is marked by the Megalithic culture. The
name comes from the use of large stone blocks used in tombs to bury the
dead. No major urban sites have yet been excavated in south India but there
are plenty of mid-sized settlements that would qualify for a town. Evidence
of bronze material suggests that there was definitely some kind of trade
relationship with bronze producing societies or even some local production.
The lack of extensive excavation in peninsular India is perhaps a reason
why little is known about the societies there. Unlike northern India,
exploration and excavation in south India started much later. The
Archaeological Survey of India established its Bengaluru branch only in
2001. The surveying of the region around Vaigai River in Tamil Nadu
started in 2013-14.
The first season of excavation at Keezhadi in Madurai district has yielded
significant findings. Subsequent seasons brought out the existence of an
urban settlement. This is for the first time that signs of an ancient urban
settlement have been excavated in Tamil Nadu. Brick walls and brick
platforms and ring wells point towards an evolved urban settlement.
More than 1,500 artefacts have been found during the excavation, primarily
glass beads. Some pottery with early Tamil Brahmi inscription too has been
found. According to Amarnath Ramakrishnan, who supervised the first two
seasons of excavation, these findings are in a way physical evidence of
what the Sangam Era (4th century BCE – 2nd century CE) literature provides
us in form of poetry.
During the subsequent seasons of excavations, more artefacts including pot
shards with ancient Tamil Brahmi script, which bears a striking similarity
with Brahmi, have been found. Carbon dating of the evidence found has
now pushed back the antiquity of the region from 3rd century BCE to 6th
century BCE.
We do not know exactly how old the settlement is and what preceded it. It
might take a couple of years for us to fully understand the significance of
the site. The discovery of the site, however, is significant in its own right.
The detailed study of the artefacts may throw up results, which can
potentially alter the history of India. Alternatively, they might fall short of
altering the history of India but will definitely give legitimacy to the literary
evidence available in the Sangam literature.
Our current understanding of history of south India is limited to the
Megalithic settlements and the recent find of Keezhadi. However, there is
literary evidence that suggests there was a flourishing civilisation with
advanced urban planning, literature and overseas trade. The existence of
overseas trade with peninsular India is well documented, and references are
available in European manuscripts.
The period between 1200 BCE and 600 BCE must have witnessed a series
of adaptation to the new habitats where the Harappans migrated to after
abandoning their urban centres. Introduction of Iron would have made it
possible to till a larger area, and favourable rain conditions would have,
once again, made it possible to produce surplus. The process of resettlement
and reaching a stage of surplus production would have taken a long time.
Dating oral traditions – in the realm of unknown
The period between 1200 BCE and 600 BCE is also identified as the Vedic
Age. It is believed that the Vedas were composed in this period and great
literary strides were made with standardisation of Sanskrit. The belief that
the Vedas were composed around that time doesn’t come from solid
evidence but from mere guesswork. Max Mueller was the first to assign a
date to the Vedas. This happened in the mid-nineteenth century, much
before the first evidence of the Harappan bricks were properly understood.
Max Mueller assigned the date of 5th – 6th century BCE to the various Sutra
literature. He then gave exactly 200 years [26] to every preceding set of
literature like the Aranyakas, Brahmanas and the Vedas, to have composed.
This is how an approximate date of 1200 BCE was assigned to the Vedas.
Mueller eventually became an authority on Indic literature and studies, and
his words were taken as the ultimate truth. From a purely curious mind’s
point of view, the 200-year period looks very arbitrary. Mueller could have
assigned a period of 300 or 500 year for the preceding texts and that would
have become the truth.
There are multiple views on the Vedic Age. Some scholars believe that the
Vedic Age started much earlier than 1200 BCE and was even contemporary
to the Harappan culture. One of the strongest arguments made in support of
this view is the existence of Saraswati. We know that Saraswati was already
a dwindling river when the urban centres of Harappa were abandoned. This,
when compared to the hymns of Rig Veda where Saraswati is said to be a
mighty river, indicates that at the time of writing the Vedas, the river was
not only extant but was full of water like the Indus.
Others believe that the Vedic age was not contemporary to the Harappans
but was much older than that. Bal Gangadhar Tilak in his work, ‘The Arctic
home in the Vedas’, assigned 4000 BCE as the date of the Vedic culture.
He, as suggested by the title, believed that the Aryans came to India from
the North Pole due to melting permafrost, which happened in 8000 BCE.
Others have taken to Archaeoastronomy to assign a date to the Vedas. These
dates range from 4000 BCE to 11000 BCE.
Dr. B.B. Lal, former Director General at ASI, also believes that evidence
from the Rig Veda indicates a geography spread across the northern plains
of India from the Ganga in the east to Indus in the west. Clubbed together
with the fact that Saraswati dried up around 2000 BCE, it is only obvious to
believe that the Harappans were the Vedic Aryans and the composition of
Rig Veda is definitely earlier than 2000 BCE [27] .
While we still do not have any ‘evidence’ to suggest a clear date for the
Vedas, one will have to make do with the available information and form
one’s own opinions. While doing so, one should remember that many times,
but not always, there are vested interests and motives behind accepting or
rejecting a theory. The Marxist historians in India are bent on promoting the
Aryan migration theory, the Aryan Dravidian divide, rejecting the existence
of Saraswati, etc. This serves their purpose of supporting the narrative that
was created in the 20th century to undermine India’s history. At that time, it
also served the purpose of Imperial Britain to buy legitimacy of their
oppression of India.
On the other hand, there are historians and interest groups who not only
want to push back the antiquity of Vedas to as far back as 11000 BCE, but
would also like us to believe that everything good about India is indigenous
and everything bad has come from outside. This is precisely the reason why
every student of history and anyone who is interested in history should
always listen to diverging views but at the same time critically examine
both.
Whether the Vedas were composed in 1200 BCE or in 11000 BCE, they
will probably remain a topic of debate and discussion for a long time to
come. The question of the so-called AMT and dating the Vedas has moved
on from being an academic question to a matter of fierce political debate.
Meanwhile, time does not stop to listen to our debates and discussions. It
keeps moving in one direction only, forward.
The age of Mahajanapadas
While the people of PGW culture were settling in, they were also
organising themselves in different political structures. By 500 BCE, we start
getting clear evidence of established states or political units. These were
referred to as the Mahajanapadas. We find their reference in Panini’s
Ashtadhyayi and in many Jain and Buddhist scriptures. There were sixteen
such Mahajanapadas, mostly in north, north-west and eastern parts of the
Indian subcontinent. This is also the first time we find the mention of some
kind of political structure in the subcontinent. These varied from
monarchies to republics.
If these Mahajanapadas were mentioned in a 5th century BCE work, the
process of their formation would have definitely started much earlier. Now
we can act like Mueller and assign a random time span for them to have
evolved or we could simply skip the effort. The choice is yours.
Mahajanapada Modern Mahajanapada Modern
equivalent equivalent
Anga Eastern Kuru Meerut region
Bihar/Bengal
Asmaka Vidarbha/ Magadh Patna
Telangana
Avanti Western Madhya Malla Kushinagar
Pradesh
Chedi Bundelkhand Matsya Jaipur/Alwar
Gandhara Peshawar, Pakistan Panchal Badaun/Bareilly
Kashi Varanasi Surasen Mathura/Gwalior/Bharatpur
Kamboj North-east Vrijji Northern Bihar/Nepal
Afghanistan
Kosal Central/Eastern UP Vatsa Prayagraj

The Mahajanapadas have been described in various religious and non-

religious texts. References have been made in terms of established trade
routes from east to the west and how one travels from one end of the route
to the other, hopping from one Mahajanapada to the next. At that time, there
were two established trade routes in India, the Uttarapatha and the
Dakshinpatha. The Uttarapatha had Tamralipti in the east and Bahlika in the
west. The route was used for inter-Janpada trade. There is evidence of horse
trade from Central Asia to plains of India. Tamralipti, or modern-day
Tamluk in Purba-Medinipur district of West Bengal, used to be a busy port
city in ancient times, trading with both western Janpadas and Southeast
Asia. Upinder Singh in her book, ‘A history of ancient and early medieval
India’, mentions trade relations between the Mahajanapada of Anga and
Southeast Asia. Traders would sail to Suvarnabhumi (region identified with
Southeast Asia) to trade in spices, precious stones and cotton fabrics.
Suvarnabhumi in all probability was a reference to a region in Southeast
Asia, which has remained in the consciousness of the people even in
modern times. That is the reason why the new airport in Bangkok is called
Suvarnabhumi Airport. Tamralipti was also the port from where Faxian, the
Chinese traveller, left for China. (412 CE). Tamralipti located on the banks
of Rupnarayan remained an important port town but was subsequently
abandoned, probably because the port got repeatedly inundated with silt due
to frequent cyclones.
The Mahajanapadas of India had established extensive trade networks, not
only within the subcontinent but also to Southeast Asia and China. The
province of Sichuan in south-western China had a thriving trade in Chinese
silk [28] with the eastern Mahajanapadas. The Arthashastra composed
between 2nd and 3rd centuries BCE documents Chinese silk. Later records of
Shi Ji mention the travel of Zhang Qian, a Chinese diplomat to India in the
first century BCE. In the document, it is said that Qian was surprised to see
Sichuanese cloth and Qionglai bamboo rods being sold in Bactria [29] .
Upon investigating the matter, he was informed by the locals that these
goods were imported into eastern India by merchants of Sichuan. The goods
were then transported across the Uttarapatha, all the way to the Bactrian
markets.
If the goods from Tamluk ended up in the markets of Bactria (modern
Balkh, in Afghanistan), over 3,000 km away, one can imagine the kind of
supporting infrastructure that must have existed to support long-distance
trade. It is unlikely that traders from Tamluk would have travelled all the
way up to Bactria to sell the Sichuan silk. Travelling over 3,000 km at a
stretch in a caravan would have taken months and would have required
frequent stocking of food supplies, changing of horses/bullocks. It would
have also meant being away from their trade hubs for almost a year. No
clever businessperson would take such a risk.
The most likely scenario would have been a short to medium distance
travel. The traders from Tamluk would have exchanged their wares with
traders from western Mahajanapadas like Magadh, Kosala and Panchal. The
traders from middle India would then have taken the goods further west,
probably with more intermediaries in Kuru, Matsya region. Most likely
these mid-distance travel would have been supported by rest houses, animal
shelters and some kind of security arrangements offered by the chiefs of the
intermediary Mahajanapadas in exchange of taxes and tolls.
Politically, the Mahajanapadas were a mix of Monarchy and Republican
territories. We know for sure that Kamboj, Malla and Vrijji followed a
Republican form of government. Kuru too, according to a Jataka scripture,
is said to have shifted to Republican form of governance around 5th century
BCE. Vrijji was unique in a way that it was a confederacy with a
Republican form of government.
The Republics of ancient India were governed by the dual system of a
Sabha and a Samiti. The Sabha was a congregation of common people, and
the Samiti was a much smaller group of elected/nominated members close
to the ruler/king. This dual system can be vaguely compared to the modern
bicameral legislature, where elected representatives are divided into two
groups. In the case of India, it will be the directly elected Lok Sabha and
indirectly elected Rajya Sabha.
The confederacies were a union of clans where different clans came
together for the purpose of governance. Vrijji was one such confederacy.
Vrijji had eight clans, and each clan head was known as a Raja. It was ruled
by consensus, and all religious rights were performed collectively by the
Rajas.
The Mahajanapadas that would have evolved into territorial states must
have had their origins in smaller towns. Trade, agriculture and the urge to
defend the surplus could possibly have led to fortifications of the towns and
eventually their growth into large kingdoms or republics. The urge to
conquer more territory for agriculture and mining of iron would, most
likely, have started the territorial expansion. The early Mahajanapadas
witnessed a change with the accession of Bimbisar in Magadh.
Bimbisar acceded to the throne of Magadh in the latter half of the 5th
century BCE. His ambition of territorial expansion made him use various
strategies to form alliances and gain territories. He entered into matrimonial
alliances with Kosala, Licchavi and Madra. He also made friends with
powerful kingdoms and invaded weaker ones. He was succeeded by his son,
Ajatshatru, after he imprisoned him.
The Magadh empire kept on expanding but it was not until the middle of
third century BCE when it saw greater expansion, south of Vindhyas, by the
Nandas. The Nanda Dynasty was founded by Mahapadma Nanda in around
345 BCE. He conquered territories in Deccan, Kalinga and as far as the
Kuru Mahajanapada in the west. He was succeeded by Dhana Nanda but his
rule proved to be short lived. A major event during his time changed the
course of history of India.
Greeks at the gates of India
In spring of 334 BCE, Alexander crossed over Hellespont or the Straits of
Dardanelles as it is called today, to enter the Persian Empire. A large part of
Ancient Egypt, Libya and entire modern Turkey was under Persian control
when Alexander embarked on his conquest. It took him more than a year to
conquer the Anatolian regions of the Persian Empire. In 332 BCE, he
marched into present-day Lebanon and then onwards to Syria and Palestine.
The next year he reached Egypt, and in July 331 BCE, he arrived in
modern-day Iran. He had conquered Anatolia, Egypt and the Levant and
was now standing in the heart of the Persian Empire.
When Alexander started his invasion of the Persian Empire, he arrived in a
deeply divided and weakened Persia. Many provinces were nominally
under the Empire but were practically independent. The subjects in Egypt,
for example, saw the Persians as foreign invaders and were resentful. There
were many minor insurgencies, which were further weakening the Empire.
Alexander took advantage of the situation and conquered the Persian
territories in a series of battles.
Alexander, who was raised by his maternal uncle, was taught the austere
ways of living. It was a quality that resonated with his army and earned him
their respect. However, by the time Alexander conquered Persepolis, the
seat of Persian Empire, he got used to the luxuries of the Orient. He,
however, never lost sight of his ambitions. By autumn of 330 BCE, the
Persian conquest was complete and he headed north to the cities in present-
day Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. When Alexander was conquering the
Central Asian cities, Dhana Nanda acceded the throne in Pataliputra in
Magadh.
In April 329 BCE, Alexander crossed the Hindukush. The Greeks were
unaware of these mountains and confused them with the Caucasus in
Eastern Europe [30] . They believed the Hindukush were an extension of the
Caucasus and recorded them as such. He went back and forth the
Hindukush and campaigned in northern Afghanistan and Central Asia. In
the spring of 327 BCE [31] , he once again crossed the Hindukush from
Bactria and arrived at its foothills. He camped his troops in what is now
Bagram in Afghanistan.
The region of Bactria and everything eastwards still held its Mahajanapada
era features. The names of the cities and towns were no longer Persian but
Sanskrit or Prakrit and the culture distinctly Indian. The region of Bahlika
that the Greeks called Bactria was the westernmost end of the
Mahajanapada continuum.
Once in Bagram, he started to consolidate his troops by taking in new
recruits. His campaigns in Persia and then Central Asia took a heavy toll on
his troops. Many troops perished and many were rendered invalid.
Alexander started recruiting troops from Bagram and surrounding areas,
soon he divided the new army into two and ordered one half, commanded
by trusted generals, to head to ‘Peukelaotis’ or Pushkalavati, known by its
Pali name Pukkalaoti [32] . The other half of the troops, also the best, was
probably commanded directly by Alexander. The two troops were to meet at
a convenient place on the banks of the Indus.
The troops commanded by generals of Alexander also had local chiefs
known as Taxiles, a reference by the chroniclers to chiefs ruling the
territories between Indus and Jhelum/Hydaspes. These chiefs of
Mahajanapada extraction sided with Alexander. The ones who revolted
were duly executed.
On their way to Indus, the detachment headed by Alexander encountered
smaller local chiefs defending their towns and villages. In some cases,
where the people knew they did not stand a chance to defeat Alexander’s
troops, simply set fire [33] to their villages and fled to the mountains nearby.
Many cities and towns are mentioned in the records left behind by the
chroniclers, which Alexander or his troops invaded. Some of them have
been identified, and some of them still remain disputed. The fact is that
there are many versions of Alexander’s attack on India, from contemporary
and later chroniclers, and it is almost impossible to pinpoint the places on a
map today.
When one reads the records of Alexander’s conquest, one must also
remember that getting lost in translation is easy. The Greeks probably had
no direct contact with India before the invasion. They would have only
heard about India from secondary sources, unlike Persia where they had
first-hand information from the Greek colonies. What the chroniclers saw
and understood should be read with an open mind and not taken on face
value all the time. Some of the information may fall into the category of
legends with some truth and some fantasy. Some information may have
been altered in the course of multiple translations and interpretations. The
Greek accounts do give us valuable information but the content should be
read together with more recent archaeological finds and scholarship.
One of the last sieges of Alexander is said to be at the yet unidentified,
‘rock of Aornos’. Believed to have been located somewhere in present-day
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in Pakistan, the rock of Aornos was a plateau which
could not be put into submission by laying a siege. The plateau was large
and flat enough to grow crops and hence would never surrender. Alexander
eventually conquered it by brute force.
Having successfully conquered the Rock of Aornos, Alexander crossed the
Indus somewhere close to present-day Attock, by building a bridge. The
bridge was built using boats from locally sourced timber and employing the
labour of elephants. The records left by the chroniclers give us information
about the people of the Indus region. One should remember that much of
the account left is prone to exaggeration, misunderstanding and plain
falsehood. An example being the description of people in the region. The
texts describe the Indus people with an average height of five cubits or 90
inches or 7.5 [34] feet and of a darker complexion compared to other people.
The description of rivers of India by Arrian is interesting. He says the rivers
of India cannot be compared with any he has seen in Egypt, Anatolia or
Persia. He specifically mentions the Indus and the Ganga as mighty rivers,
which hold more water than any other river he has seen. When we see these
rivers today, they seem heavily diminished and of course highly polluted.
Most of the rivers flowing in India and in Pakistan were dammed either
during the colonial period or shortly after independence in 1947. This
obviously reduced the amount of water flowing down in the plains. It is
especially the case with Ganga and Yamuna in northern India. The rivers do
not get enough water until they are met with their tributaries mid-course.
The Indus must have been a mighty river in ancient times, when there were
no dams. The description of Indus in the Vedas attests to the fact. Unlike
most rivers, Indus is not described as a nadi (river in Sanskrit) but a nad
(masculine form of the river), Brahmaputra, i.e. son of Brahma being the
only other nad .
Once Alexander crossed the Indus and arrived in Taxila, he was met by the
embassy of many rulers. Ambhi, the king of Taxila, described as one of the
greatest cities between Indus and Hydaspes, sent him presents and gave him
territory. It is recorded that Ambhi sent him 200 talents (each Greek talent
weighing approximately 26 kg) of silver, 3,000 oxen, 10,000 sheep, 30
elephants and 700 horsemen. Chiefs from neighbouring territories of
Doxares too joined Alexander. Thus, we see that advent of Alexander in the
Mahajanapada regions saw a mixed response. At some places, the people
voluntarily submitted to him and saved themselves the horrors of death and
destruction. At other places, he was welcomed by burning cities and a
population ready to fight him to the last man. Taxila, despite being a large
and prosperous city, as described by Arrian, submitted to Alexander to save
itself from sure destruction.
The next stop for Alexander was the banks of Hydaspes (Jhelum). This is
where the most famous battle, which has acquired a cult status in India, was
to be fought. Hydaspes was the Greek name of Jhelum as we know it today.
However, in the Nadistuti Sukta of Rig Veda, Jhelum is identified as
Vitasta. The river is also known as Bedasta in Kashmir, a modified version
of Sanskrit Vitasta. Ptolemy identified Bedasta as Bidaspes, which
eventually was known as Hydaspes to the Greeks.
The journey from Taxila to the banks of Hydaspes where Alexander met
Porus must have been well over a 150 km. After winning the war,
Alexander is said to have founded the city of Nicaea, to mark his victory.
The city, unfortunately, did not survive, and modern historians have not
been able to find its exact location. The location is believed to be lying
somewhere close to the present-day city of Jhelum in the Punjab Province
of Pakistan, six kilometres from the India–Pakistan border.
The name Nicaea, given to the city, was borrowed from the Greek city of
the same name, located in north-west Anatolia. The Anatolian city would
play a defining role in shaping Christianity, six centuries later. The Roman
Emperor Constantine I would convene the First Council of Nicaea in 325
CE to deliberate the early Christian Cannon Laws and bring uniformity in
observing dates of Easter. The city would also hold a Second Council in 787
CE, which would eventually settle various contentious matters between
different Christian sects.
The battle of Hydaspes
Once Alexander arrived on the banks of Hydaspes, he was informed that
Porus has camped across the river, waiting to thwart his attempts at crossing
over. Alexander wanted to make sure he could successfully cross the
Hydaspes with his entire army and face Porus with his full strength.
Crossing the Hydaspes was crucial. He at once ordered the bridge on the
Indus, he used earlier, to be dismantled and the boats used to build it
brought down to Hydaspes.
Coenus, one of Alexander’s most faithful generals, was tasked to carry out
the arduous exercise. The smaller boats were cut in half and the larger, 30
oar galleys, were cut into three. The sections were then transported on
wagons, all the way from Taxila to Hydaspes. The task must have taken
weeks to complete. The boats were then reassembled, and a new bridge was
constructed. It is interesting that the battle of Hydaspes was not the only
time when boats were moved overland for warfare. In 1453 CE, the Turkish
armies of Mehmet II would transport their boats from the Bosphorus, into
the Golden Horn using Oxen and human labour. Just like in the Battle of
Hydaspes, carrying of boats overland would prove one of the reasons for
winning the war against the Byzantines.
The various accounts of the battle by different chroniclers provide different
estimates of the total strength of the armies on either side. We come across
numbers ranging from 120,000 to just 60,000 for Alexander’s strength. On
Porus’ side, we have estimates range between 20,000 and 50,000 infantry
and different numbers of chariots and elephants. We would probably never
know what the actual strength of the belligerent armies was. What we know
is that Alexander’s army was smaller than Porus’.
Arrian gives an account of the pre-war manoeuvres by Alexander, which
were a mix of show of strength and psychological warfare. Once on the
banks of Hydaspes, Alexander could see the battle formation of Porus on
the opposite bank. Porus had already constituted scouting units in his army,
who would go up and down the river to see where the river was fordable
and to keep an eye on the movement of the Macedonian army. Porus
wanted to prevent Alexander from crossing over at any cost.
In response to Porus’ manoeuvers, Alexander divided his own army into
smaller units. His units started mimicking what Porus’ army was doing. The
Macedonians, in small units, would march up and down the river to find a
suitable fording point. Sometimes Alexander himself would command one
such unit. In an attempt to show how committed he was to cross over,
Alexander called for provisions to be sent from villages and garrisons to the
battle site. He wanted to convey to Porus that he is willing to wait for the
waters to subside and cross over in winters, if required. The constant
movement of the Macedonians up and down the river kept Porus engaged in
monitoring the enemy’s movement.
We saw how historians and chroniclers have given conflicting views on
location of Taxila and the battle site on Hydaspes. To add further confusion,
there are conflicting accounts on the time of the battle itself. The account of
Arrian puts the dates between 18th April and 18th May, 326 BCE. However,
a translation of the account puts it well after the summer solstice of 21st
June. The confusion is understandable. Arrian mentions heavy rains and a
swollen Hydaspes during the war. He describes the water of Hydaspes as
turbid.
We know that the glacial rivers of Himalayas see an increase in water flow
in the summer months when melting snow starts feeding the rivers. We also
know that the summer monsoon, which reaches the northern plains in late
June and early July, causes flooding of the rivers. If we consider the actual
climatic conditions on the subcontinent, the later date of post-21st July is
more likely to have been closer to the actual battle time.
Alexander of course did not want to wait for the river to subside to cross it
over. He was constantly sending his troops to find a suitable ford,
preferably away from the camp of Porus. Crossing over directly into Porus’
camp would mean sure defeat. His biggest worry was his cavalry. His
horses were not used to elephants in warfare, and they would be scared by
the loud trumpeting of the elephants. There will be chaos and confusion,
leading to a crushing defeat.
Alexander made sure that every night the army would create a commotion
with war cry and hasty movements to create a sense of panic in the Porus’
camp. Porus ensured that he would follow the commotion and make sure
there is no attempt to cross over. However, after many nights of similar
commotion, without any attempts to cross over the river, Porus dropped his
guard.
While encamped, Alexander is believed to have engaged with Porus in
coaxing him to surrender. Curtius Rufus, a Roman historian in the first
century CE, mentions that Alexander sent an envoy to Porus. He wanted
Porus to meet him at the banks of his side of the river and pay him tribute.
In response, Porus sent him a curt response saying, he will meet him but
wielding his sword.
Meanwhile, Alexander found a suitable spot to cross over the river. At this
point, both sides of the river were covered in thick forest and moving the
troops could easily be concealed. Alexander moved part of his troops to the
ford and instructed the rest to cross over only when Porus moves his
elephants away from the camp. Fording of the river was to happen under
the cover of darkness. Porus’ troops did not make much, of the commotion,
caused by Alexander’s troops. They were used to it now. They did not
expect the wolf to finally arrive.
Alexander left a detachment of his troop midway between the ford and his
camp. He instructed them to cross over as soon as they saw the Indian
troops engage with the Macedonians. At the ford, the dismantled boats were
already reassembled and hides inflated with hay were ready to be fitted on
the pontoon rafts for the cavalry to cross over. Small and large boats were
both used to cross over to the other side.
True to the unpredictable Indian monsoon, a thunderstorm struck at night.
Heavy rains and strong winds made it impossible for the boats to cross over.
It was only before daybreak, when the rains stopped, that the troops could
cross over to the other side.
Once the troops reached the other side, they were in for a shock and
disappointment. What they thought was the opposite bank of the river,
turned out to be an island. The thick forest cover on the island prevented
Alexander from seeing the river on the other side of the island. The shock
however was short lived. Fortunately, for Alexander, the river on the other
side was not very deep. The storm last night has definitely swollen the
water but it soon subsided. He found the right ford and crossed over to the
other side.
There is another set of conflicting accounts on what happened just before
Alexander crossed over from the island to the point where he landed on the
other bank. The Greek historian, Aristobulus of Cassandreia, who
accompanied Alexander on his campaign writes that while Alexander was
crossing the river from the island, Porus’ son rode along the bank with 60
chariots. He could have stopped Alexander from crossing over, but did not
engage and simply rode past. These troops were later killed by Alexander.
Other accounts suggest that there was an encounter with the Indian troops
led by Porus’ son just as the Macedonians were landing on the bank.
Ptolemy who accompanied Alexander on his campaign suggests that Porus’
son met Alexander with an infantry of 2,000 and 120 chariots. By that time,
Alexander’s troops had already landed. In the encounter that ensued,
Alexander was injured by Porus’ son and his horse died of wounds. After
the initial confusion where Alexander thought that the entire army of Porus
was charging at him, he soon learnt that the troops led by Porus’ son were
small in size. The chariots of Indians proved to be a liability on the slippery
ground. The wheels would often get stuck in mud made soft due to heavy
rains. Porus’ son was eventually killed in the encounter.
Porus upon hearing the arrival of Alexander and death of his son marched to
meet him on suitable ground. He left behind a small detachment to deal
with the Macedonian section camped across the river. The battle formation
of Porus made use of elephants, infantry and cavalry but the discipline of
the battle-hardened Macedonians and strategy of Alexander proved
superior. Alexander’s attack caused confusion in the Indian camp and the
battle formation broke. The elephants in the end proved more of a liability
since amid confusion they started trampling on Indian soldiers. Many
mahauts were killed, and the elephants were no longer in control. It is
estimated that approximately 20,000 infantry and 3,000 cavalry on the
Indian side died. The chariots were all destroyed. The death toll on
Alexander’s side is listed at 80 infantry, 10 horse archers, 20 companion
cavalry and 200 other cavalry. These numbers seem highly under-reported,
given the scale of war.
Porus realised his defeat when he saw most of his army lying dead. He
however continued fighting till the very end. Arrian mentions that unlike
Darius III of Persia, Porus did not abandon his troops at the first sight of
defeat. This act of Porus seemed to have impressed Alexander a lot and
rightly so. All through his campaign Alexander hardly ever faced resistance.
The Egyptians were all too happy to invite him to overthrow the Persians
and much of Anatolia fell without resistance. Only in Persia proper did
Alexander face some resistance, but once in the Mahajanapada region, he
faced his toughest opponents.
Having watched Darius III flee the battle, the resilience and bravery of
Porus must have made Alexander see a worthy opponent in him. After the
war, Alexander is believed to have sent messengers to Porus, who was now
retreating to his camp. Multiple messengers including Ambhi are believed
to have approached him but it was Meroes (a friend of Porus), who finally
managed to convince Porus.
Alexander and Porus met for the first time and what happened next is a mix
of poetry and facts. Upon seeing Porus, Alexander is believed to have
admired his seven feet stature. The conversation between them is recorded
by Arrian as –
‘Then Alexander, who was the first to speak, requested Porus to say how he
wished to be treated. The report goes that Porus replied, ‘Treat me, O!
Alexander as befits a king;’ and that Alexander, being pleased with his
answer, replied, ‘For mine own sake, O! Porus thou shalt be so treated, but
do thou, in thine own behalf, ask for whatever boon thou pleases.’ to which
Porus replied that in what he had asked everything was included. Alexander
was more delighted than ever with this rejoinder, and not only appointed
Porus to govern his own Indians, but added to his original territory another
of still greater extent’.
The exact words exchanged between Alexander and Porus might have been
different from the above account. But what the account tells us is that not
only was Alexander impressed by Porus, he also saw him as an equal. It is
believed that after his victory, Alexander stayed with Porus for a month and
settled the disputes between him and Ambhi. A marriage alliance was
struck, and a reconciled Ambhi was sent back to Taxila.
So far what we know about Alexander’s campaign has been exclusively
derived from the Greek sources. One can argue that these accounts can be a
glorified version of what actually happened. After all who doesn’t like to
leave behind a tale of great victories? There have been instances where the
Greek version of the campaign has been challenged. In India, questions
have been raised and alternate versions of the battle discussed in the
blogosphere.
Questions have been raised about the Greek versions of the Persian defeat
too. The Greek accounts say that Darius III fled the battlefield when he saw
his army has been defeated. Historians and archaeologists countering this
view site the Astronomical diaries of Mesopotamia. The Astronomical
Diaries were daily records maintained by the administration. They recorded
market prices, water levels in the rivers, celestial phenomenon, politics, etc.
These were written in the cuneiform script on clay tablets. One such diary
notes the events during Alexander’s campaign in Mesopotamia. It notes that
the attack by Alexander wreaked havoc on the markets and the markets
witnessed hyperinflation, so much so that the governor of the city has to
close the market down. Much like what happens today on a crazy day in
stock market. There have been instances when stock markets suddenly
crash or zoom and the regulators have to suspend trading for a few hours or
an entire day.
The tablet also records that at the end of the battle, the Persian soldiers were
demoralised by the setbacks and eventually fled, leaving their king, Darius
III, behind. This is exact opposite of what the Greek texts mention.
According to Arrian’s records, it was Darius who fled, leaving his army
behind. We do not know for sure why there are conflicting records of the
same event. It is believed that once the Macedonians saw the Persian army
retreating, they assumed that the King has fled the battlefield, and hence,
the troops are retreating. Again there are no correct answers, for one can
also argue that the Astronomical Diaries recorded the alternate version to
save their king from disgrace.
Such conflicting views become critical when historians, commentators,
activists and politicians start viewing historical events through the lens of
modern times. Both versions serve the purpose of one group or the other.
Both are not likely to be interested in finding out the truth, but more
interested in the truth that meets their objective. For a history enthusiast, it
is important to see history as it was. It is better to not reach a conclusion
where evidence is scarce. In such cases, both sides of the story need to be
told, without reaching a definitive conclusion.
So whether Darius III fled the battlefield or his soldiers deserted him is an
unsolved mystery. One should leave it at that. The important thing is that
the Persian armies were defeated and Alexander marched into the
Mahajanapada region. Here, again one finds the same dilemma. There are
no Indian records to provide a counter view of the campaign. So what
exactly happened during Alexander’s campaign in India? Did he indeed
subjugate the Indians? Did he really defeat Porus?
The answer to all these questions is, ‘we do not know’. Unless we come
across some evidence which suggests otherwise, we have to rely on the
Greek accounts. Evidence of defeat of Alexander would probably instil a
sense of pride in us and right a historical wrong. But if one looks beyond
the binaries of victory and defeat, there is a huge expanse in between. The
way Alexander treated Porus after the battle and the way he gave him
additional territories to rule, tells us about the trust and respect they had for
each other. The post-war relationship between Alexander and Porus does
not belong in the binaries of victory and defeat but it is somewhere in
between.
From a historical point of view, the events post-Hydaspes proved to be a
turning point in his campaign. Alexander was keen to reach the banks of
Ganga and engage with the army of Dhana Nanda. His own army, however,
was reluctant. After almost eight years since they embarked on the mission
to conquer the world, they for the first time, in India, faced a tough match.
Their energy had dissipated, and they longed to return home.
Influential generals in Alexander’s army refused to follow Alexander any
further. Seeing the demoralised army, Alexander gave a long and emotional
speech to his soldiers but it fell on deaf ears. It is said that Alexander was so
saddened by his army’s reluctance to fight further, and he shut himself up in
his tent and refused to talk to anyone. It was only after much persuasion by
his generals that he agreed to come out of his tent. He decided to return
home, sailing on the Hydaspes to the southern sea.
On his way back, he sailed through the land of Mallis and engaged in a
battle. The Mallis were engaged after Alexander crossed the confluence of
Hydaspes and Akesines (Chenab). It is believed that Alexander’s ships
suffered damages due to the fast rapids at the confluence. Once in the open
waters, Alexander repaired his fleet and sailed on.
The location of the land of Mallis is disputed, more because the landmarks
mentioned in the Greek accounts have shifted. The confluence of the rivers
too has since shifted. The area is now identified with the surroundings of
modern-day Multan in Pakistan. The region of Malli had various cities and
forts, which Alexander subjugated after bitter resistance from the Indians.
At one point, the Indians, upon witnessing the advance of the Macedonians,
set fire to their houses and were burnt alive along with their families.
During the fight, the Indians fought pitched battle with the Macedonians
and only a few were eventually captured. The rest being killed in action.
The act of setting houses to fire to escape the enemy and that of fighting
until death, brings some parallel for the medieval practice of Jauhar and
Saka in Rajasthan. There too the besieged city, in event of imminent defeat,
would commit its women to fire and the men would go out and fight unto
death. Similar events have also occurred in modern history, outside India. In
the year 1849, the king of Buleleng in modern Bali saw imminent defeat at
the hands of invading Dutch army. Not willing to face the humiliation, he
along with his followers committed Puputan [35] , a ritual suicide.
It was at one of the Malli cities that Alexander was to receive a near-fatal
blow. The Macedonian army came upon a fort, which seemed abandoned.
They imagined the city has already been taken and started to gather few
scaling ladders to breach the high walls. While trying to breach the walls of
the fort, Alexander used a scaling ladder and found himself alone on top of
the wall. The Indians, upon seeing Alexander alone, started firing arrows at
him. He repelled the attacks and in order to cause terror in the hearts of the
Indians jumped inside the fort.
Meanwhile, the troops of Alexander found it difficult to gather enough
ladders to scale the walls. Some of his soldiers managed to climb over and
join him in his fight. They were too few. In the ensuing attack, an arrow
from a Malli soldier hit Alexander in his chest, breaching his armour. The
arrow lodged itself between his ribs, piercing his lung. Alexander fell to the
ground and fainted. After much effort, more Macedonians finally managed
to enter the fort and protected their prostrated king.
Various sources give conflicting accounts of what happened next. Some
suggest the Macedonian surgeons removed the arrow from his chest, while
the others suggest that the soldiers themselves managed to dislodge it and
pulled it out. Whatever the case, the arrow was pulled out of his chest, but it
left a puncture in his lung. It must have taken Alexander, weeks to recover
from the near-fatal wound. We know from the accounts of Arrian that a
sense of unrest prevailed in the army. It was rumoured that Alexander has
actually died and his guards are preventing the news from spreading. It was
only after partial recovery, when Alexander showed up on a horse that his
troops rejoiced.
From then on, Alexander sailed further down and reached the mouths of the
Indus. There he divided his army into two. One half sailed to the Persian
Gulf, hugging the Makran coast and the other half marched through the
desert of Makran. He reached Babylon in 323 BCE and died there of an
infection, thus ended the expedition of Alexander.
India as seen by the Greeks
Other accounts of Alexander’s campaign like that of Curtius Rufus, shed
some light on the social aspect of India. In his account, he erroneously
believes that both the Indus and the Ganga drained into the Red Sea. It is
interesting to note that Alexander never really reached Ganga and it is
unlikely that any of his companions would have done so either. However,
the river finds mention in various accounts. It is likely that the Ganga had
already achieved a high status in the religious and social lives of the
Mahajanapada people and hence was talked about in great admiration. It
was perhaps this admiration that led to the Greeks to write about it. There
seems no other reason why they would write about a river they have never
seen.
In his mention of the people, Rufus says that the Indians drape themselves
with fine muslin, down to their feet and coil their heads with linen, a
reference to the pagdi worn by Indians. He then says that the Indians do not
cut their hair and wear them long. Beards are also popular. The men also
wear pendants of precious stones in their ears. Depending on the social
status, men also wear bracelets and armbands made of gold. In his words,
‘The luxury of their kings, or as they call it, their magnificence, is carried to
a vicious excess without a parallel in the world’.
Rufus gives a detailed account of the conduct of the king in public. He says,
‘When the king condescends to show himself in public his attendants carry
in their hands silver censers, and perfume, with incense, all the road by
which it is his pleasure to be conveyed. He lolls in a golden palanquin,
garnished with pearls, which dangle all around it, and he is robed in fine
muslin embroidered with purple and gold. Behind his palanquin follow
men-at-arms and his bodyguards, of whom some carry boughs of trees, on
which birds are perched trained to interrupt business with their cries.
The palace is adorned with gilded pillars clasped all round by a vine
embossed in gold, while silver images of those birds which most charm the
eye diversify the workmanship. The palace is open to all comers even when
the king is having his hair combed and dressed. It is then that he gives
audience to ambassadors, and administers justice to his subjects.
His slippers being after this taken off, his feet are rubbed with scented
ointments. His principal exercise is hunting; amid the vows and songs of his
courtesans, he shoots the game enclosed within the royal park. The arrows,
which are two cubits (36 inches) long, are discharged with more effort than
effect, for though the force of these missiles depends on their lightness they
are loaded with an obnoxious weight.
He rides on horseback when making short journeys, but when bound on a
distant expedition he rides in a chariot (howdah) mounted on elephants,
and, huge as these animals are, their bodies are covered completely over
with trappings of gold. That no form of shameless profligacy may be
wanting, he is accompanied by a long train of courtesans carried in golden
palanquins, and this troop holds a separate place in the procession from the
queen's retinue, and is as sumptuously appointed. His food is prepared by
women, who also serve him with wine, which is much used by all the
Indians. When the king falls into a drunken sleep his courtesans carry him
away to his bedchamber, invoking the Gods of the night in their native
hymns’.
Like other accounts, there might be a mix of exaggeration and truth in this
too especially on the drunken state of the king. It is believed that treachery
was not unknown in those times and the king was not allowed to get drunk,
lest one of his courtesans assassinates him. In the accounts of Megasthenes,
it is said that the wine was used only for sacrificial purposes and was most
probably imported. The Brahmins of the Ganga region considered
intoxicating drinks as a wise and indulgence was punished severely.
One cannot be sure of how true any of these accounts are. For we know that
wine as we know it today or a local variant of it must have been around at
that time. Fermenting grape juice or any other starch is not really rocket
science. But since there are conflicting views we will leave it at that.
Regarding the religious practices, Rufus says that the Indians regarded as
Gods, whatever they found useful, especially the trees. Cutting down of
trees attracted capital punishment. Seems like the act of cutting a tree fell in
the ‘rarest of the rare’ categories in those times. It is not unlikely that it
would have been the case. Trees have always found an important place in
the Indian culture, right from the Harappan times. We have Harappan seals
with the Peepal leaf motif. It was under a Peepal tree that Gautama became
Buddha. Even now in the 21st century India, we continue to see some trees
as sacred. Peepal, Banyan, Banana, mango and Coconut trees are still
considered sacred.
The Hindu scriptures are full of references to trees, some with magical
powers. One such is the Kalpataru or Kalpavriksha. Translated as a wish-
fulfilling tree, it was extracted out of the churning of the celestial ocean.
Trees like Banyan and coconut are still identified with this mythical tree.
The case of coconut tree is interesting in a sense that it indeed grants
wishes, not literally though. Every single part of the tree is useful to
humans. The fruit of course has many well-known uses from consuming it
raw to its use in the kitchen. Even the residue from the fruit finds its use in
coir industry. The leaves can be dried and used to thatch roofs. The trunk
turned into timber for boats and the roots for ropes.
Rufus gives a short introduction on the Indian concept of timekeeping too.
He says that the months of the Indians consists of fifteen days and is based
on the movement of the moon. He then says that though of fifteen days,
they assign the full course of the month to the year. The interesting thing to
note here is that the most popular Hindu calendar used today, i.e. the
Vikram Era, uses the same principle. The month is divided into two phases,
the bright (Shukla) and the dark (Krishna). Each phase has fifteen days, and
two phases together constitute a full month.
The account of Diodorus Siculus, another Greek historian from Sicily, is
fascinating. He wrote his account of Alexander sometime between 60 and
30 BCE. He makes a bizarre mention in his account. He talks about the
kingdom of Sopeithes or sophytes between the Rabi and Beas rivers. He
writes that in this kingdom, physical attributes were given very high regard,
so much so that an infant with perfect physical attributes, as considered by
them, was allowed to live. The unfortunate ones who did not meet the
criteria were eliminated. This was surprisingly similar to the Spartan
tradition where unfit babies were abandoned.
He then writes that when men went to marry, they did not look for dowry or
fortunes. All they looked for were the perfect physical attributes. The king
of the Sophytes is said to be a very handsome man who stood at four cubits.
Again there is no consensus on the identity of either the kingdom or the
king. Attempts have been made to identify him, using Panini’s text, as
Saubhuti, who ruled in the same geography as the Sophytes. This however
has not proved conclusive. There is evidence of another Sophytes, who
minted coins but was based in the Bactrian region and was most likely a
Greek Satrap.
Diodorus writes another extraordinary incident that took place in Sophytes.
It is believed that the king had special dogs, which were bred from
tigresses. He describes that the Sophytes king arranged for a fight between a
full-grown lion and four dogs. In the fight, the dogs overpower the lion and
kill it. This may have been an exaggeration, for we know that it is
impossible for tigresses to breed dogs.
Another interesting account of Alexander is given by Plutarch, a Greek
biographer. In the region of Sambos, lying west of the Indus, Alexander
encounters a group of gymnosophists, or naked philosophers. To test their
wisdom, he puts them to a test by asking them a series of questions. The
answers would either get them killed or set them free. The plot is similar to
that of Yudhisthir’s encounter with Yaksha (Yaksha prashna), where he is
asked a series of questions in order to resurrect his dead brothers.
The encounter is said to have unfolded in the following manner – ‘He
[Alexander] captured ten of the gymnosophists who had been principally
concerned in persuading Sabbas (Sabos) to revolt, and had done much harm
otherwise to the Macedonians. These men are thought to be great adepts in
the art of returning brief and pithy answers, and Alexander proposed for
their solution some hard questions, declaring that he would put to death first
the one who did not answer correctly and then the others in order.
He demanded of the first ‘Which he took to be the more numerous, the
living or the dead?’ He answered, ‘The living, for the dead are not’.
The second was asked, ‘Which breeds the largest animals, the sea or the
land?’ He answered, ‘The land, for the sea is only a part of it’.
The third was asked, ‘Which is the cleverest of beasts’? ‘He answered,
‘That with which man is not yet acquainted’.
The fourth was asked, ‘For what reason he induced Sabbas to revolt’? He
answered, Because I wished him to live with honour or die with honour’.
The fifth was asked, ‘Which he thought existed first, the day or the night’?
He answered, ‘The day was first by one day’. As the king appeared
surprised at this solution, he added, ‘Impossible questions require
impossible answers’.
Alexander then turned to the sixth and asked him ‘How a man could best
make himself beloved’? He answered, ‘If a man being possessed of great
power did not make himself to be feared’.
Of the remaining three, one being asked ‘How a man could become a god?’
replied, ‘By doing that which is impossible for a man to do. The next being
asked, ‘Which of the two was stronger, life or death?’ he replied, ‘Life,
because it bears so many evils’. The last being asked, ‘How long it was
honourable for a man to live?’ answered, ‘As long as he does not think it
better to die than to live’.
Upon this, Alexander, turning to the judge, requested him to give his
decision. He said they had answered worse than each other. ‘Since such is
your judgment,’ Alexander then said, ‘you shall be yourself the first to be
put to death’. ‘Not so,’ said he, ‘O king, unless you are false to your word,
for you said that he who gave the worst answer should be the first to die’.
The gymnosophists that Alexander encountered have been identified as
Jains, Buddhists and Hindus, but like many of the confusions, this too has
not been resolved. But this episode is important to discuss, as it refutes the
colonial prejudice that the Greeks brought philosophy to India. This
encounter is a single incident recorded by the Greeks. It can thus be
assumed that philosophical thought at the time of Alexander was a result of
a much longer process.
The departure of Alexander was as much a turning point in Indian history as
was his arrival. It was after his retreat that the seeds for the first pan-India
empire were sown.
The port cities of Indian Ocean
At the time when Alexander was invading north India, southern India was
witnessing an increase in its international trade links. Ptolemy, the Graeco-
Roman polymath (100 CE – 170 CE), mentions a third century BCE, port
town Maisolos on the eastern coast of India in his accounts. This port has
been identified with modern-day Machilipatnam in Andhra Pradesh. Later
in the Erythraean Scrolls, it is mentioned as Masalia. The port city was
known for exporting its fine-quality muslin to Romans.
Maisolos, Masalia or Machilipatnam in the Krishna River delta has also
been identified with the Satavahana kingdom of the Deccan. There is
however a dispute when it comes to assigning a date to the origins of the
Satavahanas. Various dates from the third century BCE to 30 BCE are
assigned to it. What we know, irrespective of the dates of the Satavahana
Dynasty, is that around the time of Alexander’s attack, the port of
Machilipatnam was doing brisk business with the Romans and possibly
with some Southeast Asian cities too.
Further south from Machilipatnam lies the modern city of Chennai. Today,
it is a major automobile hub and home to a large international seaport.
However, in the 3rd century BCE, trade and commerce were captured by
cities further to its south. Puhar or Pumpuhar and Mahabalipuram were
thriving ports with trade relations to the Roman cities. The Erythraean
scrolls mention these two ports, where large boats from Roman cities
docked.
One of the major drawbacks to depend on the Erythraean scrolls for dating
the cities is that they were written in the early years of the Common Era.
This means all references to cities go back only as far as the early years of
the Common Era. However, two approaches have pushed the dates further
back. The first is archaeological evidence from marine excavation.
The National Institute of Oceanography (NIO), Goa, has carried out
excavation works on the coast of Tamil Nadu. The work by NIO, sometimes
in collaboration with the ASI and other international universities, has
revealed significant information about prehistoric Tamil culture.
As we saw earlier, the Deccan region has an abundance of Megalithic sites
but these structures do not give us signs of any urban centres. The
excavations by NIO [36] however give us evidence that the cities of Puhar
and Mahabalipuram had settlements dating back to the 3rd century BCE.
Remnants of structures, which can be identified as ports, have also been
located undersea.
The NIO has carried our extensive excavation and exploration activities in
the inter-tidal zones along the coast of Tamil Nadu. A major find has been
the substantiation of the flood myths of Sangam Age. The texts of the
Sangam Age describe Puhar as the port capital of early Cholas. In
Manimekhalai, a later Sangam text, attributed variously between the 5th and
8th century CE, it is said that the city of Puhar was swallowed by sea, due to
the wrath of Indra. Though the historicity of the event cannot be
established, but the recent studies by the NIO suggest that the shoreline of
Tamil Nadu has indeed changed.
The most striking evidence of changing shoreline comes from excavation of
Dutch forts from the 18th century. In the town of Tharangambadi or
Tranquebar, the remains of a Dutch fort were found a 100 m [37] , inside the
sea, from the present shoreline. This structure is partially visible during the
low tide. Further studies based on a mid-17th -century Dutch map and
location of a Chola era Shiv temple have concluded that the shoreline has
receded approximately 300 m in the last 300 [38] years.
In the case of Mahabalipuram, the underwater exploration by NIO has
found man-made stone structures that resemble ruins of a large complex.
The remains have been discovered at two places, 700m and 200m,
seawards, from the present shoreline. This suggests that the shoreline has
retreated significantly inwards and is actually eating away the state of Tamil
Nadu.
From the above evidence, it can be assumed that the nature of shoreline of
Tamil Nadu would have been significantly different in ancient times. The
ancient cities of Puhar and Mahabalipuram would have extended hundreds
of metres in what is now the Bay of Bengal. In fact, the sonar studies, off
the coast of Puhar, have revealed a palaeochannel of Kaveri. We thus know
that the sea indeed swallowed up not only Puhar but other cities like
Mahabalipuram and Tranquebar too were partially swallowed by the sea. In
fact, the entire coastline of Tamil Nadu is witnessing a slow encroachment
by the sea.
It has now been established that the Sangam Era cities of Tamil Nadu
indeed existed and the archaeological finds of pottery help us date them
around 3rd century BCE. The second approach to push back the dates of
urban Tamil Culture is by an educated guess. Though one should refrain
from conjecture while reading history, we will use a reasonable guess
nevertheless. Since the Erythraean scrolls date to the early years of the
Common Era, it becomes an established fact that trade between western and
eastern coasts of India and Roman cities was flourishing at that time. It is
not unreasonable to believe that the trade would have possibly started
before the beginning of the Common Era.
For a city to become a trading destination, a minimum volume of
production is required. The city should produce surplus, which can be
traded. A city producing surplus commodity also has to achieve a certain
level of maturity in its social structure to facilitate manufacturing activities.
Features like a trader’s guild, supply chain for raw material, etc. have to be
in place for international trading. These things take time to evolve and
establish. They may take a few hundred years or perhaps longer. For our
purpose, it can hence be assumed that the coastal cities of Tamil Nadu were
thriving urban centres during the time of Alexander’s invasion of north
India.
The age of empire-building
The retreat of Alexander in 324 BCE must have come as a relief for the
states in the Ganga plains. The stories of merciless sack of the cities by
Alexander must have reached them and instilled either fear or resolve to
face the enemy. After Alexander gone, things may have eased down. The
territories won by Alexander were administered by either the Greek
appointees or by the local Indian rulers as vassals.
The new political structure was still in its infancy when seeds of change
were being sown by a former student of Taxila University. Being a student
of Taxila, Chanakya is likely to have followed the events leading to the fall
of Taxila, very closely. There is no definite information on why Chanakya
picked up young Chandragupta Maurya to defeat the Nanda army. There are
legends, which suggest that Chanakya was insulted by Dhana Nanda. In
order to avenge the insult, Chanakya decided to uproot the empire and
hence recruited a young Chandragupta.
Whatever the cause, the reality is that Chandragupta was recruited by
Chanakya and within a year they raised an army to defeat Magadh. In post-
Alexander India, there was a good supply of battle-hardened soldiers.
Chanakya with his excellent administrative skills and strategic thinking
forged alliances with neighbouring kingdoms of Magadh to garner support
for Chandragupta. His strategy worked, and in 322 BCE, two years after
Alexander’s retreat, Chandragupta was able to conquer Magadh and
established the Mauryan Empire.
From there, he started his westward campaign, and by 317 BCE, most of
the north and western India was under the Mauryan control. The years
following the conquest of north and west India were spent in consolidating
the empire. In 305 BCE, Chandragupta was once again at war, this time
with Seleucus Nicotar. Seleucus was a Macedonian general of Alexander,
who had conquered much of modern Iran and Iraq to establish the Seleucid
kingdom. His territories extended to Gandhara and Bactria on the east.
In a decisive battle in 305 BCE, Chandragupta defeated Seleucus and
entered a treaty. Seleucus is believed to have entered into an alliance by
way of marrying his daughter to Chandragupta. Seleucus also accepted 500
war elephants in return of a large territory ceded to the Mauryans. The
victory added Baluchistan, Gandhara and much of modern Afghanistan to
the Mauryan Empire.
The victory march of Chandragupta continued towards the south, and he
managed to conquer much of the Deccan. The southernmost parts of ancient
Tamil country remained independent but are believed to be at friendly terms
with Chandragupta.
The kingdom flourished and the capital, Pataliputra, modern-day Patna,
reached its glory. Various accounts of later Greek chroniclers and
contemporaries like Megasthenes picture Pataliputra as a magnificent city.
The city itself is believed to have been about 15 km long and 3 km wide,
laid out in the shape of a parallelogram [39] . The city also had a moat outside
its wooden fortification walls. The moat also received the sewage from the
city, through wooden trains 6’3” in height. This piece of information is
interesting, since for the first time, we come across a reference to a planned
drainage system after Harappan times. Megasthenes described the
fortification walls to have had 570 towers and forty-six gates. The moat was
600 feet wide and 390 feet deep. Much of the information provided by
Megasthenes has been corroborated by archaeological excavations carried
out since 1926-27 [40] .
There is a very detailed account of the city of Pataliputra and various social
customs in Megasthenes’ Indika/Indica. However, one should remember
that the book also mentions some seemingly impossible things like gold-
digging ants and mouthless men (metaphor for men subsisting on smoke).
Though the case of gold-digging ants was correlated to the Himalayan
Marmot (a kind of giant squirrel) by the French ethnologist Michel Peissel,
it can be assumed that Megasthenes involved in creating some myths or
perhaps his original work was misinterpreted by later chroniclers. Whatever
the case, one should be careful while leaning on Indica for facts and we
must read them together with modern findings.
An important piece of information that we get from Indica is the non-
existing written laws in Mauryan times. We are told that despite there being
no written laws, people conduct business based on trust and memory. The
argument here is that despite the lack of written law, there are very few
incidents of theft or deceit. The Indica quotes [41] , ‘Megasthenes says that
those who were in the camp of Sandrakottos (Chandragupta), where in lay
400,000 men, found that the thefts reported on any one day did not exceed
the value of 200 drachmas, and this among a people who have no written
laws, but are ignorant of writing, and must therefore in all the business of
life trust to memory’.
The quote brings out two things, one that though there were incidents of
theft, they were of small magnitude and perhaps the Greeks suffered from
an extremely high incident of theft in their camps. Second, the Indians are
said to have no knowledge of writing. This is the most important piece of
information.
Historians and archaeologists are struggling to decipher the Harappan script
ever since the first seal was published. There have been no breakthroughs
so far. Even centuries years later, in the Mauryan times, the Indians are said
to have no knowledge of writing. However, there existed a great university
at Taxila. There are also references to seals in east Indian cities with short
Kharosthi-Brahmi inscriptions. How does one reconcile these?
One way to look at it is that probably Megasthenes was exaggerating when
he said the Indians did not know writing. But why would one do so?
Probably in order to demean the natives? We do not know. The other
possibility is that the Indians indeed were unaware of a writing system since
most of the work happened on trust and memory as described in the Indica.
The university at Taxila too must have conducted its courses verbally, and
the students would simply memorise everything. The knowledge would
then be passed on orally to the next generation, much like how the Vedas
were passed on from one generation to the next. This is unlikely to be
completely true since we have evidence from Pannini’s texts, which
mention the concept of writing and usage of words like lipi (script) and
lipikar (scribe).
Later in his career, Chandragupta is believed to have grown averse to
empire-building and became a Jain monk. He accompanied Bhadrbahu, a
monk, and went to Shravanbelagola. Before departing, Chandragupta
crowned his son, Bindusar, as the successor of Magadh. In the year 297
BCE, Chandragupta undertook the fast unto death in a cave.
The aversion to warfare and material wealth seems to be a permanent
fixture in the Indian mind. We have many well-known instances where
people have grown averse to wealth and power for various reasons. Both
Mahavira and Buddha were born into royal households and had all the
wealth and power to their beck and call. Both renounced the material wealth
in pursuit of spiritual wealth. Chandragupta did the same, but only after he
acquired material wealth by force. His grandson Ashoka too is believed to
have undergone a transformation after the victory of Kalinga. In the story of
Mahabharata, Arjun the champion warrior went into a state of self-doubt
when he realised he would be waging a war against his own family.
We may never know for sure, whether any of the above incidents actually
occurred but we do have the legends, which describe them. Even if these
incidents did occur, only in the minds of the people who wrote them, they
reflect the state of a typical Indian mind, a mind that is steeped in
contemplation and seeking the truth.
With the Monsoon – ancient trade routes of India
While the Mauryan kings were expanding and consolidating the empire,
seeds of a major change were being sown in the east coast of India. Within
a period of two centuries, the seed will not only grow but would turn into a
large banyan, with its canopy covering almost 4.5 million square kilometres
of land mass outside India. That seed was the maritime trade from Indian
ports.
The east coast of India had various riverine and sea ports that engaged in
trade with many cities of Southeast Asia and Ceylon (modern Sri Lanka).
Riverine trade was well developed during the Mauryan times. The
Arthashastra makes a case for not only the duties and taxes to be paid by the
merchants on the boats, but also lays down river worthiness rules of the
commercial vessels. It also classifies the distinction between passenger
carriage and cargo carriage tariffs. There was also a provision of wavier of
taxed on goods destroyed due to weather conditions. It can thus be assumed
that shipbuilding was well known during the Mauryan times.
Tamralipti, the modern-day Tamluk in West Bengal, was a busy port in the
Mauryan times. The ports of Cuttack, Puri and Chilika, in ancient Kalinga,
the modern Odisha, were also major international ports, doing business with
Southeast Asia. According to a paper [42] by the NIO, the earliest
archaeological evidence of Indian presence in Southeast Asia comes from
Ban Don Ta Phet in Thailand. A number of Agate and Carnelian beads from
2nd to 3rd centuries BCE have been found there are believed to have
originated in India.
The paper further suggests that in Chandraketugarh, West Bengal, punch-
marked coins have been excavated, which show ship symbols. Epigraphical
evidence from Chandraketugarh, Bangarh and Hadipur has yielded
Kharosthi inscriptions on seals, pots and plaques. The seals from
Chandraketugarh and Bangarh depict seafaring vessels. References to a
journey to three countries/directions are also found in Kharosthi-Brahmi
script. The period of these artefacts is attributed between the 3rd and 1st
centuries BCE. Apart from proof of trade, the seals of Chandraketugarh are
also a proof of trade between the east Indian port cities and north-west
cities, where Kharosthi was a popular script.
Excavations in Sembiran, Bali, have thrown up pottery with
Kharosthi/Brahmi inscriptions. The pottery, classified as the ‘Rouletted
Ware’ (named after the use of a rouletted/toothed instrument to carve
geometrical patterns on the pots), is typical of south-eastern India and has
been found all across Arikamedu, Vishakhapatnam and coastal Odisha. One
such pot contained rice husk, that is dated to 2660±100 [43] years before
present, i.e. between approximately 600 and 400 BCE. This find has
actually pushed back the trade contacts between India and Southeast Asia
by almost 500 years from our earlier estimates.
Moreover, the finding of the Rouletted Ware also indicates that the contact
of Bali with India may not have been limited to just one Indian city. Since
the Rouletted Ware is found all along the eastern coast of India, there might
have been multiple contact points. Similarly, excavation of the Rouletted
Ware in central Vietnam shows us the extent to which Indian traders or their
goods were sailing.
The findings at Indian and various Southeast Asian cities also highlight an
important meteorological discovery that the Indians made. We know from
the Erythraean scrolls that Hippalus, a Greek navigator, discovered the
Monsoon patterns in the Indian Ocean in 45 CE. The knowledge was then
used to navigate the sea with favourable winds. What has been missed out
here is that the Indian traders of eastern India have discovered the Monsoon
patterns many centuries before Hippalus. It was their knowledge of the
wind patterns in the Eastern Sea that helped them navigate to Southeast
Asia with the retreating Monsoon in late October and sail back to India with
the advancing Monsoon in May. The event of starting off the sea voyage is
still symbolically celebrated in Odisha as the festival of Bali Jatra (voyage
to Bali). The festival is celebrated on the full moon of the Hindu month of
Kartik (fifteen days after Diwali).
Apart from exchanging commodities, trade is also a medium to exchange
ideas. Even in modern times, when people visit foreign countries for
business meetings or trade fairs, they bring back with them stories. When
Indians interact with their foreign counterparts, they also tell them stories of
India. This process, also known as the people-to-people contact, eventually
leads to exchange of not only information but other cultural elements like
language, food, music, etc. A great example of exchange of ideas is the
popularity of Yoga in the Western world. The 20th century Indians
popularised the art through people-to-people contact.
Sometimes the business demands that the trader or a business delegate
spends a prolonged period of time in abroad. In the modern terminology, we
would call them secondments. The secondments are a much more powerful
tool of cultural exchange than a short-term business visit. Given the ease of
travel in modern times, the secondees can frequently travel back to their
homes. It was, however, not the case in ancient times.
To protect the trade interests or to secure procurement, the Indian traders
probably spent a long time in foreign countries. We do not have much
evidence in the form of archaeological remains to say when exactly the
Indian settlements began to appear in Southeast Asia. The first evidence we
get is from the stone inscriptions from early centuries of the Common Era.
For this reason, it is far easier to establish a chronology of changes that
happened in the Common Era than trying to say with authority on what
happened in the centuries just before it.
The Indian traders were not only sailing to, far off places like Bali, they
were also trading with ports closer home in the Andaman Sea. The city of
Koh Kho Khao, in Thailand, on the western side of the Malay Peninsula
was one such port. Archaeologist and academic Dr. H.G. Quaritch
published many books and articles on the history and archaeological finds
on Southeast Asia. In one of his articles, which is quoted by Dr. R.C.
Majumdar in his work, ‘Suvarnadvipa’, 1937, Quaritch says that in all
likelihood, the first Indian settlements must have come up in the region of
modern Takua Pa, where Koh Kho Khao is located.
The Indian settlements were a result of slow migration process from India
to Suvarnabhumi. Quaritch suggests two possible migration routes for the
Indians to reach other parts of the Southeast Asian region. One down the
straits of Malacca to south and another, crossing over the mountains of the
Malay Peninsula and reaching the eastern side. On the eastern side of the
peninsula is the Bay of Bandon, a suitable location for a harbour, and it was
probably from here that further migration happened to Cambodia and
Vietnam.
It is likely that the events would have happened the way Quaritch described
them. These events would have, probably, happened in the final years
Before Common Era, at a slow pace. The movement of groups of Indian
merchants would have taken with them the language, culture, religion and
food habits to new places. It was probably during this period that the local
Malay people were first introduced to the Indian culture.
According to Quaritch, the incentive for early Indian settlers in the region
was an abundance of Tin in the western Malay Peninsula. The early settlers,
according to Quaritch, attracted more Indians to settle in, strikingly similar
to how Indians in America, Canada and the UK attracted other Indians to
settle in. Apart from mining, the Indians would have also established their
trading and agricultural communities in the region. Once they started
dispersing along the two potential routes, through the straits of Malacca or
over land, the people established themselves in new locations and in the
process propagated the Indian culture to new territories.
If one reads the quotes by R. C. Majumdar in his work, ‘Suvarnadvipa’ one
would come across the repeated reference to words ‘colonies’ and
‘colonisation’. These are also the words we use today in the context of
European arrival in India. The English, the French, the Dutch, all came to
India for trade and ended up colonising it, in varied degrees. It was the
English who ultimately added India as a ‘colony’ to the British Empire. So
how should we read the words used by Majumdar?
If one reads through the work of Majumdar, it becomes evident that the
process of ‘colonisation’ of Southeast Asia by the Indians was not like the
British and other European colonisation of India. It is important that we
really understand the term colonisation before accepting or rejecting
Majumdar’s claim. The Oxford dictionary defines colonisation as, ‘ The
action or process of settling among and establishing control over the
indigenous people of an area’ . The definition, very clearly, talks of two
very different processes: first that of settling among the indigenous people
and second that of establishing control over them.
From the accounts of Quaritch and later historical evidence (in terms of
archaeological remains, language and religious beliefs), it is undisputable
that Southeast Asia had Indian settlements. That is the reason the history
and culture of Southeast Asia are so heavily influenced by Indian culture.
But was there any control of the indigenous people? This question can be
looked at from two points of view. We know for a fact that Funan, broadly
the modern-day Cambodia, was the first Indianised state of the region.
There are various versions of how the kingdom was established. Some
sources attribute the emergence of Funan to the arrival of Kaundinya, a
Brahmin from India. It is believed that he upon a receiving divine message,
sailed to Funan, fought the local princess and won. As a result, Kaundinya
took the princess as wife and started ruling the country. Some versions
suggest that Kaundinya actually fought Soma, the Naga princess, and
impressed by his valour and she proposed him to marry her. As a result,
Kaundinya became the king of Funan.
There are some Chinese sources (The Book of Liang), which corroborate
the Kaundinya story. It however says that Kaundinya came from the
southern land. In the later versions of the story in Cham and Khmer
folklore, there are no references of a battle between the Nagas and
Kaundinya though the reference to his foreign origin remains. The later
versions appear to be almost mythological where the Naga princess married
Kaundiyan and her father drinks the sea around the place, creating a vast
piece of land to rule.
With all these confusing accounts, what we extract is the information that
Kaundiyan was definitely a foreigner – possibly an Indian or a person from
one of the Indian settlements within the Southeast Asian region. We are not
sure how he ended up founding Funan. Was it war or was it an
understanding with the indigenous people, we do not know. What we know
is that around the first century CE, Funan was established as the first
Indianised state in the region.
Coming back to our question. Was the establishment of Funan an act of
colonisation? We know that the Indians settled in the region, hence
fulfilling one of the aspects of the definition of colonisation. We now know
that they also started ruling Funan. This means they had established control
over the indigenous people in Funan. Technically, they fulfilled both the
requirement of colonisation. While the establishment of rule over Funan
may point towards a direct link to an Indian, it is not so in the case of other
Indianised states. The second part of the definition is hence not fulfilled. I
will leave it at that for the readers to make a judgement, whether Indians
really ‘colonised’ Southeast Asia.
An important question is, were these colonies treated the same way as the
British Crown treated her colonies? Because if they were, then Indians
would have been guilty of colonialism in their early history. One of the key
features of colonialism is economic exploitation. Colonialism in India not
only resulted in political dominance by the British but also economic
exploitation by them. Control over trade, extraction of taxes led to the
failing of local industry. Vast sums of money were remitted to England to
fuel the industrial revolution, while India was getting poorer and weaker.
Political dominance together with remittance of revenue to the mother
country became the hallmark of modern colonialism. In the case of the
Southeast Asian ‘colonies’ of India, we do not see economic exploitation
being mentioned anywhere. There was of course trade between India and
the Indianised kingdoms. But these kingdoms also had trade relations with
other parts of the world, including China in the east and Rome and Persia in
the west. In this regard, Funan was more or less an independent economic
centre. The Roman geographer Ptolemy described the Funan ports to be an
emporium where the Chinese and Roman traders carried out business. This
is unlikely to happen in a colonial system.
We also do not come across any references to any kind of remittances to
any of the Indian kingdoms from the Indianised states of Southeast Asia.
We can deduce that there was a large-scale cultural propagation by the
Indian settlers in Southeast Asia, but there is little evidence to suggest total
colonisation.
The establishment of Funan paved the way for further Indianisation of the
region. Within a span of five hundred years, the entire Indonesian
archipelago was Indianised. Funan had collapsed and succeeded by the
Khmer kingdom, and the Chams in Vietnam took advantage of a weak
Funan and established their own kingdom of Champa around 400 CE. On
Sumatra, the Srivijaya Empire grew to become a dominant force and
controlled all international trade through the straits of Malacca.
The region continued to be under the influence of Indian religions of
Hinduism and later Buddhism, till about fifteenth century when modern-day
Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei and parts of Thailand and Philippines
converted to Islam. Despite their conversion, many social aspects of these
countries continue to be guided by their ancient Hindu and Buddhist
traditions. Sanskrit is still very much a part of Bahasa Indonesia and Bahasa
Melayu. The national emblem of Indonesia is Garuda, the vehicle of
Vishnu, and the administrative capital of Malaysia is Putrajaya.
Syncretic India
The advent and retreat of Alexander proved to be a major event in the
history of India. In the years following his retreat, India was rapidly unified
under a single empire, the largest India has ever seen. At its peak, the
Mauryan Empire controlled a territory of 5 million square kilometres. The
only region on the subcontinent that was not under the direct control was
the Tamil country at the tip of the Indian Peninsula.
It will not be until the seventeenth century when India would once again
come under a single political rule under the Mughals. The Mughal
territories in the seventeenth century would however fall short of a million
square kilometre of the Mauryan times.
During the Mauryan times, Buddhism became the state religion and the
Third Buddhist Council was convened by Ashoka. He also sent his daughter
Sanghamitra and son Mahinda to Sri Lanka as missionaries of Buddhism.
This was the first instance of organised religious export outside India.
During the same period, missionaries were also sent to Burma, modern-day
Myanmar, to spread Buddhism. Emissaries were also sent to West Asia and
Greece with the message of Buddhism.
The spread of Buddhism was assisted by the trade routes out of India. In
later times, the Silk Road will also become the route of propagation of
Buddhism in Central Asia and Iran [44] . The maritime routes of south and
east India will take Buddhism to South East Asia (as discussed in the
previous section).
Within a period of a thousand years from the time of Buddha, the entire
known world east of India had embraced Buddhism. In the west, it reached
the eastern extents of Persia and many parts of Central Asia. Indian monks
travelled as far away as Japan to spread the message of Buddhism. Buddhist
missionaries arrived in China in the early centuries of the Common Era and
in Japan [45] in 467 CE.
The political situation in India went another change once Ashoka died. The
mighty Mauryan Empire started to crumble. By the time, Brihadratha
acceded to the throne in 187 BCE, the empire had lost a substantial part of
its territories in south and north-west India. In 185 BCE, Brihadratha was
assassinated by his general Pushyamitra Shung, thus ended the mighty
Mauryan Empire.
At the time of accession of Pushyamitra, the north-western and southern
territories were already independent. The Graeco-Bactrians on the northern
borders found an opportunity to invade the erstwhile Mauryan territories,
which were now coming out of Mauryan control. The Graeco-Bactrians
were of Hellenistic extraction but had formed marriage alliances with the
Persians, whose territories they then ruled. Once they took control of the
Mauryan territories in India, they came to be known as Indo-Greeks.
Archaeological evidence suggests that the Manender, one of the most
successful Indo-Greek kings, conquered territories as far inside India as
Kaushambi in Eastern Uttar Pradesh. A stone inscription known as the Reh
Inscription was found in Fatehpur district of Uttar Pradesh, 96 km west of
Kaushambi. The inscription gets its name from Reh, the village where it
was excavated. The inscription written in Brahmi script reads,
‘Maharajasa Rajarajasa
Mahamtasa Tratarasa Dhammi
kasa Jayamtasa ca Apra
[jitasa] Minānada[de?]rasa’

The English translation (G. R. Sjarma) of the text reads, ‘The great king of
kings, the great king Menander, saviour, steadfast in the Law (dharma ),
victorious and unvanquished…’. The name of the Indo-Greek king
Manender appears with many adjectives, and there is a clear reference of a
victory. Kaushambi was part of the Mauryan Empire and is perhaps a
testimony to the Indo-Greek invasion in the 2nd century BCE.
In the south, the weakening Mauryan Empire gave way to the Satavahana
Dynasty around the same time as northern India was bearing the brunt of
Indo-Greeks. Based primarily in the modern- day Telangana and Andhra
Pradesh, the dynasty eventually captured much of modern-day Maharashtra,
Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh.
The time when the Indo-Greeks were making inroads in northern and
western India, another group, the Indo-Scythians (Sakas) were pushing their
way from Chinese Central Asia. By the time the Indo-Greek kingdoms grew
week, the Indo-Scythians controlled much of modern-day Pakistan and
western India as far away as Mathura.
Various archaeological finds in the region attest to their presence in the
region. The Mathura lion capital, excavated in 1869, has Kharosthi
inscriptions in Prakrit. It mentions the names of the king and the queen and
has reference to Buddha and Buddhist religious beliefs. Later, both the
Indo-Greeks and the Indo-Scythians were ultimately absorbed into the
Gupta Empire.
It is important to note that such defining political changes always bring with
them a risk to the economic stability of the region. A change in regime may
bring with it a change of tax structure. The maintenance processes of major
trade routes may get neglected during the war. Changing money might have
become difficult given the high demand of currency for war purposes.
There might be many other reasons that may impact regular trade during the
time of regime change or a war. It is possible that there might have been
some impact of the political flux on the internal and external trade in India.
Amidst all the changes, sometime in the early 1st century BCE, various
Yuezhi tribal groups from China arrived in the Bactrian region. The
Kushans were one of the Yuezhi tribes of Chinese Central Asia (modern
Xinjiang Province in China). There are conflicting views among historians
as to how they ended up in Bactria, all the way from China. Some views
suggest that they were a nomadic group and migrated westwards from
China and settled in Bactria. Other including a contemporary book on
history of China, The Book of Han, claims that the Yuezhi were tribal
people from ancient Gansu region and were driven away by the Xiongnu in
the 1st century BCE.
The Yuezhi are believed to be a group of five tribes, and Kushans were one
of them. The group settled in Bactria just when the Indo-Greeks were
making a foothold in the region. Pan Yung, a general in the Chinese army,
submitted an account of the Yuezhi in around 125 CE. According to this
account, Kujula Kadphises, the second ruler of the Kushans, had defeated
the other four tribes of the Yuezhi and had established his supremacy. He
later attacked Puskalavati, the Gandhara capital, and Kashmir to absorb
them into his domain.
When the Yuezhi settled in the Indo-Greek lands, they took up Greek as
their language. While they were still trying to consolidate their territory,
they assimilated into the local culture and religion. The assimilation
becomes evident in the later years of Kushan rule, especially during the
reign of Kanishka. It was during the reign of Kanishka that the Kushans
replaced Greek with Bactrian as their official language.
A key archaeological find, in Afghanistan, in 1993 presented the
archaeologists and historians with a treasure trove of information on
Kushans. It was the Rabatak Inscription. The discovery of the inscription
and its subsequent reading at the British Museum is nothing short of an
adventure.
Afghanistan in 1993 was coming to terms with the withdrawal of the
Communist forces of Soviet Russia. A bitter civil war had ensued, following
rival claims to establish an Islamic state in the country. The Peshawar
Accord of the previous year envisaged a mechanism of power sharing
between various warring factions.
Pakistan was meddling into the Afghan affairs to achieve its doctrine of
strategic depth. The Cold War polarisation of the world apparently
threatened Pakistan of a hostile encirclement by Soviet Russia and India.
The Pakistani spy agency, the Inter Service Intelligence (ISI), propped up
Gulbuddin Hekmatyar as a contender to rule Afghanistan. The
disagreements between Hekmatyar and Burhanuddin Rabbani led to a bitter
civil war in Afghanistan, which eventually led to the takeover of the country
by the Taliban.
It was in such times, when law and order was managed by battle- hardened
Mujahedeen and civilian lives were at constant risk that the Rabatak
Inscription was discovered. A Mujahedeen, who was digging a trench on a
mound, accidentally stumbled upon the inscription. Being in the midst of a
fierce civil war, it was impossible to send the stone inscription outside the
country for its reading. A photograph was ultimately sent to the British
museum for an initial reading. The findings were stunning. So much
information was provided in that inscription and that it was possible to
solve many discrepancies of the past.
The efforts to bring the inscription to London probably failed, and it was
only in April 2000 that the British historian Jonathan Lee went to
Afghanistan to locate the stone for a better reading. The entire episode
sounds like one of the treasure hunt stories where the treasure is found, lost
and finally retrieved.
The text itself is written in Greek alphabet but uses the Bactrian language.
The full translation [46] of the 23 line text by B. N. Mukherjee can be read in
the Appendix at the end of this book.
The first three lines tell us that the Kushans had already taken up to using
grand adjectives for themselves. They have also started to legitimise their
kingship by establishing a link with the divinity. Kanishka talks about
obtaining the kingship from Nana (a Bactrian Goddess). It is also
interesting to note that Nana is invoked in the very first instance and other
Gods are not mentioned by their names. Perhaps, Nana was a popular
Goddess with the Bactrian people and Kanishka gave her the importance
she deserved in the local belief system.
The last section of the first three lines also mentions the promulgation of a
new calendar, established by Kanishka. Again the Gods are invoked and are
projected to have blessed the decision.
Starting of a new calendar or an era (Shak Era, Vikram Era, Hijri Era) is
usually associated with a major historical event. Either a king wins a
decisive war making him superior to other contemporaries (Vikram Era), or
it is a major event that would shape the future (Hijri Era). It seems that
Kanishka too had reached a level of significant achievement in terms of
territorial conquest.
The lines three and four talk about replacing Greek with the Aryan
language, i.e. Bactrian. This indicates two things: one that a large section of
the conquered population no longer spoke Greek; secondly, Kanishka
probably wanted to further assimilate into the local culture and seek
legitimacy from his subjects. We see this being done earlier when Ashoka
used Greek in his rock edicts in Afghanistan, to communicate with his
Greek-speaking subjects. With the change over from Greek to Bactrian, it is
likely that the administration and the court proceedings too were carried out
in Bactrian.
The lines four to six give us an indication of how far the writ of Kanishka
ran. He talks about sending his message of victory to various governing
classes, i.e. rulers. Here, he specifically mentions the ‘Koonadeano’, which
Mukherjee identifies as Kaundinya. It is interesting that Kanishka identifies
one of the ruling clans Kaundinya by its name. It suggests that they were a
major political entity, probably due to the power they wielded. In the
previous section on the Indianised kingdoms of Southeast Asia, we saw
how the first Indianised kingdom was founded in Funan by Kaundinya.
Probably, the Kaundinyas were indeed an influential clan with both political
and trading prowess.
Kanishka identifies cities like Ujjain in central India, Saketa (Ayodhya),
Kaushambi and Pataliputra in the east and Sri Champa (in north
Chhattisgarh) in central India in the inscription. In lines, six and seven, he
declares that these rulers have submitted to the will of the king, i.e.
Kanishka himself. Finally, he proclaims that entire India has submitted to
him. This however is stretching things a bit too far. It is highly unlikely that
he in fact subjugated any of the southern or eastern regions. There were
many powerful kingdoms in the south, and they would have definitely
found a mention if they were indeed subjugated.
The lines seven to eleven exclusively talk about religious patronage
Kanishka extended to various deities. He says he has asked the master of
the city to build a shrine for the chief deity Nana and others like Sri, Farrah
(probably a Greek Goddess) and Omma. He then invokes Nana, once again,
together with an eclectic mix of Persian and Indian Gods like Ahura Mazda,
Kumaras, Mahasena, Vishakha and Mihir. His order to make images of
these along with the patron Goddess Nana suggests that he accorded equal
importance to Gods of other people in other parts of his kingdom. We see
this actually happening when we study the coins of Kushan period. They
have a mix of Greek, Buddhist and Hindu Gods on the coins.
Lines 11 through 15 give us the genealogy of the Kushans. Here the kings
since Kujula Kadphises are mentioned with relationship to the subsequent
generations. Here, we also see an attempt to deify the Kushan clan by
Kanishka. In his order to the master of the city, he says that the worship of
these images of the kings has to be done according to the royal command,
also indicating that there was, in most likelihood, a forced attempt to deify
the clan.
In the final lines, he seeks blessings from the Gods for a healthy, secure and
a victorious future for two thousand years, again asking for too much
perhaps. There is also a reference to the Aryan year, which may refer to the
Azes Era (after the Indo-Scythian king Azes).
The Greek and Indian influence on the Kushans and their adoption of
Buddha as one of their deities resulted in something spectacular. At the time
when the Kushans were consolidating their power in Central Asia and the
Indian subcontinent, the region was undergoing a religious metamorphosis.
In Central Asia, the Greek pantheon had established itself along with
Persian Zoroastrianism. In India, Buddhism and Jainism were gaining
ground.
We know that the early Buddhist in India used symbolism as a means to
depict the Buddha. We find various symbols like the eight-spoked wheel,
the lotus, the Bodhi Tree and sometimes an empty throne, representing
Buddha. The Kushans readily adopted Buddhism and introduced Buddha in
their syncretic religion, which included Greek, Hindu and Buddhist icons.
A little before the Kushans entered the Indian subcontinent from their
Bactrian base, Jain iconography had already taken shape. We find statues of
Jain Tirthankars being carved, giving them human forms. The excavation at
Kankali Tila at Mathura had revealed a treasure trove of Jain sculptures.
One of them, a set of three, quadruple images has been dated back to the
year 42 BCE. Apart from establishing the antiquity of Jainism as a religion,
the dating of the statues also tells us that depiction of deities as images or
statues was well established in the final years Before Common Era.
In the Bactrian region, the Greeks had already imported their traditions of
carving statues of their own Gods. When Buddha was adopted into the
Kushan pantheon, it was probably natural for them to create images of
Buddha too. The Rabatak Inscription tells us that Kanishka has ordered
creating of images/statues of many of the Gods he identified with.
The symbolic representation of Buddha changed when the Kushans started
to carve stone statues of Buddha. This is most likely to have happened
simultaneously in the Bactrian region and in the Indian subcontinent.
Artisans used their own style in carving out Buddha statues. In the Bactrian
region, they were heavily influenced by the Greek style of carving. The
artists in the Indian subcontinent, primarily in Mathura, used the style they
deployed in carving the Jain statues.
These two styles were so distinct that later archaeologists and historians
called them by two different names. The Bactrian style was named the
Gandhara School, and the Indian style was named the Mathura School. The
Gandhara School differentiated itself by using Greek methods of putting a
Toga on the statue. The stress was more on the physical appearance of the
statue, and hence, the facial features were sharp and contours of the body
distinct. The curly hair of Buddha too is probably a Greek import. The early
statues were carved in a standing position, like the Greek Gods.
In Mathura, the features were more native and physical attributes were not
stressed upon. The Indian tradition of not stressing upon the physical
attributes and to concentrate more on the spiritual aspect of an image
continued well into the twentieth century. It is only for the last decade or so
that we have seen depiction of Shiv, Hanuman and sometimes Ram as a
gym going, abs flexing deities.
With both Gandhara and Mathura schools flourishing, Buddha’s statues
became common across the Kushan territories. By the time Kanishka took
over, the Kushan territories included the Tarim Basin in China, with fabled,
Silk Road, cities like Kashgar, Khotan, Yarkand and Turfan. It was along
this section of the Silk Road that Buddhism first arrived in China. Though
there is an alternate theory of arrival of Buddhism in southern China by the
maritime Silk Road from Southeast Asia, scholars have cast their doubts on
the evidence supporting it [47] .
Apart from goods, the Silk Road also became the road for Buddhist
missionaries to travel from India to Central Asia and China. Lokaksema,
(probably derived from Sanskrit, Lok+Kshema, i.e. well-being of the
world), a Kushan monk during the reign of Kanishka travelled from Bactria
to China. With him, he took many Buddhist works, including the Mahayana
Sutra and the Ashtasahastrika. He is said to have translated fourteen Indian
works into Chinese for their further dissemination. This led the way for
Mahayana Buddhism to arrive in China.
It is rather fascinating to imagine a monk with immense will power to
undertake a journey into an unknown world, make the alien land his own,
learn their language and then translate voluminous texts into the newly
acquired language.
On an average, a person takes somewhere between 80 and 100 weeks to
learn Chinese, provided they put in at least five hours a day. In the mid of
second century CE, when Lokaksema went to Luoyang in China, he must
have travelled for months with one or more Silk Road caravans probably
learning Chinese on his way. It is also likely that he might have known
Chinese in his time in Bactria. After all, Bactria was a great melting pot of
trade and commerce and it won’t be surprising that some people may have
known Chinese. In either case, the mere adventure of travelling
approximately 5,500 km (in today’s Google Maps distance) from Bactria to
Luoyang is in itself so thrilling.
With Lokaksema, Buddhism was established in China and so were the
Buddhist statues. The statues eventually made their way to Korea and
Japan. The Kushans probably did not know what they were unleashing
when they ordered the first Buddha statues to be carved. The entire credit
for changing the iconography of Buddhism goes solely to the Kushans and
particularly to Kanishka.
The trans-national kingdom
The Kushan rule proved to be a boon, especially for the cities in modern-
day Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. Geographically, these regions
lie in the desert and xeric shrublands biome. This means they receive very
scant rainfall, crucial for agriculture. These regions have two major rivers,
the Oxus (modern Amu Darya) and the Jaxartes (modern Syr Darya) and
some minor rivers, which join these and ultimately flow into the Aral Sea.
Areas around these rivers are suitable for agriculture but traditionally a
majority of the population in these regions were nomadic.
The Kushans embarked upon an ambitious task of bringing in new areas
under cultivation. In the case of the Indian subcontinent, agricultural land
was reclaimed from forests by either cutting down the trees or by burning
them. The abundance of glacial rivers and monsoon then provided enough
water for agriculture. The conditions in Central Asian regions was exact
opposite. There were no thick forests to cut down to create arable land. The
land was plenty but the problem lay in getting water to these parched areas.
The Kushans built canals from the rivers of the region to take water to new
areas. The works on new canals in the southern regions along the Oxus
created new agricultural oases and large commercial centres in the region.
The canal work was also carried out in the north along the Zeravshan River,
feeding Samarkand. Some of these canals extended up to a hundred
kilometres [48] . A direct impact of such extensive irrigation projects was felt
on the nomadic tribes of the region. Many of them, with advent of assured
irrigation, shifted to agriculture. A larger population now depended on state
funded project for subsistence and trade. This helped the Kushans to
consolidate their power over the local population and earn legitimacy.
The extent of increase in settlement along the new irrigation projects can be
estimated by the number of archaeological remains that have been
excavated in the area. An estimated 117 archaeological monuments have
been excavated in the Surkhan Darya Province in Uzbekistan [49] . A large
network of such canals indicate that the Kushans probably had amassed
wealth by collecting taxes from trade. These canals must have used
considerable amount of money and manpower to be built. It is estimated
that on an average 6,000 – 7,000 [50] labourers were employed for
maintenance works of a single canal.
The foot hills in the region were also brought under cultivation by using
small sized reservoirs [51] . These reservoirs were between 1,000 and 1,200
m3 in volume and were built on slopes of terraces to catch water from a
gorge or a spring. The masonry of these reservoirs was simple. Stones were
arranged in oval or rectangular form and plastered with turf. Some evidence
of construction of aqueducts to carry water from mountainous regions has
also surfaced.
A major advantage that the Kushans had was the strategic location of their
Central Asian provinces. The cities of Samarkand, Bukhara and Tashkent all
sat right on the Silk Road. This was also the point from where the Silk Road
branched off to the Indian subcontinent. The cities of Peshawar and Taxila
acted as the gates to the Indian subcontinent. Goods from the north would
have travelled down these cities to reach the port cities in western India.
Barygaza (modern Bharuch in Gujarat) was one such port that did brisk
trade with the Romans.
Sitting on a major inter-change of international trade would have given the
Kushans opportunities to collect revenue, interact with different people and
civilisations and foster international relations. The cities of Bactria,
Samarkand and Bukhara must have been a melting pot of ideas, knowledge
and cultures. One can probably compare them to modern-day versions of
such places like Singapore and Hong Kong.
The Kushans not only profited by the accident of being on a major trade
inter-change. They also encouraged trade from other parts of India. The
primary exports [52] from Indian ports were spices, perfumes, medicinal
products, lacquer, dye, sugar, vegetable oil (coconut and sesame), precious
stones and of course ivory. Indian ivory was very popular in the Roman
world.
An ivory statuette was excavated from the ruins of Pompeii in 1930s. Made
in typical Indian style with ornaments and bangles, it was identified as
Pompeii Lakshmi. Later research however identified it with a Yakshi. The
statuette dates back to early years of the Common Era and must have
reached Pompeii with either the Roman seafaring traders or over land via
the Kushan territories.
The trade in luxury imports from India into the Roman cities proved very
expensive. Pliny the Elder complained that the Roman taste in Indian
products is draining the empire of its gold. It is believed that he also
referred to India as the ‘sink of the world’s gold’. Not all the gold of
Romans would have arrived by the sea to the ancient ports of Barygaza and
Muziris, some of it would have surely fallen into the treasuries of the
Kushans.
The Kushans were not only great conquerors and trade facilitators, they
were also great town planners and art connoisseurs. Excavations at many
places in Central Asia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, north-west India and eastern
India have revealed both modest and grand cities and town of the Kushan
era. There are some contemporary texts that give us an account of life in a
typical Kushan city.
The Pali text, Milinda Panha or Milind Prashna or questions of Milind, is
dated to early centuries of the Common Era [53] . It is a philosophical text of
Buddhist doctrines, written in form of questions and answers. The original
text was probably written in Sanskrit or one of the Prakrits of north India.
The original text is lost, and only a later Pali translation from Sri Lanka is
extant. Milind has been identified by the historians as the Indo-Greek king
Menander I of Bactria, who ruled from a city near modern-day Sialkot. He
in his quest for knowledge engages with Nagsena, a Buddhist monk.
It can be debated, whether the question and answers session actually took
place. But from the details of city life in the text, one can form an image of
how the Indo-Greek city of Sagala (modern Sialkot) must have looked. The
Kushans who succeeded the Indo- Greeks would have inherited such well-
planned cities and towns. A passage from Milind Panha gives a very vivid
description [54] of the capital city of Menander. It reads
‘There is in the country of the Yonakas (the Greeks) a great centre of trade,
a city that is called Sagala, situate in a delightful country well-watered and
hilly, abounding in parks and gardens and groves and lakes and tanks, a
paradise of rivers and mountains and woods. Wise architects have laid it
out, and its people know of no oppression, since all their enemies and
adversaries have been put down. Brave is its defence, with many and
various strong towers and ramparts, with superb gates and entrance
archways; and with the royal citadel in its midst, white walled and deeply
moated.
Well laid out are its streets, squares, cross roads, and market places. Well
displayed are the innumerable sorts of costly merchandise with which its
shops are filled. It is richly adorned with hundreds of alms-halls of various
kinds; and splendid with hundreds of thousands of magnificent mansions,
which rise aloft like the mountain peaks of the Himalayas.
Its streets are filled with elephants, horses, carriages, and foot-passengers,
frequented by groups of handsome men and beautiful women, and crowded
by men of all sorts and conditions, Brahmans, nobles, artificers, and
servants. They resound with cries of welcome to the teachers of every
creed, and the city is the resort of the leading men of each of the differing
sects. Shops are there for the sale of Benares muslin, of Kotumbara (a type
of cloth from the Kangra region) stuffs, and of other cloths of various kinds;
and sweet odours are exhaled from the bazaars, where all sorts of flowers
and perfumes are tastefully set out. Jewels are there in plenty, such as men's
heart’s desire, and guilds of traders in all sorts of finery display their goods
in the bazaars that face all quarters of the sky. So full is the city of money,
and of gold and silver ware, of copper and stone ware, that it is a very mine
of dazzling treasures. And there is laid up there much store of property and
corn and things of value in warehouses-foods and drinks of every sort,
syrups and sweetmeats of every kind. In wealth it rivals Uttara-kuru (region
in the Ganga plains), and in glory it is as Âlakamandâ, the city of the Gods’.
One can clearly see that the passage is full of superlatives and reads more
like a praise to the king. This might be true, since the text ends in Menander
embracing Buddhism and hence a very favourable picture is painted of him
and his city. However, to create that favourable image, there has to be a
canvas, which at least has some semblance of the imaginary image.
Archaeological excavations at many of the Kushan sites have in fact
brought out similar town planning and fortifications as mentioned in Milind
Panha. Excavations at Sirsukh (Taxila) [55] have revealed a city shaped like a
parallelogram with a 3 mile perimeter. The city walls were built of rubble
and limestone masonry and were 18.5 feet in thickness. The outer sections
of the wall was provided with semi-circular bastions every 90 feet. The fort
wall also had provisions for drainage at regular intervals. Loopholes in the
wall provided for archers to defend the walls.
In Kaushambi, India, excavations of a palace complex have identified
introduction of elliptical domes [56] for the first time in India by the
Kushans. The popular belief that the dome is an Islamic influence in India is
most likely not true.
The Kushans also introduced the semi-ashler masonry in construction. The
previous method of masonry used rubbles and was hence prone to damage.
It is believed that after a strong earthquake shook Taxila, the rebuilding of
the city was carried out using new techniques like the semi-ashler. In this
technique, which is hardly path breaking today, stones used were either
dressed to have straight edges (like bricks) or stones with a natural straight
edge were used. Such stones held together with the plaster much better and
provided strength to the walls. The earlier mud and rubble structures were
weak and were reinforced using a thick layer of plaster [57] .
Fire baked bricks too were commonly used in building houses, and the
floors too were paved with bricks. We see that the tradition of using baked
bricks continued from the Harappan times to the Kushan period. In some of
the houses that were excavated, ash filled hearths were also found. Brick
wells too have been found inside the houses, indicating water management
and some level of prosperity.
We have seen that since the Harappan time, hearths have been a constant
feature in homes of the Indian subcontinent. Usually located in an open
space, these were used for daily cooking. In some cases, tandoor like
structures too have been found. The Harappan hearths are very interesting
since the type of hearth defines the way people cook. One may wonder why
the Asian cooking is so tilted towards woks, pans and pots over an open
fire, while the European cooking tilts more towards the use of an oven.
I believe that the climate plays a major role in this choice. Being largely
within the tropical and subtropical belt, the Indian subcontinent witnesses
long period of hot and humid climate. This is of course followed by a brief
winter but it is mild compared to the temperate zones. Such weather
conditions do not make it comfortable to be around a fire for a long time.
The temperate zones on the other hand witnessed long cold winters
intercepted by a brief summer.
The hot and humid climate in the Asian region makes perfect sense to have
the hearth outside the house and finish the cooking as fast as possible. Woks
and pans serve the purpose well. Boiling, frying and pan baking take less
time compared to an oven and hence lets the people spend more time
outside the kitchen. In Europe on the other hand, heating was an absolute
must for a substantial part of the year. The early fireplace inside the house,
probably, doubled up as a cooking place too. Roasting and baking of
vegetables, bread and meat could be done sitting inside the house, by the
fire. The heat from the fire also gave warmth to the house. This obviously
was perfected at some time when the oven and the fireplace got separated.
Climate not only impacts the way people cook, but also the way they dress.
The period of Kushans not only resulted in mingling of ideas and religion, it
also brought different kinds of clothing to India. The Kushans themselves
were from Central Asia, where winters are harsh. They eventually settled in
the Gandhara region, which already had Hellenistic influence, thanks to the
Greeks. The Greek Himation and Chitons were already popular. The colder
climate made boots comfortable to wear. The Kushans adopted the Hellenic
styles and fused with it their own Central Asian features.
Later on, the Persian contact of the Kushans influenced their dresses and
more tunics and trousers were seen in the murals. We also see use of head
dresses, what is called a Pagdi in Hindi, for men. A long piece of cloth
coiled around the head was an integral part of one’s identity until mid-20th
century. It was only after independence that Indians started adopting
western outfits in large numbers and the use of pagdi declined and
ultimately disappeared, save for festive occasions.
The stone carvings and murals from the Kushan era at museums depict both
men and women in different attires. They range from traditional Indian
dhoti and sari to Persian tunics and Central Asian knee length over coats.
One cannot be sure, what the most popular form of dress in the Kushan
times was. What we can assume is that it probably depended on the needs
and weather conditions, much like today. The Gandhara and Central Asian
cities would probably have adopted tunics and trousers to escape harsh
winters. The people in the Ganga plains and the north-west would have
continued with their dhotis and saris.
Some images of the Kushans show trousers that are loose but shrink at the
ankles [58] . This together with a fitting tunic resembles closely with a
modern kurta and a Shalwar worn by many women in Punjab (both in India
and Pakistan), Himachal Pradesh and Kashmir.
Of assimilation and integration
The Kushans were the last invaders to arrive and settle in India from
Central Asia in the ancient times. The Indian subcontinent would not
witness a large scale foreign invasion until the 7th century CE, when
Rashidun and Umayyad forces started attacking the western frontiers of
India.
After the decline of Kushans, there were minor encroachments on the north-
western borders of India by the Persians. These were however short lived,
and India saw a period of relative calm from foreign invasions.
The series of invasions, which started from Alexander in 326 BCE, resulted
in destruction of life and property. That was how wars were fought in
ancient times. The nature of war did not change much even in the 21st
century. However, many non-lethal elements have made their way into
modern warfare. The alleged Russian interference in the 2016 American
elections, for example.
The years after Alexander departed India and subsequently died in Babylon,
other invaders followed, the Seleucids, the Indo-Greeks, the Indo-Parthians
and the Kushans. Apart from the large-scale violence and destruction that
each of these brought upon the people of India, there was another common
thread to these events. All three of these people came to India, won
territories and integrated in the Indian culture.
It is important to note that these people did not come in large numbers to
displace the local population. They were essentially invading armies, who
were accompanied by families and a large band of service providers. After
their victory, they established themselves in the subcontinent and started the
process of integration. The integration process led to a short-lived change in
the social structure of the conquered land, especially in the cities that served
as the capital or administrative centres. How costumes, customs and
religion saw intermingling due to the Central Asian and Greek influence
were discussed above. We have evidence of the religious integration of
invaders, once they settled down in India. Thre are instances like the
conversion of Manender to Buddhism, the acceptance of Indian Gods by
Kanishka and the Heliodorus Pillar (Circa. 113 BCE) in Vidisha, dedicated
to the Hindu God Vasudeva. These material evidence point to the fact that
the invaders always accepted and integrated themselves in the local culture,
language and religion, once they settled down.
The process of integration is, however, not same as the process of
assimilation. To understand the process of integration, one can imagine a
large Lego castle, built by using colourful Lego bricks. The individual
pieces have a different colour but they have found their place in the large
castle and are also integral to its overall look. Similar to a large Lego castle,
the Seleucids, the Indo-Greeks, the Indo-Parthians and the Kushans brought
in their own customs and craft to India and integrated them with the larger
Indian society.
The process of assimilation, on the other hand, goes one step forward. To
understand it, let us assume a glass of warm milk to which a spoon full of
sugar has been added. When one looks at the glass of milk, it is impossible
to say whether it has sugar in it or not. Only when one drinks it, does the
sweetness lets one know that sugar has been added to it. The ancient
invaders did show some element of assimilation too. This is most visible in
the religious sphere. All of them patronised the Indian religions and gave
the Indian deities like Buddha and Indra, a special place together with their
own deities.
In some cases, the rulers converted to Buddhism and actively engaged in
propagating the faith to other parts of their empire. While they did this, they
maintained their identities by virtue of their clothing and in many cases
their names. The Kushans were the most assimilated of all the invaders.
They gave up their ancestral language when they invaded India and adopted
Greek. Later on, with reduced influence of Greek, they gave it up in favour
of more popular Bactrian.
These people showed not only tolerance towards their subjects, but also
went ahead and intermingled with them to adopt their customs, religion and
language. Yet they maintained their own identities. The numismatic
evidence shows these kings dressed in Central Asian or Greek attire (hats,
tunics, etc.), using Greek alphabet but at the same time giving space to
Indian deities. They did not stop at mere integration, but they also stopped
short of total assimilation in the Indian culture.
Once the influence of the invader waned, in wake of emerging Indian
empires like the Gupta Dynasty, the Greek and Central Asian traits started
fading away from popular culture. Some of the traits however continued to
exist, for example, in clothing as we discussed above.
The process of integration and assimilation ceased with the Arab invasion
of India. One may refer to the account given by Al Biruni, in his Indica to
understand how things changed during the Arab invasions. In the chapter,
‘about the beginning of idol worship [59] Al Biruni describes a Sun temple in
the city of Multan, in modern-day Pakistan. He says –
‘A famous idol of theirs [Hindus] was that of Multan, dedicated to the sun,
and therefore called Aditya. It was of wood and covered with red Cordovan
leather; in its two eyes were two red rubies. It is said to have been made in
the last Kritayuga, Suppose that it was made in the very end of Kritayuga
the time which has since elapsed amounts to 216,432 years. When
Muhammad Ibn Al Kasim Ibn Almunabbih conquered Multan, he inquired
how the town had become so very flourishing and how so many treasures
had there been accumulated, and then he found out that this idol was the
cause, for there came pilgrims from all sides to visit it. Therefore he thought
it best to have the idol where it was, but he hung a piece of cow’s flesh [the
cow being sacred to the Hindus] on its neck by way of mockery. On the
same place a mosque was built. When then the Karmatians [a Muslim sect
with Ishmaili roots ] occupied Multan, Jalam Ibn Shaiban, the usurper,
broke the idol into pieces and killed its priests’.
The era of Arab and later Islamic invaders saw widespread destruction and
desecration of Indian religious places. The cycle of integration and
assimilation was reversed and a new cycle of religious and cultural
dominance and enforcement ensued in the subcontinent. A discussion on the
scale and impact of this reversal is beyond the scope of this book and I
would leave it for a later work, if that happens.
Empire of Deccan
While the Kushans expanded and consolidated their rule in Central Asia and
northern Indian subcontinent, the Indo-Scythians were pushed to western
India. They ruled a large part of modern-day Gujarat, southern Rajasthan
and western Madhya Pradesh. The Indo-Scythians, also known as the
Western Satraps, were contemporaries of the Satavahana Dynasty. The two
were constantly at war to expand and retain territories. The Satavahanas
were eventually defeated by the Satraps around 2nd century CE. The
Western Satraps continued to rule until the 4th century CE with a reducing
territory, when Chandragupta II absorbed the Satraps in the Gupta Empire.
The Western Satraps together with the Satavahanas, probably controlled a
large share of international trade. The Port city of Bharuch, known as
Barygaza in the Erythraean Scrolls, was under the Satraps, and
Machilipatnam, known as Maisolos in the Erythraean Scrolls, was under the
Satavahanas. The two also provided political stability to the region as the
Mauryan Empire declined.
The Satavahanas were most likely the first to consolidate southern India in
a large empire. Though the Chera, Pandians and others had territories in
modern-day Tamil Nadu and Kerala, the Satavahanas were the first to bring
in a large territory under a single political rule.
The dates of origins of Satavahana Dynasty is contested variously between
2nd and 1st centuries BCE. Based on the extant epigraphical evidence, it can
be said that the Satavahanas were firmly in place in the Maharashtra region
by 1st century BCE. Buddhism was still very popular in the peninsular
region of India and the Satavahanas patronised it. The UNESCO designated
World Heritage Monument Ajanta Caves in Aurangabad are linked to the
Satavahanas by some historians. Though like much of ancient history, this
claim too is disputed. However, there is enough evidence elsewhere to
suggest the Satavahana patronage to Buddhism.
The Sanchi Stupa in Vidisha was built during the Mauryan time but
substantial repair works were carried out by the Satavahana king Satakarni
II, an inscription on the southern gateway of the stupa reads, ‘Gift of
Anand, the son of Vasishthi, the foreman of the artisans of rajan Siri
Satakarni’. The Nasik Caves too bear references to Satavahana kings,
indicating their patronage to Buddhism in other parts of their kingdom.
Apart from Buddhism, the Satavahanas also patronised the Vedic tradition.
The Naneghat cave inscriptions give a detailed account of Satavahana
patronage to Vedic rituals. The inscriptions also provide information on the
emergence of Puranic deities and their increasing importance in the larger
Hindu religious discourse. The Naneghat inscriptions start with salutation to
both Vedic and Puranic Gods. It invokes Balram and Krishan as the Puranic
Gods and Indra, Moon, Sun, Varun, Yama and Kuber as the Vedic Gods.
The inscriptions not only tell us about the religious affiliations of the
Satavahanas, but also shed light on the social practices of the royal family.
It is most likely that the social practices followed by the royal family would
have been social norms for the society at large. We can thus believe that the
larger population of the Satavahana region too gave equal if not
disproportionate patronage to both Buddhism and a mix of Vedic and
Puranic Hindu practices.
There are other sources, which shed light on the Satavahana rule. As part of
a submission to the Ministry of Culture, the Department of Marathi
Language, Government of Maharashtra, has submitted a set of documents.
The appendix is meant to act as a substantial support to the case of
Marathi’s classical status. The first appendix in the document is the,
‘History and inscriptions of the Satavahanas, the Western Kshatrapas’. The
appendix, written by V.V. Mirashi, delves deep into the Naneghat
inscription of Naganika cave. It states that the inscription is written in old
Brahmi script and the language is Prakrit. Based on this information, the
inscription can be roughly dated to a period just after the reign of Ashoka,
in the 2nd century BCE or early 1st century BCE.
The inscription is written as a first person account of a queen mother,
eulogising the deeds of her late husband and the present king (her son). The
appendix then goes on to conclude that the queen mother was in all
probability ruling as a regent, till her son came of age. Though a
governance issue, the fact that a widow was allowed to rule as a regent tells
us that the women of high status, in ancient India, were able to claim a high
office when the need arose. There are other instances of women taking over
conventionally male-dominated careers, right up to the colonial times. The
numbers of such instances are however small to make a general statement
on the condition of women in ancient India.
The regent would have relinquished her rights once her son, ‘Vedi-Sri’ was
ready to take over the throne. It won’t be an exaggeration to imagine that
she would have wielded significant power in the court, the administration
and over high officials, while she acted as the regent.
The fact that the inscription was ordered by the queen herself, tells us the
power the queen mother wielded even after her son became the king. The
queen mother has been identified as Naganika, the wife of Satakarni. The
appendix mentions recent findings of joint coins of Satakarni and Naganika
in the Junaar area, near the caves. This was probably the first time a
woman’s name appeared on an Indian coin. The next time a woman will
appear on coins would be in the middle ages when Razia Sultan minted
coins.
There are other points of significance that corroborate the high status the
women of Satavahana times enjoyed. Many later kings took up their
mother’s name as their identity. We have at least three prominent kings of
the Satavahana period who took up their mother’s name: Kochiputra
Satakarni, Gautamiputra Satakarni and Vasishthiputra Pulumavi.
The Naneghat inscription also describes the benevolence of the Satavahanas
when it came to patronising and practicing the Vedic sacrificial rituals. The
inscription mentions the lavish gifts of cows, horses, property, gold, silver
and clothes given to the presiding priests and attendants during rituals. The
two major Vedic rituals carried out by the Satavahanas, according to the
inscription, were the Ashvamedha (twice) and the Rajasuya. This
declaration shows that the restrictions put on Vedic rituals during the
Ashokan era were slowly weaning.
This were the early signs of revival of the Vedic practices, which were
perhaps severely restricted under the Mauryan rule. This is further attested
by the Ayodhya inscription of the Shunga Dynasty. Though the time period
is contested, but it definitely belonged to the Shunga Dynasty. It reads,
‘Dhana, Lord of Kosala, son of Kausiki, the sixth of the Senapati
Pushyamitra, who had performed the Ashvamedha twice, erected a
memorial in honour of Phalgudev, the father of Dharmraja’ [60] .
When we read about Ashoka and his conversion and later propagation of
Buddhism, we are almost given an image of a reformed king who accepted
non-violence. But these indirect references to possible curbing of Vedic
rituals show a darker side of Ashoka. The Ashokavaadna, a Buddhist text
written in Sanskrit, describes Ashoka’s commitment to Buddhism. In the
final section, the author mentions Pushyamitra Shunga as an enemy of
Buddhism, a possible reference to Pushyamitr’s attempt to revive Vedic
rituals.
The Satavahanas were a geographical bridge between Peninsular India and
the Ganga plains. Their territories lay on the Dakshinapatha, which was a
major trade route. This was the reason why the Naneghat inscriptions were
inscribed in the caves there. Naneghat, a mountain pass in the Sahyadri
range of the Western Ghats, connected the Deccan region to the Konkan
region. In all probability, the pass acted as a toll collection plaza for the
Satavahanas and hence was chosen for the inscription, attracting more
eyeballs. Like modern-day advertisers, eyeballs and location were also an
attraction for ancient Indians.
Apart from being a trade and cultural bridge between south and north, the
Satavahanas proved to be a bridge between Buddhism and Modern
Hinduism. The bridge seems to be mostly a one way passage from where
people crossed over to Hinduism. While the Satavahanas patronised
Buddhism and Vedic rituals, there seems to have been a clear shift towards
Hinduism. A reason for the tilt towards Vedic rituals of the Satavahanas
could be their Brahmin origin or simply a walk back to the old ways once
the restrictions of the Mauryan Empire ceased to exist.
The Satavahanas also introduced their own set of restrictions on the people.
The Nashik inscriptions by Gautami Balasri, mother of Gautamiputra
Satakarni, states that Satakarni had put a stop on intermixing of the four
varnas. This is most likely a reference to the inter-marriage among the four
varnas. It however sounds a bit hypocritical given the matrimonial alliance
between Satavahanas and the Indo-Scythian Western Kshatraps.
Vasisthiputra, the son of Gautamiputra, married the daughter of
Rudradaman I, who was a Hindu converted from Buddhism and of Indo-
Scythian lineage.
But it is likely that they put very real restrictions on the general population
to prevent the intermixing of Varnas. This practice was however not related
to intermixing of Jatis, or castes as we know today. In all probability, the
intermixing of castes continued to happen.
But an open proclamation of discouraging varna mixing seems to have
taken up by later dynasties, especially during the Gupta Age. A genetic
study by the National Institute of Biomedical Genomics, Kolkata, suggests
that intermixing of castes ceased around 1,600 years ago. This period
coincides with the Gupta Dynasty in India. The initial restriction on the
varna mixing would have percolated down to caste mixing during this time,
and it stayed the same way ever since.
The research also hints that caste system was probably a result of the
Guptas using the state machinery to enforce caste segregation. This again is
a guesswork. The same study also says that the Brahmins of east and north-
east India continued to mix with Tibeto-Burman people till about 8th century
CE, when the Buddhist Pal Dynasty was established. If the Guptas indeed
used the state machinery to control varna mixing, they would have done it
more effectively in their core area, of which Bengal was a part. Why would
they allow the Brahmins of Bengal to keep mixing with others but would
not allow other?
A possible explanation to this might rest in the system of guilds followed by
the ancient Indians. We know that the guild or the sreni system existed in
India since the time of Mahajanapadas. The srenis or the guilds were
organised units of people engaged in a particular trade or manufacturing of
a particular craft. We have references of weavers, potters, smiths, oil
pressers, carpenters, gardeners, etc. organised in guilds. These are also,
roughly, some of the castes we have in India today. It is possible that at
some point in time, these guilds stopped intermixing and became
endogamous. Once the social mobility stopped, these groups would have
undergone a process of finding their place in the social hierarchy.
The concept of varna and jati underwent a restructuring process, and the
broad distinction of four varnas was replaced by three varnas and multiple
jatis. The jatis formed primarily in the fourth varna, the Shudra. We do not
know whether the restriction on varna mixing was purely based on the
Vedic interpretations or was there any other reason to support it. Was it
more geared to prevent the dilution of the guilds? Was the mixing of guilds
leading the jatis to engage in more than one trade? Was this creating an
imbalance in the economic life?
The Satavahana were engaged in international trade, and any dilution of the
guilds would have had a great impact on the revenue. We do not know for
sure why the restrictions were put in place by the Satavahanas. We can only
debate and guess the possible reasons. But it for sure led to crystallisation
of the caste system in India.
The Satavahanas, often dealt with little importance in academic discussions,
were in fact agents of great change in the Indian subcontinent. They acted
as the economic bridge between north and south India. They also revived
the Vedic rituals, which faced sanctions under the Mauryan rule. They
furthered the emerging Puranic deities like Krishna and Balrama. They
were the ones who took pride in taking up their mother’s name. They were
the ones under whom the women claimed the high office of a regent. They
were also the ones who promoted international trade with far off places like
the Roman Empire. The wealth of epigraphical, numismatic and
archaeological evidence surrounding the Satavahanas demands a detailed
academic study and wider dissemination of the findings.
India’s gifts to the world – performing arts
The Indian subcontinent never really had a dull moment in its history. From
the prehistoric times onwards, human curiosity paved way for creation of
one of the greatest civilisations of the ancient world. The spread of
population and culture throughout the subcontinent was supported by
favourable climatic conditions and a rich geography. We saw how great
empires emerged, flourished and declined. How the western parts of the
subcontinent witnessed continuous attacks and invasions. How the invaders
came, settled and assimilated in the Indian civilisation. We saw how great
empires contributed to the growth of social and economic well-being of the
people. Amidst all this, a very important aspect of Indian history got missed
out, its contribution and advances in the non-political sphere of life.
History is as much about politics as it is about other things like art,
literature, science, medicine, mathematics and philosophy. Developments in
these fields are an indication of prosperity of a society. For only when the
basic needs of the society are met, it starts pursuing the secondary aspects
like art and literature. Only when the society finds adequate means of
sustenance that it thinks of preservation and engages in medicinal research.
Only when the society has the security of its preservation that it enters the
realm of contemplation and produces works of philosophy.
The inquisitive nature of Indians to seek answers and solution to problems
has manifested itself since prehistoric times. The dental procedures of the
Neolithic Indians is probably the earliest such manifestation. It has since
manifested itself in designing the hydrology of the Harappan cities of
Lothal and later in the quest of unknown in the Rig Veda.
The inquisitive nature of Indians also created a society, which was curious
and accommodating. They sought answers and engaged in debates. The
debates were not restricted to religious discourse alone but spilled over to
other areas like medicine and science, which we will see later on in this
book. The evolution of multiple religious doctrines in the Indian
subcontinent is the greatest proof that the Indian mind was not only curious
but also an expanded, all welcoming space.
The expanded, all welcoming mind of Indians made India the only country
where three major religions emerged, evolved, flourished and spread to
almost half of the then known world. No other country or region comes to
my mind, which has the distinction of being more inclusive and welcoming
than India was at any time in recent or ancient past.
Medieval India witnessed a phase of religious change and persecution under
the Persians, Turks and Mongols. As a result, Buddhism was wiped out
from Eastern India, where it had a strong presence. The phase of
introduction of Abrahamic religions in India and the persecution of Indian
religions are beyond the scope of this book. It will be sufficient to state that
despite the persecution carried out by different rulers over a period of time,
India retained its religious identity. However, it eventually lost considerable
territory during the process of its independence.
So what were the ancient Indians doing other than building empires and
trading with remote cities? One of the achievements of ancient Indians was
compilation of treatise on theatre. This was an important achievement not
because it laid the foundation of theatre performances, but because it tells
us that theatre was perhaps patronised by royalty and lay people alike.
Hence, the need to lay down a standard manual to ensure quality of the
production. We can draw a parallel from the modern time where there are
many film schools to meet the demands of Bollywood. The schools exist
only because films in India are patronised by the common people, and the
film schools help meet the demand for actors and technicians.
The earliest known text on performing arts is the Natya Shastra. It is
attributed to Bharata Muni and is dated, variously, between 500 BCE and
500 CE. There is a reference to another work on theatre rules in Panini’s
works. He refers to Natasutras, attributed to various people. Considering
that Panini is believed to have lived in the 5th century BCE, the Natasutras
definitely existed before his time. Some scholars place Natasutras around
600 BCE [61] . The Natasutras have been linked to performance of Vedic
rituals where the sacrifice is performed with music. This pushes the origins
of rules of Natasutra to Vedic times.
It is generally accepted that the Natya Shastra is the oldest extant text on
performance art. But given the evidence of Natasutra, one can say that the
Natya Shastra was probably a work which collated, compiled, improved the
earlier works and laid down new rules as well. Though attributed to
Bharata, the Natya Shastra was probably composed over a period of time
before Bharata standardised it. It is very likely that later on the text would
have undergone changes to include new techniques and discard old ones.
Natya Shastra is divided into 36 chapters where each chapter deals with a
specific aspect of theatre art. It deals with subjects like developing the plot,
intermediary and supporting scenes, division of acts, features of an
auditorium, set designs, incorporation of music and dance in plays, etc.
The ancient Indian theatre style was markedly different from the Greek
theatre. The primary difference being the dependence, in Natya Shastra, on
dance, song and instrumental music [62] . The ancient plays were essentially
dance dramas, where the acting was supplemented by other performing arts.
This is probably the reason why the modern version of ancient dance
dramas, i.e. Bollywood, has so many songs.
The Natya Shastra makes another departure from the western form of
theatre. According to the Natya Shastra, performance is all about putting up
a spectacle [63] . The people witnessing a performance are hence addressed
as ‘prekshakas’, i.e. observers and not as ‘shrotas’ i.e. audience. There is
also an element of speech in form of the dialogues, but the overall
experience of a performance is appreciated by the grandeur of the spectacle.
Again, we see the concept of a spectacle in modern Bollywood movies,
where larger than life characters do physics defying acts.
The Natya Shastra also delves into the concepts of judging the
performances. According to it, the ultimate judge of a performance are the
spectators. According to the text, the rules set by the experts alone cannot
be used to judge a performance. The Natya Shastra recommends the
assessors to consult a select number of spectators to arrive at a decision.
Much like the modern reality shows, where the audience votes for their
favourite singers or dancers. Or perhaps it can be compared to the critics’
feedback of modern film and theatre performances.
The first chapter of Natya Shastra deals with the origin of drama in ancient
India. It is written in the form of a dialogue between Bharata Muni (to
whom the book is attributed) and rishis like Atreya. In the dialogue, Bharata
informs the rishis that Natya Shastra was in fact created by Brahma by
condensing all the four Vedas. Hence, a fifth Veda was created, which was
accessible to all. Bharat here makes a reference to Shudras not allowed to
listen to Vedas, and hence, the fifth Veda will be accessible even to them.
This piece of information is critical, since we now know that at the time of
composition of Natya Shastra, the Shudras were subjected to discriminatory
practices. However, at the same time, we also see that the social elites of the
time also created something that is accessible to all.
In the first chapter, Bharata describes the staging of the very first play
during the Dhvaja Utsav (Banner Festival) of Indra. The play was to
recreate the events of victory of Devas over Asuras. When the performance
started showing the Asuras as the defeated lot, they got triggered. The
Asuras created a commotion, demanding an end to the performance as it did
not include their side of the story. Such was their anger at being shown in a
bad light that they paralysed the actors with their supernatural powers.
Now this is what Bharat wrote more than 2,000 years ago but this could
well be the present time. Even today, an outraged group of people, not
happy with a dialogue, a scene or characterisation in a film get triggered.
They take to protests, file petitions in the courts or sometime beat up the
cast and crew. Apparently, tolerance level among the audience has always
been very low.
The Natya Shastra gives us an insight into the work done, probably, by
multiple dramatists. They laid down the principles of ancient Indian theatre
and with it gave us a peek into the sophistication of the ancient Indian
society but the Indian mind, as we saw, is all welcoming. Many dramatists
strayed away from the principles of Natya Shastra, and Kalidasa was one
such dramatist [64] . One can argue that perhaps Kalidasa wrote his work
before the Natya Shastra was formalised. At the same time, one can also
argue that Kalidasa deliberately violated the rules of Natya Shastra.
Apart from the Natya Shastra, the plays from ancient India give us a lot of
indirect information about the society, culture and other non-political
aspects of India. In Mrachakatika (the play titled, clay cart), the female
protagonist is a courtesan. The character of Vasantasena, the courtesan, is
portrayed as a dignified woman who has considerable financial assets and
lives a luxurious life. We find similar references to courtesans in other
works. In Amrapali, the protagonist enjoys a high social status being a
courtesan.
The play in its prologue informs the spectators about Charudutta, the male
protagonist. He is introduced as a poor young man who is a Brahmin and
son of a merchant. This introduction might seem ordinary but the point to
be noted here is the possibility of social mobility, at least in the upper caste.
A Brahmin is supposed to dispense his duties as a scholar, a teacher and
performer of the ritual sacrifices. Here, we see a Brahmin merchant.
There are many references to Indian mythology in the play, and the names
of characters from the epics Ramayana and Mahabharata are invoked. It is
generally accepted that Shudrak, the playwright lived between the 3rd
century BCE and 5th century CE. We can thus assume that by the time
Mrachakatika was written, the epics were already well established in the
common folklore. For this to happen, the dates of origin of these epics
would have to fall much before the 3rd century BCE.
The play among other things touches upon the culinary habits of ancient
Indians. Sugar and rice, curdled milk, cream of curdled milk, fried meat,
etc. are mentioned at various instances in the play. Rice cakes are often
mentioned, which for sure must have been different from the cakes we
know today. They were probably balls of steamed rice mixed with other
condiments sweet and savoury.
In the fourth act of the play, a vivid description of vasantasena’s house is
provided. The house has eight courts, and each has a distinct use like music
room, kitchen, jewellery workshop, etc. It is equated with a piece of
Kuber’s palace, implying the opulence and wealth the courtesan’s house
enjoyed. The house of Vasantasena also has an orchard with many trees and
creepers. This tells us a little about the way houses in ancient India were
planned, at least the ones belonging to rich people.
The play mixes aspects from both Hinduism and Buddhism at various
places. The patron God of lovers, ‘Kama’ is frequently invoked. Indra,
Lakshmi and Brahma too are invoked in many dialogues. A shampooer is
introduced in the play who is running away from the keeper of the gambling
house to avoid paying his debts. Vasantasena pays off his debts, which so
overwhelms the shampooer that he becomes a Buddhist monk. This again
may come across as a comic scene but it also tells us that both the Vedic
form of Hinduism and Buddhism coexisted and were accepted openly by
the people.
The immense contribution of Natya Shastra can be gauged by the fact that
after more than two millennia, the text is still taught at the National School
of Drama, Delhi.
India’s gifts to the world – Storytelling
The concept of storytelling has always been loved by Indians. The ultimate
evolution of storytelling was Natya Shastra where a story was presented
visually by following certain rules. The Indian literature, right from the time
of composition of Rig Veda, has used metaphors to describe things. The
texts have used everyday events like sun rise, rain, storm, etc. to tell stories,
give policy guidelines and device mechanism to construct altars. The art of
storytelling continues in the modern times in many different formats. From
big budget Bollywood movies to small budget Jatra plays in Bengal and to
household Bhagwat sessions, all have carried on the tradition of ancient
storytelling.
Many storytelling formats were almost lost to modern versions of
storytelling with advent of mass media like cinema, radio and television.
Some of them were lucky that they were patronised and promoted. The
Pandavani style using song as a medium of storytelling found worldwide
recognition through Teejan Bai’s work in the 1980s and 90s. Dastangoi,
which followed the ancient Indian storytelling format, flourished in the 13th
century. The art form died in the 19th century but has recently been revived
by successful commercial performances. Indians still love a good story.
When we talk about storytelling, we cannot ignore, the Panchatantra, one of
the greatest contribution to the art of storytelling. It is perhaps the only
secular literary work that can truly claim to be a world heritage. Widely
accepted to have been composed few centuries before Common Era,
Panchatantra has become the most widely read Indian text between Java
and Iceland. The original Sanskrit text has been translated into Persian,
Arabic, Hebrew, Syriac, Latin, Greek, German, English, Spanish, etc. The
text travelled from India to Europe much like everything else did, through
West Asia.
Panchatantra uses metaphors and substitutes to tell a story. The use of
animals, who talk, think and act like humans is a clever play to relate the
acts and nature of humans to that of animals. The anthropomorphism of
Panchatantra strikes a chord of similarity with many modern works. Some
of the famous anthropomorphic characters in modern storytelling are Aslan,
the talking lion in The Chronicles of Narnia, an entire jungle full of talking
animals in the Ice Age series and of course the talking pigs of Animal Farm.
Arthur William Ryder, a Sanskrit professor at University of California,
Berkeley translated Panchatantra in English from a late 12th century
manuscript of Purnabhadra. In the introduction of his work (The
Panchatantra Purnabhadra’s Recension of 1199 CE), he said, ‘The
Panchatantra is a Niti Shastra, or textbook of Niti’. He also laments on the
lack of vocabulary in western languages for Sanskrit words like Niti. In the
introduction section, he further writes, ‘The word Niti means roughly ‘the
wise conduct of life’. Western civilisation must endure a certain shame in
realising that no precise equivalent of the term is found in English, French,
Latin or Greek. Many words are therefore necessary to explain what Niti is,
though the idea, once grasped, is clear, important, and satisfying’.
The stories of Panchatantra are widely read to children as stories with a
moral. However, Ryder describes Panchatantra as a Niti Shastra, which
makes it equally interesting for adults. It was perhaps its universal appeal
that led to its translation into multiple languages across the world.
Long before the work was translated into foreign languages, it was widely
borrowed by people across India. The Jataka tales, which are the stories of
Buddha’s previous lives, are heavily influenced by the Panchatantra. So
influential were the Jataka tales that some Buddhist sects (Mahasamghika
Chaitika) accepted them as Buddhist canonical literature. Many Stupas built
across the Indian subcontinent including Sri Lanka were associated with a
legend of Buddha’s pervious birth to enhance the importance and holiness
of the site.
The Jataka tales travelled to Central Asia, Tibet, China and Japan with the
spread of Buddhism. So profound is the impact of the Jataka tales and
hence the Panchatantra that the Christian missionaries in Japan [65] used
them to convert people to Christianity. They used the translations of the
Jataka tales to convince potential recruits that Buddha himself was
originally a Christian.
The first West Asian translation of Panchatantra was in Pahlavi, or Middle
Persian in the 6th century (550 CE). Borzuy, a Persian physician, is believed
to have visited India and took a copy back with him. The episode of Borzuy
coming to India and his chance encounter with the Panchatantra are
mentioned in Shah Nama. According to Shah Nama, Borzuy went to India
in search of a resurrecting herb (he probably heard about the Sanjivani
herb). He obviously did not find the herb. However, he met a sage who
explained to him the metaphor of the herb. According to Shah Nama the
sage said, ‘The herb is the scientist; science is the mountain, everlastingly
out of reach of the multitude. The corpse is a man without knowledge, for
uninstructed man is everywhere lifeless. Through knowledge man becomes
revived’. The sage then introduced him to Panchatantra and the wisdom
within.
Francois de Blois, professor and research fellow at University College
London, in his work, Burzoy's Voyage to India and the Origin of the Book
of Kalilah wa Dimna, has carried out a detailed research on how the
Panchatantra and other Indian stories like Mahabharata influenced the
Kalilah wa Dimna (Arabic translation of Borzuy’s work). Blois comes
across two versions of how Borzuy came to know about Panchatantra. One
is the story of Shah Nama and the resurrecting herb, and the other is a
version where the book itself is well known in Persia and the king orders
Borzuy to travel to India and bring him the book.
We are not sure about the actual circumstances under which Borzuy came to
India and translated Panchatantra. What we know is that it was translated
into Pahlavi. The original Pahlavi work is now lost, an Arabic translation,
by Ibn al-Muqaffa, however, did survive. The translation of Panchatantra in
Arabic is counted among the earliest classical works in Arabic prose.
The 8th century Arabic translation proved to be the base text for all future
translations. The German translation, Das Buch der Beispiele, of the Arabic
work was one of the first to be printed at the Gutenberg’s press along with
the Bible. Not only did Panchatantra travel to Europe and Southeast Asia as
translated text and retelling, it also had a profound impact on the way
literature developed in the West Asia and to some extent in Europe.
The Panchatantra stories are not standalone episodes with a set plot. They
are in fact stories with multiple sub-stories, also known as nested stories in
modern literature. This format of nested stories was well known to ancient
Indian storytellers. The ancient epics, Ramayana and Mahabharata, have a
similar format where the main story is supplemented by many, smaller
nested stories. The concept of introducing questioning as the basis of a story
is another Indian concept that we see both in the Panchatantra and in later
work like the Betal Pachhisi. The story within a story has been borrowed in
Arabic works like the one thousand and one nights where sub-stories are
introduced or one long story is broken down into smaller parts (Sindbad the
Sailor).
The modern-day literature of Europe too saw Panchatantra’s influence in
works of great writers like Jean de la Fontaine in the 17th century France.
His collection of stories known as La Fontaine’s fables is considered to be
classics of French literature. For his oriental stories, he drew heavily from
Panchatantra and used animals as characters. In the introduction of his
second book, Fontaine writes [66] , ‘I think that it is not necessary to mention
the sources from where I took this last part of these stories, but I say as the
recognition of gratitude: Mostly I owe the Indian wise Bulba (Bedba [67] ),
that his book has been translated into all the languages’.
The use of animals to convey stories of morals, satire, political messages
has not really ceased since Panchatantra. The famous cartoon character
Mickey Mouse, first created in 1928, falls in the long line of animal
characters used to tell stories. Today, the Panchatantra has been translated or
adapted in more than fifty international languages and has more than two
hundred versions. In India alone, it has been translated into every Indian
language, which has its own version of the stories.
India’s gifts to the world – medicine
Medicine was another non-political area which saw great progress in
ancient times. The collective knowledge of ancient medicine is now known
as Ayurveda, i.e. the Veda of life. The earliest mention of a doctor in the
Indian text comes in Rig Veda. The twins, known as Ashvini Kumaras, sons
of Saranyu (Goddess of clouds) and Surya the Sun god, are mentioned as
the doctors of Gods. In the Puranic texts, Dhanavantri is mentioned as the
doctor of Gods and is also the bearer of Amrit, the potion of eternal life.
Dhanavantri still lives in popular folklore and is commemorated on
Dhanteras or Dhanavantri Tryodashi before Diwali. Though the modern
version of the commemoration has turned into a day seeking material
wealth, the origins of the day lie in seeking good health.
The Indian system of medicine must have evolved over many centuries.
Ayurveda uses herbs, spices, shells and pure metals to produce medicines.
The use of these components in isolation or as a compound can only be
mastered after years of observation. So when Charaka compiled Charaka
Samhita, the compendium of Charaka, in about 4th century BCE, much of
what he wrote would have already been significantly evolved and
established. It is likely that the text was perfected over a period of time by
other physicians. The text available now is believed to be compiled by
Dhridhabaal [68] , in the 6th century CE. The dates of Dhridhabaal’s
composition have been variously placed between 4th and 6th century CE. In
the text, he mentions that a significant part of the text had to be rewritten
since the original was lost.
Charaka Samhita is divided into eight books and 120 [69] chapters. These
books deal in matters relating to general principles of health and well-being,
diseases and their cause, medical training and ethics, anatomy, diagnosis,
medicines and their use in treatment, pharmacology and convalescence. The
Charaka Samhita is one of the earliest texts to lay down a code of ethics for
the medical practitioners, including the doctor and the nurse.
A translation of the Charaka Samhita by Kaviratna and Sharma (1913, Sri
Satguru Publication) states, ‘It mandates that the physician must seek
consent before entering a patient's quarters, must be accompanied by a male
member of the family if he is attending a woman or minor, must inform and
gain consent from patient or the guardians if the patient is a minor, must
never resort to extortion for his service, never involve himself in any other
activities with the patient or patient's family (such as negotiating loans,
arranging marriage, buying or selling property), speak with soft words and
never use cruel words, only do what is calculated to do good to the patient,
and maintain the patient's privacy.
The ethical practice meant for doctors practicing more than two thousand
years ago is still relevant, especially the ones of consent and charging a
reasonable fee. The modern-day corporate hospitals can sure learn a thing
or two from this ancient text. The fact that a doctor is expected to do, ‘what
is calculated to do good to the patient’ reminds us of the numerous lab tests
that one is prescribed and various, mostly unrequired, supplement pills one
is expected to pop.
The book also suggests the ways to train as a doctor. Charaka recommends
that an aspiring doctor should study the available medical texts and select a
guru to guide him [70] . The aspiring doctor is also encouraged to work as an
apprentice under a good doctor to master the science of medicine. Charaka
Samhita establishes, probably for the first time, the fact that doctors keeps
learning throughout their lives. Charaka encourages the doctors to
constantly look for new findings and discuss them with other doctors. He
believed that sharing and discussing the findings will increase the
knowledge base and bring happiness. This is another first where a type of
peer review is suggested by Charaka.
While Charaka wrote about the various aspects of training, pharmacology
and ethics of Ayurveda, in another compendium, Sushruta wrote about
medicine and surgery. The Sushruta Samhita is a collection of verses,
arranged in 186 chapters, dealing in medical practices, diseases and most
importantly on surgery. The book details out procedures for various forms
of surgical techniques, including rhinoplasty and cataract surgery.
A detailed description of the cataract surgery [71] is provided in the
Uttartantra section of the Sushruta Samhita. The procedure provides minute
details like the weather conditions in which the surgery should be
conducted and the position in which the patient should be seated. Sushruta
recommends mild weather conditions for the procedure to succeed. He also
describes the various surgical tools to be used in the procedure. The
procedure recommends a puncture in the eyeball at a place where there are
no blood vessels and the cataract is then extracted by inducing a sneeze. A
series of post-operative measures are also recommended for proper healing
of the wound. Sushruta proposes the surgery only when the cataract is ripe,
much like what the doctors recommend today.
Professor H. C. Verma of IIT Kanpur in an article writes about the
Rhinoplasty procedure described by Sushruta. The procedure did not have
the cosmetic value as it has today, but was rather a corrective procedures
done for the people who were punished by having their nose chopped off.
The procedure involved carving out of the skin on the forehead in shape of
a long neck jar (surahi), flipping in downwards and finally stitching it on to
the amputated nose.
The works of Sushruta were considered important not only in India but also
abroad. Translations of his works were ordered by the second Abbasid
Caliph, Mansur. The translated work is known as Kitab-Shah-Shun-e-Hindi
or Kitab-e-Susrud. These and other translations of the Sanskrit works of
Indian doctors form the basis of Arabic medicine system [72] . The work later
on was translated from Arabic to Latin and formed the basis of European
medicine [73] for a long time. It will not be an exaggeration to say that
Sushruta was not only the father of Indian surgery, but also played a
significant role in medicine and surgery around the ancient world. While the
world acknowledged and accepted the medical knowledge of India [74] ,
many mock the achievements of their own.
We saw how Indian medical texts travelled west after being translated into
Arabic and eventually made their way into Europe. A similar process of
dissemination occurred in northern India, where the Indian medicinal
knowledge was transferred to China. With the opening up of the Karakoram
route during Kanishka’s rule, trade and people-to-people contact between
India and the modern Chinese Province of Xinjiang increased. Along with
Buddhism, many non-religious Indian texts too travelled to China. One
such text was the Bower Manuscript.
The Bower Manuscript, discovered in China, is an ancient Indian work on
medicine, divination and magical incantation. The chapters dealing with
medicine in the manuscript are also covered in the Charaka Samhita. The
manuscript is written in late Brahmi, which puts it in the Gupta Age,
between 4th and 6th centuries CE. The manuscript was accidentally
discovered during a treasure hunt by the local tribesmen of Kucha (modern-
day Kuqa County in the Tarim Basin).
The discovery of Bower Manuscript was a turning point in Indian history
and that of Xinjiang. The once busy highway between India and China was
all but forgotten by the nineteenth century. The political and social changes
in the subcontinent had shifted focus. The Indians were busy defending
themselves against the invaders from the north in the early middle ages and
then the Europeans. The stories of Silk Road had however survived in the
European memory. The British government in India and the Russians in
Central Asia were looking for opportunities to discover the mysterious
mountains and fabled oasis of Xinjiang.
The first attempt at discovering the oases of Xinjiang was done by an Indian
munshi, Mohammed Hamid [75] in 1865. Considered too risky and
dangerous for a British officer, the Indian munshi seemed like a fair game
to the British. He travelled across the Karakoram pass from Leh into
Xinjiang, to bring intelligence back to India. The curiosity of British
exploration was less for the historical importance of the place but more to
survey the area. It was the time of the Great Game when Tsarist Russia and
Imperial Britain were trying to outsmart each other in the game of colonial
conquest. The munshi’s mission was to survey the land and foresee how an
invading Russian army can be stopped at the gates of India.
The munshi unfortunately fell ill and died on his way back. But the first
attempt and the perception that China is not as dangerous as previously
thought prompted the European explorers to try their luck. In the following
decades, many explorers traversed the Taklamakan desert and made some
spectacular discoveries. The discovery of the Bower Manuscript was one
such.
In 1889, the local tribesmen while hunting for treasures in a dome like
mound in Kucha, came across a heap of manuscript and some mummified
animals. The manuscripts were taken to the local Qazi, who in turn sold
them to another man, a Ghulam Qadir [76] . Around the same time,
Lieutenant Hamilton Bower was in the region on a survey mission and on a
pursuit of an Afghan murderer. Bower came to know about the manuscripts
and purchased a set which had 51 birch-bark leaves and sent it to the Asiatic
Society of Bengal, Calcutta.
Neither Ghulam Qadir nor Bower knew of the importance of the manuscript
until it was deciphered by Dr. Augustus Rudolf Hoernle. It was only after it
came to light that the text was Sanskrit written in Brahmi, that the ancient
connections between India and China came to light. In a way the discovery
opened up a completely new filed of exploration.
India’s gifts to the world – Astronomy
The ancient Indian texts like the Rig Veda have been studied by many
people for their contribution in science and mathematics. The mention of
months, years, constellation etc. indicates a fair amount of knowledge,
among the Indians, regarding astronomy too. Later texts like the Shatapatha
Brahmana also mention aspects of geometry. These early works on science,
mathematics and geometry were not done in the interest of pure
mathematics. The efforts were solely directed towards accurately
constructing the fire altars and ascertaining the right time to conduct the
rituals. One can say that the development of much of ancient science in
India was driven by the Hindu religious beliefs.
People who have studied the Shatapatha Brahman for its contribution to
science, maths and astronomy have also observed indirect reference to its
time of compilation [77] . Subhash Kak, in his article, astronomy of the
Shatapatha Brahmana, puts the compilation period in around 2950 BCE. He
also mentions dates proposed by others, but his own estimation comes from
a reference in Shatapatha Brahmana (2.1.2.3) where it is said that the
constellation Kritika never swerves from the east. One might question a
backward computation to estimate the dates and disagree from the
conclusion. But since we do not know the exact dates of writing of Rig
Veda, we cannot out rightly reject these claims.
The Shatapatha Brahmana gives an elaborate methodology to perform the
fire sacrifices, i.e. the yagya, according to seasons and nakshatras (asterism
in which the moon rises). There are descriptions of various constellations
and their relation to various Vedic Gods in the text. This tells us that the
Indians were exploring astronomy well before the Shatapatha Brahmana
was written. In Rig Veda (1:25:08), for example, we find the mention of a
year being divided into twelve months and each month into two fortnights.
There is also a mention of the moon passing through each of the 27
nakshatra during a lunar cycle (which marks a lunar month). The Rig Veda
also describes a solar eclipse (5:40:05). Here, the hymn, in a metaphor,
describes the sun being obscured by a demon Svarabhanu, and the creatures
are bewildered by the phenomenon. Kumar and Rengaiyan in their article,
Vedic mythology of solar eclipse and its scientific validation, written for
Indian Journal of Traditional Knowledge (Vol. 13(4), October 2014, equate
the Svarabhanu with moon, the one who is illuminated by the sun’s rays.
The construction of fire altars was an elaborate and precision driven task.
The mahavedi, i.e. the great altar, was constructed in shape of a falcon with
specified number of layers and each layer with a specific number of burnt
bricks. This probably laid the foundation of early geometry in India. In
some cases, altars of different shapes were supposed to have exactly the
same area. This required careful mathematical calculations with a fair
knowledge of geometry. In simple terms, if one has to draw a square, a
rectangle and a circle of same area, one has to have the knowledge of both
mensuration and geometry.
Kak in his paper also refers to the fact that the effort to create a square and a
circular altar of the same area meant that the ancient Indians knew the
approximate value of Pi. Now we are not sure since there is no direct
reference to Pi in the text. But the fact that Kak’s indirect evidence gives the
value of Pi as 25/8, i.e. 3.125, against the now known value of 3.141, is an
indication that the mathematical knowledge of ancient Indians was
definitely more than just elementary.
The Taittriya Samhita of the Krishna Yajurveda mentions the performance
of Ekadashratra sacrifice to adjust the lag in the length of the lunar year.
This eventually culminated in addition of an intercalary month every third
year. The intercalary month is not fixed and varies in each cycle. The
selection of the month depends on the transition of sun from one
rashi/zodiac to the other. The phenomenon of equinox and solstice were
also known in the ancient times. In Kausitaki Brahmana [78] (19:3), it states
that shortest day was at winter solstice when the seasonal year began with
uttarayana and rose to a maximum at the summer solstice.
The Vedanga Jyotisha also describes the measure of time. According to the
text, 10 matras is equal to one kashtha, 124 kashtas make one kaala, 10
kaalas make one nadika, 2 nadikas make one muhurta, and 30 muhurtas
lead to one day. A total of 366 days make one solar year of 12 months and
five solar years make one yuga. Though the precision of a mechanical clock
was not available in the ancient time, the time keepers devised a mechanism
to measure time using a vessel of water.
The other verses of the Vedanga Jyotisha deal with calculation of tithi
(dates), lagna, nakshatra, etc. These are described in a detailed
mathematical way in which known values are multiplied, subtracted and
added with a constant to arrive at the desired result. This clearly shows that
jyotisha was not what it is perceived to be today, a fortune telling
mechanism. It was a science that dealt with time keeping and involved
knowledge of mathematics and astronomy.
Apart from zodiacs, nakshatras, sun and moon, the ancient Indian texts also
refer to the comets and meteorites. The Brihata Samhita, a work believed to
be from 5th to 6th centuries CE, makes references to several comets and their
characteristics. Prof. R.N. Iyengar of Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru,
has written detailed papers sighting comets [79] and meteorite [80]
observation in ancient India. In his paper on the comets, Iyengar mentions
that at least 26 comets have been identified by the Indians. The names and
their purported effects are also given. The texts also mention the number of
years between each of their appearances, indicating that the activity of
comet observation must have been carried out by successive generations.
The information derived by Iyengar comes from Brhata Samhita (5th -6th
centuries CE) of Varahmihira and Adbhut Sagar (11th -12th centuries CE) of
Ballala Sena. Though the Brhata Samhita dates to 5th century CE, Iyengar
believes that Varahmihira did not add any new information but simply
compiled what was extant (texts by Parashar, Vrddha Garga, Garga, etc.).
Hence, the information in the text must come from an older period.
The text describes the shapes of the comet, their direction of sighting, the
nakshatra in which they are seen and their purported impact on the
environment. The comets are named variously depending, probably, on the
shape of their head. Ketu seems to have been the generic name for a comet,
for it forms a constant suffix. The purported impact of the comets is often
drought, earthquakes, disease, death, fire, etc. Of course, we know that a
comet is not likely to cause any of these, so what do we make of these
observations? I think it should be seen as information on the then state of
environment, which like today was unstable and unpredictable. The cycles
of droughts (weak monsoon), earthquake (Indian subcontinent sits on a
highly sensitive seismic zone), disease (epidemics), etc. were just as
common as they are today. The observers, incorrectly, connected these
natural phenomenon to appearance of comets in the sky.
Iyengar in his work on the meteorites compares the Marutas of Rig Veda as
a metaphor of meteorites. He quotes several hymns where the Marutas are
described as traversing the sky in groups and brightening the night sky. This
might be a reference to a meteor shower. It is unlikely that the ancient
Indians missed the meteorites in their night sky, when even with our high
PM2.5 skies, we can see them.
The early works including the Rig Veda and then the Yajurveda elaborate on
astronomy but it was not until the composition of Surya Siddhanta that
astronomy was formalised in ancient India. Surya Siddhanta is first
mentioned in Varahmihira’s Pancha Siddhantika, believed to have written in
the 6th century CE. It is likely that Varahmihira quoted an existing text from
the past. The opinion is divided among the scholars as to when Surya
Siddhanta was composed. The dates range from 1st millennium BCE to 5th
century CE.
The Surya Siddhanta deals exclusively in planetary motions, their shapes,
their orbits and time keeping. The text was the first to identify time zones.
Time zones as we understand today are based on the prime meridian or zero
longitude at Greenwich, England. Countries choose their respective prime
meridians and hence their time zones with reference to what we know as
Greenwich Mean Time.
The ancient Indians knew of the difference in time at different longitudes.
The Surya Siddhanta suggested a method to calculate mid-night at different
places with reference to zero longitude, passing through Lanka [81] . Lanka
here is not a reference to the modern day Sri Lanka, but to an imaginary
point on the equator. Lanka is described as a point south of Avanti (modern
Ujjain), on the same longitude, on the equator. The first prime meridian
hence was set in Ujjain. The present version of Surya Siddhanta has
undergone many revisions [82] . It is believed that the extant text was
compiled sometime between 7th and 10th centuries CE. Most of the work
presented in the current version must have been updated, and new
information would have been added.
Since the text deals with planetary motions, the introduction of
trigonometric functions became imperative. We find the use of sine, versine
and cosine functions in calculating the movement of sun, moon and other
planets, in the text. Due to the circular motion of the planets, the arc
distances too were calculated. It was probably for the first time that the arc
distances were calculated in degrees and minutes, much like the modern
times.
The fourth chapter of the text deals in computation of the elements of a
lunar eclipse. Eclipses have fascinated mankind for a long time. In the
Vedic texts, we see that the eclipse is said to be caused by the actions of a
demon. But by late centuries BCE and early centuries CE, the cause of
eclipses were established in the modern sense. It was known that the lunar
and solar eclipses are caused by the motions of sun, moon and earth and the
play of shadows that result from it.
Formulae are provided to measure the mean and true linear diameters of sun
and moon. It also provides a formula to measure the diameter of earth’s
shadow in minutes. The conditions that have to be met for an eclipse to
occur are described in the 11th verse of the chapter. Subsequent verses
predict whether an eclipse will be full or partial. The fifth chapter deals in
solar eclipse and describes the calculation of time of eclipse.
A comparison of the results from Surya Siddhanta and the modern results
has been carried out by Kripa Shankar Shukla in his work. The results are
compared in the table below. We see that the results for sun, moon and
mercury are strikingly close to the modern values. The other are however
way off the mark. The interesting thing however is that corrections to all the
values seems to have been made by different people at different times. An
indication that there was a constant attempt to improve the results and get
closer to the accurate value.
Planet Mean diameters according to
SS AB BSS Modern
Sun 32’24’ ~33’ 32’31’ 32’3.36
’
Moon 32’ 31’30’ ~32’1’ 31’8’
Mars 2’ 1’17’ 4’46’ 9’36’
Mercur 3’ 2’8’ 6’14’ 6’68’
y
Jupiter 3’30’ 3’12’ 7’22’ 3’124.7
2’
Venus 4’ 6’24’ 9’ 16’8’
Saturn 2’30’ 1’36’ 5’24’ 2’49.5’
(SS: Surya Siddhanta, AB: Aryabhatiya, BSS: Brahma Sphuta Siddhanta)
In 476 CE, another great Indian mathematician and astronomer, Aryabhatta,
was born. He must have been a sharp student for we know from his text, the
Aryabhatiya, that at the age of 23 [83] , he started writing his work in
Kusumpura, (identified as Pataliputra) or modern-day Patna. He probably
had an illustrious career as a teacher, astronomer and mathematician. Later
mathematicians, like Bhaskara I, mention names of various scholars like
Panduranga Swami, Latadeva and Nishanku as pupils of Aryabhatta.
His work, the Aryabhatiya, deals in planetary motions and the concept of
time, nakshatra and sine-differences. He was the first person to suggest the
spherical nature of earth and that it spins on its own axis, leading to
westward movement of stars and sun. According to him, the period of one
rotation of earth on its axis equals to 23 hours, 56 minutes and 4.1 seconds,
which is very close to the modern estimate of 23h:56m:4.091s.
The Aryabhatiya is divided into four chapters. The first deals in basic
definitions and astronomical parameters and the second in mathematical
concepts like mensuration and time keeping. It also discusses algebra with
reference to simple, simultaneous, quadratic and linear intermediate
equations. The third chapter is again on units of time and finding the true
positions of planets and the fourth on planetary motions on the celestial
sphere.
In the final stanza of the first chapter, Aryabhatta writes, ‘knowing this
Dashagitika-Sutra, the motion of earth and the planets, on the celestial
sphere, one attains the Supreme Brahmana after piercing through the orbits
of the planets and the stars’. Clearly, Aryabhatta was extremely devoted to
his work and compared it to attaining the supreme god. A similar devotion
was seen in modern times when Srinivas Ramanujan is believed to have
said, ‘An equation has no meaning for me unless it expresses a thought of
god’.
India’s gift to the world – Mathematics
Mathematics is fundamental to our existence today. From the basic
functions like shopping to launching remote sensing satellites, mathematics
plays an important role in our lives. The ancient Indians and their curious
minds worked on various mathematical problems to fulfil their needs. Early
Indian works on mathematics proved to be seminal and were constantly
improved upon by later Indians. The profound impact of Indian work can be
measured by the fact that Indian mathematical works were translated and
carried to distance lands. The Arabic translations of Indian mathematics and
its subsequent arrival in Europe through the works of Fibonacci in 13th
century CE, revolutionised the understanding of mathematics in the western
world and led to many discoveries in the Renaissance period.
The dissemination of Indian mathematics to faraway Europe was a slow
process. One of the early mentions of the dissemination is captured in
Fibonacci’s Liber Abaci [84] , i.e. the book of calculation. Fibonacci wrote
the book in 1202, where he acknowledges the ‘nine Indian figures’ i.e. the
nine numerals. He came in contact with various merchants along the
Mediterranean trade routes and learnt the Hindu numerals from them. His
study of the Hindu numerals led him to the discovery of the advantages the
Hindu numerals and mathematics had compared to the Roman numerals.
In his introduction to the book he writes, ‘But this, on the whole, the
algorithm and even the Pythagorean arcs, I still reckoned almost an error
compared to the Indian method’. In the first chapter Fibonacci introduces
the nine Indian figures and their methods of writing large numbers. One can
say that the entire work of Fibonacci and later mathematicians in the
western world was inspired by ancient Indian mathematics.

One of the most important contribution to Indian mathematics was the

approximation of the value of Pi by Aryabhatta. He described the value in
textual form which reads, ‘Four more to a hundred, multiplied by eight and
add sixty-two thousand. Two times ten thousand of the diameter will
approach the circumference. If we apply this rule to find out the ration of
circumference to diameter, the resulting value is 3.1416. Apart from the
value of Pi, the other significant deduction is that the value is only an
approximation and could be expanded further, alluding to the irrational
nature of Pi.
Almost all the ancient works on mathematics mention the number of
revolutions of sun, moon and earth in a yuga. This is a simple calculation. If
one knows the number of days it takes for one revolution of earth, one can
easily calculate the total number in a yuga (a period of 4,320,000 years).
The number of revolution, according to Surya Siddhanta and Aryabhatiya,
of earth in a yuga is 1,582,237,500 and that of moon is 57,753,336. What
looks like a simple calculation is actually the earliest mention of such large
numbers. No other civilisation used or imagined such large numbers. To put
this in perspective, we can see the examples of Roman numerals. The
largest numeral in the Roman number system is 1,000. Using the then
prevailing system, it was impossible to write large numbers used in Surya
Siddhanta.
So why were the Indians using such astronomical numbers? Was there any
practical use of these numbers? We do not know for sure. What we can say
is that the concept of such exceptionally large numbers came from the
Indian philosophy, which talks about timelessness, i.e. things that neither
have a beginning nor an end but are in a constant cycle.
The ancient texts of Surya Siddhanta and Aryabhatiya have come to us
down the year with some possible changes. The work has been compiled
from various sources and presented in its present form. This obviously will
lead to disagreement among the scholars and historians. The date of original
text, the interpretation of Sanskrit and even the authorship might be
contested. It is all fair in the quest of knowing the truth, so long as we keep
our minds open to ideas. New technology and assessment of old
information in new light sometimes gives us a totally different result.
Recently, the scientists at Bodleian Library at Oxford University carried out
carbon dating of the Bakhshali Manuscript to ascertain its date of
composition. The manuscript holds immense mathematical and literary
value because of the use of zero in its text.
The manuscript was discovered in 1881, in a village called Bakhshali, near
modern-day Mardan in Pakistan. The manuscript was discovered by a
villager while digging a stone enclosure at one of the mounds. Apart from
the manuscript a triangular diya (earthen lamp), a soap stone pencil and
large earthen pot with perforated bottom were also discovered. The villager
took the manuscript to the local police inspector, Mina An-Wan-Uddin
(Anglicised Anwaruddin?), who in turn brought it to the assistant
commissioner of Mardan [85] . Unfortunately, much of the manuscript was
destroyed while it was being pulled out of the stone enclosure.
The Bakhshali village lies in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of
Pakistan. In the Mahajanapada era, the region was known as Gandhara.
Gandhara, a centre of international trade, was probably the right place for a
mathematical work to be written.
In 1902, the manuscript reached Oxford. There were many attempts by
Indian and western scholars to date the manuscript and to find out the
nature of its contents. The manuscript, a collection of 70, very fragile,
leaves of birch bark, is a Sanskrit text, written in Sharda script. The Sanskrit
used in the text is heavily influenced by the local dialects. Scholars believe
that the language used was common in the area till about 3rd century CE.
Based on the language and style of writing, many scholars tried to date the
manuscript. The estimates ranged from 4th century CE to 12th century CE.
In September 2017, carbon dating results of the manuscript were published.
The carbon dating was done by the Oxford University, using three different
samples. One of them dated to as far back as 3rd century CE. All of samples
contained the symbol for zero, represented as a dot. The carbon dating
results have now conclusively proven that the earliest recoded zero in
history dates back to 3rd century CE. However, it will not be an
exaggeration to say that zero was probably in use much before the
manuscript was written.
The use of numerals, including zero, travelled from India to the Arab world
through trade routes. The remarkable ease of computing that the India
numerals brought with them made them an instant hit. By the 14th century,
the use of Roman numbers started declining in Europe. They were replaced
by the Indian numerals, which were then known as the Arabic numerals.
Interestingly, the dot evolved into the modern symbol of zero in India and
rest of the world, but it is still represented by a dot in the Arabic numerals.
Probably, the Arabs did not bother to follow the change.
Other than its recording of zero, the Bakhshali Manuscript gives important
insight into the third-century Indian mathematics scene. The manuscript is
believed to be a training manual for the merchants of the Gandhara region.
This makes absolute sense, since the region was the hub of international
trade in the Mahajanapada times. The manual explains calculations of daily
transactions like ratios and proportions, time and distance, interest
calculation, profit and loss, weights and measures, and fractions. The
problems on academic interest include linear equations, intermediate
equations of the second-degree, arithmetic progressions, quadratic
equations, values of square roots, complex series, etc.
Like many ancient texts, the Bakhshali Manuscript also gives us indirect
information on the history of the time. The text uses mostly Sanskrit
vocabulary with some western loan words, in the matters related to money
problems. Dramma and Dinar are used multiple times in the text. This
indicates that these two currencies were prevalent in the region at the time.
Dramma was probably the Greek Drachma and Dinar the currency issued
by the Kushans.
The carbon dating results have not only put to rest the debate about the age
of the manuscript, it has also pushed back the date of use of zero in India.
But that is perhaps a collateral consequence. The most important thing that
the manuscript brings forth is that it was in India that zero evolved in its
own right as a number. Other civilisations like the Babylonians and the
Mayans used a symbol as a placeholder for zero. But they never used it as a
number in its own right.
Marcus du Sautoy, professor of mathematics at Oxford University, was
involved in the study of Bakhshali Manuscript. He realises the importance
of the text and says [86] , ‘Today we take it for granted that the concept of
zero is used across the globe and is a key building block of the digital
world. But the creation of zero as a number in its own right, which evolved
from the placeholder dot symbol found in the Bakhshali manuscript, was
one of the greatest breakthroughs in the history of mathematics.
We now know that it was as early as the 3rd century that mathematicians in
India planted the seed of the idea that would later become so fundamental to
the modern world. The findings show how vibrant mathematics have been
in the Indian subcontinent for centuries’.
In a video posted on the website of Bodleian Library, [87] Sautoy says that
‘the concept of zero comes from a culture that is quite happy to conceive of
the infinite and of nothing. The idea of having a symbol for zero, or nothing
is part of their philosophical culture. It is important to realise that culture is
important in making big mathematical breakthroughs’. Sautoy is not wrong
when he links Indian culture to mathematical breakthroughs.
The idea of large numbers like the cycle of yuga, as we saw above, or the
idea of infinity and nothingness, is part of the cultural beliefs of Indians.
The acceptance of timelessness and cyclical nature of the universe and
creation probably led to the ancient Indians to believe that our existence is
not limited by our lifetime or by known history. It is perhaps beyond the
known and hence needs large numbers to express it. The all accepting and
expanded Indian mind was never at odds with the idea of unknown, abstract
and accepted it with equal ease as it accepted the known.
India’s gifts to the world – philosophy
The curious mind of humans was probably the reason why we are today the
most evolved species on earth. Our constant attempt at making things easier
for us has led to many innovations and discoveries. Medicines, machines,
tools and gadgets have all made our lives simpler, safer and more
productive. These are things that satisfy and stoke our hunger for material
things around us. The definition of a material life, however, changes with
time. We reject old things and accept the new things that are better than the
old. The new again becomes old and is replaced by a newer thing. The cycle
goes on, like it always has.
Beyond the material things in the world, human mind also questions
abstract ideas. It also tries to find answers to those abstract questions. The
quest to know about our existence, the reason for our existence, to seek the
truth, to escape the miseries of life, is probably as old as civilisation or may
be older. The questions we ask ourselves to understand the abstract and the
unknown falls into the realm of philosophy.
The first reference to philosophical ideas comes in Rig Veda where the
concept of creation and our existence is questioned. The Nasadiya Sukta of
Rig Veda (10:129) is one such sceptical question. The hymn is a paradox of
ideas, which contemplates the creation of universe. It seeks answers to what
existed before creation. It goes on to explain the process of creation. It
believes that probably the devas too do not know the answer, for they came
after the creation. It then goes on to end with a paradox and say that perhaps
the Supreme Being, who surveys everything, i.e. the God would know or
maybe even he does not know.
The idea of questioning the creation is not new to India. But that is not what
is central to this hymn. The main idea is the sceptical nature of questioning.
The manner in which the hymn doubts the ability of the Supreme Being, i.e.
God, to know the truth, makes it philosophical. It also makes the author of
the hymn and by extension the Indians an inquisitive lot. A society that did
not accept God as omniscient, yet was not chastised for blasphemy.
The idea of sceptical questioning is at striking odds with later religions like
Christianity and Islam where a definite answer is given to the process of
creation. This definite answer tries to satisfy the curiosity of human mind,
but at the same time stops it from further questioning.
The philosophical tradition was one of the most important gifts of ancient
Indians to successive generations. The idea of questioning, contemplation
and seeking, spilled on to other aspects of life and contributed to the
evolution of science, mathematics, astronomy and even religion. It was the
eternal quest to know the truth that led to the rise of Buddhism and Jainism
as alternate and parallel philosophies in India. It was the quest for liberation
or moksha that led to the Hindu tradition of Bhakti, branching out from
Vedic traditions.
Throughout ancient history, the philosophical traditions of India have
weaved a fabric where both theists and atheists have found a place. For both
theism and atheism are ways to seek the truth. It is this innate tendency of
Indians that makes them seekers and not believers. A seeker’s quench never
satiates while believers stay content with their beliefs.
The quest of knowledge or truth has led to evolution of different
philosophical schools in India. Some are steeped in reality and deal with
everyday aspects of life, while others deal more in the abstract. In both, the
ultimate goal is to get liberated from the cycles of birth and death.
According to Indian thought, life itself is suffering. It starts when the child
is conceived in the mother’s womb where it spends very uncomfortable
nine months. The human misery starts from conception and ends only with
death. Desire, disease, hunger and pain are the manifestation of the misery
we go through our entire life. To get out of the misery, it is important we
understand them and then find ways to liberate ourselves from them.
One of the oldest philosophical works in India is attributed to Samkhya
(literally, a number). Samkhya follows the path of 25 principles/tattvas,
which when understood would eventually lead to emancipation of the soul
or moksha. The scholars have different views on the origin of Samkhya. It
is believed to have originated in early centuries of the first millennium BCE
[88]
and was subsequently formalised. Rishi Kapila is believed to have come
up with Samkhya philosophy. Multiple references to Kapila are found in
Hindu, Buddhist and Jain scriptures. The Jataka tales of Buddhism, one of
the earliest Buddhist texts (4th century BCE), refer to Buddha as Kapila in
one of his previous lives.
Samkhya tries to understand our existence and assigns it a dual nature. It
believes that the universe has two realities. Purusha or the consciousness
and Prakriti or matter. The fusion of Purusha and Prakriti leads to formation
of life, i.e. the fusion of consciousness or soul with matter or body.
Everything in the universe is a result of such fusion. But if a fusion of
Purusha and Prakriti leads to creation, why is there diversity in our
existence? Why are there different kinds of animals, birds and even
humans? Samkhya brings in the three attributes, Sattva, Rajas and Tamas, to
explain the diversity.
Sattva is assigned the properties of happiness, Rajas with unhappiness and
Tamas with delusion. In their natural state, these three attributes lie in an
equilibrium. The equilibrium is disturbed when the soul acts upon these and
various permutation and combinations lead to creation of a diverse
universe. The three attributes act both together and against each other to
prevent homogeneity of creation. This can be understood as nature creating
diverse species of plants and animals but creating diversity within the same
species. Thus, we have sexual diversity, physical diversity, mental diversity
and physiological diversity within the same species.
Purusha and Prakriti’s fusion gives rise to intellect, ego sense and mind.
These further lead to evolution of sense organs and organs of action (hands,
legs, mouth, rectum and sex organs). From these evolve the five senses,
which lead to the evolution of the five gross elements of nature, i.e. earth,
water, fire, air and ether. These together form the 25 elements of Samkhya.
The scope of this book does not allow me to delve deeper in Samkhya and
its other aspects like the nature of causality or a deeper understanding of the
interplay of the 25 elements.
It is believed that Samkhya evolved into a theist school of philosophy from
its original atheist roots. From purely a Vedic point of view, the
philosophical schools have been divided into two. According to such
division, there exist six theist schools, Nyaya, Vaisheshika, Samkhya, Yoga,
Mimamsa and Vedanta. The atheist schools of philosophy are Buddhist,
Jain, Charvaka and Aajivika. It is not surprising that both the theist and
atheist schools of philosophy aim to attain liberation or moksha, but follow
a different path.
The Indian philosophy is a culmination of questions we ask about our
existence, to find the path to moksha. These questions are not designed on
the principles of modern surveys. The answers to these questions do not lie
in one of the four options presented. These are open questions, and there are
no right or wrong answers. A seeker would like to know all the possible
answers to satiate their quest for the ultimate truth. This is probably the
reason why there were both theist and atheist schools, and within them,
there were further divisions. These divisions have multiple commentaries
on them, which interpret them differently. This in a way is consistent with
what Samkhya says about diversity.
Later works of philosophy include the Bhagwat Gita or simply the Gita.
The Gita is a dialogue between Arjun, the Pandava prince, and Krishna, his
friend and charioteer. The premise of the dialogue has a great significance
as it occurs just when the war of Mahabharata was about to start.
When multiple rounds of negotiations and embassies failed to resolve the
impasse between Kauravas and Pandavas, a decisive war was the only way
out. As the two armies take their positions, Arjuna the great warrior is
presented with a dilemma. He is faced with an army which includes his
family, friends and teachers. He contemplates the situation and becomes
unsure of his action.
His dilemma is whether to fight his own to gain what is rightfully his or to
forego the war to preserve the bond he shares with them. At this point,
Krishna gives him a series of lectures to make him understand what he is
doing and what he is supposed to do. He explains to Arjun how his actions
can lead him to moksha, the ultimate goal of life.
The philosophy of Gita revolves around the principles of dharma, karma
and bhakti. According to Gita, these are principles, which when followed
will lead to the liberation of the soul. Gita is also a seminal work, which
shaped Hinduism as we know it today. Though it is a synthesis of Vedic,
Samkhya and Yogic philosophy, it also introduces a new concept that of
bhakti to a chosen god. This goes against the Vedic traditions of invocation
of multiple Gods, each of whom have a different function. In a way, it
undermined the Vedic pantheon and helped the development of the concept
of Hindu trinity of Brahma, Vishnu and Mahesh/Shiv.
Like almost all the ancient texts India has produced, there is no consensus
on the dates of composition of Gita. It is likely that the work was influenced
by many people over a period of time. The text as we know it, probably
crystallised in the early Gupta period. Later on, many commentaries on Gita
were written. The oldest being the one written by Shankaracharya (8th – 9th
century CE).
The first English translation of Gita was published by Charles Wilkins in
1785 under the title, ‘Bhagwat-Geeta, or dialogues of Kreeshna and
Arjoon’. The work of Wilkins in India has been documented and makes for
an interesting story in its own right. Wilkins arrived in India in 1770, at the
age of 20. He came from a humble background, unlike majority of the
bureaucrats who came from aristocratic background. He joined the East
India Company as a junior clerk in Calcutta (now Kolkata).
It was the time when the British control over India was consolidating but
across the Atlantic, the British colonies in America were about to begin the
American Revolutionary War.
Two years after the arrival of Wilkins in India, Warren Hastings became the
Governor of the Presidency of Fort William, and two years later, in 1774, he
was appointed as the first Governor General of Bengal. Hastings was
interested in knowing more about the Indian traditions and ways of life to
make his own life easy as an administrator. When he found a polyglot in
Wilkins, he started supporting him [89] . Wilkins learned Bengali and Persian
and created the first typeface to print Bengali. During his tenure, Wilkins
also met up with Bengali Brahmins to learn Sanskrit. His initial attempt was
not met with success as the Brahmins were reluctant to teach him. He
finally found a guru in Varanasi. Kashinath Bhattacharya, a respected
Brahmin in Varanasi, taught him Sanskrit. Later on, Wilkins consulted
Kashinath extensively for his work, though he never acknowledged his help
in the book when he published it [90] .
The work of Wilkins is important since it was the first ever direct
translation from Sanskrit into English. All earlier translations were carried
out either by consulting the available Persian translations of the original
Sanskrit work or through an intermediary. The intermediary was usually a
local maulvi, who would read from either the Persian or the original
Sanskrit text, understand it and then convey it to the interested party.
Wilkins was the first person to carry out a direct translation from Sanskrit.
There was no longer a need for an intermediary to understand the Sanskrit
text. Wilkins’ work proved to be a revolution, and Gita was translated into
Russian, German and French shortly after its publication in 1785.
The philosophical traditions were probably the most important aspect of the
non-political history of India. It was perhaps the inquisitive nature that led
to multiple interpretation and commentaries on early works like the Rig
Veda and Samkhya. These in turn encouraged people to explore further and
refine what was already written. The free nature of the society and its
acceptance of different views not only led to diversification of religion but
also led to diversification within the religion. It can be seen in modern India
where the Hindus of Haryana have significant difference in their rituals and
festivals when compared to Hindus of Manipur. Despite the differences in
both culture and rituals, both are Hindus and are comfortable with the
differences.
India’s gifts to the world – language
The political and non-political contributions we discussed thus far owe a
debt to one person. For without him, there would not have been the written
form of Vedas, the Upanishads, the prashastis, the Surya Siddhant, the
Natya Shastra or any of the ancient texts we refer to. This man was Panini.
A resident of Pushkalavati in Gandhara Mahajanapada, Panini, was the first
Grammar Nazi. He laid down the rules of Sanskrit language in 3,959 verses
arranged in eight chapters. His work is hence called, Ashtadhyayi, or ‘of
eight chapters’.
We know very little about the life of Panini. Patanjali’s Mahabhashya gives
his full name as Dakshiputra Panini, literally meaning son of Dakshi
descendent of Panin. Daskhi was his mother. Like the later Satavahanas,
Panini or rather Patanjali choses to identify Panini with his mother’s name.
In Ashtadhyayi, Panini quotes various other grammarians, telling us that his
work was based on pre-existing Sanskrit grammar rules. Believed to have
lived in 5th century BCE, there is no consensus on the exact period in which
Panini lived and worked. It can be assumed that perfection of grammar did
not start with Panini. His was a summation and improvement of what was
probably done over many centuries before him.
The work of Panini is important in many ways. To begin with, Ashtadhyayi
was the first of its kind of work to lay down the rules of grammar for a
language. Greek was not even a standardised language in antiquity, and
many literary works were written in dialects like Ionic, Aeolic and Doric.
Old Latin was standardised only in 75 BCE during the Roman Republic.
Sanskrit on the other hand had flourished with not just standardisation but
also with a set of rules to read and write. Apart from being the first
language to have grammar rules, the text of Ashtadhyayi is known for its
brevity. From brevity comes the sutra style of writing. A sutra is essentially
a condensed rule, written in text form. This form of writing avoids the
elaborate, explanatory nature of hymns and hence can convey a lot in a few
words.
The sutra form of writing in itself is an accomplishment. It gives the exact
information required to fulfil a task. It leaves little or no scope for
interpretation and hence leads to consistency and accuracy. The Indians
used the sutra style of writing for not just grammar, but also to define
metres (in poetry), writing astronomical observations and rules to conduct
rituals.
The Ashtadhyayi has been studied by many people in many different
contexts. Its linguistic contribution aside, Frits Staal, the professor of
philosophy at University of California, Berkeley, believed that the
Ashtadhyayi was the first artificial language [91] . In his article he says, ‘The
earliest known artificial language is the metalanguage of Panini’s grammar
of Sanskrit (5th century BCE). A metalanguage is a language in which an
object language is described and analysed. A grammar of Sanskrit – the
object language – may be composed in English, French or Japanese – the
metalanguages. Panini’s metalanguage makes technical use of the sounds
and case endings of Sanskrit. It results in artificial expressions such as: // na
lingi // indre ca // aatah // iko yan aci // a a //. These formulas are not
intelligible to Sanskrit speakers or scholars unless they are Panini
specialists. Their explanation would fill a good part of an IIAS Newsletter’.
The nature of Panini’s grammar and its relation to artificial language was
not a 21st century discovery. In 1985, Rick Briggs, a researcher at Ames
research centre, NASA published a paper in the Artificial Intelligence
magazine [92] . It was the time when researchers were trying to find a way in
which natural languages can be made accessible to computers. Or to put in
simple terms, how to make Google understand your questions.
In the abstract of his article, Briggs laments, ‘Understandably, there is a
widespread belief that natural languages are unsuitable for the transmission
of many ideas that artificial languages can render with great precision and
mathematical rigor’. He then goes on to claim that these beliefs were false
and he believes that Sanskrit is one such natural language that can be made
accessible to computers. His claim generated widespread interest around the
world and especially in India. This is what led to the popular belief that
‘Sanskrit is the most suitable language for computers’. But this belief is not
true. Even today computer programmes are not written in Sanskrit or in any
of its branch languages, like Hindi or Bengali. So what exactly did Briggs
mean?
What he meant was that the grammatical rules laid down for Sanskrit can be
used to write a computer language. As we saw that the grammar rules of
Panini fall in the metalanguage category, they can be used to write the rules
for a computer language too, and hence, Sanskrit became the most suitable
language for computers.
But is it of any relevance today? It may have a use for the people who want
a manual to write codes. But what importance does it hold for common
people who do not care much about the codes and are only interested in
what a computer programme can do for them? Well, the most important
thing to note is the way in which the grammar rules were written. They are
a template that can be used not only for Sanskrit but for other languages
too, making it universal, in a way timeless. We do not know whether the
original idea of Panini was to make rules, which can be universally applied.
What we know is that he wrote the rules in a way that were almost
mathematical in nature for precise understanding and application of
grammar.
In 1965, Noam Chomsky published, ‘Aspects of the theory of syntax’. A
work on reformulation of his theory of Transformational generative
grammar, a part of the theory of generative grammar. It sees grammar as a
rule-based system that generates exactly the same syntax, which forms
grammatical sentences in a given language. In the preface of his book,
Chomsky admits that the work in generative grammar that he is doing is not
new and can be traced back to Panini. He says, ‘What is more, it seems that
even Panini's grammar can be interpreted as a fragment of such a generative
grammar, in essentially the contemporary sense of this term’ [93] .
This again establishes the timelessness of Panini’s work. The development
of language in India also had its impact on the Indianised territories of
Southeast Asia. The early classification and arrangement of Sanskrit
alphabet into categories based on the way they are pronounced, passed on to
almost all Indic languages. Unlike the arrangement of say the English
alphabet, the Sanskrit arrangement follows a logical process.
The vowels and consonants are arranged separately. The consonants are
again arranged in a logical sequence following their sounds. They are
arranged in five groups. These are Guttural or ‘Kanthya’, Palatal or
‘Talavya’, Retroflex or ‘Murdhanya’, Dental or ‘Dantya’ and Labial or
‘Oshthya’.
The guttural alphabet are the first set starting with ‘ka’. The palatal with,
‘cha’. The retroflex with, ‘Ta’. The dental with, ‘ta’ and the labial with,
‘pa’.
The classification of Sanskrit alphabet spilled over from Brahmi to almost
all Indic scripts except for Tamil. Though Brahmi alphabet have been
discovered in the recent archaeological findings in the Vaigai delta, Tamil
seems to have evolved separately.
Most of the Southeast Asian languages including that of Myanmar and the
Tibetan language adopted the same alphabet with minor changes in the
early centuries of the common era. Though their languages were different,
they used the Indic alphabet to write them. However, in the post-Colonial
era, Indonesia, Malaysia and The Philippines shifted to the Roman alphabet.
Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia and Laos still use the Sanskrit alphabet with
local variations.
Foreign pilgrims in India – Faxian
A lot of history of ancient India has been stored in some unlikely places and
comes from equally unlikely sources, like travelogues. One such travelogue
was written in the fifth century CE by a Chinese monk, Faxian. While
reading the travelogues, one should consider that at some instances, the
information might be exaggerated to push the vested interest of the writer.
They would have seen things and interpreted them from a very different
point of view. As with the case of the Greek historians, the travelogues by
Faxian or Xuanzang should be read with new archaeological studies for
corroboration.
Faxian was distressed at the mutilated and imperfect state of the collection
of Buddhist scriptures in China and decided to do something about it.
Together with four other monks, he set on his travel to India to bring the
books of rules to China. His sole quest was to seek literature on Buddhism
in India, which was the birth place of Buddha and bring those pure rules to
China.
They started off from Ch'ang-gan, modern-day Xi’an and travelled north-
west to Gansu, crossed the Taklamakan and arrived in Hotan [94] . During his
travel through the region, Faxian describes the flourishing Hinayana
tradition of Buddhism and the order of monks and their lifestyle in the
region of Shen Shen. Shen Shen has been identified as the region in the
vicinity of, now dried up, Lop Nor lake in south-eastern Xinjiang. Faxian
mentions that the region had more than 4,000 monks who practiced the rule
of India i.e. Buddhism [95] . Faxian mentions that from Shen Shen on his
journey westwards, he found the monks studying Buddhism and Indian
languages (probably Sanskrit and or Prakrit).
Faxian gives a detailed account of a festival, he calls the procession of
images, in Hotan. Here, he mentions, for the first time, the Mahayana sect
of Buddhism being practiced. He also mentions a monastery named Gomati
(rich in cows), which supplied him with the provisions throughout his stay
in Hotan. He describes the elaborate ritual of procession of images where
the king himself receives the procession. The path of the procession was
watered, and the buildings along it decorated in the best possible way. To
carry the image (of Buddha), a four wheeled cart was constructed and
beautifully decorated. The image of Buddha is attended by two
Bodhisattvas and the Devas (a reference to Hindu deities).
The presence of Deva imagery in a far off place like Hotan seems rather
intriguing. We would find the answer if we go back to Kanishka and his
patronage to Buddhism and the Vedic Gods. Kanishka in his all-embracing
nature had patronised not just Buddhism but the Vedic Gods too. It
propagated a syncretic religious belief system, which had Buddhism at its
centre.
It was during Kanishka’s reign that Buddhism travelled to China, through
the Karakoram. The monks, scholars and traders who propagated Buddhism
in China also took with them the Vedic Gods as part of the syncretic
religion. That is the reason why we find the imagery of Vedic Gods, i.e. the
Devas in a far off place like Hotan. Apart from the Devas, other Vedic Gods
like Saraswati, Brahma, Kuber and Vishnu too travelled to China, Korea
and Japan where they are known with different local names and have their
own shrines.
Faxian doesn’t mention, how the cart carrying the image was pulled. It
might have been pulled by oxen, horses or perhaps by the devotees and
monks like the carts of Jagannath, Balbharda and Subhadra are pulled in
Puri every year.
According to the travel account, the first stop of Faxian in India was
Skardu, in modern-day Gilgit-Baltistan region of Pakistan occupied
Kashmir. When Faxian arrived in Skardu, it was spring time and the king
was holding the Pancha-Parishad. James Legge, a Scottish missionary who
translated Faxian’s work, describes the Parishad as a conference instituted
by Ashoka for the purpose of confession of sins and inculcation of morality.
This interpretation by Legge may or may not be true. Being a missionary,
the concepts of sins and confessions would have occurred to him naturally.
But those concepts and their theological link to Christianity have nothing to
do with Buddhism.
From the name, we can assume that the Parishad or the council was either
presided by five members of the King’s court or was meant to discuss five
principles or even a council that went on for five days. We are not sure what
it really meant but we for sure know that it was a religious council. Faxian
mentions invitations being sent out to monks from different parts of the
region, seeking their attendance and lavish gifts bestowed upon them in
return of their blessings.
Skardu was a predominantly Buddhist region in fifth century India. Faxian
mentions a magnificent Stupa that held the relics of Buddha. He mentions a
tooth relic and a spittoon which were kept in the Stupa. The Stupa had an
order of more than a thousand monks and their disciples, practiced
Hinayana Buddhism. Sadly, today there are no Stupas standing in Skardu,
which would remind us of its Buddhist heritage. Most of them being lost to
iconoclasm. As recently as June 2020, Buddhist rock carvings were
vandalised in Chilas region of Gilgit-Baltistan.
Proximity of Skardu to the Tibetan plateau and continuous contact between
the two regions led to spread of the Tibetan script in the region. Balti, the
language spoken today in the region, belongs to the Tibetan-Ladakhi family.
However, Pakistan started imposing Urdu across the country, which also led
to the decline of Balti script. With the influence of Tibet on the region, one
can conclude that there were strong trade and cultural relations between the
two regions.
The Buddhist history of Skardu was forgotten once the persecution by
Islamic rulers of the region started in fourteenth century CE. Much of the
early destruction was done by Sikandar Shah Miri (reign: 1389-1413 CE),
the sixth sultan of the Shah Mir Dynasty. His zeal for Islamisation of the
region was fuelled by Mir Mohammad Hamdani, a Sufi from the Hamadan
Province in Iran. Widespread persecution and destruction of Hindu and
Buddhist temples earned him the notorious title of Sikandar Butshikan, i.e.
Sikandar the iconoclast. As a result of persecution, the demographics of the
region changed. Non-Muslims were either killed or converted, and some
simply migrated to safer locations. The forgotten history of Skardu was
rediscovered by a Scottish missionary worker, Jane E. Duncan. In her
travelogue, she writes about the discovery of the Buddha rock in Skardu
and some rock carvings in Tibetan script. Her work was published in 1906.
Faxian crossed over the mountains and entered northern India into the city
of T’o-leih. The city has not been conclusively identified. Cunningham
however erroneously identified it with the Dardus region in Gilgit [96] . In
the city, Faxian mentions a large wooden statue of Bodhisattva in lotus
position, eighty cubits (modern equivalent measurement of Cubit are not
available) in height and same from knee to knee. Faxian eventually crossed
the Indus along an extremely narrow mountain path, which led to a rope
bridge. From there, he is believed to have entered modern-day Swat.
Swat was different from the regions west of Indus. The people there spoke
the language of central India and dressed in the manner of central India.
From Swat, he travelled to Gandhara, Taxila and Peshawar, all major
Buddhist centres. He talks about the various Jataka stories that were popular
in the region. In Peshawar, he is told the story of Buddha where he
prophesised the arrival of Kanishka, who would build a grand stupa at
Peshawar. Faxian describes the Stupa as four hundred cubits high and the
most magnificent one he has ever seen. Once in the Punjab region, Faxian
records the flourishing state of Buddhism and the warm hospitality he
received from the people there.
From Punjab, Faxian travelled further south-east, hugging the course of
Yamuna to arrive in Mathura, the erstwhile second capital of the Kushans.
From the perspective of history, Faxian’s account of Mathura is extremely
valuable. He refers to the region as the Middle Kingdom, probably a
translation of Madhya Desha or a comparison to the Chinese terminology of
Middle Kingdom. Like the Eurocentric approach in 19th and 20th centuries,
China believed itself to be the centre of everything and hence called itself
the Middle Kingdom or the kingdom in the centre.
He describes the people of Mathura as a happy lot, who do not have to get
into administrative hassles like registering their households and attending to
magistrates and their rules. He was probably comparing this to either his
own country or to other parts of India he visited.
He records that the capital punishment had been abolished and criminals
were merely fined based on their circumstances. The severest form of
corporal punishment was amputation of the right hand. Here, we see a clear
influence of Buddhism and probably Ashoka’s doctrine of non-violence
being implemented. The abolition of capital punishment that many modern
societies have implemented was unheard of in ancient and medieval world.
Yet, here we have the earliest evidence of abolishing capital punishment by
a state.
Faxian also talks about the eating habits of the people, who were
predominantly vegetarian. He says that in the whole country, the people did
not kill any living creature. This again comes from Ashoka’s doctrine of
non-violence against animals, which he also recorded in his rock edicts. The
people of Mathura were teetotallers and never ate onions and garlic, as
observed by Faxian.
This provides an interesting insight into the food habits of central India at
that time, some of which has carried on into the modern times. There are
communities, which still do not eat meat, avoid alcohol and shuns onion
and garlic. He mentions that the people did not rear pigs and fowl and live
cattle was not sold in the markets. This makes sense, since most of the
population was vegetarian.
An interesting observation is made on the social system in Mathura. He
mentions Chandals, who were considered the lowest of the castes, as
exception to the culinary habits of the people. The severest form of
discrimination was reserved for them. They had to announce their arrival in
the city by beating a wooden piece (probably a bell), to warn the others. We
do not know whether this discrimination was practiced only by the Hindus
or even by the Buddhist. Faxian’s account is silent on this.
The tradition of land grants to priests or Brahmins has been traced back to
3rd century CE. These land grants were known as Brahmadeya, i.e. given to
a Brahmin. Scholars believe that this practice led to dominance of Brahmins
in the countryside and probably created a rigid social hierarchy. Some
others believe that this practice also led to cultivation of virgin land and
hence helped increase the productivity. Whatever the case may have been,
this practice seems to have percolated in the Buddhist order as well.
Faxian mentions the endowments given by kings and Vaishyas (traders) to
monks. These endowments included houses, fields, orchards along with
their resident population and cattle. The grants were recorded on metal
plates (most likely copper plates, as in the case of Brahmadeya grants). He
said it was impossible for anyone to revoke the grant once it was made. The
practice according to Faxian was started after the death of Buddha and had
continued till this time. This might actually mean that the Brahmadeya
practice was borrowed from the Buddhist practice.
Many modern historians lead us to believe that there was widespread
antagonism between the Buddhist and Hindus during that time, especially
since the monks were getting immense patronage from both royalty and the
trading community. Faxian’s account, inadvertently, clears the picture for
us.
He mentions that once the monks get their tribute from the harvest, the
heads of Vaishya and Brahman communities brought them clothes and other
such articles and distribute them among the Buddhist monks. This indicates
that the Buddhist monks were patronised not only by fellow Buddhists but
also by the Hindus.
From Mathura, Faxian travelled a distance of approximately 158 km (in a
straight line) to arrive at Sankasya. The ancient city of Sankasya is today
known as Sankisa in Farukhabad district of Uttar Pradesh. This place has a
special importance in Buddhism, since it is believed that Buddha upon his
return from the Tavatimsa heaven, descended here.
The Tavatimsa heaven is identified in both Hindu and Buddhist beliefs as a
lesser heaven, where Indra resides, also known as Swarga. Ashoka built a
stupa at the place where Buddha was believed to have descended and
erected one of his famous pillars. Faxian however erroneously recorded the
capital on top as a lion capital. It was an elephant capital, which still
survives and is protected by the Archaeological Survey of India. The stupa
itself lies in ruins with a small temple at the top.
Faxian mentions many stupas and viharas that were built at various places
where Buddha performed his routine like clipping his nails and cutting his
hair. Sankisa, by the description of Faxian, would have been a flourishing
Buddhist city with great centres of learning and worship.
His onward travel from Sankisa took him to Kanyakubja, modern-day
Kannauj, to Saket, identified with modern-day Ayodhya and to Saravasti.
He describes the various stupas and viharas that existed there. The stupas
were built on sites where Buddha either preached or performed a miracle.
From Saravasti, Faxian travelled to other places of Buddhist importance
like Kapilavastu, Lumbini, Kushinagar and Vaishali. He recounts the
various legends associated with these places and the stupas built on places
of importance. He also mentions the famous legend of Amrapali, the
courtesan of Vaishali, who became a nun. Most of the account of these
places deals more in the religious aspect of Buddhism and little with the
history of these places. Upon his arrival in Pataliputra, Faxian once again
describes the procession of images, similar to what he witnessed in Hotan.
The procession was taken out on the eighth day of the second month. The
procession was similar to what he witnessed in Hotan, with four wheeled
carts and the festivities around the event.
From Pataliputra, Faxian travelled to Gaya and witnessed the tree under
which Buddha attained enlightenment. He came back to Pataliputra and
went to Varanasi to spend some time there. He eventually returned to
Pataliputra and spent about three years, learning Sanskrit and translating
various manuscripts he had collected. Surprisingly, he did not mention
anything about either the city or his stay for those three years.
His second long stop was in Tamralipti, modern-day Tamluk in West
Bengal. He describes the city as a seaport with twenty-two monasteries. He
spent two years in the city to translate the manuscript and eventually went
to Cylone, modern-day Sri Lanka, on a merchant vessel. It took him
fourteen days to reach the island. In Sri Lanka, he stayed another two years
and did more translation. His journey back to China was on sea, which was
no less than an adventure in itself.
He first went to Java, and his ship got caught in a sea storm and probably
hit a rock, resulting in a leak. To lighten the ship, the traders started casting
away heavy objects. Faxian too threw away all his belongings save for the
manuscripts he was carrying. On his way from Java to China, his ship once
again got caught in a storm and this time lost its way. They sailed for more
than the actual journey time and almost ran out of the provisions including
fresh water.
Faxian records that the sea routes were infested with pirates and meeting
them was a sure way of quick death. Though the sailings happened with
favourable monsoon winds, we can imagine how dangerous sea travel was,
given the uncertainty of weather and no system of an advance warning. He
eventually reached China and presented his work to the king of Nanking.
The travelogue of Faxian is different from many later travellers, especially
the Persian and Arab travellers, who give far more information on the social
and political aspects of India. We might not get much information on
politics of 5th century India, but what we know is that from Hotan in
Xinjiang in China, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in Pakistan to Tamluk in West
Bengal, fifth century, India was full of magnificent stupas and viharas. They
housed many thousand monks and nuns and stored a large number of
manuscripts. So what happened to these stupas?
Foreign pilgrims in India – Xuanzang
Faxian was not the only Chinese monk to travel to India, there were others
who also came in search of sacred texts and probably visited the places of
importance to Buddhist legends. They either left no records of their travel
or their records are too short to be yield any significant information. There,
however, was another Chinese traveller who came to India, following the
footsteps of Faxian. More than two hundred years later, in 629 CE,
Xuanzang, also known as Huein Tsang, started his journey from China to
India.
Xuanzang passed through the Tarim basin and entered Central Asia. While
Faxian entered India from Xinjiang, Xuanzang travelled to many cities in
Central Asia and then entered India through Afghanistan. He makes some
interesting observations in his records, which are different from those of
Faxian. He writes about the general nature of the cities he visited, the
behaviour of the people who inhabited them, the languages they spoke, etc.
He gives a description of the crops grown by the people and the trade
activities they engaged in. He of course, also, records the legends of
Buddha, associated with each place, like Faxian did.
If one reads the translation of Xuanzang’s [97] travels, one would
immediately see the partisan approach in his work. Such partisan
description of the people would make Xuanzang a bigot in today’s context.
Throughout his work, he notes the number of Buddhist monasteries and
Stupas each city has. His description of the people changes depending on
whether the city is predominantly Buddhist or Hindu. The people living in
Buddhist cities, invariably, receive a favourable description. He praises
them liberally with adjectives like courageous, gentle, remarkable, soft,
agreeable, docile, sincere, etc.
The people in predominantly Hindu cities are subjected to much harsher
treatment and are described as rude, cruel, fierce, crude, etc. He also records
the behaviour of people living in cities, which were not following the
‘correct’ ways of Buddhism. One such city was Bolor, identified to be in the
Baltistan region of Kashmir. Describes them as, ‘The people are rough and
rude in character; there is little humanity or justice with them; and as for
politeness, such a thing has not been heard of. They are coarse and
despicable in appearance, and wear clothes made of wool. Their letters are
nearly like those of India, their language somewhat different. There are
about a hundred Sangharamas (monasteries) in the country, with something
like a thousand priests, who show no great zeal for learning, and are
careless in their moral conduct’.
Xuanzang during his journey through the Chinese city of Kuche, modern-
day Kucha in the Aksu Prefecture of Xinjiang Province of China, notes the
Indian influence on the city. He writes that the teaching of sutras and rules
of discipline are like those of India. This is not surprising since the
proximity to India and the direct trade contacts would have constantly
influenced the region. It is also likely that monks from India continued to
travel to the region with trade caravans and ensured Indian influence. He
also notes the presence of a deva temple on the eastern borders of Kuche.
He does not clarify which deva was the temple dedicated to, but it definitely
refers to a Hindu deity. This too was probably the result of the early
syncretic influence of Kanishka, which brought both Buddhism and the
Hindu elements to China.
His journey through Afghanistan took him to Bamyan, where he saw the
now destroyed Bamyan Buddha statues. He also refers to a lying Buddha
statue and relic Stupas in the Bamyan region. Travelling east of Bamyan,
Xuanzang reaches Kapisa, modern-day Kabul, he describes Kabul in great
detail, talking about its geography, trade, people and religion. The kingdom
of Kapisa was ruled by a Kshatriya king, who apparently was very shrewd
in nature. He had conquered a large territory, and many local rulers were his
subjects. He counts some 100 convents in the city, which housed 6,000
priests.
Kapisa was a major trade centre, and the markets stocked goods from
faraway lands. The city not only had Buddhist convents and stupas but also
hosted deva temples, the naked ascetics (Digambar Jains) and the ones who
smeared themselves with ashes. One could say that the city of Kapisa was
cosmopolitan in nature that attracted people from many faiths. It being an
international trade hub would have definitely helped this. The cosmopolitan
nature of Kapisa also tells us a lot about the political leadership. The
Kshatriya king, who was likely a practitioner of the Hindu religion,
patronised both the Buddhist and Hindu forms of worship and was
welcoming to others like the Jains too.
Kabul was once a city that resembled a modern Indian city like Delhi, with
its temples, mosques, gurdwaras and churches. Xuanzang mentions many
monasteries, Stupa with relics of Buddha dotting the region around Kapisa.
The Stupas and monasteries were built by many rulers including, Ashoka
and Kanishka. The tradition carried on, and both Faxian and Xuanzang saw
the contemporary rulers also patronising Buddhism. Kapisa was all
welcoming, a totally different image of what Kabul today is.
The region of Kapisa and Gandhara must have left an impression on
Xuanzang. He makes a note of various customs, dresses, cleanliness,
politeness, etc. and gives a detailed account of the social history of the
region. He writes about the time keeping methods, where he mentions the
month being divided into two fortnights, each corresponding to the phasing
of the moon (Shukla-Paksha and Krishna-Paksha). He also records the
names of the months, starting with Chaitra and ending in Phalgun.
The towns were no longer planned on the Harappan lines and had winding
roads and dirty lanes. The people wore unstitched garments, which were
wrapped around their body. To brace for the colder season, sheep wool was
used to weave garments, these were known as kambal. The Hindi word for
blanket is still kambal.
On language and education, Xuanzang notes that the language of India has
been unchanged for a very long time and people speak with a clear
pronunciation. He however mentions that the people of the frontier region
have let corruption seep into their language. He was probably hinting at the
influence of other languages and loan words in the border areas.
Each province had an official to record the events pertaining to evil and
good events, including calamities. The record book was called ‘neelpitta’ or
the blue deposit. The records were probably written on birch barks and have
likely perished.
The minimum age for a child to be initiated into formal education was
seven. Much like in the modern times, the child was educated in five
streams: Shabdavidya or basic literacy; Shilpasthanvidya or arts, mechanics
and calendar; Chikitsavidya or knowledge of medicine; Heluvidya or logic ;
and Adhyatmavidya or the science of interior. The study of Veda and the
Buddhist principles were also carried out. once educated, at the age of
thirty, the student was considered ready to chooses his path as a
householder or as a monk/ascetic.
Xuanzang also touches upon the subject of caste. He mentions the four
castes, Brahman, Kshatriya, Vaishya and Shudra. He however also gives us
a very important piece of information on caste mobility. In 7th century India,
people were still engaging in intercaste marriages.
Xuanzang writes, ‘In these four classes purity or impurity of caste assigns
to everyone his place. When they marry they rise or fall in position
according to their new relationship’. He further adds, ‘Besides these there
are other classes of many kinds that intermarry according to their several
callings. It would be difficult to speak of these in detail’.
On administration and justice, Xuanzang says that the people are generally
upright and moral. The punishments are usually handed out by means of a
fine. In exceptional cases, however, the accused gets his nose and or ear
chopped off. In some cases, amputation of hands and legs are also carried
out. Exile and imprisonment are also mentioned as a form of punishment.
Torture to extract truth was not common but was practiced.
Like Faxian, Xuanzang also finds it strange that the families were not
required to register themselves with the state. Subsistence farming did not
attract any tax, while one-sixth of the produce went to the treasury as tax on
royal agricultural land. Roads and waterways authorities charged a toll for
their use. Public works like digging of reservoirs, construction of temples,
Stupas, etc. were carried out by paid labour.
He specifically mentions that the payments were in proportion to the work
done. Moreover, there was no forced labour. The charging of a toll finds a
mention in the Arthashastra by Chanakya, indicating an old tradition. The
principles of revenue collection laid down during the Mauryan period
would have been implemented throughout the territory and probably stayed
long after the empire declined.
The states also had an army, which was raised by the state as per the
requirement and was paid an agreed upon amount. However, the statement
in itself might not be significant, but it implies that there were probably no
mercenaries in the army. The mercenaries are not paid by the state but are
promised a share of the booty in case they win the war. In medieval times,
the use of mercenaries came to India with the Afghan and Turk armies. The
presence of mercenaries led to widespread loot and rioting after the war. As
a result, the common people suffered a lot. The battle was no longer about
the victory of the king, but was about who can loot more.
On food habits, there is also a description of the different types of food that
the people ate. Rice and corn were the staple crops and people also
consumed mutton, fish, gazelle and deer. Ox, elephants, donkey, horse, pig
and dog meats were banned. Garlic and onions were neither cultivated nor
consumed. Milk, curd, butter and cream were popular. Mustard oil was used
for cooking. Other than the Brahmans, all other castes also enjoyed wine
made from grapes or sugar cane.
In his description of the regions in modern Afghanistan and Pakistan’s
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Xuanzang laments about the many Stupas and
monasteries lying in ruins or left with few monks. At the same time, the
deva temples he mentions seems to have a decent membership and
patronage. This is probably an indication of start of decline of the Buddhist
faith in these parts of ancient India.
What is interesting is that he never mentions any animosity between the
Buddhist and deva (Hindu) followers. Neither does he mentions any
systematic state sponsored campaigns against the Buddhists or the Hindus.
The reasons for decline of Buddhism in the Bactria-Gandhara region are not
clear.
There could have been multiple reasons for the decline ranging from a
reduced patronage by the local king, reduction in the proselyting activities
of the Buddhists to an organic resurgence of the Hindu practices in the post-
Mauryan India. Whatever the reason was, it was definitely not a result of
violent backlash against the Buddhist, as suggested by some historians and
politicians.
The northern frontiers of India that Xuanzang was visiting had witnessed a
violent and a large-scale invasion just a century ago. The Huns, a tribe of
Central Asia, spilled into Persia and then into India in about 500 CE. The
Huns were animists and worshiped fire among other divinities. They buried
their dead and practiced polyandry [98] . In a short span of three decades, the
Huns ravaged a large part of northern India up to the Magadh capital,
Pataliputra. During their devastating attacks, many monasteries and temples
were destroyed. The ruinous state of the Stupas in Kapisa and surrounding
regions could have been due to the Hun attack.
An observation by Xuanzang regarding the changing practices in the
monasteries and Stupas might give us an indication on why Buddhism
started to decline in these areas. He writes that a short distance outside the
city of Kapisa there is a Stupa, which has five sacred relics of Buddha and
the king of Kapisa had appointed [only] five monks to serve at the Stupa.
This was probably a reference to the inadequate importance given to a
Stupa, indicating the declining interest in Buddhism.
These monks however got overwhelmed by the high daily turnout of people
and introduced a fee for viewing the relics. He writes, ‘Their plan, in brief,
is this: All who wish to see the skull bone of Tathagata have to pay one gold
piece; those who wish to take an impression pay five pieces. The other
objects in their several order, have a fixed price; and yet, though the charges
are heavy, the worshippers are numerous’.
The monetisation of the visits may have put off people in the long run. The
relics of Buddha were now ascribed mythical powers and were associated
with many miracles. Buddhist texts were no longer written in Pali, the
language of the common man, but were written in Sanskrit, the language of
the elite. Kings and traders patronised the monks and generous donations
filled the monasteries with food, gold and other luxuries. In a way
Buddhism of 5th and 6th century closely resembled the Vedic religion. It
started to look like a mirror image of a religious practice that Buddha
himself wanted to reject.
If one were to choose the most interesting account of a city among
Xuanzang’s travel in north India, it would be the account of Brahmapura
and its neighbour Suvarngotra. Cunningham in his work, Ancient Geology
of India, has identified it with the Garhwal and Kumaon region. Xuanzang
gives a brief account of the city but the information that he provides is
immensely valuable. He mentions that the city had a mixed population of
believers and non-believers, i.e. Buddhists and non-Buddhists. There were
only five priests in the five monasteries the city had. On the other hand,
there are ten deva temples, in which persons of different opinions dwell
together. This description reinforces the peaceful cohabitation of Buddhist
priests with other faiths, even if they were a tiny minority of five. At the
same time, the deva temples, a reference to Hindu temples, harboured
people of different opinion, under the same roof. It is a clear reference to
the different sects that might have existed at that time.
Suvarngotra, a neighbouring state of Brahmapura, was a known as the
country of the eastern women. Xuanzang mentions that for a long time, this
country has been ruled by a woman and hence called the kingdom of
women. He says, ‘The husband of the reigning woman is called king, but he
knows nothing about the affairs of the state. The men manage the wars and
sow the land, and that is all’. While the matrilineal societies of the north-
east and Kerala are now well known, the kingdom of women is still
struggling to come out of the pages of Xuanzang’s records.
Xuanzang travelled to eastern parts of India through Varanasi, Saravasti,
Kapilavastu, Lumbini and Vaishali before he arrived at Pataliputra. He
wrote two chapters devoting them to describe Magadha. However, most of
his account is restricted to the description of the various monasteries and
Stupas he came across and the Buddhist legends associated with them. His
account of Nalanda is of historical importance, where he gives details on
the structure, architecture and the student life of the university.
The excavation carried out by the Archaeological Survey of India at
Nalanda suggests that the university was spread across an area of 100
hectares. The excavations have revealed a sprawling complex with temples
and monasteries, laid out in a systematic manner. The university complex is
made of bricks with some monuments made of stones. Six grand temples
and eleven large monasteries have been excavated. The entire layout is
divided into eastern and western half, with a hundred feet wide passage
bisecting the complex, north to south. The western side being assigned for
temples and the eastern side for the monasteries. The monasteries were
multi-storeyed structures with amenities like hidden chambers for
safekeeping. Each monastery had a common courtyard, a well, a kitchen
and a granary.
Xuanzang in his work praises the University for the quality of its teaching
and the reputation its alumni enjoy. He mentions that so great is the
reputation of Nalanda that some people falsely claim to be its alumni and
enjoy the honour they get. Several thousand priests used to live in the
university complex, and a very strict admission policy was followed by the
administration. There was likely a two-stage admission process where
candidates were asked questions and a shortlist was prepared. The first
stage was meant to screen the candidates. The success rate was as low as
twenty per cent. In the next stage, the shortlisted candidates would appear
in front of the assembly (probably a select council of teachers) and answer
their questions.
Nalanda’s importance in ancient India was not solely because it was a
university town. Ancient India already had a seat of higher learning at
Taxila. The opinion is divided on whether Taxila qualified as a university.
There were no organised lecture halls, community centres or living quarters
on the premise, and hence, scholars do not consider it to be a university in
proper sense. However, Taxila had Chanakya, Panini and Charaka as its
alumni and teachers.
Nalanda on the other hand has all the elements of a modern university. It
can be safely assumed that Nalanda was the world’s first university. It was
unique in many ways and far ahead of its times. Apart from being organised
into different building complexes, it had a large number of students
studying and living there. It had a wide range of non-religious subjects like
astronomy, philosophy, mathematics, logic, etc.
On the other hand, it also had religious subjects like Buddhist studies and
world’s first comparative religious studies course. Students of different
religious beliefs discussed and debated while living under the same roof.
The comparative religious studies are a subject that many modern western
universities take pride in, projecting them as the pinnacle of liberal studies.
These are the subjects that the modern universities introduced in post-war
twentieth century.
Nalanda was not just the university to introduce liberal courses, it was also
the first university to accept foreign students from as far away as Korea and
Indonesia. The university was burnt down to ashes by the invading armies
of Bakhtiyar Khilji in late thirteenth century. It is said that so grave was the
attack and arson that the books in the monastery burnt for more than a
week.
Another interesting incident that Xuanzang narrates is that of his meeting
with Bhaskaravarman, the king of Kamrup (areas including modern-day
Sylhet in Bangladesh, Meghalaya and Assam). He was surprised that the
region did not have a single monastery. He writes, ‘…hence from the time
when Buddha appeared in the world even down to the present time there
never as yet has been built, one sangharama as a place for the priests to
assemble’. It is probably the only place Xuanzang visited that did not have
either a Stupa or a monastery. He describes Bhaskaravarman as a person
who has no faith in Buddha. He however says, ‘Though he has no faith in
Buddha, yet he much respects Sramanas of learning’. Once again
establishing that irrespective of religious following the people of India were
all welcoming.
Xuanzang visited other parts of eastern India, including Tamralipti in
Bengal and the cities of Odisha. He mentions a port town, which he
identifies as Charitrapur. He observed that merchants departed from this
port to, far off countries for trade and strangers arrive and transit from
faraway places.
We have already seen how Indian traders engaged in trade with Sri Lanka
and cities of Southeast Asia since the later centuries BCE. Xuanzang
probably saw the traders conducting business with the countries in
Southeast Asia. He also mentions the many Stupas and temples the cities in
Odisha had. Most of the Stupas, he says, were built by Ashoka. These
would have been built after Ashoka’s bloody victory over Kalinga.
We are left with little information on Xuanzang’s journey in southern India.
He leaves a long record of incidents associated with the life of Buddha but
very little on things of historical importance. From Odisha, he went to
Andhra, Chola, Kanchipuram, Konkan, Maharashtra, Kutchh, Saurashtra
and then onwards to Sindh. During his travel, he consistently mentions the
presence of monasteries and temples coexisting and in some places people
studying both the Buddhist and the Hindu doctrines.
Sindh in times of Xuanzang was predominantly Buddhist. He mentions
presence of several hundred monasteries and about 10,000 priests in them.
There were only about thirty deva temples where people of different sects
assembled. Sindh was ruled by king belonging to the Shudra caste and was
a Buddhist. The description of the people we get is different from his
general description of the people he encountered at various places. He says
that for several hundred miles along the Indus, there are thickly populated
regions. This is not surprising, given that Indus with its immense water
resources has the potential of sustaining a large population. Even today
Punjab and Sindh in Pakistan are the most populated provinces in the
country.
The people of ancient Sindh were primarily pastoralists and followed
Hinayana doctrine of Buddhism. He refers to them as people with a
penchant for bloodshed. This was possibly due to their pastoral lifestyle
where maintaining territory was crucial for survival. In their religious
behaviour, he says that the people used to dress up like a Bhikshu or a monk
(shaving their head and draping the saffron cloth) but carried on with their
routine of a householder. This was probably the biggest shock that he got.
How could a monk be a householder?
The aberration that Xuanzang saw was a compromise between accepting a
religion and sustenance. A society where everyone is tending to animals for
a living and defending territory is unlikely to offer alms to monks, who read
scriptures and meditate all day. This was also a reason why Buddhism
primarily flourished in urban centres, where people lived a more settled and
secure life. In urban centres, it was possible for the householders to engage
in docile activities like trading and artisanship, which do not require
constant vigil to preserve the source of livelihood.
Throughout his records, Xuanzang talks of deva temples only as a
comparison to the monasteries. The only time he actually gives a detailed
account of a temple is in Multan. He specifically mentions a Sun temple,
which had an idol cast in gold and adorned with precious gems. Such was
the popularity of the temple that people from across the subcontinent used
to visit it.
He mentions the rich offerings of gems by the kings. The Sun temple of
Multan was probably the Tirupati of ancient India. The temple complex was
surrounded by water reservoirs and groves to stroll about. A charity home
was also run on donations by the pilgrims, where food, shelter, medicines,
etc. were provided for the poor. We are told that every day the temple used
to admit thousands of pilgrims. The temple was destroyed by the Ismailis in
the 10th century [99] . A fact recorded by Al Biruni in his works.
The journey of Xuanzang took him to Kalat, the westernmost point in the
subcontinent. Here, he mentions a territory, several thousand miles east to
west and north to south, on the way to Persia. The people of Kalat, which he
called Langala, used Brahmi alphabet but their language was different.
Probably influenced by Persian, since he mentions that the territory was
controlled by Persia, he records a hundred monasteries with six thousand
priests and several hundred deva temples. The city had a richly adorned
Maheshvara temple, where Pashupata sect of Hindus offered prayers.
Xuanzang takes a northerly route from Kalat into Afghanistan, travelling
through Ghazni, Kabul, Badakhshan, Chitral and then into Xinjiang. From
the modern perspective, the reader has to take the account of Xuanzang and
Faxian with a pinch of salt. Both were pilgrims, in search of Buddhist texts
and visiting the sacred places associated with life of Buddha. Their aim was
not to record history, and they just left an account of their travel for others.
We have to accept that they might have erred in recording the exact
locations, description of places and distances between places. They would
have given a biased view of people, as we saw above, belonging to
Buddhist and non-Buddhist beliefs. They might have used exaggerated
accounts at places to give significance to Buddhist majority cities. Their
accounts give us a very high-level understanding of the society and the
influence of Indian culture and religion had on faraway places.
The last empire of ancient India
During the time Xuanzang visited India, Harshvardhan of the Pushyabhuti
Dynasty ruled a large part of northern, north-western and eastern India.
Harsha as he is a known, was a king, poet and a playwright. He ruled from
his capital Kanyakubja, modern-day Kannauj in Uttar Pradesh. He is known
for patronising Buddhism, Hinduism and Jainism.
After the decline of the Gupta empire, Harsha held the largest territory in
India. Much of the information on Harsh has been collected from the
records of Xuanzang and Baan Bhatta, his court poet. Harshacharita, the
biography of Harsh, was written by Bhatt and was probably the first attempt
at recording history in India.
Bhatt’s account of Harsh is mixed with mythological stories and the social
character of his times. We can assume that in seventh century India, the
Vedic religion has seen a significant change. Bhatt’s work mentions the
Puranic Gods like Shiva, Vishnu, Saraswati, Sita, Ram, Krishna, Ganpati,
etc. He constantly mentions the Vedic rituals and sacrifices too, together
with discussion on philosophy of Mimamsa. His reference to the epics,
Ramayana and Mahabharata, and the Puranas, firmly establishes the
trajectory of the society moving from Vedic to Puranic forms of worship.
If one were to choose an instance where the decline of Vedic Gods at the
expense of Puranic Gods is most visible, it would be the one where Krishna
lifts the Govardhan hill to save his clan from torrential rains unleashed by
Indra. The legend suggests, Indra being angry at the refusal by Krishna to
offer him his annual sacrifice, sends torrents of rain to punish the village.
Krishna as a symbol of a superior power, saves the village by lifting the hill
on his little finger, under which the villagers takes refuge.
There are many other stories where the all-powerful devas of Vedic lore are
depicted as a weakened force, who constantly seek help from either Vishnu,
Shiva, Brahma or Adi Shakti (the feminine source of all creation). This also
marks the transformation from the nirguna to saguna (formless to, with
form) worship of god. The religious changes in the seventh century India
created a fertile ground for the emergence of Bhakti Movement in the
eighth century.
Coming back to Harshcharita, Bhatta’s account of Harsh is a narration.
According to the account, Bhatta, after spending time at Harsha’s court,
returns to his village and narrates the story to his friends and family. He
uses extremely ornate language and idioms. While he describes the court
and the royal household, he also gives out a lot of information that would
help us today in reconstructing the social situation of seventh century
northern India.
He says that in Harsha’s country, the caste (Varna) confusion has stopped.
He probably meant intermixing of caste. We know from the Nashik
inscriptions that a similar attempt was made by the Satavahanas. He
mentions, Rajyashri, the sister of Harsh was trained in music and dance.
This was probably a common custom in that time.
Narrating the scene of Rajyashri’s wedding, Bhatta mentions the arrival of
queens from distant lands and helping with the marriage arrangements. His
description of the various tasks carried out by the royal family, i.e. the king,
the queen and the two brothers, sound exactly like a wedding scene from
today. The use of beetle leaf is highlighted multiple times throughout the
text. It is used as a cosmetic to colour the lips of women. It is also used as a
ritual practice where people chew their morning beetle. It also finds
mention in various marriage rituals, much like modern Hindu weddings.
It is interesting to note that Bhatt liberally uses Kama and Rati as adjectives
to describe the masculine and feminine beauty in the text. The modern
taboos associated with explicitly talking about sex or references to anything
remotely associated with sex were certainly unknown in ancient India.
The practice of Sati was prevalent in the time of Harsha, as mentioned in
the text. We see a reference of Sati in the episode where Bhatt describes
Rajyashri’s life after her marriage. Rajyashri’s husband was killed in battle,
and eventually, she became a Buddhist nun. Bhatt gives a very dramatic
account of Rajyashri’s attempted Sati and Harsha’s timely intervention to
save her.
This may or may not be true, but eventually the episode ends in Rajyashri
donning the red robe (of a Buddhist nun). Another observation one can
make regarding the practice of Sati is that though Sati was prevalent, it was
definitely not seen as a sacred custom. Harsha’s successful attempt at
saving his sister from Sati is an endorsement to this.
The account of Xuanzang and the Harshcharita when read together give us
an image of India, which was syncretic and evolving. It is not surprising,
since India has always been a religiously and philosophically evolving
country.
Since the time of Ashoka, when Buddhism gained prominence as a result of
royal patronage, Indians evolved to accept Buddha into their religious folds.
Though Ashoka clamped down on Vedic rituals, they never really vanished.
They probably coexisted. Later with introduction of idol worship of
Buddha’s statues in Gandhara region during the reign of Kanishka, imagery
of Vedic Gods was also given a place on the Kushan coinage.
By the time the Gupta empire took roots, the Vedic practices were already
gaining momentum and royal patronage. The Guptas in the north and the
Satavahanas in the south were two major powers patronising the Vedic
practices. Both Faxian and Xuanzang mention Buddhist and non-Buddhist
places of worship across India. We have already discussed the multi-
religious and multi-sectarian society that India was in the ancient times. The
concepts of debates and discussions were put to use to establish religious
supremacy.
Xuanzang, in his records, mentions a drum of discussion. Anyone who liked
to challenge a theory or religious doctrine would strike the drum. Upon
hearing, it was obligatory on part of the community to send the best and
most knowledgeable person to the debate. A defeat in such a debate would
mean end of the career for that person. In some cases, the defeated side
would have to accept the religious doctrines of the winner, i.e. convert to
the winning religion.
The age of transition – the cycle of life
With the decline of the Satavahana Dynasty in 2nd century CE, southern
India saw emergence of smaller tributary states as independent kingdoms.
One of the earliest such kingdoms was the Kadamba Dynasty. The
territories ruled by the Kadambas coincide roughly with modern-day
Karnataka. The weakened Satavahana Dynasty got fragmented, and its
territories were absorbed in the neighbouring kingdoms. The Western
Kshatraps took over the northern and western territories while the eastern
territories went to the Andhra Ikshvakus. In south, the Pallava Dynasty
fought with the Kadambas to expand northwards.
It was only in the middle of 4th and early 5th centuries that the Kadambas
were able to consolidate territory and establish a kingdom. The Kadambas
can be credited with establishing Kannada as the administrative language of
the state. They also replaced the Satavahana Brahmi script with Kannada
script. This formalisation led to the literary development of the language
from its old form into its modern form today. However, they used Sanskrit
for communication, in southern parts of their territory.
The Kadambas practiced a syncretic form of religion where they combined
the early Vedic practices with later Puranic practices. They carried out the
Vedic Ashvamedha Yagya but also built temples of Vishnu and Shiva. They
provided land grants for Jain temples and Buddhist Stupas. Like their
northern contemporaries, the Kadambas patronised all religions, while
carrying on with their own personal faith. The Kadamba Dynasty declined
in the middle of 6th century and gave way to the Chalukya Dynasty.
According to inscriptions found in Badami region, Chalukya Dynasty was
established by Pulakeshin I in early 6th century. With steady consolidation
and expansion, the Chalukya Dynasty reached its peak during the reign of
Pulakeshin II. The Chalukya boundaries under Pulakeshin II extended to
Kaveri in the south and Narmada in north. This was also the time when the
Chinese traveller Xuanzang visited the region.
In his introduction to the region, which he calls ‘Mo-ho-la-ch’a’ (translated
as Maharashtra), he describes the people of the land as, ‘…the disposition
of the people is honest and simple; they are tall of stature, and of a stern,
vindictive character. To their benefactors they are grateful; to their enemies
relentless [100] ’.
As it happens, a similar description of Kappe Arabhattan, a Chalukya
warrior of 8th century, toes a similar line to praise him. The first two lines
have striking similarity with the description of Xuanzang. They read,
‘Kappe Arabhattan, beloved of the good people. Avoided by evil people, an
exceptional man in Kaliyuga [101] ’. Probably such descriptions were
common for successful generals and warriors or for the army in general.
Xuanzang’s local interpreters might have described the people in a similar
language.
In a brief paragraph, Xuanzang describes the standard operating procedure
to avenge an insult or dishonour. Revenge was sought by inviting the
opponent to a duel of spears, but if one submitted, he was not killed. This
seems like an exaggeration for a well-governed city with powerful rulers,
where law and order is expected to be maintained through an efficient
administration. In the same paragraph, we are told that upon defeat in battle,
the general was punished by being presented with woman’s clothes (the
modern equivalent of choodiyan pehen lo, i.e. wear bangles). This act
apparently led to fighting unto death instead of being subjected to
humiliation.
We find a special mention of Pulakeshin II in the records of Xuanzang. He
praises him for his efficient administration and says, ‘His plans and
undertakings are wide-spread, and his beneficent actions are felt over a
great distance’, Implying that the territory of Pulakeshin II was spread over
a vast area and his administration benevolent. He also indicates to his iron
fist hold over his tributary states when he says, ‘His subjects obey him with
perfect submission’.
He mentions the conflict between Shiladitya of north India (identified as
Harsh) and Pulakeshin II. Shiladitya or Harsh, having conquered most of
the land from east to the west, was unable to venture into the Chalukya
territories. He writes, ‘He [Harsh] has gathered troops from the five Indies
[Punjab–Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Odisha] and summoned the best
leaders from all countries, and himself gone at the head of his army to
punish and subdue these [Chalukyas] people, but he has not yet conquered
their troops’.
It was Pulakeshin II who halted the southward march of Harsh. A recent
discovery of a copper plate inscription has revealed that the decisive battle
between Harsh and Pulakeshin II was fought sometime in the final months
of 618 CE and early 619 CE [102] . Despite the efforts of Harsh to conjure up
a large army from across his kingdom, the Chalukya king emerged
victorious and the Narmada was accepted as the boundary.
Like all ancient and medieval Indian armies, the Chalukya army too had
war elephants. Efficient in intimidating the enemy and possessing brutal
power, these beasts were intoxicated with alcohol before the battle. The idea
was to make them lose their sense of restrain and trample the enemy forces.
This strategy worked but at the same time proved counterproductive. In a
state of inebriation, the elephants were capable of turning on their own
army. This happened frequently, including in the battle of Hydaspes where
Alexander fought with Porus. However, we don’t find the mention of
inebriated elephants in Porus’ army.
The Chalukyas were patrons of Vedic and Puranic forms of worship. They
however equally patronised Buddhism and Jainism. Xuanzang mentions
that the people of Maharashtra were fond of learning and studied both
Buddhist and non-Buddhist texts. This is an interesting observation that he
makes. One would imagine that it was always the king or ruler who
patronised a particular religion or sect by building temples, Stupas and
other places of worship. But it seems that in the case of the Chalukya
territory and probably in a large part of India even lay people indulged in
reading religious books of other faiths. Comparative religious studies, in
western universities, have gained traction in 21st century, and in ancient
India, it was a common practice.
The Chalukyas built many Buddhist Stupas and monasteries, which is
attested by the account of Xuanzang. He counts a hundred monasteries in
the region where almost 5,000 priests lived. There were another one
hundred deva temples where people of different sects worshiped. This was
also the time when the Puranic traditions of worship had overtaken the
Vedic form of worship. Temples with images of Shiva, Vishnu, Surya,
Shakti, etc. had emerged and had gained much favour among the masses.
The Vedic practices of Yagya or fire sacrifice diminished and was only
limited to Passover events like birth, the thread ceremony, marriage and
death. The Puranic traditions probably started in early centuries CE and
were well established during the Gupta Age. The Buddhist tradition
borrowed liberally from the Puranic traditions and introduced the concepts
of Bodhisattva, i.e. the previous births of Buddha. The Jataka tales too were
influenced by early Vedic and non-Buddhist traditions of India.
There seem to have happened a churn of thoughts in which many different
ideologies, thoughts and concepts fused together and threw up something
completely different. We can think of it as a process of making a salad,
where individual vegetables and greens are chopped, squeezed, seasoned,
tossed and presented in a bowl. People simply pick up what they like. But
irrespective of which piece of vegetable or green they pick, they will get to
taste a bit of other flavours in the bowl. That is what happened to religion in
India.
One of the 6th century cave temples in Badami has a relief of Vishnu in
reclining pose (Ananta Vishnu). The relief shows Vishnu sleeping on the
serpent (Vasuki in Buddhist traditions) while ten of his avatars gaze upon
him. Buddha is shown as the ninth avatar of Vishnu. It is worth noticing that
the during the Chalukya period, Buddha was both worshiped as an
individual deity in monasteries and Stupas and as part of the Puranic
traditions. This is amply clear from the records of Xuanzang.
Apart from the reliefs of Vishnu and Shiv, the caves also depict Ganesha,
Kartikeya, Parvati and Durga in her Mahishasuramardini form. The Puranic
traditions started to migrate out of India through trade and cultural contact.
In the book, Worshipping Siva and Buddha: The Temple Art of East Java
[103]
, the authors published a series of archaeological excavations carried out
in Indonesia.
As many as 165 images of Durga were excavated in temples associated with
Shiva. Most of the images were dated 6th century onwards. The emergence
of Puranic deities in India and Southeast Asia at around the same time,
gives us a reason to think. Did Southeast Asia completely relied on India for
its theological and religious needs?
The 6th and 7th century India was at a junction where religion was taking
shape and started resembling the Hindu belief system as we know it today.
Those who are aware of the ten avatars of Vishnu (Dashavatara) would not
find anything special about this mention. But the inclusion of Buddha as
one of the avatars should make us think as to why a deity of a different
religion was included into the Hindu folds?
Modern historians and commentators have a divided opinion on the
inclusion of Buddha in the Puranic traditions. Some believe that it was an
attempt to appropriate the Buddhist legacy by the Puranic tradition. Others
believe that it was a result of organic osmosis that happened in ancient
India. Those who support the appropriation theory site the Buddhist claims
of modern Buddhists in Asia, who reject the belief that Buddha was an
avatar of Vishnu. This is hardly surprising. Buddhism evolved in different
ways in different countries it went to. The very fact that Buddhists are no
longer averse to kill to eat tells us the kind of change Buddhism underwent
as it travelled out of India.
Non-violence and rejection of animal sacrifice were taken extremely
seriously by the early Buddhists in India. No less than Ashoka himself made
it clear that animals should not be slaughtered for food. The point here is
that as Buddhism travelled outside India, it adapted to the local needs and
eventually transformed into a religion that was different from what it used
to be in India, at least in its social beliefs. Buddhists outside India have seen
Buddhism as an identity. It is natural for them to reject any kind of
association, much less a subordination (in form of an avatar) of Buddhism
to another religion.
But what happened in India is amply clear from the records of Faxian and
Xuanzang. The Indians never thought of Buddhism as a separate religion.
The coexistence of deva temples and Buddhists monasteries is a proof that
Buddhism was always a part of the religious fabric of India, rather like a
Persian carpet, full of colourful flowers. All different yet complementing
each other and pleasing to the eyes.
The Puranic traditions, through their storytelling medium (as opposed to
pure ritualistic tradition of Vedas), gained currency. The Vedic Gods like
Indra, as we saw in the earlier section, started to lose favour. The slow
decline of both Vedic and Buddhist traditions in India led to fusion and
amalgamation of various traditions. It was during this process that Buddha
was incorporated as an avatar of Vishnu. It was an obvious thing to happen,
given the nature of Indian society with an all welcoming, expanded mind.
At the cusp of change
The 7th century was in a way a defining moment in world history. The
sequence of events, starting in early years of 7th century, changed the world
history, like never before. The magnitude of the events was so large that it
impacted much of the then known world. The social, political and religious
changes left an indelible mark, which is still strong. Such was the impact of
the change that it was felt from the Iberian Peninsula in Europe to the desert
oases of China. India with her cultural and commercial enterprise was the
proverbial land of honey and milk. It was impossible for her to stay away
from those changes.
By the time Xuanzang entered Kashmir in 632 CE, Mohammed, the
Prophet of Islam had died. He left behind a politically unified Arabia and a
new religion, Islam. The scope of this book does not allow us to dwell upon
the circumstances under which Islam was established and then propagated
in the Arabia. But we will briefly touch upon the territorial expansion that
happened after the death of the Prophet.
Shortly after the death of Mohammed, the Arab army under the leadership
of Abu Bakr started its campaign into Syria and Palestine. Palestine in the
7th century was a much larger territory and included modern-day Jordan.
One of the first cities to fall to the invading Muslim armies was Petra, the
famed Nabatean city, on the Frankincense route to Rome. By the autumn of
634 CE, Damascus had fallen and the first Caliph, Abu Bakr, was dead. The
following year, with Umar as the second Caliph, entire Palestine and
southern Syria were under the Caliphate. The battle for Levant continued
and in April 637 CE, when Xuanzang was visiting Kushinagar, Jerusalem
fell to Umar. The residents were given peace in exchange of a poll tax
called Jizya. By the time Xuanzang returned to China in 645 CE, Egypt,
Armenia, the south Caucasus and Persia were conquered and the grand
library of Alexandria was destroyed, yet again. Umar was assassinated in
644 CE by a Persian slave and Uthman became the third Caliph.
Before the advent of Islam and ensuing territorial conquest, Persia and the
Byzantine Empire engaged in a long battle to conquer each other’s
territories. A constant state of battle probably weakened the two empires
and made them easy targets for a zealous Islamic army. In 651 CE, the
conquest of Central Asia, then known as Khorasan, started. With the
conquest of Khorasan, the Sassanid Dynasty collapsed.
The reign of Uthman saw widespread discontent in the Islamic ruling
dispensation. He was seen as lenient in his policies, which led to loss of
control over the tribal differences. A revolt broke out in the ranks, and he
was assassinated by Egyptian rebels in 656 CE. Ali the last of the Rashidun
Caliphs succeeded Uthman and saw a bloody civil war, which resulted in
his own assassination in 661 CE. The end of Rashidun Caliphs paved way
for the Umayyad Caliphate. It was under the Umayyads that the Islamic
armies reached Kabul in 664 CE.
The relentless march of the invading Muslim army was finally stopped at
the doorstep of modern Afghanistan, the graveyard of empires. The Islamic
armies would face stiffest resistance to their territorial expansion in
Afghanistan. What started as a march to Syria in 632 CE became one of the
fastest territorial expansion campaigns.
Though Alexander conquered a larger territory in much less time, he could
not keep it. His territories were divided shortly after his death. In the case of
the Islamic conquest, the territories were not only retained, but they were
also put under a taxation system with revenues accruing to the Caliphate.
The early Islamic Caliphate can be described as a prototype of a colonial
empire if not the first colonial power.
By 664, the armies of the Caliph had added Persia, Syria, Egypt,
Mesopotamia, Armenia, the South Caucasus and a large part of the
Byzantine Empire to the Arab territories they already controlled. In about
thirty-two years, the Caliphate controlled the largest contiguous territory in
the world. But Afghanistan was a tough cookie to crack. The 7th century
Afghanistan was ruled by Buddhist and Hindu dynasties. The modern
provinces of Kabul, Zabul, Kandahar and Ghazni were the frontier
kingdoms, where the Persian influence ceased and Indian cultural traits
emerged.
Along with the conquest of Persia, efforts were also made to conquer
territories east of Persia. The campaigns yielded little success. The first
major Afghan city to be taken by the Umayyads was Bactria, also known as
Balkh. The city fell to the Islamic armies in 709 CE, four decades after their
arrival at the gates of India. The territories were held on against the Islamic
invasion well into the first half of 8th century, preventing their advance into
the Indus valley.
The kingdoms of Zabulistan together with Kabul fended off the Arab
advance up to 870 CE [104] when the region fell to the Arab general Al Rabi.
The Arabs kept raiding the Indian territories for slaves and booty
throughout the 8th and 9th centuries. The Arab armies were kept in a constant
state of preparedness to execute raids into the Indian territories. A record
mentions that in 795 CE, seven million Dirhams [105] worth of plunder came
in from Kandahar, Zabul and Kabul.
Such was the resistance from the Afghans that around 700 CE, a peace
accord was signed between Ibn al-Ashath, the Arab general and Zunbils (of
Zabul). The senior Arab commanders condemned this action and denounced
Al-Ashath for turning away from the Jihad against infidels [106] . The Arabs,
however, got some success in Sindh, where Mohammed Bin Qasim
defeated Raja Dahir of Sindh in 712 CE.
The advent of Islamic armies at the gates of India was not a surprise to the
frontier kingdoms. They have in the past centuries seen armies of
Alexander, the Indo-Greeks, the Kushans, the Scythians, and the Huns,
invade the north-western borders of India. What was different this time
were the post-war events; the enslavement of wives and children of fighting
men [107] ; and The desecration of places of worship and religious taxation.
Amidst all the political, social and religious changes that the frontier
kingdoms of India were witnessing, southern India was preparing for a
religious renaissance with birth of Adi Shankaracharya.
Appendix
Lines 1-3
‘The year one of Kanishka, the great deliverer, the righteous, the just, the
autocrat, the god, worthy of worship, who has obtained the kingship
from Nana and from all the Gods, who has laid down (i.e. established) the
year one as the Gods pleased’.

Lines 3-4
‘And it was he who laid out (i.e. discontinued the use of) the Ionian speech
and then placed the Arya (or Aryan) speech (i.e. replaced the use of Greek
by the Aryan or Bactrian language)’.

Lines 4-6
‘In the year one, it has been proclaimed unto India, unto the whole realm of
the governing class including Koonadeano (Kaundinya, Kundina) and the
city of Ozeno (Ozene, Ujjain) and the city of Zageda (Saketa) and the city of
Kozambo (Kausambi) and the city of Palabotro (Pataliputra) and so long
unto (i.e. as far as) the city of Ziri-tambo (Sri-Champa)’.

Lines 6-7
‘Whichever rulers and the great householders there might have been, they
submitted to the will of the king and all India submitted to the will of the
king’.

Lines 7-9
‘The king Kanishkaa commanded Shapara (Shaphar), the master of the city,
to make the Nana Sanctuary, which is called (i.e. known for having the
availability of) external water (or water on the exterior or surface of the
ground), in the plain of Kaeypa, for these deities – of whom are Ziri (Sri)
Pharo (Farrah) and Omma’.

Lines 9-9A
‘To lead are the Lady Nana and the Lady Omma, Ahura Mazda,
Mazdooana, Srosharda, who is called .. and Komaro (Kumara)and called
Maaseno (Mahasena) and called Bizago (Visakha), Narasao and Miro
(Mihara)’.
Lines 10-11
‘And he gave same (or likewise) order to make images of these deities who
have been written above’.

Lines 11-14
‘And he ordered to make images and likenesses of these kings: for
king Kujula Kadphises, for the great grandfather, and for this grandfather
Saddashkana (Sadashkana), the Soma sacrificer, and for king V'ima
Kadphises, for the father, and for himself (?), king Kanishkaa’.

Lines 14-15
‘Then, as the king of kings, the son of god, had commanded to do,
Shaphara, the master of the city, made this sanctuary’.

Lines 16-17
‘Then, the master of the city, Shapara, and Nokonzoka led worship
according to the royal command’.

Lines 17-20
‘These Gods who are written here, then may ensure for the king of kings,
Kanishkaa, the Kushana, for remaining for eternal time healthy, secure and
victorious.. and further ensure for the son of God also having authority over
the whole of India from the year one to the year thousand and thousand’.

Line 20
‘Until the sanctuary was founded in the year one, to (i.e. till) then the Great
Arya year had been the fashion’.

Line 21
‘..According to the royal command, Abimo, who is dear to the emperor,
gave capital to Pophisho’.

Line 22
‘..The great king gave (i.e. offered worship) to the deities’.

Line 23
‘..’
[1]
https://news.nationalgeographic.com, Humans left Africa earlier, during Ice Age heat wave,
Christine Dell’Amore, Jan 2011
[2]
Ibid
[3]
Ibid
[4]
Rose, Jeffrey I. ‘New Light on Human Prehistory in the Arabo-Persian Gulf Oasis.’ Current
Anthropology, vol. 51, no. 6, 2010, pp. 849–883. JSTOR
[5]
Ibid
[6]
Jean-Francois Jarrige, Mehrgarh Neolithic, International seminar on the ‘First farmers in global
perspective’, Lucknow, India, January 2006.
[7]
Ibid
[8]
Ibid
[9]
Elizabeth Errington, ‘Ancient Afghanistan through the eyes of Charles Masson (1800-1853): The
Masson Project at the British Museum’, IIAS Newsletter no. 27,p 8-9
[10]
A Kos in medieval India measured around 2 miles
[11]
J.M. Kenoyer (1998), Ancient cities of the Indus Valley Civilisation, p. 21
[12]
Journal of Royal Asiatic Socisety, Volume 81, Issue 1-2, April 1949, P 109-110
[13]
Based on S.P. Gupta, G.L. Possehl and Michel Danino
[14]
Ibid
[15]
Wells, B. K. The Archaeology and Epigraphy of Indus Writing (Archaeopress, 2015)
[16]
Ancient symbols, computational linguistics, and the reviewing practice of the general science
journals, Computational Lingusistics, Volume 36, Number 3, 2010
[17]
Entropy, the Indus Script, and Language: A Reply to R. Sproat, Rajesh P.N. Rao, Computational
Linguistics 36(4), 2010
[18]
Hinduism and Law: An Introduction, Cambridge University Press, 2010, p-57
[19]
Down To Earth, May 15, 1994, R. S. Bisht, P-26
[20]
https://www.harappa.com/slide/weights-harappa
[21]
Kesavan Veluthat, The temple and the State in medieval South India, Sage Publication, 2017
[22]
Annual Report of the Archaeological Survey of India, 1926-27, Edited by Sir John Marshall,
1930, p-222-223
[23]
The decline of and fall of the Indus Civilisation, Nayanjot Lahiri, p222
[24]
The homeland of Indo-European languages and culture: some thoughts, Robert Raikes
[25]
Indian Archaeology – A review 1999 – 2000, p-142
[26] th
Upinder Singh, A history of ancient India: From Stone age to the 12 century, P-185
[27]
How deep are the roots of Indian civilisation? An archaeological and historical perspective –
B.B. Lal, P-15
[28]
Encyclopaedia of India-China cultural contacts, Vol I, p-3
[29]
Ibid
[30]
Anabasis of Alexander, Book IV
[31]
Ibid
[32]
Ibid
[33]
Ibid
[34]
Ibid, p-85
[35]
Sanjeev Sanyal, The Ocean of Churn, p-224
[36]
Submergence of Poompuhar – Study based on underwater explorations and coastal processes,
2004, NIO
[37]
Onshore and Near Shore Explorations along the Southern Tamilnadu Coast: with a View to
Locating Ancient Ports and Submerged Sites, NIO, Gaur & Sundaresh
[38]
Ibid
[39]
Ancient India as described by Megasthenes and Arrian, McCrindle J.W., 1877
[40]
Pataliputra excavation, B.P. Sinha and Lala Aditya Narain, The Directorate of Archaeology and
Museums, Bihar, 1970
[41]
Ibid
[42]
Early Maritime Activities of Orissa on the East Coast of India: Linkages in Trade and Cultural
Developments, Sila Tripathi, 2002
[43]
An Indian trader in ancient Bali?, Lansing J.S, Antiquity Publications, 2004, p-287
[44]
Religions of Iran: From prehistory to the present, Richard Foltz
[45]
The Book of Liang
[46]
B.N. Mukherjee, The great Kushan testament, Indian Museum Bulletin, Calcutta 1995
[47]
Land Route or Sea Route? Commentary on the Study of the Paths of Transmission and Areas in
which Buddhism Was Disseminated during the Han Period, Xiuqin Zhou, 2004, Sino-Platonic
papers, p-26/27
[48]
History of Central Asia, Vol. 2, UNESCO publication
[49]
Ibid
[50]
Ibid
[51]
Ibid
[52]
Ibid
[53]
The questions of king Milinda, T.W. Rhys Davids, 1890
[54]
Ibid
[55]
The Kushan civilisation: Urban development and material culture, Dr. B.R. Mani, 2013
[56]
Ibid
[57]
Ibid
[58]
Ibid
[59]
Alberuni’s India, Dr. Edward C. Sachau, 1888
[60]
A Shunga inscription from Ayodhya, RDBR Sahni, Epigraphic Indica Vol 20, ASI, P – 54-58
[61]
Farley P. Richmond; Darius L. Swann; Phillip B. Zarrilli (1993). Indian Theatre: Traditions of
Performance
[62]
Manomohan Ghosh, The Natyashastra, 1951, Asiatic society of Bengal
[63]
Ibid
[64]
Ibid
[65]
TheHindu.com, Christian Missionaries used Panchatantra translation to convert Japanese: expert,
13-01-2016
[66]
Prof. Dr. Salahuddin Mohd. Shamsuddin, Place of ‘Panchatantra’ in the world of Literatures,
British Journal of Humanities and Science, December 2013, Vol 10 (2)
[67]
A reference to the imagined author of Panchatantra
[68]
Bhavana K.R. & Shreevathsa, Medical Geography in Charaka Samhita, 2014, P-371-377
[69]
Ray, Gupta & Roy, Sushrut Samhita (a scientific synopsis), 1980, p-424-438
[70]
Kaviratna & Sharma, The Charaka Samhita, Vol2, 1913, P547-548
[71]
Mukhopadhyay & Sharma, Cataract surgery in Susruta Samhita, Ancient Science of Life, Vol No.
XI No.3 & 4, January – April 1992, Pages 169 - 173
[72]
Grzybowski & Ascaso, Acta Ophthalmologica, Vol 92, Issue 2, 2014 p - 194-197
[73]
Ibid
[74]
columbiasurgery.org, History of medicine: Ancient Indian nose job & the origin of plastic
surgery
[75]
Peter Hopkirk, Foreign Devils On The Silk Road, 1988, p – 35
[76]
Ibid
[77]
Subhash C. Kak, Astronomy of the Shatapatha Brahmana, Indian Journal of History of Science,
28(1), 1993, p - 16
[78]
Vedanga Jyotish of Lagadha, Indian National Science Academy, 1984
[79]
R.N. Iyengar, On Some Comet Observations in Ancient India, Journal of Geological Society of
India, V.67, March 2006
[80]
R.N. Iyengar , Comets And Meteoritic Showers In The Rig Veda And Their Significance, Indian
Journal of History of Science, 45.1 (2010)
[81]
Kripa Shankar Shukla, The Surya Siddhanta with commentary of Parameshvara, 1957
[82]
Ibid
[83]
Shukla & Sarma, Aryabhatiya or Aryabhatta, Indian National Science Academy, 1976
[84]
L. Sigler, Fibonacci’s Liber Abaci, Springer science+Business media, New York, 2003
[85]
Svami Satya Prakash Saraswati & Usha Jyotishmati, The Bakshali Manuscript, 1979
[86]
https://www.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/bodley/news/2017/sep-14
[87]
Ibid
[88]
Larson and Bhattacharya, The Encyclopaedia of Indian Philosophies, Volume 4, Princeton
University Press, pages 107-109
[89]
Richard Davis, Wilkins, Kashinath, Hastings and the First English Bhagvad Gita, International
Journal of Hindu Studies, 19, 1-2, 2015
[90]
Ibid
[91]
Artificial languages: Asian backgrounds or influences?, IIAS Newsletter, #30, March 2003
[92]
Knowledge representation in Sanskrit and artificial intelligence, AI Magazine, Vol 6, Number 1
(1985)
[93]
Aspects of the theory of syntax, Noam Chomsky, The MIT Press, 1965
[94]
James Legge, A record of Buddhist Kingdoms, Oxford, 1886
[95]
Ibid
[96]
Ibid
[97]
Great Tang records on the western regions, Vol I&II, Samuel Beal, Trubner & Co.
[98]
http://www.silk-road.com/artl/heph.shtml
[99]
Chapter, ‘Of assimilation and integration’
[100]
Buddhist records of the western world, Samuel Beal, Vol II, Trubner & Co. Ludgate Hill
[101]
Kappe Arabhatta inscription, Badami
[102]
The Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Pune
[103]
Worshipping Siva and Buddha: The Temple Art of East Java, Ann R. Kinney, Marijke J. Klokke,
Lydia Kieven, University of Hawaii Press, 2003
[104]
Andre Wink Al-Hind: The Slave Kings and the Islamic Conquest, Vol 2, Brill, 1992
[105]
Ibid p-121
[106]
Ibid 122
[107]
Ibid 122