Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Subject: History

Lesson: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Course Developers :

1.1: The historiography of early India

Prof. Bhairabi Prasad Sahu
Department of History, University of Delhi

1.2: Early Indian notions of history

Dr. Naina Dayal
Assistant Professor, St. Stephen's College, University of
Delhi

1.3.1.1: Source and tools of historical reconstruction:

literary sources - I
1.3.1.2: Source and tools of historical reconstruction:
literary sources - II
Dr. Shonaleeka Kaul
Assistant Professor, Department of History, University of
Delhi

1.3.2: Source and tools of historical reconstruction: literary

sources: archaeology as a grassroot approach to the
Indian past
Prof. Nayanjot Lahiri
Professor, Department of History, University of Delhi

1.3.3: Source and tools of historical reconstruction: literary

sources: epigraphy and numismatics

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Shibani Bose
Ph.D. Scholar, Department of History, University of Delhi

1.4.1: Recent trends in historical interpretations: the

historiography of gender in ancient Indian history
Dr. Uma Chakravarti
Associate Professor (retired), Miranda House, University of
Delhi

1.4.2: Recent trends in historical interpretations:

environment, technology, and regions
Dr. Supriya Verma
Associate Professor, Miranda House, University of Delhi
Language Editors:
Naina Dayal
Assistant Professor, St. Stephen's College, University of
Delhi

Veena Sachdev
University of Delhi

Production Editor: Ashutosh Kumar

Assistant Professor, Lady Shri Ram College, University of
Delhi

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Table of contents

Chapter 1: Indian history

 1.1: The historiography of early India
 1.2: Early Indian notions of history
 1.3.1.1: Sources and tools of historical reconstruction: literary sources - I
 1.3.1.2: Sources and tools of historical reconstruction: literary sources - II
 1.3.2: Sources and tools of historical reconstruction: archaeology as a
grass roots approach to the Indian past
 1.3.3: Sources and tools of historical reconstruction: epigraphy and
numismatics
 1.4.1: Recent trends in historical interpretation: the historiography of
gender in ancient Indian history
 1.4.2: Recent trends in historical interpretations: environment, technology
and regions
 Summary
 Exercises
 Glossary
 Further readings

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

1.1: The historiography of early India

Introduction

Historiography, as distinguished from history, deals with the art of writing history across
time. Like the railways and present day universities, modern writings on early India began
in colonial times. This does not mean that we did not have our own traditions of writing
history, but the kind of history that we are now used to made its beginning in the last phase
of the 18th century with the establishment of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. Sir William Jones
and his contemporaries laid the foundations of this new effort. What we had earlier were
Puranic genealogies, biographies and monastic and temple chronicles which contained
aspects of our historical tradition. However, they also represented a complex mix of legends
and historical facts, posing difficulties of separating one from the other. Unless one has
knowledge of the legends, mythology and the Epic-puranic stories it is difficult to recover
history from these sources. In other words, history is there in these records but it is not
open and obvious. Modern late 18th and 19th century history in Europe was focused on the
state, nobility, military and administrative history. It was based on an awareness of
evidence, causation or explanation of happenings, emphasis on chronology and narration
involving a succession of sequences. From James Mill in the early part of the 19 th century to
Vincent Smith in the first decade of the 20 th century British administrative scholars produced
a series of influential works. They had two advantages. First, as the pioneers they were the
first to make use of the advances made in the knowledge about early India largely owing to
the discovery of old historical sites and developments in studies relating to ancient Indian
literature, inscriptions and coinage. The gradual advance in archaeological information also
enriched the source base, though much of the written history was derived from literary
evidence. Secondly, as colonial masters they had control over the generation and spread of
knowledge among the administrators and the emerging university systems. In the early
stages Indians as people with local wisdom and as translators were involved in the process,
but they did not control or provide direction to it.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Colonial Indology

Colonial Indology or imperialist historiography defined what they deemed to be the

characteristic features of Indian culture and civilization. The continuous presence of petty
states and the absence of large political systems or their periodic presence owing to foreign
influence, beginning with the Aryan invasion; the absence of popular participation in local
affairs; Indians as people immersed in religion or the search for things spiritual and the
harmonious, unchanging self-sufficient village are among the ideas whose origins go back to
this historiography. So also the communal periodization of Indian history into Hindu India,
Muslim India, etc. owes its emergence to James Mill‘s multi-volume History of British India.
The basic premises of Indian history and civilization laid down by Mill continued to cast their
shadow on the works of Smith, separated in time by almost a century. Almost 15% of his
work Early History of India was devoted to the successful campaigns of Alexander in India,
and his inability to appreciate the Harshacharita and the description of India at the death of
Harsha as relapsing into its usual chaos are seen as examples of his inability to appreciate
things realistically. Montstuart Elphinstone, located between these two towering figures,
despite his sympathetic understanding of India did not feel confident to contest Mill. His
cautious style of writing lacked intensity and did not win him many admirers. Stages in
history do not end or begin with the going or coming of rulers with particular religious
beliefs and practices. Changes in economy, society, and culture help us to mark a break
between periods in history. India being characterized by diversity on grounds of multiple
regions, religions, languages and ethinicity and ever threatening to fall apart was yet
another invention of colonial Indology.

Value addition: did you know?

What V. Smith had to say
― The triumphant progress of Alexander from the Himalaya to the sea demonstrated
the inherent weakness of great Asiatic armies when confronted with European skill
and discipline.‖

The Harshacarita according to V.Smith was ―amazingly clever, though irritating

performance; executed in the worst possible taste and yet containing passages of
admirable and vivid description.‖

Source: Smith, V. Early History of India, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 112, 343.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Admittedly, these scholars made enormous contributions to various areas of study enabling
the recovery and piecing together of the past. However, in trying to examine them and
understand the implications of their assumptions and purpose it is said that the underlying
belief was the superiority of English and European cultural heritage and inferiority of the
Indian inheritance. It has been argued that the downplaying of the Indian past was
deliberate and done to justify British colonialism. The unchanging caste system and village
society or life-threatening diversity or even the numerous petty despotic states could be
reformed and held together only through the continuation of the British Raj. It needs to be
remembered that analytical categories like caste and Indian village became important for
colonial writings only in the second phase or pre-Mutiny period of British rule. The first stage
was marked by an uncritical glorification and the creation of an idyllic picture of our ancient
past, when the Shakuntalam and Manusmriti were translated into English. This period of
romantic love with India was followed by what is usually described as the Utilitarian
indictment of India‘s past. The colonial masters were gradually faced with problems of
administering the conquered territories, they had to understand India. That led to the
cataloguing of knowledge and invention of categories to understand and address India.
Some of these developments can also be located in the intellectual history of Europe of the
19th century. At that time the construction of the other was important to the construction of
the European self-image. The European assumptions of being on a civilizing mission or
representing enlightened nation states could be justified only by contrasting it with the
retrograde colonies, which were unchanging and had no history.

Nationalist historiography

Educated Indians read and interacted with British writings on early India and because of this
exposure wanted to know more about the past and if possible absolve it of some of the
charges made by British scholars. In the process the nationalist views revolved around
those proposed by the colonialists. It is therefore generally agreed that despite their
opposition to the British they did not go beyond the colonial framework of analysis and, in
fact, were rooted in it. Between the last quarter of the 19th century and the 1940s in general
we had a large number of eminent Indian historians actively engaged in deciphering early
India. They ranged from R.G. Bhandarkar and R.C. Dutt through K. P. Jayaswal and R. K.
Mookherji to H. C. Raychaudhuri and R. C. Majumdar. As with the imperialist historiography,
so also in this case there were different strands within the nationalist writings. The works of
Bhandarkar and Dutt, for example, though imbued with the spirit of nationalism were not
rabidly jingoist. The nationalists approvingly cited the early British (Orientalist) works
because they were considered to be sympathetic to India, and accepted the ideas of
spiritual India and village republics largely owing to their contemporary suitability. It was
believed that India achieved a degree of spiritual and moral development unmatched by the
west. Similarly, self-sufficient villages meant local self-governance, and more importantly
they were the units of mobilization in the national movement. The idea of a common group

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of Indo-European languages and their association with the Aryans was approvingly
accepted. It established a common ancestry between the colonial masters and the Indian
subjects. What was not seen was that it introduced a racial interpretation of Indian history
by differentiating between the incoming Aryans and Dravidians or the local inhabitants.

As the freedom struggle progressed early Indian history was called upon to prove the
existence of democracy, self-government, checks and balances and so on. The discovery
and translation of the Arthashastra came as a boon for the nationalists. They went on to
assert the existence of political theory, a pan-Indian centralized empire and welfare state,
among a host of other claims. Private ownership in land, constitutional monarchy, republics,
shipping and maritime activities and local government in early India were being argued for
by K. P. Jayaswal and R. K. Mookherji. Jayaswal‘s Hindu Polity and Mookherji‘s The
Fundamental Unity of India were among their most influential works. The introduction of the
concept of Golden Ages interspersed with Dark Ages marked by political disunity or the
absence of large political formations questioned, even if indirectly, the idea of Oriental
Despotism or an unchanging society.

The period was also characterized by the emergence of regional histories, most of which
came from Bengal and the Tamil south. Small battles were transformed into major wars and
local heroes were unduly glorified. The idea of Indian colonies in south-east Asia or their
evolution largely owing to Indian influence was a product of these times and had its greatest
exponent in R. C.Majumdar. It is suggested that it was an extension of the same approach
which the colonial historians adopted in the study of early India, the idea that all that was
good necessarily came from outside. Such ideas also partly compensated for contemporary
India‘s colonial subjection. No matter if they were a colony at present, they themselves had
colonies in the glorious past. In short, all that was good in the early part of the 20th century
was there in some form in the early cultural past. The nationalist historiography did not
make a distinction between Aryan, Hindu and early India and all that was good was
assigned to it. In the process they reinforced the communal divide in the periodization of
Indian history. Writing regional histories, building a history of resistance and creating
regional Rajput, Maratha and Sikh heroes in their fight against the Muslims only
compounded the problem. However, they also fostered national awakening, generated a
sense of pride in the past and provided justification for the freedom struggle.

Like colonial historians, nationalist historians too accepted the sources at face value and
many were selectively used. Actually, two conflicting nationalist histories or nationalisms
were at play, one representing the British and the other the Indians. Both erred on the side
of excess, but also focused on the role of ideology in writing history. However, they
provided the foundation for the evolution of sober history. The works of historians such as
K. A. N. Sastri, A. Appadorai on south India and A. S. Altekar on women and state and
government emerged in that background. The most important contribution of the
nationalists was that they laid bare new sources of information. When it is said that the

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Guptas did not invent nationalism but it was nationalism that invented the Guptas, it is this
aspect that is being emphasized. New sources brought Gupta history alive. Macro-
generalizations or in many cases generalizations made from the perspective of north India
continued to characterize the works of the nationalist historians, a tendency which they
shared with colonial writings.

Figure 1.1.1: K. P. Jayaswal

Source: http://www.indiapicks.com/stamps/Gallery/1981-83/1027_KP_Jayaswal.jpg

Figure 1.1.2: R. C. Majumdar

Source: Singh, Upinder. 2009. A History of Ancient and Eraly Medieval India: From Stone
Age to the 12th Century. New Delhi: Pearson Education, 8.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

New conceptual historiography

By the middle of the 20th century the use of inscriptional data along with the basic textual
material can be seen in the works of U. N. Ghoshal, A. N. Bose and K. M. Gupta who began
to work on themes revolving around the agrarian system, social relations and rural economy
and land systems in north and south India. Work of this nature brought together factual
details from different sources, cutting across time and space. It did not allow the working
out of processes of change with regard to any institution or region. The explanation of
society and economy within incorporative frameworks was unknown. Perspectives on early
India have undergone significant changes from the middle of the 1950s and 1960s with the
publication of the major works of D. D. Kosambi and R. S. Sharma. Since then social and
economic history, with bearing on polity and culture, has occupied centre stage. Early India,
encompassing both the early historical and early medieval periods, instead of being seen as
a period dominated by numerous dynasties and their wars came to be perceived in terms of
socio-economic stages. Explanations of change centering around political authority and
invasion made way for environment, technology and economic life in this Marxist
historiography. Whether the Vedic people had access to iron or not, or why the rise of
Magadha, emergence of urban centres and new religious movements happen to coincide in
the middle of the first millennium BC in the middle Ganga plains, or what was the
relationship between the newly emerging social and political formations and the Bhakti
movement in and around the Gupta period were the kind of questions that were asked and
addressed. Early India was not just visualized in terms of the early historical and the early
medieval, the first extending up to and including the Gupta period, and the second covering
the succeeding six to seven centuries. Within these phases other stages have also been
worked out. While the later Vedic period has been seen as a transitional stage anticipating
the coming of complex society, the Age of the Buddha is seen as being characterized by
peasant production, urbanization and state society. The Mauryan period then is seen as
being marked by centralized state control of the economy. The early medieval period
similarly has been perceived in terms of two stages, the seventh-tenth and tenth-thirteenth
centuries. It needs to be mentioned that despite many things in common between the
writings of Kosambi and Sharma, there are differences too. Kosambi was interested in the
examination of the relationship between multiple processes of change happening at the
same time, as in the middle of the first millennium BC or the middle of the first millennium
AD, without tying them in a formal universal pattern. However, Sharma tried to link them as
cause and consequence within neat theoretical frameworks.

The new historiography went on to become the dominant historiography during the late
1960s and 1970s. It won admirers and adherents in various parts of the country,
importantly in east and south India. The works of M. G. S. Narayanan and R. N. Nandi on
early and early medieval south India immediately come to mind. Its ability to provide
straight line arguments and capacity for generalizations made for easy understanding. In a

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

situation where people knew only what happened in the past and not why or how it
happened such straight line arguments as iron-productivity-surplus-complex society and
land grants-political and fiscal fragmentation-feudalism had an enormous attraction. That
the state could have an economic basis and that new religious movements would have a
social foundation were deeply stimulating and attractive ideas of the time. Briefly stated,
this historiography characterized the early historical and early medieval periods in
opposition to each other. The early historical period is seen as marked by peasant
production, comparatively less unequal distribution of land if not produce, horizontal spread
of urban centres and artisanal production, monetization of the economy and wide ranging
exchange networks, including maritime trade. Although society was stratified, it is seen to
be less hierarchical and exploitative than in early medieval times. The vaishyas and shudras
as the basic tax payers and source of labour bore the brunt of society. The beginning of the
early medieval period is explained in terms of a crisis, which was a consequence of the
decline of trade, decay of urban centres and the Kali Age crisis, threatening to turn society
upside down. The early medieval period which is perceived as feudal is said to have been
characterized, besides the above traits, by a paucity of metallic money, fragmentation of
political authority (owing to land grants), a predominantly agrarian economy, relative shifts
in the status of the vaishyas and shudras, numerical expansion of castes, loss of mobility of
artisans, traders and peasants, localization of crafts and the emergence of self-sufficient,
closed economic units. The rise of a dominant class of landlords continuously maximizing its
collection of rents and a subjected, servile peasantry, suffering numerous restraints, it is
argued, finally resulted in rural unrest, even revolts. It may be remembered that the details
of this summarized presentation have not remained the same over the last forty years, nor
do the followers of the ―Indian Feudalism‖ school subscribe to identical views. For example,
the explanation of the transition to the early medieval period has shifted over time and not
all of them share the same perspective on early medieval dynamism and change. The tribal
basis of Indian history and the coexistence of people at different stages of social and
cultural competence, pointing to uneven patterns of growth within the country, was
recognized and acknowledged by this historiography. Yet in the final analysis they
continuously resorted to engaging in wider generalizations.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.1.3: D. D. Kosambi

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damodar_Dharmananda_Kosambi

Value addition: did you know?

How D. D. Kosambi defined history
―….history is defined as the presentation, in chronological order, of successive
developments in the means and relations of production.‖

Source: Kosambi, D. D. An Introduction to the Study of Indian History,

Bombay: Popular Book Depot, 1.

Alternative perspectives

In the later part of the 1970s and the early 1980s some discomfort with the historiography
under discussion was visible. It was being realized that economic developments could be
influenced by factors other than economic. Stratification of society, social requirements, and
the distribution and channelization of resources were as important as their production and
availability. Explanations based on technology and economic factors alone had to make way
for the interplay of multiple forces. The shift in perspectives on early India can be seen in
the writings of Romila Thapar, B. D. Chattopadhyaya and Hermann Kulke. Perspectives tend
to change depending on the kind of questions historians ask, the variety of sources they use
and the methods they adopt. The Mauryan economy was usually seen in terms of state

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

control over all sectors across the empire, largely drawing on the Arthashastra. Recent
researches, by looking at the regional material cultures brought to light by archaeology and
moving away from the traditional treatment of literary sources, have modified our
understanding of the period. Archaeology has revealed the coexistence and interaction
between multiple cultures at different levels of growth. Prosperity during the said period was
largely limited to Gangetic northern India and its fringes. It is also being recognized that
empires by their nature accommodated different spaces and varied societies, resulting in
the uneven depth of administration across regions. There is a tendency to equate a state
system such as the Mauryan state or the Satavahana state with a socio-economic system or
to generalize from the perspective of Gangetic northern India for the whole country. What is
missed is the unevenness in material culture between regions, and even sub-regions.
Historians are beginning to recognize these differences and working out the patterns of
social and cultural changes in different regions. To elaborate, in post-Mauryan Deccan while
coastal Andhra owed its prosperity to agriculture, the economy of the central Deccan
(Telengana region) was largely sustained by artisanal production, including the smelting and
forging of iron tools, and trade. Similarly the post-Mauryan centuries instead of being seen
only in terms of money, trade and towns are also beginning to be understood in terms of
agrarian expansion, local state formation and the spread of Vedic-shastric ideas in regions
outside the Gangetic plains. This period is perceived as being crucial to the consolidation
and spread of Brahmanical ideas. In the Gupta and post-Gupta period the process of
continuous agrarian expansion created conditions for the coexistence of developing and
developed areas in many regions of the country. Settled areas (janapada) and forests
(aranya), in spite of representing different kinds of spaces, existed in a relationship of
interaction and change and not necessarily in opposition to each other. Settlements were
dependent on forests for a variety of resources and the former could with the passage of
time induce spatial and social changes in the latter.

The idea of a general crisis and decline characterizing the movement from the early
historical to the early medieval, despite the acceptance of agrarian expansion in the regions
during the same period, has been questioned in recent years by historians who focus on
the processes of change and the gradual phased integration of spaces, economy, society
and polity. Though it is admitted that early medieval India experienced several processes of
change it is treated in continuity with the early historical phase. The focus is on the
historical transformation of the regions outside Gangetic northern India and the changes
coming from within local societies, leading to the shaping of the agrarian regions. Agrarian
expansion and the peasantization of tribes, local state formation and the geographical
extension of state societies, as well as caste formation and the placement of different
groups in a hierarchy in society, with reference to the varna scheme, are seen as the major
developments in the early medieval centuries. The rise of new deities, emergence of
integrative cult centres, temples and monasteries also characterized the period. Instead of
generalizing across regions and centuries and creating long lasting stable structures, this
alternative historiography shows regional variations and changes over time. Rural
settlements are shown to be of many types: village (grama), hamlet (palli), herders‘
habitation (ghosha), etc. All the villages did not have everything. Their composition varied.
If one had a temple, the other had a tank and yet another had a cremation ground. The

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implication being that there was inter-village cooperation because all the three facilities
were necessary to all. The social composition of the villages also varied. Some were
brahmana settlements, others non-brahmana settlements and still some others had a mixed
population. It is shown that settlements did not remain the same all through, they changed
with time. While some became rural exchange centres, there were others which became
important local markets and centres of political interest for purposes of revenue and
purchase of long-distance goods. As in the case of rural settlements and rural society, it is
said, there were several grades of exchange centres and traders too. The historical
complexity and variety across regions receive their due in the recent writings. In some
cases they disturb long cherished notions and that is but natural. Advances are always
made building on work already done. Earlier ideas about rural settlements, rural society, the
village community, trade and towns are being questioned. Like all informed discussions the
debate on what constitutes early medieval India or what were its markers has opened up
new possibilities.

Archaeology has enriched our understanding of early India. It has given rise to new sets of
questions bearing on the spread of agriculture, urbanization, state, crafts, money, trade and
literacy. The numerous archaeological cultures ( Black and Red Ware, Ochre Coloured
Pottery, Copper Hoards, Painted Grey Ware, etc) dated between the later half of the second
millennium BC and the middle of the first millennium BC suggesting mutual contacts and
adaptations have helped us to move away from invasion and colonization as explanatory
categories for change. These Chalcolithic and Iron Age cultures are important because they
make it possible to shift from the primacy of literature to a greater reliance on
archaeological evidence to understand the long-term history of the spread of settlements,
agriculture, crafts, trade and technology. All of these developments did not begin with the
early historical period, their origins can be traced to the proto-historic cultures of different
regions. The presence of high-value grave goods, including iron objects, at some megalithic
sites in Vidarbha suggests social differentiation even in these early Iron Age cultures. The
importance of the proto-historic data in any long-term understanding of resource use,
exchange, craft production and social organization can not be missed. In fact, recent
researches on the transition to the early historical phase in Gangetic north India, the
Deccan, and south India point to the importance of such evidence. The use of statistical
methods in the analysis of archaeological data in some cases has been quite rewarding
insofar as it has produced meaningful patterns and enriched our understanding of past
lifeways. In the case of south India where inscriptions are plentiful, N.Karashima,
Y.Subbarayalu and their colleagues have used the same method to find out patterns over
time in revenue terms, status terms and the history of rural settlements. The history of the
intrusion of the state and the change in agrarian relations in brahmana and non-brahmana
settlements have been lucidly worked out through the application of the said method in the
study of inscriptions. Works on early medieval India are increasingly becoming inscription-
based. Apart from other advantages, they have helped us to move away from the
Dharmasastra-based prescriptive or ideally desirable positions on state and society. In these
days of inter-disciplinarity, historians are also familiar with ideas from political science,
economics and anthropology. Concepts such as lineage, clan, tribe, royal sovereignty,
popular participation and consent, surplus and the ways in which it is generated are used to

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

explain and understand pre-literate and complex societies. For example, Burton Stein‘s
much criticized characterization of the Chola state as segmentary derived from his
perception of the structure and functioning of Alur society in Africa.

The history of caste, shudras, untouchables, Bhakti, tantricism, temples as sites of

interaction, and women in society and gender relations, as distinguished from 'the position
of women' perspective, are part of a wider canvas of history. They are related to issues such
as social differentiation, social mobility and state formation and can not be treated in
isolation. Technology or economy is no longer seen as the only agency of change. Social
differentiation could emerge from different sources. It could be the association or absence
of association with economic resources or political power. State formation as an area of
study shows how one aspect of society cannot be studied to the exclusion of the other. An
agrarian base, settlements, and some kind of social differentiation are necessary for the
emergence of the state. However, once the state was in place it could, and in fact it did,
influence changes in each of the aforesaid areas. Again, both the developing and developed
states needed social acceptance and support to continue, and they made use of religious
ideas, temples, monasteries and brahmanas to achieve their objective. Such examples, and
there can be many more, highlight the interplay of numerous forces in the making of
history.

Summing up

It is clear that no history is written in a vacuum. All writing is a response to an existing

tradition. Histories could, and in fact did, get influenced by the intellectual climate of their
times. The colonialist and nationalist historiographies amply demonstrate it. Normally we
look for the differences between one school of writing and another. That it is not necessarily
always true can be again seen in the case of the two above mentioned historiographies.
They were mostly interested in the same issues but modified the arguments to suit their
own interests. Similarly on the issue of engaging in broader generalizations, so as to make
the emerging patterns easily understandable, there is much in common between these two
schools and the Marxist or new conceptual historiography. Generalizations have their
advantages, but they also tend to ignore regional specificities in terms of environment, soil
type and social structure. Usually there is a tendency to treat each historiography as being
undifferentiated or homogeneous. Nevertheless, there are differences within each school;
and that needs to be recognized. Among the nationalists Bhandarkar, Jayaswal and
Majumdar can not be seen to be the same. That will be doing injustice to their scholarship
and contribution. It may be useful to remember that when we speak about the movement
from one variety of historiography to another we are only referring to the shift in the
dominant way of writing. There can never be a neat break nor for that matter can a style of
writing end one fine morning. There will always be overlaps. In the later part of the 1960s

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

and 1970s, when there had already been a decisive shift towards Marxist historiography,
other forms of writing did not end. In the course of historiographical shifts, with the passage
of time, explanations for change have also undergone change: from outside influences and
invasions through technology and economic factors to the mutual interplay of several
factors. The kind of history that is produced is not just dependent on the availability of
sources, but also on the sets of questions that are asked and the perspectives that are
made to bear on the sources. Significant shifts in early Indian historiography were possible
from the later part of the 1950s and 1960s largely because of the change in the issues that
were raised and addressed. Looking back from the present the earlier historiographies may
not appear to be very attractive. Nevertheless, it needs to be recognized that we are where
we are largely because they laid the foundations and others built on it.

1.2: Early Indian notions of history

Did early Indians lack a sense of history?

It is often said that the first truly historical work produced in India was Kalhana's
Rajatarangini (River of Kings). This consists of eight books, each called a taranga (wave),
and is composed in Sanskrit verse. The Rajatarangini contains an account of the rulers of
Kashmir, from the earliest ones to those of the 12th century CE, the period of its author.
Kalhana was a brahmana, the son of a minister, and he drew on a range of sources --
monuments, coins, inscriptions, royal orders, manuscripts and his family members' and his
own recollections of recent times -- to write his history of Kashmir. He also attempted to
explain past events, but often ended up invoking fate. Nevertheless, the Rajatarangini, with
its awareness of evidence, interest in causation and sequential narrative, is recognizable as
a work of history. However, it is a text of the early 2nd millennium CE.

When 18th/19th century European scholars looked for histories of early India, they found
very little that conformed to their idea of what a history should be. They concluded that
early India was deficient in history-writing. This lack was linked with Indian notions of time.
Indian scales of time were regarded as fantastically large, and Indians were accused of
subscribing to the view that time flows in cycles, according to which every period of time
invariably returns, every event is repeated, and nothing is unique. And the theory of cyclical
time was regarded as a hindrance to the development of a true, linear historical sense.
While nationalist histories developed in opposition to imperial frames, scholars like R.C.
Majumdar, nevertheless, accepted the idea that history was relatively underdeveloped as a
branch of early Indian literature.

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Value addition: did you know?

What James Mill had to say about the 'chronology and ancient
history of the Hindus'
James Mill's enormously influential The History of British India was first published in
1817. It was used as a text-book at the 'East India College' at Haileybury, close to
London, where young men were trained before being posted to India. This is what
Mill has to say at the beginning of the first chapter of the first volume of his three-
volume History:

'Rude nations seem to derive a peculiar gratification from pretensions to a remote

antiquity. As a boastful and turgid vanity distinguishes remarkably the oriental
nations they have in most instances carried their claims extravagantly high….

The present age of the world, according to the system of the Hindus, is distinguished
into four grand periods, denominated yugas. The first is the Satya yuga,
comprehending 1,728,000 years; the second the Treta yuga, comprehending
1,296,000 years; the third the Dwapar yuga, including 864,000 years; and the
fourth the Kali yuga, which will extend to 432,000 years. Of these periods the first
three are expired, and in the year 1817 of the Christian era, 4911 of the last. From
the commencement, therefore, of the Satya yuga, to the present time, is
comprehended a space of 3,892,911 years, the antiquity to which this people lay
claim.'

Mill roundly condemns such 'Hindu statements' which are 'not only carried to the
wildest pitch of extravagance, but are utterly inconsistent', and pronounces that their
'wildness and inconsistency … place them beyond the sober limits of truth and
history'.
Source: Mill, James. 1990 reprint. The History of British India. Vol. 1. New
Delhi: Atlantic Publishers & Distributors, 24, 27.

It is, however, possible to adopt a different approach. Romila Thapar makes a distinction
between 'embedded history' and 'externalized history'. Embedded history is where historical
consciousness can only be extracted with effort, as in myth, epic and genealogy.
Externalized history, on the other hand, exhibits a more evident historical consciousness, as
in chronicles of regions and biographies of figures of authority. If we understand history as a
mode of reflecting about the past, we can argue that a sense of history is present in a
branch of early Indian literature -- in the itihasa-purana tradition. Even texts that invoke
divine forces and narratives that are set in cosmological time embed within themselves a
commentary on their present, while at the same time giving an account of the past.

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The dana-stutis and other fragmentary narratives in Vedic literature

Romila Thapar writes that embedded forms of history tend to be scattered. She draws
attention to the dana-stutis that are found in different parts of the Rig Veda (c. 2nd
millennium BCE). These are hymns in praise of gifts: bards composed eulogies on their
patrons who were often clan chiefs. The occasion for a stuti was a successful cattle raid
against a neighbouring community in which the chief and his followers captured a large
number of cattle. From the wealth he had acquired, the chief gave the bard cattle, horses,
gold, chariots and slave girls; and the bard recorded the hero's generosity in a stuti, usually
naming the donor. However, the dana-stutis were not just records of past liberality, they
also indicated what was expected from chiefs. Bards claimed that they could bestow
immortality on their patrons, and it is true that we know of some rajas from the dana-
stutis.

Extolling the raja's deeds was a part of sacrifices like the ashvamedha. From later Vedic
texts (c. 1st half of the 1st millennium BCE) we gather that a horse was let loose to wander
for a year as part of the yajna. During that period, vinagathins or lute-players -- one a
brahmana, the other a kshatriya -- sang about the raja's ritual and heroic accomplishments
every day at the place of sacrifice. One can note that only particular kinds of information
were preserved in the stutis and the songs of the vinagathins -- what was important from
the point of view of their bardic or brahmana or kshatriya composers. The achievements of
rajas were recorded. Not surprisingly, the composers of such eulogies did not proclaim their
patrons' failures. One can also note that it is likely that many of the narratives that were
later incorporated in the Sanskrit epics and Puranas developed from such stutis and gathas
(songs), as also from Vedic akhyanas (cycles of stories that commemorated heroes).

The Sanskrit epics: the Ramayana of Valmiki and the Mahabharata of Vyasa

Traditionally, the events of the Rama story are placed in the Tretayuga, and those of the
Mahabharata at the juncture between the Dvapara and Kali yugas; and the Kaliyuga is
believed to have begun in 3102 BCE. The Ramayana informs us that Valmiki saw Rama's
story with his mind's eye and turned the vision into the Ramayana; he did so when Rama
was ruling his kingdom. The Mahabharata tells us that Vyasa rose daily for three years and
created the Mahabharata; he did so after the Kurukshetra war, which ushered in the
Kaliyuga. The texts' information about their creation does not tally with the views of modern
scholars on the period of composition of the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. There is
broad agreement among scholars that, while the kernel of the stories contained in the texts
may date back to the early centuries of the 1st millennium BCE, as we have them now, the

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Ramayana and the Mahabharata are products of the final centuries BCE and early centuries
CE.

Value addition: did you know?

What does the word 'epic' mean? Why are the Ramayana and
the Mahabharata regarded as epics?
Epics recount tales of great heroes who undergo a series of adventures that test
their virtue and valour. Their stories encompass features like disputed succession to
an ancestral realm, abducted or humiliated wives, journeys through dangerous
uncharted lands and bloody wars – their heroes survive all this to emerge victorious.
In the form in which we have them, epics look back at a heroic age that has passed
and glorify values like bravery, honour, fortitude and unswerving obedience to duty.
Their heroes tend to have a special relationship with the gods – an epic hero could
be a part or an incarnation of a god, for instance. So, these texts bring together the
human and divine realms, often in the person of the hero.

As a genre, the epic is not only narrative and heroic, it also tends to be oral in origin.
And since such texts have generally been transmitted orally, their stories have been
told in a particular way. Each narrator has recounted the tale in his own manner –
dwelling, for instance, on a part that he likes or considers important, elucidating
right and wrong, and so on. In the process, epics have changed and grown. They
begin with a core text that describes historical happenings. Fresh material keeps on
being introduced around this – later events, new values and didactic matter are
added on and, during the evolution of an epic, the scale of the core incident is also
hugely inflated. Since all manner of material is added to such texts repeatedly over a
long period of time, we cannot speak of a narrowly defined ‗epic age‘.

The Ramayana and the Mahabharata display the features of epics. They are narrative
and heroic, and it is believed that the political situation they reflect predates the
period of their composition, that they look back at a past age. They are generally
held to be oral in origin. And scholars like J.L. Brockington have argued that the
Ramayana and the Mahabharata, like other epics, were composed over a long period
of time.
Source: Original

Traditionally, the Ramayana is regarded as a kavya -- a poem about idealized characters,

the Mahabharata is not. The latter is classified as itihasa, literally, 'thus (iti) indeed (ha) it
was (asa)'. However, we cannot say with certainty whether or not all the events described
in either epic are factually correct. Rather, modern scholars argue that the Ramayana and
the Mahabharata reflect historical processes of change. For instance, Romila Thapar draws

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attention to the difference in the system of governance in the chronologically early and late
portions of the Mahabharata. She writes that while much of the early layer indicates a
period a little before the emergence of the monarchical state, the later sections assume the
existence of well-established monarchies, and the text suggests the transition from 'lineage
to state'. Given that both the Ramayana and the Mahabharata are concerned with enduring
problems for rulers, such as determining the heir to the throne, it is not surprising that the
two texts contain genealogies. The Mahabharata contains the genealogy of the lunar line
(chandravamsha), and the Ramayana contains the genealogy of the solar line
(suryavamsha). While these genealogies may not be literally true, they do reflect an
attempt to capture and order the past or, to put it another way, a historical consciousness.

Value addition: what the sources say

The Bhrigus and the Mahabharata
Apart from genealogies of rulers, the Sanskrit epics contain genealogies of sages.
Here is one of the genealogies of the Bhrigus, an unconventional line of brahmanas,
who are an important presence in the Mahabharata:

'The blessed Lord Bhrigu issued forth by breaking open Brahma's heart. Bhrigu begot
the wise Shukra….A master of Yoga, he became the sagacious guru of the Daityas as
well as the Gods, remaining a celibate of wisdom and strict vows. And while this son
of Bhrigu was thus charged by the omnipresent One with the well-being of the
creatures, Bhrigu begot another flawless son, Chyavana, of the blazing
austerities….Manu's daughter Arushi became the wise Chyavana's wife, and from her
was born the greatly famous Aurva….His son was Richika, who begot Jamadagni.
Jamagadni begot four great-spirited sons, the last being Rama, not the least
endowed with virtues, skilled in all weapons and missiles, willful destroyer of the
barons [kshatriyas].'

In the Mahabharata, the Bhrigus act in ways that do not conform to the norms of
conduct for brahmanas set forth in the literature on dharma, including the
Mahabharata itself. They are associated with violence -- they are sometimes hostile
to kshatriyas, and sometimes even to the gods. Rama (Parashu Rama), for instance,
is said to have destroyed the kshatriyas of the earth over and over again. One can
ask why genealogies of sages are found in a text about a feud in a kshatriya family.
Perhaps such genealogies were important because they preserved information about
the legitimate transmission of knowledge. And the Bhrigu brahmanas are associated
with the codification and transmission of the Mahabharata within the text.
Source: van Buitenen, J. A. B. trans. 1973. The Mahabharata: The Book of
the Beginning. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 149-50.

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The Puranas

The Puranas, as we know them, are likely to have been composed from about the 4th-5th
centuries CE. The word purana refers to that which belongs to the past, and the texts
known as the Puranas suggest how the past was seen in the mid-1st millennium CE. The
Puranas contain narratives of beginnings. We are told, for instance, that the earth was ruled
by the Manus, of whom the first -- Manu Svayambhu -- was born of the god Brahma. A
great flood occurred at the time of a later Manu. Everything was submerged, but Manu, his
family and seven sages survived. Manu's children became the ancestors to many lineages.
In some versions of the story, Manu's eldest son -- Ikshvaku -- is said to be the ancestor of
the suryavamsha, and the youngest child -- Ila -- the progenitor of the chandravamsha. We
gather that rulers of the solar and lunar lineages ruled till the Mahabharata war. That event
is a time-marker: after an account of the war, the narrative goes on to chronicle the
dynasties of the Kaliyuga, the present corrupt age. Not surprisingly, the kings of the post-
war period are depicted as inferior to the suryavamshi and chandravamshi descendants of
Manu's progeny. They are often not of kshatriya stock, as rulers of the past were. It is
evident that people of mixed caste, those regarded as outcastes, shudras, foreigners and
others of impure origin, as well as upstarts could wield power in the Kaliyuga. The listing of
dynasties and their kings brings the account up to about the mid-1st millennium CE.

Value addition: interesting details

Genealogies in the future tense
Statements about what happened after the Mahabharata war are made in the future
tense in Puranic genealogies. So, the narrator says: 'I will now enumerate the kings who
will reign in future periods….' It is evident that the past lay in events that took place
before the war. The dynasties of the post-war period include the Shishunaga, Nanda,
Maurya, Shunga, Kanva and Andhra. The Guptas are mentioned towards the end of the
genealogical lists, and we are told that they will rule over the territories of Prayaga,
Saketa and Magadha. Does this indicate that the genealogies were put together in the
Gupta period? Was the future tense used so as to suggest that these rulers were
destined to rule? To assert their right to rule?
Source: Original

There is much in the Puranic genealogies that can be dismissed as fiction. However, it is
important to note that many of the rulers mentioned in these genealogies are also known
from other sources -- from inscriptions and coins, for instance. It seems that traditions of
recording the names of rulers as well as the duration of their reigns existed in early India.
The Puranic genealogies were one form in which such information was preserved. One may
also note that genealogies become significant at times that witness attempts to either
contest or consolidate power. Invoking genealogies at such times can be seen as a way of

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claiming an exalted status, and this would have been especially important when such claims
were tenuous. And scholars like Romila Thapar have drawn attention to the fact that rulers
of the post-Gupta period, many of them former underdogs, started latching on to kshatriya
genealogies to legitimize their power.

Prashastis and charitas

The Sanskrit epics and Puranas were composed in fairly simple Sanskrit verse. Although
Sanskrit learning was largely the preserve of the upper castes, and of brahmana men in
particular, these texts suggest that their contents may have been recounted before
audiences that included women and the lower castes. In other words, all sections of society
might have had access to the genealogies contained in the epics and Puranas. But there
were other texts that were probably meant for a more exclusive, elite audience. These were
usually written in ornate Sanskrit, and were associated with the royal court. This category of
texts includes prashastis (eulogistic inscriptions) and charitas (accounts of the lives of
great men).

While some of the earliest prashastis are in Prakrit, the best known are in Sanskrit. Such
inscriptions became common from around the 4th century CE. Perhaps the most famous
prashasti is Samudragupta's 4th century CE Allahabad pillar inscription, which is inscribed
on an Ashokan pillar. It was composed by Samudragupta's court poet and minister,
Harishena, in Sanskrit prose and verse, and eulogizes the Gupta king's military
achievements, cultural accomplishments and personality. It describes his victories over the
rulers of north India, and his expeditions to south India. It mentions rulers elsewhere who
acknowledged his supremacy. Samudragupta is depicted as an able and compassionate
king, his scholarship is praised, as are his musical performances and poetry. While it is likely
that some of the descriptions of Samudragupta's exploits are true, it is important to
remember that the text was composed by the king's court poet as a panegyric.

Banabhatta's Harshacharita is the oldest surviving royal biography in India, and one of the
best known. This 7th century CE text in complex Sanskrit prose presents a glowing picture
of Banabhatta's patron -- Harshavardhana. It contains an account of the ruler's ancestry
and his early life, and culminates with his accession to the thrones of Thanesar and Kanauj.
Not surprisingly, prashastis and charitas depict their authors' patrons as ideal monarchs.
This apart, it has been suggested that both kinds of eulogistic compositions may have been
especially useful in situations where rulers were somewhat vulnerable. The Allahabad
prashasti hints at a conflict regarding Samudragupta's claims to the Gupta throne, and
Harsha became king after the sudden death of his elder brother and also claimed the

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kingdom of his deceased brother-in-law. These two rulers may not have been the obvious
choice for rulership. And one can ask whether prashastis and charitas can be understood as
means of legitimizing kings whose right to the throne could have been questioned.

Value addition: what the sources say

The Harshacharita and Banabhatta
Given below is a long, complex, eulogistic sentence from the Harshacharita, which is
typical of the genre of charita:

'He [Harsha] was embraced by the goddess of Royal Prosperity, who took him in her
arms, and, seizing him by all the royal marks on all his limbs, forced him, however
reluctant, to mount the throne -- and this though he had taken a vow of austerity
and did not swerve from his vow, hard like grasping the edge of a sword; clinging
closely to duty through fear of stumbling in the uneven path of kings, and attended
with all her heart by Truth who had been abandoned by all other kings, but had
obtained his promise of protection, and waited on reverentially by the reflected
images of a fair handmaid standing near, which fell on his toe-nails, as if they were
the ten directions of space impersonate.'

In his biography of Harsha, Banabhatta also tells his audience about himself.
Interestingly, he describes himself as a Bhrigu brahmana. As has been mentioned
above, the Bhrigus are associated with the Mahabharata. In this way, among others,
Banabhatta links himself and his text with the itihasa tradition.
Source: Singh, Upinder. 2008. A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India:
From the Stone Age to the 12th Century. New Delhi: Pearson Education, 31;
Pathak, V. S. 1966. Ancient Historians of India: A Study in Historical
Biographies. Bombay: Asia Publishing House, 32-39.

Parallel traditions of historical writing and dating systems

There were traditions of historical writing other than those that were related to rulers. One
tradition was that of the Buddhist monastic chronicle. While focusing on the sangha or
monastic order, it included more general information about the history of the period.
Maintaining such records probably became more important as monasteries became wealthy
institutions, attracting patronage from the rich and the powerful. One may mention as
examples the Dipavamsa and the Mahavamsa, or the Sri Lankan chronicles, both composed
in Pali in the mid-1st millennium CE, but narrating events from earlier periods. The
Dipavamsa focuses on the coming of Buddhism to Sri Lanka and the establishment of the

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sangha. The Mahavamsa covers the same themes but also highlights the history of the
Mahavihara monastery, to which the author belonged. The history of the sangha was
integrated with the political history of Sri Lanka, and even with the rule of the Mauryas in
India, for Ashoka is said to have sent his son Mahinda to spread the message of Buddhism
to the island. The Buddhists not only maintained records of this sort, they also developed a
system of chronology, where major events were dated in terms of the number of years from
the death of the Buddha.

There were other systems of dating as well. One involved the use of regnal years. This was
a system in which kings took the first year of their reign as the starting point, counting the
years of their rule from that beginning. This system was used by the Mauryan ruler Ashoka,
who used dates derived from the time of his consecration. So, for instance, his 13th Major
Rock Edict tells us that he conquered Kalinga when he had been consecrated eight years.
Many different eras were also used in early India. Examples include the Vikrama era of 58
BCE, the Shaka era of 78 CE and the Gupta era of 319-20 CE. It is clear that cyclical time
was not the only concept of time known to people in early India. Linear time, too, was used
extensively -- in genealogies, biographies and chronicles, for instance. It is also clear that
different categories of early Indian texts exhibit a sense of history. We cannot always be
sure of the historicity of their contents, but we can be sensitive to the ways in which they
demonstrate a historical consciousness. We must remember, however, that these texts
suggest how elites reflected on the past, how they recorded and ordered it.

1.3.1.1: Sources and tools of historical reconstruction: literary

sources - I

Special features of early Indian literary sources

There are many sources for reconstructing ancient Indian history. These are usually studied
under two main heads: archaeological and literary sources. The latter in the Indian context
includes not only written texts but literature that for most of its formative phase was not
written down but transmitted orally, through memorization, from generation to generation.
Such texts were compiled and put down in writing much after they were composed -
sometimes centuries after. This creates a problem regarding the use of these sources for
history writing, since it is not clear which period - that of composition or of compilation –
they refer to.

Another peculiarity of works of early Indian literature is that they are rarely a single text;
they occur mostly as a corpus of several books or volumes which were not composed
together but at different points of time, again spread over centuries or even a thousand
years. This is called internal stratification: the multiple layers of time represented in a
single body of literature. Often even within a volume, different chapters may belong to
different time periods. Parts that get added on to the original story/narration over time are

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called later interpolations. These make dating the text, and the historian‘s task of sifting
through what the text contains, a complex affair.

Historians have to also be conscious of numerous biases or positional perspectives in early

Indian literature. For example, almost all these texts were composed by men, not women.
This has resulted in women being virtually invisible in the narrations or being portrayed in
negative ways. However, such representations cannot be taken literally; while they reflect
the subordination of women, known as patriarchy, it does not mean women were actually
only passive victims. Scholars have shown how it is possible to read between the lines and
uncover a more complex social reality where women played active roles and resisted
control.

Similarly, most early Indian texts were composed by members of the educated upper
classes and upper castes. As such they tend to carry a by and large elite perspective and
often one that looks down upon lower social groups. It should be remembered, however,
that sometimes texts that recommend the social exclusion of low castes and outcastes are
prescriptive rather than descriptive texts. This means they have to be understood as
recommendations that put forward an elite worldview/ideology but do not necessarily
portray social reality in its complexity or totality.

This is another feature of early Indian literature: much of it is didactic, which means it is
intended to provide moral instruction. A large part of it is also mythological: divine or
supernatural characters or themes figure prominently or divine authority is invoked to
explain phenomena. The close mixing of supernatural with earthly elements in the telling of
tales makes traditional Indian literature seemingly unfit for historical purposes. In fact,
however, myths have recently been seen as a device for narrating stories in a symbolic,
rather than literal or direct, way.

The above discussion is a general one about literary sources. The truth is that there is great
variety in this field and these observations may apply more to some and less to other types
of texts. The point to remember is that early Indian literature is a highly complex source of
history that calls for sophisticated, rather than simplistic, strategies of interpretation, which
are sensitive to the special ways in which different texts may represent history. Approached
in this way, this literature is a storehouse of knowledge that has the potential to yield a
great deal that is of interest and relevance to scholars of history.

There can be different ways of classifying early Indian literature, like sacred and secular,
indigenous and foreign accounts, or distinguishing among languages of composition like
Sanskrit, Prakrit and Tamil, or genres like agama (scripture), itihasa (history), shastra
(technical treatise) and kavya (creative literature). Below we sample some texts, broadly
following the chronological order in which they are believed to have been composed. It is
not a comprehensive sampling by any means. It includes only some major types of texts
that have been important in the reconstruction of aspects of early India.

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The Vedas

The earliest known literature from the Indian subcontinent is in Sanskrit, one of the oldest
known languages in the world and part of the linguistic group called Indo-European to which
also belong French, German, Latin, Persian and several others. This earliest literature is oral
and is called the Vedas, from the root vid (literally, ‗to know‘), and Veda means
‗knowledge‘. The Vedas are traditionally regarded as shruti, i.e., ‗heard‘ or revealed texts,
words said to be uttered by the god Brahma in the ears of the first man. This is essentially a
reference to the great antiquity of these texts and to the sanctity associated with them.
They are oral literature par excellence.

There are four Vedas, Rig, Sama, Yajur and Atharva, which have come down to us in
various branches or recensions known as shakhas. The Atharva is believed to be less
orthodox than the others, since it deals with themes like evil influences, diseases, omens,
amulets and magical spells, among other things. Each Veda has four parts: Samhita
(collection of verses/hymns or suktas), Brahmana (collection of mantras or ritual formulae),
Aranyaka (‗forest books‘ containing philosophical speculations) and Upanishad (the vedanta
or end part of the Vedas that contains mystical discussions on the nature of the soul and of
creation, etc.). Chronologically, this whole body of texts can be divided into early and later
parts. Early Vedic literature includes just Books II to VII of the Rig Veda Samhita, believed
to be composed between 1500 and 1000 BCE. Later Vedic literature includes Books I, VIII,
IX and X of the Rig Veda Samhita, all the other parts of the Rig Veda, and the other three
Vedas. They were composed between 1000 and 500 BCE. Please note that these dates are
tentative and only one set of dates out of several others that different scholars have
suggested, some of which would make the Vedas as old as 4000 or 3000 BCE! The most
recent dating of the Rig Veda on linguistic grounds is by Michael Witzel, putting it at 1900
BCE.

The Vedas as a whole are collections of hymns on themes ranging from prayers for more
children and cattle, to speculation over the origins of the universe (known as cosmogony),
and deliverance from disease and evil forces. The beginnings of musical notation (Sama
Veda) and medicine (Atharva Veda), not to mention philosophy, astronomy and
mathematics, can be traced to the Vedas that are traditionally believed to be the fount of all
knowledge. Historians have extracted information for social and economic history from
incidental references in these texts, such as the transition from a pastoral, pre-class-and-
caste society in the Rig Veda to agriculture, class, caste and political territories in the later
Vedas. This is detailed in unit 2.5.1.

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Value addition: voices from the past

The Hiranyagarbha Sukta
Here is an extract from Rig Veda X.121 (Hiranyagarbha Sukta) and X.129. Note the
deeply curious imagination that does not accept God as the ultimate creating
principle but seeks some principle of creation that created the gods themselves.

‗A golden embryo (hiranya garbha) evolved in the beginning. Born the lord of what
has come to be, it alone existed. It established the earth and heaven here. To what
deity should we do homage with oblations? Who is the life-giver, the strength-giver,
whose decree all, [even] the gods honour…? To what deity should we do homage
with oblations? … When the deep waters came, carrying everything as an embryo
and giving birth to the fire, then the life of the gods, the sole [existent] evolved - to
what deity should we do homage with oblations? …‘ (Rig Veda X. 121)

‗There was no non-existent and no existent at that time. There was neither the mid-
space nor the heaven beyond. What stirred? And under whose control? … Darkness
was there, hidden by darkness, in the beginning. A signless ocean was everything
here … Who really knows? Who shall here proclaim it -- how things came to be, how
this creation? The gods are on this side, along with the creation [of this world]. So
then who does know how it came to be? He who is its overseer in the highest
heaven, he surely knows. Or if he too does not know …?‘ (Rig Veda X. 129)

And now sample a verse from the Atharva Veda. It is a spell or mantra to drive away
fever, which seems to resemble the flu.

‗May Agni drive the fever away from here….So cold, then burning, you make us
shake with coughing, terrible are your characteristics, O fever; spare us from them!
O fever, with your brother the lingering sickness, with your sister the fit of coughing,
with your cousin the itch, go away and stay with other people! … To the people of
Gandhara and of Mujavant, to those of Anga and of Magadha, we send the fever…!‘
(Atharva Veda V.22)
Source: Embree, Ainslie (ed.). 1988. Sources of Indian Tradition, Vol. I, 2nd
edn. New York, 19-21; Renou, Louis. 1971. Vedic India, Classical India. Vol.
3. Delhi: Varanasi: Indological Book House, 23-24.

The Dharmashastras

Post-Vedic Sanskrit literature is also known as smriti or ‗memorized‘, rather than ‗heard‘
(shruti), texts. The suggested meaning is that these were composed by humans -- great
sages -- and not revealed by God. So they do not enjoy the sanctity reserved for the Vedas
but are authoritative in their own right. An important group of post-Vedic texts is the
Dharmashastras. Dharma, from the root dhri meaning 'to maintain or support', has

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

multiple meanings: broadly it refers to natural and moral laws governing the
universe and the lives of people. The Dharmashastras are socio-legal texts from
early India composed in two broad phases. The early Dharmasutras were
composed between 500 and 200 BCE; they include the Baudhayana Dharmasutra,
the Gotama Dharmasutra and the Apastamba Dharmasutra. The later phase saw
the composition, between 200 BCE and 900 CE, of the Dharmasmritis, like Manu
Smriti, Narada Smriti and Yajnavalkya Smriti.

These texts, together with the numerous commentaries (tika) written on them, lay
down the founding principles of Brahmanical social and moral order. The most
important is the varnashramadharma, that provides for the division of society into
four broad varnas, brahmana, kshatriya, vaishya and shudra, that are placed in
descending order of status and privileges. The texts prescribe the duties of each.
These texts also tell us about jatis, or smaller groups the numbers of which ran
into hundreds and thousands over the centuries. The main features of the varna-
jati system according to these texts were endogamy (marriage within one‟s social
group) and hereditary occupation. We do however hear of varnasamkara or mixing
of the varnas, suggesting that cross-varna marital unions, some acceptable
(anuloma) and some unacceptable (pratiloma), did happen (although
varnasamkara was probably a legal fiction to accommodate different jatis as high
or low into the varna scheme). Similarly, these texts allow for exceptions to the
rule on occupations during a crisis, which is called apad-dharma or duty in
distress. The very mention of varnasamkara and apad-dharma that run opposite to
the two main rules of caste shows that social reality could be very different from
theory or what was prescribed. So it is necessary for historians to read between
the lines when using the Dharmashastra for reconstructing early Indian social
history. Other topics a Dharmashastra typically covers are: rites and sacraments and
yajnas, the vow of studenthood (brahmacharya), the taking of a bride (grihastha), various
kinds of marriages, rules for what may be eaten and what may not, the purification of men
and of objects, women, the rules of a hermit‘s life (vanaprastha), renunciation of worldly life
(sanyasa), duties of a king, laws of inheritance of property, laws concerning gambling, laws
of different regions and peoples, the eternal law (sanatana dharma) of individual families
(Manu Smriti I.111-18).

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Value addition: voices from the past

The Manu Smriti and women
In this extract from the Manu Smriti (III.55-7; IX.3-7,11,26), it becomes clear how
important women are in Manu‘s scheme of things.

‗Women must be honoured and adorned by their fathers, brothers, husbands, and
brothers-in-law who desire great good fortune. Where women are honoured, there
the gods rejoice; where they are not honoured, there all sacred rites prove fruitless.
Where the female relations live in grief, that family soon perishes; where they do not
suffer from any grievance, that family always prospers.…Her father protects her in
childhood, her husband protects her in youth, her sons protect her in old age - a
woman does not deserve independence. A husband protects his own offspring,
character, family, self and dharma when he protects his wife scrupulously…The
husband should engage his wife in the collection and expenditure of his wealth, in
cleanliness, in dharma, in cooking for the family, and in looking after the necessities
of the household…Women destined to bear children, enjoying great good fortune,
deserving of worship, [are like] the resplendent lights of homes....‘
Source: Embree, Ainslie (ed.). 1988. Sources of Indian Tradition, Vol. I, 2nd
edn. New York, 228-29.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

The Mahabharata and the Ramayana

Figure 1.3.1.1.1: A scene from Peter Brook‟s dramatization of the Indian epic

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mahabharata_(1989_film)

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

The period between 500 BCE and 500 CE saw the composition of the two famous
epics, Vyasa‟s Mahabharata and Valmiki‟s Ramayana. These are known as itihasa
(„thus it was‟) or narratives on the past. Their magnificent and powerful stories
are very well known in the Indian subcontinent and beyond, like in south east Asia
where they are performed to this day. The Mahabharata is the enormous and
complex story of the fight for a kingdom between two sets of royal cousins, the
Kurus and the Pandavas of Hastinapur. It seems to have started out as a smaller
text, known as Jaya (Victory), which expanded by the incorporation of thousands
of myths and secondary stories over time to its full size of a 1,00,000 verses. The
Ramayana is the smaller (24,000 verses) and more compact tale of Rama‟s exile
from the kingdom and his triumphant crusade against the demon king Ravana of
Lanka. The original story of Rama, the Ayodhyan prince, also grew over time and
Rama emerges as the incarnation of god Vishnu in this text. Thus the Ramayana,
as also the Mahabharata because of the role of Krishna and his Bhagavad Gita
(Divine Song) in it, are regarded as not only the mother of all tales but also sacred
scriptures.

Figure 1.3.1.1.2: A scene from the Ramayana being enacted in Indonesia where it
is very popular

Source: flickr.com/photos/portfolio/542883379/

Their importance for religious history apart, we can see the epics as simply fiction
and mythology or we can search for a kernel of historical truth in them (some

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

scholars have tried to do this literally by excavating sites mentioned in the epics).
We can interpret them as recording the establishment in history of significant
political practices. For example, primogeniture, or the passing of the throne to the
eldest son, is seen first challenged and then re-established in both texts. The epics
are also perfect examples of didactic texts: they enshrine significant social and
cultural values, like devotion to one‟s parents and elder brothers, and loyalty to
one‟s husband. The Ramayana lays down models of ideal behaviour for men and
women in various roles, like maryadapurushottama Rama and the chaste Sita,
which have had a powerful influence on shaping Indian social thought and
practice. (Note that various versions of the Ramayana were composed after
Valmiki‟s text in other languages like Prakrit and Tamil and these often question
the values prescribed in the original.) The Mahabharata examines closely the
question of dharma or what is righteous behavior and what is not. The Bhagavad
Gita, which is a part of the Mahabharata, is not only a Vaishnava scripture but a
profound philosophical document that seeks to guide individual action in the time
of crisis and self doubt.

Value addition: voices from the past

Remain the same in pleasure and pain …
Influenced considerably by the Upanishads, this extract from the Bhagavad Gita
explains the indestructible nature of the soul which does not die when the body dies.
So the wise do not allow various states the impermanent body goes through - like
pleasure and pain, joy and despair, victory and defeat - to overwhelm them, but
remain the same, calm and hard working people in all conditions.
Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWKyUmRhjG4

1.3.1.2: Sources and tools of historical reconstruction: literary

sources - II

Buddhist and Jaina literature

Said to be composed two centuries after the demise of the Buddha (6th-5th centuries BCE),
but put to writing only in the 1st century BCE in Sri Lanka, the Pali texts Tripitaka, or ‗Three
Baskets‘, are the earliest non-Brahmanical and non-Sanskritic literature. As such they

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

constitute an indispensable alternative perspective on early India, especially on the social

history of the time. They constitute the early Buddhist canon: the Sutta Pitaka is supposed
to report the very words of the Buddha in conversation with his disciples, the Vinaya Pitaka
details the rules for the Buddhist monkhood or sangha, and the Abhidhamma Pitaka,
composed somewhat later, contains an advanced discussion of Buddhist philosophy. Some
parts of the Sutta, such as the Jatakas or birth stories of the previous incarnations of the
Buddha before he was born as prince Siddhartha, are also late, dating to the 3rd century
BCE-2nd century CE.

The Tripitaka were composed within a relatively compact and definitely known period of
time, and deal with mostly historical rather than mythical characters, including the Buddha
and the host of rulers he was associated with. They also refer to a large number of states,
like the sixteen mahajanapadas, and cities contemporary to the Buddha. As such a greater
element of reliability is assumed for their contents. And since they provide a comparative
testimony to the Brahmanical texts, they offer a valuable completive to our understanding
of the social scene. For example, we know from the Tripitaka that varna was only a
theoretical category of social stratification while jati was a functional one, which determined
actual social status, and nati or kinship was important too. Also the Pali texts are rich in
details of the everyday life of commoners, which provides a popular and not only elite view
of early history.

Later Buddhist literary sources from early India include the Milindapanho from the 1st
century BCE or CE, recording the dialogue between the Indo-Greek king Menander (Milinda)
and the Buddhist monk Nagasena. The Lalitavistara, from the 1st-2nd centuries CE, gives
details of the Buddha‘s life story, and the Divyavadana and Ashokavadana profile the
Buddha and the Buddhist king Ashoka, while the Dipavamsa (4th century CE) and
Mahavamsa (5th-6th centuries CE) describe the spread of Buddhism to Sri Lanka. Some of
these later texts are in Sanskrit.

Another body of non-Brahmanical, non-Sanskritic literature is the Jaina Agamas or

scriptures. They were composed in Ardhamagadhi, a Prakrit language, and compiled in the
5th or 6th century CE at a great Jain Council held in Valabhi, Gujarat. They consist of a series
of sub-parts known as angas, upangas, prakirnas and sutras. Together with later Jaina
works like the Parishishtaparvan and Trishashti-lakshana-mahapurana, they give an account
of the life and teachings of tirthankaras or Jaina saints like Mahavira and Rishabha. Their
importance for writing a sectarian history of early India is obvious; their significance also
lies in the glimpses of social and geographical history they provide.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Sangam and other early Tamil literature

Tamil is an ancient language that belongs to the Dravidian family of languages, rather than
to the Indo-Aryan family to which Sankrit, Prakrit, and north Indian languages derived from
Sanskrit belong. The earliest extant literature in Tamil is from no earlier than a little before
the beginning of the first millennium CE. This is what is known as Sangam literature, since
according to legend it was composed at three great (mythical) sangams or poetic
assemblies held over thousands of years, the first and last of these said to be at Madurai.
Some of the kings and poets associated with the third assembly are historical figures and so
the legend of the sangams may refer to some real literary gathering.

Sangam literature, also known as early classical Tamil literature, consists of poetry of two
kinds: puram or the ‗exterior‘ poems that deal with war, community and kingship, and akam
or ‗interior‘ poems that revolve around the theme of love and longing. They are found as a
part of two anthologies, the Ettutokai (The Eight Collections) and the Pattuppattu (The Ten
Songs). The earliest parts of the first two books of a work on grammar and language, the
Tolkappiyam, are also a part of Sangam literature. These anthologies were compiled around
the 12th-13th centuries CE while the Sangam poems that figure in them were composed
probably between the 3rd century BCE and 3rd century CE. Interestingly, they were
composed by poets from rural as well as urban backgrounds and from commoner as well as
elite classes. They contain incidental references to early Tamil material culture.

Value addition: delving deeper

Emotion and geography in Sangam poetry
A unique concept to be found in the akam or love poems of the Sangam repertory is
the tinai. The tinai were different landscapes in the Tamil region, like kurinci or
mountain, neytal or seashore, palai or arid zone, mulai or pasture, and marutam or
riverine tract. They are associated with different moods of love, like love-union or
separation and longing, by the Sangam poets. In describing the tinai thus, the
poems capture aspects of at once physical and economic, as well as emotional and
social, geography.
Source: Original

Apart from Sangam literature, the early Tamil corpus includes a didactic work, Tiruvalluvar‘s
Tirukkural (5th-6th centuries CE), on ethics and polity. The two most celebrated writings,
however, are the twin epics, the Shilappadikaram and the Manimekhalai, from the same
period as the Tirukkural. Ilango Adigal‘s Shilappadikaram (The Song of the Anklet) is the
tale of the chaste and devoted Kannaki and her husband Kovalan, who is unfaithful to her.
Kannaki comes to be worshipped as the ideal wife. Sattanar‘s Manimekhalai (The Jewel

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Belt) is the story of the adventures of a young girl called Manimekhalai who wants to
become a nun and serve the needy. While the Silappadikaram has Jaina leanings, the
Manimekhalai is Buddhistic. In the period starting after the epics, Tamil literature comes to
be dominated by stirring bhakti poetry of the great Shaiva (Nayanar) and Vaishnava (Alvar)
saints, which included famous women saints. Some of the major collections of their poetry
that were compiled in the 10th century and after are the Divyaprabandham and the
Periyapuranam.

Kannada and Telugu are other old Dravidian languages, though not as ancient as Tamil. But
the earliest texts in these languages date only from the 9th and 11th centuries CE
respectively.

The Puranas

Figure 1.3.1.2.1: Ancient Indian scriptures are found in the form of manuscripts, like this
one purportedly of the Bhagavata Purana

Source: www.harekrsna.com/.../sastra/vedas/puranas.html

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Incorporating a vast amount of material, the Puranas, literally ‗old‘, are texts that are
encyclopedic in nature. They are supposed to deal with five topics (pancha-lakshana),
namely, the creation of the world (sarga), dissolution and re-creation of the world
(pratisarga), the periods of the various Manus (manvantaras), the genealogies of gods and
sages (vamsha), and the life stories of royal dynasties (vamshanucarita). They thus discuss
cosmology, mythology, time and its divisions into enormous units like yugas and kalpas
according to the rise and decline of dharma, the accession and succession of royal
dynasties, and the deeds of important individuals. Thus, amidst a host of information about
traditional cultural beliefs, the Puranas are a great source for political history of the early
period, helping us string together the succession and broad dates of ruling families, from
the earliest down to the period of the Guptas. The lists of dynasties may vary, however,
between one Purana and another, creating some uncertainty.

In addition they dilate at great length on ritual and social practices and ceremonies, such as
puja (image and temple worship), tirtha (pilgrimage) and vratas (vows), associated with
the emergence of various religious cults and sects, like the worship of Shiva, Vishnu and
Shakti or Devi. They were thus important vehicles of Brahmanical religious and social
values. The Puranas give accounts of mountains, rivers and places, which offer important
glimpses of historical geography, and tell us about temple architecture. They contain a
wealth of myths about the conflicts among gods, demons and sages, which scholars today
believe are symbolic accounts of interactions among different social groups that came face
to face as settled society expanded into new regions in the subcontinent. Myths thus can be
read as ―embedded history‖ or history that has to be extracted from some non-historical
form and is not directly available but is nonetheless significant. Some of these myths, such
as the Dashavatara or the ten incarnations of Vishnu, and the Kalamsha or the twelve
forms of Shakti, may reflect the complex process by which Vedic and non-Vedic cultural
traditions merged to give rise to the integrated belief system we know as Brahmanism or
Hinduism today. (Visit the following for sculptural depictions of Puranic myths:
https://peicamp.in/downloads/supplements/42104248_StudentResourcesChapter10.pdf

There are 18 Mahapuranas (Great Puranas) and 18 Upapuranas (Minor Puranas). Their
composition began to take final shape around the middle of the first millennium CE though
they speak about phenomena like the beginning of time. Further, written in the future
tense, they claim to be prophecies, particularly about royal dynasties. The Mahapuranas
include the Vishnu, Shiva, Matsya, Varaha, Kurma, Brahma and Agni. Some Puranas like the
Bhagavata and the Skanda are late.

Charitas: historical biographies

A particular form of creative writing or kavya that is of special interest for historians is the
charita or the royal biographies that were composed by court poets. From our time period
Bana‘s biography of king Harsha, the Harshacharita, is the first and major example. It is

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

only in the early medieval period that the genre of charita takes off. Several important
charitas were composed, like Bilhana‘s Vikramankadevacharita, Hemchandra‘s
Kumarapalacharita (in Prakrit), and Sandhyakara Nandi‘s Ramacharita (all from the 11th and
12th centuries). They provide invaluable information about the regional kingdoms and
societies of their time. Of course they also tend to exaggerate the merits and achievements
of their patron-kings

Kalhana‘s Rajatarangini (12th century), though not a charita, should also be mentioned
here: it is the earliest political history of Kashmir written as a kavya. It traces royal dynasty
after dynasty from the earliest times, and uses older texts and inscriptions and monumental
remains to authentically put together this chronicle of the region. This aspect of the text,
together with its exceptional close attention to dates, has led scholars to celebrate the
Rajatarangini as a ‗genuine‘ work of history from early India.

Foreign accounts

A unique source on early India are the accounts left behind by travellers from foreign lands
who came in a regular stream from different parts of the world. They came as ambassadors,
pilgrims, adventurers, traders and scholars. Among the earliest foreign accounts is the
Indica of Megasthenes, the Greek ambassador to the court of Chandragupta Maurya (4 th
century BCE) at Pataliputra. It has not survived in original but in citations by other Graeco-
Roman chroniclers like Strabo, Arrian and Diodorus. Their versions often conflict with one
another which creates some confusion over what the original contained. An anonymous
Greek work, Periplus of the Erythraean Sea (1st century CE), which is essentially a sailor‘s
manual, also gives some interesting information on peninsular India and Indo-Roman trade,
while Ptolemy‘s Geography and Pliny‘s Naturalis Historia, though not based on personal
visits to this country, mention aspects about it.

Value addition: delving deeper

A mixed bag: Megasthenes‟ Indica
Megasthenes‘ Indica is one of the earliest ―first person‖ accounts by a foreigner on
India. Several of his observations about this land and its people are authentic and
accurate. For example, the high respect in which the philosophoi (Greek name for
the learned class, including the brahmanas) were held; or the fact that social groups
practised endogamy and hereditary occupation. However, Megasthenes may also
have misunderstood some things. He is reported to have written that Indian society
was divided into seven groups (mere or genea) -- this does not tally with varna,
which are four in number, or jati, which would run into many more than seven.
Then, he wrongly observed that there was no slavery in India, nor money-lending on
interest, and that the king owned all land. However, we know that there definitely

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

were slaves in India, known as dasas and dasis; perhaps Megasthenes was looking
for Greek style, large-scale, organized slavery, which he would not find here.
Similarly, money-lending clearly existed, and private ownership of land was
predominant. So the Indica, at least as it has come down to us through later works,
got some things right and some things wrong.
Source: Original

Frequent foreign visitors were the Chinese and important accounts have been left behind by
Faxian in the Gupta period (5th century CE), Xuanzang in Harsha‘s reign (7th century CE)
and Yijing (late 7th century). They came as Buddhist pilgrims and scholars and toured the
country, especially Buddhist centres, extensively. Their accounts carry descriptions of cities
and towns and monuments and courts. It is sometimes difficult, however, to identify the
places they mention since they use Chinese names for them. Their writings are imbued with
a strong Buddhist flavour and viewpoint.

Figure 1.3.1.2.2: An artist‘s impression of Xuanzang

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xuanzang

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

The Arabs were great travellers and scholars who ventured to different parts of the world
including India in search of knowledge. They left behind geographical and historical accounts
like the works of Sulaiman and Al-Masudi (9th century CE), ―the Herodotus of the Arabs‖. Al
Biruni‘s Tahqiq I Hind (11th century CE) is a detailed study of Indian languages, scripts,
geography, sciences, astronomy, religions, festivals, social organization, and laws. It makes
for an invaluable commentary on the people that populated India at that time and their
social and cultural practices.

The difficulty in using foreign accounts to reconstruct early India is that since their authors
were from backgrounds very different from India, they often simply could not understand,
or misunderstood and therefore misrepresented, aspects of Indian society and culture.
Some of them were based on hearsay rather than personal experience and tended to give
fantastic or bizarre descriptions. It is nonetheless fascinating to read outsiders‘ perspectives
on our land as also to make connections and decipher what they were trying to express
about our past.

In conclusion

A host of other kinds of genres and texts act as valuable sources for early Indian history,
some of which, significantly like the technical treatises and creative literature, will be
discussed in Chapters 10.1 and 10.2. It should be noted however that most traditional
Indian literatures were not intended as historical accounts when they were composed but as
scripture or poetry or mythology or eulogy or technical manual etc. So great care has to be
taken in using them as historical documents. They cannot be read in a simple, literal fashion
but must always be taken in the internal context of their genre and function.

Also, works of literature reveal as much about history by the circumstances in which they
were produced as they do by their content. In other words, a great deal can be understood
about the political, social, economic and cultural milieu of early India through questions like
who composed a text, what was his social background, who sponsored the work and why,
what are the values and practices the text reflects or questions, etc. So literary works have
to be located in an external context too before their full potential as sources of history can
be realized.

1.3.2: Sources and tools of historical reconstruction: archaeology

as a grass root approach to the Indian past

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

What is archaeology?

Archaeology is a study of the material remains of the past aimed at understanding the
character and changes in human cultures over time. As a method of studying the past, it
concerns itself with the entire gamut of past human experience – from what people ate and
how long they lived to what they thought and how they expressed their fears and
aspirations. Before describing how the people of ancient India and the milieu in which they
lived can be recovered through its material culture, some clarifications about the
terminology used in archaeology and its relationship to other kinds of historical sources may
be offered.

Terminology

Material culture is made up of many elements. First, there are artefacts which are portable
objects that are used, made or modified by humans. These include stone tools, pottery,
metal objects, ivory plaques, stone sculpture and so much else. Alongside, archaeologists
also study non-artefactual remains. These can be organic and environmental (and are thus
sometimes described as ‗ecofacts‘) ranging from plant pollen and animal fossils to river
sediments and old soils, or anything else which helps in understanding the natural world in
which ancient humans conducted their activities. Many elements of landscapes also bear
signs of human modification in the form of remains of houses, floors, cooking hearths,
fortifications, roads and canals. These are best described as archaeological features.
Houses and buildings of other kinds are most commonly found at archaeological sites which
are spaces where such and other structures are found along with artefacts and
environmental and organic remains. These can also be places where there may be no
structures but a mere scatter of stone tools or potsherds. So, the city of Mohenjodaro in
Sindh is a site but so is the palaeolithic scatter of stone tools at Arangpur in Haryana. Such
scatters make us realize that a great deal of what archaeology studies is in the form of
fragments, the debris and garbage – bits of food remains, potsherds, brickbats, broken
stone tools -- that is formed as people go about their daily lives.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.1: North Black Polished Ware and related pottery from Sodanga in Central
India

Source: Personal

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Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.2: Broken Jaina sculpture from Sodanga in Central India

Source: Personal

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.3: Mounds are common archaeological sites. These are the mounds of
Harappa.

Source: Charles Lewis – personal collection

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.4: Rock shelters also contain archaeological sites as in the case of Lakhajoar
which is marked by ancient rock paintings.

Source: Personal

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.5: Rock shelter in Bhimbetka where stone tools were excavated

Source: Personal

For analysing the character and changes in past human activity, it is crucial to understand
the contexts of finds. This consists of examining the matrix in which they are found. Many
objects and buildings or their remains are either partially or fully buried, and in order to
study them, archaeologists conduct excavations. While excavating, stratigraphy is closely
observed. Deposits and soil are usually found in layers, and generally, where one layer lies
on top of another, the lower one was deposited first. This, though, is not always so.
Sometimes pits from the top introduce later material into lower levels. Occasionally, the
layers get inverted, i.e., the oldest layers come to the top.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

How is archaeology different from history?

Archaeology is obviously related to history in that both disciplines seek knowledge of the
human past. In both cases, we study the human past in a given temporal and spatial
setting. The difference, however, lies in the sources. In general, the historian‘s history is
essentially the past as it is revealed by the written record. Archaeology, on the other hand,
uses techniques for investigating the human past by means of material objects of human
origin and in the light of the natural milieu in which human activities were conducted.

Figure 1.3.2.6: The earliest evidence of writing comes from Mesopotamia. Administrative
tablet from South Mesopotamia, 3100–2900 B.C.

Source: www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/wrtg/ho_1988.433.3.html

This material that archaeologists study does not tell them directly what to think. It is we
today who have to make sense of these things. Historical records, on the other hand, offer
opinions and pass judgments (which, of course, are analysed and interpreted). So,
historians broadly study what people say while archaeologists look at what people do, and
generally there is a marked discrepancy between them. This was demonstrated by a study
done on the garbage of Tucson, a town in Arizona, by William L. Rathje. The study showed
that 85% of people there, who were interviewed on their beer consumption, said that they
did not consume any beer, while 15% claimed that they consumed not more than 8 cans

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

per week. However, the trash cans showed that only 25% consumed no beer, 21%
consumed not more than 8 cans per week, while 54% consumed more than 8 cans per
week.

Figure 1.3.2.7: Perhaps the earliest evidence of writing in India comes from Harappa where
sherds such as this belonging to c. 3300-2800 BC E show signs that bear similarities to the
Later Indus script

Source: shangri-la.0catch.com/hp/indus.html

Apart from a disparity in the sources, there is also a difference in timescale. When
compared with the total length of human cultural development, the era covered by history
represents less than 1% of the overall span of more than a million years. Conventional
historical sources begin only with the introduction of writing around 3000 BCE in West Asia,
and considerably later in most other parts of the world (for example, not until 1788 CE in
Australia). So, for non-literate people outside the range of written history, the
archaeological approach is the only one that can be used to obtain direct information.

Discovering ancient India through archaeology

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Prehistory

The archaeological data through which the prehistory of India has been constructed are
diverse. To begin with, there are some human skeletal remains. The hominid skull cap and a
hominid clavicle or collar bone (of Homo erectus or early Homo sapiens) from Hathnora
(Madhya Pradesh) seem to be the oldest. More recently, a fossilized baby skull which, as in
the case of Hathnora, belongs to the Pleistocene period, was discovered at Odai (Tamil
Nadu). Human skeletons become much more common in later hunter-gatherer Mesolithic
contexts, especially in the Allahabad-Banaras zone of the Ganga alluvium. These skeletons
have yielded all kinds of information ranging from the wide presence of osteoarthritis even
among the young to the stress markers which indicate vigorous activities like spear-
throwing and the possible use of sling shots.

Figure 1.3.2.8: Fossilized baby skull from Odai (Tamil Nadu). This is an axial 3 D Maximum
intensity projection image with teeth within mandible & maxilla.

Source: Personal

Far more common than skeletal remains are stone tools. Their ubiquitous distribution helps
in understanding the spread and character of human cultures across several millennia. The
earliest stone tools, going back to 1.8 million years ago or somewhat earlier, come from the
Potwar plateau section of Pakistani Punjab, Jammu, and Karnataka. The deposits in which
these tools are found frequently contain material which can be scientifically dated. For
example, in the case of Isampur in Karnataka, two fossil herbivore teeth, found with the
Acheulian assemblage, were dated through Electron Spin Resonance (ESR) which
provides accurate dates for bone and shell samples. In this case, the lower palaeolithic

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

culture of Isampur was shown to be around 1.3 to 1.2 million years old. Stone tools can be
scientifically studied for understanding their functions. One method for determining this is
through a microwear study of their edges – through a scanning electron microscope.
Apparently, wood, bone, hide, meat, antler, and non-woody plants leave very different
kinds of polish, and studying them can lead to unexpected results. Take the case of Baghor
III, a palaeolithic site in the Sidhi district of Madhya Pradesh. Of the 176 specimens that
were examined, it was found that 73.6% of shaped tools and blades were commonly used
on vegetal matter. Clearly, plant processing and a diet of vegetables and fruits were very
important in the diet of the people of Baghor.

Figure 1.3.2.9: Hand axes from Peninsular India

Source: www.chennaimuseum.org

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.10: Neolithic celts from Peninsular India

Source: www.chennaimuseum.org

Faunal remains found in the geological contexts that yield stone tools can also tell us a
great deal about the animals who shared the landscapes peopled by prehistoric humans.
There are ancestral forms of the present cattle, horse, and elephant, along with those of
buffalo, varieties of deer, lions, tigers, and panthers. Such animals sometimes lived in
habitats where they are no longer found. The lion, for instance, is found in the Susunia
region of West Bengal, while the rhino is present in the Billa Surgam caves of Andhra.

Prehistoric behaviour can also be identified through various kinds of sources, of which the
most important is art. There is a profusion of rock art dated to the mesolithic period in
India, from the Karakoram mountains in the north to Kerala and Tamil Nadu in the south.
Some of the rock paintings, done in green ochre on the walls of Bhimbetka‘s rock shelters,
are likely to be upper palaeolithic. Such paintings can also be scientifically dated. For
example, datable carbon has been obtained from the white gypsum-bassanite paintings of
Central India and the radiocarbon dates suggest that these were painted over many
millennia, from 5200 to 1100 years ago.

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Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.11: Mesolithic paintings in a rock shelter at Bhimbetka

Source: Personal collection of author

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Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.12: Paintings in a rock shelter at Lakhajoar

Source: Personal

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.13: Hand prints in caves in Argentina

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:SantaCruz-CuevaManos-P2210651b.jpg

Archaeology can also occasionally recover sites of ritual worship. An upper palaeolithic
shrine was discovered at Baghor I in the Sidhi valley where a stone with laminated marks in
the shape of a human vulva was placed on a small rubble-built platform as an object of
worship. This is a practice which has continued in that area where such stones are
worshipped today as incarnations of the Mother Goddess.

Value addition: did you know?

How archaeology has established that most prehistoric
humans, like modern humans, were right-handed
Hand prints in the caves of France and Spain are one source. It is assumed that
when a left hand has been stencilled, the artist was right-handed and vice versa.
From the French cave of Gargas, of the 158 stencils, 136 were identified as being of
the left hand and only 22 as those of the right. Right-handedness was, thus,
predominant.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Source: Colin Renfrew and Paul Bahn. 1991. Archaeology Theories Methods
and Practice. London: Thames and Hudson, 383-84.

Protohistory

In comparison to prehistory, there is a wider range of archaeological source material for

reconstructing protohistoric India which begins with the emergence of food producing
communities in the archaeological record. This is partly because protohistoric societies
flourished in what is called the Holocene, where environmental shifts have been on a
relatively small scale as compared to the previous epoch, and consequently, evidence of
human culture has survived better. This is also because, as a consequence of more complex
settled societies, there was an explosion in the variety of artefacts that came to be
manufactured, and in the kinds of structures that came to be constructed. This is not merely
the case with sites of the first urban civilization of India – the Harappan Civilization -- whose
structures include fortifications, high platforms, granaries and brick and stone reservoirs,
and whose body of artefactual evidence includes weights, seals, semi-precious and precious
stone beads, faience, stone, shell and metal objects, tons of pottery, apart from various
remains of plants and animals. This is also true for more humble protohistoric villages.
Take the case of Mehrgarh in Baluchistan which perhaps represents the earliest village
stratum of the subcontinent. The archaeological remains there consist of mudbrick, multi-
roomed houses, burials, fireplaces, baskets strengthened with bitumen, stone blades and
bladelets, bone tools, jewellery of turquoise, lapis lazuli, steatite and shell.

Figure 1.3.2.14: Mehrgarh in Baluchistan

Source: http://www.guimet.fr/IMG/cache-150x150/gui_1_mehrgarh-2-150x150.jpg

Such data are studied through a variety of techniques. If, for instance, one was to examine
the ways in which the character of Harappan craft production has been reconstructed, it
involves plotting, through excavation, the distribution and character of production at various
sites. From such distribution, the location of units of production can be ascertained. Two

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

types of production units were noticed at places like Mohenjodaro: production which was
governed by a centralized system of management and small scale wokshops/units of
cottage manufacture. The first type of production is evident in the case of stoneware bangle
manufacture. The manufacturing debris is confined to one part of the city, and the pots in
which these were fired were sealed. Since this is a highly formal administrative act, it
underlines that their production was centrally controlled. In the case of cottage
manufacture, steatite objects are known to have been produced in a more decentralized
manner because excavations showed working units in different parts of the city. Apart from
this, whether such objects were being produced for local consumption or for a regional
market can also be analysed. We know that Nageshwar in Gujarat was a manufacturing
centre of shell ladles because the range of manufacturing waste there is complete enough to
allow us to reconstruct this. That it was producing ladles for a large market can be
reconstructed on the basis of the very small number of finished ladles there, too few to
justify the immense quantities of manufacturing waste. This can only mean that the
Nageshwar ladles were sent to other places. In addition to a careful physical examination,
scientific techniques are used as well in studies of craft. An example of this is the neutron
activation analysis which was done on stoneware bangles from Harappa and Mohenjodaro
and on objects which were made from the local clay in their vicinity. A physical examination
suggested that these were produced at specialized workshops in Mohenjodaro, with no such
activity indicated at Harappa. However, neutron activation analysis showed that such
bangles were manufactured at both places. Additionally, ancient practices, including
artisanal production, can also be illuminated through ethnoarchaeology which involves a
study of living cultures and communities in order to understand ancient lifeways. For
example, in order to study the production of Harappan long barrel cylinder carnelian beads,
the skills involved in the production of beads that are very similar to Harappan specimens –
the ‗chasai‘ beads in Khambhat in Gujarat - were observed. In Khambhat, there is a very
distinctive group that produces these beads since it is a highly specialized process.
Apparently, seven years or so are needed to acquire the skills for producing such beads.
This probably explains why in the Harappan case, too, the production of such beads was in
the hands of a very limited number of craftspeople.

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Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.15: Mohenjodaro in Sindh

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mohenjodaro_Sindh.jpeg

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.16: Shell bangles and terracotta objects of the Indus civilization.
Source: http://www.hindunet.org/hindu_history/sarasvati/html/TERRAC-5.jpg

Figure 1.3.2.17: Necklace or belt of long barrel carnelian beads, Mohenjo-daro.

Source: www.harappa.com/indus/80.html

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Early history

Once written sources become available, the defining characteristic of the beginning of
history, archaeological sources are used frequently along with textual/documentary
information. Such studies fall within the domain of historical archaeology since they work
with both artefacts and texts.

The interface of archaeological and literary sources has worked satisfactorily in the case of a
ground level identification of historical places. How do we know where ancient places with
names like Kaushambi or Taxila or Tamralipti were situated in antiquity? We know about
their locations because scholars have successfully identified them on the basis of
descriptions in the accounts of travellers. Alexander Cunningham, the first Director-General
of the Archaeological Survey of India, considered the writings of Xuan Zang, the Chinese
pilgrim who travelled between 629 and 645 CE from Kabul to peninsular India, as the most
valuable because he was nearly always right in his distances and directions. Cunningham
then sought to fit these bearings with archaeological remains, and through this method, he
located scores of ancient sites including Taxila near modern Rawalpindi, Sagala or modern
Sialkot, Ahichchhatra near Bareilly in Uttar Pradesh, Vaishali near Hajipur in north Bihar and
Nalanda near Rajgir in South Bihar. Archaeological sources can also support, in general
outline, the knowledge derived from literature of some features of ancient Indian life such
as the basic layout of cities. An instance is the discovery of a crescentic early historic
fortification around Mathura which has been alluded to in the Ramayana. Again, the outer
stone fortification surrounding Rajgir was measured to be about eight miles in circuit which
roughly conforms to the measurement mentioned by Xuan Zang.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.18: Taxila in Pakistan

Source:
http://blog.travelpod.com/travel-
photo/watchoutworld/4/1235987700/2_taxila.jpg/tpod.html

Archaeology adds significantly to our knowledge of ancient Indian religion as well. For
instance, texts describe a variety of temple rituals connected with Hinduism, and, in several
instances, archaeological manifestations of such practices have been revealed at
excavations of temple sites. Such material traces include: large terracotta bowls excavated
from the temple area at Bhitari (c. 450-550 CE) in north India which were probably used to
offer food either to the deity or for the ritual feeding of large groups of worshippers or
pilgrims; sprinklers, also from Bhitari, which priests probably used for sprinkling water while
performing worship; traces of animals sacrificed for the deity (e.g. domestic sheep and
humped cattle bones excavated in the inner sanctum at the Parasuramesvara temple at
Gudimallam in Andhra Pradesh);and votive offerings in the form of terracotta figurines of
various gods and goddesses, from Kashmir to peninsular India. Generally, archaeological
data reflect popular practice more accurately than texts.

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Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.19: Nalanda in Bihar

Source: http://lti1.files.wordpress.com/2008/10/nalanda48op8.jpg

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.20: Gudimallam Linga at Parasuramesvara temple in Andhra Pradesh

Source: www.liveinternet.ru/.../2281209/post108899381/

Figure 1.3.2.21: Ashoka Pilllar at Rampurwa in Bihar

Source: westchamparan.bih.nic.in/html/tourist.html

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Finally, it is also worth remembering that archaeological data pertaining to early India can
throw light on issues on which literary sources are silent. From where, for instance, was the
stone used for manufacturing Ashokan pillars, quarried? There are no documentary pointers
to this. However, we know that the stone was quarried from the hillsides of Chunar in Uttar
Pradesh because Vidula Jayaswal identified hundreds of ancient quarries by examining the
markers left behind when stone blocks were extracted, through chiseling debris and the
presence of cylindrical blocks in various degrees of completion. Inscriptions ranging from
those written in early Brahmi to a Nagari epigraph of the 13 th/14th century give an idea of
the time frame of such quarrying activities. Similarly, basic manufacturing techniques are
much better studied through archaeology. The state of iron technology in early historic India
can be best understood through a study of the iron artefacts that were then produced. The
technological skills of iron workers in the Gupta period have not been described in texts or
inscriptions, but these can be understood from the analysis of the iron pillar in the courtyard
of the Qutab Minar (4th-5th centuries CE). Weighing more than 6 tonnes and with a height
of 6.7 metres, this is certainly the largest known instance of a forged iron column in
antiquity. It has been shown to be corrosion resistant, among other things, because of the
purity of its iron, its high phosphorous content and lower sulphur content.

So, in many ways, the study of material culture with the advent of history is a way of
extending text-based views of the past.

Value addition: did you know?

Archaeology as a source for the history of medieval India
Iqtidar Alam Khan has documented sarais, bridges, gateways, kos minars, tanks and
graffiti in Persian and Devanagari on some of these structures along Mughal
highways, covering a distance of 19,000 kms.
Source: Iqtidar Alam Khan. 1990. The Karawansarays of Mughal India: A
study of Surviving Structures. Indian Historical Review 14, 111-37.

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Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.22: Gupta Iron Pillar in the courtyard of Qutab Minar in Delhi

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ashoka_Pillar_Delhi.JPG

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.2.23: Prehistoric painting at Narsinghgarh

Source: Personal

1.3.3: Sources and tools of historical reconstruction: epigraphy

and numismatics

Epigraphy

An epigraph or inscription refers to any writing engraved on hard or durable surfaces like
seals, rocks, wood, metal, pillars, temple walls, copper plates, etc. and the study of
inscriptions is called epigraphy. Epigraphy involves deciphering the text of inscriptions as
well as analyzing their content. Palaeography or the study of ancient writing also falls
within its scope.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Indian epigraphic studies

Although inscriptions and coins can be clubbed together under archaeological sources, the
studies of the two have emerged as separate disciplines. The field of Indian epigraphy was
born in the late eighteenth century and progressed thanks to the painstaking efforts of a
number of individuals over the centuries. Indian epigraphy owes greatly to the contributions
of Europeans like Charles Wilkins, James Prinsep, J. F. Fleet, Eugene Hultzsch, Christian
Lassen, Alexander Cunningham and later Indians like Bhagwanlal Indraji, R. G. Bhandarkar,
R. D. Banerji, D. R. Bhandarkar, N. P. Chakravarti, N. G. Majumdar and D. C. Sircar among
other leading epigraphists.

Of writing, scripts and languages

The antiquity of writing in India

The earliest inscriptions are in the pictographic Harappan script that awaits decipherment.
The Ashokan inscriptions of 4th century BCE are the earliest deciphered inscriptions. These
were written mostly in the Prakrit language and Brahmi script though other languages and
scripts were also used. We know little about how the art of writing evolved between these
two periods, roughly 1750-260 BCE. Vedic literature does not directly refer to writing.
However, later Vedic texts indicate the knowledge of writing as a possibility by mentioning
grammatical and phonetic terms and arithmetical calculations. Even the testimony of Greek
and Latin authors on writing in early India is inconclusive. The Buddhist Pali texts, the
Jatakas and the Vinaya Pitaka give us the first definite references to writing. Panini‘s
Ashtadhyayi mentions the word lipi/libi (script) (Salomon 1998, 10-11).

Value addition: did you know?

What people in ancient wrote on and the inks and pens they
used
Surfaces used for writing included palmyra leaves, birch and aloe bark, cloth, hide,
wood and paper while those for engraving included stone, earthen objects, shells,
copper, gold, silver, bronze, iron and other metals. Here it is important to
understand that writing involves a softer surface while engraving a harder one. Royal
charters, for instance, were generally written first on a perishable material and then
copied by engraving them on copper plates or stones.

Ink called masi in Sanskrit was prepared with charcoal being mixed in water with
gum, sugar etc. Among coloured inks, red ink was the most popular, one kind being
prepared by mixing vermilion with gum in water. Mixing gold and silver powder with
gum in boiling water made costly golden and silvery inks. These were generally used

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

by painters or for writing on behalf of the rich.

Lekhani referred to a pencil, brush, pen etc. Varnika mentioned in early Indian
literature was a wooden pen, pointed at the end without a slit. Isika was a pen made
of reed or bamboo branch. Iron pens with sharp points were used to inscribe letters
on palm leaves, particularly in the southern parts of the country.
Source: Sircar, D. C. 1965 Indian Epigraphy. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 61-
82.

Scripts and languages of ancient and early medieval inscriptions

A language consists of spoken symbols of communication. A script, on the other hand, is a

system of visual communication that uses signs or symbols having specific meanings or
sounds (Singh 2009, 6). In other words, language refers to the spoken style while the script
refers to the style of the written text.

A script can be logographic, syllabic or alphabetic. In a logographic script, written symbols

stand for a word, in a syllabic script for a syllable and in an alphabetic script for a single
phonetic sound. In this sense, Brahmi and Kharoshthi fall midway between alphabetic and
syllabic scripts and are described as semi-syllabic and semi-alphabetic (Singh 2009, 42).

The evolution of Brahmi, a script written from left to right and deciphered by James Prinsep
in 1837, has been traced in three stages: early Brahmi (3 rd-1st centuries BCE), middle
Brahmi (1st century BCE- 3rd century CE) and late Brahmi (4th – 6th centuries CE). The
stages are also often associated with dynasties e.g., Ashokan Brahmi, Kushana Brahmi and
Gupta Brahmi, the latter evolving into a script known as Siddhamatrika or Kutila in the late
6th century.

The use of Brahmi was far more widespread than that of Kharoshthi, a regional script
largely confined to the north-western parts of the country and written from right to left. The
homeland of the latter primarily included the territory along and around the Indus, Swat
and Kabul river valleys, which comprised the land known as Gandhara in ancient times.
Ashoka‘s Shahbazgarhi and Mansehra inscriptions are in the Kharoshthi script that also went
on to be used by the Indo-Greek, Indo-Parthian and Kushana kings in north India. While
Kharoshthi declined by the 3rd century CE, Brahmi lived on to become the parent of all the
indigenous scripts of South Asia and parts of central and Southeast Asia.
In southern India, the earliest inscriptions are in a variant of Brahmi called Tamil- Brahmi.
The early medieval period saw the emergence of three southern scripts: Grantha, Tamil and
Vatteluttu. The first was used for writing Sanskrit while the second and the third for writing
Tamil. The Tamil script appeared under the Pallavas in the 7 th century CE while scripts
similar to the modern Telugu and Kannada scripts emerged in the 14 th-15th centuries. The
same time also witnessed the development of Malayalam script out of Grantha.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.3.1: Sketch of James Prinsep, the man who deciphered the Brahmi script
Source: http://www.asi.nic.in/asi_monu_whs_sanchi_detail.asp

The earliest epigraphic language employed by the indigenous rulers of India was Prakrit
while the use of pure Sanskrit in the inscriptions of northern India is first noticed from the
second half of the 1st century BCE. The first long Sanskrit inscription is the Junagadh rock
inscription of the western Kshatrapa king Rudradaman. By the end of the 3rd century CE,
Sanskrit had nearly ousted Prakrit from northern India. This process, however, took much
longer in the Deccan and South India where we find bilingual Sanskrit – Prakrit inscriptions
till the 4th-5th centuries. The use of Prakrit dwindled thereafter.

Between the 4th and the 6th centuries, Sanskrit emerged as the language of the elite and
politically powerful and hence the language of royal inscriptions all over India. Another
important development of the time was the evolution of regional languages and scripts.

In the south, the old Tamil language came to be used in inscriptions in the second century
BCE and early centuries CE. Tamil gained in importance under the Pallavas who issued both
Tamil and bilingual Tamil- Sanskrit inscriptions from the 7th century onwards. The same
trend was followed by the Pandya and Chola dynasties. Inscriptions in Kannada emerged in
the late 6th century with the early Telugu Chola kings. Inscriptions in Malayalam are dated
from the ninth-tenth centuries. We also have some late inscriptions in Tulu, a Dravidian
language spoken in the south-western parts of Karnataka and northern parts of Kerala.

Epigraphs in modern Indian languages like Marathi and Oriya appear in the eleventh
century. Inscriptions in dialects similar to Hindi come from Madhya Pradesh from the 13 th
century onwards and Gujarati from the fifteenth century onwards.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Value addition: did you know?

Bi-script and bi-lingual inscriptions
In bi-script inscriptions, the text is written in the same language in two different
scripts. Most instances come from the northwest, where we come across short bi-
script Brahmi-Kharoshthi inscriptions. Far more common are bilingual and
multilingual inscriptions that involve the use of two or more languages, mostly
Sanskrit and some other language. A twelfth century inscription found at Kurgod in
Bellary district, Karnataka is in three languages- Sanskrit, Prakrit and Kannada.
Source: Singh, Upinder. 2009. A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India
From the Stone Age to the 12th Century. New Delhi: Pearson Longman, 43-
46.

Dating inscriptions

The dates on inscriptions can range from simple year dates to detailed specifications of the
year, month, lunar fortnight (paksha), lunar day (tithi), weekday along with other
astronomical details. The specification of the year and day began in the 2 nd century BCE. An
interesting practice is noticed in some later inscriptions, which instead of using numbers,
used words standing for these numbers. For instance, bhumi (earth)=1; kara (hand)=2;
loka (the worlds)=3; veda=4 etc. These words were to be read backwards, in the reverse
sequence of the numbers in the date-e.g. ‗kara-veda-bhumi‘ meant the figure 241 and
reading backwards would give the year 142. Undated inscriptions are assigned rough dates
on palaeographic grounds.

Inscriptions are usually dated in regnal years or eras and the dates of eras could be in
words, numerals or both. A few notable eras of the ancient and early medieval periods
include the Vikrama era of 58 BCE, the Shaka era of 78 CE, Chedi era of 248 CE and the
Gupta era of 319-20 CE. In Kerala and adjoining parts of Tamil Nadu, inscriptions used the
Kollam era of 824 CE while those in Karnataka and adjoining areas used the Chalukya-
Vikrama era of 1076 CE. These eras marked important events, usually the accession of a
king and some continued to be used even after the end of their founding dynasty.

Types of inscriptions

According to Salomon (1998, 110), most inscriptions fall into the two broad categories of
donative and panegyric records. Earlier, D.C. Sircar (1981, 2) had classified epigraphic
records under two groups: those engraved by or on behalf of the ruling authority and those
incised on behalf of private individuals or organizations. However, it is important to
remember that inscriptions cannot be classified into mutually exclusive categories and
overlapping in their character is inevitable.

Broadly speaking, then, inscriptions can be classified as donative, dedicative and

commemorative. Donative inscriptions record donations made in favour of religious

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

establishments or the installation of religious images and were inscribed on shrine walls,
images, railings and gateways. Royal land grants, inscribed on stone but mostly on copper
plates are an important constituent of this category. The Satavahana and Kshatrapa
epigraphs at Nashik are the earliest stone inscriptions recording land grants with tax
exemptions. The Pallava and Shalankayana grants of the mid 4 th century are the earliest
surviving copper plate grants.

Most royal inscriptions and some private ones too begin with a prashasti and some of
these are solely dedicated to the purpose of glorifying their subject. Epigraphs
commemorating particular achievements of a king in a prashasti include the Hathigumpha
inscription of Kharavela, a 1st century BCE/1st century CE king of Kalinga in Orissa, the 2nd
century Junagadh rock inscription of Rudradaman I and the Allahabad inscription of the 4th
century Gupta emperor Samudragupta.

Value addition: did you know?

Samudragupta‟s Allahabad prashasti
The court-poet, Harisena, here glorifies the martial virtues of the king in glowing
terms:

Whose body was most charming, being covered with

The plenteous beauty of the marks of hundreds of

Scars caused by battle-axes, arrows, spikes, spears,

Barbed darts, swords, iron clubs, javelins, barbed

Arrows, long arrows and many other weapons.

Source: ncertbooks.prashanthellina.com/class_6.../CH 11.pdf

Commemorative inscriptions record a specific event or commemorate the dead in the form
of memorial stones, not always connected with burials. For instance the Lumbini pillar
inscription of Ashoka records the visit of the king to the Buddha‘s birth-place. Memorial
stones most commonly included those erected in the memory of dead heroes or women who
became sati.

We also come across inscriptions recording charitable services by private individuals like the
building of waterworks, wells and feeding houses. Other types of inscriptions include labels,
graffiti left by pilgrims and travellers and writing on seals.

Value addition: did you know?

About „footprint inscriptions‟
These comprise of a pair of engraved footprints of noteworthy people like holy men
and kings and are found in many parts of the country.

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Source: Singh, Upinder. 2009. A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India
From the Stone Age to the 12th Century. New Delhi: Pearson Longman, 49.

What inscriptions tell us

The importance of epigraphy has been attributed to the paucity in the ancient period of the
kind of historical data available from literary sources for other civilizations of the ancient
and medieval period (Salomon 1998, 3). Where other sources fall silent, inscriptions can
step in crucially to fill in the gaps in our information about historical figures and events.
Inscriptions having the advantage of durability, serve as reliable primary rather than
secondary sources for history writing. Compared to literary sources, they are less likely to
be tampered with, as additions and modifications can be easily detected. Inscriptional
evidence is also of particular importance as it consists of the most detailed and
chronological foundation for nearly all aspects of ancient and medieval Indian culture.
According to D. C. Sircar, ―there is no aspect of the life, culture and activities of the Indians
that is not reflected in inscriptions‖ (Salomon 1998, 4).

Notwithstanding their contribution in the reconstruction of the history of ancient and early
medieval India, inscriptions need to be used carefully while dealing with different aspects of
the past. The main problem, according to Salomon (1998, 226) is that most inscriptions are
not essentially historical documents but rather donative or panegyric records which
incidentally record some amount of historical information.

Inscriptions are a vital source of information on political and dynastic history. This is
particularly true in the case of later dynasties such as the Rashtrakutas, where the
abundance of epigraphic information enables us to reconstruct a fairly detailed account of
their history, chronology and geography. However, epigraphic evidence for earlier
dynasties like the Sungas for instance, tends to be meager and hence needs to be
supplemented with evidence from literary sources.

The findspots of inscriptions as well as the claims of territorial and military conquests made
in inscriptions are often taken as indicating the area under the political control of a ruler.
However, such claims are problematic because inscriptions are not always found in their
original place and not all inscriptions of a king‘s reign can be discovered. Moreover, court
poets who were eager to glorify their royal patrons may well have exaggerated these
claims.

Similarly, the genealogical information provided by inscriptions also needs to be examined

carefully. Here again in this respect, later inscriptions are richer than earlier ones. Their
prashastis give details about dynastic histories and reigns of kings. However, problems are
encountered: when we consider the possibility of the information having been exaggerated;
when there is confusion regarding kings with the same name in a genealogy; when
inscriptions make conflicting claims; or when genealogies skip names. In all such cases, the

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details of political events need to be corroborated with information from other available
sources.

Inscriptions also constitute a principal source of information on political structures,

administrative and revenue systems particularly of the early medieval period. They tell us
about modes of agricultural production, systems of land tenure, the history of settlement
patterns, agrarian relations, forms of labour, class and caste structures. Land grants in
particular have been central to debates regarding the ownership of land in ancient as well as
early medieval India. The significant increase in the number of royal grants to Brahmanas
between c. 600-1200 AD has been interpreted as being indicative of a period of political
fragmentation or as ―one of several integrative and legitimizing policies adopted by kings‖
(Singh 2009, 573).

Epigraphy enables us to work out a geographical and chronological framework for the study
of the religious traditions of ancient and medieval India. Inscriptional records help us in
tracing the growth and relative popularity of various devotional cults at different times and
places. They also reveal patterns of royal patronage to different religions and sects and at
the same time enlighten us about sects and cults that flourished but did not leave any
literature of their own like the Ajivika sect and the yaksha and naga cults. Inscriptions can
throw light on the history of iconography and architecture by helping us in identifying and
dating structures.

Computer-aided analysis of epigraphic data also aids the study of historical geography. In
many cases, they help in the geographical identification of places known from literary
sources while in others they provide us with the ancient names of places not mentioned in
literary sources.

Epigraphic records also contain information that can be used to study the history of
languages and literature as also the performing arts.

Numismatics

We are all aware of the importance of money as a medium of exchange, a unit of value and
measure of wealth. Money is defined as any article or commodity accepted by general
consent as a medium of economic exchange

Numismatics or the study of coins involves an analysis of their weight (metrology), design,
metallic composition, the sources of the metals used and message content. Most ancient
coins are chance discoveries and can be stray individual finds or part of a coin hoard. The
earliest coins in the world, dated to 700 BCE, come from Lydia in West Asia and were made
of electrum, an alloy of gold and silver (Singh 2009, 51).

The origin and evolution of Indian coinage

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The human story began with limited wants and needs. Similarly limited were the means of
meeting these requirements. The earliest known mode of exchange was therefore barter in
which one commodity was exchanged in return for the other. Starting from the stone age till
Harappan times, economic transactions were based on barter. Words such as nishka,
nishka-griva and hiranya-pinda (gold ornaments) though mentioned in the Rig Veda, cannot
be understood as coins nor are terms like nishka, suvarna, shatamana and pada (gold
globules) used in later Vedic texts any more indicative of having been full-fledged coins.

The emergence of states, urbanization and expanding trade in the 6 th-5th centuries BCE
provides the context in which we come across the earliest definite literary and
archaeological evidence of coinage in the Indian subcontinent. Buddhist texts and Panini‘s
Ashtadhyayi refer to kahapana/karshapana, nikka/nishka, shatamana, pada, vimshatika,
trinshatika and suvanna/suvarna. It is however, important to remember that the beginning
of the use of coinage did not mean the disappearance of barter.

Punch-marked coins, mostly of silver and some of copper are the earliest found coins. These
were generally rectangular but sometimes even square or round and were either cut out of
metal sheets or made out of flattened metal globules. Dies or punches were then used to
hammer on the symbols. The symbols used could be simple geometric ones, plants,
animals, sun, wheel, tree, mountain, branches and human-figures. Some of these may
have had a religious and political significance. These coins, however, do not carry any
legends i.e. anything written on them. Punch-marked coins circulated all over the
subcontinent and are found at many places till the early centuries CE but they continued to
be in circulation for a longer period in peninsular India. Most coins were issued by states
though in later times we have evidence of city and guild issues also.

Value addition: did you know?

Beans and berries as units of measure
A black and red seed of the gunja berry (Abrus precatorius) known as the raktika,
ratti or rati was the basic unit of Indian coin weight systems. Silver punch-marked
coins generally weighed 32 rattis or about 56 grains (grain is a weight measure used
for metals; 1 grain=64.79 mg). Similarly, in South India, the standard weight of
coins was calculated on the basis of the relationship between two kinds of beans- the
manjadi (Odenathera pavonina) and the kalanju (Caesalpinia bonduc).
Source: Singh, Upinder. 2009. A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India
From the Stone Age to the 12th Century. New Delhi: Pearson Longman, 51-
52.

The punch-marked coins were followed by uninscribed cast coins made of copper or alloys of
copper. Found in most parts of the subcontinent except the far south, these coins were
made by pouring molten metal into clay and metal casts and moulds. Clay moulds have
been recovered from many sites while we also have a bronze mould from Eran in central
India. Finds of these coins with punch-marked ones from the same archaeological level at
some early historical sites suggest an overlap in time.

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Another early Indian coin type was the uninscribed die-struck coin, mostly in copper and
only sometimes in silver. These were probably minted around the 4 th century BCE and are
found in large numbers at sites like Taxila and Ujjain. Symbols similar to those on punch-
marked coins were struck on the coin blanks with metal dies that had the required designs
carved on them.

Die-struck Indo-Greek coins of the 2nd/1st-century BCE marked the next stage in the history
of Indian coinage. Usually round and mostly in silver, the obverse of these coins bore the
name and portrait of the issuing ruler while the reverse generally had religious symbols.
Bilingual and bi-script coins were common, with the name of the ruler in Greek language
and script on the obverse and in Prakrit language and Kharoshthi script on the reverse. The

Shakas, Parthians and Kshatrapas followed the Indo-Greek pattern of coinage including the
practice of issuing bilingual and bi-script coins.
Figure 1.3.3.2: Kushana coins
Source: http://www.rbi.org.in/currency/museum/c-ancient.html

The Kushanas (1st-4th centuries CE) were the first to issue gold coins in large quantities,
their silver coins being rare. A large number of copper coin finds of low denominational
value is indicative of a growing money economy. The obverse of the coins carried the figure,
name and title of the king while the reverse depicted Brahmanical, Buddhist, Greek, Roman
and other deities. The legends were either in Greek or sometimes in Kharoshthi on the
reverse.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.3.3.3: Indo-Greek coins

Source: http://www.rbi.org.in/currency/museum/c-ancient.html

Numismatic evidence from the 3rd century BCE to the 4th century CE consists of what
numismatists call indigenous, tribal, janapada or local coins issued by chieftains, kings and
non-monarchical states like the Arjunayanas, Uddehikas, Malavas and Yaudheyas. These
were mostly cast or die- struck in copper or bronze and sometimes in silver with a few
examples of the use of lead and potin (an alloy of copper, lead, tin and dross). We also
have evidence of coins issued by the city administration and merchant guilds.

In the Deccan, the Satavahanas issued die-struck as well as cast coins in silver, copper and
also some coins of small denomination made of lead and potin. As a result of large-scale
trade, Roman coins also came into peninsular India in large quantities in the early centuries

Figure 1.3.3.4: Coins of the Yaudheyas

Source: http://www.rbi.org.in/currency/museum/c-ancient.html

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

CE and may have been used for large transactions. In the western Deccan particularly, we
find the co-existence of Satavahana, Kshatrapa, punch-marked and Roman coins in the
early centuries CE.

We also have punch-marked coins from South India which seem to have been dynastic
issues from the symbols they used. For instance, the double carp fish of the Pandyas or the
bow and arrow of the Chera kings.

The Guptas, in north India issued a large number of die-struck gold coins called dinaras with
legends in Sanskrit along with silver and only some copper ones. The obverse showed the
ruling king in different poses while the reverse carried religious symbols.

Figure 1.3.3.5: Gupta coins

Source: http://www.rbi.org.in/currency/museum/c-ancient.html

The Satavahana coins in the eastern Deccan were followed by the lead coins of the
Ikshvakus in the Krishna valley (3rd-4th centuries), copper issues of the Shalankayana
dynasty (early 4th- mid-5th centuries) and the Vishnukundins (mid-5th- mid-7th centuries).
The western Deccan yielded coins of the Traikutakas (3 rd-4th centuries) and silver coins of
the Kalachuris (6th century) were found in the Maharashtra area.

The numismatic evidence of the early medieval period has been used by historians to
discuss the nature of political, social and economic structures of the time. Views that see a
feudal order in this period, though contested, talk of a decline in coinage along with a
decline in trade and urban centres, followed by a revival in the 11 th century.

Nevertheless, the use of gold, silver and copper coins continued while dynasties now also
issued some coins in base metal alloys. Bills of exchange called hundikas and the use of
cowries often supplemented coins. Cowries seem to have been used in cases where coins of
small denominational value were in short supply or for small-scale transactions.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

In the western Deccan, early medieval coin finds have been attributed to dynasties like the
Chalukyas of Badami, the eastern Chalukyas, the Chalukyas of Kalyana, the Kalachuri
Rajputs and the Kadambas of Goa. In the far south, the prominent finds are those of the
Pallavas and Cholas.

Figure 1.3.3.6: Coins of the Cholas 9th-13th centuries

Source: http://www.rbi.org.in/currency/museum/c-ancient.html

Coins as a source of history

Coins, as a source of history, according to P.L. Gupta (1981,4), play two roles: firstly, they
throw light on those aspects of history, for which little or no evidence comes forth from
other sources and secondly they confirm and exemplify the history known from other
sources.

Coins are essentially related to economic history. Different attributes of coins such as their
existence, metal content, fabric, size, technique, weight, symbols and motifs, art, legends,
find-spots and condition can hint at aspects of economic history such as the production and
circulation of coinage as well as the purchasing power of coins. The study of coins is also
essential for the history of exchange and trade. For instance, the wide distribution of
Kushana coins indicates the flourishing trade of the period. Similarly, in the Deccan, the
ships on Satavahana coins are suggestive of the importance of maritime trade in the period.
Large numbers of Roman coins found in various parts of India bear testimony to the volume
of Indo- Roman trade. Coins have also been used by historians to dwell on the state of the
economy of the time. Debasement of coins has generally been interpreted as an indication
of a financial crisis or general economic decline as in the time of the later Guptas. This
notion, however, has been countered by the argument that in many cases debasement
could have been a response to a context where the supply of precious metals was restricted
but there was an increase in the demand for coins due to a spurt in the volume of economic
transactions.

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The importance of coins for the political history of ancient as well as early medieval India
also comes forth in several respects. Numismatic evidence particularly enlightens us about
political events between c. 200 BCE and 300 CE. Coins sometimes reveal the names of
unknown kings. Out of over three dozen Indo-Greek kings and 2 queens known from coins,
only 2 are mentioned in inscriptions and 7 in literary sources (Goyal 1995, 4-5). We also
have numismatic evidence for the Parthians, Shakas, Kshatrapas, Kushanas and
Satavahanas. Coins tell us about ancient political systems other than monarchical states by
the use of the term gana on the coins of tribes like the Yaudheyas and Malavas, suggesting
a non-monarchical polity.

Coins often carry the titles, dates and biographical details of kings. For instance, we have
coins commemorating the marriage of the Gupta king Chandragupta I with a Lichchavi
princess. Coins prove the existence of a Gupta king named Ramagupta between
Samudragupta and Chandragupta II. We also know of the ashvamedha sacrifice performed
by Samudragupta and Kumaragupta I from coins. The archer and battleaxe coin types and
the lyricist type showing Samudragupta playing the vina, portray different shades of the
king‘s personality.

Similarly, symbols, figures and depictions of deities on coins strongly hint at the
personal religious beliefs of kings, royal religious policy as well as the cults
patronised under various rulers. The use by the Kushanas of Indian, Iranian
and Graeco-Roman religious traditions on their coins can be interpreted as a
demonstration of their syncretic religious beliefs.

Coins also have a significant role in archaeology, helping us to date the layers in
archaeological excavations. For instance, at Sonkh near Mathura, excavated levels were
divided into eight periods on the basis of coin finds

1.4.1: Recent trends in historical interpretation: the

historiography of gender in ancient Indian history

For well over a hundred years or more, women have been ‗missing‘ from the teaching and
learning of history as have some other categories of the marginalized: peasants, workers,
tribals, and dalits among others. History as a field of enquiry and of recording ‗events‘ had
emerged in early societies as a story of power: the struggles of a few men to capture it and
of other men to dislodge those wielding it. In such a framework, women were bound to be
missing as they rarely, if ever, were regarded as legitimate claimants for the throne, the
case of Razia Sultan in India being an exception since she was nominated by her father to
be the ruler despite having brothers. But, with changes in the framework of history, as
people challenged the narrow basis of power from the 18 th century onwards across the

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world, through democratic struggles, other stories of the past and present began to be
written. In India, it is only in the post-independence period that the frameworks of history
really changed, especially since the 1980s, but even so women remained on the margins,
sometimes subsumed under other categories of the margins such as ‗peasants‘ and ‗tribals‘.
Only from the late 80s and onwards have women become a category in themselves, the
legitimate focus of a historical framework that has opened up the way we think about
history and the paradigms that were conventionally associated with it.

Visibility within invisibility

However, it may be noted, that the story of the missing women in history-writing in India is
complicated by the ‗visibility‘ of women since the 19th century. This visibility was granted
not because women were treated as an independent field of enquiry, but because they were
regarded as signposts for, and signifiers of, a national culture, which was seeking to
regenerate itself from the charge of backwardness, levelled against all Indians by the
colonial rulers. Thus we have a very distinctive way in which women appear as the subjects
of the ‗women‘s question‘, whose status was in need of reform, led by a group of men in the
19th century. Women were regarded as ‗pegs‘ to hang questions of culture, as symbolic
pawns in a complex ideological contest. This mode of writing history has acted as an
impediment in actually using gender as an analytical category. The practitioners of women‘s
history have thus had to first challenge the construction of ‗women‘ by the 19 th and 20th
century writers to make cultural claims about India‘s ancient past, and its contrast to the
perceived evils of the present, and only then move on to writing a more gender inclusive
history.

Value addition: did you know?

Nineteenth century writing
In 1888, R. C. Dutt published an influential work titled A History of Civilisation in
Ancient India where he outlined the achievements of the ancient past beginning with
the ‗Vedic Age‘. The discoveries of the Indologists were used to highlight the
‗progress of the human mind, such as we shall seek for in vain among the records of
any other equally ancient nation.‘

An important element in the civilization was the ‗status of women.‘ He wrote:

'Still more [appealing] to us is the picture of cultured ladies who were themselves
rishis, and composed hymns and performed sacrifices like men. For there were no

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unhealthy restrictions against women in those days….'

Nineteenth century writers were often constructing an ancient past where there were
no ‗unhealthy‘ restrictions: the lack of education and the customs of purdah, or the
confinement of women within the four walls of the home. This led to comparisons
with ancient Greece and Rome, a popular theme of the 19th century writing on
Indian women:

'The historian of India who has studied the literature of the ancient Hindus will have
no hesitation in asserting that never in the most polished days of Greece and Rome
were women held in such high regard in those countries as in India three thousand
years ago.‘

Source: Dutt, R. C. 1888. A History of Civilisation in Ancient India. reprint

1972. Delhi: Vishal, 171.

Completing the nationalist project

Half a century later, A. S. Altekar (1929), an influential writer, was still attempting to
conclude the debate on the status of women in the ‗ancient past‘ on a positive note. He
argued that the community ‗on the whole‘ showed proper concern and respect for women,
allowing them considerable freedom in the different activities of the social and political life
of that time.

The feminist project: rewriting history

Feminist ‗her‘storians began their work on gender by countering the nationalist

reconstructions of history. For example, Chakravarti and Roy (1988, 322) pointed out that
the parameters for the exploration of women‘s roles were set by the nationalist historians,
who, in their search for the nation‘s past, had confined themselves to a limited set of
questions regarding the status of women. These were determined by a focus on women in
the upper-caste households, the economic vulnerability of widows, property rights for
women, the right to education and so on. In short, the perspective of women was confined
to seeing them within the family.

Feminist historians instead turned the spotlight on women outside the family, upon women
who laboured in the homes of wealthy landowners. They argued that there were
innumerable women who had no property and whose place within the family had no
relevance to wider society, which merely viewed them as sources of cheap labour

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(Chakravarti and Roy, 332). In this they showed that women could not be homogenized
under a single category, rather they drew attention to the differing social locations of
different categories of women.

In search of new sources

However, most important was the problem of the way a narrow patriarchal bias in the past
had worked to erase women, and other marginalized groups, from the very sources
themselves as the sources have come down to us refracted by the biases of their times.
Thus, one of the first tasks of gender sensitive historians was to compile or highlight
sources that had previously been ignored. For example, a compilation titled Women Writing
in India put together a number of writings by women beginning from the 1st millennium
BCE and bringing it up to the 20th century CE.

Value addition: did you know?

Earliest examples of women‟s writing

The Therigatha, or the songs of the bhikkhunis, a text which was part of the
Khuddaka Nikaya of the Buddhist textual corpus, is the earliest known text to have
been authored by women. In this collection women describe a range of experiences,
religious, social and personal. Take for example

I Mutta‘s Song:

So free am I, so gloriously free!

Free from three petty things-

From mortar, from pestle and from my twisted lord, freed from birth and death I am,

And all that has held me down

Is hurled away

II The Song of Mettika

Though I am weak and tired now,

And my youthful step is gone,

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Leaning on this staff

I climb a mountain peak,

My cloak cast off, my bowl overturned,

I sit here on this rock.

And over my spirit blows

The breath

Of liberty

Source: Tharu, Susie and K. Lalita. ed. 1991. Women Writing in India, Vol. I.
Delhi: Oxford University Press, 68-69.

Buddhist texts as sources

Another text of the Buddhist literary corpus was a companion to the Therigatha (which
literally means songs of the elder bhikkunis). This was the Theragatha or the songs of the
elder bhikkhus. Together these texts provide a glimpse of the social and religious
experiences of women and men. The verses in these two texts are accompanied by
biographical details of the authors of the verses: their places of birth, their social location,
their distinctive experiences as women and men, how they were drawn to Buddhism and to
what stage they reached in their journey towards salvation. From the point of view of the
historian two things stand out. One, the proportion of women who reached their goal of
nibbana was larger than men: 23% women to 13% men; and two, the distinctiveness of the
subject matter of the verses. While men talk about their everyday lives, on the field,
workplace and courts, women speak of ‗kitchen drudgery‘ and the pain of losing loved ones,
especially children, clearly making the poems with a female sensibility.

Other texts, other voices

It was not only texts authored by women that were highlighted by gender sensitive
historians. Even a corpus like the Sangam literature in Tamil was analysed from the point of
view of women‘s voices depicted in it. A breakdown of the poems showed that many of the
Sangam poems had been composed by women. From a total of 2,381 poems, 154 carried
women‘s signatures and 102 were anonymous: some of these too may have been composed
by women since ‗anonymous‘ in many cultures often stood for women.

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The verses written by women evoke multiple moods. They are about women who sing while
transplanting paddy seedlings, drawing water and husking paddy, as they do even today.
They also sang as they kept vigil on the ripening grain, to keep the birds away but also to
charm the spirit of the plant and coax it along as it reached fruition according to Tharu and
Lalita (1991, 71). At the same time, the aesthetics of the poetry created tropes for women
such as the heroic mother, who wants to know whether her son had died while facing the
enemy; the widow, who mourns her husband‘s death; the young girl who waits for her
lover; the barren woman; the oppressed daughter-in-law who complains of her mother-in-
law; or the co-wife who wants her abandonment to end. Other verses break out of the
standard images of women as in this verse where Auvaiyar, a wise woman, sings poignantly
of her suffering:

Shall I attack these people, shall I strike them?

I do not know

Or shall I find some reason and cry out

to this city that sleeps

not knowing my suffering

while the moving wind swirls

And pulls me to and fro. (Tharu and Lalita 1991, 75)

Later Tamil texts extended the Sangam literary corpus and its importance for locating
women‘s voices was recognized by scholars, theatre persons and cultural practitioners. Two
Tamil classics, the Silappadhikaram and its narrative sequel the Manimegalai, have been
very influential and provide richly worked out representations of women. When we look at
them together, we see the main female protagonists represented in the form of three
archetypes: Kannagi as the good wife who possesses sacred power derived from the purity
of her conduct; Madhavi the beautiful and talented courtesan who excels in the art of
providing pleasure; and her daughter Manimegalai who renounces her life as the object of a
prince‘s desire to become a bhikkhuni and serve humanity.

All three archetypes may be seen in the Pali Buddhist texts also: the wife, the courtesan and
the bhikkhuni.

Women on the margins

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A female figure that does not appear to be so much a trope as a kind of happenstance in the
Pali textual tradition is the dasi, or woman in servitude. As early as the 1930s Horner‘s
sensitive study of women in Buddhism broke the binaries of colonialism/nationalism in
historical writing by detailing and categorizing women as they appeared in Buddhist
literature. It powerfully demonstrated that women could not be homogenized under a single
rubric, as R.C. Dutt and Altekar had tended to do in their work. While they classified women
into daughters, mothers, wives and widows—all of the upper castes without specifically
acknowledging the focus of their writing, she brought in what she called the ‗woman
worker‘, in addition to all the other categories. What is interesting is that among those
whom she includes in the category of the woman worker, whom she defines as not being
dependent on a husband, father or children, is the courtesan who gains a livelihood through
her skills such as singing, dancing and entertaining.

But there are other women workers who work for masters and mistresses and must perform
hard labour: they supported themselves, kept watch over the paddy-fields, drew water from
the river for the households in which they worked, and even functioned as keepers of the
burning ground. Two illuminating examples of dasis throw light on little known aspects of a
gender inclusive history: one dasi stands out for her tremendous powers of reasoning and
the second for her understanding of the importance of her own work.

Value addition: what the sources say

Women speak: the commonsense of a dasi
Punna, the dasi of the famous setthi Anathapindika, drew water daily for his
household. She noticed a brahmana making dips in the river and shivering in the
cold and asked him why he subjected himself to such suffering when he had a choice
not to, a choice that she did not have because she was a dasi.

The brahmana said he was trying to acquire merit by the ritual dips he took in the
water. Punna then with pretended innocence said that this meant the frogs and
fishes who lived in the water must be going straight to heaven. And the water must
be very clever to wash off the sins but keep the merit intact as it flowed over the
body of the brahmana. The sly humour and the commonsense of the dasi made the
brahmana realize his stupidity, so he gave up on his meaningless rituals.

Source: Chakravarti, Uma. 2006. Everyday Lives, Everyday Histories. Delhi:

Tulika, 217.

Value addition: what the sources say

The margin strikes back: the myth of gentle temper
Kali was a dasi who worked for a mistress called Vedihika who had a fantastic

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reputation for being even-tempered and gentle. One day Kali was struck by the
thought that her mistress‘s gentle manner and even temper was really because she
did her work so well. So she proceeded to conduct an experiment on her own gut
feeling by testing her mistress‘s even temper by getting up later and later three
successive mornings. Three days was enough to break the myth of the mistress‘s
even temper who assaulted Kali on the third morning. Kali then displayed her blood-
splattered head to the neighbourhood and put an end to the mythical gentleness of
the mistress, as well as satisfying herself of her own true worth and the
unacknowledged worth of her labour.

Source: Chakravarti, Uma. 2006. Everyday Lives, Everyday Histories. Delhi:

Tulika, 92.

Figure 1.4.1.1: ‗Dasas and dasis serving a princess'. Details from grotto XVII and Grotto I at
Ajanta c. 600 CE

Source: From the cover design created by Ram Rehman for Chakravarti, Uma. 2006.
Everyday Lives, Everyday Histories. Delhi: Tulika.

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Strategies for gendering ancient India

Scholars writing a gender inclusive history have had to use a number of strategies to
literally ‗excavate‘ texts in order to tease out what they contain. Ancient Indian history has
been written by using texts, inscriptions and archaeological material. Texts have been used
extensively to write the many histories that have become a solid body of interpretations.
Some scholars have gone back to these earlier writings and deployed strategies such as
reading against the grain: that is, countering the way the text presents itself to those it
intends to influence. To provide an example: there are a number of hymns that sing praises
of the goddess of dawn, Ushas. While this is evidence of an early acknowledgement of a
goddess tradition which is important, other hymns refer to the gods smashing her chariot,
clearly suggesting a certain hostility towards her. In conjunction with other references a
more complex picture of gender may be drawn, taking us away from simple questions of
high or low status attributed to women by scholars to apply to our earliest texts.

Another mode of analysis deployed to understand gender has been to study the way a
particular myth changes over time. Not only does this lead us to understand that myths are
constructions, but also that they are closely related to and shaped by the social context in
which they are produced. An early and brilliant example of this was the analysis of the
Urvashi and Pururavas myth by D.D. Kosambi (1962). The story contained in the myth
recounts the love between an apsara and a human man and the conditions she set upon
him for their marriage. In three different versions in the Rig Veda, the Mahabharata and the
Vikramorvashiya by Kalidasa, there are significant changes in the narrative. Kosambi
attributed these to changes in the structure of society which made for differences in the
power relationships between men and women. Similarly, Romila Thapar (1999) examined
the story of Shakuntala across time and highlighted narrative shifts that reflected changing
gender relations. The Sita story too has been subjected to similar analysis with wide
differences between textual traditions across time

In recent years the study of inscriptions, which has a long history of scholarly attention, but
without any attention to gender, has experienced a significant change. While many
inscriptions were inscribed on behalf of kings and important men to claim recognition for a
range of deeds accomplished by them, a substantial body of inscriptions were carved in
stone by humbler donors too. They provided support for the construction of stupas and
monasteries to claim merit for their piety. These studies have led to important issues being
looked at, such as the proportion of women donors to men donors and the way women
describe themselves in the inscriptions: through familial categories as wives, mothers and
daughters, or through other ascriptions such as bhikkhunis. These have led to a lively
debate on women‘s access to property or to incomes, and the agency displayed by them in
seeking to record their piety as individuals rather than being content to be subsumed within
the piety of the men around them.

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All of these developments in writing history have led to a deeper understanding of gender as
an important element of exploring history.

But none of the moves described here have led to a paradigm shift in thinking and writing
history. This is because the world of production and the world of reproduction have been
framed as binaries with history dealing either with power or with production, but not as yet
including reproduction as a critical element in understanding social relations. A real
paradigm shift will happen only when these binaries give way and all of human experience is
brought into the framework of history without creating a hierarchy of social and cultural
relations. An important beginning has been made in the works of a few practitioners of
gender history. They have outlined the importance of reproduction and social reproduction
so that all categories of women can be brought into the framework of history. The
relationship between class, caste, patriarchy and the state and its institutions is being
outlined, thus seeking to break down the false divide between gender history and
‗mainstream‘ history. Such studies demonstrate how our understanding of the past deepens
when gender is included as a category of analysis.

1.4.2: Recent trends in historical interpretation: environment,

technology and regions

Xuanzang while traveling in northern India between 630–643 CE visited places associated
with the Buddha. Many of these were urban centres between which he describes traveling
through forested areas. ―[A]fter crossing to the south side of the Ganges on the north of the
river Jumna we come to the country of Prayaga…From this, in a south-west direction, we
enter a great forest, in which we frequently encounter evil beasts and wild elephants. After
going 500 li or so, we arrive at Kiau-shang-mi (Kausambi).‖

On the other hand, a recent scientific study concludes that ―[p]alynological studies of lake
deposit profiles [in the Ganga plains] have helped in the reconstruction of
palaeovegetation over the last 15 kyr BP [15,000 years before present]. It indicates that
the region was open grassland with a few forest thickets.‖

We have, thus, two seemingly opposing views of past environments of the same region, one
through an eyewitness account and the other through a scientific study. How do we
reconcile with these two contrasting images? Perhaps, instead of viewing past environments

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in binary terms, we need to visualize scenarios of multiple but interlocked yet ever changing
micro ecological zones.

Environment

Environmental and climatic changes are often cited as reasons for the decline of past
societies. One very well known case is that of the Harappan civilization but there are other
examples as well. For instance, the emergence and decline of Deccan chalcolithic societies
have also been explained using similar reasons. Archaeologists have investigated certain
other aspects of the environment in the case of the latter. Rather than pure environment, it
is, in fact, ecology or the interrelationship between humans and the environment which is
considered more significant. For some archaeologists, the environment serves as the
determining factor to explain cultural development and change. The excavations at
Inamgaon in the Ghod Valley in Maharashtra conducted over a long period of twelve years
were guided by precisely these sentiments. More recently, inter-disciplinary studies,
involving archaeologists, geologists and palaeobotanists, have focused on recovering
evidence of past environments in the Ganga plains.

Environment as a cause of decline of the Harappan civilization

Environmental and climatic change has been attributed as factors in the decline of the
Harappan civilization. Several reasons have been cited: excessive floods on the Indus,
tectonic changes in the Indus Valley, the wearing out of the landscape and deforestation,
the drying up of rivers, as well as increasing aridity. Early geological work by M.R. Sahni
identified both excessive floods and tectonic uplift in the Indus region. Robert L. Raikes and
George Dales were to further suggest that an avulsion in the Indus Valley caused the river
to be dammed up leading to disruption in the life of the inhabitants of Mohenjodaro. H.T.
Lambrick was to prefer a theory of the Indus shifting to a new bed and hence resulting in
the deterioration of the countryside surrounding Mohenjodaro.

Walter Fairservis put forward a theory of the wearing out of the landscape. He pointed out
that while cattle power was essential for increasing cultivation, animals would have to be
fed even when they were not working. For this, either they would have to be pastured
elsewhere or stall-fed. The latter would require the growing of fodder crops and his estimate
was that the inhabitants of Mohenjodaro would perhaps have grown only about one-fourth

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of their fodder needs. The rest would have required foraging from the landscape. Not only
this, the need to fire the millions of bricks needed for construction at Mohenjodaro would
also have gradually resulted in deterioration of the landscape.

Much more recently we have the situation of the Cholistan desert in Pakistan. The river
Ghaggar in India passing through Rajasthan enters Pakistan where it is called the Hakra.
This river, being largely dry now, facilitated the documentation of ancient sites by M.R.
Mughal. A flowing river largely erodes the archaeological sites along its banks. He recovered
evidence of numerous habitations of periods ranging from the ‗Hakra Ware‘, Kot Diji, Mature
Harappan, Late Harappan, Painted Grey Ware to the medieval period. This area records the
largest number of settlements in the Greater Indus Valley. However, while mapping out
settlement locations over different periods, Mughal found that the area occupied by Mature
Harappan sites was far larger than that by Late Harappan sites. The shrinking of area
occupied by sites in subsequent periods seemed to suggest that the river was slowly drying
up in its lower reaches. In a study using remote sensing methods, Yash Pal, B. Sahai, R.K.
Sood and D.P. Agrawal were to suggest that river capture was the reason for the drying up
of the Ghaggar. The region of focus was the Sutlej-Yamuna divide, with the gradual
movements of the two rivers shifting their courses and eventually being captured by other
river systems. The Yamuna shifted eastwards and became part of the Ganga system while
the Sutlej, whose waters largely fed the Ghaggar, moved westwards and became part of the
Indus system.

The theory of Harappan decline being attributed to increasing aridity or climatic change was
based on palynological data recovered by Gurdeep Singh from three salt water lakes in
Rajasthan, Sambhar, Didwana and Lunkaransar. Singh had suggested, nearly forty years
back, that the period of the Harappan civilization was marked by increased rainfall, a theory
which has been strongly disputed. The following period, c. 1800–1500 BCE was a short dry
period. However, one problem with this theory is the lack of consistency in dates as
according to Singh‘s own data, aridity set in at Lunkaransar at around 2000 BCE but at
Sambhar it was around 1000 BCE. Moreover, as pointed out by V.N. Misra, even if there
was increasing aridity, the archaeological record does not register a lack of occupation.
Contrarily, Rajasthan and adjoining parts of Haryana and Punjab register a number of
settlements of ‗Late Harappans‘ as well as of the ‗Ochre Coloured Pottery culture‘.

The basic problem with most of the theories attributing Harappan decline to changes in the
environment is that many of the factors such as river shifts, deforestation, tectonic changes
or floods, largely impact on the immediate environment of a site. Floods near Mohenjodaro
may impact on that site but floods per se as a cause cannot explain the decline of the entire
civilization. Similarly, the drying up of the Hakra would definitely have had an impact in the
Cholistan but cannot be a reason to explain Harappan decline on the Indus, in the Punjab,
or in Kutch. So is the case with environmental degradation affecting specific zones such as
metal mining areas or the outskirts of urban settlements. Shereen Ratnagar has in fact

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argued that structural contradictions inherent in the social and economic systems of the
Harappans and the end of external trade with Mesopotamia are also issues that need to be
seriously considered for any discussion on the decline of the Harappan civilization.

Understanding ancient ecology

Geomorphologists and archaeologists have tried to understand past land use strategies at
several sites in the subcontinent. One of the best examples would be the case of Inamgaon.
This site is located in a meander of the river Ghod in western Deccan. The features that
were relevant for this particular study included the availability of water in the deep pools
near the site, sparse vegetation, basalt outcrops with veins of siliceous stones used for
making tools, and the prevalence of black soil ideal for rainfall agriculture.

An important method by which the usefulness of the landscape for ancient inhabitants can
be judged is site catchment analysis. This method, developed by E. Higgs and S. Vita-Finzi,
was used in the case of Inamgaon to ascertain how far its inhabitants would have had to
travel for resources such as raw materials, forest products, cultivable land, pasture areas
and so forth. For this, it was required to have information on what materials (which came to
light through excavation) were being used in the settlement. It was also understood that
the immediate catchment enclosed the area within a radius of 5 km which was possible to
cover in an hour‘s walk; this was divided into segments of 12 minutes (1 km) and 30
minutes (2.5 km). Since the topography around Inamgaon was more or less even, the
catchment area of 5 km formed a circle around the site. Modern land use patterns,
variations in soils, raw material outcrops, plant and animals encountered within these
segments were recorded. Thus, within an area of 1 km from Inamgaon were documented
arable land, chalcedony and other stones for making cutting tools, basalt for making
grinding stones and pottery clay. The area from 1 km to 2.5 km radius was probably utilized
for grazing, small game hunting and wild plant gathering; basalt outcrops found here may
also have been used. The area from 2.5 – 5 km radius was probably covered by thorn forest
where small and larger game was hunted. The excavators also found evidence for a small
settlement about 5 km from Inamgaon which may have been a farmstead or was seasonally
occupied. About 7 km away were again found rich veins of chalcedony and other stones as
well as evidence for the production of stone tools. This was about 3 km away from the small
settlement. However, more exotic materials found in the excavations at Inamgaon, such as
copper, gold, ivory and so forth would have come from areas much further away.

The excavators of Inamgaon, on the basis of botanical and cultural evidence, hypothesized
that climatic changes impacted on the settlement and its inhabitants around 1000 BCE. The

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data obtained from the Rajasthan lakes was used which suggested a distinctly dry phase
from 3000 – 2500 years BP. The period from 1000 – 700 BCE at Inamgaon was understood
to have been affected by frequent droughts which occurred due to a relatively dry climate
and increasing aridity. This period 1000 – 700 BCE, that is, the Late Jorwe period showed
signs of cultural change. ―There was a striking change in the house plan during this period;
instead of large rectangular houses of the preceding period, there were small round huts of
modest dimensions. The overall economic degeneration was visible in every field of human
activity during this period. The houses were small, built close to each other in a haphazard
manner giving the appearance of a slum.‖ The botanical evidence for the Late Jorwe period
showed highly reduced intensities of cultivated forms as compared to earlier period, even
though far more soil of the Late Jorwe period was excavated and analyzed. The evidence
seems to suggest a ―general situation nothing short of famine.‖ A greater reliance on wild
plant and animal foods may also suggest a changing emphasis in subsistence strategies.

The cultural changes from Early to Late Jorwe at Inamgaon were seen to be due to
increasing aridity. This was based on the data from the Rajasthan lakes. But as we have
already seen, there is no consistency about the dates of the onset of an arid period.

Reconstructing past environments

After Gurdeep Singh‘s work in Rajasthan in the late 1960s, the more recent work on
environmental and climatic changes has focused on the Ganga plains. So far, it had been
believed that the middle Ganga plains had thick forests which were cleared only in the mid-
first millennium BCE with the help of iron tools.

Value addition: new leads

Past environment and climate in the Ganga plains
Recent studies have focused on pollen samples recovered from lakes (Sanai in Rae
Bareilly, Basaha in Unnao, Misa in Lucknow, Lahuradewa in Sant Kabir Nagar and
Khoalan in Pratapgarh) in the middle Ganga plains. It has been suggested that since
the last 15,000 years the Ganga plains had ―open grassland with a few forest
thickets‖. Animal bones dated to about 50,000 years ago were also recovered from a
section of the Yamuna river at Kalpi. The study of carbon isotopes in the teeth
enamel of these animals suggested a diet of grasses. Thus, it is concluded that the
upper Ganga plain too was moist grassland. A further postulation is that there were
climatic fluctuations alternating between high and low rainfall between 50,000 and
3,500 years ago.
Source: Singh, I. B. “Quarternary Palaeoenvironments of the Ganga Plain
and Anthropogenic Activity.” Man and Environment 30, 1 (2005): 1-35.

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Pollen samples from the lakes appear to indicate a predominance of grasses with a sparse
representation of tree taxa. This evidence has also been used by archaeologists to refute
earlier theories suggesting that iron would have been critical for the large-scale clearance of
forests.

Value addition: an important debate

Iron and social change
There has been a longstanding debate among historians and archaeologists over the
issue of iron and social change. Iron tools were seen by historians as being
necessary for clearing forests and extending agriculture in the middle Ganga plains in
the first millennium BCE. The argument centred on increased agricultural production,
specifically of rice, which was seen to generate surplus that led to the emergence of
states and urban centres in this region. Other related developments were the rise of
new social groups, such as traders, merchants, rich landholders and artisans, whose
aspirations resulted in new religious formulations. Not everybody agrees with the
role given to iron as the catalyst in large-scale socio-economic and religious
transformations. Archaeologists have argued that the transformations proposed by
historians occurred much after the introduction of iron and in many areas,
particularly outside the middle Ganga valley, the use of iron did not lead to the
growth of states and urban centres.
Source: Sahu, B. P. ed. 2006. Iron and Social Change in Early India. New
Delhi: Oxford University Press.

There are, however, several questions that still remain to be answered. First, is the issue of
the inconsistencies in the data from the different lakes. For example, at Basaha Lake, in the
last 2000 years there is a disappearance of tree taxa and an increase in grasses, whereas at
Misa Tal, in more or less the same period, there is an increase in both grasses and trees.
From Khoalan Lake, for the same period, the data shows a fluctuation from increasing to
decreasing tree taxa. Second, if we accept that the Ganga plains were largely grassland, we
would then expect mobile pastoralism to have been an important component of past
subsistence strategies but which would have also included farming, fishing, foraging and
hunting. This is an aspect which can easily be ascertained through archaeological data.
However, so far, archaeological investigations in the Ganga Valley have concentrated mainly
on agricultural settlements.

There is also textual evidence which gives the impression that there were substantial forests
in the Ganga Valley at least in the two thousand years between 1000 BCE and 1000 CE.
Perhaps rather than viewing grasslands versus forests in binary terms, a more variegated
landscape would probably have been the case in the past. While there may have been tall
grasses on river banks and around lakes, there would also have been areas under forests as
Xuanzang observed while traveling between cities. Moreover, forests could also have been
planted just as they were cleared or pastures may have replaced agricultural lands or vice

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versa due to human interventions. Thus, any study on past environments needs to take into
account the constant reconfigurations of landscapes through human activities.

Technology

Early archaeologists working on the Harappan civilization, such as John Marshall and Ernest
Mackay, had shown considerable interest in technology by their recording of possible craft
tools, facilities and unfinished objects. This was the initiation of research on craft activities
that really took off from the 1980s in the Indian subcontinent when Massimo Vidale and
Jonathan Mark Kenoyer used the methods of ethnoarchaeology and experimental
archaeology to study processes as well as organization of crafts. In the ethnoarchaeological
work on crafts, the focus is on present day communities that are still practicing
craftworking, in that all aspects relating to crafts such as material procurement and
processing and formation of objects were to be recorded. However, the focus of such
documentation must rest on addressing questions of archaeological relevance; otherwise
such observations would remain purely ethnographic. In contrast, actual experiments are
conducted in experimental archaeology to ascertain whether a certain technique may have
resulted in the archaeological object under study. Thus, ethnoarchaeology uses observation,
while experimental archaeology uses simulation.

Khambhat bead making

The modern city of Khambhat in Gujarat where stone bead making is still being practiced
became a focus of study from the 19th century. Excavations at the site of Nagara near
Khambhat revealed limited evidence for bead production in the early historical period.
Resources for bead making are obtained from the carnelian mines of Jhagadia near Bharuch
in south Gujarat, which may have been a source in the ancient past too. Khambhat became
important from the ethnoarchaeological point of view because the craft is still being
practiced in homes and workshops in the city giving clues to understanding ancient bead
making techniques. The study of Khambhat bead making undertaken by J.M. Kenoyer, M.
Vidale and K.K. Bhan employed both ethnoarchaeologicy as well as experiments aimed at
reconstructing bead making techniques.

These scholars undertook detailed recording of bead making at an organized workshop as

well as of an ―entrepreneurial‖ setup. In the former workshop, they found demarcated

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rooms for storage, offices, and craft processes. ―One large room…is divided into a chipping
area and a storage area. The chipping area is…subdivided into specific working areas where
different craftsmen sit in a semi-circle facing the open doorway which provides light and
fresh air. The storage area contains burlap sacks filled with unheated and heated nodules,
broken nodules in process, bags of debitage, containers filled with chipped bead rough-outs,
ground bead blanks, water jars, and various complete or broken tools.‖ In the latter type of
working area, ―most of the production activities are carried out inside (a) fenced area and
these include drying of nodules, heating, chipping, grinding, and dumping or stockpiling of
raw materials and fuel. Chipping is done in specific areas while seated on burlap sacks, but
these areas are occasionally used for dumps, stockpiling, or even for grinding.‖

Figure 1.4.2.1: Stages of bead manufacture

Source: Kenoyer, J. M. 1998. Ancient Cities of the Indus Valley Civilization. Karachi: Oxford
University Press, 160.

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Figure 1.4.2.2: Carnelian beads with chipped perforation

Source: Kenoyer, J. M. 1998. Ancient Cities of the Indus Valley Civilization. Karachi: Oxford
University Press, 160.

Figure 1.4.2.3: Experimental replicas of ‗Ernestite‘ stone drills for drilling long carnelian
beads

Source: Kenoyer, J.M. 1998. Ancient Cities of the Indus Valley Civilization. Karachi: Oxford
University Press, 160.

Various processes within bead making were recorded and earlier processes that craftspeople
remembered were also documented. This was necessary in order to gain analogues for
ancient crafts, particularly when several modern processes utilized facilities like electricity
which would have been unavailable in the past. In such instances, experiments were

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conducted utilizing older techniques to gauge how long individual processes would have
taken to complete. Thus, for the sawing of nodules, it was found through experiments that
it took three to four hours of sawing by hand to cut through a small nodule, whereas
modern techniques use electric powered circular blades which obviously completed the job
in a shorter time. For grinding of beads, it was found that ―before the introduction of
electrically powered emery wheels, the bead rough-out was ground and shaped on a hard
sandstone or quartzite grinding stone. In the recent past, special grooved stones were used
to grind and shape small round beads. The bead was secured in a wooden vise that could be
held in both hands, allowing greater pressure to be exerted on the stone. Hand grinding
without the use of a vise is very time-consuming and experimental studies have shown that
it would take four days to grind a single large biconical bead. If the same size of bead is
held in a wooden vise its process can be completed in approximately four hours. The
modern electrically powered emery wheels make it possible to grind the same bead in four
or five minutes.‖ Similarly as far as polishing of beads is concerned, several beads were
polished in the past by tumbling them in a leather bag along with water and abrasive
material. While this technique has not been practiced in Khambhat for over 50 years,
craftspeople‘s memories of this technique allowed these scholars to replicate it
experimentally. They found that after 15 days of tumbling by hand, beads acquired a low
lustre polish. These experiments were useful in providing rough estimates of the amount of
time it would have taken to perform several bead making processes.

Value addition: interesting details

Mohenjodaro surface survey
A surface survey of the site of Mohenjodaro in Sind was conducted by a German-
Italian team as part of a non-invasive strategy of further studying the ancient site. At
an ancient site, particularly one that is less disturbed by modern human activity,
archaeological material may be found on the surface through erosive actions of wind
and water. Thus, for the large parts of the mound of Mohenjodaro that were still
unexcavated, it was useful to undertake a surface survey to plot the material
appearing on the surface which may reflect ancient activities underneath the soil.
However, not the entire unexcavated area was available for survey as in some
places, vegetation, camel tracks, emerging brick structures, and excessive salt
efflorescences prevented examination. For archaeologists studying craft activities,
indicators to look out for are raw material in nodules or blocks, tools, unfinished
objects, waste resulting from production, rejected semi-finished objects and
facilities. The Mohenjodaro surface survey was significant as it revealed distinct areas
where crafts and craft processes were practiced. Information from the surface survey
thus could be used to supplement the data recovered in excavation.
Source: Jansen, M. and G. Urban, eds. 1984. Interim Reports Vol. 1. Reports
on Field Work Carried out at Mohenjo-daro. Aachen and Roma: RWTH and
ISMEO.

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Stoneware bangle production

The surface survey conducted at Mohenjodaro brought to light the evidence of manufacture
of an unusual Harappan artefact - the stoneware bangle. Called as stoneware by early
excavators on account of the hardness of the ceramic material, these bangles are composed
of specially prepared clay. Halim and Vidale reconstructed the techniques of firing of these
bangles through finds of material eroding on the surface of the mound. These bangles were
fired in saggars (refractory boxes) which were stacked one on top of another, coated with a
clay layer and enclosed within a large jar. The jars were stamped with Harappan seals
presumably to prevent tampering with the contents. The bangles themselves are
exceptional artefacts engraved with minute Harappan inscriptions. ―The relative rarity of
stoneware bangles, the complex and singular nature of the manufacturing technology, the
control of production (as exemplified by the use of seals and inscriptions on saggars), the
inscriptions on the bangles themselves, and the apparent restriction of both production and
use to only two major Harappan centers, all point to a unique social function for these
artefacts.‖

Experimental studies using the skills of a modern skilled potter, Mohammad Nawaz, at
Harappa by Kenoyer required cleaning the clay over several days and finally powdering the
fine dried clay with a mortar and pestle to produce even finer clay. Experiments were done
with adding materials such as finely powdered iron oxide in the form of red ochre as well as
tree bark. Experiments were also done to see whether the bangles could be formed on the
wheel which would then need to have excess clay trimmed off while the wheel was moving.
The bangles would have to be polished and in an experiment an agate bead was used for
the polishing. A soft cotton cloth and mustard oil could also achieve the high polish. Last,
the inscriptions had to be engraved for which experiments were made using stone tools and
copper engravers. Comparisons of ancient and experimental bangles showed that the
engraving was done after polishing but before firing. Experimental firings were also done
using different types of dung (cattle and buffalo dung, powdered goat dung). Experimental
archaeology can only suggest possible ancient techniques and are not necessarily the final
or only explanations. In fact, as Kenoyer pointed out, ―even today, after almost ten years of
experimentation, we have not been able to replicate these unique stoneware bangles
perfectly.‖

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Figure 1.4.2.4: Mohammad Nawaz, a potter at Harappa, making a replica of an ancient

storage jar

Source: Kenoyer, J. M. 1998. Ancient Cities of the Indus Valley Civilization. Karachi: Oxford
University Press, 151.

Archaeologists also use scientific techniques to ascertain the source of material from which
artefacts were made by comparing the archaeological material with raw material locally
available near the site. This was done with stoneware bangles from both Mohenjodaro and
Harappa and it was found that bangles were made at both Mohenjodaro (which was already
known from the surface survey) and Harappa. But analyses of bangles showed that the
bangles from Harappa included some bangles manufactured at Mohenjodaro. The reverse
was not found. This allows technology to give an idea about ancient interaction networks.

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One must keep in mind that ethnoarchaeology or experimental archaeology can only
suggest possible ways to explain the archaeological data. In fact, it would be useful to note
that the archaeological evidence may just be explained by quite different processes.

Regions

While regions have been demarcated by geographers on the basis of physiography and by
linguists on that of language, the two seldom correspond. For the historian the point of
interest is to locate the texts in a language which is then spatially demarcated using place-
names and names of rulers that in turn are corroborated through inscriptions and coins.
Regional/linguistic identities can very easily be mapped out from the early medieval period
onwards. What is important to note is that the regional languages first appear in inscriptions
before any surviving literary texts. For instance, Telugu inscriptions have been dated to the
sixth century CE, while the earliest literary text belongs to the mid eleventh century.
Distinct regional styles can be discerned for the same period in religious art and
architecture, too,. The period between the third and sixth centuries CE, but more specifically
the period after the sixth century witnessed the acceleration of local state formation. Land
grants to brahmanas (recorded on inscriptions) were an important factor in the legitimation
of political power. A number of studies on different regions have been undertaken and
include those on Andhra, Assam, Orissa and Rajasthan. Many of these studies were enabled
by the availability of numerous inscriptions as well as literary texts in both Sanskrit and
vernacular languages. Thus as Upinder Singh writes ―during 600–1200 CE, the
developments at the political, social, economic, and cultural levels crystallized into distinct
regional formations and patterns.‖ However, for the period upto 750 CE, it is only in the
case of Tamilakam, where we have textual evidence that the idea of a separate region
emerges.

Understanding a region through texts and archaeology

In historical scholarship on ancient south India, the term ‗Tamilakam‘ has been used to refer
to a region based on a separate ethnic and linguistic identity. Such a reconstruction is made
from written sources such as Sangam texts, classical accounts by Graeco-Roman
geographers and navigators as well as inscribed material. Often, historians have also used
the archaeological record to reconstruct such an identity. However, as Shinu Abraham has
pointed out that ―archaeologists are equally culpable; it has become customary for South
Indian archaeologists to label sites and objects in Kerala and Tamil Nadu as ‗Tamil,‘ without
considering whether signifiers exist in the material record that substantiate or refute this

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notion of cultural separateness.‖ Her investigations, on the other hand, show that the
archaeological record of the Early Historic period (500/300 BCE – 300 CE) in Tamil Nadu
and Kerala is not very different from that in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. What are
shared archaeologically throughout South India in this period are a similar range of
ceramics, iron tools and weapons, ornaments and most burial forms. ―In fact, except for the
linguistic evidence, it would be challenging to identify a ‗Tamil‘ artifact or site on the basis of
the physical or stylistic traits alone.‖ Therefore, there actually appears a lack of fit between
the textual and the archaeological evidence.

Abraham has sought to explain what appears to be a contradiction by disaggregating the

two categories of sources. For her, the early Tamil texts represent the efforts of ―petty
rulers‖ to forge a regional identity as a strategy ―to develop, maintain and justify elite
activities.‖ The need to do this was to garner support and control resources in a scenario
where there may have been internal resistance and external threats. The archaeological
data, on the other hand, reflects the everyday lives and rhythms of small-scale, local
communities limited to the confines of a village and the immediate landscape. While this
would hold for rural settlements, Abraham does not seem to have taken into account the
extensive networks that urban centres would have had, and which may have extended
beyond the region. It is however important to note that neither the ordinary urban nor rural
dwellers would have needed to forge any regional identity.

Archaeology of a region: material cultures, landscapes and social networks

in ancient Kathiawad

While there have been several archaeological studies on regions in the subcontinent, one
particular case study will be discussed here. Kathiawad is a square peninsula separated
from Kutch by the flat salt plains of the Rann of Kutch and the mainland by the tidal mud
flats of Khambat. Yet neither geographically nor culturally does Kathiawad constitute a
homogeneous region. For instance geographers have divided the region into as many as
nine or fifteen sub-regions. Linguistically too the region of Kathiawad shows a differentiation
in sub-dialects of Kathiawadi with Halari being spoken in the northwest, Sorathi in the
southwest, Jhalwadi in the northeast and Gohilwadi in the southeast. Politically too, this
region was not a unified entity through history. Moreover physiographic, linguistic and
political subdivisions seldom coincide. Yet Kathiawad, surrounded as it is by the sea on
three sides, does constitute a distinct entity. Linguistically too Kathiawadi is a dialect of
Gujarati, the others being Pattani, Charotari and Surati. Hence Kathiawad provides a
convenient unit for study although it does not mark the boundaries of material cultures
either in the chalcolithic or Iron Age periods.

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In the chalcolithic period, for example, lustrous red ware is not confined to Kathiawad alone
but is also found in the Gujarat plains and still further in south Rajasthan and western
Maharashtra. In the Iron Age the distribution of northern black polished ware reveals a
cultural link reaching out to several early Iron Age sites in the subcontinent. Similarly when
we discuss the phenomenon of red polished ware we must take into account not only the
Gujarat plains but also the Deccan, and scattered occurrences over central and north India.
The point is that regions are never givens, never self-evident entities of analysis. It is
human interactions – political, economic and social – which mark out regions.

This study revealed that several features which made their appearance in the chalcolithic
and the early Iron Age periods have continued into the present day. For instance jowar and
bajri, the staple crops of Kathiawad today, first began to be cultivated in the third
millennium BCE. Similarly animals like cattle, sheep and goat, which play an important role
in the contemporary subsistence economy were also introduced in the chalcolithic period. A
continuation in house form and building materials can also be traced. It is also interesting to
note that walled villages have persisted in Kathiawad until the present. In fact in a
discussion of settlement patterns of contemporary Gujarat state, it has been observed that
it is the village walls, which set Kathiawad apart from the Gujarat plains. Thus with the
peopling of Kathiawad, a certain identity of this peninsula emerged.

1.1: Exercises

Essay questions

1) Compare the imperialist and nationalist writings.

2) Assess the work of the Marxist historians.

3) In what ways are the recent histories different from the earlier ones?

4) Account for the recent trends in the history of early India.

5) Do you agree with the view that early India experienced no change?

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6) Is it possible to clearly separate one aspect of history from another?

7) There are continuities between different historiographical trends. Comment.

8) What are the characteristic features of modern history writing?

9) Analyse the role of ideology in the writing of history.

10) Do sources alone allow for better history writing?

1.2: Exercises

Essay questions
1) What do you understand by the term 'history'? Do you think early Indians lacked a sense
of history?

2) What does the word 'epic' mean? Why are the Ramayana and the Mahabharata classified
as epics? How do they demonstrate a historical consciousness?

1.3.1.1: Exercises

Essay questions

1) Discuss the main challenges historians face when using early Indian texts.

2) In what ways can the Dharmashastras be drawn on for reconstructing early social
history?

3) What political and cultural values do you think the Sanskrit epics reflect?
1.3.1.2: Exercises

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Essay questions

1) What are the special insights to be gained from early Buddhist and Jaina literature?

2) What are the unique features of Sangam literature?

3) How can the Puranas be used for writing political and cultural history?

4) What are the advantages and difficulties of interpreting foreign accounts on early
India? Are foreign accounts useful?

1.3.2: Exercises

Essay questions

1) What is archaeology? How is archaeology different from history?

2) Write an essay on the range of available archaeological sources and the tools for
studying them with reference to ancient India.

3) In which ways has archaeology illuminated different aspects of ancient India?

1.3.3: Exercises

Essay questions

1) Write a note on the origin and evolution of coinage in India.

2) What are the various kinds of inscriptions? Indicate some limitations of

inscriptional evidence.

3) Analyse the ways in which epigraphy and numismatics have aided our
understanding of history.

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1.4.1: Exercises

Essay questions

1) Why did the 19th century nationalists write about women in the ancient past?

2) What is the earliest text to be authored by women?

3) What kind of stereotypes can we find in the depiction of women in early Indian texts?

1.4.2: Exercises

Essay questions

1) Did environmental and climatic change result in the decline of the Harappan
civilization?

2) How have ethnoarchaeological and experimental studies helped in understanding

aspects of Harappan technology?

3) Discuss some of the possible ways through which the contours of a region can be
mapped out.

Objective questions 1.1

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Question Number Type of question LOD

1 True or False 1

Question
a) Nationalist historians preceded the beginning of Marxist writings.

b) James Mill has glorified the ancient Indian past.

A.
c) D. D. Kosambi was interested in political and dynastic history.

d) Since the 1960s discussions on early India have seen an increase in the level of
theoretical conceptualization.

e) History can be written on the basis of literary sources alone.

Correct Answer / a) True

Option(s) b) False
c) False
d) True
e) False

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

a) The heyday of the nationalist writings was the late nineteenth and early twentieth
century, while Marxist works date to the middle of the twentieth century.

b) James Mill‘s writings marked the beginning of the indictment of early India.

c) Kosambi‘s works were characterized by a decisive shift towards economic and

social History.

d) In the middle of the twentieth century, Marxist historiography ushered in the use
of a variety of theoretical models for early India.

e) History is written on the basis of a variety of sources such as literature,

archaeology, coins and inscriptions.

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Reviewer‘s Comment:

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Objective questions 1.2

Question Number Type of question LOD

1 True or False 1

Question
The Rig Veda contains dana-stutis.

Correct Answer /
True
Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

The dana-stutis of the Rig Veda (c. 2nd millennium BCE) are hymns in praise of gifts.
Bards composed eulogies on their patrons who were often clan chiefs. A dana-stuti
mentions the gifts received by its composer, and usually the name of his benefactor.
And historians know of some rajas from the dana-stutis. Some scholars regard these
records as the 'earliest histories' of ancient India.

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Question Number Type of question LOD

2 Match the following 2

Question
Match the following:

a) Gupta era i) dynasties of the Kaliyuga

b) Nanda and Kanva ii) account of the life of a great man

c) charita iii) 319-320 CE

d) Dipavamsa iv) Sri Lanka

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Correct Answer /
a) and iii), b) and i), c) and ii), d) and iv)
Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

a) Perhaps the best known dynastic era is the Gupta era of 319-320 CE. This was
projected as beginning from the year of accession of the first important Gupta king,
Chandragupta I. Interestingly, the use of the era began with retrospective effect,
from the time of Chandragupta II, around 80 years after it was supposed to begin. It
was only after they had consolidated their power that Gupta rulers started an era,
pushing back their claims to power as far back as possible.

b) The Nanda and Kanva dynasties appear in Puranic genealogies. They are
presented as dynasties of the period after the Mahabharata war, which is said to
have ushered in the Kaliyuga, the present dark age. These were historical dynasties,
and such information in Puranic genealogies indicates that these records cannot be
dismissed as pure fiction, even if they seem rather fanciful at times.

c) Charitas were meant to be accounts of the lives of great men. Most of the charitas
that survive are in Sanskrit, and the style of these compositions is very ornate. It
seems likely that they were composed for elite consumption. One of the earliest
charitas we have access to is the Buddhacharita of Ashvaghosha (c. 1st century CE).
This is a biography of the Buddha. Banabhatta's Harshacharita is the oldest surviving
biography of an Indian king, and one of the best known.

d) The Dipavamsa (c. 4th-5th centuries CE) is the earliest Pali chronicle available
from Sri Lanka. It focuses on the coming of Buddhism to the island and the
establishment of the sangha or monastic order. The existence of a text like the
Dipavamsa suggests that traditions of historical writing in early South Asia were not
associated only with the royal court.

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Objective questions 1.3.1.1

Question Number Type of question LOD

1 Match the following 1

Question

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Match the following:

1) Bhagavad Gita a) Origins of the universe

2) Itihasa b) ―Knowledge‖

3) Veda c) Varnashramadharma

4) Hiranyagarbha Sukta d) ―Thus it was‖

1)
2) 5) Manu Smriti e) Vaishnavism

Correct Answer /
1) and e), 2) and d), 3) and b), 4 and a), 5) and c)
Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

1) The Bhagavad Gita is a scripture devoted to the worship of Krishna, an

incarnation of Vishnu.

2) Itihasa literally means ―thus it was‖; it is the name of the textual genre to which
the Mahabharata and Ramayana belong.

3) Veda literally means ―knowledge‖; it is from the root ‗vid‘ which means ‗to know.‘

4) The Hiranyagarbha Sukta is a Vedic hymn that speculates about the origins of the
universe from a golden embryo.

5) The Manu Smriti is a dharmashastra that deals with the topic of the four varnas
and the ashramas and their duties.

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Objective questions 1.3.1.2

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Question Number Type of question LOD

1 Match the following 1

Question
Match the following:

1) 1) Kalhana a) Tinai
2)
3) 2) Bana b) Ardhamagadhi

3) Sangam poetry c) Al Beruni

4) Jaina Agama d) Kashmir

4)
5) 5) Tahqiq i Hind e) Charita

Correct Answer / 1) and d), 2) and e), 3) and a), 4) and b), 5) and c)
Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

1) Kalhana is the author of the history of Kashmir called Rajatarangini.

2) Bana wrote the earliest major charita or historical biography we have called
Harshcharita about King Harshavardhana.

3) Tinai is the concept of different ecological zones like mountains or river valleys
that is found in the Sangam poems.

4) The Jaina canonical works called Agamas are written in the language of
Ardhamagadhi, a Prakrit dialect.

5) The Tahqiq i Hind is the Arab Al Biruni‘s account of India from the 11 th century.

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Objective questions 1.3.2

Question Number Type of question LOD

1 True or False 1

Question
Writing was known in prehistory.

Correct Answer /
False
Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

Prehistory means prior to the advent of history. The acceptable criteria for the
advent of history is the presence of writing.

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Prehist
Reviewer‘s Comment:

Question Number Type of question LOD

2 True or False 1

Question
Cooking hearths and houses form part of artefactual data.

Correct Answer /
False
Option(s)

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Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

Cooking hearths are fixed structures, not portable objects.

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Artefactual data is usually made up of objects that are made or modified by humans
and are portable. Cooking hearths are made by humans but are not portable.
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Question Number Type of question LOD

3 True or False 1

Question
Stoneware bangles are prehistoric artefacts.

Correct Answer /
False
Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

In this lesson, the stoneware bangles that are mentioned are very sophisticated
objects made by Harappan craftspeople. This makes stoneware bangles protohistoric
artefacts.

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To be designated as prehistoric, stoneware bangles had to be manufactured by

hunter-gatherers. In fact, these bangles are made by urban craftspeople of the
Harappan Civilization.
Reviewer‘s Comment:

Question Number Type of question LOD

4 True or False 1

Question
Mathura is mentioned in the Ramayana.

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Correct Answer /
True
Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

Mathura is mentioned in the Ramayana as a city with fortifications shaped like a

bow. This broadly matches up with what has been discovered in the archaeological
excavations of Mathura.

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Ramayana's references to place names include Mathura which is why the statement
cannot be false.
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Question Number Type of question LOD

5 True or False 1

Question
The Qutab complex iron pillar belongs to the Mauryan period.

Correct Answer /
False
Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

The iron pillar in the Qutab complex bears an inscription which belongs to the 4th-
5th centuries CE. Hence, it is not Mauryan in date.

Resource/Hints/Feedback for the wrong answer

The Qutab complex iron pillar does not bear any sculptural motifs or inscriptions
which can be dated to the Mauryan period.
Reviewer‘s Comment:

Question Number Type of question LOD

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6 Multiple choice question 2

Question
A Harappan pot is an:

a) Artefact
b) Ecofact
c) Structure

Correct Answer /
a)
Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

A Harappan pot is an artefact because it is a humanly made portable object.

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A Harappan pot cannot be an ecofactt because is not a natural element in the

ecosystem or environment. It also cannot be considered as a structure because
unlike houses and roads which, while being made by humans, are fixed, a pot is
portable.
Reviewer‘s Comment:

Question Number Type of question LOD

7 Multiple choice question 2

Question
Hathnora is famous because of the discovery of:

a) Remains of an ancient city

b) Fortifications
c) Hominid skull cap

Correct Answer /
c)
Option(s)

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Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

Hathnora is the place in Madhya Pradesh where a hominid skull cap was found.

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Hathnora is not known for the remains of any ancient city or fortifications.
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Question Number Type of question LOD

8 Multiple choice question 2

Question
‗Acheulian‘ is a term that denotes objects that are:

a) Prehistoric
b) Protohistoric
c) Historical

Correct Answer /
a)
Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

The term 'Acheulian' is used to denote handaxes of prehistoric times. These are tear
drop-shaped stone tools flaked on both sides and are the dominant tool form of the
lower palaeolithic in many parts of the world. Such axes are called Acheulian
because they were first discovered in a place called St. Acheul in France.

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No objects of the protohistoric and historic periods are called 'Acheulian'.

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Question Number Type of question LOD

9 Multiple choice question 2

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Question
Mehrgarh contains the remains of an ancient:

a) Village
b) Administrative centre
c) Stupa

Correct Answer /
a)
Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

Mehrgarh's archaeological remains suggest that its population was largely involved in
food production. That is why it is considered to represent the remains of an ancient
village.

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An administrative centre usually has weights, seals/sealings and/or buildings which

can be considered as serving administrative functions - these are not found at
Mehrgarh. A stupa is a funerary structure associated with Buddhism while Mehrgarh
is a protohistoric settlement that existed much prior to the advent of Buddhism.
Reviewer‘s Comment:

Objective questions 1.3.3

Question Number Type of question LOD

1 True or False 1

Question
Ashokan inscriptions are the earliest inscriptions.

Correct Answer /
False
Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

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The Ashokan inscriptions of 4th century BCE are the first deciphered inscriptions but
the earliest inscriptions that still await decipherment are in the pictographic
Harappan script.

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Question Number Type of question LOD

2 True or False 1

Question
The earliest language to be used in ancient Indian inscriptions was Sanskrit.

Correct Answer /
False
Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

The earliest epigraphic language was Prakrit. The use of pure Sanskrit in the
inscriptions of northern India is first noticed from the second half of the 1 st century
BCE.

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Question Number Type of question LOD

3 Multiple choice question 2

Question

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The Brahmi script was deciphered by:

a) D. C. Sircar

b) Charles Wilkins
a)
c) James Prinsep

d) R. G. Bhandarkar

Correct Answer /
c)
Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

James Prinsep was the first to decipher in 1837, the edicts of the ancient Indian emperor Ashoka written in
the Brahmi script.

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Question Number Type of question LOD

4 Multiple choice question 2

Question
Palaeography involves the study of:

a) stones

b) coins

c) monumental remains

d) ancient writing

Correct Answer /
d)
Option(s)

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Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

The term is derived from the Greek palaios (―old‖) and graphein (―to write‖) and
involves the study of ancient and medieval handwriting.

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Question Number Type of question LOD

5 Multiple choice question 2

Question
Which of the following are the earliest found coins:

a) Uninscribed cast coins

b) Punch-marked coins

c) Die-struck Indo-Greek coins

d) Kushana coins

Correct Answer / b) Punch-marked coins

Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

Punch-marked coins, mostly of silver and some of copper are the earliest found
coins.

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Objective questions 1.4.2

Question Number Type of question LOD

1 True or False 1

Question
Stoneware bangles found at several Harappan sites are manufactured from a variety
of stone.

Correct Answer /
False
Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

Stoneware bangles are made from specially prepared clay.

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2 True or False 1

Question
Experimental archaeology can suggest possible ancient techniques but there can be
other explanations as well.

Correct Answer /
True

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Option(s)

Justification/ Feedback for the correct answer

While experimental archaeology can suggest possible ancient techniques, other ways
of understanding ancient technology can be through direct archaeological evidence
for production.

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3 Match the following 2

Question
Various scholars have attributed different reasons for the decline of the Harappan
civilization. Match the name with the reason cited by them.

a) M. R. Sahni i) Increased aridity

b) W. Fairservis ii) Shifting of the Indus bed

c) H. T. Lambrick iii) Environmental degradation

d) G. Singh iv) Excessive floods

Correct Answer /
a) and iv), b) and iii), c) and ii), d) and i)
Option(s)

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a) M. R. Sahni has attributed the decline of the Indus civilization to excessive floods
in the Indus region.

b) Walter Fairservis has suggested that there was environmental degradation due to
the fodder requirements of cattle as well as fuel for firing bricks.

c) H. T. Lambrick has argued that due to the shifting of the course of Indus, the land
around Mohenjodaro had deteriorated.

d) G. Singh has made the point that increasing aridity or climate change was
responsible for the decline of the Indus civilization.

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Summary 1.1

 Historiography relates to the ways in which people write histories.

 With changing times, issues of interest as well as the ways of looking at the sources
change.

 Sweeping generalizations on the basis of evidence from one region do not do justice
to the sources or the other regions.

 New sources alone do not bring about a change in history writing.

 Knowledge from other disciplines improves our ability to ask and answer fresh
questions about the past.

Summary 1.2

 When 18th/19th century European scholars looked for histories of early India, they
found very little that conformed to their idea of what a history should be. They
concluded that early India was deficient in history-writing. While nationalist histories
developed in opposition to imperial frames, scholars like R. C. Majumdar,

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nevertheless, accepted the idea that history was relatively underdeveloped as a

branch of early Indian literature.

 However, if we understand history as a mode of reflecting about the past, we can

argue that a sense of history is present in a branch of early Indian literature -- in the
itihasa-purana tradition.

 The dana-stutis of the Rig Veda, the Sanskrit epics, the Puranas, prashastis, charitas
and chronicles of religious institutions, among other sources, exhibit a sense of
history, even though this sometimes has to be prised out.

Summary 1.3.1.1

 There is a great diversity of texts from early India. They have their own special
features which need to be taken into account when using them as historical sources.
Chief difficulties relate to chronology and internal stratification.

 There are four Vedas, Rig, Sama, Yajur and Atharva, and each has four parts,
Samhita, Brahmana, Aranyaka and Upanisad. Early Vedic literature is from between
1500 BCE and 1000 BCE while Later Vedic literature is from 1000 BCE to 500 BCE.
These are only provisional dates.

 The Dharmashastras are socio-legal codes composed between 500-200 BCE and
200BCE-900 CE. They furnish us with the founding principles of the Brahmanical
social system like the chatur-varna-ashrama-dharma, the jatis, hierarchy, purity
and pollution, rites and sacraments to be performed, and laws of inheritance,
marriage etc.

 The Mahabharata and Ramayana grew in size over different stages of composition
between circa 500 BCE and 500 CE. They are grand narratives that tell tales of
 the royal clans of Hastinapura and Ayodhya respectively. They convey various
political, sectarian and cultural beliefs and values of the time that have also played
an important role over the ages.

Summary 1.3.1.2

 The earliest Buddhist literature, the Tripitaka (6th-5th century BCE), in Pali offer a
non-Brahmanical and non-Sanskritic perspective. They provide a popular and not
only elite view of early history. Other Buddhist works in Pali and Sanskrit chart the

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life and teachings of the Buddha and his followers. Jaina texts known as the Agamas
similarly provide us with details about the Jaina faith.

 Sangam poetry (3rd century BCE - 3rd century CE) comprises early Tamil literature; it
is a vibrant narrative on royal and commoner society in ancient Tamilakam. It was
followed by the composition of the twin epics Shilappadikaram and Manimekhalai as
well as works of grammar like the Tolkappiyam.

 The 18 Mahapuranas (3rd century CE onwards) are texts that are encyclopedic in
nature discussing cosmology, mythology, time and its divisions, the accession and
succession of royal dynasties, the deeds of important individuals, the growth, rituals
and pilgrimages of various sects among a host of other information. They are a rich
source on dynastic, geographical, religious and cultural history.

 The royal Charitas that began to be composed after the 7 th century CE, like the
Harshcharita and the Vikramankadevacharita, are biographies of historical figures,
mostly kings, that provide invaluable information about the regional kingdoms and
societies of their time. The Rajatarangini from the 12 th century CE is an important
regional history of the dynasties of Kashmir which bases itself on multiple sources of
information and research.

 Foreign accounts by the Greeks, Romans, Chinese and Arabs offer interesting outside
perspectives on ancient Indian culture and society even as they have some
drawbacks.

Summary 1.3.2

 Archaeology is an approach to the past which studies material remains in order to

understand how cultures existed and changed over time.

 Archaeological data can be of various types: artefacts (potsherds, bricks, beads);

ecofacts (pollen remains, soil types); and structures (fortifications, house
foundations, rock shelters, temples, stupas).

 Such data are recovered through explorations and excavations and are studied
through physical examination and by using scientific techniques.

 Ancient India as a whole – from 2 million years ago or more till the late centuries of
the 1st millennium CE – has been illuminated through archaeology. Prehistoric and
protohistoric India depend almost entirely on such sources, while in the historical
centuries, archaeology complements documentary sources.

Summary 1.3.3

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

 Initially put together under archaeology, epigraphy and numismatics have now
emerged as separate and well-established disciplines.

 Both shed valuable light on almost all aspects of the ancient and early medieval
Indian past ranging from the political, economic, social to the cultural.

 Inscriptions and coins as material remains of the past can serve as valuable sources
for a comprehensive reconstruction of the past, if they are read and analyzed
keeping in mind their limitations and if the evidence they yield is cross-checked with
information from other inscriptions and sources.

Summary 1.4.1

 In the nationalistic project of the nineteenth century the image of women as

occupying a high status in ancient India was carefully constructed.

 The feminist project of ‗her‘storians in the late twentieth century was to rewrite
history with a new gender sensitive focus.

 Women scholars went on to search for new or unused sources to write a new history.

 They also disaggregated the category ‗woman‘ to draw attention to the margin within
the margin.

Summary 1.4.2

 Although environmental and climatic changes have often been seen as causes for the
decline of societies, the most well known being the Harappan case, there may have
been other factors as well that need to be considered.

 Past land uses can be understood through certain methods in archaeology as was
done at Inamgaon.

 Recently attempts have been made to reconstruct past environments of the Ganga
plains using pollen analyses and studies on the teeth enamel of certain animals. New
studies indicate the Ganga plains were grassland. This brings into issue the
longstanding debate between historians and archaeologists over the role of iron for
large-scale clearance of forests and its impact.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

 Archaeologists have used methods like ethnoarchaeology, experimental archaeology,

refitting broken artefacts, as well as chemical characterization studies to reconstruct
ancient technologies.

 Distinct regional formations emerged in the period between 600 and 1200 CE.

 Where the physical and linguistic contours of ‗Tamilakam‘ as a region were mapped
through texts and archaeology, recent studies show that there may actually be a lack
of fit between the two.

 An archaeological study of Kathiawad has tried to show some of the complexities

involved in the investigation of regions and yet one can see certain enduring cultural
landscapes over the longue duree or several millennia.

Further readings 1.1

Chattopadhyaya, B. D. 2003. Trends of Research of Ancient Indian Economic History, in

Idem, Studying Early India: Archaeology, Texts and Historical Issues. Delhi: Permanent
Black.

Sharma, R. S. 2009. Studies in Ancient Polity, in Idem, Rethinking India’s Past. Delhi,
Oxford University Press.

Thapar, Romila. 1999 (5th impression). Ideology and the Interpretation of Early Indian
History, in Idem, Interpreting Early India. Delhi: Oxford University Press.

Further readings 1.2

Brockington, J. L. 1998. The Sanskrit Epics. Leiden: Brill.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Pargiter, F. E. 1962. Ancient Indian Historical Tradition. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.

Pathak, V. S. 1966. Ancient Historians of India: A Study in Historical Biographies. Bombay:

Asia Publishing House.

Thapar, Romila. 1996. Time as a Metaphor of History: Early India. Delhi: Oxford University
Press.

Thapar, Romila. 2000. Cultural Pasts: Essays in Early Indian History. Delhi: Oxford
University Press.

Thapar, Romila. 2002. Early India: From the Origins to AD 1300. Berkeley: University of
California Press.

Trautmann, T. R. 2009. Indian Time, European Time, in The Clash of Chronologies: Ancient
India in the Modern World, 25-52. Delhi: Yoda Press.

Further readings 1.3.1.1

Embree, Ainslie (ed.). 1988. Sources of Indian Tradition, Vol. I, 2nd edn. New York:
Columbia University Press.

Renou, Louis. 1971. Vedic India, Classical India. Vol. 3. Delhi: Varanasi: Indological Book
House.

Richman, Paula, (ed.). 1992. Many Ramayanas: The Diversity of a Narrative Tradition in
South Asia. Delhi: Oxford University Press.

Singh, Upinder, 2008, A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India, Delhi: Pearson, chapter
1.

Winternitz, Maurice. 1985-1993. A History of Indian Literature, 3 Vols. Rep. edn. Delhi:
Motilal Banarsidass.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Further readings 1.3.1.2

Hart, George L. 1975. The Poems of Ancient Tamil, Their Milieu and their Sanskrit
Counterparts. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Majumdar, R. C. 1960. Classical Accounts of India. Calcutta: Firma K. L. Mukhopadhyay.

Singh, Upinder. 2008. A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India. Delhi: Pearson,
Chapter 1.

Thapar, Romila. 1978. ‗The Tradition of Historical Writing in early India‘ in Ancient Indian
Social History: Some Interpretations, Delhi: Orient Longman, 237-258.

Warder, A. K. 1989. Indian Kavya Literature. Vol 1-5. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.

Further readings 1.3.2

Renfrew, Colin and Paul Bahn. 1991. Archaeology: Theories, Methods, and Practice. London:
Thames and Hudson Limited.

Singh, Upinder. 2008. A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India. Delhi: Pearson
Longman.

Further readings 1.3.3

Bhandarkar, D. R. 1921. Lectures on Ancient Indian Numismatics. Patna: Eastern Book

House.

Goyal, S. R. 1995. The Coinage of Ancient India. Jodhpur: Kusumanjali Prakashan.

Gupta, P. L. 1981. Coins: The Source of Indian History. Ahmedabad: B. J. Institute of

Learning & Research.

Kosambi, D. D. 1981. Indian Numismatics. New Delhi: Orient Longman.

Sahni, Birbal. 1973. The Technique of Casting Coins in Ancient India. Varanasi: Bhartiya
Publishing House.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Salomon, Richard. 1998. Indian Epigraphy: A Guide to the Study of Inscriptions in Sanskrit,
Prakrit, and other Indo-Aryan Languages. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal.

Sircar, D. C. 1965. Indian Epigraphy. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.

Singh, Upinder. 2009. A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India From the Stone Age to
the 12th Century. New Delhi: Pearson Longman.

Further readings 1.4.1

Altekar, A. S. 1987 reprint. The Position of Women in Hindu Civilisation. Delhi: Motilal
Banarasidass.

Chakravarti, Uma and Kumkum Roy. 1988. Breaking Out of Invisibility: Rewriting the
History of Ancient India, in Retrieving Women’s History, ed. S. Jay Kleinberg. New York:
Berg.

Dutt, R. C. 1888. A History of Civilisation in Ancient India. reprint 1972. Delhi: Vishal.

Kosambi, D. D. 1962. Myth and Reality. Bombay: Popular Prakashan.

Thapar, Romila. 1999. Sakuntala: Texts, Readings, Histories. Delhi: Kali for Women.

Tharu, Susie and K. Lalita, ed. 1991. Women Writing in India, Vol. I. Delhi: Oxford
University Press.

Further readings 1.4.2

Abraham, Shinu A. ―Chera, Chola, Pandya: Using Archaeological Evidence to Identify the
Tamil Kingdoms of Early Historic South India.‖ Asian Perspectives 42, 2 (2003): 207-223.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Blackman, M. J. and M. Vidale. ―The Production and Distribution of Stoneware Bangles at

Mohenjo-daro and Harappa as Monitored by Chemical Characterization Studies‖. In South
Asian Archaeology 1989, edited by, C. Jarrige, pp. 37-44. Madison: Prehistory Press, 1992.

Dhavalikar, M. K., H. D. Sankalia and Z.D. Ansari. Excavations at Inamgaon, Vol. I, Parts I
and II. Pune: Deccan College, 1988.

Halim, M. A. and M. Vidale. ―Kilns, Bangles and Coated Vessels. Ceramic Production in
Closed Containers at Moenjodaro.‖ In Interim Reports Vol. 1. Reports on Field Work Carried
out at Mohenjo-daro, edited by M. Jansen and G. Urban, pp. 63-97. Aachen and Roma:
RWTH and IsMEO, 1984.

Jansen, M. and G. Urban, edited. Interim Reports Vol. 1. Reports on Field Work Carried out
at Mohenjo-daro. Aachen and Roma: RWTH and IsMEO, 1984.

Kenoyer, J. M., M. Vidale and K. K. Bhan. ―Contemporary Stone Beadmaking in Khambhat,

India: Patterns of Craft Specialization and Organization of Production as Reflected in the
Archaeological Record‖. World Archaeology, Vol. 23, 1 (1991): 44-63.

Kenoyer, J. M. ―Experimental Studies of Indus Valley Technology at Harappa.‖ In South

Asian Archaeology 1993, Vol. 1, edited by A. Parpola and P. Koskikallio, pp. 345-62.
Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia, 1994.

Kenoyer, J. M., M. Vidale and K. K. Bhan. ―Carnelian Bead Production in Khambhat, India:
An Ethnoarchaeological Study.‖ In Living Traditions. Studies in the Ethnoarchaeology of
South Asia, edited by B. Allchin, pp. 281-306. Columbia and New Delhi: South Asia
Publications and Oxford & IBH, 1994.

Kenoyer, J. M. Ancient Cities of the Indus Valley Civilization. Karachi: Oxford University
Press, 1998.

Lahiri, N. The Decline and Fall of the Indus Civilization. New Delhi: Permanent Black, 2000.

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Ratnagar, S. The End of the Great Harappan Tradition. New Delhi: Manohar, 2000.

Sahu, B. P. edited. Iron and Social Change in Early India. New Delhi: Oxford University
Press, 2006.

Singh, I. B. ―Quarternary Palaeoenvironments of the Ganga Plain and Anthropogenic

Activity.‖ Man and Environment 30, 1 (2005): 1-35.

Singh. Upinder. A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India. Chapter 10. New Delhi:
Pearson, 2008.

Glossary 1.1

Orientalist: one who knows the eastern languages. In history we generally use the term to
mean those early western historians who knew Indian languages, translated Indian texts
and glorified our ancient past

Utilitarian(ism): a school of British liberalism represented by thinkers such as Jeremy

Bentham, James Mill, and J. S. Mill

Glossary 1.2

akhyana: cycle of stories commemorating heroes recited at the time of a yajna

charita: account of the life of a great man

dana-stuti: hymn in praise of gifts

itihasa: literally, 'thus indeed it was'

prashasti: panegyric, eulogistic inscription

purana: literally, 'old'. The word is found in Vedic literature, where it denotes an ancient
narrative. However, we cannot be sure of its nature. Note that the term purana is a singular
noun, and must be seen as distinct from the many texts we know as the Puranas.

raja: chief or king

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

vinagathin: lute-player who sang about a raja's ritual or heroic accomplishments at the
ashvamedha

yuga: an age, one of four periods of time. A mahayuga or 'grand yuga' consists of four
yugas in succession: Satya or Krita, Treta, Dvapara and Kali. Each successive yuga is
shorter, and is marked by a decline in dharma. At the end of one mahayuga, the cycle of
yugas begins again

Glossary 1.3.1.1

Anuloma: hypergamy
Endogamy: marriage within one‘s social group
Internal Stratification: the presence of many layers of time of composition within a single
text

Pratiloma: Hypogamy

Prescriptive: a work that recommends a certain idea or practice as desirable (which

therefore may or may not have prevailed outside theory in the real world)

Primogeniture: the rule by which the throne passes from the king to his eldest son

Glossary 1.3.1.2
Genre: a type or class showing common properties
Kalamsha: the 12 forms of Shakti like Kali and Durga

Milieu: environment
Philosophoi: the Greek term for the scholar class referring to brahmana as well as non-
brahmanical monks and teachers.

Sarga: creation of the universe

Tirtha: pilgrimage

Vamsha: family, genealogy

Vrata: sacred vows

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

Glossary 1.3.2

Electron Spin Resonance (ESR): This allows trapped electrons within bone and shell to
be measured without heating. The number of trapped electrons indicates the age of the
specimen.

Holocene: the most recent, and still continuing, geological epoch, it began around 10,000
years ago

Microwear Analysis: the study of polish and wear marks on stone artefacts in order to
understand their functions

Pleistocene: the geological epoch preceding the Holocene, it began around 1.6 million
years ago and ended with the advent of the Holocene

Radiocarbon Dating: an absolute dating method that measures the decay of the
radioactive isotope of carbon (C-14) in organic material

Neutron Activation Analysis: a scientific technique used for characterizing the elements
in artefacts by bombarding samples with a beam of neutrons in a nuclear reactor

Glossary 1.3.3

Chronology: the order in which past events occur

Dross: impurities separated from metals while melting
Genealogy: the study of family ancestries and histories
Janapada: a territorial state; a region consisting of urban and rural settlements, along with
its inhabitants
Kshatrapa: a viceroy or subordinate ruler of the Scytho-Parthians
Panegyric: formal or elaborate writing in praise of a person
Pictographic: a pictorial sign or symbol
Phonetic: associated with pronunciation
Prashasti: a Sanskrit word, meaning ‗in praise of‘; an inscription written in praise of a ruler
Syncretic: merging of diverse elements

Glossary 1.4.1

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 Chapter 1: Reconstructing ancient Indian history

bhikkhuni: a Buddhist nun

dasi: a woman slave

Glossary 1.4.2

Geomorphology: a sub discipline of geography which involves the study of forms and
development of landscapes

Palaeobotany: the study of ancient plant remains

Palaeovegetation: the study of ancient vegetation

Palynology: the study of pollen grains used for getting information on chronology and
environment

Remote sensing: involves techniques which obtain data by sensors at some distance from
the surface being recorded. These could be aerial photography, satellite imagery and
techniques using various forms of energy such as sound and radio waves, electricity and so
forth

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