CHAPTER 1

The Importance of Ancient Indian History

THE stuby of ancient Indian history is

important for several reasons. It tells
us how, when and where people de-
veloped the earliest cultures in. our
country. It indicates how they started
agriculture which made life secure and
settled. It shows how the ancient In-
dians discovered and utilized natural
resources, and how they created the
means for their livelihood. We come to
know how they took to farming, spin-
ning, weaving, metal-working, and so
on; how they cleared forests; and how
they founded villages, Cities, and fi-
nally large kingdoms.

_ People are not considered civilized

unless they know writing. The differ-
ent forms of writing prevalent in India
today are all derived from the ancient
scripts. This is also true of the lan-
guages that we speak today. The lan-
guages we use have roots in ancient
times, and have developed through the

ages.

Unity in Diversity

Ancient Indian history is interesting

because India proved to be a crucible
of ethnic groups. The pre-Aryans, the
Indo-Aryans, the Greeks, the
Scythians, the Hunas, the Turks, etc.
made India their home. Each ethnic
, Group contributed its mite to the evo-
lution of Indian social system, art and

architecture, and literature. All these

peoples and their cultural traits mixed
up so inextricably with one another
that at present none of them can be
clearly identified in their original form.
A remarkable feature of ancient
Indian culture has been the commin-
gling of cultural elements from the
north and the south, and from the east
and the west. The Aryan elements are
equated with the Vedic and Sanskriti:
culture of the north and the pre-Arya.
with Dravidian and Tamil culture otf
the south. But many Dravidian and
non-Sanskritic terms occur in the
Vedic texts ascribed to 1500-500 B.c.
They indicate ideas, institutions, prod-
ucts and settlements associated with
the peninsular and non-Vedic India.
Similarly many Pali and Sanskrit
terms signifying ideas and institutions
developed in the Gangetic plains ap-
pear in the earliest Tamil texts called
the Sangam literature which is roughly
used for the period 300 B.c.- A.D. 600.
The eastern region inhabited by the
pre-Aryan tribals made its own con-
tribution. The people of this area spoke
Munda or Kolarian languages. Several
terms that signify the use of cotton,
navigation, digging stick, etc., in Indo-
Aryan languages are traced to the
Munda languages by the linguists.
Although there. are. many Munda

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pockets in Chhotanagpur plateau, the

rémnants of the Munda eulture are not
so strong as those of the Dravidian cul-
ture. Many Dravidian terms are also
used found.in the Indo-Aryan lan-
guages. It is held that changes in the
phonetics and vocabulary of the Vedic
language can be explained as much
on the basis of the Dravidian influence
as that of the Munda influence.

India has since ancient times been

the lar.d cf several religions. Ancient
India witnessed the birth of Hinduism,
Jainism and Buddhism; but all these
cultures and religions intermingled
and acted and reacted upon one an-
other in such a manner that though
people speak different languages,
practise different religions, and ob-
serve different social customs, they
follow certain common styles of life
throughout the country. Our country
shows a deep underlying unity in spite
of great diversity.

The ancients strove for unity. They

looked upon this vast subcontinent as
one land: The name Bharatavarsha or
the land of Bharata was given to the
whole country after the name of an
ancient tribe called the Bharatas, and
the people were called Bharatasantati
or the descendants of Bharata. Our
ancient poets, philosophers and writ-
ers viewed the country as an integral
unit. They spoke of the land stretch-
ing from the Himalayas to the sea as
the proper domain of a single univer-
sal monarch. The kings who tried to
establish their authority from the
Himalayas to the Cape Comorin and
from the valley of the Brahmaputra in
the east to the land beyond the Indus
in the west were universally praised.
They were called Chakravartins. This

ANCIENT INDIA

kind of political unity was attained at

least twice in ancient tines. In the
third century B.C. Ashoka extended his
empire over the whole country, except.
for the extreme south. Again, in the
fourth century A.D. Samudragupta
carried his victorious arms frpm the
Ganga to the borders of the Tamil
land. In the seventh century, the
Chalukya king, Pulakeshin defeated
Harshavardhana who was called the
lord of the whole of north India. In spite
of lack of political unity political for-
mations all over the country assumed
more or less the same shape. The idea
that India constituted one single geo-
graphical unit persisted in the minds
of the conquerors and cultural lead-
ers. The unity of India was also recog-
nized by foreigners. They first came
into contact with the people living on
the Sindhu or the Indus, and so they
named the whole country after this
river. The word Hind is derived from
the Sanskrit term Sindhu, and in
course of time the country came to be
known as ‘India’ which is very close to
the Greek term for it. It came to be
called 'Hind' in Persian and Arabic lan-
guages.

We find continuous efforts for.the

linguistic and cultural unity of the
country. In the third century B.c.
Prakrit served as the lingua franca of
the country. Throughout the major
portion of India, Ashoka's inscriptions
were written in the Prakrit language
and Brahmi script. Later Sanskrit
acquired the same position and served.
as the state language in the remotest
parts of the country. The process be-
came prominent in the Gupta period
in the fourth century A.D. Although
politically the country witnessed

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THE IMPORTANCE OF ANCIENT INDIAN HISTORY 3

numerous small states in the post-

Gupta period, the official documents
were written in Sanskrit,

Another notable fact is that the an-

cient epics, the Ramayana and the
Mahabharata, were studied with the
same zeal and devotion in the land of
the Tamils as in the intellectual circles
of Banaras and Taxila. Originally com-
posed in Sanskrit, these epics came
to be presented in different local lan-
guages. But whatever the form in which
Indian cultural values and ideas were
expressed, the substance remained al
same throughout the country.

Indian history deserves our atten-

tion because of a peculiar type of so-
cial system which developed in this
country. In north India arose the

a/caste system which came to

prevail almost all over the country, The
caste system affected even the Chris-
tians and the Muslims. The converts
belonged to some caste, and even
when they left Hirlduism to join the
new religion they continued to main-
tain some of their old caste practices.

Relevance of the Past to the

‘Present —

The study of India's past assumes

special significance in the context of
the problems we face in modern times.

Some people clamour for the restora-

tion of ancient culture and civilization,
and a good many are sentimentally
swayed by what they consider to be
the past glories of India. This is differ-
ent from the concern for the preserva-
tion of ancient heritage in art and ar-
chitecture. What they really want to
bring back is the old pattern of soci-

ety and culture. Such a situation de- ©

mands a far better understanding of

‘cient
_ progress in different fields of life, but

the past. There is no doubt that an-

Indians made remarkable.

these advances cannot. enable us to

compete with the achievements of. .
modern science and technology, We
cannot ignore the fact that the anflient -
Indian society was marked by gross
social injustice. The lower orders,.
particularly the shudras and-untouch-
ables, were encumbered with disabili-
ties which are shocking to the mod-
ern mind. The restoration of the old
“way of life will naturally revive and
strengthen all, these inequities. An-
cient India's march to civilization was -
accompanied by the growth of social
discriminations. The success of the
ancients in surmounting the difficul-
ties presented by nature and human
factors can build our hope and confi-
dence in future, but the attempt to

- bring back the past will mean the per-

petuation of social inequity which

plagued the country. All this makes it
necessary to know what the past
means.

We have many survivals of ancient,

medieval and later times persisting in
the present. The old norms, values,
social customs and ritualistic prac-'
tices are so deeply ingrained in the
minds of the people that they cannot —
easily get rid of them. Unfoitunately
these survivals inhibit the develop-
ment of the individual and the coun-
try. They were deliberately fostered in
a colonialist situation. India cannot
develop speedily unless such vestiges
of the past are removed. from its soci-
ety. The caste system and sectarian-
ism hinder the integration and-devel-.

opment of the country on democratic

lines. Caste barriers and prejudices do -

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4

not allow even the educated people to

appregiate, the dignity of manual
sdabour and prevent our unity for a
common cause, Though women have
been enfranchised, their age-long so-
cial subordination prevents them from

playing their due role in social

progress. This is also true of the lower

orders of society. The study of ancient
India helps us to go deeply into the
roots of these prejudices. We can find

ANCIENT INDIA

out the causes that sustain the caste |

system, subordinate women, and: pro-
mote narrow religious sectarianism.
The study of ancient Indian history,
therefore, is relevant not only to those
who want to.understand the true
nature of the past that some people
want to relive but also to those who
want to appreciate the nature of ob-
stacles that hamper the development
of the country.

EXERCISES

_ 1. Explain the meaning of the following terms and concepts:

Ethnic groups, Sanskritic culture, Varna, ‘Unity in Diversity’,

Chakravartin.

2. Discuss how the study. of ancient Indian history is relevant to an +

understanding of contemporary India.

3. Do you think that it is desirable to think in terms of restoring the

past? Why, or Why not? Discuss.

4. Give examples of commingling ot different cultures in the context

of ancient Indian history.

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