THE INDIAN EMPIRE AFTER THE INDUS VALLEY

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THE INDIAN EMPIRE AFTER THE INDUS VALLEY
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INDIA
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UNIQUE INDIA

• Indian history, is more than just a set of unique
  developments in a definable process it is, in
  many ways, a microcosm of human history itself, a
  diversity of cultures all impinging on a great
  people and being reformed into new, syncretic
  forms.

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GEOGRAPHY

• The most striking element of Indian geography is
  the natural barrier formed by the mountain ranges
  in the north of India. For India is a continental
  plate that is crashing into the Asian continental
  plate. As it does, both continental plates push
  up the earth where they meet into a forbidding
  range of mountains. The central mountain range,
  passing across in the shape of a sword near the
  northern edge of the Indian subcontinent, is the
  Great Himalayas. These northern mountains, which
  are less of a barrier in the west, have naturally
  isolated India from its neighbors.    All along
  the southern edge of this great mountain wall are
  rich soils that are generously rained on even
  though this region lies in the temperate zone, it
  is lush and subtropical. To the south are the
  extensive flood plains of the Indus River in the
  west and the Ganges in the east. With rich soil
  renewed every year by river flooding and with
  generous summer rains, these plains in the north
  are among the richest agricultural areas in the
  world. It was here that Indian civilization first
  arose, in the fertile flood plains adjoining the
  Indus River. This vast stretch of flood plain has
  been the home of the great Indian empires as
  well, the Mauryans and the Guptas.    The
  southern portion of India is a large peninsula
  with a forbidding mountain range all along the
  western coast and a large flat plateau called the
  Deccan in the center of the sub-continent. The
  eastern coast is flat land and affords many
  opportunities for harbors from this area Indian
  culture had the widest contacts with foreign
  peoples.

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CULTURE

• India is one of the most culturally,
  linguistically, and ethnically diverse regions
  one can imagine. Four major peoples,
  distinguished by the languages they speak, make
  up the population of the region.
• Each of these peoples speak a bewildering variety
  of languages each region of India is dominated
  by a single language. The major languages, most
  of which are Indo-European, are
• Hindi
• Urdu (which is very closely related to Hindi but
  uses Arabic script)
• Bengali
• Marathi
• Assamese
• Sindhi
• Oriya
• Punjabi
• Kashmiri
• Nepali
• Telugu (Dravidian)
• Tamil (Dravidian)
• Kannada (Dravidian)
• Malayalam (Dravidian)
• Wow. Despite this variety of languages, Indian
  culture is remarkably fluid and the contacts
  between peoples frequent and productive. Very few
  cultures are so tied into the overall geography
  of their region Hinduism requires frequent
  pilgrimages as part of one's spiritual
  perfection, so the intercourse between different
  peoples has been constant throughout Indian
  history.

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Chandragupta Maurya (321-297 BC)

• He was an adventurer rather than a king. Like
  Alexander, he began with almost no army
  whatsoever with this army he seized the region
  of Magadha just south of the lower Ganges and
  then steadily conquered the whole of the Ganges
  basin. Chandragupta Maurya had started his
  empire. When Alexander the Great departed from
  Gandhara, a power vacuum was left in western
  India which Maurya took advantage of. Marching
  westward, he quickly conquered the whole of the
  Indus Valley, and eventually gained Gandhara and
  Arachosia (the mountainous region west of the
  Indus) after defeating the Greek rulers of Persia
  and Bactria, the Seleucids.    Hand in hand
  with this ambitious conqueror was a shrewd and
  calculating Brahman named Kautilya. While
  Chadragupta Maurya built his empire by the force
  of his arm, Kautilya designed the government.
  Together they created the first unified state in
  Indian history. The government Kautilya and
  Chandragupta created strictly regulated economic
  activities. The laws were harsh and the death
  penalty was applied to a myriad of offenses.

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Bindusara (297-272 BC)

• Chandragupta's son Bindusara extended the
  conquests even further by setting his sights
  south to the Deccan. By the end of Bindusara's
  reign, the Mauryan Empire included at least a
  third of the peninsula and stretched all the way
  from Bangladesh to the Hindu Kush mountains.

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Asoka (272-232)

• He seems to have been forged from the same mold
  as his illustrious fathers. Once he rose to the
  throne, he began an aggressive campaign to
  conquer the remainder of the subcontinent. The
  last major regions yet to be conquered were the
  Dravidian regions in the far south and the
  Kalinga in North India.    The conquest of
  Kalinga, which extended Mauryan rule to its
  farthest boundaries, seems to have been a
  tremendous shock to Asoka. War and conquest are
  always bloody and cruel, and the experience of
  massive homicide is often an experience that
  shakes people to their very souls. Asoka was so
  troubled by the conquest that he underwent a
  religious conversion. In the latter years of the
  Brahmanic period, several religious movements
  arose in reaction to the power and abuse of power
  by the Brahmans. The most significant of these
  religious reactions was Buddhism, which is
  discussed in more detail in the chapters on the
  religious history of ancient India. Buddhism was
  really much less of a religion and more of a
  philosophy--or, better yet, a philosophical
  therapy. Its founder, Siddhartha Guatama, the
  "Buddha," or "Awakened One," was the son of a
  noble who, when he first encountered death and
  sickness, resolved to find a way to end human
  suffering. After years of struggle and
  meditation, he "awakened" to the truth of things
  that all human suffering is caused by human
  desire and that human desire can be quenched when
  one understands the impermanence of all things,
  including the self. Unlike Brahmanism, Buddhism
  eschews elaborate rituals and magic unlike the
  Rig Veda, Buddhism advocates a non-striving,
  non-coercive and meditative life.

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ASOKA BUDDHIST CONVERSION

• The Buddhist way of life was a way out of Asoka's
  crisis. He converted to Buddhism and strove to
  achieve the Buddhist "middle way" between
  extremes. He became a vegetarian, renounced all
  warfare, and attempted to build a state based on
  Buddhist principles. First and foremost, the
  state would strive for nonviolence, or ahimsa in
  place of violence, the state would rule by "law"
  or "right" (dharma).    Asoka, of course, could
  not put all of these reforms into practice. He
  found that some level of violence and retribution
  was necessary and declared as much. Although he
  made the laws less harsh, they still involved
  physical punishment and, in some cases,
  execution. Still, Asoka began a process of
  transformation in Indian society. He represented
  first and foremost the possibility of
  exemplifying religious idealism in a lived life
  rather than in a merely formal position. Although
  he took the vows of Buddhism and even joined the
  order, he chose to remain active in the real
  world and exemplify his religion in his actions
  as king. He also demanded religious toleration
  under Asoka, all competing religious systems were
  allowed to co-exist peacefully. The stunning
  ability of Indian culture to tolerate competing
  religions throughout its history begins with
  Asoka. Finally, although he could never really
  fully translate Buddhist ideals into government,
  he began a process of cultural transformation
  that would completely remake India. By the start
  of the Gupta dynasty, the bulk of Indian society
  had become vegetarian and no laws carried the
  death penalty.

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ASOKAS GREATEST ACHIEVEMENT

• THE SPREAD OF BUDDHISM.

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RELIGION IN INDIA

• INDIA MOVES TOWARD MONOTHEISM
• THREE MAJOR RELIGION CHOICES
• BUDDHISIM
• HINDUISM
• JANISM

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BUDDHISM

• THE CORE OF BUDDHISM CHANGES TO A MASS RELIGION
  THAT OFFERS SALVATION TO ALL AND ALLOWS POPULAR
  WORSHIP. THIS DIVIDED BUDDHISTS OVER THE NEW
  DOCTRINE.
• MAHAYANA- ACCEPTED THE NEW DOCTRINE.
• THERAVADA- FOLLOWED THE ORIGINAL TEACHINGS OF
  BUDDHISM

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NEW BUDDHIST

• THIS NEW THOUGHT AFFECTED AND INSPIRED INDIAN
  ART, CULTURE, AND LITERATURE.

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THREE NEW GODS

• VISHNA- PRESERVER OF THE WORLD
• SHIVA- DESTROYER OF THE WORLD
• BRAHMA- CREATOR OF THE WORLD

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BRAHMA
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SHIVA
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VISHNA
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BUDDAH
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INDIAN CULTURE

• HIGH PRODUCTION OF LITERATURE
• 2000 TAMIL POEMS STILL EXIST
• WRITING ACADAMIES SPRANG UP
• DRAMAS WERE POPULAR

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SCIENCES

• ASTRONOMY
• MATHEMATICS
• MEDICINE
• THESE AREAS OF THOUGHT ALL PROGRESSED IN THE
  INDIAN EMPIRES.

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RESULTS OF TRADE

• TRADE BROUGHT ABOUT ADVANCEMENT IN THOUGHT.
• INVENTED NEW CALENDAR.
• 1000yrs. BEFORE COLUMBUS, SUGGESTED THAT THE
  WORLD WAS ROUND.
• MATHEMATICS- CAME UP WITH MODERN NUMERALS,
  CONCEPT OF ZERO, THE DECIMAL SYSTEM, AND
  CALCULATED THE SOLAR YEAR TO 365.3586805 (AS
  CLOSE AS MODERN DAY CALCULATORS DO).

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TRADE

• INDIA GAVE THE WORLD SPICES, SAPPHIRES,
  GOLD,WOOD (EBONY, TEAK, AND FRAGRANT SANDALWOOD),
• INDIA WAS STRATEGICALY PLACED BETWEEN CHINA,
  GREECE AND ROME.

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TRADE INVENTED THE MIDDLEMAN

• INDIA BOUGHT GOODS FROM THE EAST AND THE WEST AND
  SOLD IT FOR A PROFIT.

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RESULTS OF TRADE

• SEA TRADE INCREASED
• LED TO AN INCREASE IN BANKING LOANS WITH
  INTEREST
• BROUGHT NEW RELIGIONS
• BROUGHT NEW THOUGHT AND IDEAS
• IT SPREAD INDIAN RELIGION AND CULTURE TO THE REST
  OF THE WORLD

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ANALYSIS

• A VAST VARIETY OF ETHNIC AND LINGUISTIC GROUPS,
  POLITICAL FRAGMENTATION, ELABORATE HIERARCHY OF
  SOCIAL GROUPS, AND THE MANY DEITIES AND RELIGIONS
  THAT DOTTED THE LANDSCAPE.

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INDIAS TOPOGRAPHY
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VEDIC AGE 1500 500 B.C.E.

• INDUS VALLEY CIVILIZATION
• HIGH LEVEL OF SOCIAL ORGANIZATION AND TECHNOLOGY
• VEDAS- RELIGIOUS TEXT OF THIS PERIOD

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VARNA CLASS

• BRAMIN- PRIESTS AND SCHOLARS
• KSHATRIYA- WARRIORS AND OFFICIALS
• VAISHA- MERCHANTS, ARTISANS, AND LANDOWNERS
• SHUDRA- PEASANTS AND LABORERS

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JATI- BIRTH GROUPS OR CASTES

• ELABORATE RULES THAT GOVERNED THE INTERACTIONS
  BETWEEN GROUPS.

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MOKSHA

• THE INDIVIDUAL PURSUIT INTO THE NATURE OF ONES
  SELF AND THE UNIVERSISE THROUGH PHYSICAL AND
  MENTAL DISCIPLINE (YOGA). SPECIAL DIETARY
  PRACTICES AND MEDITATION. THIS RELEASED ONE FROM
  THE CYCLE OF REINCARNATIONS AND UNION WITH THE
  DIVINE FORCE THAT ANIMATES THE UNIVERSE SOMETIMES
  WAS LIKENED TO A DEEP, DREAMLESS SLEEP

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CULTURE
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EMPIRE

• INDIAN EMPIRES CAME AND WENT
• POLITICAL COHESION DID NOT EXIST
• THE BELIEFS OF BUDDHISM, JANISM, AND HINDUISM
  RIVALS WHAT EMPIRES DO ACQUIRE TERRITORY THROUGH
  WAR. THESE RELIGIONS FOSTERED NONVIOLENCE, AND TO
  BE HAPPY WITH YOUR LOT IN LIFE.