Title: Ashoka
and the Decline of the Mauryas
Author: Romila Thapar
Publisher: Oxford University
Press, 2012 (First published 1961)
ISBN: 978-0-19-807724-4
Pages: 402
An exhaustive treatment of Ashoka and the Mauryan empire
from one of the leading historians of the country. It is always a delight to
read the work of a master. Even a cursory look at the long list of footnotes
and references suffice to support the claim of erudition. And she has chosen an
apt subject to apply her supreme analyzing skills. Every Indian knows about
Ashoka in one form or another. Most of us have heard about him through
childhood legends while some has read about his times in history. Still another
set might have wondered how the national symbol of India came about in the
present shape. In any case, the tradition of Ashoka transcends centuries of
history and still touches the Indian psyche. Professional historians from
abroad had also been mesmerized by his legend and left wonderstruck at the
unique aspects which are not witnessed anywhere. Have you ever heard of a king
expressing remorse at the terrible bloodshed and dislocation caused to virtuous
people in a battle he had actually won? This book answers several questions in
the minds of enthusiasts and provides material for further research into the
old king’s story.
Thapar develops history into the nature of science. She
begins with historiography, the method by which later historians make out a
logical sequence of events from available data. Ashoka was a prolific issuer of
edicts in the form of rocks and pillars, the remains of which still exists.
Being a pragmatic ruler he employed scripts which are comprehensible locally,
even when the language was Prakrit, a popular form of Sanskrit. Brahmi and
Kharoshti scripts are used at many places. In the North West, which possessed a
mixed population of Greeks and Persians, owing to the invasion of Alexander the
Great hardly half a century earlier, the language of inscription was Greek and
Aramaic. The edicts were usually a manifesto of the king as he declared it to
his subjects rather than decrees. However, the historians are never certain
whether Ashoka always practiced what he preached. Another source of information
are the Buddhist texts compiled around the period, most notably Dipavamsa and
Mahavamsa of Sri Lanka and the works of Taranatha of Tibet. India’s first ever
historical text, Kalhana’s Rajatarangini composed in the 12th
century in Kashmir also contains brief mention of the ancient emperor. However
the Buddhist texts follow a fixed pattern of demonizing Ashoka before his
conversion to the faith and beatifying him after it. They call him Kamashoka
for his lust, Chandashoka for his cruelty and Dharmashoka when he followed the
Buddhist path. One thing is certain from all these tomes. Ashoka was indeed a
hardy ruler during the initial stages of his reign. Fratricidal warfare is
mentioned in the struggle for the throne. It is equally certain that there was
no overnight conversion after the Kalinga war as is made out in popular
accounts. His change was gradual and without doing away with his imperial
obligations which sometimes demanded violence or coercion. The historian has an
unenviable task of separating wheat from the chaff by going about carefully
with a sieve on the available texts.
A lengthy discussion on the economy and polity of the
Mauryan state is presented but almost all of it taken from Arthashastra. Apart
from references in some edicts and quotations from Megasthenes’ Indica there is
no other work to rival Kautilya’s masterpiece on statecraft. Thapar’s handling
of the subject is masterly and illustrates the rudiments of many modern
institutions taking shape during Ashoka’s enlightened reign. Mauryan
administration and foreign policy is also commendable, the most noted success
of it evident in Sri Lanka. Though it is clear that Buddhism in Lanka preceded
Ashoka, it was during his reign at Magadha that he could persuade Tissa, the ruler
of the island kingdom to embrace the religion through a mission by his
son/brother Mahinda.
Ashoka’s rock and pillar edicts constitute an archaeological
curiosity in the form of establishing literary continuity over two millennia.
The script has charged but only in form. The rules of combining vowels with
consonants remain the same and illustrates the umbilical cord shared by the
modern Indian languages with the matriarch of them all, Sanskrit. The author
painstakingly goes through each edict and brings out the significance of each
and the neat pattern in which all of them mesh together. The edicts tell the
story of a broadminded monarch illuminating the path of Dhamma (which may
loosely be translated as righteousness in English). But Ashoka’s Dhamma
is not that of Buddhism, even though he was an ardent adherent of the religion.
In a path breaking initiative that was to serve as a beacon to the
multi-ethnic, multi-religious and multi-linguistic conglomeration that
crystallized as modern India, Ashoka propounded the path of tolerance and
introduced Dhamma which he distilled out from the essence of all sects
prevailing in his kingdom. He was not a puritan in the sense that he didn’t
advocate impossible goals. Slaughter of animals was proscribed in the edicts,
but elsewhere the king accedes to the killing of two peacocks and a deer daily
in the royal kitchen, with a caveat that such practices must stop in the near
future. Ashoka’s Dhamma was well suited for the socio-political transition that
was going on in Magadha. Pastoral nomadism was giving way to rural agriculture
and the social tensions engendered by agglomeration of people in villages and
towns could only be addressed through the all-encompassing mantle of Dhamma. We
may note here the word Dhamma is a Prakrit version of the Sanskrit term Dharma.
Thapar skillfully assesses the geographic extent of the Mauryan Empire which
reached its zenith under Ashoka by the presence of edicts. In the North West,
it included Taxila and in the rugged South, we may suspect that it girdled all
the provinces judging from the awe-stricken tone exhibited by Tamil
inscriptions of the period.
Thapar’s assessment of the reasons behind the empire’s
downfall in uncharacteristically wide off the mark and displays lack of focus
and anachronistic assignment of reasons. The dynasty lasted barely 50 years
after Ashoka’s death. The reasons include a highly centralized administration
falling into the hands of weak rulers, foreign aggression in the form of
Bactrian Greeks from the North West, resentment among Brahmins as a direct
result of the state policy of patronizing Buddhism and public insurrection
owing to a very high land tax of 25%. The most astonishing fact is that Thapar
assumes lack of national awareness and the non-development of the idea of the
superiority of the state over that of king. This is incomprehensible coming
from an eminent historian of the stature of Romila Thapar. The concept of
states or nation was far ahead in future and there is no way the Magadha of 200
BCE could get stimulated by post-Renaissance European concepts of the 1700s CE.
The reasons cited are so broad based that if we take the historian’s argument
at face value, we also have to accept the same justifications for the downfall
of any reign in ancient or medieval history.
The book is a hoard of information comprehensively
collected from numerous sources. Six appendices provide immense value to the
narrative and give a detailed translation of every edict issued by Ashoka. The
book was originally published in 1961 and a thoughtful ‘Afterword’ summarizes
and brings the reader up to date on the progress obtained in the intervening
period. Maps and monochrome plates provided along with the text is highly
appreciated in terms of utility. Kautilya’s Arthashastra is a priceless
document in learning about the Maurya period, but controversies exist between
scholars regarding the historical date of the tome. Thapar subjects this to a
careful analysis in one of the appendices. What can be summarized in a nutshell
is the vivid image of Ashoka as a man that is conveyed to us through the edicts
and mentions in contemporary texts.
The book is thoroughly
recommended.
Rating: 3 Star
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