Abstract
The Mauryan Empire was preceded by the Achaemenian Empire, which in extent, and centralisation appears to have set a model for it. There is much on the surface to justify this thesis. Most remarkably there is the use of stone inscriptions for which the Achaemenid emperors, especially Darius and Xerxes, set a precedent. Stone and stone-cut art and architecture, not traceable in post-Indus India begin with Aśoka, and this too had Achaemenid precedents on a grand scale. This essay concedes the connection but argues that the contexts and contents of Aśokan inscriptions were essentially different from their Achaemenid precedents, and Mauryan art too, in both its forms and message, owed much to indigenous tastes and genius.
The Mauryan Empire, especially with reference to Aśoka and his inscriptions, has attracted considerable attention in recent years, though the genealogy of this renewed interest can be traced back to the early seventies of the last century (Mabbett 1972: 54–67). The structure of the empire, meanings and implications of the location and spread of the Aśokan records, their authorship, intentions of their author and response of their audience, are matters that have stirred the imagination of historians and archaeologists for a long time, indeed ever since Prinsep deciphered the Brahmi inscriptions of Aśoka and identified their author in 1839. The recent phase in interpreting Aśoka has owed much to Thapar (1987), Fussman (1987), Olivelle (2012) and Lahiri (2015). Apart from other issues, the imperial idea or other ideology of his empire has also evoked some engagement. It will be useful to examine the representations of the imperial idea in the records of those times, and assess the nature of their relationship with the earlier and spatially proximate Achaemenids and their ideas of empire.
I
An empire is a political formation and does not necessarily represent any particular social formation. As conquest states in search of resources of various types, including revenues from agriculture and trade, timber and elephants from forests, and mines and minerals, empires could include within their expanded territory multiple social formations or cultures at varying levels of evolution. The Mauryan Empire too, having been constituted by the metropolitan state of Magadha, had its core area and multiple peripheral regions. What distinguished these regions from each other were their specific socio-economic relationships, the preceding history of regional state formation, and the nature of the empire’s central administrative presence. The metropolitan state of Magadha, broadly comprising the upper and middle Gangetic Plains, had a long history of state formation and all that it entails; distant areas such as Gandhara had comparable experience before being conquered, while some other, mostly peripheral regions, had no earlier known histories of complex societies and state formation (Thapar 1987: passim). Thus, we need to bear in mind the extent of cultural plurality and degree of unevenness within the empire, stretching from Afghanistan to Karnataka and from Bengal to Gujarat. There is, indeed, the view that empire-states are based on and perpetuate differences among peoples and cultures largely because they also exclude and hierarchise in the process of being inclusive (Burbank and Cooper 2010). Compulsions such as these could have led the Mauryan emperors to generally resort to creating pretensions of uniformity, including an ideology, to bind their subjects to themselves so as to ensure the continuance of their own authority.
Aśoka’s dhàma, representing a set of moral or ethical ideas, has indeed been perceived as an effort to provide a common ideological dimension to the empire (Thapar 1961: 144ff.). The Aśokan inscriptions provide much useful information about the ways in which the emperor tried to reach out to and establish a common chord with his subjects. The rock edicts (RE) are usually found near the frontiers of the empire, while the pillar inscriptions (PE) are located within the ambit of the metropolitan state in North India. The sites of minor RE are mostly concentrated in the south with a scatter elsewhere (see Map 1). The spatial spread of the inscriptions indicates their absence in parts of interior peninsular India (Kulke and Rothermund 2016: 43), which reinforces some recent reassessments of the Mauryan state, highlighting the uneven patterns of expansion and differential spread of authority structure within the empire. The RE juxtapose the deeds of the emperor for the wellbeing of the people with those of past sovereigns. Claims of being a well-intentioned administrator, donor and responsive emperor run through the texts. The emperor emerges as an able, confident ruler in complete control of the affairs of the empire. In RE XIII, the defining and cautioning of the Atavikas (forest tribes) offers a case where the supreme authority of the emperor is specifically asserted. Similarly, the Separate Edicts, which articulate benevolent intentions, and the exclusion from the Kalinga inscriptions of RE XIII, depicting the misery and melancholy during and after the Kalinga War, have been seen as the result of conscious imperial decision, and not something left to the initiative of officials at the local level (Veluthat 1999: 1081–86). These had the potential to assure the people of good governance and win their confidence.
The location of the epigraphical records on communication routes, meeting points of people, nodes and even rock shelters is striking (see Falk 2006, for the most detailed study yet of Aśokan sties).
The inscriptions at Dhauli are in the vicinity of Sisupalgarh, the presumed regional centre of Tosali; at Jaugada or Samapa they are located within the urban site, whereas the edict at Kandahar was on a trade route. At Girnar and Sannathi, the records were set up near urban centres. Interestingly, at none of the older cities such as Champa, Pataliputra, Varanasi or Sravasti have texts of the emperor’s promulgations survived. Alongside the conversational tone of the REs and the mention of the fact in the separate REs (Hultzsch 1925: 92–100, 111–18) that these imperial exhortations were required to be read out on certain days of the year to ordinary listeners, makes clear the presence of an anxiety to reach a wide audience for the royal missives. RE XIV (ibid.: 25–26) also conveys an impression of the knowledge of the emperor of the ground realities: He was familiar with the fact that the same Edicts were deliberately not represented in similar fashion everywhere, and the range of variation straddled the elaborate, medium and abbreviated versions, so that one may presume that the initiative to vary the message could often come from local officials with the knowledge of local needs and sensitivities. Many such representatives of the state in the south were presumably bilingual so as to be able to transmit the Edicts’ contents to the local populace. The presence of a scribe or engraver like Chapada in the south with his familiarity with Kharoshthi (ibid.: 176–77) lends credence to such possibilities. It facilitated the emperor’s effort to adapt the language of his inscriptions to the dialect of his officialdom so as to facilitate the further verbal transmission in a local language.
The Aśokan inscriptions surely signified an ambitious project of communication in so far as they helped to communicate and share thoughts with the functionaries of the state as well as subjects in different corners of the far-flung empire. The promulgations were inscribed on stone in public places. Some were on horizontal rock faces as at Bahapur in New Delhi (Falk 2006: 67–69), while others such as at Maski were on vertical surfaces. Multiple copies of his message must have been sent to the provinces in his zeal to reach out to the people. The messages in the process of their oral communication had the potential to create an image of the emperor and the empire. Messages conveying the emperor’s readiness to listen to the affairs of people at any time and place and ensuring their welfare and happiness (RE VI: Hultzsch 1925: 11–13) marked a transformation in the political culture of the times, constituting a manifest attempt to reassure local people across regions.
The use of Kharoshthi, Greek and Aramaic in the northwest frontier region of the empire was a tacit recognition of the multicultural character of that region. Aramaic was the language of official communication in the Achaemenian Empire. It must have been earlier introduced in the Achaemenid satrapies within Afghanistan and the Indus basin; Kharoshthi is held to have evolved from Aramaic. The campaigns of Alexander led to the intrusion of Greek in the area. That the local specificities were factored in, is amply clear from the nature of the bilingual (Greek and Aramaic) edict engraved at Kandahar and also the deployment of the Greek expression ‘eusebeia’ or piety and Aramaic ‘qshyt’ or truth to convey the idea of the Prakrit term dhàma (Mukherjee 1984: 32–35). Dhàma, it was surely believed, would be better intelligible to the local inhabitants, if conveyed to them by a term familiar to them in their own tongue or rather a more familiar language than Prakrit. The message conveyed in the record is seen to represent a sense of confidence and self-assurance so far as it spelt out Aśoka’s achievements in the moral field rather than the political and military conveyed in Achaemenid proclamations. The Behistun inscription of Darius in Iran is the point of reference in this context. There,
the facts narrated are counted from the king’s succession to the throne, with the king stating that everything changed with his reign. But Darius is shown as victorious over his enemies and protected by a god (Ahuramazda). Ashoka by contrast emphasizes personal humility and the ultimate triumph of non-violence. (Lahiri 2015: 174)
The Persian inscriptions may have provided the motivation for getting the Aśokan messages engraved on stone for their sheer lasting quality. Pillar Edict (PE) VII actually states that the dhàmalipis have been inscribed on stone so that they may endure as long as the sun and the moon do. The manifest desire that his sons and grandsons, may conform to them (Hultzsch 1925: 130–37), yet again endorses Aśoka’s hopes for their permanence.
That brings us to the question of the audiences of Ashoka’s texts. It has been said that as opposed to the people at large, it was the high officials and, particularly, leaders of the communities and middle class householders to whom Aśoka’s messages were addressed. Since Dhàma is said to include good treatment of slaves and servants (RE IX, XI, XIII and PE VII: Hultzsch 1925: passim), it has been suggested that only men of substance could be addressed here (Olivelle 2012: 177). One must recognise, however, that a contrary argument can also be advanced: Aśoka was trying to tell slaves and servants that he was also mindful of their interests! Indeed, one can go on to refer to Aśoka’s injunction in RE XIII for people to obey ‘those placed above’ (galu-shusha) (Hultzsch 1925: 45; Kalsi text), as proof that he was addressing those at the bottom. Finally, we should pay heed to what Aśoka himself says about his projected audience, namely the small as well as the great men (Minor Rock Edict I and REX) and the people at large (jana, loka) (e.g., RE VI) (Ibid.: 34–35, 39–40, 166–67, et passim). Issues of literacy and communication in an essentially oral society should not have come in the way of disseminating the emperor’s messages among ordinary people through their being read out to listeners (cf. Thapar 2000: 446, 448–49). For example, the separate REs were to be read out publicly on Caturmāsī (the full-moon days of the four month period, June–October) and on Tisya days (Hultzsch 1925: 92–100, 111–18). Furthermore, it is stated in the same Edicts that some of the audience might want to listen to the emperor’s message on other days too. Admittedly, the appreciation and acceptance of the messages would have varied across localities and regions. Besides, like the pillar edicts (PE), the RE too, given their dimensions and locations, had the potential to visually display the authority of the emperor, and create a sense of awe and respect for him.
The very act of communicating with the subjects through engraved records in the public domain throughout the empire was a symbolic assertion of imperial presence. Moreover, the use of a uniform language, with some regional variations, across the empire was, it is argued, ‘a potent symbol of the new imperium’ (Olivelle 2012: 170). The standardised script across large parts of the empire further facilitated the spread of an imperial ideology. The core of the ideas in the Aśokan inscriptions was centred on inculcating dhàma among his subjects. Dhàma went on to replace warfare as well as hunting and feasts. In RE V (Hultzsch 1925: 32–34) he mentions the creation of new officials known as dhàma-mahāmāttas responsible for propagating. The seven PEs record Aśoka’s dissemination of the idea of and the use of state officials for the purpose. REs III and IX (Ibid.: 4–5, 15–17), for instance, define in terms of its constituent virtues, which appear to be a pool of long-held principles that the Buddha had propounded for the ordinary people. But Aśoka certainly drew to the centre what was only on the periphery of early Buddhism and strove (in the words of Habib and Jha 2004: 70) to make ‘both society and state answerable to the call of compassion’. There was regard (perhaps, not necessarily an equal one) for all religious sects, the (Buddhist) Sangha, Brahmanas, Jains and the Ājīvikas. He encouraged all ‘sects’, calling them pāsàda—a curious word to use, since it was a pejorative word, meaning heretic, religious fraud, in Sanskrit (pās[an[d[a), as well as in Prakrit (cf. –pākhand in Hindustani)—to meet each other and maintain mutual respect (RE XII) (Hultzsch 1925: 20–22). The systematic use of the compound Brahmana-Samana or Samana-Brahmana makes Aśoka’s anxiety to be at peace with leading men of both the non-Brahmanical sects (mainly, of course, Buddhists, but also Jains and Ājīvikas) and Brahmanical priesthood. Tolerance in its broadest sense extending to people and their faiths and beliefs, and non-violence in its wider applicability, including the animal world, are certainly of crucial significance within the large range of moral principles that are listed in Aśokan Edicts to define dhàma (Thapar 2002: 202–03). If this accorded more with Buddhism than with Brahmanism, there was little here at which Brahmans could take offence. And yet the absence of any reference to obligations imposed by caste (the two terms varṇa and jāti are totally absent in Aśokan corpus) is a remarkable positive fact for which Aśoka has seldom received due credit.
Before leaving the subject of the momentous change Aśokan written edicts represented with their contents and wide distribution, a digression will not be out of place. In much of the discussion we have followed, it is assumed that Aśoka’s subjects had the only means that we have, of knowing about his principles and practice, namely his edicts. We tend to overlook the fact that there also existed a developed system of memorisation and oral transmission, the system by which all pre-Mauryan texts in Sanskrit have survived. We must imagine that before Aśoka’s time in the absence of writing, royal orders must also have been memorised and transmitted through messengers throughout the Empire. This must have continued under Aśoka as well. In that process they could have been rendered into local languages and disseminated far more widely than through the written word. The pity is that we cannot even remotely establish how extensively Aśoka’s message could have reached his subjects through such purely oral means, inherited from the pre-writing period.
II
Aśokan inscriptions follow in time the grand set of Achaemenid inscriptions of Darius and Xerxes, whose empire included the Indus basin which later formed part of the Mauryan Empire (for epigraphic references to Indian territories under Achaemenid suzerainty, see Sircar 1965: 3–14).
The third-person introductions such as ‘King Priyadarsin, Beloved of the Gods, says’ that we find is Aśokan Edicts echoes the kind of introductions usual in Achaemenid Royal Edicts—‘King Darius says’ or ‘King Xerxes says’. Yet another common element between the two sets of records is in the fact of their being initially so composed that the author after appearing in the third person, immediately shifts to the first person. The Persian record ends with the words, ‘(Thus) Saith Darius, the king: By the grace of Auramazda I made inscriptions in another fashion … such as was not formerly…and it was written and ….I sent the same inscriptions into all lands, and the people ….’ In Xerxes’s Persipolis inscription there is also some element of personal obligation (though to Ahura Mazda) (Gnoli 1989: 89), which seems to anticipate Aśoka’s numerous references to his obligation to serve the cause of dhàma. It is, therefore, believed that the Persian Edicts were used as models by Aśoka, especially the Behistun or Bisutun Rock Inscription of Darius (Adrados 1984). The latter dwells on the life and deeds of Darius, while there were also others to choose from such as his great funeral inscription or the inscriptions at Persepolis which render accounts of the building of the palaces. The Achaemenids too, like Aśoka later, had attempted the widest dissemination of their proclamations engraved on rocks. Darius, for instance, in the Behistun inscription ‘offers prizes or threatens with punishment, respectively, to those who spread or conceal the text of his inscription’ (ibid.: 3). Aśoka surpassed him by engraving the same texts, or sets of texts in different parts of the empire. Starting from the dates of events being narrated from the king’s accession to the throne, through the mention of the king being benevolent, truthful, non-violent and acting according to justice, to the use of the Iranian word dipi—‘inscription’ adapted as lipi—the evidence strongly points to the source of inspiration being provided by Achaemenid inscriptions (cf. ibid.: 4).
In spite of the similarities, the differences between the two sets of records cannot be brushed aside. While the Aśokan texts were essentially designed to appeal to people to follow ethical conduct, the Persian records exalted the king by proclaiming his victories and acts of glory—traits usually noticeable in Indian praśastis such as Khāravela’s Hatigumpha inscription, or Rudradāman’s Junagadh inscription, to take two early examples. But Aśokan Edicts are largely free of this taint. Similarly, one is not sure if, as with Aśokan inscriptions, the same Edict had copies set at different places in the case of the Achaemenid inscriptions. There are, therefore, basic indications of innovation, along with difference of purpose, in the case of Aśokan inscriptions.
Possible Greek sources of influence on Aśoka’s use of inscriptions to spread his message cannot also be ruled out. The presence of Greek ambassadors at the courts of Chandragupta and Bindusāra, the embassies sent by Aśoka to Greek Rulers (RE XIII) (Hultzsch 1925: 43–49) and the presence of Greek inhabitants within his empire as attested by the Kandahar bilingual inscription, are more than suggestive of a two-way cultural flow between Mauryan India and the Hellenistic world. The use of expressions in Aśokan Edicts such as ‘beloved of the gods’ (devānàpiya) or ‘the one with the benevolent look’ (Piyadāsi) for the emperor had their parallels in epithets used by Hellenistic kings, such as ‘saviour’ (soter) and ‘friend of the gods’ (theophilos), among many others. Interestingly, the names of at least five contemporary Greek Kings were well known to Aśoka, being fairly accurately given in RE XIII just cited. That apart, there is no precedent for the Aśokan PE in the Achaemenid Empire, but the Greek world could offer examples of inscriptions of texts of laws inscribed on walls and pillars of various types. Yet while recognising possible Persian and Greek influences on Aśoka’s use of inscriptions, we must recognise that these texts undoubtedly have a distinct literary style of their own, where much originality has to be recognised (Adrados 1984: 9).
The magnificent Achaemenid monuments were still there when art in stone flowered under Aśoka. Besides the Pillared Hall, the remains of parts of the city wall and huge wooden buildings were laid bare at Kumrahar and Bulandibagh, in and around Patna. The Pillared Hall with eighty pillars, standing on a wooden platform and supporting a wooden roof, must have been an impressive sight. The pillars were made of Chunar sandstone and bore the characteristic Mauryan polish. The arrangement of the pillars is said to be identical with the one in the grand Achaemenian Hall of Hundred Columns at Persepolis. The Mauryan polished surface of the columns and the general design of the hall apparently owed their inspiration to the Persian predecessor (Ray 1975: 14–15).
The pillars bearing the Edicts of Aśoka are found spread from Topra and Meerut near Delhi to the Nepalese Terai in the east, and Sanchi in the south. The area of Aśokan columns without the Edicts extends further eastward to Basarh in northern Bihar. Incidentally, in their geographical spread, with the exception of Sanchi, they are all confined to what is regarded as the metropolitan region of the empire (where, the letter ‘l’ did duty for ‘r’ as well in all texts). The Chunar Hills are generally held to have been the resource area for the Aśokan pillars. On the basis of her field work and the discovery of sandstone blocks with Kharoshthi script in the Chunar quarry, Vidula Jayaswal (2012) has suggested that skilled craftsmen from the northwest conversant with that script were brought here to work together with local professionals. Furthermore, the shafts of many Aśokan pillars are said to be not monoliths, but the results of the joining of five to six cylindrical blocks of sandstone. (But see Falk 2006: 54–57, where much doubt is thrown on Aśokan pillars being sourced from Chunar rocks).
The sudden use of stone, especially for monumental purposes, has led historians to look for extraneous influences, so often to Iran of the Achaemenid emperors. However, as with the Aśokan inscriptions, in this instance too, the differences in style with the columns at Persepolis have to be noted. The absence of column capitals in halls and of the bell-shaped bases for the columns in Aśokan architecture, among other details, support the conclusion that while the source of inspiration for the Mauryan builders might have been Achaemenian, the actual form was indigenous (Ray 1975: 24–25). Hellenistic art too is seen to have played a part in the shaping of Mauryan imperial art. One should not lose sight of the fact that Iranian art under the Achaemenids came under the influence of Hellenistic culture after Alexander, and it is this Hellenistic Orient which seems to have left its imprint on Mauryan art. In short, to quote Niharranjan Ray,
… The Mauryan column, intended to produce the effect of an independent monument … is simpler, more harmonious in conception and execution, and gives the feeling of more stability, dignity and strength, … The indigenous and original contribution to the creation of this item of Maurya art is therefore undeniable. Equally … the Maurya columns seem to reveal the debt they owe to Achaemenian art, also to Hellenistic art insofar as … part of the general effect is concerned. (ibid.: 26)
At this juncture a short diversion into Achaemenian history would not be out of place. The Achaemenid Empire lasted for over two centuries between Cyrus and the coming of Alexander. The need for an imperial ideology appears to have been dictated by inescapable compulsions of empire. The images and messages of Achaemenid kingship seem to have been formulated in Dariu’s reign and these set norms for his successors. Their monumental architecture and sculpture in stone were associated with their imperial centres in Western Iran such as Persepolis, Susa and Ecbatana. Persia, or the region of Parsa (Fārs), emerges as the privileged core exercising supremacy within the empire whose territory spread from Lydia (Sardis) and South-eastern Europe to Bactria and the Indus. The diversities of the people, cultures and languages within the realm were certainly marked (Kuhrt 2007: 826ff.) and set limits to direct control. The administration was adapted to local needs and traditions, providing an efficient system of governance across that extensive empire. A common code of law, gold currency, weights and measures and the use of Aramaic as the official language were the obvious means to secure a firm integration of that empire. Yet within the satrapies or provinces the observance of local laws, customs and traditions seem to have continued unhindered. Despite unifying Western Asia in a political system, there was no effort to impose uniformity or cultural unity on the heterogeneous peoples of the empire (Stronach 1980: 209–10).
Apart from the grand construction programmes launched at Pasargade and Persepolis, there was a network of urban centres and communication routes connecting the core territories. The Persepolis and the Susa areas and the space in between them seem to have been especially favoured, although outposts such as Sardis and Kandahar at the opposite ends of the empire seem also to have been firmly held. Caravansarais were widely distributed to facilitate the movement of travellers, grain and goods. The conquests of Cyrus and Darius and their newly gained imperial status were both, now, represented in monumental art. Pasargade founded by Cyrus was witness to massive activity drawing on stone-working skills from Ionia and Lydia while creating the architectural traditions of Iran. Darius continued with the tradition and placed Achaemenid art and architecture on firm foundations. Persepolis was his project, and it was adorned with major buildings and relief sculptures under him and his successor Xerxes.
Darius prayed to his god for the protection of his country from the army (of the enemy), famine and the ‘lie’—meaning disorder (Kuhrt 2007: 487). He moves on to proclaim that much wrong had been previously done, which he set right. The strong does not smite nor harm the weak. These words in contrasting the past with the present and in terms of their rhetoric remind us of Aśoka and his records and work in stone. One can argue that given a situation similar to the Achaemenid Empire, Aśoka responded in a manner similar to that of the Achaemenid emperors, but essentially he was still driven by his own genius.