Ayaz Amir writes
STRANGE that one of history's cradles, the Indian peninsula, should have so little truck with genuine history, as opposed to myth-making and mythology.Amir's assertion is that till Muslims came to India, there was no historical writing. A civilization which was thriving from 2500 BC, did not have any "historical writing" till 1017 AD till Alberuni visited India, which is a big gap of 3500 years. Now what did Alberuni write about?Is there any Indian Herodotus? Or Thucydides or Tacitus? One of the richest histories of the world, full of blood, conquest and great achievement without any chronicler, not even an apology of a Gibbon. Before Alberuni who accompanied the armies of Mahmud Ghaznavi, we have the Hindu holy texts, the Upanishads, Kautilya's Arthashastra and Megasthene's account of the court of Chandragupta Maurya. But nothing that can be credited as historical writing.
Indian history - that is, historical writing - begins with the coming of the Muslims. This is a remark made not in the spirit of drum-beating because we of the sub-continent are prickly to an inordinate degree, apt to stand on our dignity and pick quarrels about the wrong things, but just a bald statement of fact.[A travesty of history via an email from The Acorn]
He accompanied Mahmud of Ghazni to India and stayed there for many years, chiefly, in all probability in the Punjab, studied the Sanskrit language and translated into it some works from the Arabic, and translated from it two treatises into Arabic (Elliot and Dowson:5). Sachau, translator of Alberuni's Indica believes Alberuni "composed about twenty books on India (Sachau:xxvii), both translations and original compositions, and a number of tales and legends, mostly derived from the ancient lore of Eran and India." He was indeed a prolific writer and his works are stated to have exceeded a camel-load. (Elliot and Dowson:3)Alberuni translated Patanjali's Yoga-Sutra into Arabic (called Kitab Patanjal). He also wrote a monograph on Indic culture, Kitab al-Hind which did not achieve the prominence of other works of comparative religion written around the same time. Romila Thapar adds that Alberuni was the finest intellect of central Asia. In the ten years he spent in India, he made observations on Indian conditions, systems of knowledge, social norms and religion. His book Tahqiq-i-Hind is the most incisive made by any visitor to India. But was he the first person to indulge in some "historical writing" as Ayaz Amir writes.Let me also make another observation about Alberuni. He regards Hindus as excellent philosophers and he felt strong inclination towards Hindu philosophy but still he was a Muslim and at times does not fail to point out the superiority of Islam over Brahmanic India[India as Alberuni saw it]
Huen Tsang was a Chinese scholar who visited India in 630 A.D at the age of 26. Huen Tsang returned to China with enough statuary and texts to load twenty horses and wrote a long account of India which was based on personal observation[1]. It seems his accounts had more detail than his predecessors and was meticulous in detail [3]. Alberuni carried one camel load of books and Huen Tsang required twenty horses and so the winner is...
Around the same time Banabhatta wrote Harshacarita which provided a descriptions of significant events during the reign of Harshavardhana [3] This was the first biography in Sanskrit as well as a masterpiece of literature.[1]. At this time Alberuni's grandfather was not even born.
Before Huen Tsang, Fa Hian, a Chinese pilgrim visited India between 405 - 411 A.D during the reign of Chandra-Gupta II. From his writings we learn about the life of the disposers of the dead, the social hierarchy, Magadha and its towns. He was not concerned about political affairs but wrote about festivals and Brahmins. He watched, "the brahmacharis come forth to offer their invitations; the Buddhas then, one after another, enter the city". [1]. At this time, pardon my french again, Alberuni's grandfather's grandfather was not born.
Now let's go back some 700 years to 327 B.C., when Alexander of Macedonia came to Punjab. Of Alexander's companions, three were noted for their writing on India. Nearchus, who explored the coast between Indus and the Persian Gulf, Onesicritus, who later wrote a book about India and Aristobulus, whom Alexander entrusted with certain commisions in India. Besides this Strabo, who lived in 64 B.C - 19 A.D wrote an important geographical work of which Book XV, Chapter I deals with India. Diodorus who lived up to 36 B.C wrote an account of India based on Megasthenes. Pliny the Elder wrote about India based on Greek books and the reports of Merchants. Arrian who lived between 130 A.D. and atleast 172 A.D. wrote about India, its geography, and manners and customs. Plutarch (45 - 125 A.D.) wrote Lives and its chapters 57-67 deals with Alexander and mentions India.[4]
References to the times of Chandragupta Maurya come from Brahminical, Buddhist and Jain sources. The Brahminical sources include the Puranas, Mudrarakshasa of Visakhadatta, and the works like Kathasaritsagara of Somadeva and Brihatkathamanjari of Kshemendra. The Buddhist authorities are Dipavamsa, Mahavamsa, the Mahavamsa Tika and Mahabodhivamsa. The Jain books are Kalpasutra of Bhadrabahu and Parisishtaparvam of Hemachandra.
I have in my collection, the The Arthashastra
But as you can see, most of these authors are foreigners, including Alberuni. So Ayaz Amir has a point when he asks, "Is there any Indian Herodotus? Or Thucydides or Tacitus?". The answer is No. My question to him is, why does it matter? When did having a Herodotus become the standard of approval for any civilization? Do the Mayans or Sumerians or Chinese have a Herodotus ? No. Does that diminish the value of those civilizations? No. Each country does things different now and in ancient times it was no different. While Greeks have well chronicled history, early Indian history comes from coins and charters, random inscriptions, oral tradition, literary compositions and religious texts [1]. Each of these provide a version of history which can be corroborated with inputs from other sources.
Sorry to burst your bubble Ayaz. India had a documented history long before Alberuni set foot here.
References
[1] India, a History by John Keay
[2] In search of the cradle of civilization by Georg Feuerstein, Subhash Kak, David Frawley
[3] Early India by Romila Thapar
[4] Chandragupta Maurya and His Times
Comments (9)
JK, Super piece.
Just a point of doubt, prolly you can clear it up...weren't the puranas supposedly historical writings of the Vedic Kings and their conquests?
Posted by Ravages | June 15, 2005 10:06 PM
Posted on June 15, 2005 22:06
JK,
Given the amount of time those foreign writers spent in India, I'd call them Indian ;-)
Posted by Nitin | June 15, 2005 11:09 PM
Posted on June 15, 2005 23:09
Ravages, Puranas are religious sectarian narratives and hence they are not acceptable as history according to Romila Thapar. For example some of the stories in Puranas are that of Manu and how he was born off Brahma and how he took a boat full of animals when there was flood etc. There is some mythology there. It also starts the lineage of the people in Mahabharata - the Ikshvaku dynasty.
Puranas are not entirely mythology as it contains references to historical dynasties. But of the historical dynasties mentioned in the Puranas only some have cross references.
Posted by JK | June 16, 2005 7:16 AM
Posted on June 16, 2005 07:16
Nitin, that's how Sonia became an Indian - by spending too much time here :)
Posted by JK | June 16, 2005 10:02 AM
Posted on June 16, 2005 10:02
Varnam,
How about mailing this to Ayaz? I am going to do it right away. It would be better still if you too did so.
Posted by pennathur | June 16, 2005 7:17 PM
Posted on June 16, 2005 19:17
Come on,
Since when have we taken fools like Ayaz Amir so seriously?
He will go to the extent that India was created out of Pakistan.
If we go about telling about the blood filled history of muslims to Ayaz Amir, about how they destroyed indegenous cultures and people of not just Iraq, Iran (Zorostrians), Central Asia (Buddhists), Afghanistan (Hindu and Buddhists and who can forget Hindukush, the slaughter ground o Hindus), ofcourse present day India, Pakistan and Bangladesh where Hindus are almost becoming second class citizens... then Ayaz will start a jehad against islam (Provided his heart is clear enough to accept reality)
Now they(Muslims) demand reservations! Tommorrow they will demand India too.
Posted by Sameer | June 23, 2005 4:12 AM
Posted on June 23, 2005 04:12
A very interesting piece there. But it would have been much better had you written it as piece about Indian history rather than as a loaded response to Ayaz Amir - whoever that is!
But I have to say one thing though, the translation of work by Alberuni perhaps is the first work available today that looks at India in a broader perspective. I found it very interesting to read about India at that period of time. None of the works that you mention - like Arthashastra (i have read the version you had linked to and another better one but I can't remember the translator) or Harscharita does that. No I am not questioning their quality or anythign, just mentioning that they were not travelougues or observations.
I wonder if there are any comprehensive work done by Huen Tsang, and available in English? Again the question of camelload and 26 horses doesn't decide on who the winner is. It depends on what came of it. Do let me know if you have some idea about the availability of some of his work.
Posted by Pramod | June 26, 2005 8:38 AM
Posted on June 26, 2005 08:38
Pramod,
1. I don't like reading bland academic type articles on history. So I don't like to write them as well.
2. There seems to be books on Fa Hian and Huen Tsang on Amazon, but out of circulation. It would be interesting to read them. Have you read the writings of Greek authors?
3. Regarding camels and horses - i should have put a smiley symbol after it. I assumed you would get the humor.
Posted by JK | June 28, 2005 11:37 AM
Posted on June 28, 2005 11:37
Perrett's article [Perrett, Roy W. "History, Time, and Knowledge in Ancient India." History and Theory. 38(3). 1999. pp. 307-321.] makes the case that the ancient "indians" had their histories. One example is the twelfth century poet Kalhana's Rajatarangani, a history of Kashmir. But Perrett also argues that "there was no significant value attached to history in ancient India." It seems like a strong claim, but remember, it took Sir William Jones and the Asiatic Society to retrieve Ashoka; we ourselves had forgotten the dude long ago.
Perrett traces the lack of interest in history to Indian epistemology. The philosopher Jitendra Mohanty traces it to Hindu metaphysics. Perhaps a metallurgist would find metallurgical causes. What really matters is that the next Alburuni will have no reason to write as the first one (1020 CE) did:
"Unfortunately the Hindus do not pay much attention to the historical order of things, they are very careless in relating the chronological succession of their kings, and when they are pressed for information and are at a loss, not knowing what to say, they invariably take to tale-telling." [Source: Perrett's article]
Ouch.
Posted by Anil Menon | September 7, 2005 1:26 PM
Posted on September 7, 2005 13:26