Ancient History

9 notes tagged Ancient History.

• History

  Ancient India Essentials: Harappa to the Guptas

  Harappan sites and artefacts, the Vedic-age shift from Sabha to kingdom, Mauryan district officers, and why Fa-hien's travels matter.

• History

  Buddhism and Jainism: Teachings and Sects

  The Buddha's teachings and the Tipitaka, Mahavira and the Jaina tirthankaras, and why Mahayana and Theravada aren't the same split as Hinayana.

• History

  The Mahajanapadas and the Mauryan Empire

  How Magadha's iron and river routes built an empire, what the Arthashastra says about slavery, and why Ashoka's Kalinga edicts skip Kalinga itself.

• History

  The Gupta Empire and Post-Gupta Polity

  Samudragupta's conquests and Chandragupta II's reign, the vocabulary of Gupta land grants, the vishti forced-labour system, and post-Harsha trade.

• History

  The Spread of Buddhism: Councils and Schisms

  How the councils at Rajagriha, Vaishali and Pataliputra produced the key schisms, and how Ashoka's and Kanishka's patronage spread Buddhism abroad.

• History

  Vedic Literature, Archaeology and Historiography

  The four Vedas' layered Samhita-Brahmana-Aranyaka-Upanishad structure, Cunningham's 1861-71 founding of the ASI, and how epigraphy rebuilds ancient geography.

• History

  Buddhism and Jainism: Anatta versus Jiva

  Four Noble Truths versus the Three Jewels, anatta versus the eternal jiva, and why the Bodhisattva is a distinctly Mahayana idea with no Jain equivalent.

• History

  Sangam Age: Trade, Ports and Tamil Literature

  Muziris and Arikamedu prove real Indo-Roman trade in pepper and gold; Ettuthogai and Pattuppattu are the anthologies this chapter actually tests.

• History

  Mahabharata as Source: Kinship and Caste

  The Mahabharata's centuries-long composition, gotra exogamy, Draupadi's polyandrous marriage, and how jati multiplied beyond the four-fold varna.