The Influence Of Greek Classics On Indian Culture In Ancient Era Abstract (1).docx

Greek invention in ancient India

Greek Classics in Indian Culture The ancient Greeks were the “inventors” of more elements of civilization than any other people of the world. These elements of civilization can be viewed among historical writings especially associated with Herodotus and Thucydides, and the evolution of Democracy having foundational seeds in Athens. The Greeks view of the world was predominantly secular and rationalistic. It exalted the spirit of free inquiry and preferred knowledge to faith. With only a limited cultural inheritance of the past upon which to build, the Greeks produced intellectual and artistic monuments that had served ever since as standards of achievement. So in some ways the single most legacy of the ancient Greece is the civilization in India and ancient era is particularly influenced by the Greeks, especially in Art, language, culture and mostly covers the all aspects of Human life. This article is an attempt to explore cultural and religious evolution of India as an outcome of Indo Greek interaction. It further attempts to answer that why and how the India was influenced by the Greeks, Subsequently the Indian art particularly Ghandhara appeared as the world’s famous Art of India.

Introduction: The advent of Greeks in India dates back from 6th century (BC) to 5th century (AD) as an outcome of Greek expedition towards Persia. They intended to explore intellectuals and savvy conversant people in the fields of Philosophy, sea trade, Art, Diplomacy, administration, and empire governance. Their quest is manifested through materialization of long list comprising Kingdoms and Greek rulers who reigned India •

. Greeks invaded Indus and the Ganges, the Plateaus of the Deccan and the Beaches of Gujrat; however, their infiltration into India remained void of some geographical parts.

•

Greeks came into India as merchants and traded to Malabar Coast of Coromandel, and the mercenaries they served in the places of Tamil kings.

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Until the British came no European race so thoroughly traversed and explored

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Greek invention in ancient India

the great Sub-continent. Though Greeks were also an alien nation like British; however unlikely British, the Greeks adapted to Indian climate and customs. Their progenies received eloquent influence of Indian religions and their contribution in Buddhism. However, the role of Greeks in India is largely associated with invasion of Alexander on India; whereas, the historical accounts suggest arrival of Greeks in India long ago the Alexander. It can be commented that huge historical coverage of Alexander has eclipsed the contribution of earlier Greek arrivals in India. It is narrated that at the time of invasion on India through the Passes of the Hindu Kush. Alexander got conversant with the fact that a number of Greeks from Bactria had already established in the fertile mountains that overlooked the valley of the Indus. The historical literature also suggests that Bactria Greeks ruled the parts of India that remained unknown to the Alexander. Various historical accounts suggest that the arrival of earlier Greeks in India took place approximately 2 centuries before the advent of Alexander. Their route of travel remained along the trade routes linking India, Persia, Ionian cities of Asia Minor. Some other accounts suggest that these journeys were glorified through expedition tales of Greek gods Dionysus and Heracles. It is narrated that these glorified legendary tales of Greek expedition to India inspired the Alexander to campaign for India in search of finding the great Ocean which he believed

The Greeks in Ancient India: It is believed that the Alexander was ambitious military leader whose ambitions were curtailed owing to geographical and climatic constraints of Monsoon in India. However, post Alexandrian period observed infest of Bactrian Greeks which was catalyzed with the decline of Mauryan empire in India. It resulted augmentation of Greek influence in India upto a level of managing various Bactrian kingdoms in India.1

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CHAUDHRY M.IQBAL,PAKISTANI SOCIETY

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Greek invention in ancient India

Ideology Buddhism flourished under the Indo-Greek kings, and their rule, especially that of Menander, has been remembered as benevolent. It has been suggested, although direct evidence is lacking, that their invasion of India was intended to show their support for the Mauryan empire which had a long history of marital alliances, treaties of friendship, and exchange of ambassadors and religious emissaries with the Greeks, to protect Greek populations in India, and to protect the Buddhist faith from the religious persecutions of the Sungas. The city of Sirkap founded by Demetrius combines Greek and Indian influences without signs of segregation between the two cultures. Alternatively, the Greek invasions in India are also sometimes described as purely materialistic, only taking advantage of the ruin of the Mauryan Empire to acquire territory and wealth.2

Coins The first Greek coins to be minted in India, those of Menander I and Appolodotus I bear the mention "Saviour king" (BASILEOS SOTHROS), a title with high value in the Greek world which indicated an important deflective victory. For instance, Ptolemy I had been Soter (saviour) because he had helped save Rhodes from Demetrius the Besieger, and Antiochus I because he had saved Asia Minor from the Gauls. The title was also inscribed in Pali as ("Tratarasa") on the reverse of their coins. Menander and Apollodotus may indeed have been saviours to the Greek populations residing in India, and to some of the Indians as well. Also,

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G. K. Jenkins

JOURNAL ARTICLE Indo-Greek Tetra drachms

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Greek invention in ancient India

most of the coins of the Greek kings in India were bilingual, written in Greek on the front and in Pali (in the Kharoshthi script) on the back, a tremendous

Concession to another culture never before made in the Hellenic world. From the reign of Apollodotus II, around 80 BCE, Kharoshthi letters started to be used as mintmarks on coins in combination with Greek monograms and mintmarks, is suggesting the participation of local technicians to the minting process. Incidentally, these bilingual coins of the Indo-Greeks were the key in the decipherment of the Kharoshthi script by James Prinsep (1799–1840). Kharoshthi became extinct around the 3rd century CE.3

The Greek and Classical Indian Literature: The classical Indian literature comprising Yuga Purana, Mahabharata, and Buddhist literature provide historical narrations of Indo Greek interaction in ancient times. The information through these accounts suggests that Greeks were called “Yavanas” by the indigenous people. Among available historical literature, there is narrative dearth regarding Indo Greek wars. Yuga Purana elaborates military campaign of the Greeks mainly mentioning their resistance against Sketa in Oudh, and annexing of Panchalas between the Ganges and the Jumna. Moreover, it gives speculative information about their period of stay in Pataliputra. The exact chronological accounts regarding these events are missing in ancient either Indian or Greek literature. Though there is exactitude lapse among inferences from Yuga Purana, yet some mentions of Mahabhasya written by Patanjli about siege of „Sketa” and “Madyamika” provide alternative account to substantiate events mentioned in “Yuga Purana”. As the Patanjli was contemporary to those events, hence his writings can be trusted in terms of its

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BY R.C.MAJUMDAR,M.A,PHD AN ADVANCED HISTORY OF INDIA

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Greek invention in ancient India

oral accounts. These writings have some allusions of war stating: “The Yavana was besieging Sketa. The Yavana was besieging Madyamika.” Patanjali lived in second century B.C, and this time which he used as illustration precisely because they were fresh in the minds of his readers.17The reference to the siege of Sketa confirms the information given in the Yuga Purana. But the reference of Madyamika takes us into a quite different area of Greek invasions in India. Madyamika was situated far to the south of Menander’s invasion route to Pataliputra4

Religions In addition to the worship of the Classical pantheon of the Greek deities found on their coins (Zeus, Herakles, Athena, Apollo...), the Indo-Greeks were involved with local faiths, particularly with Buddhism, but also with Hinduism and Zoroastrianism.

Buddhism Actually Buddhism in India is a very turning point in the world of art and culture, as well as in philosophy and religion. The Greek- Indian Buddhist religious thought appeared as the new dawn across Asia and Europe more than all other religious faiths. There is an opinion that the Buddha neither thought to set up a new religion nor looked upon his doctrine as a different form of the popular cults of the time.19 But here a question is arose that his followers raised his status almost to divinity even during his life time; and after his death they worshiped him by his symbols the stupa, recalling his parinivana and the Bodhi tree. During the reign of Asoka such kinds of stupas were built all over the India. But in all these Buddhist sculptures of that concerned era there is no show of Buddha himself. But displayed by such emblems as a wheel, an empty throne, a pair of footprints or a pipal tree

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BY R.C.MAJUMDAR,M.A,PHD AN ADVANCED HISTORY OF INDIA

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Greek invention in ancient India

Buddhist symbolism From around 180 BCE, Agathocles and Pantaleon, probable successors to Demetrius I in the Paropamisadae, and the earliest Greek kings to issue Indianstandard square bilingual coins (in Brahmi), depicted the Buddhist lion together with the Hindu goddess Lakshmi. •

Indian coinage of Agathocles, with Chaitya-hill, and tree in railing.

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Enlarge

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Indian coinage of Agathocles, with Chaitya-hill, and tree in railing.

Some coins of Agathocles in the Indian standard also show a six-arched stupa and a tree in a railing, typical symbol of the Bodhi tree in early Buddhism. These coins show an unprecedented willingness to adapt to every aspect of the local culture: shape of the coinage, coinage size, language, and religion.Later, some Indo-Greek coins incorporate the Buddhist symbol of the eight-spoked wheel, such as those of Menander I, as well as his possible grandson Menander II. On these coins, the wheel is associated with the Greek symbols of victory, either the palm of victory, or the victory wreath handed over by the goddess Nike. A 2nd century BCE relief from a Buddhist stupa in Bharhut, in eastern Madhya Pradesh (today at the Indian Museum in Calcutta), represents a foreign soldier with the curly hair of a Greek and the royal headband with flowing ends of a Greek king. In his left hand, he holds a branch of ivy, symbol of Dionysos. Also parts of his dress, with rows of geometrical folds, are characteristically Hellenistic in style. On his sword appears the Buddhist symbol of the three jewels, or Triratana.

Representation of the Buddha The anthropomorphic representation of the Buddha is absent from Indo-Greek coinage, suggesting that the Indo-Greek kings may have respected the Indian aniconic rule for Buddhist depictions, limiting themselves to Buddhist symbolism only. Consistently with this perspective, the actual depiction of the Buddha would

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Greek invention in ancient India

be a later phenomenon, usually dated to the 1st century CE, emerging from the sponsorship of the syncretic Kushan Empire and executed by Greek, and, later, Indian and possibly Roman artists. Datation of Greco-Buddhist statues is generally uncertain, but they are at least firmly established from the 1st century CE.

Hinduism The first known bilingual coins of the Indo-Greeks were issued by Agathocles around 180 BCE. These coins were found in Ai-Khanoum, the great GrecoBactrian city in northeastern Afghanistan, but introduce for the first time an Indian script (the Brahmi script which had been in use under the Mauryan empire), and the first known representations of Hindu deities, in a very Indian iconography: Krishna- Vasudeva, with his large wheel with six spokes ( chakra) and conch (shanka), and his brother Sankarshan- Balarama, with his plough (hala) and pestle (masala), both early avatars of Vishnu. The square coins, instead of the usual Greek round coins, also followed the Indian standard for coinage. The dancing girls on some of the coins of Agathocles and Pantaleon are also sometimes considered as representations of Subhadra, Krishna's sister. In any case, these coins suggest the strong presence of Indian religious traditions in the northwestern Indian subcontinent at that time, and the willingness of the Greeks to acknowledge and even promote them. Artistically, they tend to indicate that the Greeks were not particularly reluctant to make representations of local deities, which has some bearing on the later emergence of the image of the Buddha in Hellenistic style.

Zoroastrianism Persian culture and religion seem to have been rather influential among the Western Indo-Greeks, who, located around the Paropamisadae, lived in direct contact with the Central Asian cultural sphere and the eastern reaches of the

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Greek invention in ancient India

Parthian empire. Images of the Persian Zoroastrian god Mithra appear extensively on the Indo-Greek coinage of the Western kings, as a god with a radiated Phrygian cap.This Zeus-Mithra god is also the one represented seated (with the rays around the head, and a small protrusion on the top of the head representing the cap) on many coins of Hermaeus, Antialcidas or Heliokles II, or possibly even earlier during the time of Eucratides I, on whose coins the deity is said to be the god of the city of Kapisa.The future Buddha Maitreya, usually represented seated on a throne Western-style, and venerated both in Mahayana and non-Mahayana Buddhism, is sometimes considered as influenced by the god Mithra. "Some scholars suggest he (Maitreya) was originally linked to the Iranian saviour-figure Mitra, and that his later importance for Buddhist as the future Buddha residing in the Tusita heaven, who will follow on from Sakyamuni Buddha, derives from this source." (Keown, Dictionary of Buddhism)5

Economy Very little is known about the economy of the Indo-Greeks. The abundance of their coins would tend to suggest large mining operations, particularly in the mountainous area of the Hindu-Kush, and an important monetary economy. The Indo-Greek did strike bilingual coins both in the Greek "round" standard and in the Indian "square" standard, suggesting that monetary circulation extended to all parts of society. The adoption of Indo-Greek monetary conventions by neighboring kingdoms, such as the Kunindas to the east and the Satavahanas to the south, would also suggest that Indo-Greek coins were used extensively for cross-border trade.

Tribute payments It would also seem that some of the coins emitted by the Indo-Greek kings, particularly those in the monolingual Attic standard, may have been used to pay some form of tribute to the Yuezhi tribes north of the Hindu-Kush. This is 5

CHAURASIA SHYAM RADEY HISTORY OF ANCIENT INDIA EARLEST TIME TO 1000.A.D

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Greek invention in ancient India

indicated by the coins finds of the Qunduz hoard in northern Afghanistan, which have yielded quantities of Indo-Greek coins in the Hellenistic standard (Greek weights, Greek language), although none of the kings represented in the hoard are known to have ruled so far north. Conversely, none of these coins have ever been found south of the Hindu-Kush.

Trade with China An indirect testimony by the Chinese explorer Zhang Qian, who visited Bactria around 128 BCE, suggests that intense trade with Southern China was going through northern India, and therefore probably through the contemporary IndoGreek realm. Zhang Qian explains that he found Chinese products in the Bactrian markets, and that they were transiting through northwestern India, which he incidentally describes as a civilization similar to that of Bactria:6

Indian Ocean trade Maritime relations across the Indian Ocean started in the 3rd century BCE, and further developed during the time of the Indo-Greeks together with their territorial expansion along the western coast of India. The first contacts started when the Ptolemies constructed the Red Sea ports of Myos Hormos and Berenike, with destination the Indus delta and the Kathiawar peninsula. Around 130 BCE, Eudoxus of Cyzicus is reported (Strabo, Geog. II.3.4)

to have made a

successful voyage to India and returned with a cargo of perfumes and gemstones. By the time Indo-Greek rule was ending, up to 120 ships were setting sail every year from Myos Hormos to India

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VINCENT.A.SMITH THE ERALY HISTORY OF INDIA

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Greek invention in ancient India

Armed forces The coins of the Indo-Greeks provide rich clues on their uniforms and weapons. Typical Hellenistic uniforms are depicted, with helmets being either round in the Greco-Bactrian style, or the flat kausia of the Macedonians (coins of Apollodotus

Military technology Their weapons were spears, swords, longbow (on the coins of Agathokleia) and arrows. Interestingly, around 130 BCE the Central Asian recurve bow of the steppes with its gorytos box starts to appear for the first time on the coins of Zoilos I, suggesting strong interactions (and apparently an alliance) with nomadic peoples, either Yuezhi or Scythian. The recurve bow becomes a standard feature of Indo-Greek horsemen by 90 BCE, as seen on some of the coins of Hermaeus

Size of Indo-Greek armies The Greco-Bactrian king Eucratides (171-145 BCE) is said to have vanquished 60,000 Indo-Greeks, before being himself defeated by Menander.EnlargeThe Greco-Bactrian king Eucratides (171-145 BCE) is said to have vanquished 60,000 Indo-Greeks, before being himself defeated by Menander. The armed forces of the Indo-Greeks during their invasion of India must have been quite considerable, as suggested by their ability to topple local rulers, but also by the size of the armed reaction of some Indian rulers. The ruler of Kalinga, Kharavela, claims in the Hathigumpha inscription that he led a "large army" in the direction of Demetrius' own "army" and "transports", and that he induced him to retreat from Pataliputra to Mathura. A "large army" for the state of Kalinga must indeed have been quite considerable. The Greek ambassador Megasthenes took special note of the military strength of Kalinga in his India in the middle of the 3rd century BCE7

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BY R.C.MAJUMDAR,M.A,PHD AN ADVANCED HISTORY OF INDIA

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GREEK ART Introduction The Greek artistic approaches largely influenced on Indian art by the Buddhist tradition and persisted into the later Gupta period. The Greeks are very famous for their innovative and the anthropomorphic representation of the Buddha in Indian sculpture In the Greeks‟ campaigns, The Buddhists were oppressed in the Eastern side by Sunga dynasty. Between the two cultures, they also lead the artistic commerce. The Ghandhara School of Buddhist art hence grown up under the great influence of the Greeks. The Greek initiation of sculpting the Buddha in human form matured and it became a major part of the Buddhist iconography. The Greeks also introduced their own architectural and sculptural forms, like cupids, friezes and Corinthian columns into the Buddhist school. Several Greek mythological figures were incorporated into Buddhist architectural works, including Heracles, who became equated to Vajrapani21. The Greek skills and techniques

were

endured

till

the

epoch

of

Gupta.

Gupta‟s

realistic

anthropomorphic representations of the Buddha reflect the legacy of the Greek artistic influence.

Ghandhara Art The Ghandhara and Mathura Schools of Art made a revolt ternary contribution to the traditions and history of Buddhist art. Early Buddhist art was aniconic. At Bharhut, Sanchi and Amravati before the 1st century A.D., the Buddha was represented only in symbols; a riderless8 horse, the tree or wheel, stupa, and the rest indicated the great renunciation, enlightenment, preaching of the doctrine and the nirvana. In Ghandhara and Mathura art, however, the Buddha was represented in human form, and many 8

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sculptures representing bodhisattvas have been found in GandharaThis radical change in Buddhist art has been explained as an expression of the change in the doctrinal content of Buddhism. "In artistic expression", observes Wheeler, "the outstanding difference between these two main types of Buddhism (Hinaydna and Mahayana) was that during the prevalence of the Hinayana teaching the Buddha himself was never represented. The early Indians that he was represented only by symbols before the 1st or 2nd century A.D. When the Buddha was first riper scented in anthropomorphic form at Ghandhara western humanism clashed with Indian mysticism.’ Ghandhara art extended over the valleys of Kabul, Swat (Udyana), Taxila and Kashmir from the 1st to the 5th century A.D., in two distinct phases and over two geographical areas. In the first phase, from the 1st to the 3rd century A.D., the medium was stone (blue or green schist and phyllite) which was abundant in the plain of Peshawar (Takht-i-Bahi, Shah-ji-kl-Dherl, and Sahri-Bahlol) and the Swat Valley. In the second phase, from the 3rd to the 5th century A.D. the scalp trues were done in stucco or lime plaster and clay. And the chief sites were spread over a much wider area, the Peshawar plain and Taxila in Pakistan, Kashmir in India

Occupation of the Region since the Stone Age The Ghandhara region was occupied by human beings as early as the Stone Age. Evidence of this human presence is seen in artifacts such as stone tools and burnt bones that have been dated to about 15,000 years old. Fast forward to the Vedic period, Ghandhara was a mahajanapada, i.e. one of the 16 important kingdoms / republics of ancient India. The kingdom is mentioned in both of the great Hindu epics, the Mahabharata and the Ramayana. According to the former, for instance, the Ghandhara were supporters of the Kauravas, who fought against the Pandavas. The Gandharans are also recorded to have been highly skilled in the art of war.

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Stone palettes Stone palettes are round trays commonly found in Western and Central Asia. They usually represent Greek mythological scenes. Some of them are attributed to the IndoGreek period in the 2nd and 1st century BCE a few were retrieved from the Indo-Greek Many are considered to be of later production, around the 1st century CE during the time of the Indo-Parthians.

Hellenistic groups A series of reliefs, several of them known as the Burner reliefs which were taken during the 19th century from Buddhist structures near the area of Burner in northern Pakistan, depict in perfect Hellenistic style gatherings of people in Greek dress, socializing, drinking or playing music. Some other of these reliefs depicts Indo-Scythian soldiers in uniform, sometimes playing instruments. Finally, reveling Indian in dhotis richly adorned with jewelry are also shown. These are considered some of the most artistically perfect, and earliest, of Ghandhara sculptures, and are thought to exalt multicultural interaction within the context of Buddhism, sometime during the 1st century BCE.

Hellenistic groups Depictions of Greek devotees within a Buddhist context are also numerous. Some show a Greek devotee couple circambulating stupas together with shaven monks, others Greek protagonists are incorporated in Buddhist jataka stories of the life of the Buddha (relief of The Great Departure), and others are simply depicted as devotees on the columns of Buddhist structures.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY BOOKS CHAUDHRY M.IQBAL, PAKISTANI SOCIETY BY R.C.MAJUMDAR, M.A, PHD, AN ADVANCED HISTORY OF INDIA CHAURASIA SHYAM RADEY HISTORY OF ANCIENT INDIA EARLEST TIME TO 1000.A.D VINCENT.A.SMITH THE ERALY HISTORY OF INDIA JAYAPALAN. N. SOCIAL AND CULTURAL HISTORY OF INDIA SINCE 1556 ARTICAL G. K. JENKINS JOURNAL ARTICLE INDO-GREEK TETRA DRACHMS

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CONTENT

S.NO

TOPIC

Pg.no

1

Greek Classics in Indian Culture

1

2 3

Introduction The Greeks in Ancient India:

1 2

4 5 6

Ideology COINS The Greek and classical India literature

2 3 4

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Religions

5

8

Buddhism

6

9 10

Buddhist symbolism Presentation of the Buddha

6 6

11

Hinduism

7

12

Zoroastrianism

7

13

Economy

8

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Trade with china

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15

India ocean trade

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16 17

Armed forces Armed forces

10 10

18

Size of indo Greek armies

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19

Greek art

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20

Introduction

11

21

Occupation of the region since the stone age

12

22

Stone palettes

13

23

Hellenistic groups

13

24

Enistic groups

13

25

Bibliography

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Greek invention in ancient India Topic

Greek invention in ancient India

Submitted to maam

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