Hindu Its subdued pathos, its fidelity to nature, and its living move- 'Blind, having seen; Poor, having rolled in wealth; he with a staff Greek and As we proceed eastward from the Punjab, the Greek type types of begins to fade. Purity of outline gives place to lusciousness sculpture. of form. In the female figures, the artists trust more and more to swelling breasts and towering chignons, and load the neck with constantly accumulating jewels. Nevertheless, the Grecian type of countenance long survived in Indian art. It is perfectly unlike the coarse, conventional ideal of beauty in modern Hindu sculptures, and may perhaps be traced as late as the delicate profiles on the so-called Sun Temple at KANARAK, built in the 12th century A.D. on the Orissa shore. on India. Foreign Bengal. 1 Report of the Archæological Survey of Western India for 1874-75, p. 49 (Mr. E. Thomas' monograph). 2 Goldstucker assigned the Yavana siege of Saketa (AJODHYA), mentioned in the Mahábháshya, to Menander; while the accounts of the Gárgi Sanhitá in the Yuga Purána speak of a Yavana expedition as far as Patná. But, as Weber points out (Hist. Ind. Lit., p. 251, footnote 276), the question arises as to whether these Yavanas were Greeks or Indo-Scythians. See, however, Report of Archæological Survey of Western India for 1874-5, P. 49, and footnote. in India. Greek ambassadors to Bengal.1 A Grecian lady became the queen of Chandra Gupta at Patná (circ. 306 B.C.). Greek girls, or Yavanis, were welcome gifts, and figure in the Sanskrit drama Greek as the personal attendants of Indian princes. The credentials survivals of the Indian embassy to Augustus in 22-20 B.C. were written on skins; a circumstance which perhaps indicates the extent to which Greek usage had overcome Bráhmanical prejudices. During the century preceding the Christian era, Scythian or Tartar hordes began to supplant the Greco-Bactrian influence in the Punjab. The term Yavana, or Yona, formerly applied to a non- The Bráhmanical race, and then to the Greeks, was now extended Yavanas. to the Sake or Scythians. It probably includes many various tribes of invaders from the west. Many years of patient effort will be required before the successive changes in the meaning of Yavana, both before and after the Greek period, are worked out. 1 Weber, Hist. Ind. Lit., p. 251 (ed. 1878), enumerates four. in India. CHAPTER VII SCYTHIC INROADS INTO INDIA (126 B.C. TO 544 A.D.). Scythic ABOUT 126 B.C., the Tartar tribe of Su are said to have driven influences out the Greek dynasty from Bactria; and the Greco-Bactrian settlements in the Punjab were overthrown by the Tue-Chi.1 The Scythian migrations towards India culminated in the empire of Kanishka, who held the Fourth Buddhist Council, circa 40 A.D., and practically became the royal founder of Northern Buddhism. The Scythic element thus played an important part in the history of Northern India. Under Kanishka and his successors a connection was established with the Buddhist nations of Central and Eastern Asia, traces of which survived to the time of Hiouen Thsang (629-645 A.D.) in the name of China-pati, about 10 miles to the west of the Beas river.2 China-pati is said to have been the town which Kanishka appointed for the residence of his Chinese hostages. It has been suggested that the Aswamedha, or Great Horse Sacrifice, in some of its Indian developments at any rate, was based upon Scythic ideas. It was in effect,' writes Mr. Edward Thomas, a martial challenge, which consisted in letting the victim who was to crown the imperial triumph at the year's end, go free to wander at will over the face of the earth; its sponsor being bound to follow its hoofs, and to conquer or conciliate' the chiefs through whose territories it passed. Such a prototype seems to him to shadow forth the life of the wamedha, Central Asian communities of the horseman class, among of Scythic whom a captured steed had so frequently to be traced from camp to camp, and surrendered or fought for at last.'3 An Scythian(?) effort has indeed been made to trace Buddha himself to a Scythic origin. The As origin (?). Buddha a 'De Guignes, supported by Prof. Cowell on the evidence of coins. Appendix to Elphinstone's History of India, p. 269, ed. 1866. 2 General Cunningham's Anc. Geog. of India, p. 200. 3 Report, Archaological Survey of Western India, pp. 37, 38 (1876). But see, in opposition to Mr. Thomas' view, M. Senart in the French Journ. Asiatique, 1875, p. 126. in India, A. D. Whatever may be the value of this conjecture, the influence Scythic of the Scythian dynasties in Northern India is a historical Buddhism fact. The northern or Tibetan form of Buddhism, represented 40-634 by Kanishka and his Council1 in 40 A.D., made its down to way the plains of Hindustán, and during the next six centuries competed with the earlier Buddhism of Asoka. The Chinese pilgrim in 629-645 A.D. found both the Northern or Scythic and the Southern forms of Buddhism in full vigour in India. He spent fourteen months at China-pati, the town where Kanishka had kept his Chinese hostages in the Punjab; and he records the debates between the Northern and Southern sects of Buddhists in India. in various places. The Scythic influence in India was a Scythic dynastic as well as a religious one. The evidence of coins settlements and the names of Indian tribes or reigning families, such as the Sákas, Huns, and Nágas, point to Scythian settlements as far south as the Central Provinces.2 lation. Some scholars believe that the Scythians poured down upon Scythian India in such masses as to supplant the previous population. elements in the popu The Jits or Játs,3 who form nearly one-half of the inhabitants of the Punjab, are identified with the Getae; and their great subdivision the Dhe, with the Dahae, whom Strabo places on the shores of the Caspian. This view has received the support of eminent investigators, from Professor H. H. Wilson to General (1) Of the Cunningham, the present Director-General of the Archæo. Játs. logical Survey of India. The existing division between the Játs and the Dhe has, indeed, been traced back to the contiguity of the Massa-getae or Great Getae, and the Dahae, who dwelt by the side of each other in Central Asia; and who may have advanced together during the Scythian movements towards India on the decline of the Greco-Bactrian Empire. Without pressing such identifications too closely in the service of particular theories, the weight of authority is in favour of a Scythian origin for the Játs, the most numerous and industrious section of the population of the Punjab. A similar descent 1 Numismata Orientalia (Ceylon fasc.), p. 54. 6 Muir's Sanskrit Texts, chap. v. vol. i. (1868); C. Grant's Gazetteer of the Central Provinces, lxx., etc. (Nagpur, 1870); Reports of the Archaological Survey of India and of Western India; Professor H. H. Wilson (and Dr. F. Hall), Vishnu Purána, ii. 134. 3 The word occurs as Játs and Jats; but the identity of the two forms has been established by reference to the Ain-i-Akbart. Some are Hindus, others Muhammadans. • See among other places, part iv. of his Archæological Report, p. 19. 5 Massa means 'great' in Pehlevi. It should be mentioned, however, that Dr. Trumpp believes them to be of Aryan origin (Zeitsch. d. Deutsch. Morg. Gesellsch., xv. p. 690). See (2) Of the Rajputs. Indian has been assigned to certain of the Rájput tribes. Colonel Tod, still the standard historian of Rájásthán, strongly insisted on this point. The relationship between the Játs and the Rájputs, although obscure, is acknowledged; and although the jus connubii no longer exists between them, an inscription seems to show that they intermarried in the 5th century A.D.1 Professor Cowell, indeed, regards the arguments for the Scythic descent of the Rájputs as inconclusive. But authorities of great weight have deduced, alike from local investigation and from Sanskrit literature, a Scythic origin for the Játs and for some of the Rájput tribes. We shall see that the Scythian hordes also supplied certain of the non-Aryan or so-called aboriginal races of India. The Scythic settlements were not effected without a struggle. struggle As Chandra Gupta advanced from the Gangetic valley, and rolled against the Scythians. back the tide of Greco-Bactrian conquest, 312-306 B.C., so the native princes who stemmed the torrent of Scythian invasion are the Indian heroes of the first century before and after Christ. Vikramaditya, King of Ujjain, won his paramount place in Indian story by driving out the invaders. An era, the Samvat, beginning in 57 B.C., was founded in honour of his achievements. Its date seems at variance with his legendary victories over the Scythian Kanishka in the 1st century after Christ; 6 Samvat era, 57 B. C. 5 Mr. J. Beames' admirable edition of Sir Henry Elliot's Glossary of the Races of the North-Western Provinces, vol. i. pp. 130-137, ed. 1869. 1 Inscription discovered in Kotah State; No. 1 of Inscription Appendix to Colonel Tod's Annals and Antiquities of Rájásthán, vol. i. p. 701, note 3 (Madras Reprint, 1873). 2 Appendix to Elphinstone's Hist. Ind., pp. 250 et seg., ed. 1866. 3 Tod's Rájásthán, pp. 52, 483, 500, etc., vol. i. (Madras Reprint, 1873). 4 Dr. Fitz-Edward Hall's edition of Professor H. H. Wilson's Vishnu Purána, vol. ii. p. 134. The Húnas, according to Wilson, were 'the white Huns who were established in the Punjab, and along the Indus, as we know from Arrian, Strabo, and Ptolemy, confirmed by recent discoveries of their coins and by inscriptions.' 'I am not prepared,' says Dr. FitzEdward Hall, 'to deny that the ancient Hindus when they spoke of the Húnas included the Huns. In the Middle Ages, however, it is certain that a race called Húna was understood by the learned of India to form a division of the Kshattriyas.' Professor Dowson's Dict. Hind. Mythology, etc., p. 122. Samvatsara, the 'Year.' The uncertainty which surrounds even this long accepted finger-post in Indian chronology may be seen from Dr. J. Fergusson's paper 'On the Sáka and Samvat and Gupta eras' (Journal Roy. As. Soc., New Series, vol. xii.), especially p. 172. 6 The Hushka, Jushka, and Kanishka family of the Rájá Tarangini, or Chronicles of Kashmír, are proved by inscriptions to belong to the 4th century of the Seleucidan era, or the 1st century A.D. |