The Rediscovery of Brahmi, Asoka, and Indian History

The Road Roller of Bihar

While building a road in Bihar, in the early nineteenth century, the supervisor of the construction project noticed that the road-roller seemed to be narrower at one end and broader at the other. On closer inspection, he found some inscriptions on its side, which that Brahmin pandit of the nearby village was unable to read. He could not even identify the script (which he called the pin-men script) or the language of the inscription. It seemed to be a pillar from some monument. The road workers told the supervisor that the pillar had a lion capital, which they cut off, so the pillar could be more useful as a road-roller. Such was the fate Samrat Asoka’s pillar!

The road supervisor was James Prinsep, who discovered that the language was Pali, the script Brahmi,the capital destined to become India’s national emblem, the the king and his dynasty forgotten, by a country with teeming not just with history, but with people who cared not a whit about it. Ironically, most of us schooled in independent India are now familiar with Asoka and his pillar and utterly ignorant of Prinsep.

When Prinsep stumbled upon the pillar, he was a member of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, which had been founded in 1784 by Sir William “Oriental” Jones, a polymath of tremendous accomplishment, to whose contribution to India was immense, and who is almost as spectacularly forgotten as Prinsep.

Sir William "Oriental" Jones

Jones & the Asiatic Society of Bengal

The East India company and later, the British government, were the funnels through which India was enriched by Western science and industrialization. The Asiatic Society was the funnel through which new fields in the humanities, like Geology, Numismatics, Archaeology, Anthropology, Economics, Art History, all recently evolving in Europe, enriched India. Jones, a child prodigy, master of 28 languages, and scholar of law, was appointed as a Puisne Judge of the Calcutta Supreme Court in 1783. He formulated an agenda to study the law, sciences, mathematics, history, geography, medicine, trade, manufacture, agriculture and religions of not just India, but all of Asia. He surmounted obstacles to quickly learn Sanskrit, and found such a similarity between it, Persian, Latin and Greek, that he proposed that they all had a common ancestry.

His oft quoted passage from his third lecture is : “The Sanskrit language, whatever its antiquity is of a perfect structure, more perfect than the Greek, more copious than Latin, more exquisitely refined than either, yet bearing to both a stronger affinity, in roots of verbs and forms of grammar, than can have possibly been produced by accident. So strong that they…must have some common source…reason to believe Celtic, Gothic, old Persian also had the same origin as Sanskrit.” This heralds the beginning of Modern Linguistics and the discovery of the Indo-European Language Family.

Jones went on to translate the Manu Smriti to English to better administer justice. He also translated Kalidasa’s plays like Abinjana Shakuntalam, which took Europe by storm. He discovered that Chess and Algebra had Indian origins, wrote a treatise on Music, and studying Greek and Indian history, proposed that Sandrocottus mentioned by Megasthenes was Chandragupta. On further study, he also established the river Erranaboas was the Sone (originally called Hiranyabahu) and that Chandragupta last capital Palibothra must have been Pataliputra, now Patna, in Bihar (overturning Prayag, Kannauj, Varanasi etc as candidates). Jones also told a thrilled Europe that India had an ancient God called Buddha, perhaps of African origin, who founded a religion called Buddhism in India,now forgotten. Europe soon discovered that Buddhism was alive and well in the rest of Asia, but Jones’ discoveries launched an earnest inquiry into India and Asia’s history, that primarily relied on literature for the next three decades.

James Prinsep

And then James Prinsep arrived in Calcutta in 1819. A prodigy very different from Jones, with far humbler origins and far less accomplished youth, Prinsep nevertheless made dramatic impacts on the Asiatic Society and scholarship. After working in mints and civil administration, he turned to history in 1832. He transformed the field from ‘scholastic archaeologists’ to ‘field archaeologists’ or ‘travelling antiquarians.’ His intellectual successor Alexander Cunningham said of Prinsep, that between 1833 and 1838, “more of India’s history was reconstructed than before or since.”

The Society faced bankruptcy and a shutdown by Macaulay and Mill, who called Oriental studies “waste paper and accumulation of timber.” But Governor General Auckland restored its funding.

James Prinsep

Coins and PinMen

An army of Orientalist coin collectors, including Horace Wilson, Col James Tod, Charles Masson, General Ventura, helped unravel several aspects of history. Masson collected thirty thousand coins, which brought to light a number of Indo-Greek kings from Theodotus (225 BC), Apollodorus, Menander, Eucradites, Antialkides, Agathocles and Kanerkos (who was later identified as Kanishka by Prinsep). Some of these like the coins of Agathocles had legends in both Greek and Sanskrit (Rajane Agathakulasya). The Sanskrit script was the same as the pin-men script, in Prinsep’s road roller.

Several other pillars including the famous Feroz Lat in Delhi, Lauriya Nandangarh in Bihar and in Allahabad had been discovered, with the same pin-men script. The Allahabad pillar, for example, also had two other inscriptions, one of Samudragupta in Sanskrit in Nagari script and Jehangir in Persian. Comparing transcripts Prinsep realized that all three pillars had the same text, not just the same script! The script had also been found at slabs in Bodh Gaya; a stupa at Sanchi; and at Dhauli and at Udayagiri-Khondagiri, both near Bhubaneshvar. The Samudragupta, son of Chandragupta of the Allahabad pillar was of the Solar race, whereas William Jones’ Sandrocottus was of the Lunar race. 

Asoka's Pillar and Buddhist stupa in Vaishali, Bihar

Rock with Asoka's Pali edict in Brahmi script
at Dhauli, Orissa 

Brahmi inscription at Karla caves, Maharashtra
Lower line reads "daanam" ( दानं )

Studying the Sanchi inscriptions, Prinsep observed that several of them ended in the same set of three characters. He brilliantly guessed that they were records of donations, based on similar later inscriptions at other stupas in Buddhist nations. Perhaps they were the phrase “-ssa daanam.” (-’s donation). Now he was confident that the language was Pali, not Sanskrit. With intelligent guessing, and dedicated effort, he decoded the script in six weeks! The Brahmi script was now readable, nearly 1500 years after it had been replaced by its daughter script Nagari.

Sanchi stupa Brahmi inscriptions
ending with daanam

Most of the pin-men (Brahmi) inscriptions began with the phrase “Devaanaampiya PiyaDassi laaja hevam aaha” (“Thus spake King Beloved-of-the-Gods PiyaDassi”), but, who was this king? That continued to be a puzzle. There seemed to be no PiyaDassi in Indian literature. 

Concurrently, Turnour, an Orientalist in Kandy was given a copy of the Mahavamsa, the History of Sri Lanka, by the Thero of the Saffragam monastery. He came across this passage : “King Devenampiya Tissa, induced Dammasoka, Ruler of several kingdoms of Dambadiva (Jambudvipa) to depute his son Mahindu and daughter Sangamitta to Auradhapura to introduce religion of Buddha.”

The Thero also gave Turnour the Dipavamso, which threw a flood of light : “218 years after MahaParinnirvana of Buddha, Piyadassi, son of Bindusara and grandson of Chandragupta, Viceroy of Ujjaiyini was inaugurated king.”

Thus, Devanampiya Piyadassi was revealed to be Dammasoka or Dharma Asoka, grandson of Chandragupta Maurya. The wide spread of his pillars and edicts, from Afghanistan to Andhra Pradesh, showed how vast an empire he ruled; it gave details of the Kalinga war, and of Asoka’s change of heart; and of his sending emissaries to spread Buddhism across the world.

Consequences

Inscriptions of the period 300 BC to 300 AD turned out to be in the Brahmi script, in Prakrit or Sanskrit, and so, suddenly, six hundred years of history stood revealed, including the dynasties of the Kshatrapas, the Kushanas, the Shungas, the Satavahanas. The Hathigumpha inscriptions were of king Kharavela of the Mahameghavahana dynasty.

In the twentieth century, Tamil inscriptions in the Tamil Brahmi script were also discovered. The field of palaeography was enriched when it was realized that the Brahmi script is the parent script of both Nagari and Grantham scripts, the latter of which was the parent of scripts of the South East Asian languages like Thai, Burmese, Sumatran, Cambodian etc.

References
1. Buddha and the Sahibs by Charles Allen
2. The Asiatic Society of Bengal by O.P. Kejriwal
3. The Powerpoint presentations of S Swaminathan
4. Essays by James Prinsep, Journal of the Asiatic Society

Video of INTACT lecture Rediscovery of Asoka - lecture in 2013
Audio of 2016 DUJ Lecture on Rediscovery of Brahmi and Asoka - Part 1
Audio of 2016 DUJ Lecture on Rediscovery of Brahmi and Asoka - Part 2

My blogs on Western Orientalists
1. Ellenborough - Abolition of slavery in India
2. Robert Caldwell - discoverer of Munda language family
3. Francis Whyte Ellis - discoverer of Dravidian language family
4. An Englishman's Tamil inscription
5. A mathematician's Poem about Madras
6. Did Macaulay undermine Indian education?
7. Madras and its American connections

My History blogs
Three Perspectives on History - Caldwell, Mark Twain, PT Srinivasa Iyengar
Novel on Samrat Asoka - some speeches
Timelines of Gujarat and Tamilnadu
Timelines of Karnataka and Tamilnadu
Vaishali

Origins of Chemistry
Beginning of Electronics

Vaishali

If there is a Heaven

When the Sakya prince Siddhartha renounced his family, palace, kingdom and duty to search for the Truth, he left Kapilavastu and wandered to several places, before his great epiphany at Gaya. One of the cities he visited was Vaishali, a city-state governed by a guild of businessmen. “If there is a Heaven, it must be at least as rich and at beautiful as Vaishali,” he remarked. Siddhartha may be best known for his renunciation, but he knew a thing or two about wealth and beauty.

On his further wanderings, he met the most powerful, ambitious, feared man of his times – Bimbisara, ruler of Magadha, with his capital at Rajagriha, the Abode of Kings. A puzzled Bimbisara asked Siddhartha why he would leave queen and kingdom, wealth and power, to wander around as a monk. When Siddhartha explained about his search, Bimbisara merely said, “If you find, please come and share your enlightenment with me.”

Several years later, the beggarly monk Siddhartha believed he had attained enlightenment, and after preaching his message to those who would listen, mostly others in search of the same, he returned to Rajagriha to keep his promise to Bimbisara, now far more powerful, the conqueror of several kingdoms. And on the mountain of Grihakuta, Gautama Buddha held sermons for Bimbisara, his first royal disciple. On top of this hill, Buddha convened and conducted his first Council of the new religion he had founded.

Of Buddha and Rajagriha, later. For now, Vaishali.

It is not the world famous Buddha, but the mighty Bimbisara with whom the city of Vaishali is most closely associated. And more than with Bimbisara, a dancer, a courtesan, a woman of unparalleled beauty – Amrapali. 

Amrapali

Briefly, the story is that when Amrapali, an extraordinarily beautiful woman entered the streets of Vaishali, the richest men in the city fought each other, vying to possess her as a wife. Seeing that no man had an advantage over another, they held council and declared her a public woman. Any man could have her for the evening for her price. She learnt the various arts and excelled any woman they knew in dancing. One day, while she was dancing, there was an alarm over an invasion, a call to arms and the announcement that a king was invading their beautiful city – none other than Bimbisara.  For the next several days, while the men prepared for Bimbisara’s siege and eventually, war, Amrapali had no visitors. Until one day, a handsome young man visited her, and returned every day for several days, and finally proposed to her. She then explained to him that her loyalty was to the city itself, that she could marry no man, as that would incite jealousy in every rival and bring strife to Vishali.  The heartbreak in her suitor’s expression must have been visibly moving. Curious only now, she asked him who he really was, as she had never seen him in the city before, and all the able men in the city were too worried about an impending invasion to spare time even for Amrapali.

He told her who he was – Bimbisara. How he managed to enter the city undetected and unaccompanied is a detail best left to unromantic fact fanatics, but whatever his disappointment was, it paled in comparison to the spectrum of emotions that Amrapali suffered. Horrified that she had spent weeks delighting the very scourge of the city to whom she felt unshakeable loyalty, fearing the consequences of her unknowing betrayal, torn with longing that she could simply leave the city and spend her life as the beloved of a man, so obviously enchanted with her, she sent him away to spend time alone. Madly in love with Amrapali, heart rent, with  no further interest in the city she lived, and seeing not the earthly paradise that Siddhartha had seen earlier, Bimbisara merely withdrew his siege, and went back to Rajagriha, to console himself in the arms of other gorgeous women and mere royal delights, but still, no Amrapali.

The citizens of Vaishali, though, found out that their favorite woman had entertained their most feared enemy while they spent the same time in abject fear of annihilation. Outraged, betrayed, disgusted, they chased her out of Vaishali into the forests tossing curses and stones and cries of contempt upon her fleeing form, ignoring all pleas of guileless innocence. Time passed, not healing her at all, as she lived in  a hut with her most loyal attendants, heart broken, beauty shattered, her soul leaking life every day, until one day she had another visitor. A man who radiated peace and wisdom, kindness and compassion, and whose ambition far surpassed that of Bimbisara or any royal conqueror. For this man wanted nothing less than to conquer all humanity and with his newfound wisdom. Gautama Buddha.

To Amrapali, now, as to Bimbisara earlier, he brought a healing touch to a soul torn asunder by the cruelty of circumstances and human cruelty. Amrapali finally found a place in his Order, his Sangha, as a nun.

Stupas

The Buddha then wandered to several places and finally his soul underwent the final extinguishing – the Maha Pari Nirvana, in Kushinagara. His body was given to his family at Kapilavastu to be cremated, but with some parts distribued to the other seven of his Eight Great Events, one of which is Vaishali. Mud stupas were erected over his relics, buried in caskets at these places by his followers.

Buddha's Mud Stupa in Vaishali, under the dome

Mud stupa - what remains

Sri Lankan Buddhists near Mud Stupa

Vishala's lake near mud stupa

In later times, an even more famous and powerful king, Samrat Asoka of the Maurya dynasty, ruling from Pataliputra, decided to rebury these famous relics. In Vaishali he built a stupa of stone, some distance away from the original, convened a Council of Buddhists and granted land and resources for establishing a monastery. Several monks of this monastery were then later buried and stupas of various sizes and shapes erected for them, in order of their accomplishment and services to Buddhism in the esteem of their fellow monks.

Near the brick stupa is a tall majestic pillar, of polished sandstone, that is most symbolic of Asoka. Unlike the three-lion capital of the Sarnath pillar, which is now the emblem of the Wovernment of India, the Vaishali pillar has a one lion capital. The pillar made of sandstone, is smoothened by the technique of Mauryan polish, and glints like metal by the light of the evening, evoking awe in such admirers of India as Sir William Jones, the founder of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, James Prinsep, who rediscovered Ashoka and decoded the Brahmi script, and Sir Alexander Cunningham, who established the Archaeological Survery of India, which preserves these monuments.

Brick Stupa and Pillar built by Samrat Asoka

Tombs of other monks

Single Lion capital

Vaishali today

I visited Vaishali in 2011 November as a guest of my friend RajaGanesh, who was working for the Patna branch of IndianOil. His friend Rahul loaned me a car and his driver Valmiki, who knew only Hindi, whereas my Hindi was scattered and flawed, tenseless, caseless and with few pretensions of cogent expression. With me was my friend Karuna from Madras, who had accompanied me the previous eight days with me in Orissa and Calcutta, and with whom I have travelled to other places 

too, like Ajanta and Kanchi.

Vaishali’s history goes back much earlier than the time of Amrapali, Bimbisara and Buddha. It is named after its founder Raja Vishala. Not far from the mud stupa, are the remnants of Vishala’s palace, a low level of bricks designating walls, similar to the ruins of Harappan cities.

Raja Vishala's "palace"

What I saw of Vaishali in 2011 was a small farming village – similar to GangaiKonda Cholapuram or Vijayanagar. In one segment, there were some farmers houses in concrete, with cement poles for electric or telephone lines, but no actual wires. The route to the mud stupa was lined with Indian mud huts, where farmers live; and in stark contrast, concrete three storey Buddhist hospitality centers all run by trusts of Buddhist nations – Sri Lanka, Vietnam, Cambodia, Burma, Thailand etc.

Vietnamese center on the road to mud stupa

Farmer's houses on road to mud stupa

Farmer's house - poles for electriciy, but no wires 

Vaishali was recently in the news, globally, for all the wrong reasons - friends of students writing board exams, climbing windows to pass cheat sheets to the examinees. The brick building of the exam center shows several things – some modernity during Nitish Kumar’s reign, but the relative poverty of Bihar compared to most of India, the ambition of its students and the lawlessness of the society. On my return to Patna from Vaishali after sunset, I saw not a single electric light anywhere, except one small town halfway back. Nor a single bus for public transport. Even oil lamps lit only a few households.

The poverty of Bihar, especially Vaishali, was in stark contrast to Siddhartha’s bedazzlement.

But there is more to Vaishali’s history and heritage than Buddhism. I shall write about it soon.

Friends helping students cheat at board exams, in Vaishali, Bihar, 2015

Other Travel Essays

1. Kerala - LMS
2. A Pallava temple in a river island
3. Kundavai Jinalayam (in Tamil)
4. Dholavira
5. Bus stop index
6. Kumbakonam - LMS

6. The Greenery of the Chola country