The Mauryan Empire

Flagship overview

The Mauryan Empire (321 to 185 BCE) was the first pan-Indian empire, stretching from the north-west across the Ganga valley into the Deccan, with its capital at Pataliputra. It was founded by Chandragupta Maurya with the guidance of his minister Kautilya (Chanakya), consolidated by Bindusara, and carried to its height by Chandragupta's grandson Ashoka, whose inscriptions are the earliest dated, decipherable royal records in Indian history. The empire is unusually well documented for an ancient Indian state, because the sources combine literary works (Kautilya's Arthashastra, the Greek envoy Megasthenes' Indika, the Buddhist Jatakas and Dipavamsa and Mahavamsa, the Jain and Puranic traditions, the Sanskrit play Mudrarakshasa) with the archaeological and epigraphic record of Ashoka's edicts and the polished stone pillars.

For CAPF, the Mauryas are a high-yield topic. The examiner tests king-to-achievement matching, the authorship of the Arthashastra and the Indika, the date and significance of the Kalinga War, who deciphered the edicts (James Prinsep, 1837) and Ashoka's title (Devanampiya Piyadassi), the four provincial capitals, the Sarnath Lion Capital as the national emblem, and who ended the dynasty.

Core narrative

Sources for the Mauryas

The Mauryan period is reconstructed from an unusually wide range of sources:

• Literary (indigenous): Kautilya's Arthashastra (statecraft and administration); the Sanskrit play Mudrarakshasa of Vishakhadatta (the Gupta-age drama on Chandragupta's rise); the Puranas (dynastic lists); the Buddhist Jatakas, the Dipavamsa and Mahavamsa of Sri Lanka (on Ashoka and the missions); and Jain texts (on Chandragupta's renunciation).
• Literary (foreign): Megasthenes' Indika (preserved in fragments quoted by later Greek writers such as Strabo and Arrian), and other Greek accounts.
• Archaeological and epigraphic: Ashoka's edicts (the chief contemporary source for his reign and the only deciphered royal record), the polished stone pillars and capitals, the Barabar caves, and the NBPW pottery and urban sites.

Chandragupta Maurya (c. 321 to 297 BCE)

Chandragupta overthrew the last Nanda king (Dhana Nanda) and seized Magadha around 321 BCE, aided by the Brahmana minister Kautilya (also called Chanakya or Vishnugupta), the reputed author of the Arthashastra. Having first liberated the north-west from the Greek garrisons left after Alexander's retreat, he defeated Seleucus Nicator (Alexander's general and ruler of the eastern part of his empire) around 305 BCE. By the treaty, Seleucus ceded the trans-Indus territories (Kabul, Kandahar, Herat, Baluchistan) in return for 500 war elephants, and the two exchanged ambassadors. Seleucus sent Megasthenes, who lived at Pataliputra and wrote the Indika, the most important Greek account of Mauryan India. Jain tradition holds that Chandragupta later abdicated in favour of Bindusara, became a Jain monk under the teacher Bhadrabahu, migrated south, and ended his life by ritual fasting (sallekhana) at Shravanabelagola in Karnataka.

Bindusara (c. 297 to 273 BCE)

Bindusara, known to the Greeks as Amitrochates (Sanskrit Amitraghata, "slayer of foes"), extended Mauryan control into the Deccan and consolidated the empire his father had won. He kept up diplomatic contact with the Greek (Hellenistic) world: Antiochus I of Syria sent the envoy Deimachus, and Bindusara is said to have asked for sweet wine, dried figs, and a sophist. He favoured the Ajivika sect (the determinist order founded by Makkhali Gosala).

Ashoka (c. 268 to 232 BCE)

Ashoka (Ashokavardhana), who came to the throne around 273 BCE and was formally consecrated around 268 BCE after a succession struggle, is the greatest Mauryan ruler and among the great kings of world history. The defining event of his reign was the Kalinga War (c. 261 BCE), an immensely bloody conquest of Kalinga (coastal Odisha). The slaughter and suffering, described with remorse in Rock Edict XIII, turned him from conquest by war (bherighosha, "the beat of the war-drum") to conquest by righteousness (dhammaghosha, "the proclamation of Dhamma"). He embraced Buddhism (becoming an upasaka and then more deeply committed), convened the Third Buddhist Council at Pataliputra (c. 250 BCE) under Moggaliputta Tissa, and sent Buddhist missions abroad, including his son Mahendra and daughter Sanghamitra to Sri Lanka (to King Tissa), and missionaries to the Hellenistic kingdoms, Central Asia, and Southeast Asia.

Ashoka's Dhamma was a practical, non-sectarian code of ethical conduct, not a new religion: respect for elders, teachers, and Brahmanas and Shramanas; kindness to servants, slaves, and the poor; truthfulness; tolerance and concord among all sects; non-violence (ahimsa) and abstention from animal slaughter; and works of public welfare (wells, rest-houses, roadside trees, medical care for humans and animals). He appointed special officers, the Dhamma Mahamattas, to propagate and supervise it, and instituted dhamma-yatras (tours of moral instruction) in place of pleasure tours.

Ashoka's inscriptions

Ashoka's edicts are the earliest deciphered royal inscriptions of India, engraved on rocks and pillars across the empire. They fall into Major Rock Edicts, Minor Rock Edicts, Major Pillar Edicts, Minor Pillar Edicts, and cave inscriptions (Barabar). Most are in the Prakrit language and the Brahmi script; in the north-west they use the Kharoshthi script (Shahbazgarhi, Mansehra), and at Kandahar and Taxila there are Greek and Aramaic versions, including a bilingual Greek-Aramaic inscription. They were first deciphered by James Prinsep in 1837. In the inscriptions Ashoka calls himself Devanampiya Piyadassi ("the Beloved of the Gods, of pleasing/gracious appearance"); only the Maski, Gujarra, and a few other minor edicts give his personal name, Ashoka, which confirmed the identification.

Administration

The Mauryan state was a highly centralised monarchy with the king at the apex, assisted by a council of ministers (mantriparishad). The empire was divided into provinces, each governed by a prince (kumara) or a viceroy; the four chief provincial capitals were Taxila (north-west), Ujjain (west), Tosali (Kalinga, east), and Suvarnagiri (the south). Below the provinces lay districts (administered by the pradeshika, rajuka, and yukta) and villages, the smallest unit, headed by the gramika. The Arthashastra describes a vast bureaucracy of departmental superintendents (adhyakshas) overseeing trade, mines, agriculture, the mint, weights, ports, and so on. An extensive espionage system of spies (gudhapurushas, both stationary and roving) kept the king informed. Megasthenes described Pataliputra as administered by a municipal council of thirty members in six committees of five, dealing with crafts, foreigners, births and deaths, trade, manufactures, and the collection of the sales tax. The state maintained a large standing army (Megasthenes records a war office of six committees) and derived its main revenue from the land tax (bhaga, usually one-sixth of the produce) and the bali.

Society and economy

Society was hierarchical but mobile in places. Megasthenes (somewhat inaccurately) described seven classes (philosophers, farmers, soldiers, herdsmen, artisans, magistrates, and councillors) and reported the absence of slavery as the Greeks knew it. Agriculture was the backbone, supported by state farms (sita lands), irrigation (the Sudarshana lake at Junagadh was built under Chandragupta by the governor Pushyagupta and improved under Ashoka), and a money economy using the silver punch-marked karshapana (pana). Trade, mining, and craft production were closely regulated and taxed; the state ran mines and some workshops. The characteristic luxury pottery is the lustrous Northern Black Polished Ware (NBPW).

Art and architecture

The Mauryas pioneered monumental stone art in India:

• The free-standing monolithic pillars of polished Chunar sandstone, surmounted by animal capitals; the Sarnath Lion Capital (four addorsed lions on an abacus with the dharmachakra and animals) was adopted as the national emblem of India on 26 January 1950, and its wheel is the Ashoka Chakra on the national flag.
• Rock-cut caves in the Barabar and Nagarjuni hills (near Gaya), donated to the Ajivikas, the earliest examples of rock-cut architecture in India, with their famous mirror-like polish.
• Stupas: the original brick core of the Great Stupa at Sanchi dates to Ashoka, who is traditionally said to have built many stupas.
• The Mauryan polish (a high lustre on stone) and large terracotta figures are distinctive.

Decline

After Ashoka's death (c. 232 BCE) the empire weakened rapidly under a series of weak successors and the strain of holding so vast a realm. The last Mauryan king, Brihadratha, was assassinated around 185 BCE by his own commander-in-chief, Pushyamitra, who founded the Shunga dynasty. Causes advanced for the decline include: weak later rulers and partition of the empire among them; a top-heavy, over-centralised administration dependent on the king; financial strain from the army and the bureaucracy; Ashoka's pacifist policy weakening the army (one older view, now disputed); a Brahmana reaction against Ashoka's measures (the historian H. P. Sastri's view, also disputed); and pressure from the north-west by the Bactrian Greeks.

Static facts to memorise

Rulers and achievements

Sources and emblems

Edicts the examiner reuses

The Mauryan polished pillars and capitals

Security and governance angle

The Arthashastra is one of the earliest systematic treatises on statecraft, internal security, and intelligence anywhere in the world. It details a layered espionage system (the gudhapurushas, including stationary spies posing as merchants and ascetics and roving agents), the administration and defence of provinces, the policing and fortification of the capital, the saptanga (seven limbs) theory of the state (king, ministers, territory, fort, treasury, army, ally), and the mandala (circle of kings) theory of foreign policy, with its sixfold policy (shadgunya) of peace, war, neutrality, and so on. Its guiding maxim, that the king's happiness lies in the happiness of his subjects (praja-sukhe sukham rajnah, praja-hite hitam), is an early statement of welfare governance. Ashoka's reliance on a unifying ethical code (Dhamma) across a vast, diverse empire is an early model of integration by persuasion rather than coercion, a theme the examiner can pair with internal-security and governance notes.

How CAPF asks it

Formats: king-to-achievement matching; authorship questions (Arthashastra, Indika); single-correct on the Kalinga War date and Edict XIII; who deciphered the edicts and the title Devanampiya Piyadassi; chronological ordering of the three rulers and who ended the dynasty; source of the national emblem.

Authored practice (with answers):

Common confusion

• Arthashastra (Kautilya, statecraft) versus Indika (Megasthenes, a Greek's account). Do not swap the authors.
• Kautilya = Chanakya = Vishnugupta: three names for one minister.
• Bindusara = Amitraghata (Greek Amitrochates); favoured the Ajivikas. Ashoka favoured Buddhism.
• The Third Buddhist Council (Pataliputra, Ashoka) is the Mauryan one; the Fourth (Kashmir) is Kushana (Kanishka).
• Pushyamitra Shunga ended the Mauryas and founded the Shungas; do not confuse with the Kanvas or the Nandas.
• Devanampiya Piyadassi is Ashoka's title in the edicts; his personal name appears only in a few minor edicts (Maski, Gujarra).
• The Sarnath Lion Capital is the national emblem; the wheel from it is the Ashoka Chakra on the flag.

Memory hook

• Three great Mauryas in order: "Chandragupta builds, Bindusara holds, Ashoka changes" (founder, consolidator, reformer).
• Four provincial capitals: "Taxila up, Ujjain west, Tosali east, Suvarnagiri south" (TUTS).
• "Prinsep in '37" fixes the decipherment of the edicts.
• Saptanga (seven limbs of the state) in the Arthashastra: King, Minister, Territory, Fort, Treasury, Army, Ally.

Night before

• Mauryan Empire 321 to 185 BCE; founder Chandragupta Maurya, minister Kautilya (Chanakya).
• Kautilya wrote the Arthashastra; Megasthenes (Seleucus' envoy) wrote the Indika.
• Chandragupta defeated Seleucus Nicator (c. 305 BCE) and gained the trans-Indus lands for 500 elephants.
• Bindusara, "Amitraghata", extended into the Deccan and favoured the Ajivikas.
• Ashoka's Kalinga War (c. 261 BCE), described in Rock Edict XIII, turned him to Buddhism and Dhamma.
• Edicts are in Prakrit (Brahmi script; Kharoshthi in the NW; Greek-Aramaic at Kandahar); deciphered by James Prinsep in 1837.
• Ashoka is "Devanampiya Piyadassi"; he held the Third Buddhist Council at Pataliputra (c. 250 BCE).
• Mahendra and Sanghamitra carried Buddhism to Sri Lanka; Dhamma Mahamattas spread the moral code.
• Provincial capitals: Taxila, Ujjain, Tosali, Suvarnagiri; the village head was the gramika.
• Sarnath Lion Capital is the national emblem (adopted 1950); Barabar caves given to the Ajivikas.
• The last Maurya, Brihadratha, was killed by Pushyamitra Shunga (c. 185 BCE).

Glossary

• Arthashastra: Kautilya's treatise on statecraft, economy, administration, and internal security.
• Indika: Megasthenes' Greek account of Mauryan India (surviving in fragments).
• Dhamma (Ashokan): a practical, non-sectarian code of moral conduct, not a sect.
• Dhamma Mahamattas: special officers appointed to propagate and supervise Dhamma.
• Devanampiya Piyadassi: Ashoka's title in the inscriptions, "Beloved of the Gods, of gracious appearance".
• Bherighosha and dhammaghosha: conquest by war-drum versus conquest by Dhamma.
• Kumara: a prince or viceroy governing a Mauryan province.
• Gramika: the headman of a village, the lowest administrative unit.
• Adhyaksha: a departmental superintendent in the Mauryan bureaucracy.
• Gudhapurusha: a state spy in the Arthashastra's intelligence system.
• Saptanga: the seven limbs (elements) of the state in the Arthashastra.
• Mandala: the Arthashastra's "circle of kings" theory of foreign relations.
• Karshapana (pana): the silver punch-marked coin of the period.
• NBPW: Northern Black Polished Ware, the lustrous luxury pottery of the age.
• Sallekhana: the Jain practice of ritual fasting to death, ascribed to Chandragupta.

Related notes

• mahajanapadas jainism and buddhism
• post mauryan and gupta age
• vedic age
• Index
• syllabus index