5.1 Ancient India — Indus Valley to the Guptas

Ancient India

Indus Valley Civilisation (c. 2500-1750 BCE)

India's earliest urban civilisation flourished along the Indus river in present-day Pakistan and northwest India. The two major excavated sites are Harappa (Punjab) and Mohenjo-daro (Sindh). Other important sites include Lothal (Gujarat, with the world's earliest known tidal dockyard) and Dholavira.

Key features:

• Town planning — grid layout, baked-brick houses, covered drains
• The Great Bath at Mohenjo-daro
• Pashupati seal suggesting an early proto-Shiva deity
• Standardised weights and measures, trade with Mesopotamia
• Script remains undeciphered

The civilisation declined by c. 1750 BCE, possibly due to climate change, river shifts, or Aryan migration.

Vedic Age (c. 1500-600 BCE)

Divided into Early Vedic (Rig Vedic, pastoral) and Later Vedic (agricultural, kingdom-based). The four Vedas — Rig, Sama, Yajur, Atharva — were composed. Society stratified into the four varnas: Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya, Shudra. Important Later Vedic texts: Upanishads, Brahmanas.

Mauryan Empire (c. 322-185 BCE)

Founded by Chandragupta Maurya with guidance from Chanakya (Kautilya), author of the Arthashastra. The empire stretched across most of the subcontinent.

• Ashoka the Great (c. 268-232 BCE) conquered Kalinga in 261 BCE, renounced violence, embraced Buddhism, and propagated Dhamma through rock and pillar edicts across the empire.
• The Lion Capital of Sarnath is India's national emblem; the Dharmachakra appears on the national flag.
• Decline followed Ashoka's death; the last Mauryan ruler Brihadratha was killed by his general Pushyamitra Shunga (185 BCE).

Gupta Age (c. 320-550 CE) — Golden Age

Founded by Chandragupta I (320 CE), the Gupta Empire reached its zenith under Chandragupta II (Vikramaditya). Called India's Golden Age for cultural and scientific flowering:

• Aryabhata — mathematician/astronomer, proposed Earth rotates on its axis, authored Aryabhatiya (499 CE)
• Kalidasa — Sanskrit poet, dramatist (Shakuntala, Meghaduta)
• Sushruta and Charaka — medical texts
• Decimal place-value system and concept of zero
• Nalanda University flourished as a Buddhist learning centre
• Ajanta cave paintings patronised by Gupta rulers

Huns invasions weakened the empire by the mid-6th century.

Buddhism and Jainism — The Sixth-Century BCE Reform Movements

Both arose in the Ganga valley as reactions to Vedic ritualism and the rigidity of the varna order, and both preached in Prakrit, the people's language, rather than in Sanskrit.

Karnataka link: Jainism became a defining force in Karnataka. The Gangas and early Hoysalas were Jain patrons, Shravanabelagola with the monolithic Gomateshwara statue (c. 983 CE) is the greatest Jain site in South India, and Chandragupta Maurya is traditionally believed to have spent his last days there as a Jain ascetic.

The Mauryan Empire in More Detail

• Chandragupta Maurya (c. 322–298 BCE) founded the empire with Chanakya (Kautilya), author of the Arthashastra, as his mentor. Megasthenes, the Greek ambassador of Seleucus, wrote Indica at his court.
• Bindusara (c. 298–273 BCE) extended Mauryan control into the Deccan.
• Ashoka (c. 268–232 BCE) fought the Kalinga war in 261 BCE, recorded in Rock Edict XIII — the only inscription in the world where a victorious emperor expresses remorse. He then propagated Dhamma: non-violence, respect for elders, tolerance between sects, and welfare works.
• Ashokan edicts in Karnataka: the minor rock edicts at Brahmagiri, Siddapura and Jatinga-Rameshwara (Chitradurga region), along with Maski and Palkigundu in Raichur, are the oldest written records found in Karnataka. The Maski edict is famous for naming Ashoka as Devanampiya Asoka, confirming that Devanampiya of the other edicts was Ashoka himself.
• Administration: a centralised bureaucracy with mahamatras and rajukas, the dhamma mahamatra to supervise Dhamma, and a Council of Ministers (Mantriparishad).

Between the Mauryas and the Guptas

Gupta Achievements Worth Naming

• Aryabhata — Aryabhatiya (499 CE); Earth's rotation on its axis; value of pi; the place-value system.
• Varahamihira — Brihat Samhita, astronomy and astrology. Brahmagupta — rules for zero and negative numbers.
• Sushruta and Charaka — surgery and medicine.
• Kalidasa — Abhijnanashakuntalam, Meghaduta, Raghuvamsha, Kumarasambhava.
• Art and architecture — Ajanta paintings, the Dashavatara temple at Deogarh, the iron pillar at Mehrauli, the Nalanda mahavihara.
• Coinage: the Guptas issued the largest number of gold coins (dinaras) of any ancient Indian dynasty. Samudragupta's Allahabad (Prayag) pillar inscription by Harisena records his campaigns, including in the south.

Exam Angle

Ancient India questions are almost entirely name-and-place recall: site to river, king to inscription, text to author, founder to birthplace. Build three flashcard sets — IVC sites and their distinguishing find, Buddhist and Jain place-names, and text-to-author pairs — and add the Karnataka hooks (Ashokan minor edicts, Shravanabelagola, Chandragupta's last days) because the paper reliably prefers the version of a fact that touches the state.