Chronology of Indian History --Newer discussions

DrRajpalSingh said:
As referred to earlier in post 821, http://www.jatland.com/forums/showt...gy-of-Indian-History-Newer-discussions/page42 ,

the name of Dasaratha appears as contemporary/near contemporary of Divodasa and he is said to be his ally in his fight against the Asura enemies.

Does his fainting during the fight and saving by his wife Kaikeyi as alluded to in the Ramayana

has any historicity to find out the real position ? If this event of his participation in the war against

the Asura group is hinted then another important date line of the prehistory of India could be illuminated !

If someone having the information on the issue shares his research on the topic of discussion, he/she is welcome !

Thanks and regards
Click to expand...

H C Roychowdhury identified Rigvedic hymn [RV. 1.126.4] mentioning name of 'Dasratha'.

No one agreed with him because etymologically 'Dasaratha' means ten chariots. However,

S.B Roy has undertaken further probings on the issue. He says that Roychowdhury's identification

was correct. He has shown that Dasaratha, Divodasa, and Kaaksshivan were near contemporaries.

He goes on to add that ''this is informed by the Ramayana description that Dasaratha fought on the

side of Divodasa against the Danava king Sambhara, the son of Kulitara. Further both Pargiter and

Pradhan have noticed that Sharadvanta Gautama, a priest of Siradwaja Janaka, Married Ahalya the

sister of Divodasa.'' These are cross connexions between the royal and risi dynastic persons.

All these facts taken together lead to surmise that Dasaratha's time line could be c.2000 B.C.

It seems to be a convincing conclusion and there is no harm if it is accepted as working

hypothesis, at least till the time, other more convincing fact comes forth !
 
To recapitulate, we have so far tried to fix a few lamp posts of the chronological order of the prehistory of India on the date line of

Divodasa and Dashratha, the illustrious father of legendary Rama c.2000 B.C.

and The Dasrajan battle c. 1970 B.C.

Mahabharata Battle c. 1414 B.C.

Earlier the date of the founding of the Maurya dynasty by Chandragupta Maurya c.323 B .C. was arrived at by establishing cross contacts with external rulers.

Now we propose to take some other disputed topic on the timeline but before doing so would like to know the comments with sources quoted whether primary or secondary of the readers on these earlier dates.

Thanks
 
Last edited:
We had arrived at conclusion about the contemporaneous of Asoka Maurya with other kings of the neighbouring countries of his period in the post and requested for comments of the learned authors :

DrRajpalSingh said:
...................................

Friend,

What is your opinion on the utility of cross contacts in Indian Proto-history especially for determining the Mauryan Dynasty's identity using the following cross contact found on the Asokan Inscription itself.

Ashoka and Antiok, {Antiokas] the Yona Raja in c. 257 B.C.
Click to expand...
log:http://www.jatland.com/forums/showt...-Chandragupta-in-c-323-BC&p=334795#post334795

Once again, it is requested that we must join healthy discussion to remove the haze from the timeline of history of India in general and of the Jats in particular.

Thanks.
 
Let us reappraise and discuss Chronological Methods to understand how the

timeline in history has been fixed by the authors of Ancient History of the world

in general and the History of india in particular which is included in the text books

at different levels. We propose to take up Western Indology and compare and contrast

it with the Ancient system of Indian chronology fixation as revealed from Indian Ancient

Texts and then derive some tentative conclusions.

Would this be in fitness of the things or not, views of the learned participants are invited.

Alternate methods, if any, are welcome.

Thanks and regards
 
The first method adopted to fix the chronology is Literary Method.


This method contains in it some more sub systems or methods such as

Literary style method

Analysis of proper names

Dynastic method.

Over the years all these methods have been tried to understand and fix the ancient

timeline/chronology of India since very ancient times.

Thanks
 
While computing chronology of the ancient times, the dynasties of the rulers/kings are identified, compared with contemporary persons belonging to the region/outside region including foreign countries; sometimes names of well known great saints, risis of the yore or some authors, pilgrims etc whose timeline have had been established earlier are taken into account. After careful collection of such data analysis is undertaken to weed out irrelevant information and then decision is arrived at as has been done by Pargiter in his study of the Puranic data in relation to other sources and preparation of the list of Dynasties of the Kali Age. He has also prepared another list of earlier rulers in a separate book.

V.A. Smith, H.C. Roychowdhury and SB Roy have also done commendable efforts in this field.

In Indian Puranic lists, from Manu to Chandragupta Maurya, the number of 143 dynasties have been undoubtedly mentioned but the lists in various Puranas differ in respect of names of the rulers, the number of rulers and their timelines etc.

To make use of these vast information, the historians on ancient Indian history have been doing research and have solved many a knotty issues and some more issues remain to be resolved.

When this work would be accomplished by applying all the available tools of research to scrutinise the data by the researchers, only then, the chronology of ancient Indian history would be set on firm footing.
 
Last edited:
Though an aberration, I would like to share some of the important timeline of Ancient India

as provided by Romila Thapar in her 'The Penguin History of Early India, 2002, pp.xii-xiii as under:

"The chronology of the earlier part of Indian History is notoriously uncertain compared to that of China or the Mediterranean world. The literary sources can belong to a span of time rather than a precise date. However, this ambiguity is offset in the data from inscriptions that are usually precisely dated, often in a known era. Most of the important dynasties of the early period used their own system of reckoning, which resulted in a number of unconnected eras."

After dwelling upon the problem she has provided us with the following timeline for the period B.C.E. Indian Subcontinent:

c. 2600-1700 : Harappan urbanisation: Mature and late Harappan.

c.1500-500: Composition and compilation of the Vedic corpus,
Neolithic and chalcolithic cultures in various parts of the subcontinent,
Megalithic burials, largely in the Peninsula.

c. 1000: Availability of iron artefacts gradually increases in range and number after the sixth century B.C.

c. 6h century: Urbanisation in the Ganges Plain, Formation of the earlier States and rise of Magadha

c. 519: Cyrus, the Emperor of Persia conquers parts of NW India

c. 493: Accession of Ajatshatru.

c.362-321: Nanda dynasty

c.321: Accession of Chandragupta, the founder of the Maurya dynasty.

and so on.

Comments of the learned participants are invited.
 
Last edited:
Friends, you would appreciate that active participation in the form

of contribution [comments, research sharing or expression of views]

is necessary for continuance of any discussion.


Hence your comments are welcome on the issue of the chronology of ancient Indian History.

Thanks and regards
 
[h=3]According to Jatland wiki page on ancient dynasties of rulers, their chronology is given as under:

Hariyanka dynasty (545 BC-346 BC)[/h]
[h=3]Shishunaga dynasty (430-364 BC)[/h]

The above given chronology is correct or not? If correct, Ok.

If incorrect, what correction do you suggest ?

For details see page :http://www.jatland.com/home/Rajgraha
 
DrRajpalSingh said:
While computing chronology of the ancient times, the dynasties of the rulers/kings are identified, compared with contemporary persons belonging to the region/outside region including foreign countries; sometimes names of well known great saints, risis of the yore or some authors, pilgrims etc whose timeline have had been established earlier are taken into account. After careful collection of such data analysis is undertaken to weed out irrelevant information and then decision is arrived at as has been done by Pargiter in his study of the Puranic data in relation to other sources and preparation of the list of Dynasties of the Kali Age. He has also prepared another list of earlier rulers in a separate book.

V.A. Smith, H.C. Roychowdhury and SB Roy have also done commendable efforts in this field.

In Indian Puranic lists, from Manu to Chandragupta Maurya, the number of 143 dynasties have been undoubtedly mentioned but the lists in various Puranas differ in respect of names of the rulers, the number of rulers and their timelines etc.

To make use of these vast information, the historians on ancient Indian history have been doing research and have solved many a knotty issues and some more issues remain to be resolved.

When this work would be accomplished by applying all the available tools of research to scrutinise the data by the researchers, only then, the chronology of ancient Indian history would be set on firm footing.
Click to expand...

In continuation to this methodology of fixation of chronology, S.B Roy has done exhaustive research work and brought a few monographs based on reliable sources. He has prepared a chronological list of ancient Risis whose contribution appears in the pages of Vedic literature and also prepared the list of royal dynasties based on the Puranic literature and compared them with the names of royal persons / dynasties appearing in Rigveda and other Indian literature.

After having prepared the dynastic lists of royal persons and Risis, he has assigned separate number to each person of both the categories.

Then he has cross checked both the lists and established cross connection between them on the basis of references found in the ancient literature mentioned. At times he has not hesitated to take help from other clues available in Vedic literature and epics too. About his methodology we will discuss in the subsequent posts also and then discuss the chronology fixed by him critically.

Thanks.
 
There are a number of astronomical references in our ancient literature like Puranas, Ramayana and Mahabharata, and the like, which come to the help of the historians to fix chronology of the ancient period of history of India. Kindly share some such references from the ancient books so that their historical value could be utilized by those scholars who are doing research on the chronology of Indian history.

Exact quotes from the original sources like epics describing important events like birth, marriage, coronation, battle or any other event may be given.

Thanks.
 
It is reported that Epic Mahabharata contains many references on astronomy. Could Shri LR Burdak ir any other friend throw some light on this particular aspect by quoting the original source .
 
The said references have been quoted in a research paper from Mahabharata [Critical Edition], Poona to which I have not been able to lay my hands. It would be in fitness of things first to verify their authenticity and then to use them for calculation of timeline of ancient India.

The references appear in 1.1.1; 1.4.1

Then they appear in Virat Prava, Udyog Prava, Bhisma Prava, Karana Prava, Shailya Prava and Anushashan Prava.

A brief review of all these references proves that these references from the Epic denote some information on time frame.

Hence it is requested that the readers may contribute to verify the contents from original source available and accessible to them.
 

''Maghmase ghanishtabheerttaraneiti bhanumaana ardhashlesheya shravanashya dakshinenopanivantatey itiha kashthey bhawatah!!''

Baudhayana Shruta sutra [Caland's edition], XXVI cited by S.B. Roy, Date of Mahabharata Battle.


​Could someone throw light on the meaning and interpretation of the shaloka.
 
If the chronology of our ancient literature is given due consideration and

it is accepted that the Vedic period ended with Vyasa making the Rigveda

a closed canon after having redacted it. This would mean, after this time [c.1450 BC]

the contents of Rigveda Samhita have neither got addition of verses nor any

pruning of its contents was done in it. All the contents had already been composed.

Thereafter,it is admitted that exhaustive indexing was undertaken by Shunaka, Ashwalayan and

Katyayana but no changes in original text was made by them or any other till date.

Astronomical/astrological references from Rig Veda must be starting point followed by Shruta Sutra,

Purana and Epic etc. to give solid base to timeline study of Indian history and then make comparative

study to arrive at some convincing results.
 
It has been pointed out that even Rigveda contains some verses/hymns

which tell about division of time in various units.

On my part, I am on look out for this very important clue and

would share the same with the participants immediately on finding it.

In the meantime, if someone having exact information on this aspect favours

us with his contribution, it would be highly appreciated.

Thanks and regards,
 
The Vedanga Jyotisa (Astronomy)
The Vedanga Jyotisa [Astronomy], propounding the doctrine as taught by Lagadha, has 36 verses in the Rigvedic recension and 43 in the Yajur-Vedic one, 30 being common to both. The Atharvana Jyotisa of 162 verses dealing with muhurta [a particular division of time], karana [an astrological division of day], yoga [leading star of a lunar asterism; a variable division of time], tithi [lunar day]., and vara [week-day] falls outside the Vedic period. It is important as it treats also of jataka [astrology], a branch of jyotisa. It is, however, pre-Siddhanta, as it makes no mention of the twelve rasis [zodic] borrowed from the Greeks.

The Vedanga Jyotisa helps to determine, for purposes of the sacrifices, the positions of the sun and moon at the solstices and of the new and full moon in the circle of the 27 naksatras or star groups of the zodic. It gives simple rules and concise formulae for the calculation of tithis, parvas [new and full moon days, visuvats [equinoxial days], etc.

To be contd......
 
The Jyotisha-Vedanga gives some rules for calculating and fixing the days and hours for the different sacrifices. It is really unfortunate that the earlier works of this Vedanga as also of others should have been lost to us. Some of the astronomical theories and mathematical calculations worked out by the Vedic Aryans are really startling, considering the age and surroundings in which they originated. But at present the only source is the Vedic Samhitas and the Brahmanas particularly of the Yajurveda, from which we may derive our knowledge of these. -------R C Majumdar, The Vedic Age, p.482
 
For proper utilisation of olden sources of history in regard to Astronomy and calculation of charonological order of events that occurred in past, it is necessary to read good books on mathematics. I have come across names of a few such books which I would like to share with the readers. They are :

1. 1.B.Datta and A.N.Singh , History of Hindu Mathematics, 2 parts , Reprint ,Bharatiya Kala Prakashan, New Delhi, 2004.Supplementary material revised by K.S.Shukla in
issues of Indian Journal of History of Science, INSA, New Delhi, India spread over Vols. 15, 18, 19, 27 and 28,1980-1984.
2. 2.C.N.Srinivasa Iyengar, History of Indian Mathematics, World Press, Calcutta, 1967.
3. 3.T.A.SaraswatiAmma, Geometry in Ancient and Medieval India, Motilal Banarsidass, Varanasi, 1079.
4. 4.A.K.Bag, Mathematics in Ancient and Medieval India, Choukhambha,Varanasi, 1979.
5. 5.K.V.Sarma,K.Ramasubramanian, M.D.Srinivas and M.S.Sriram, Ganitayuktibhasa of Jyesthadeva : Rationales in MathematicalAstronomy ,Vol.1. Mathematics,Vol.2. Astronomy, Hindustan Book Agency, New Delhi, 2008/2009 ;Springer Reprint, 2009
 
We hve on Jatland - [wiki]Vishnu Purana/Book IV:Chapter XXIV[/wiki]

Kindly scrol through to See comment - 484:81

According to the chronology of our text, however, it would be but B. C. 1415; to that of the Váyu and Matsya, B. C. 1450; and to that of the Bhágavata, 1515. According to Col. Wilford's computations [4] the conclusion of the great war took place B. C. 1370: Buchanan conjectures it to have occurred in the thirteenth century B. C. Vyása was the putative father of Páńd́u and Dhritarásht́ra, and consequently was cotemporary with the heroes of the great war. Mr. Colebrooke infers from astronomical data that the arrangement of the Vedas attributed to Vyása took place in the fourteenth century B.C. Mr. Bentley brings the date of Yudhisht́hira, the chief of the Páńd́avas, to 575 B. C. [5];According to the chronology of our text, however, it would be but B. C. 1415; to that of the Váyu and Matsya, B. C. 1450; and to that of the Bhágavata, 1515. According to Col. Wilford's computations [4] the conclusion of the great war took place B. C. 1370: Buchanan conjectures it to have occurred in the thirteenth century B. C. Vyása was the putative father of Páńd́u and Dhritarásht́ra, and consequently was cotemporary with the heroes of the great war. Mr. Colebrooke infers from astronomical data that the arrangement of the Vedas attributed to Vyása took place in the fourteenth century B.C. Mr. Bentley brings the date of Yudhisht́hira, the chief of the Páńd́avas, to 575 B. C. [5]; but the weight of authority is in favour of the thirteenth or fourteenth century B. C. for the war of the Mahabharata, and the reputed commencement of the Kali age.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top