Class 12 History Chapter 2 Kings, Farmers and Towns NCERT Solutions in English

Q. Discuss the evidence of craft production in Early Historic cities. In what ways is this different from the evidence from Harappan cities?

Answer: A wide range of artefacts has been recovered from Early Historic urban sites: fine pottery bowls and dishes with a glossy finish, known as Northern Black Polished Ware, probably used by rich people, and ornaments, tools, weapons, vessels and figurines made of gold, silver, copper, bronze, ivory, glass, shell and terracotta. From the second century BCE, short votive inscriptions in many cities name the donor and sometimes his or her occupation, revealing washing folk, weavers, scribes, carpenters, potters, goldsmiths, blacksmiths, officials, religious teachers, merchants and kings living in these towns. Guilds or shrenis, organisations of craft producers and merchants, are also mentioned; they probably procured raw materials, regulated production and marketed the finished product.
This differs from Harappan evidence in an important way. Because people still live in most Early Historic cities today, extensive excavation is difficult, so this picture is built up from scattered artefact finds and inscriptions rather than from full excavation of a site, as was possible with the abandoned Harappan cities. On the other hand, the Early Historic votive inscriptions name real individuals and their occupations directly, something the Harappan sites, despite their systematic excavation, cannot offer, since their script remains undeciphered.

Q. Describe the salient features of mahajanapadas.

Answer: The sixth century BCE saw the emergence of sixteen large states known as mahajanapadas, named in early Buddhist and Jaina texts; the lists vary, but Vajji, Magadha, Koshala, Kuru, Panchala, Gandhara and Avanti occur most frequently. Each mahajanapada had a capital city, often fortified, since maintaining fortifications, armies and an early bureaucracy required resources.
There were two broad kinds of states. Most mahajanapadas were kingdoms, ruled by a single king who was ideally expected to be a Kshatriya, as the Dharmasutras composed by Brahmanas from this period advised. Some, called ganas or sanghas, were oligarchies, where power was shared among a number of men, collectively called rajas; both Mahavira and the Buddha belonged to such ganas, and in the Vajji sangha the rajas probably controlled resources such as land collectively. Rulers were advised to collect taxes and tribute from cultivators, traders and artisans, and raiding neighbouring states was a recognised, legitimate means of acquiring wealth; some states built standing armies and regular bureaucracies, while others depended on militia recruited from the peasantry.

Q. How do historians reconstruct the lives of ordinary people?

Answer: Inscriptions, the chapter’s main source, do not provide all the answers here, because ordinary people rarely left accounts of their own thoughts and experiences. Historians have therefore tried to solve this problem by examining stories contained in anthologies such as the Jatakas and the Panchatantra. Many of these stories probably originated as popular oral tales that were later committed to writing; the Jatakas, for instance, were written in Pali around the middle of the first millennium CE.
One such story, the Gandatindu Jataka, describes the plight of the subjects of a wicked king, including elderly women and men, cultivators, herders, village boys and even animals. When the king went in disguise to find out what his subjects thought of him, each one cursed him, complaining that they were attacked by robbers at night and by tax collectors during the day, and eventually abandoned their village for the forest. Using such stories carefully, alongside inscriptions, lets historians see how the relationship between kings and their rural subjects, especially over taxation, was often strained.

Q. Compare and contrast the list of things given to the Pandyan chief (Source 3) with those produced in the village of Danguna (Source 8). Do you notice any similarities or differences?

Answer: In the Silappadikaram, people bring the chief Senguttuvan a great range of forest and hill produce as gifts when he visits the forest: ivory, fragrant wood, fans of deer hair, honey, sandalwood, red ochre, antimony, turmeric, cardamom and pepper, along with fruits, medicinal plants, sugarcane, flowers, areca nut, bananas and animals including baby tigers, lions, elephants, monkeys, deer and peacocks. Prabhavati Gupta’s inscription at Danguna, by contrast, is a land-grant charter listing the exemptions of an agrahara: the village is exempted from providing grass, animal hides, charcoal, flowers and milk to royal officers, and from the king’s rights over liquor, salt, mines and khadira trees, while the grantee receives rights to hidden treasures, deposits, and major and minor taxes.
There is one point of overlap: flowers appear in both lists. Beyond that, the two lists come from two different kinds of economy. The Pandyan gifts are voluntary tribute, mostly forest and hill luxuries, given to a chief who then redistributed them among his own supporters; nothing here is a tax or a formal administrative right. The Danguna list is the opposite: everyday agricultural and forest produce and revenue rights formally transferred by royal charter from the king to a religious grantee, along with legal exemptions and privileges. The Pandyan list therefore reflects a chief’s economy of gift and redistribution, while the Danguna list reflects a king’s economy of land grants, taxation and administrative privilege, and this is the central contrast this chapter draws between “chiefs and kings in the south” and land-granting kingship further north.

Q. List some of the problems faced by epigraphists.

Answer: There are technical limitations: letters are sometimes very faintly engraved, so reconstructions of the text remain uncertain, and inscriptions may be damaged or have letters missing altogether. It is also not always easy to be sure of the exact meaning of words used in an inscription, some of which may be specific to a particular place or time, so scholars constantly debate and discuss alternative ways of reading the same text.
Beyond these technical problems lies a more fundamental one: although several thousand inscriptions have been discovered, not all of them have been deciphered, published and translated, and many more inscriptions must once have existed but have not survived the ravages of time, so what is available today is probably only a fraction of what was originally inscribed. Finally, not everything politically or economically significant was necessarily recorded in an inscription in the first place, since inscriptions focus, more often than not, on grand and unique events rather than routine life.

Q. Discuss the main features of Mauryan administration. Which of these elements are evident in the Asokan inscriptions that you have studied?

Answer: The Mauryan empire had five major political centres named in Asokan inscriptions: the capital Pataliputra, and the provincial centres of Taxila, Ujjayini, Tosali and Suvarnagiri. These were carefully chosen: Taxila and Ujjayini lay on important long-distance trade routes, while Suvarnagiri, literally “the golden mountain”, was probably important for tapping the gold mines of Karnataka. Historians increasingly doubt that such a vast and diverse empire, stretching from the hilly terrain of Afghanistan to the coast of Orissa, could have had a uniform administrative system; administrative control was probably strongest in and around the capital and the provincial centres. Communication along land and river routes was vital, and could take weeks or months, so the army was important for provisioning and protecting officials on the move. Megasthenes describes a committee with six subcommittees for coordinating military activity, covering the navy, transport and provisions, foot-soldiers, cavalry, chariots and elephants. Asoka additionally held the empire together by propagating dhamma, a set of principles simple enough to be virtually universally applicable, spread through inscriptions on rocks and pillars and through special officers called dhamma mahamatta.
Several of these elements are directly evident in the Asokan inscriptions studied in this chapter. The inscriptions record virtually the same message at different centres, from the North West Frontier region of present-day Pakistan to Andhra Pradesh, Orissa and Uttarakhand, which shows the empire’s reach even if not a uniform administration. Asoka’s own inscription on the pativedaka system (Source 10) shows a deliberate effort at continuous reporting from across the empire, and his edicts repeatedly use the titles devanampiya and piyadassi and refer to the propagation of dhamma, confirming that inscriptions, along with dhamma mahamatta, were his chosen instrument for holding a diverse empire together.

Q. This is a statement made by one of the best-known epigraphists of the twentieth century, D.C. Sircar: “There is no aspect of life, culture and activities of the Indians that is not reflected in inscriptions.” Discuss.

Answer: There is a great deal of truth in this claim. Inscriptions in this chapter alone cover royal conquest and remorse (Asoka’s Kalinga edict), administrative reform (the pativedaka inscription), irrigation and public works (the Sudarshana lake inscription), religious donation and land grants (Prabhavati Gupta’s charter for Danguna), trade and mercantile life (votive inscriptions naming merchants, goldsmiths and weavers), and claims to divine or superhuman kingship (the Prayaga Prashasti). Read together, such inscriptions do touch an extraordinarily wide range of political, economic, social and religious life.
Yet the claim needs qualifying. As the chapter itself points out, routine agricultural practices and the ordinary joys and sorrows of daily existence find no mention in inscriptions, which focus, more often than not, on grand, unique events rather than everyday life. Moreover, the content of an inscription almost invariably reflects the perspective of the person who commissioned it, whether a king, a queen or a wealthy donor, so the same events look very different from the point of view of, say, a peasant paying taxes or a labourer working under compulsion, neither of whom left an inscription of their own. Because of this, historians juxtapose inscriptions with other kinds of evidence, such as the Jatakas and the Panchatantra, in order to arrive at a fuller understanding of the past. A balanced answer, then, agrees that inscriptions reflect an enormous range of Indian life and activity, but stops short of saying that no aspect of it is left out.

Q. Discuss the notions of kingship that developed in the post-Mauryan period.

Answer: Several different notions of kingship developed after the decline of the Mauryan empire. In the far south, the chiefdoms of the Cholas, Cheras and Pandyas in Tamilakam were built around chiefs rather than kings in the northern sense: a chief received gifts from his subordinates, redistributed them among his supporters, and generally maintained no standing army or officials, unlike a king who collected regular taxes. Elsewhere, dynasties such as the Satavahanas and the Shakas, whose social origins were often obscure, derived revenue from long-distance trade and, once in power, attempted to claim social status in various ways.
The Kushanas took the boldest step, claiming outright divinity: colossal statues of Kushana rulers were installed in shrines at Mat near Mathura and in Afghanistan, and many Kushana rulers adopted the title devaputra, “son of god”, possibly inspired by Chinese rulers who called themselves sons of heaven. By the fourth century, larger states such as the Gupta empire relied on samantas, men who maintained themselves through local resources including control over land, and who offered homage and military support in return; a powerful samanta could become a king in his own right, while a weak king could be reduced to subordination. Gupta kingship, in turn, was projected through Sanskrit prashastis composed by court poets, such as Harishena’s Prayaga Prashasti in praise of Samudragupta, which presented the king in language equal to that used for gods such as Kubera, Varuna, Indra and Yama. Historians read such extravagant claims partly as a genuine assertion of power and partly, since kings were increasingly dependent on samantas, as an attempt to project at least the appearance of unchallenged authority.

Q. To what extent were agricultural practices transformed in the period under consideration?

Answer: Agricultural practice changed significantly, though unevenly, across this period. From about the sixth century BCE, the iron-tipped ploughshare came into use in fertile, high-rainfall alluvial river valleys such as those of the Ganga and the Kaveri, but its adoption was far from universal: cultivators in the semi-arid tracts of Punjab and Rajasthan did not adopt it until the twentieth century, and communities in the hilly north-eastern and central subcontinent continued to practise hoe agriculture, which suited their terrain better. In parts of the Ganga valley, the technique of transplantation, broadcasting seeds and later moving the saplings into waterlogged fields, dramatically raised paddy production, even though it meant back-breaking labour for the cultivator. Irrigation, through wells and tanks and less commonly canals, was organised by both communities and individuals, the latter usually powerful men, including kings, who often recorded such works in inscriptions like the Sudarshana lake inscription.
These changes did not benefit everyone equally. A growing differentiation appeared among those who worked the land: landless agricultural labourers, small peasants, and large landholders and village headmen who exercised control over other cultivators, a pattern also seen in early Tamil literature’s categories of vellalar, uzhavar and adimai. From the early centuries of the Common Era, land grants, some creating agraharas exempted from paying revenue, extended cultivation into new areas and created new rural elites who could exercise considerable local authority. Taken together, the period saw real technological change in how land was worked and watered, but that change produced new and often sharper social distinctions among those who depended on the land, rather than a single, even improvement for everybody.

Q. Compare Maps 1 and 2, and list the mahajanapadas that might have been included in the Mauryan Empire. Are any Asokan inscriptions found in these areas?

Answer: (Keep textbook Maps 1 and 2 side by side.) The Asokan inscriptions on Map 2 spread from Kandahar in the northwest to Brahmagiri in the south and Kalinga in the east, and almost every mahajanapada on Map 1 falls inside that spread, so practically all of them were probably included in the Mauryan Empire. Mahajanapada by mahajanapada:
Gandhara: inscriptions at Shahbazgarhi and Mansehra; the provincial centre Taxila is here.
Kamboja: the Kandahar inscription lies further northwest in this direction.
Kuru: Topra, Meerut and nearby Kalsi.
Matsya: Bairat and Bhabru.
Vatsa: Kaushambi. Kashi: Sarnath.
Vajji and Malla: Rampurwa, Lauriya Nandangarh, Lauriya Araraj; Rummindei and Nigalisagar nearby.
Magadha: the capital Pataliputra, Sahasram and Ahraura.
Avanti: the provincial centre Ujjayini, with Sanchi nearby.
Chedi: Gujarra lies near this area.
Panchala, Shurasena, Koshala, Anga, Ashmaka, Vanga: these also lie within the spread of the empire, but Map 2 marks no inscription at their capitals (Ahichchhatra, Mathura, Shravasti, Champa).
Conclusion: yes, Asokan inscriptions are found in the areas of most of the mahajanapadas, especially the pillar inscriptions of the Ganga valley. The Cholas, Keralaputras and Pandyas of the far south are shown separately on Map 2, with no inscriptions.

Q. Collect newspapers for one month. Cut and paste all the statements made by government officials about public works. Note what the reports say about the resources required for such projects, how the resources are mobilised and the objective of the project. Who issues these statements, and how and why are they communicated? Compare and contrast these with the evidence from inscriptions discussed in this chapter. What are the similarities and differences that you notice?

Answer (how to do the project): Make a table for each cutting: the project (road, bridge, dam, canal), the official making the statement, the resources mentioned (money, materials, labour), how they are raised (budget, taxes, loans), the objective, and how the statement reaches people (newspaper, television, website). Then compare with the chapter’s inscriptions, especially the Sudarshana lake inscription (Source 5), in which Rudradaman claims he repaired the lake from his own treasury without taxing his subjects. Similarities: in both, the ruler or government takes credit for a public work and publicises the achievement, and both are written from the point of view of whoever commissioned them. Differences: inscriptions were engraved permanently on stone and few could read them, while statements today reach many people through the media; today costs and resources must be accounted for publicly, whereas an inscription recorded only the ruler’s claim. End by noting why both kinds of source have to be checked against other evidence.

Q. Collect five different kinds of currency notes and coins in circulation today. For each one of these, describe what you see on the obverse and the reverse (the front and the back). Prepare a report on the common features as well as the differences in terms of pictures, scripts and languages, size, shape and any other element that you find significant. Compare these with the coins shown in this chapter, discussing the materials used, the techniques of minting, the visual symbols and their significance and the possible functions that coins may have had.

Answer (how to do the project): For each note and coin record what is on the obverse and reverse (pictures, symbols, scripts, languages, denomination), its size, shape and material, and tabulate the similarities and differences. Then compare with the chapter’s coins: punch-marked coins (silver and copper, symbols punched or stamped onto the metal), Indo-Greek coins (the first to bear the names and images of rulers, with names in Greek and Kharosthi), Kushana coins (gold, King Kanishka on the obverse and a deity on the reverse, identical in weight to Roman and Parthian coins), Yaudheya coins (copper, issued by a tribal republic) and Gupta coins (gold of remarkable purity). Discuss what coins did then and now: easing exchange and trade, proclaiming the ruler’s authority and identity, and (today) displaying national symbols.

Q. Which were the areas where states and cities were most densely clustered?

Answer: On Map 1 the states and their capitals cluster most densely in the Ganga valley: Kuru (Indraprastha), Panchala (Ahichchhatra), Shurasena (Mathura), Koshala (Shravasti), Vatsa (Kaushambi), Kashi (Varanasi), Malla (Kusinagara), Vajji (Vaishali), Magadha (Rajagaha/Rajgir) and Anga (Champa). Fertile alluvial land and cheap communication along the Ganga and its tributaries explain the cluster. There are fewer states in the northwest (Gandhara, Kamboja) and central India (Avanti, Chedi), and only Ashmaka further south.

Q. What are the different explanations offered by early writers and present-day historians for the growth of Magadhan power?

Answer: Present-day historians give geographical and economic reasons: agriculture in the region was especially productive; iron mines (in present-day Jharkhand) were accessible and provided resources for tools and weapons; elephants, an important part of the army, were available in the forests; and the Ganga and its tributaries provided cheap and convenient communication. Early Buddhist and Jaina writers attributed Magadha’s power to the policies of individuals: ruthlessly ambitious kings such as Bimbisara, Ajatasattu and Mahapadma Nanda, and their ministers who implemented their policies. The modern view rests on resources and geography; the early writers credit people.

Q. Why were these walls built?

Answer: Rajagaha (Rajgir), Magadha’s first capital, was a fortified settlement located amongst hills. Mahajanapada capitals were often fortified because raids on neighbouring states were a recognised means of acquiring wealth; the walls protected the capital, the king, his treasury and his army, and also displayed the ruler’s power.

Q. Why is the lion capital considered important today?

Answer: The lion capital of the Asokan pillar at Sarnath is today the national emblem of India, seen on government seals, currency notes and coins. It is an example of the spectacular Mauryan stone sculpture regarded as typical of empires, and it is linked with Asoka, whom twentieth-century nationalist leaders regarded as an inspiring figure.

Q. Could rulers have engraved inscriptions in areas that were not included within their empire?

Answer: Yes, it is possible. Asoka’s inscriptions were mainly messages proclaiming dhamma, and such messages could have been engraved along trade routes, in frontier areas or in neighbouring regions to reach people there. The chapter itself says control was not uniform even within the empire’s frontiers and was probably strongest around the capital and the provincial centres. So the presence of an inscription alone does not prove that an area was fully under the ruler’s administration.

Q. Why were officials appointed to supervise these occupational groups?

Answer: The same officials collected taxes, so supervising occupations connected with land secured the state’s revenue. Woodcutters, carpenters, blacksmiths and miners supplied timber, iron and minerals needed for tools, weapons and the army. Supervising the rivers, land measurement and the sluices let out from the main canals ensured an equal supply of water for cultivation, and rewarding or punishing huntsmen kept forest resources under control.

Q. Read the excerpts from Megasthenes and the Arthashastra (Sources 1 and 2). To what extent do you think these texts are useful in reconstructing a history of Mauryan administration?

Answer: Useful: Megasthenes was a Greek ambassador at Chandragupta Maurya’s court, so his account is contemporary; it describes officials’ duties (supervising rivers, measuring land, collecting taxes) and the committee with six subcommittees for military affairs. The Arthashastra lays down minute details of administrative and military organisation, such as how elephants were captured. Limits: Megasthenes survives only in fragments and writes as an outsider (comparing practice with Egypt); only parts of the Arthashastra were probably composed by Kautilya, and it prescribes rules rather than showing what actually happened everywhere; the Greek army figures are considered exaggerated by some historians. These texts are therefore most useful when checked against Asoka’s inscriptions and archaeological evidence.

Q. If the Greek accounts were true, what kinds of resources do you think the Mauryan ruler would have required to maintain such a large army?

Answer: An army of 600,000 foot-soldiers, 30,000 cavalry and 9,000 elephants would need a large treasury to pay the soldiers, and so regular taxes from cultivators, traders and artisans; huge quantities of grain for the soldiers and fodder for the animals; elephants captured from forests and horses; iron for weapons and equipment from mines; bullock carts to carry equipment; and servants and artisans to look after the soldiers, which is exactly what Megasthenes’s second subcommittee arranged.

Q. Why did people bring these gifts? What would the chief have used these for?

Answer: The source says the people brought gifts “just as the defeated show respect to the victorious king”, that is, to show respect and submission to the chief Senguttuvan. A chief did not collect taxes but received gifts from his subordinates. He would have distributed them among his supporters to keep their loyalty, used some in rituals and for his own consumption, and goods such as ivory, sandalwood, cardamom and pepper were also valuable in trade.

Q. How has the king been portrayed?

Answer: On the obverse King Kanishka is shown standing, wearing a long coat and high boots, holding a tall staff or spear in one hand and stretching the other towards a small altar, with lettering around the edge. A deity appears on the reverse. Showing the king on one face and a deity on the other links him with the gods, matching the Kushana claim to divine status seen in the title devaputra.

Q. What are the elements in the sculpture that suggest that this is an image of a king?

Answer: The statue is colossal; the figure stands upright and frontal in a dignified pose; he wears the heavy long coat and large boots of Central Asian rulers; he holds a large sword and a staff or mace, symbols of power; and an inscription is carved on his robe. Colossal statues of Kushana rulers like this were installed in a shrine at Mat near Mathura.

Q. Why do you think kings claimed divine status?

Answer: Identifying with a variety of deities was one means of claiming high status. Rulers such as the Kushanas often had obscure social origins, so a divine claim gave them legitimacy and respect; many Kushana rulers took the title devaputra and installed colossal statues of themselves in shrines. In the Gupta period, states depended on samantas, and a powerful samanta could become a king; claims like those in the Prayaga Prashasti, which compares Samudragupta to Kubera, Varuna, Indra and Yama, set the king above every rival. Some historians also argue that kings projected themselves as larger than life precisely when their control was weakening, to present at least a façade of power.

Q. Why did rulers make arrangements for irrigation?

Answer: Irrigation increased agricultural production, and more produce meant more revenue for the ruler; reservoirs such as the Sudarshana lake made cultivation possible in drier areas. Such works also advertised the ruler’s generosity and power: Rudradaman had it recorded that he repaired the lake from his own treasury without imposing taxes on his subjects. The chapter notes that individuals who built irrigation works were usually powerful men, including kings, who recorded these activities in inscriptions.

Q. Would these boundary markers have been adequate to resolve disputes?

Answer: Only partly. Buried markers such as stones, bones, ashes, potsherds and charcoal would not decay and could be dug up as proof of a boundary, so they were of some use. But being concealed, they could not be seen by ordinary people; they could be moved or reburied; and with no written record or map, settling a dispute still depended on the memory of witnesses. Disputes would therefore also have needed witnesses, village headmen and the king’s judgement.

Q. How would you classify the people described in the text in terms of their occupations?

Answer: Cultivators: small farmers who had apportioned the rice-land, threshing grounds and arable land, mainly using spades. Gatherers of forest produce: people carrying bundles of bark, sacks of flowers, loads of flax and hemp, honey, peacocks’ tail feathers, wreaths of wax, logs and grass. Sellers (traders): village wives hastening to neighbouring villages with baskets of forest fruits on their heads to sell.

Q. What were the things produced in the village?

Answer: The items from which the village is exempted show what Danguna produced: grass, animal hides (used as seats), charcoal, fermenting liquor, salt (dug out), minerals from mines, the produce of khadira trees, flowers and milk. The village was also donated with its major and minor taxes, which shows that it was cultivated.

Q. Find out whether plough agriculture, irrigation and transplantation are prevalent in your state. If not, are there any alternative systems in use?

Answer (how to do it): This is a task about your own state. Talk to farmers or use agriculture department information to find out three things: how land is ploughed (bullock plough, tractor or hoe); what irrigation is used (wells, tube wells, tanks, canals or rain alone); and whether paddy is transplanted or sown directly. Then compare with the chapter: the iron ploughshare spread in fertile high-rainfall valleys, cultivators in semi-arid Punjab and Rajasthan adopted it only in the twentieth century, and the hoe suited the hilly north-east and central parts. Where plough, irrigation or transplantation are not used, explain the alternative (rain-fed farming, hoe cultivation, shifting cultivation) and why.

Q. Were there any cities in the region where the Harappan civilisation flourished in the third millennium BCE?

Answer: Most cities on Map 3 lie in the Ganga valley and to its east and south (Shravasti, Kanauj, Mathura, Kaushambi, Varanasi, Vaishali, Pataliputra, Rajgir, Mahasthan, Chandraketugarh, Vidisha, Ujjayini, Paithan, Dhanyakataka, Shishupalgarh, Kodumanal, Puhar). In the region where the Harappan civilisation flourished (the Indus valley, Punjab, Gujarat) the map shows only a few, such as Taxila in the northwest and Bharukachchha on the Gujarat coast. The centre of urban life had shifted from the Indus region to the Ganga valley.

Q. Why did the author compile this list?

Answer: The author was an anonymous Greek sailor, and the Periplus (“sailing around”) was a guide for traders. The list tells merchants what they could sell at the market-towns of the Malabar coast (coin, topaz, antimony, coral, crude glass, copper, tin, lead) and what they could buy there (pepper, malabathrum, fine pearls, ivory, silk cloth, transparent stones, diamonds, sapphires, tortoise shell), helping traders sailing from the Red Sea to plan profitable voyages.

Q. What are the transactions involved in trade? Which of these transactions are apparent from the sources mentioned? Are there any that are not evident from the sources?

Answer: Transactions in trade: buying raw materials, producing goods, carrying them over land, river and sea, paying for protection on the routes, buying and selling in markets, paying with coins or exchanging goods, and paying taxes. Apparent from the sources: the Periplus shows long-distance sea trade, with coin and metals imported and pepper, pearls and stones bought at the Malabar ports; Roman coin hoards in south India confirm it; the Harshacharita shows village women selling forest fruits locally; the Silappadikaram shows gifts flowing to a chief; votive inscriptions name merchants and guilds organising production. Not evident: actual prices and rates, credit and loans, the everyday dealings of peddlers and small markets, and transactions inside guilds; the chapter also notes that fewer gold coins after the sixth century CE do not tell us clearly whether trade declined or coins simply stayed in circulation.

Q. Do some Devanagari letters appear similar to Brahmi? Are there any that seem different?

Answer: Fig. 2.11 sets the Brahmi forms of ka, cha, dha, da, ma and ra beside Devanagari. Some are similar: Brahmi ka (a cross of a vertical and a horizontal stroke) survives in the vertical and cross strokes of Devanagari क; the curved Brahmi forms of dha and da resemble ढ and द; and Brahmi ra is a single vertical stroke. Some are different: Brahmi ma and cha look quite unlike म and च, and Brahmi has no headline like Devanagari. The similarity exists because most scripts used to write modern Indian languages are derived from Brahmi.

Q. Epigraphists have translated the term pativedaka as reporter. In what ways would the functions of the pativedaka have been different from those we generally associate with reporters today?

Answer: The pativedakas were the king’s officials who reported the affairs of the people only to the king, at all times, whether he was eating, in the inner apartment, in the bedroom or being carried, so that he could dispose of the people’s affairs everywhere. A reporter today works for a newspaper or channel and carries news to the public, and may question what the government does. The pativedaka was a government informant serving the ruler, while a reporter is an independent source of news for the people.

Q. Look at Map 2 and discuss the location of Asokan inscriptions. Do you notice any patterns?

Answer: Yes, there are clear patterns. (1) Major rock edicts lie mostly at the frontiers and coasts of the empire: Kandahar, Shahbazgarhi and Mansehra in the northwest, Girnar and Sopara in the west, Shishupalgarh and Jaugada in Kalinga on the east coast, Sannati in the south and Kalsi in the north. (2) Pillar inscriptions are mostly in the Ganga valley, the heartland around the capital Pataliputra (Topra, Meerut, Nigalisagar, Rummindei, Rampurwa, Lauriya Nandangarh, Lauriya Araraj, Sarnath, Kaushambi), and at Sanchi. (3) Minor rock edicts form a dense cluster in Karnataka (Maski, Gavimath, Palkigundu, Jatinga Rameshwar, Siddapur, Udegolam, Rajula Mandagiri, Nittur, Brahmagiri), near the gold-mining provincial centre of Suvarnagiri, and appear in Rajasthan at Bairat and Bhabru. (4) Many inscriptions stand near important towns and trade routes, where more people would see them.