Literature of Ancient India

ANCIENT INDIA

❖      Most of literature is religious: vedas,Epics,Jain and buddhist literature etc.

❖      Secular works: Most famous is Indica by Megasthenes (300 b.c.).Though original text of this work is lost,extensive quotations from it are seen in works of  later authors.

❖      Lack of works with historical authenticity due to mixing of myths with history

Vedas and related literature

(Period:1500-1000 bc,language:sanskrit)

●       four:rig,yajur,sama and atharva

●       Rig veda : Oldest,1028 hymns.Indra is the chief god portrayed.

●        Brahmanas contain detailed explanation of Vedic literature and aranyakas are an appendix to them

●       Upanishads:Philosophical.eg:Mundaka,brihadaranyaka,chandogya etc

●       “satyameva jayate” our national motto is from mundaka upanishad

The epics and post vedic literature:

●       The epics : Mahabharata and ramayana

●       The puranas : brahma,vishnu,agni,padma etc

●       Addition to these texts may have taken place even during gupta age.eg:vayu purana,matsya purana etc refer to the gupta kings

●       Smritis:Most famous being Manu Smriti.

Other works in sanskrit

●       Kautilya's arthashastra,Vatsyayana's Kamasutra,Plays written by Bhasa.

●       Panini’s ashtadhyayi & patanjali’s mahabhashya both on sanskrit grammar

●       Buddhist texts in sanskrit:Mahavastu (collection of stories of hinayana school),Lalitavistara(of Mahayana school) and asvaghosha’s buddhacarita (period:1CE)

●       Science based :susrutha samhita(on surgery) and charaka samhita (ayurveda)

Buddhist literature

Earliest buddhist literature were in Pali

●       The tripitakas:vinaya pitaka(has rules of daily life),sutta pitaka(deals with morality) and abhidhamma pitaka (philosophy and metaphysics).

●       Milinda-Panha:conversation between Indo greek king Menander and buddhist philosopher Nagasena

●       Jataka tales:Concern the previous births of bodhisattva

●       Works of Nagarjuna:most important being ‘Mulamadhyamakakarika’

Jain literature

Written mainly in prakrit

●       Angas,Upangas, Prakirnas etc are jain works

●       Bhadrabahu(Contemporary of chandragupta maurya) wrote kalpasutra, a biography of jain tirthankaras and Parisista parva was written by Hemachandra.

Literature during and after gupta age (approx 500C.E. to 1000 C.E.)

❖      Due to patronage received from the elite, creative works increased.Purpose of literature turned into entertainment also.More science based works too.

❖      Urban life and its features were often depicted in the plays.

Kalidasa and his works

(Period:not clear probably 5th century AD)

●       Dramas:Abhijnanasakuntalam,malavikagnimitram and vikramorvasiyam

●       Epic poems:Raghuvamsa and kumarasambhava

●       Other major works:Meghasandesam (lyric) Ritusamhara(earliest work,poem)

●       Among the nine gems of court vikramaditya.

Considered indian equivalent of shakespeare.His literature has simplicity,emotions and marks the pinnacle of ancient indian literature.

Other important works

●       Plays: Visakhadatta’s Mudrarakshasa,shudraka’s Mrichcha-katika  (means toy cart) Harsha vardhana’s Priyadarsika, Ratnavali, and the Nagananda.

●       Poetry:Harisenas poetry about samudragupta, sisupalavadha by magha,kiratarjuniya by bharavi

●       Science/rules:Natyasastra by Bharata,Varahamihira’s Brihat samhita and aryabhatiya by aryabhata,ashtanga hridaya by vagbhata

●       Harsha charita and Kadambari by Banabhatta

●       Panchatantra by vishnu sharma.

Tamil literature.

●       Oldest dravidian language.

●       Sangams were assemblies poets,bards and writers(mainly 100-300 C.E).They were patronised by kings and produced sangam literature.Of the three sangams most of literature received is from the third at madurai.Compiling of sangam works took place probably around 600 C.E.

●       Sangam literature classified into:agam(related to love and sexuality) and puram (related to ethics,valour etc).Also classified on the basis of landscapes mullai (forests),Kurinji (mountains) marutham (agri-land) etc

●       Major works in tamil:Tolkappiyam(earliest tamil;work on grammar),Thirukural or kural by thiruvalluvar,silapathikaram (an epic story of woman named Kannagi) by ilango adigal.

●       Manimegalai, Civaka Cintamani, Valayapathi,Kundalakesi and silapathikaram are the 5 epics of tamil literature

N.B:Due to lack of authentic sources exact time period of most of ancient works is disputed.So dates mentioned may vary considerably depending on the source you choose to trust.