Land grants

Also called: Land grant system · Topic: Economy of Early India: Agriculture, Trade, Guilds, Coinage · NCERT: Class 7, Ch 6 "The Age of Reorganisation"; Class 7, Ch 7 "The Gupta Era: An Age of Tireless Creativity"; Class 7, Ch 3 "Empires and Kingdoms: 6th to 10th Centuries"; Class 12, Ch 2 "Kings, Farmers and Towns"

Meaning

A land grant was a gift of land, or of a whole village, by a king or queen, written on copper plates (sometimes on stone). From the early centuries CE, most such gifts went to religious institutions or to Brahmanas. Land grants matter because they created a new rural elite between the king and the peasant. They are also among our best records of village life. Historians still debate whether they made the state stronger or weaker.

Explanation

Background: why kings gave land away

• From the early centuries CE, kings began giving away land. They put the gift in writing so that nobody could deny it later.
• The earliest inscriptional grants date to c. 100–200 CE. They were made by Satavahana and Shaka rulers.
• Historians do not agree on the reason. There are two main views:
• View ①: grants spread farming.
  • The king gave away forest or empty land, not rich farmland.
  • The Brahmana donee (the person who received the land) settled there, cleared it, brought in peasants and started farming.
  • The result was new farmland, a new revenue base and new followers on the frontier. The state grew.

• View ②: grants show that kings were losing power.

  • Kings were losing control of samantas (big landed chiefs and subordinate rulers).
  • So they bought loyalty with land because they could no longer simply command it.
  • In prashastis (praise inscriptions), kings called themselves "supermen". The boasting was loudest just when their control was slipping. It was a facade (a false front).

• Evidence that supports View ②: the Gupta pattern. The Guptas ruled through provinces and gave copper-plate grants to local rulers, priests and chieftains. The king was sharing power outward, not keeping it at the centre.

Main features: the plate, the language, the donee

• Material: a few grants were cut on stone. Most were on copper plates.
• Title-deed: the copper plate was handed to the donee. It was his title-deed, meaning his proof of ownership.
• Language: mostly Sanskrit. From the 7th century, part of the text was also written in a local language, Tamil or Telugu.
• The Sanskrit part praised the king and gave the legal wording.

• The local-language part described the village boundaries and the dues.

• Who got the land: overwhelmingly religious institutions or Brahmanas, such as temples, monasteries and learned priests.

• Long life of the practice: copper-plate grants stayed in use for over a thousand years.

Types of grant villages

• Agrahara (land granted to a Brahmana):
• It was exempt from land revenue, so the Brahmana paid the king nothing.

• He often got the right to collect dues from local people himself. Tax that used to go to the king now stayed with him.

• Brahmadeya (the Pallava term for a tax-free village given to Brahmanas).

• Chalukya agraharams: some grew into centres of learning. Aihole and Badami are the two named examples.

Results

• A new rural elite. A Brahmana family or a temple now controlled the land, collected the dues and owed the king little.
• Shared sovereignty. Revenue and administrative rights passed from the king to local holders.
• A written record of village life. Exemption lists in the grants tell us what villages produced and what they owed the state.
• Both views can be true at once. The same grant could extend farming and also break up royal power.

Time, place and evidence

• Period: from c. 100–200 CE (Satavahana and Shaka grants) and continuing for over a thousand years.
• Regions and dynasties named in the study note: Satavahanas, Shakas, Guptas, Vakatakas, Pallavas, Chalukyas, Western Gangas and the Palas of Bengal.
• Key grants and inscriptions:
• Danguna grant of Prabhavati Gupta. She was the daughter of Chandragupta II and was married into the Vakataka royal family.
  • Sanskrit legal texts denied women independent access to land. Yet she granted a village.
  • She orders the village's gramakutumbinas (householder-peasants) and the Brahmanas living there to obey the new lord.
  • The grant can be read in two ways. Either a queen was an exception, or the legal texts were not followed everywhere.
  • Her exemption list describes what the village owed before the grant:
  • No entry of soldiers and policemen into the village.
  • No supply of grass, hides, charcoal, flowers or milk to royal officials on tour.
  • No royal purchase of fermenting liquors and no salt-digging by the king's men.
  • Rights over hidden treasure, mines, khadira trees and all taxes passed to the donee.
• Western Ganga copper plate of Durvinita, c. 550 CE. In his 40th regnal year he celebrated his birthday by granting the village Kodungervur to Brahmanas of the Bharadwaja gotra [2].
• Nalanda copper plate of the Pala king Devapala. It granted five villages to pay for the upkeep of monks and the copying of manuscripts in the monastery [3].

• Together, these two plates show both kinds of donee: a Brahmana family and a monastery.

• Aihole as context: Aihole was a Chalukya capital between the 6th and 8th centuries CE. It is the site of the Aihole inscription of Pulakeshin II, dated 634–35 CE [4][5]. Pulakeshin II ruled 610–642 CE and lived at the same time as Harsha [6].

Don't confuse with

• Agrahara vs Brahmadeya: both were tax-free land given to Brahmanas. Agrahara is the general term, and the Chalukyas used the form agraharam. Brahmadeya is the term used for Pallava grants.
• Prashasti vs land grant: a prashasti is a praise poem about a king, such as the Aihole inscription of Pulakeshin II. A land grant is a legal title-deed for a gift of land. Many grants open with praise, but their purpose is legal.
• Samantas vs donees: samantas were subordinate chiefs whose loyalty kings tried to buy. Donees of religious grants were mostly Brahmanas, temples and monasteries.
• Copper plate vs stone grant: most grants were on copper plates that the donee kept as a title-deed. Only a few were cut on stone.

Prelims Hooks

• The earliest inscriptional land grants (c. 100–200 CE) were made by Satavahana and Shaka rulers, not by the Guptas or Mauryas.
• Local languages (Tamil, Telugu) appear in grant texts alongside Sanskrit from the 7th century.
• Prabhavati Gupta, daughter of Chandragupta II and a Vakataka queen, issued the Danguna grant. It names the gramakutumbinas (householder-peasants).
• The Western Ganga king Durvinita (copper plate, c. 550 CE) granted Kodungervur to Brahmanas of the Bharadwaja gotra [2].
• The Nalanda copper plate of the Pala king Devapala granted five villages for monks and manuscript copying [3].
• Chalukya agraharams at Aihole and Badami became centres of learning. The Aihole inscription of Pulakeshin II dates to 634–35 CE [4].

Mains Points

• State-building or state-decay? One group of historians sees land grants as a planned push of farming into forests and frontiers, which raised new revenue. Another group sees kings giving up revenue and authority because they could not control their samantas. The Gupta model of provinces plus copper-plate grants to local rulers, priests and chieftains supports the second view. A balanced answer says the same grant could do both.
• Law-books vs inscriptions: Prabhavati Gupta's Danguna grant goes against the Sanskrit legal texts that barred women from independent control of land. This shows that law-books are prescriptive (they say what should happen) while inscriptions are descriptive (they record what did happen). In the same way, loud prashasti claims can hide a real loss of power, so sources need to be read against the grain.
• Grants as economic records: exemption lists cover grass, hides, charcoal, flowers, milk, liquor, salt-digging, mines, hidden treasure and khadira trees. Together they act as an indirect census of rural production and of the state's claims on it. You can use them in any GS-I answer on the early Indian rural economy and the rise of a new rural elite.

Related concepts

• Agrahara
• Land grant terms
• Kulyavapa and dronavapa
• Brahmadeya
• Devadana
• Land grant debate

Read more

• Land grants and new rural elites