Mauryan empire

Also called: Maurya dynasty, Mauryas · Topic: The Mauryan Empire · NCERT: Class 7, Ch 5 "The Rise of Empires"; Class 9, Ch 5 "State and Society up to 1000 CE"; Class 12, Ch 2 "Kings, Farmers and Towns"; Class 12, Ch 3 "Kinship, Caste and Class - Early Societies"

Meaning

The Mauryan Empire was the empire that Chandragupta Maurya founded in c. 321 BCE. He took over the Nanda kingdom of Magadha, then spread his rule from the north-west (Afghanistan and Baluchistan) down to the Deccan plateau, ruling from Pāṭaliputra. It is called the first pan-Indian empire, because for the first time one throne ruled from the north-west to the Deccan [4]. It lasted until about 185 BCE. Historians have studied it closely and nationalist historians later praised it, but its control over such a huge area was uneven: tight near the centre, looser at the edges.

Explanation

Background: why Magadha, and why then?

• Magadha was already strong.
• The Nanda kings had built up a rich treasury and a large army there.
• Their capital was Pāṭaliputra (modern Patna, Bihar).

• Chandragupta did not build an empire from nothing. He captured a state that was already working and grew it.

• Alexander left a gap in the north-west.

• Alexander of Macedon left India around 325 BCE and died in 323 BCE.
• His generals split his empire among themselves.

• Greek satraps (governors Alexander had left behind) still held land in the north-west, but they were weak.

• The founding. A few years after Alexander left, Chandragupta founded the Maurya Empire in c. 321 BCE. He was the first ruler to bring most of India under one administration [2].

  Britannica gives slightly earlier steps: Magadha throne c. 325 BCE, Punjab c. 322 BCE, and the dynasty starting the year after [2]. NCERT keeps c. 321 BCE. These are two readings of the same few years, not two different empires [2].

Kautilya: the mentor behind the throne

• Kauṭilya = Chāṇakya = Viṣhṇugupta: three names for one man. He was Chandragupta's teacher and guide.
• Buddhist texts say he taught at Takṣhaśhila (Taxila) in the north-west.
• The legend of the insult:
• Kautilya advised the last Nanda king, Dhana Nanda, to change his ways.
• The king insulted him and threw him out of the court.

• Kautilya swore to end the "evil Nanda" rule, and he chose the young Chandragupta to do it.

• Britannica calls him a Brahman statesman and philosopher and Chandragupta's chief minister [2][3].

• He is credited with the Arthaśhāstra ("science of wealth/statecraft"), a manual on politics and government in 15 sections (books) [3].

How the empire was built (sequence)

• Step 1: Magadha. He took the Nanda lands and kept Pāṭaliputra as the capital.
• Step 2: The north-west. He defeated the Greek satraps and took their land.
• Step 3: War and treaty with Seleucus (305 BCE) [4]:
• Seleucus I Nicator, one of Alexander's generals, had set up the Seleucid kingdom in Iran.
• The fight ended in a treaty, not a long war.
• Seleucus gave up the lands west of the Indus (the trans-Indus provinces).

• Chandragupta gave Seleucus 500 elephants [4].

• Step 4: Diplomacy. The two sides stayed friendly and exchanged envoys (ambassadors) [4]. Megasthenes came to Chandragupta's court around 302 BCE [4][5].

Extent and results

• NCERT on its size:
• as far north-west as Afghanistan and Baluchistan (Class 12, "Kings, Farmers and Towns");

• from the northern plains down to the Deccan plateau (Class 7, "The Rise of Empires").

• Britannica on its size: from the Himalayas and the Kābul river valley in the north and west to the Vindhya range in the south [2].

• Uneven control. Such a large empire could not be ruled the same way everywhere.
• Areas near Pāṭaliputra were held tightly.

• Far-off forests, hills and border lands were held more loosely.

• The end. Mauryan rule lasted about 150 years and ended around 185 BCE.

Time, place and evidence

• Period: c. 321 BCE to c. 185 BCE.
• Dynasty and founder: the Maurya dynasty, founded by Chandragupta Maurya.
• Capital: Pāṭaliputra (Greek Palibothra), modern Patna, Bihar.
• Key people: Chandragupta Maurya, Kautilya/Chanakya, Dhana Nanda (the Nanda king he replaced), Seleucus I Nicator, Megasthenes.
• How we know about it:
• Arthaśhāstra (Kautilya): a manual on how a state should work. It is not a history of Chandragupta's reign [3].
• Indika (Megasthenes): the first written foreign account of India, in four books [5]. The original is lost. It survives only as quotations in later Greek writers such as Strabo and Arrian [4][6].
• Megasthenes on Pāṭaliputra, as quoted by Strabo and Arrian and repeated by ASI [4]:
  • it stood where the Ganga met the Erannaboas river;
  • it was about 14.5 km long and 2.4 km wide, shaped like a parallelogram (a long, rectangle-like shape);
  • a wooden wall with 570 towers, 64 gates and loop-holes (narrow slits for shooting arrows) ran round it;
  • a ditch about 182 m wide and 14 m deep guarded it.
• Schwanbeck fragments: a 19th-century English translation of the surviving pieces of Indika, printed with Arrian's Indika, is held by the Library of Congress [6].
• Later Buddhist and Jain texts: these hold founder legends such as the Kautilya–Dhana Nanda story.
• Archaeology: ASI excavations at Pataliputra, Bihar [4].

Don't confuse with

• Chandragupta Maurya vs Chandragupta I (Gupta): the Maurya founder ruled in c. 321 BCE. The Gupta Chandragupta came centuries later and belongs to a different dynasty.
• Arthaśhāstra vs Indika: the Arthaśhāstra is an Indian manual on statecraft, credited to Kautilya and written in 15 books [3]. Indika is a Greek envoy's account, written in four books and now lost [5].
• Seleucus I Nicator vs Alexander: Alexander left India c. 325 BCE. Seleucus was one of his generals who later set up the Seleucid kingdom and signed the 305 BCE treaty with Chandragupta [4].
• Nanda vs Maurya: the Nandas ruled Magadha before the Mauryas. Their last king, Dhana Nanda, was the one Chandragupta replaced.

Prelims Hooks

• c. 321 BCE: Chandragupta Maurya founds the Maurya Empire after taking over Nanda Magadha. Capital: Pāṭaliputra (Patna).
• Kauṭilya = Chāṇakya = Viṣhṇugupta: one man. His work, the Arthaśhāstra, has 15 books [3].
• 305 BCE treaty with Seleucus I Nicator: Chandragupta gets the trans-Indus provinces and Seleucus gets 500 elephants [4].
• Megasthenes came to the court c. 302 BCE as Seleucus's envoy. He wrote Indika in four books, which survives only through Strabo and Arrian [4][5][6].
• Palibothra = Pāṭaliputra: 570 towers, 64 gates, wooden wall, 14.5 km × 2.4 km [4].
• Chronology trap: Alexander leaves (c. 325 BCE) → Alexander dies (323 BCE) → Maurya Empire founded (c. 321 BCE) → Seleucus treaty (305 BCE) → Megasthenes arrives (c. 302 BCE).

Mains Points

• How the empire was built:
• Chandragupta took over the Nanda state, which already had a treasury, an army and a capital.
• He also used the gap left by Alexander in the north-west.

• The 305 BCE treaty with Seleucus turned a war into a fixed border, an elephant deal and an exchange of envoys [4]. Mauryan power rested on arms and on settled agreements with Hellenistic (Greek) kingdoms. This is a useful point for answers on early Indian foreign policy.

• The problem of sources:

• The Arthaśhāstra describes an ideal state, not real events.
• Indika survives only in second-hand Greek quotations [4][6].
• The founder stories come from later Buddhist and Jain legends.

• So historians test each source before treating it as fact. This also helps explain why the empire's real control on the ground was uneven, even though nationalist historians later praised it as a great all-India state.

• Legend and memory: the Kautilya–Dhana Nanda insult story gives a satisfying motive for the fall of the Nandas, but it comes from later texts. It shows how Indian tradition remembered the Mauryan founding, even where the details cannot be checked.

Related concepts

• Chandragupta Maurya
• Kautilya
• Seleucus-Chandragupta treaty
• Megasthenes
• Indika
• Deimachus
• Dionysius

Read more

• Chandragupta Maurya and Kautilya: founding the empire (c. 321 BCE)