Ashoka: Kalinga, dhamma and the edicts

Detail

Who Ashoka was, and how big his empire got

• Reign: 268–232 BCE (Class 7, Class 7 Part 1, Ch 5 "The Rise of Empires"). Class 12 Part 1, Ch 2 "Kings, Farmers and Towns" gives a slightly wider range, c. 272/268 – 231 BCE. Both are acceptable in the exam; quote the book you are asked about.
• He was Chandragupta Maurya's grandson. So the line runs: Chandragupta → Bindusara → Ashoka.
• Under him the empire covered almost the whole subcontinent except the far south. That includes land in today's Bangladesh, Pakistan and parts of Afghanistan.
• Britannica also dates the Kalinga campaign to 260 BCE, and says Ashoka began issuing edicts twelve years after his coronation (269 BCE) [3][2].

The Kalinga war

• Kalinga = present-day coastal Odisha.
• Conquered in his eighth regnal year (eighth year of his rule) [3].
• Ashoka himself put the human cost on stone: "One hundred and fifty thousand men were deported, a hundred thousand were killed, and many more died."
• Deported here means forced to leave home and move somewhere else.

• The same edict calls the slaughter, death and deportation "very painful and deplorable" — that is, deeply wrong and regrettable.

• After the war he turned to intense study of, love of and instruction in Dhamma, and took up the Buddha's path of non-violence.

• Class 7 asks a sharp question worth remembering: he could have kept quiet — why admit in public to a war he won? Two lines of answer:
• Remorse is the message. The confession is the proof that the new policy of dhamma is serious.
• Warning plus mercy. He tells the unconquered forest peoples he is sorry but still powerful. Regret is broadcast; the empire is not weakened.

What dhamma actually meant

• Dhamma is not the same as Buddhism. It is a public code of conduct for everyone in the empire.
• Class 12 lists four core rules:
• Respect towards elders.
• Generosity towards Brahmanas and renouncers (renouncers = people who left family life to seek truth).
• Kind treatment of slaves and servants.

• Respect for religions and traditions other than one's own.

• These are simple and almost universal — that was the point. Ashoka used them to hold a huge, mixed empire together, promising well-being in this world and the next.

• Britannica's list of dhamma principles matches and adds detail: non-violence, tolerance of all sects and opinions, obedience to parents, respect for Brahmins and other religious teachers, liberality towards friends, humane treatment of servants, generosity towards all [3].

The machinery to spread it

• Dhamma mahāmattas — special officers whose whole job was spreading dhamma.

• His edict says they work among all sects: the Buddhist Order (Sangha), brahmans, Ājīvikas, Jains and others.

• Pativedakas — reporters. They were to bring the people's affairs to the king at all times, anywhere: while he was eating, in the cow pen, in the palanquin (a covered seat carried on poles).

• Officials were told "All men are my children" and ordered to be impartial (treat everyone the same).
• Touring inspections every five years checked for wrongful imprisonment and torture.

Titles and the name problem

• Devanampiya = "Beloved of the Gods".
• Piyadassi = "pleasant to behold" / "one who regards others with kindness".
• Most inscriptions use only these titles. The name Asoka appears in only some inscriptions — which is why the link between the king of the edicts and the Ashoka of the texts had to be worked out by scholars.

The great communicator: rocks, pillars, scripts

• Edicts were engraved on rocks and pillars across the subcontinent, mostly in Prakrit, the people's spoken language, written in the Brahmi script.
• Wider script picture from outside NCERT:
• 14 major rock edicts and 7 pillar edicts, in many versions and copies spread over the empire [3].
• Mostly Prakrit in Brahmi; in the north-west, some use Kharoshthi (a script based on Aramaic). Greek and Aramaic inscriptions are limited to Afghanistan and the trans-Indus region — he wrote in whatever language people there already read [3].

• The Ashokan edicts were first deciphered by James Prinsep in the 1830s [2].

• Kalinga's own edicts on the ground:

• At Dhauli (Odisha) the edicts are cut on a boulder, and above them on a terrace is a rock-cut fore-part of an elephant, about four feet high — among the finest Ashokan sculpture known [4].

• A duplicate set of the Dhauli edicts is cut on a rock at Jaugada, on the bank of the Rushikulya river, north-west of Ganjam town, Ganjam district, Odisha [4].

• Other located edict sites: the Ashokan Rock Edicts at Junagadh, Gujarat [4]; the Mansehra Rock Edicts (now in Pakistan), on UNESCO's Tentative List [3]; and a serial nomination for "Ashokan Edict sites along the Mauryan Routes" also on the Tentative List [3].

• At Sarnath, fragments of the Ashokan pillar survive — reported as 15.25 m high, carrying his edict plus two later inscriptions; the Sarnath remains run from the 3rd century BCE to the 12th century CE [2].

What he claimed to do for people

• Medical care for people and animals, even beyond his own borders.

• The southern kingdoms named in the edicts — Cholas, Pandyas, Keralaputras, Satiyaputras — were outside the empire.

• Ban on hunting and on cruelty to animals.

• Along main roads: rest houses, wells, and fruit and shade trees.
• Emissaries (messengers) sent to Sri Lanka, Thailand, Central Asia and beyond.
• He urged every sect to study the best teachings of the others.
• NCERT's caution (Class 7 Part 1, Ch 5 "The Rise of Empires"): we need not take every one of Ashoka's claims literally. Edicts are the king's own publicity. But he clearly did work hard at reaching his subjects, in the Kautilyan welfare mould — the idea in the Arthashastra that the king's happiness lies in his people's happiness.

Prelims Hooks

• Ashoka's reign: 268–232 BCE (Class 7 Part 1, Ch 5 "The Rise of Empires"); Class 12 Part 1, Ch 2 "Kings, Farmers and Towns" gives c. 272/268–231 BCE.
• Kalinga conquered in his eighth regnal year; Britannica dates the campaign to 260 BCE [3].
• Edict casualty figures: 150,000 deported, 100,000 killed, many more died.
• Devanampiya = "Beloved of the Gods"; Piyadassi = "pleasant to behold". The personal name Asoka occurs in only some inscriptions.
• Dhamma mahāmattas = officers who spread dhamma; pativedakas = reporters who informed the king at any time.
• Edict languages/scripts: Prakrit in Brahmi (most), Kharoshthi in the north-west, Greek and Aramaic in Afghanistan and the trans-Indus region [3].
• 14 major rock edicts + 7 pillar edicts [3]; first deciphered by James Prinsep, 1830s [2].
• Dhauli (Odisha) — rock edicts with a rock-cut elephant forepart, c. 4 feet high; duplicate edicts at Jaugada on the Rushikulya river, Ganjam district [4].
• Southern peoples named in the edicts but outside the empire: Cholas, Pandyas, Keralaputras, Satiyaputras.
• Officials' touring inspections against wrongful imprisonment: every five years.

Mains Points

• Dhamma as a tool of statecraft, not just a personal faith. Its four planks (respect for elders, generosity to Brahmanas and renouncers, kindness to slaves and servants, respect for other religions) are deliberately non-sectarian. For an empire stretching from Afghanistan to Odisha, with many languages and beliefs, a shared minimum ethic was cheaper and safer than force. Note the officers worked among Buddhists, brahmans, Ājīvikas and Jains alike.
• The edict as a source: strength and limit. Edicts are contemporary, dated, and in the king's own voice — far better than later legend. But they are also royal self-presentation. NCERT itself warns against taking the welfare claims literally. Good answers pair the edict with archaeology (Dhauli, Jaugada, Junagadh, Sarnath) rather than trusting it alone [2][4].
• Why confess to Kalinga at all? Link the remorse to policy change: after Kalinga, conquest by arms is replaced by dhamma-vijaya (victory through dhamma) — medical aid and emissaries sent to southern kingdoms and to Sri Lanka, Thailand and Central Asia, places the army did not enter. The confession makes the new policy credible while still reminding the unsubdued of his strength.
• Language choice as administration. Writing in Prakrit, the people's language, and switching to Greek, Aramaic and Kharoshthi at the frontiers, shows the message was meant to be read, not merely displayed — an early example of a state adapting communication to its subjects [3].