Chandragupta Maurya

Chandragupta Maurya (340 BC – 298 BC) was the founder of the Mauryan Empire and the first emperor to unify India into one state. He ruled from 322 BC until his voluntary retirement and abdication in favour of his son Bindusara in 298 BC.

Chandragupta Maurya is a pivotal figure in the history of India. Prior to his consolidation of power, most of South Asia was ruled by small states, while the Nanda Dynasty dominated the Gangetic Plains. Chandragupta succeeded in conquering and subjugating almost all of the Indian subcontinent by the end of his reign. His empire extended from Bengal and Assam in the east, to Afghanistan and Balochistan, eastern and south-east Iran in the west, to Kashmir in the north, and to the Deccan Plateau in the south. It was the largest empire yet seen in Indian history.

After unifying India, Chandragupta and his chief advisor Chanakya passed a series of major economic and political reforms. He established a strong central administration patterned after Chanakya’s text on politics, the Arthashastra (English: Economics and Political Science). Mauryan India was characterised by an efficient and highly organised bureaucratic structure with a large civil service. Due to its unified structure, the empire developed a strong economy, with internal and external trade thriving and agriculture flourishing. In both art and architecture, the Mauryan empire constituted a landmark. There was a growth in culture which derived its inspiration from the Achaemenids and the Hellenistic world. Chandragupta's reign was a time of great social and religious reform in India. Buddhism and Jainism became increasingly prominent.

In foreign Greek and Latin accounts, Chandragupta is known as Sandrokottos and Androcottus. He became well known in the Hellenistic world for conquering Alexander the Great's easternmost satrapies, and for defeating the most powerful of Alexander's successors, Seleucus I Nicator, in battle. Chandragupta subsequently married Seleucus's daughter to formalize an alliance and established a policy of friendship with the Hellenistic kingdoms, which stimulated India's trade and contact with the western world. The Greek diplomat Megasthenes is an important source of Mauryan history.

Chandragupta was influenced to accept Jainism by the sage Bhadrabahu; he abdicated his throne to spend his last days at the Shravana Belgola, a famous religious site in southwest India, where he fasted to death. Along with his grandson, Ashoka, Chandragupta Maurya is one of the most celebrated rulers in the history of India. He has played a crucial role in shaping the national identity of modern India, and has been lionised as a model ruler and as a national hero.

Early life
Very little is known about Chandragupta's youth and ancestry. What is known is gathered from later classical Sanskrit literature, as well as classical Greek and Latin sources which refer to Chandragupta by the names "Sandracottos" or "Andracottus."

Many Indian literary traditions connect him with the Nanda Dynasty in modern day Bihar in eastern India. More than half a millennium later, the Sanskrit drama Mudrarakshasa calls him a "Nandanvaya" i.e. the descendant of Nanda (Act IV). Again more than a millennium later, Dhundiraja, a commentator of 18th century on Mudrarakshasa states that Chandragupta was the son of the Nanda king Sarvarthasiddhi by a wife named Mura, daughter of a Vrishala (Shudra). Mudrarakshasa uses terms like kula-hina and Vrishala for Chandragupta's lineage. This reinforces Justin's contention that Chandragupta had a humble origin. On the other hand, the same play describes the Nandas as of Prathita-kula, i.e. illustrious, lineage. The medieval commentator on the Vishnu Purana informs us that Chandragupta was the son of a Nanda prince and a dasi (maid) named Mura. The poets Kshmendra and Somadeva call him Purvananda-suta, son of the genuine Nanda, as opposed to Yoga-Nanda, i.e. pseudo-Nanda. The Nanda dynasty was started by Mahapadma Nanda, who is considered the first Shudra king of Magadha.

The Buddhist text the Mahavamsa calls Chandragupta a member of a division of the Gupta(Vaisya) clan called the Moriya (Maurya). Divyāvadāna calls Bindusara, son of Chandragupt, an anointed Vaisya, Murdhabhishikata, and in the same work King Ashoka, son of Bindusara, is also styled a Vaisya. The Mahaparinibbana Sutta states that the Moriyas (Mauryas) belonged to the Kshatriya community of Pippalivana. These traditions indicate that Chandragupt came from a Vaisya lineage. The Mahavamshatika connects him with the Shakya clan of the Buddha, a clan which also belongs to the race of Ādityas.

A medieval inscription represents the Maurya clan as belonging to the solar race of Kshatriyas. It is stated that the Maurya line sprang from Suryavamsi Mandhatri, son of prince Yuvanashva of the solar race. Chandragupta was a student of Chanakya.

Plutarch reports that he met with Alexander the Great and Uvaratanam Velayudan, probably around Takshasila in the northwest, and that he viewed the ruling Nanda Empire in a negative light:

"Androcottus, when he was a stripling, saw Alexander himself, and we are told that he often said in later times that Alexander narrowly missed making himself master of the country, since its king was hated and despised on account of his baseness and low birth."

According to this text, the encounter would have happened around 326 BCE, suggesting a birth date for Chandragupta around 340 BCE. Plutarch and other Greco-Roman historians appreciated the gravity of Chandragupta Maurya's conquests. Justin describes the humble origins of Chandragupta, and explains how he later led a popular uprising against the Nanda king.

Foundation of the Maurya Empire
Chandragupta Maurya, with the help of Chanakya, defeated the Magadha king and the army of the Chandravanshi clan. Following his victory, the defeated generals of Alexander settled in Gandhara (the Kamboja kingdom), today's Afghanistan. At the time of Alexander's invasion, Chanakya was a teacher in Takshasila. The king of Takshasila and Gandhara, Ambhi (also known as Taxiles), made a peace treaty with Alexander. Chanakya, however, planned to defeat the foreign invasion and sought help from other kings to unite and fight Alexander. Parvateshwara (Porus), a king of Punjab, was the only local king who was able to challenge Alexander at the Battle of the Hydaspes River, but he was defeated.

Chanakya then went further east to Magadha, to seek the help of Dhana Nanda, who ruled the vast Nanda Empire which extended from Bihar and Bengal in the east to Punjab and Sindh in the west, but Dhana Nanda refused to help him. After this incident, Chanakya began to persuade his disciple Chandragupta of the need to build an empire that could protect Indian territories from foreign invasion.

Nanda army


According to Plutarch, at the time of the Battle of the Hydaspes River, the Nanda Empire's army numbered 200,000 infantry, 80,000 cavalry, 8,000 chariots, and 7,000 war elephants, which discouraged Alexander's men and prevented their further progress into India: "As for the Macedonians, however, their struggle with Porus blunted their courage and stayed their further advance into India. For having had all they could do to repulse an enemy who mustered only twenty thousand infantry and two thousand horse, they violently opposed Alexander when he insisted on crossing the river Ganges also, the width of which, as they learned, was thirty-two furlongs, its depth a hundred fathoms, while its banks on the further side were covered with multitudes of men-at‑arms and horsemen and elephants. For they were told that the kings of the Ganderites and Praesii were awaiting them with eighty thousand horsemen, two hundred thousand footmen, eight thousand chariots, and six thousand fighting elephants. And there was no boasting in these reports. For Androcottus, who reigned there not long afterwards, made a present to Seleucus of five hundred elephants, and with an army of six hundred thousand men overran and subdued all India."

In order to defeat the powerful Nanda army, Chandragupta needed to raise a formidable army of his own.

Conquest of the Nanda Empire
Chanakya had trained and guided Chandragupta and together they planned the destruction of Dhana Nanda. The Mudrarakshasa of Visakhadutta as well as the Jain work Parisishtaparvan talk of Chandragupta's alliance with the Himalayan king Parvatka, sometimes identified with Porus.

It is noted in the Chandraguptakatha that Chandragupta and Chanakya were initially rebuffed by the Nanda forces. Regardless, in the ensuing war, Chandragupta faced off against Bhadrasala, the commander of Dhana Nanda's armies. He was eventually able to defeat Bhadrasala and Dhana Nanda in a series of battles, culminating in the siege of the capital city Pataliputra and the conquest of the Nanda Empire around 321 BCE, thus founding the powerful Maurya Empire in Northern India by the time he was about 20 years old.

Conquest of Macedonian territories in India
After Alexander's death in 323 BCE, Chandragupta, turned his attention to Northwestern India (modern Pakistan), where he defeated the satrapies (described as "prefects" in classical Western sources) left in place by Alexander (according to Justin), and may have assassinated two of his governors, Nicanor and Philip. The satrapies he fought may have included Eudemus, ruler in western Punjab until his departure in 317 BCE; and Peithon, son of Agenor, ruler of the Greek colonies along the Indus until his departure for Babylon in 316 BCE. The Roman historian Justin described how Sandrocottus (Greek version of Chandragupta's name) conquered the northwest:

"Some time after, as he was going to war with the generals of Alexander, a wild elephant of great bulk presented itself before him of its own accord, and, as if tamed down to gentleness, took him on its back, and became his guide in the war, and conspicuous in fields of battle. Sandrocottus, having thus acquired a throne, was in possession of India, when Seleucus was laying the foundations of his future greatness; who, after making a league with him, and settling his affairs in the east, proceeded to join in the war against Antigonus. As soon as the forces, therefore, of all the confederates were united, a battle was fought, in which Antigonus was slain, and his son Demetrius put to flight. "

Expansion
By the time he was only about 20 years old, Chandragupta, who had succeeded in defeating the Macedonian satrapies in India and conquering the Nanda Empire, had founded a vast empire that extended from the Bay of Bengal in the east, to the Indus River in the west. In later years he would expand this empire. Chandragupta Maurya (340 BC – 298 BC) was the founder of the Mauryan Empire and the first emperor to unify India into one state. He ruled from 322 BC until his voluntary retirement and abdication in favour of his son Bindusara in 298 BC.[4][5][6]

Chandragupta Maurya is a pivotal figure in the history of India. Prior to his consolidation of power, most of South Asia was ruled by small states, while the Nanda Dynasty dominated the Gangetic Plains.[7] Chandragupta succeeded in conquering and subjugating almost all of the Indian subcontinent by the end of his reign.[nb 1] His empire extended from Bengal and Assam in the east, to Afghanistan and Balochistan, eastern and south-east Iran in the west, to Kashmir in the north, and to the Deccan Plateau in the south. It was the largest empire yet seen in Indian history.[8][9]

After unifying India, Chandragupta and his chief advisor Chanakya passed a series of major economic and political reforms. He established a strong central administration patterned after Chanakya’s text on politics, the Arthashastra. Mauryan India was characterised by an efficient and highly organised bureaucratic structure with a large civil service. Due to its unified structure, the empire developed a strong economy, with internal and external trade thriving and agriculture flourishing. In both art and architecture, the Mauryan empire constituted a landmark. There was a growth in culture which derived its inspiration from the Achaemenids and the Hellenistic world.[10] Chandragupta's reign was a time of great social and religious reform in India. Buddhism and Jainism became increasingly prominent.

In foreign Greek and Latin accounts, Chandragupta is known as Sandrokottos and Androcottus.[11] He became well known in the Hellenistic world for conquering Alexander the Great's easternmost satrapies, and for defeating the most powerful of Alexander's successors, Seleucus I Nicator, in battle. Chandragupta subsequently married Seleucus's daughter to formalize an alliance and established a policy of friendship with the Hellenistic kingdoms, which stimulated India's trade and contact with the western world. The Greek diplomat Megasthenes is an important source of Mauryan history.

Chandragupta was influenced to accept Jainism by the sage Bhadrabahu; he abdicated his throne to spend his last days at the Shravana Belgola, a famous religious site in southwest India, where he fasted to death. Along with his grandson, Ashoka, Chandragupta Maurya is one of the most celebrated rulers in the history of India. He has played a crucial role in shaping the national identity of modern India, and has been lionised as a model ruler and as a national hero.

Conquest of Seleucus' eastern territories
Seleucus I Nicator, a Macedonian satrap of Alexander, reconquered most of Alexander's former empire and put under his own authority the eastern territories as far as Bactria and the Indus (Appian, History of Rome, The Syrian Wars 55), until in 305 BCE he entered into conflict with Chandragupta:

"Always lying in wait for the neighboring nations, strong in arms and persuasive in council, he acquired Mesopotamia, Armenia, 'Seleucid' Cappadocia, Persis, Parthia, Bactria, Arabia, Tapouria, Sogdia, Arachosia, Hyrcania, and other adjacent peoples that had been subdued by Alexander, as far as the river Indus, so that the boundaries of his empire were the most extensive in Asia after that of Alexander. The whole region from Phrygia to the Indus was subject to Seleucus. He crossed the Indus and waged war with Sandrocottus [Maurya], king of the Indians, who dwelt on the banks of that stream, until they came to an understanding with each other and contracted a marriage relationship. Some of these exploits were performed before the death of Antigonus and some afterward."

The exact details of engagement are not known. As noted by scholars such as R. C. Majumdar and D. D. Kosambi, Seleucus appears to have fared poorly, having ceded large territories west of the Indus to Chandragupta. Due to his defeat, Seleucus surrendered Arachosia, Gedrosia, Paropamisadae, and Aria.

Mainstream scholarship asserts that Chandragupta received vast territory west of the Indus, including the Hindu Kush, modern day Afghanistan, and the Balochistan province of Pakistan. Archaeologically, concrete indications of Mauryan rule, such as the inscriptions of the Edicts of Ashoka, are known as far as Kandhahar in southern Afghanistan.

"After having made a treaty with him [Sandrakotos] and put in order the Orient situation, Seleucos went to war against Antigonus."

It is generally thought that Chandragupta married Seleucus's daughter to formalize an alliance. In a return gesture, Chandragupta sent 500 war-elephants,    a military asset which would play a decisive role at the Battle of Ipsus in 302 BCE. In addition to this treaty, Seleucus dispatched an ambassador, Megasthenes, to Chandragupta, and later Deimakos to his son Bindusara, at the Mauryan court at Pataliputra (modern Patna in Bihar state). Later Ptolemy II Philadelphus, the ruler of Ptolemaic Egypt and contemporary of Ashoka the Great, is also recorded by Pliny the Elder as having sent an ambassador named Dionysius to the Mauryan court.

Classical sources have also recorded that following their treaty, Chandragupta and Seleucus exchanged presents, such as when Chandragupta sent various aphrodisiacs to Seleucus:

"And Theophrastus says that some contrivances are of wondrous efficacy in such matters [as to make people more amorous]. And Phylarchus confirms him, by reference to some of the presents which Sandrakottus, the king of the Indians, sent to Seleucus; which were to act like charms in producing a wonderful degree of affection, while some, on the contrary, were to banish love."

Southern conquest
After annexing Seleucus' eastern Persian provinces, Chandragupta had a vast empire extending across the northern parts of Indian Sub-continent, from the Bay of Bengal to the Arabian Sea. Chandragupta then began expanding his empire further south beyond the barrier of the Vindhya Range and into the Deccan Plateau except the Tamil regions (Pandya, Chera, Chola and Satyaputra) and Kalinga (modern day Odisha). By the time his conquests were complete, Chandragupta had succeeded in unifying most of Southern Asia. Megasthenes later recorded the size of Chandragupta's army as 400,000 soldiers, according to Strabo:

"Megasthenes was in the camp of Sandrocottus, which consisted of 400,000 men."

On the other hand, Pliny, who also drew from Megasthenes' work, gives even larger numbers of 600,000 infantry, 30,000 cavalry, and 9,000 war elephants:

"But the Prasii surpass in power and glory every other people, not only in this quarter, but one may say in all India, their capital Palibothra, a very large and wealthy city, after which some call the people itself the Palibothri,--nay even the whole tract along the Ganges. Their king has in his pay a standing army of 600,000-foot-soldiers, 30,000 cavalry, and 9,000 elephants: whence may be formed some conjecture as to the vastness of his resources."

Jainism and death
According to Jain tradition, Chandragupta gave up his throne in the beginning of 3rd century BCE, when he was forty-two years old, and became an ascetic under the Jain saint Bhadrabahu, migrating south with them and ending his days in sallekhana (death by fasting) at Śravaṇa Beḷgoḷa in present day Karnataka, though fifth-century inscriptions in the area support the concept of a larger southern migration around that time.

Successors
Chandragupta Maurya renounced his throne to his son, Bindusara, who became the new Mauryan Emperor. Bindusara's son Ashoka the Great became one of the most influential kings in India's history due to his important role in the history of Buddhism.

In popular culture
Chanakya's role in formation of the Mauryan Empire is the essence of a historical/spiritual novel The Courtesan and the Sadhu by Dr. Mysore N. Prakash.

The story of Chanakya and Chandragupta was made into a film in Telugu Language in 1977 titled Chanakya Chandragupta. Akkineni Nageswara Rao played the role of Chanakya, while N. T. Rama Rao portrayed as Chandragupta.

Santosh Sivan's 2001 epic Hindi language film Asoka. The sword of Chandragupt plays an important role in the film.

The television series Chanakya is an account of the life and times of Chanakya, based on the play "Mudra Rakshasa" (The Signet Ring of "Rakshasa").

Also there is a television series on Imagine TV called Chandragupt Maurya

The Indian Postal Service issued a commemorative postage stamp honoring Chandragupta Maurya in 2001.

In the American comic strip Pearls Before Swine a girl named "Carla" mentions the story of him becoming an ascetic, although she says monk, and starving to death.