Friday, November 27, 2009

ORIGIN OF THE MAURYAS

ORIGIN OF THE MAURYAS

The determination of the caste of the ruling dynasties has attracted the attention of historians while writing ancient Indian history. Most historians agree on assigning either a 'low caste' or a tribal origin to the Maurya family. According to the brahmanical tradition, Chandragupta Maurya, the founder of the Maurya dynasty, was born of Mura, it shudra woman in the court of the last Nanda king. From her came the family name Maurya. But an earlier Buddhist tradition says that Chandragupta was a member of the Moriya Kshatriya clan. of Pipphalivana (located in the region of Gorakhpur adjoining the Nepalese teraL The tradition thus suggests that the Moriya clan was linked to the Sakya tribe to which Gautam Buddha belonged. This implies that the Mauryas in some sense, were Kshatriyas. The Maurya title of the Chandragupta family is said to have been derived from the Moriya tribe. It is also suggested that the 'Gupta' in Chandragupta's name and the later episode of Asoka's marriage to the daughter of a merchant of Vidisa lend credence to the view that the Mauryas might have been of Vaishya origin.
In the end, it can be concluded that whatever caste the Mauryas might have belonged to the deftness with which they ruled shows the likelihood of their being of the kshatriya varna.

No comments:

Post a Comment