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Ancient India and South-East Asia as Known from Jaina Sources
Dr. M. S. Shukla
The eastern littoral beyond the Ganges has long been a terra incognita to the Ancient World. How and when it became known to antiquity is a crucial subject for historical and geographical studies. Being situated to its south-east, the issue of this area has to be investigated in relation to India.
The ancient Jaina sources seem to have a significant bearing on the question. The South-East is noted as Suvarnabhumi in Ancient India. The Jaina texts also take notice of the area with this appellation.
The classical Greek and Roman accounts', the periplus, the works of Promponius Male, Pliny, Ptolemy allude to Chryse, an area which the last mentioned authority notices as Chryse Chora and Chryse chersonesus. These are equivalents of Suvarnabhumi in all. But these notices do not carry us beyond the early centuries of Christian era indicating that trans-Gangetic area was unknown to the Western World before this time.
Several Indian works also focus on the first century of our era. The Milinda Panha, the Niddesa commentary, the Valmiki Rāmāyaṇa are some of the examples. These works take note of Suvarnabhūmi. From the combined testimony of Indian and Western sources it appears that the eastern littoral beyond the Ganges was widely known to the antiquity in the early first millennium A. D. The moot point yet is whether we can discover the time when the South-East came to be first known to the Ancients.
The Arthasästra of Kautilya referring to products of economic importance enumerates Suvarnabhumi as the source of a variety of sandalwood. We get an indication of the way in which South-East was known in the later first millennium B. C. The Jaina literature also indicates that in this period the trans-Gangetic region formed a part of the known world.
The Uttaradhyayana Niryukti (Gāthā 20) alludes to Kälaka's travel to South-East. The author of Vhatkalpabhāṣya ( Vibhāga 1) citing Vṛhatkalpacūrṇi
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also refers to Kalaka's travel to the same. The Uttarādhyayana Cūrni also contains and corroborates this. Thus we have a continuous string of references to Kālaka's association with the South-East.
The Jaina sources seem to indicate a fairly early connection between India and Suvarnabhūmi as indicated by the Arthaśāstra. The Jaina works further indicate that such a measure of contact was continued in our era.
The Jaina sources inform us that Jainism was not confined to India but was carried to South-East by savants and missionaries. The story of Kalaka indicates that even before him this process was initiated. We know that Kālaka had gone to Suvarnabhumi to meet śramana Sāgara who was already living there. Is it possible then to suggest that Jaina savants had gone to Suvarnabhūmi even earlier than the time of Kālaka or śramana Sāgara for propagation of Jainism. ?
Dr. R. C. Majumdar citing an Annamite text of 14th century refers to the presence of ca-la-cha-la, i.e., Kālakācārya in Campā. The text probably records the traditional association of Kālakācārya with South-East, an echo of which had survived to its time. The commentators of Varāhamihira-saṁhitā states that the latter has noted the rules of Pravrajya according to Vankālakācārya. If Vankālakācārya and Kalakācārya are the same person, we get an indication of Kālakācārya's association with another South-East Asian area, i, e., the island of Banka, lying between Sumatra and Java.
Kālaka and śramana Sāgara obviously seem to have gone to the SouthEast for a religious mission. The Jaina tradition is suggestive then of the form and mechanism of Indianisation of South-East. The nature of first Indianisation of SouthEast Asia and the manner in which it was taking place is a matter open for opinion. The Jaina. sources seem to have a bearing on the concept of Indianisation and its operation across the Bay of Bengal. It is known that Kālaka flourished in the first century B. C. It seems most probable then that Indianization of South-East started in earnest in the period from the first century B. C. and carried on in to the Christian era. The initiation of the Indianisation process of the South-East may be seen in the light of an expansion of Indian religions outside India. We are reminded of the religious missionaries dispatched by emperor Asoka to the land of gold ( Suvarnabhūmi ).
The texts dealing with Kālaka narrative take into account the maritime trade across the Bay of Bengal. They suggest as such that we should consider the problem of Indianisation of South-East in a context, that included trade and cultural
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Dr. M. S. Shukla
relationship with the outside world. From the account of Arthaśāstra it may be well that Suvarnabhūmi entered into known world and found a place in ancient Geography as the sea-route, developed to the east across the Bay of Bengal.
If the Indianisation process tends to be interpreted in terms of an expansion of ancient maritime trade, the beginnings of Indianisation can not be later than 1st century B. C., a fact suggested by the Jaina tradition. The spread of Indian religion was a form of Indianization before the opening of Christian era and Indian savants and missionaries were the mechanics of Indianisation during its early stages. The merchants, besides carrying miscellaneous trade goods and carried art-works and cult objects for the faithful, are facts for common people. Thus merchants and missionaries were at work in the operation of the Indianisation process in the SouthEast from the time of its beginnings.
Before the official introduction of Indian political theory and religious ideas by the ruling states known as self-Indianisation, a form of Indianisation was well under way in the South-East. This process got a fillip in the first millennium A. D.
The Jaina tradition is eloquent on developing state of maritime trade to the South-East in the first century of our era. The Jaina texts like Vasudeva Hindi (300-500 A. D.) refer to Cārudatta's trading voyage to Suvarnabhūmi and reflect the flourishing condition of sea-trade across the Bay of Bengal.
Trade to the South-East was growing in proportion in Northern India in the Gupta period. There was also growing a centre of Jainism in Bengal as an inscription from Paharpur informs us. There seems a connection between the rise of this seat of Jainism and growing sea-trade to the South-East, since eastern India was at this time the nerve centre of trade to the South-East. It is known that Jainism has always been associated with traders in course of its development. The role of Jaina community in forming a connection with South-East and other areas and diffusion of Indian cultural elements there in the early Medieval period may be estimated in the light of Samarāiccakahā° and other writings dealing with external trade relations of India specially with Suvarnadvipa and Mahākatahādvipa.
References 1. D. P. Singhal, India and World Civilization, pp. 84-87.
2. Ibid, p. 85.
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________________ Ancient India and South-east Asia as known from Jaina Sources 61 3. Umakant Shah, Suvarnabhumi men Kalakacarya, Jaina Cultural Research Society, Varanasi - 5, 1956, p. 2. 4. Edited R. C. Mazumdar, 'Age of Imperial Unity'. Bhartiya Vidya Bhawan, Bombay - 7, 1951, p. 650. 5. Shah, op. cit., p. 5. 6. Singhal, op. cit., p. 84. 7. Shah, op. cit., p. 4. 8. Epigraphia Indica, XX, Archeological Survey of India, Janpath, New Delhi, 1983, p. 59. 9. Haribhadra : Samaraiccakaha, 4, 254; 5, 403, 407, 420, 426-427. *Department of A. I. H. C. & Archaeology Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi - 5.