Early History of Orissa

SR No.: 006922
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Amarchand Mittal
Publisher: Jain Cultural Research Society
Publication Year: 1957
Total Pages: 506
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 9 MB

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AN EARLY HISTORY OF ORISSA king Sātakarņi in triumphantly marching with all the four divisions of his army, amply attests to the fact that Khāravela excelled, even while he was yet a prince, in the art of war and warfare (Yujjhā-yujjhāpana kiriyā). which is to say that sava-vijā is also meant to include yuddhavidyā. The same inference may be drawn from the various acts of valour on the part of Khāravela recorded in his inscriptions.
Nevertheless, the expression saya-vijā suffers from vagueness and indefiniteness. In early period, a prince was certainly required to attain complete control over his passions by consideration of the examples of famous personages and was never to be off his guaril or lacking in force, rather energy (utthāna'.1 But there is no mention found in Khāravela's record to that effect.
What was precisely the traditional total of vidyas viz. sciences and arts prescribed for the education and training of Indian princes in the days of Khāravela, cannct be said with certainty. The Milinda-pañha? mentions that the princes of the earth were to learn the arts of writing and counting, and of handling the weapons and troops, and were to put into practice the principles of Polity, Śruti, Smțiti and the Sciences of war and warfare.
This is but a rough and ready way of enumerating in one breath the list of sciences and arts, which the Indian princes were required to master and make judicious and skilful use of. But, further on, the Milinda-pañha itself furnishes us with a list of nineteen sciences and arts in all (vachanena ekunavisati), in which king Milinda (Menander), its ideal Indo-Bactrian prince, gained
1. F. W. Thomas, CHI, Vol. I, p. 492, fn. 5. 2. Trenchneri's Edition, p. 178.