Fundamental of Ancient Indian Music and Dance

Author(s): Sureshchandra Benarji
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 83

Fundamentals of Ancient Indian Music and Dance
to train the music-lovers of China in the modes of Indian rāgas. It appears that the Chinese used to cultivate Indian music down to the 9th-10th centuries. Ancient Chinese manuscripts testify to their familiarity with the seven svaras, grāmas, mārchanās etc. of the Indian system of music. According to some, the musical notes of China have been modelled on those of India. It is significant that at least three Chinese notes correspond to the three svaras called Sadja, Rşabha and Pañcama. In the sixth century, Korea was also a seat of Indian music. From China and Korea it travelled to Japan. Indian colonies in Champa or Kambuja may have played a part in the transmission of Indian music to Japan. According to an ancient Japanese tradition, two chief types of music, called Bodhisattva and Bairo, were imported from China to Japan by an Indian Brahmin named. Bodhi. Bodhisattva is evidently an Indian appellation. Bairo seems to have been derived from the Indian rāga Bhairava which is still called Bhairo in Hindi.
of the Far Eastern countries-Java, Bali, Sumatra and Cambodia looked upon our music with respect, and actively cultivated it.
Some songs of Tibet, particularly those of the devotional character, appear to have elements in imitation of the Sāman songs.
According to some scholars, the musical instruments like the harp, which resemble the Indian viņā, were borrowed from India by such ancient lands as Greece, Egypt, Alexandria etc.
There are certain striking parallelisms between the Indian and Greek systems of music. For example, the two earliest scales of Greece, called Mixolydic and Doric, have resemblance with early Indian scales. Pythagoras' scheme of cycle of the fifth and cycle of the fourth in musical system correspond to the sadja-pañcuma and sadja-madhyama bhavas of the Natyaśāstra. Though mere likeness of the two systems is no evidence of one borrowing from the other, yet the probability of