L16 - Harshavardhana and Vardhan Dynasty | Complete course on Ancient History for UPSC

In the last session, we started with the story of the development of the Harshvardhan Empire. If you look here, you can see how the Guptas established a huge empire. But this Gupta Empire, around the 5th century, after the death of some important rulers like Kumar Gupta and Sandh Gupta, due to weak successors and due to the feudal system, the empire started declining. The feudal system is a very good system. We know how the local influential people get the support of the king. Due to the feudal system, you won't be able to see a large area of the empire directly under the ruler. You won't be able to see it directly under the administration. Because feudal lords are ruling and administering those territories. So these feudal lords, when they are present under any dynasty, and the central authority in that dynasty is getting weak, the ruler sitting on the throne is not very strong, then these feudal lords appear to be freeing themselves. They appear to be liberating themselves. And this is where we see the beginning of Pushyabhuti. Come, let's repeat a little. We talked about how in the Thanesar region, a feudal lord named Pushyabhuti was providing services under the Guptas. But as soon as the Guptas started getting weak, Pushyabhuti declared Thanesar independent and established the rule of his dynasty. You can call this dynasty the Pushyabhuti dynasty or the Vardhan dynasty. What you are seeing on the screen is the family tree of the Vardhan dynasty. In the Vardhan dynasty, after Pushyabhuti, we see Narvardhan, Rajyavardhan, Adityavardhan and Prabhakarvardhan. In the same way, we see three children of Prabhakarvardhan. Rajyavardhan, Harshvardhan and Rajshri. When the Vardhan dynasty started its rule from here, the Guptas were declining and the rule of the Guptas was getting closer to Pataliputra. The western part of UP is now under the Maukhari dynasty. In the Bengal region, we see the god ruler Shashank. Similarly, the Deccan region is under the Chalukyas dynasty. Here, the story is changing a little. In fact, this phase is also known as the transition phase. In this phase, we start moving from the ancient to the medieval. That is, we move from the ancient to the medieval India. There is a very interesting story. There is a very interesting story that we have to discuss here. How Rajyavardhan was present, but even after that, you see Harshvardhan as the ruler. We get to see a very interesting story here. To understand that story, we have to understand the situation in Malwa. This is the Malwa region, where we see rulers named Mahasen Guptas. Mahasen Guptas had two wives. You will see their sons here, Kumar Guptas, Madhav Guptas and Dev Guptas. Mahasen Guptas wanted the king of Malwa to be Kumar Guptas after him. This is what Mahasen Guptas wanted. After him, Kumar Guptas should have been the next ruler. But his second wife's son, Dev Guptas, always wanted to be the ruler. And because of this, Dev Guptas killed all his competitors. And established his rule over Malwa. Let me tell you one more thing. As long as Mahasen Guptas was the king, he had good relations with his neighboring states. But Dev Guptas did not believe in such relations. He did not believe in such alliances. This is why he was going to attack the neighboring kingdoms. This is why Dev Guptas was going to attack the Mokris in the Tannauj region. But what is the connection between the Mokris and Pushyabhutis? Let's understand this. Actually, when we see Thanesar, where Pushyabhutis are ruling, Tannauj, where Mokris are ruling, we see a kind of matrimonial alliance between them. Here, you see the marriage of Mokris' king, Griha Varman, with the daughter of Prabhakar Vardhan, i.e. the sister of Harshvardhan and Rajyavardhan, Rajashri. Rajyashri, who is Thanesar's princess, is getting married in the Mokri tribe, i.e. in the Mokris. She is getting married in Tannauj. So, in a way, you will see how Prabhakar Vardhan's family, i.e. Pushyabhutis, are connected with the Mokris due to matrimonial alliance. Now, what happens next? We will understand the rest of the story from this picture book. Here, Devgupta attacks the Mokris for the sake of expansion. He does not only attack the Mokris, but also kills Griha Varman. Rajyashri feels that if he submits himself, surrenders himself, then perhaps the rest of the kingdom of the Mokris will be saved. But Devgupta not only kidnapped Rajyashri, but also attacked the Mokris badly and many people were killed. It is obvious that this information will reach Thanesar. At this time, Thanesar's king is Prabhakar Vardhan's elder son, Rajyavardhan. So, all this information reaches Rajyavardhan. Let's see the family tree again. Here, we are talking about Rajyavardhan. Rajyavardhan was the king of Thanesar at that time. Rajyavardhan took a vow that he will kill Devgupta because he has ruined the entire family alliance. So, Rajyavardhan is coming and he is attacking Devgupta and he is also killing Devgupta. In our story, Devgupta has been killed. But when Rajyavardhan was returning after killing Devgupta, he was also looking for his sister in his kingdom. At that time, there was a friend of Devgupta who was attacking Rajyavardhan from behind. And he is none other than God Shashak Shashank. This attack of Shashank killed Rajyavardhan. And Harshavardhan gets all this information. So, in our entire story, God Shashank is present. Harshavardhan is present and Rajyavardhan is imprisoned somewhere. Harshavardhan got all this information. Harshavardhan came with his army and fought with Shashank. He defeated Shashank and killed Shashank. And Rajyavardhan was about to commit suicide. Harshavardhan also saved his sister. So, in this way, we see the whole story in which Rajyashri survives in the end. And Thanesar sees Harshavardhan as a new king. But now Harshavardhan cannot rule from Thanesar. Because not only he has to protect his kingdom and administer his kingdom, but he also has to take care of his sister's kingdom, Kannauj state. So, Harshavardhan thought it would be better to unite these two states and take his capital from Thanesar to Kannauj. So, you will see the capital also shifting here. You will see Kannauj capital shifting from Thanesar. In fact, if you look at it in one way, Kannauj is near the Ganga-Yamuna river in Uttar Pradesh. And in the whole ancient period, the most important capital was Pataliputra. But now we see the capital shifting from Pataliputra to the west. So, Kannauj is taking birth as a new significant strategic capital in the time of Harshavardhan. In this way, Harshavardhan became the king. As I told you yesterday, there are a lot of sources to read about Harshavardhan. Bhanbhatt is the court poet of Harshavardhan. Harsha Charita, Kadambari. Harshavardhan himself was a writer. In which Naganandam, Priyadarshika, Ratnavali are his works. Then during the time of Harshavardhan, we see a Chinese traveler coming here, whose name was Huan Zhang or you can call him Heng Zhang. He has written a journal or an account book, which we call Shivki. Similarly, there is a writer named Willy, who has written the biographies of Heng Zhang. And he has given good details about Heng Zhang's visit to India. We also have inscriptional sources. Like Madhuban inscription, Sonipat inscription, Banaskhida inscription and Aihol inscription. When the time comes, you will get to know what kind of content is given in these inscriptions. Now let's talk a little about Harshavardhan. See, we have already read about a Chinese traveler. Chandragupta II, Vikramaditya. A very powerful king of the Gupta dynasty. During his time, a Chinese traveler came, Pahiyan. But we have seen that Pahiyan did not visit the courts of the kings. Mostly, he stayed among the people and saw the life of the people. It is true that Pahiyan was aware of the Gupta rulers. But we do not see any kind of interaction with them. But now we see that during the time of Harshavardhan, Huan Zhang comes. And Huan Zhang or Heng Zhang is not like Pahiyan. He has to go to the proper courts. He visits the court of the king, the court of Harshavardhan. And Heng Zhang's account book does not only give us the socio-economic information of the Vardhan dynasty. But also gives us some political information. So who is Harshavardhan on the basis of Huan Zhang or Heng Zhang's account book? Let's see. Here Heng Zhang has told that Harshavardhan was initially a devotee of Lord Shiva. In fact, even in the Madhuban and Banaskheda inscriptions, Harshavardhan is said to be a devotee of Lord Shiva. In fact, for Harshavardhan, we see the title Sheela Aditya. Sheela Aditya means moral. A king who holds values. So you will see him as Sheela Aditya. You will see him as a devotee of Lord Shiva. So when we cross-check this information of Heng Zhang with other sources, we come to know that this information is correct. That he is a devotee of Lord Shiva. But Heng Zhang brings a twist. Heng Zhang says that he was initially a devotee of Lord Shiva. Harshavardhan was initially a devotee of Lord Shiva. But after that, he became a Hinayan Buddhist. He became influenced by Hinayan Buddhism. And after that, he started following Hinayan Buddhism. But then Heng Zhang claims that as soon as Harshavardhan met Heng Zhang, Heng Zhang became a Hinayan Buddhist. And he also accepted that Gautam Buddha was God. And after that, Harshavardhan started making a lot of Chaitra and Viharas. We get all this information from Heng Zhang's account book. It is very important to cross-check this information. Because you will see that in the major area of Heng Zhang's account book, Mahayana Buddhism has been praised. So sometimes it seems that Heng Zhang is writing a lot of content so that he can praise Mahayana Buddhism. And a lot of content seems to be exaggerated. We are saying all this because if I talk about the inscriptions related to Harshavardhan's period in India, then we do not get this information that he is a devotee of Lord Shiva and later became a Buddhist. But Heng Zhang is claiming this. Anyway, one thing that is given in Heng Zhang's account book and the inscriptions that we have, is that there is a religious gathering every five years. Harshavardhan was such a king who used to organize a gathering of scholars related to different religions, he used to organize a meeting of scholars related to different religions every five years. This information is also found in Heng Zhang's book and in the inscriptions of Harshavardhan. The purpose of these five-year gatherings was that the scholars of different religions should come and share their knowledge. There should be a truthful discussion. They should learn something from each other's philosophy. There have been some such gatherings or meetings here which are very popular and they have also been mentioned in Heng Zhang's account book. For example, the Tanauj Assembly. Heng Zhang also writes about this in his book. You can call it the Tanauj Assembly. When we talk about the Tanauj Assembly, it is said that this assembly was called to honor Heng Zhang. So you can imagine that Heng Zhang is sitting here among many people. Many people have come. Because this is a religious gathering, you will find many scholars and kings here. There were 20 kings. Thousands of scholars came from Nalanda University. Almost 300 Heng Yang devotees, Heng Yanis, Mahayanis, 300 Brahmins and Jains came. So you can see that people from different religions and philosophies were present in this assembly. So it was a kind of religious assembly as Harshvardhar used to call it. But there was one more special thing about it which is being told by Heng Zhang that it was called to honor Heng Zhang. Now suppose there is a stage and Heng Zhang is being called to the stage. The king is giving him some gifts and then Heng Zhang is asked to say two words. You have come from so far to visit Buddhist sites, to read Buddhist manuscripts and to translate them. So we are feeling honored that you are here in front of everyone. So please say two words. Now imagine that as soon as Heng Zhang got this chance, Heng Zhang started praising Mahayan Buddhism on the stage. He started saying that Mahayan Buddhism is superior to all the other philosophies. In this, the scholars related to the other philosophies got angry. The other religious scholars got angry. And chairs and chairs started breaking here. And we see one more thing that the whole tent was set on fire. So we see a case like a fire burning here in Kannawaja assembly. So this Kannawaja assembly was very important. Heng Zhang says many more things about this assembly. He says that in this Kannawaja assembly, there was a very big statue of Gautam Buddha in gold. Along with this, in this Kannawaja assembly, there were statues of Lord Shiva and Lord Vishnu. But they were smaller in size than Gautam Buddha. Which symbolically shows that Buddhism is very great. And if we talk about Lord Shiva and Lord Vishnu, it looks like they are attendants of Gautam Buddha. Heng Zhang writes such things in his book. So Heng Zhang is completely immersed in Mahayan Buddhism. He likes his philosophy very much. And this thing shines in his writings too. There is such an assembly, Alhabad assembly. You can say Alhabad, you can say Prayagraj. There was such an assembly there too. But it is not popular because of Heng Zhang. It is popular for the reason that it is said that Harshvardhan had donated so much to different religious scholars and theologians that their entire treasure chest was empty. So Harshvardhan used to call such religious gatherings. And his purpose was that he should talk to scholars associated with different philosophies, acquire knowledge, gain knowledge. All this can be seen. So, in this way, the king is calling such assemblies. As I told you, Harshvardhan is giving political information, but he also gives us socio-economic information. He tells how Brahmins and Kshatriyas were living a very simple life. Whereas many priests and ministers used to live a luxurious life. By this time, Shudras became agriculturalists. That is, they started farming. And due to this reason, the gap between Shudra and Vaishya, there was a line, it started blurring gradually. Because we all know that agriculturalists come in Vaishya world. So if Shudras also do farming, then they will connect with Vaishya world in a way. The gap between them will be reduced. Hence, the situation of untouchables is very bad here. As it was during the time of Guptas, the same things are continuing here. Untouchables have to live outside the village. They do not have entry in the village during the day. They will come at night, playing drums. And they are considered to be the equivalent of pollution. So we get all this information from the account book of Henzang. Whether it is about the king, whether it is about the economy or society. Along with this, when we refer to Henzang and many other sources, then we understand that during the time of Harshavardhan, land grants were quite common. It was quite common to give land grants to the priests. In fact, they did not give payment to their officials in cash. They used to give a piece of land, from where the officials used to collect tax. And that tax was their salary. Henzang says that law and order was not good in the empire of Harshavardhan. Because Henzang's goods have been stolen many times. It was a robbery. Law and order was not good. Robberies used to happen. Henzang's goods have been stolen many times. Henzang writes this in his account book. Henzang, again see, Mahayan Buddhism, how he is showing it superior in his text. Henzang says that what used to happen before, before for every crime, you will see a lot of different types of punishments. And all those punishments used to be severe. For example, if I talk about a robbery, someone committed a robbery, his hand would be cut off. Harshavardhan used to give such severe punishments. But Henzang claims that as soon as Harshavardhan adopted Buddhism, and started following Buddhist philosophy, and came under the influence of Buddhism, the punishments changed. The punishments became less lethal. In a way, instead of cutting hands and feet, he was put in jail. Henzang says this in his book. One more special thing, which we see in the time of Harshavardhan, in the time of Vardhans, is that, in earlier times, in all the dynasties we have discussed, records related to kings are easily found. For example, you have seen the popularity of many rulers. But when we talk about the local people, it is very difficult to find direct resources related to them. For example, when Fahiyan and Henzang came as travellers, we refer their records, we refer their account books. But since the time of Harshavardhan, we get public records here. The common people have also maintained records. I will explain to you what kind of records are there. For example, in your house, you buy milk every day. The milkman comes, and gives the milk to you in a bowl or in a container. You must have seen that your mother marks it in the calendar, that we gave milk today. Or the breadman gives you bread, and you mark it in the calendar every day. This is a kind of record. With the help of this record, a bill will be made at the end of the month. And you have to give that payment to the milkman, the breadman, the uncle, and the brother. So what is this? This is a kind of record. We have got such records from the common people. And these records, these archives that we have, we call them NILU PIKU. This is a term. You can remember it. We will not study the administration related to the Vardhan dynasty. Because in the last episodes, we discussed the administrative structure related to Guptas. You will see exactly the same here. Here too, the feudal system is being followed. Here too, there is a decentralized administration. Here too, the empire is being divided into provinces. We call the province OPRIKA. Then there is VISH. Then there is VITHI. And then you see the village here. So in this way, as you saw the administration of Guptas, on the same lines, the Vardhans are also administering their territory. But their army was very good. And this information is given by Harshvardhan. This data is obtained from Harshvardhan's book. That they have about 100,000 horses, about 60,000 elephants, and a very good horse-drawn army. Now let's talk about society. Let's talk a little about the society. When we look at the society here, then again you will see the Varn system and the caste system. Jati and Varn, both will be seen. Both systems were being followed. The condition of women has declined by this time. For example, you will not see a swammer here. Widows are not allowed to remarry. The system of dowry has become quite common. And there is also Sati practice. So this is the condition of women that we saw in the time of Guptas. In a way, you will see it continuing. Swammer is not allowed. Widow remarriage is not allowed. Dowry is being considered as a means for women. Which will bring a lot of dowry. Sati practice is being done. We learned from Harshvardhan's account book that in the time of Vardhans, dead bodies were disposed in two ways. The most common way is cremation. Giving fire to the body. Giving fire to the pyre is cremation. Water burial. Water burial means Jal Samadhi. Jal means water. It is quite common. You will see it a lot in the Navy. For example, a ship is stuck in the sea. And it is not able to come to the shore. And someone dies in the process. Now, there are a lot of facilities which can bring a person to the shore. It can save his body. It can take him to his family. And after that, the body can be disposed. But earlier, there were not so many means. So, if the ship got stuck somewhere in the middle of the sea, then mostly, the dead bodies were given water burial. They were left in the water. So, we can see the examples of water burial. Similarly, exposure in woods. Meaning, leaving the body in the jungle. Slowly, the animals and birds around the body will feed on the body. After that, slowly, the trees and plants will cover the body. In this way, the dead bodies have been disposed. All this information is available from the books of Hain Zhang during the time of Harshvardhan. The condition of women is not good. The condition of the untouchables is not good. But the Shudras have started farming. And we can see different ways The time that you can see here, is believed to be the time when the Roman Empire was declining in the West. And along with the Roman Empire, in India, with the help of different courts, trade has been done. So, if the Roman Empire declines, then we can see the same effect in India. And during the time of Harshvardhan, we can see the declination in trade. There are other ways to understand the declination of trade. For example, during the time of Harshvardhan, we can find a lot of hoarded coins. What does hoarding mean? Hoarding means hoarding. If you understand the economy of the world today, or if we understand the peculiar habits of a person, then it is often seen that whenever we face any kind of instability, then we start hoarding. For example, during the time of COVID, when all the shops were closed, people here started hoarding a lot of Maggi packets. They started hoarding. They started thinking that when will these shops open again? When will we get the things we need? So, hoarding. Hoarding also shows instability. Similarly, when there is a situation like this, even banks and ATMs are closed. Suppose we wanted to withdraw Rs. 2000, but we have to withdraw Rs. 5,000. We start fearing that what if the ATM doesn't work in the future? What if the situation gets worse? At that time, this money will be useful. So, hoarding shows instability economically in the society. It shows that something is not stable. The economy is not stable. Something is going wrong. So, we got the hoarded coins from the period of the Vardhan dynasty. We got the pots in which the coins were put and buried in the soil. Thinking that if the situation gets worse, we will be able to buy things with these coins. So, we got hoarding. If we are getting coins in hoarding, if the coins have been deposited here, then the coins are less in circulation. And if the coins are less in circulation, it means that the trade is decreasing. And the trade was decreasing because the Roman Empire was declining. So, during the time of the Vardhan dynasty, we got to see the most effect from the handicraft industry, agriculture. Because whatever we were doing in the craft production or farming, we exported a large portion of it to the Roman Empire. The declination of the Roman Empire means that there are no customers. So, who will we sell these things to? That is why the handicraft and agriculture were heavily affected here. Instead of growing in surplus, we started producing only what we needed, not more than that. So, to a large extent, we are seen as a self-sufficient economy during the time of the Vardhan dynasty. So, we saw the society, we saw the economy, we talked about the quality, that is, about Harshvardhan. We discussed about him. The major portion is also found in the account book of Hemzan. He came in 645 AD. Exactly two years after that, in 647, Harshvardhan died. After Harshvardhan's death, his ancestors ruled the Vardhan dynasty. And even in his time, after Harshvardhan, after his death, in 670 AD, you can see a Chinese traveler a Chinese Buddhist traveler, coming here. Now, a very major, a very important thing that we see since the time of Harshvardhan. We need to understand this thing that the sources in India related to Harshvardhan are told by the devotees of Lord Shiva. But Hemzan clearly claims that Harshvardhan's Buddhist inclination was towards Buddhism. So, from all these things, it can be concluded that yes, it is possible that he was a devotee of Lord Shiva and then his personal inclination was towards Buddhism. But he was a tolerant ruler. He was tolerant towards other religions and philosophies as well. So, if he is donating to the Buddhist monk, then in the same way, he will donate to the Brahmins So, here, Nalanda University, which was established by the king of Gupta dynasty, Kumar Gupt, to develop and maintain it, was done by Harshvardhan as well. So, this was a Buddhist learning center, Nalanda University, present-day Bihar. We can see some remains of it. Kumar Gupt had set its foundation, but to develop and maintain it, that work was done by Harshvardhan as well. Harshvardhan was one of the patronists. Harshvardhan, this university, which is a residential university, in which free education is provided, no money is taken, hostels are available, with the help of entrance exam, you can see admission being done here. How is Harshvardhan Because children are not paying the fees. So, such residential free universities, to maintain them, money should come from somewhere. So, it was seen that Harshvardhan, around Nalanda University, whatever revenue was collected that was used to maintain Nalanda University. So, he was one of the great patrons of Nalanda University. And from here also, we can see Harshvardhan's personal inclination towards Buddhism. Not only this, if you see, the map that we have made, in this, you can see King Bhaskar Varman of Assam. King Bhaskar Varman of Assam, who again had an inclination we can see his influence on Harshvardhan as well. Because he was a good friend of Harshvardhan. Right? In this Nalanda University, the professors were called Pandits. And some popular professors we can see here, like Dhingnag, Dharmapal, Shirmati or Shilbhadra. In this university, Hinayana and Mahayana doctrines of Buddhism were taught. But along with that, some knowledge of Vedas, some philosophy, grammar, astronomy, medicine and art were also taught. Strict discipline, medium of instruction, Sanskrit This was some information about Harshvardhan's period. Along with this, you can see this part getting completed. But we can see that in contemporary of Harshvardhan, we can see Chalukyas as well. And when we talk about this area, we can see Pallavas as well. You can see Chalukyas and Pallavas. If we talk about Chalukyas, then Chalukyas were contemporary with Harshvardhan. And if I particularly talk about Chalukyan Raja, then you can see Phulkeshan. Phulkeshan II. Now there is an interesting story. We can see here an amazing, very interesting story of Harshvardhan. According to that, we will try to understand here. First of all, you can see Harshvardhan's map. The map that you can see behind me, you can see that Harshvardhan's empire was limited to North India. Did Harshvardhan never tried to expand to South India? Of course he did. But who stopped him? Chalukyas stopped him. So there is a battle about which we get information. And we get that information in the Aihol inscription. Now let me tell you, Aihol used to be the second capital of Chalukyas. The first capital was Badami. It is also called Vatapi. And the second is Aihol. So in this place called Aihol, we got an inscription. In that inscription, we get information that there was a battle between Harshvardhan and Pulkeshin II. In which Pulkeshin II defeated Harshvardhan very badly. And after that Harshvardhan limited his boundaries to North India and did not try to expand to South India. Harshvardhan's sources have not said much about this battle. But in the Aihol inscription, it has been told in great detail. Who wrote the Aihol inscription? And see, this is a very understandable thing. Pulkeshin II is also mentioning this in his inscription because he had won. If he had lost, then there would have been no mention of war or battle. Because the sources we get tell us about the goodness of rulers. They tell us about campaigns that they have won. But the information about the lost campaigns is not found in the sources. So the Aihol inscription is related to Pulkeshin II. And Pulkeshin II had a port poet whose name was Ravi Kirti. Through him, this Aihol inscription has been written. So Chalukyas. Here you will see Chalukyas. Similarly, Pallavas were present in this region. We will discuss about Pallavas and Chalukyas in the Medieval History series. But for now, that's all for this series. A very important and important information for all of you which will help you a lot. And that information is that the 50% discount on Unacademy Plus which was on subscription is valid till 12 pm today. You can avail the 50% discount. You can use the referral code ARTI1702. Now if you are a repeater You are a repeater here. You had given the exam in 2023. But for some reason, it was not cleared. 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