India Discovered by John Keay Page A

figure, an emperor – apparently one of the most influential and powerful — whose very words expressing the rationale of his rule had been miraculously preserved.
    From the mention of contemporary rulers like Ptolemy and Antiochus, his dates – about 269 to 232 BC – are more certain than those of anyother Indian king before AD 1000. We know that his capital was Pataliputra (Patna) and that his empire stretched from Orissa to the Khyber Pass and from the Himalayas to at least as far south as Madras. Within this vast area there were independent tribes in the forests and hills as indeed remained the case until British times. They must have represented a real threat, since Ashoka seems to haveadopted a firm if not repressive policy towards them. In other respects, his edicts favour tolerance and passivism. In the early years of his reign he had waged war in Orissa. The bloodshed and horrors of this campaign caused him to forswear further aggression. Whether he was actually a Buddhist monk or whether he even understood Buddhist theology is doubtful. But there is no question that the resultof his conversion was an unwavering commitment to the ethics of that most humane and endearing religion.
    “The greatest and noblest ruler India has known’, according to Professor Basham, he was ‘indeed one of the great kings of the world&. Ashoka towers above the other kings of ancient India, if for no other reason than that he is the only one among them whose personality can be constructed withany degree of certainty.’ It is this personal dimension that makes Ashoka so intriguing. His disapproval of any non-religious jollifications, and the austerity and directness of his language, suggest a Cromwellian puritanism – and yet he seems so typically Indian; vegetarianism, non-violence, reverence for life in all forms, tolerance to men of other religions were as important to Ashoka as toMahatma Gandhi. The building of rest houses and the planting of trees along the highways were measures which recommended themselves to many of India’s great rulers, including the Moghuls and the British. And then there was what, by western standards, can only be called the naivety of Ashoka. To Christians the idea of moral reform on a world scale is irrevocably tied up with the ideas of sacrifice,suffering and persecution. But for Ashoka, as for most Indian reformers, regeneration springs from within and can be spread by conviction, precept and example. Like the Buddha, Ashoka’s conversion stemmed from a renunciation; like the Mahatma, he directed his appeal at something deep within the Indian soul.

CHAPTER FIVE
The Legacy of Pout
    The hill of Sanchi, source of the short inscriptions which gave Prinsep the key to breaking the Ashoka script, is one of the loveliest archaeological sites. Miles from anywhere, in the dead centre of the Indian subcontinent, the hill rises gently from a sea of scrubby jungle, the haunt of tigers and aboriginal tribesmen. On its flat summit the architectural shapesare weird and unfamiliar; the very silence suggests extreme antiquity. Yet it prompts no quavering of the spirit like the austere dawn-of-creation ruggedness of Stonehenge, nor that flutter of the emotions evoked by the chaste lines of the Parthenon or the scented splendour of the Taj. Instead there is a soothing sense of peace, and, despite the wilderness setting, an overwhelming impression ofcivilization. For more than a thousand years Sanchi was a cherished centre of worship, learning, art and trade. The panels of sculptural relief that cover the gateways portray the Buddha’s life and Buddhist history in crowded, bustling scenes. All creation seems to be represented, all human moods portrayed. No written work of history could possibly convey so vividly the reality of civilized societytwo millennia ago.
    Yet, if the atmosphere is almost tangible, the setting and the buildings defy description. The first man to attempt an account of what he called ‘the