Maurya and Shunga Art c5.20

c5.20

The very idea of recording royal orders and directions on such permanent material as rocks (and pillars) seems to have been inspired by Achaemenian practice. In respect of the form of the Asokan inscriptions Senart long ago pointed out their strong resemblance with that of the inscriptions of the Achaemenian kings. The edicts of Aśoka begin with the usual formula ‘Devānampiya Piyadasi evamāha’ which according to Senart, “is an absolutely isolated example in Indian epigraphy... In the entire series of the inscriptions of the Achaemenides, from Darius to Artaxerexes Ochus, the phrase ‘thatey Darayavaush Kshayathiya’, ‘thus saith the king Darius’, or its equivalent ‘thatey Kshayarsha’ etc., inevitably forms the preamble of each of the proclamations. In both cases, this phrase in the third person is immediately succeeded by the use of the first person, and we are still further justified in drawing attention to this curious fact that again in both cases the same word—‘dipi’, ‘lipi’—is used to designate the inscriptions, and that, as we have seen, we are led to admit, on altogether independent grounds, that the Indian form of the word was originally borrowed from Persian.” One may not fully agree with Senart in his contention, since the ‘Arthaśāstra’ ascribes a similar formula for royal proclamations, and early Buddhist texts make constant use of such archaic and conventional phrases as ‘Tathāgato āho’, ‘evamvādi Mahāsamaṇo’ etc. Indeed one has to agree with Prof. Barua when he points out that the Asokan formula probably originated from the Indian literary convention that can be traced to even such Upanishadic phrases as ‘hovācha Yājñavalkya’, ‘evamāhur’ ‘manīśiṇaḥ’ etc. But the fact remains that the whole character of Asokan epigraphs including their form has an undeniable family likeness with Achaemenian inscriptions, and has nothing to connect them with later Indian epigraphy. Aśoka's peculiar way of exhorting people to follow the laws of Dhamma also seems to have been adopted from Achaemenian practice initiated by Darius in his Behistun and Naksh i-Rustam inscriptions³⁶.