Indian Palaeography from about B.C. 350 to about A.D. 1300 c6.s5.3

c6.s5.3

As the *ha* and the *ta* of the Brāhmī are derived from forms of *He* and *Taw* not found in the Phoenician inscriptions but only in Mesopotamia, it appears probable that this is the Semitic country from which the letters were brought over.¹ It agrees with this inference, that the most ancient Indian works speak of sea-voyages in the Indian Ocean at a very early period, and sea-borne trade, carried on by Hindu Vāṇias in the same waters, is mentioned in later, but still ancient, times. The well-known Bāveru Jātaka² bears witness to an early export trade of the Vāṇias to Babylon; and the form of the word, in which the second part *ilu* is represented by *eru*, points to its having arisen in Western India, where *ra* is occasionally substituted for *la*, as in the Girnār and Shāhbāzgarhī form *Turamaya* for *Ptolemaios*. Several other Jātakas, *e. g.* No. 463, which describe sea-voyages, name the ancient ports of Western India, Bharukaccha (the modern Broach) and Śūrpāraka (now Supārā), which were centres of the trade with the Persian Gulf in the first centuries A. D. and much later. As according to the Jātakas the Vāṇias started from these towns, it is probable that these trade-routes were used much earlier. Two of the most ancient Dharmasūtras likewise bear witness to the earlier existence of trade by sea in India and particularly on the western coast. Baudhāyana, II, 2, 2, forbids Brahmans to undertake voyages by sea, and prescribes a severe penance for a breach of the rule. But he admits, 1, 2, 4, that the "Northerners," were not strict in this respect. As the other offences of the "Northerners," mentioned in the same passage, such as dealing in wool, selling animals with two rows of teeth, i. e. horses and mules, show, the term applies to the inhabitants of western and north-western India. It naturally follows that the sea-voyages referred to were made to western Asia. The same author, I, 18, 14, and the still older Gautama Dharmasūtra, 10, 33, mention the duties payable to the king on merchandise imported by sea.³ In accordance with my estimate of the age of the Dharmasūtras and of the materials out of which the Jātakas have been made up, I look upon these statements as referring to the 8th—6th centuries B. C.⁴ From still earlier times dates the well-known Vedic myth of the shipwreck of Bhujyu "in the ocean where there is no support, no rest for the foot or the hand," and of his being saved on the "hundred-oared galley" of the Aśvins.⁵ The scene of action must of course lie in the Indian Ocean, and the story points to the inference [18] that the Hindus navigated these waters during the earliest Vedic period. As, in addition, Semitic legends such as that of the Flood and of Manu's preservation by a miraculous fish occur in the Brāhmaṇas,⁶ we have a sufficient number of facts to furnish some support for the conjecture that Hindu traders, who probably learnt the language of the country, just as their modern descendants learn Arabic and Suahili and other African languages, may have imported from Mesopotamia not only the alphabet, but perhaps also other technical contrivances, such as brick-making which was so important for the construction of the ancient Brahmanical altars. With this assumption, which under the circumstances stated appears at least not quite unfounded, the Indian Vāṇias are credited with having rendered the same service to their countrymen which Sambhoṭa or Thon-mi did to the Tibetans, when he fetched the elements of their alphabet from Magadha, between A. D. 630 and 660.⁷