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Age of the Nandas and Mauryas c9.s1.t3: Later Nandas

Age of the Nandas and Mauryas c9.s1.t3

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Later Nandas

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Among the sons of the first Nanda referred to in the Purāṇas, Sahalya or Sahalin seems to have been the eldest. Most of the *Matsya* Mss. spell the name as Sukalpa. But a *Vāyu* Mss. gives the form Sahalya which, as pointed out by Barua, corresponds to Sahalin of the *Divyāvadāna*. The names of the sons of the first Nanda given in the *Mahābodhivaṃsa* are altogether different, and have not yet been confirmed from independent sources. The name of the last prince, Dhana Nanda is unknown to the classical writers who mention Agrammes or Xandrames as the name of the prince of the "barber" dynasty, who occupied the throne when Alexander was on the banks of the Beas.

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Xandrames, the name mentioned by Diodorus, has been taken by some scholars to answer to the Sanskrit Chandramas, and identified with Chandragupta Maurya. But Plutarch clearly distinguishes between "Androkottos" and the king of the "Praisiai" in the days of Alexander, and his account receives confirmation from that of Justin. Xandrames or Agrammes was the son of a usurper born after his father had obtained the supreme authority among the Prasii, while Chandragupta was himself the founder of a new sovereignty, the first ruler of his dynasty. The father of Xandrames was a barber who could claim no royal ancestry. On the other hand, Indian writers are unanimous in representing Chandragupta as a scion of a race of rulers, though they differ in regard to the identity of the family and its claim to be regarded as of pure Kshatriya extraction. Jain evidence clearly suggests that the barber usurper is identical with the *nāpita kumāra* or *nāpitasū* who founded the Nanda line.

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The figures of the eight princes who succeeded the first Nanda are rather shadowy and we do not know how far the tradition recorded by late writers can be accepted as sober history. The last of them is said to have been addicted to hoarding treasure. He amassed riches to the amount of eighty *koṭis*. In a rock in the bed of the river Ganges he caused a great excavation to be made for the purpose of burying the treasures he had acquired. Levying taxes, along with other articles, even on skins, gums, trees and stones, he amassed further riches which he disposed of similarly. This account taken from the commentary on the Great Chronicle of Ceylon can claim some antiquity. Professor Nilakanta Sastri points out that a Tamil poem contains an interesting reference to the "very famous" Nandas "victorious in war, who having accumulated treasure first in beautiful Pāṭaliputra hid it in the waters of the Ganges". Hiuen Tsang, the famous Chinese pilgrim of the seventh century A. D. refers to "the five treasures of king Nanda's seven precious substances"¹.

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¹ Watters, ii p. 296.

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The accumulation of an enormous amount of wealth, to which all our authorities bear witness, probably implies a good deal of financial extortion and it is not surprising that the Nanda contemporary of Alexander "was detested and held cheap by his subjects as he rather took after his father than conducted himself as the occupant of a throne."

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The oppressed people soon found a leader. Plutarch and Justin refer to a young lad named Androkottos or Sandrocottus, doubtless identical with the famous Chandragupta, who visited Alexander in the Punjab, and showed a keen interest in the affairs of the Prasii. "Not long afterwards" he mounted the throne and "shook off from the neck" of India "the yoke of servitude" by overthrowing the existing government in India and expelling the prefects of Alexander. Indian chronicles introduce by his side another figure, a *dvijarshabha* named Kauṭilya or Chāṇakya, whom tradition represents as an inhabitant of Taxila.

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While some of the Indian writers, notably the author of the Sanskrit play entitled the Mudrā-Rākshasa, are chiefly concerned with the battle of intrigue conducted by Kauṭilya, the Milinda Pañho affords us a glimpse of the clash of arms between the contending forces of the Nandas and the Mauryas. "There was Bhaddasāla (Bhadraśāla), the soldier in the service of the royal family of the Nandas, and he waged war against king Chandagutta ( Chandragupta ). Now in that war, there were eighty corpse dances. For they say that when one great head holocaust has taken place by which is meant the slaughter of ten thousand elephants, and a lac of horses, and five thousand charioteers, and a hundred koṭis of soldiers on foot, then the headless corpses arise and dance in frenzy over the battle field". The passage contains a good deal of mythical embellishment. But we have here reminiscence of the blood bath through which Chandragupta had to wade to the throne.

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The glamour of the Nandas has been dimmed by the greater splendour of the succeeding dynasty. But it is well to remember what the kings of the line bequeathed to their immediate successors and to posterity. They had, to use the words of Smith, "compelled the mutually repellent molecules of the body politic to check their gyrations and submit to the grasp of a superior controlling force". They developed a fighting machine that was used by the later rulers of Magadha with terrible effect in resisting the onslaught of foreign invaders and carrying on the policy of expansion within the borders of India that had been inaugurated by Bimbisāra and Ajātaśatru.

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If tradition recorded by the epitomisers of the Brihatkathā is to be believed, Pāṭaliputra under Nanda rule became the abode (kshetra) of Sarasvatī as well as Lakshmī, the home of learning as well as of material prosperity. A galaxy of scholars—Varsha, Upavarsha, Pāṇini, Kātyāyana, Vararuchi, Vyāḍi—is said to have added lustre to the age. While much of the traditional account may be mere folklore unworthy of credence, we may well believe that the cultivation of grammer received an impetus in this age. The scholia on Pāṇini, presupposed by the great commentary of Patañjali, show acquaintance with the *Yavana lipi*, and it is by no means improbable that some of the predecessors of Patañjali are to be assigned to the Nanda Age. Kings of the line are credited by certain grammarians with the establishment of a particular kind of measure (*Nandopakramāṇi mānāni*).

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In social matters the rise of Nandas may be regarded as symptomatic of a surging up of the lower classes. The Purāṇic chroniclers represent the dynasty as harbingers of Śūdra rule and as irreligious (*adhārmika*). The last statement is significant in view of the traditional connection of the family with Jain ministers and patriarchs. But the evidence on the point is of a character which makes it difficult to build too much on it.

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