Royal Chronology India (Bharatvarsh)
An important part of understanding Dharma and world religions is to understand world history. Few nations in the world have a less historical understanding of their past than India . So much of Indian history has been inadvertently or purposefully subverted by various mythologies, that the real history of India is unknown to most people (including many Indians).
Many Indians believe:
1) That India was never a unified country before Emperor Asoka or even that it was a creation of the British(!). WRONG.
2) That the Ramayana occurred around 7300 B.C.E. (according to Dr. P.V. Vartak) and that Hanuman was from a monkey race and could lift mountains. WRONG.
2) That the Mahabharat occurred around 3100 B.C.E. (according to Dr. S. Balakrishna) and that Draupadi married the 5 Pandava brothers. WRONG.
The Truth:
1) India (Bharat) first became substantially united around 3300 B.C.E. by Emperor Bharata - after whom the country is named.
2) The Ramayana occurred around 2100 B.C.E. and Hanumant was a human from a tribe called 'Vahner'. This sounded a lot like the Sanskrit word, Vanara (meaning 'monkey') and thus the mythology grew from that initial misinterpretation...
3) The Mahabharat occurred around 1400 B.C.E. and the 5 daughters of King Drupad (termed the 5 'Draupadi') married the 5 Pandava brothers.
In addition, here are some reasons why the Mahabharat could NOT have occurred around 3100 B.C.E.:
1) Given that all Indian scriptures and literature agree that there were 33 kings from the Mahabharat War until the time of Buddha, the generational length to support this timeframe (3100 à 600 B.C.E.) would have to be roughly 70 years (meaning a King would have to pass the throne to his son after ruling for 70 years) - highly improbable to sustain this over more than 1 generation; let alone 30+ generations.
2) Literary evidence clearly mentions towns and cities of north and central
3) Archeological data from sites such as Hastinapur fall more in line with the Royal Chronological dates of the Mahabharat War occurring around 1400 B.C.E. It is not likely that the archeological findings would be off by nearly 2000 years. In addition, the recent archeological find in Pandavsthan, Bihar is dated to the 2000-1000 B.C.E. range, further validating this timeline (incidentally, until this find in April 2003, no archeologists would believe that any Ganga River Region (GRR) sites were older than 1100 B.C.E.! This proves once again, that the royal chronologies described in the literature are SOLID evidence and that the archeology is slowly validating
4) Geological data from the
5) Astronomical data for the commonly touted date of 3102 B.C.E. are not reliable. Small differences in interpretation of astronomical data could change timeframes immensely. A more reliable approach is to correlate royal chronologies with archeological and geological data. The potential error with that method is on the order of 10-20% versus 100%+ for the astronomical-only method.
Summary:
All the great names in Indian history are NOT fictitious. The mythological stories we all know and love are based on REAL HISTORY. These histories have become LOST over thousands of years and replaced by colorful (but generally non-historical) mythologies. They were real people and their ROYAL DYNASTIES have been VERY well documented. In fact, they were better documented that the royal dynasties of
The Sapta-Saindhvah Region (Sindu and
This file actually has 4 spreadsheets (see the 4 lower Tabs when you open up the Excel file):
1) Royal Chronology of India (Columns K through P on the right-hand side describe other civilizations - Egypt , Israel , Iraq , Iran and China ). On the bottom of this file is a Population Chart of India from 8000 B.C.E. to 2200 C.E. On the bottom right-hand side is a list of potential dates for Dharmic Scriptures and Sources used to build the timeline.
2) The History of World Religion (all major religions [Eastern AND Western] have roots in the Vedas)
3) Comparison of All Religions
4) Festivals of India
This spreadsheet is 23 columns wide by 350 rows deep, or over 8,000 cells. Most of these contain content and many of these cells also have comments (you can hold your cursor over the cells in the TimeLine to see the comment text) that can run as long as a page per comment. This timeline therefore contains many books worth of knowledge all organized in an easy-to-view chronological manner.
Please refer as many people as you can to the websites, NewDharma.org and DharmicScriptures.org. We'd like to make this research common knowledge among Indians and others and have people e-mail us if they have any questions. Thank you.
Methodology, Sources and a Request:
Methodology - the methodology to build this timeline was as follows:
In the absence of sufficient stone inscriptions carbon-dating certain events, the best evidence available in India is the enormous amount of ancient scripture and literature. These thousands of documents have been preserved meticulously over the millennia and have well-documented stories and genealogies that tend to correlate with each other surprisingly well. Therefore, these accounts can be reasonably considered to have some element of historical validity beneath their
layers of mythology. The royal dynasties and genealogies from Indian history are the best starting place to assemble a continuous view ofIndia 's ancient past. There is a precedent for this method. A great deal of the history of the Middle East has been unlocked by correlating ancient king's lists and mythologies to known events and by using the lists as a means to direct archeological work.
layers of mythology. The royal dynasties and genealogies from Indian history are the best starting place to assemble a continuous view of
This logic was used by the noted German archeologist, Heinrich Schliemann who rightly considered the Trojan War Epic to be based upon historical events and not merely a product of wild-eyed Greek fantasy. He located likely regions where the event may have taken place (northwestern
Once the Royal Dynasties of India were listed in order, the next step was to create a timeline associated with them. Given that most Indian dynasties were based on a father-eldest son succession, the average regnal timeframes must correlate to human generational timeframes over long periods of time. Assuming that Ancient Indians had a longevity similar (if not slightly less) than ours today, I set up a generational length of 25 years per generation from 6000 B.C.E. to today. If actual generational lengths are found to be less, Indian History is slightly younger than this timeline shows, if generational lengths are longer, Indian History is slightly older than this timeline shows. For example, one of the main sources for the geneaologies in this timeline are the books by P.L. Bhargava. In his timeline, he assumes a generational length of 17 years and thus his date for Vivasvat is 3100 B.C.E. whereas mine is older, because I felt 17 years is a bit young for a prince to complete education, get married, have a first child and assume that the first child happens to be a boy! As food for thought, if generational lengths are found to be 27 years on average (for example), my timeline extends farther to the past and Vivasvat's timeframe moves to 4240 B.C.E. (i.e., 120 generations from Vivasvat to 1000 B.C.E.).
Once the Indian King's Lists and associated timeframes were established, the next step is to relate these lists to each other. For example, when the 23rd king of one list is known historically to have fought a war with the 12th king of another list, this provides a LINKAGE POINT between the two lists. In this timeline, there are dozens of such linkage points and these points did not IN A SINGLE CASE break the timeline. In other words, there was NEVER a case where linking king's list 'A' with king's list 'B' broke the linkage point between king's list 'B' and king's list 'C'. This in itself should provide the reader with a great deal of confidence in the soundness of these king's lists. As was the case with Middle Eastern genealogies (Egyptian, Mesopotamian), these lists have proven to have a greater veracity than we might initially give them credit for.
Once the king's Lists, timeframes and linkage points were established, the next step was to integrate ANCHORS. 'Anchors' are pieces of evidence that are indisputable and thus help to provide a solid structure or framework from within which all the other genealogical data resides. The anchors of this timeline are: geological data (carbon dating of dessication of
Sources-Timeline component and its related source
1.Main genealogies from Vivasvat to Rama and Krshna - books by P.L. Bhargava
3.Medieval King's Lists- http://hindunet.org(http://www.hindunet.org/hindu_history/medieval/kings_chron.html)
5.Yadava (post-Krshna) Genealogy - Yadav.com/yadavhist.html
7.Buddha genealogy-http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/dhamma/dham-hp.htm and http://sino-sv3.sino.uni-heidelberg.de/FULLTEXT/JR-ENG/hocbud.htm and
http://serendib.org/mahavamsa/gene.html (Lanka Buddhist lineage)
http://serendib.org/mahavamsa/gene.html (Lanka Buddhist lineage)
8. 'History of Religions' Spreadsheet - 'The Fountainhead of Religion' by Ganga Prasad, and numerous Zaroastrian websites.
9. 'Comparison of Religions' Spreadsheet - The 12 book series from:
http://www.hinduscriptures.org, http://www.yrec.org, Freeindia.org, Ishwar.com
http://www.hinduscriptures.org, http://www.yrec.org, Freeindia.org, Ishwar.com
10. 'Indian Festivals' Spreadsheet - www.hindunet.org, vedanet.com
11. General Information - Kautilya's Arthashastra & Nitishastra, books of Swami Dayananda Saraswati, books about Swami Vivekananda, numerous Dharmic Scriptures (Vedas, Puranas, Srimad Bhagavatam).
Request for Academic Assistance - This timeline must be thoroughly vetted by an academic effort in order to gain more credibility by the academic community and become part of the official educational system in
1) Map all the kings of the 10 books of the Rg Veda against the kings in this timeline to both add depth to this timeline and to pin down a more accurate timeframe for the composition of the Rg Veda. Continue this effort to the later Vedas.
2) More information about all the royal dynasties of
3) More information about the ancestors of Siddhartha Gautama (Buddha)
4) More information about the 24 Jaina Tirthankaras and determining the historical validity and timeframes of as many of these 24 leaders/law-givers as is possible (assuming that many of them have an historical basis).
5) More information about the chronologies of South Indian dynasties
6) Inclusion of lists of priestly teacher-disciplic successions (Guru-Parampara)
The need is great and it truly requires a full-time effort by a qualified and
motivated individual. I will support that individual (or individuals) as best I
can.
If you have any recommendations for someone who can fill this role, please
contact me at rajmohanka@...
contact me at rajmohanka@...
Thank you.
Additional Information:
Indology Basics:
This is short summary of all the basic information that Indians and more specifically, Dharmins ("Hindus") should know.
Bharat (
Bharat is the oldest continuous civilization in the world. Mesopotamian and Egyptian civilization are long gone and replaced by Islamic civilizations.
The name ‘
The 2 main rivers of the Sapta-Saindvah Civilization ("Harrappan"; "
Of the 2600 sites in the massive Sapta-Saindvah Civilization (the largest by far of any ancient one – ancient Egypt and ancient Mesopotamia put together could easily fit inside the SS civ.), over 80% of the cities were along the Sarasvati River. Sadly, due to lack of funds, only 2-3% of these sites have been excavated till today and many have been permanently destroyed by weather and vandalism.
The
The oldest major religion in the world, Sanathana Dharma (‘Eternal Truth’ or ‘Eternal Righteousness’; a.k.a., "Hindu-ism") originated along the
After thousands of years of development and expansion (from around 4000 B.C.E. to 600 B.C.E.), Sanathana Dharma became corrupt and oppressive. The initial Varna-Ashrama Dharma system of flexible employment fossilized into the "Caste System" (~ almost like a Feudal System). This was the impetus for 2 simultaneous reform movements that led to 2 new religions: Bauddha Dharma ("Buddhism") and Jaina Dharma ("Jainism").
The Bauddha Dharmic religious movement was successful to the point where some of its principles (such as non-violence, vegetarianism, Murti-worship) became incorporated into Sanathana Dharma.
The religious impact of non-violence eventually led to Mauryan Emperor Asoka abdicating his throne and becoming a Bauddha Dharmic Missionary. After that event (around 250 B.C.E.), no single Dharmic Emperor was able to unite Bharat again.
These Bauddhic missionaries traveled around the world and converted most Asians to Bauddha Dharma and set up 2 major missions in the Middle East (the Essenes and the Therapeuts; "Thera-pada") which influenced Yahshua ("Jesus") to incorporate some of their beliefs (non-violence, water immersion for soul purification; "Baptism") into the reformed Jewish religion he was promoting that later became a new religion – Christianity.
A few centuries after the dissolution of the Mauryan Empire, Bharat experienced a Renaissance with the Gupta Dynasty. This dynasty was not able to unite the entire subcontinent however.
A few centuries after the fall of the Gupta Dynasty, western Bharat starting to receive incursions from the Arabs. They spread a new religion called Islam ("submission"). This Arab religion modeled itself after the Jewish religion ("eye for an eye") with less influence from Christianity ("turn the other cheek").
Over the next 1000 years, Bharat saw waves of invasions that were not repelled successfully. This period saw the rise of Islam and the fall of all Dharmas (Sanathana, Bauddha, Jaina). Some historians are now considering this period to be the worst holocaust in world history with as many as 20 to 80 million non-Muslims (Dharmins) killed over this 1000 period. Sanathana Dharma lost its major temples, pilgrimage sites and theological universities during this period (Taxila, Nalanda, Vikramshila, etc.). The universities were major world centers during their heyday (akin to
Attendance at these universities was estimated to be over 10,000. Starting in the 1500s (after
Starting from the mid-1700s,
With a 1000 history of defeat, Bharat and Sanathana Dharma are today in shambles. Bharat is one of the poorest nations per capita and has lost nearly 50% of its historical territory. Sanathana Dharma (with roughly 1 Billion adherents) is shrinking quickly and will likely loose its status as a major world religion with the next 200 years (based on current trends).
The key to bringing Bharat back to the leadership position she has traditionally had is a combination of economic, military and cultural development.
The key to bringing about a Dharmic Renaissance for Sanathana Dharma and the global Dharmic Community (the "Dharmasya") is to rebuild the destroyed Dharmic Theological Universities and reinterpret Ancient Scriptures for modern times ("Dharmic Constructive Theology").
An effort currently under way to study
The next field that needs more organization is Indic Indology – the study of
For more information, please:
Download 2 documents (timeline, reform book) from NewDharma.org,
Download Dharmic Scriptures from DharmicScriptures.org and visit and read the articles on Sulekha.com
Online books: Bharatvani.org
The sources of Indian history can be classified under the following heads:
Inscriptions
Numismatics
Archaeology
Literature
Foreign Sources
Numismatics
Archaeology
Literature
Foreign Sources
Traditions
1. Inscriptions
Epigraphy is the study of inscriptions. Epigraphic evidences form the most reliable source of ancient history. They are engraved on stone tablets, metal plates, pillars, walls of caves, etc. The inscriptions represent various languages at different places and period of time. Some inscriptions give details about the political and religious activities of that time. Others are official, commemorative and historical. The edicts of Ashoka, the pillars of Samudragupta and Rudradaman I are religious and administrative inscriptions. Sanskrit plays at Dhar and Ajmer and musical rules found in the Pudukottai, treaties on architecture inscribed on a tower at Chittor are examples of inscriptions. Inscriptions on metal plates also cast light on the period during the Mauryans. The Mandasor copper plates, the Sohgaura plate from Gorakpur district, the Aihole inscription of Mahendra-Varman, the Uttiramerur inscriptions of Parantaka Chola I cast light on trade, taxes, currency. Some of these are dated in the Saka and Vikrama era reflects the condition of India . It gives knowledge about the boundaries of kingdoms and empire.
2. Numismatics
Numismatics is the study of coins. Coins yield information on the condition of country. The coins made of gold, silver and copper speak of the economic situation of that place in the period. Coins gives us chronological information. It also gives us knowledge about the extent of influence of that a particular ruler or kingdom and its relation with the distant areas. Roman coins discovered in India gives us an idea about the existence of contacts with the Roman empire .
Coins are the only source of idea knowledge of the Bactarian; Indo-Greeks and Indo-Parthian dynasty. The coins of this period brings to light an improvement in the coin artistry of
3. Archaeology
Archaeology is the scientific study of the remains of the past. They include buildings monuments and other material relics that the inhabitants of that period were associated with. The Department of Archaeology was set up by Lord Curzon under the Director Generalship of Dr Marshal. Excavations conducted at various sites in the valley of the river Indus , Lothal in Gujarat , Kalibangan in Rajasthan, at Sind and Punjab gives us knowledge of the civilization during about 2700 BC. Excavations at Taxila gives an idea about the Kushanas.
Similarity in monuments excavated in India and abroad establish a relations between various areas of the globe, besides this it express the Indian migration beyond India . The fine example of this is the temple of Angkor vat in Cambodia . Excavations at south Indian sites such as Adichana llur, Chandravalli, Brahmagiri highlights the prehistoric periods. The rock cut temples of Ajanta and Ellora with its sculptures and paintings express the artistic finery of that period
Besides all these pots, pottery, seals, skeletal remains all are inseparable parts of the reconstructing history.
4. Literature
This can be classified into
Indigenous literature
Foreign literature
Literature in the ancient period was not fuelled by the urge to preserve history but was a complication of experiences and rules of worship. Most of the literature of this period was religious. The Indigenous literature includes the Vedas, the Brahmanas, the Aryankas, the Upanishads, the Epics Ramayana and Mahabharatha, the Brahmashastras, the Puranas.
The Buddhist and Jain literature gives knowledge of the traditions prevalent in those periods. The literature of this period are in Sanskrit Pali Prakrit. It gives us a knowledge about music, dance, painting architecture and administration of various kings.
Kautilya`s Arthashastra is a remarkable work on the system of administration. The Sangam literature in south is an elaborate record of life in
2. Foreign Literature
The loop holes in the indigenous literature is supported by the numerous account by foreigners who were either pilgrims, travellers, traders or ambassadors in the court of various kings. The writings of Herodotus helped in scattering the knowledge of India to Europe before the invasion by Alexander. He highlights the features of the Indo-Persian relations. Megasthanes the Greek ambassador in the court of Chandragupta gives us an idea about India in his book 'Indica'.
Accounts of Fa-Hien and Hieun-Tsang who toured
Accounts by Muslims personalities also add a great insight into the history of
4. Foreign sources
The existence of details in the literature of the Greeks, Chinese, Persians, Romans and Europeans gives an account of the condition of the country then. It also speaks the truth about the conditions under which they came in contact India . The presence of various artifacts and materials of Indian origin has added to the study of Indian history.
The histories of the Chinese from 120BC to 400AD and 700AD, the accounts of Abul-Fazl in his 'Ain - i - Akbari' are a few examples of the foreign sources to know about the Indian history.
In many cases where there was a need to fill in the vagueness caused by the lack of evidence in the study of Indian history these foreign sources have proved handy.
5. Traditions
Traditions have modulated and synthesized the Indian life. These were practiced from the dome of civilizations and practiced through generations. Songs, dramas, fairs and festivals besides rituals are an inalienable part of the society. These are living sources of history.
Courtesy: S.Balaji Subrahmanyam
Dear Readers,
Kindly pass this as an important message among your Hindu brethren. Please do this as a service so that all Hindus will one day realize how they have been kept in dark about their own rich legacy. Please help Sanatana Dharma (Hinduism) to grow and rule the world.
Rasikaa
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