Sagas from the Far East; or, Kalmouk and Mongolian Traditionary Tales

by Unknown

Not to go into the elaborate discussion which the intricate study of the Indian dynasties has called forth, it may suffice in this place to observe that, in the absence of more regular records, the greatest aid we have in arriving at some fixed knowledge of the events of a remote age in India is derived from inscriptions and coins[5]. And, as a specimen of the thought and care that has been brought to bear on the matter, to specify the interesting circumstance connected with this particular instance, that the nearest approach to a satisfactory determination of the date of the chief bearer of the name of Vikramâditja that is likely to be attained has been arrived at from the observation of the influence of Greek art on the execution of certain of the coins[6] which have been preserved and collected, connecting them with the period succeeding Alexander’s invasion. A careful collation of these specimens with the most authentic list of the kings has given tolerable authority for asserting that the date of 57 B.C. may be assumed for the date of the first historic[7] Vikramâditja, whose chief honour lies in having overcome and superseded the descendants of the foreign race of rulers who had been in possession of his native country before his time. In pursuing the history of his dynasty, however, the help so far afforded by the coins ceases, and the only written records of him are the collections of popular fables of his deeds. Only one of these collections, and of that the date is unknown, has any pretension to rank as history; and even this is full of wonders and manifest exaggerations. Its author, Ravipati Gurumûrti by name, informs the reader, however, that he had brought together and compared many Sanskrit manuscripts, and sifted much oral tradition in its compilation.

According to this account, Vikramâditja was the son of a Brahman named Kandrasarman, the fourth son of Vishnusarman, inhabiting a city called Vedanârâjanapura, a name not found in any other writer. Dissatisfied with the ordinary occupations on which he was kept employed by his parents, he ran away from home and after many adventures came to Uggajini, where he married the daughter of Dhvagakîrti, the reigning sovereign of Malâva[8]. His son Vikramâditja was the more celebrated hero, and according to another MS. (quoted in W. Taylor’s Examination of the Mackenzie MSS.) the former of these two was not called Vikramâditja at all, but Govinda.

Feeling an interior conviction of his great destiny, Vikramâditja (the son) determined on obtaining supernatural aid in fulfilling it; and, with this view, he devoted himself to prayer and retirement, until he had obtained an apparition of the goddess Kali, the chosen wife of Shiva, who gave him the solemn promise that he should be invulnerable to all enemies with the exception of one who should be supernaturally born; and that he should rejoice in a happy reign of a thousand years[9]. By the shrewd advice of his half-brother Bhatti, whom he made his minister, he contrived to obtain out of this promise double the length of years actually named, for he arranged to reign for only six months at a time, spending six months in contemplation in the jungle, so that it took two thousand years to make up a thousand years’ reign[10]. In another account, he is made to reign 949 years; and, on the other hand, in another[11] only a hundred and six years.

It might have been expected that a people who raised themselves at so remote a period to a comparatively high degree of civilization, and in other departments of mental exertion distinguished themselves in so marked a manner, should of all things have possessed a copious historical literature, but there are other things to take into account which explain why the contrary is the case[12]. A German writer[13] has put the case very summarily. “Their religion,” he says, “has destroyed all history for the Hindus. They are taught to look on life as a mere passing condition of probation and sorrow, and its incidents, consequently, as unworthy to be recorded.” But this is a hardly fair statement, and only true to a certain extent. Benfey[14] perhaps reaches nearer the mark when he says,—“The life of man was for them but a small portion of the immense divine life pervading the whole universe. It lay, so to speak, rolled up in a fold of the mantle of the godhead. Viewed thus, history became a theme so vast that the infinitesimal human element of it was lost to view. Theosophies, idealisms, allegories, myths, filled up the place of the record of the doings of mortals.” Troyer[15] takes nearly the same view, but further calls attention to the influence exercised by the religious teaching concerning re-births and transmigration of souls in working against history becoming a science. Historical characters lost their positive identity, and the effect a man’s acts under a previous existence were taught to exercise on his fate diminished the responsibility and merit of, and consequently the interest in, his actions.

To arrive at a more exact view, however, it is necessary to distinguish between the parts which Brahman and Buddhist teaching have respectively to bear in the matter. The Brahmanical castes became subdivided into groups composed of many families, with no common founder, the preservation of whose name and deeds would have afforded an instigation to building up the materials of a national history. Only at a comparatively late period some traditions were kept up of the heads of these groups, but this in such a way as to serve rather to throw back attention on to the past and restrain it from the contemplation and record of contemporary events, Caste took the place of country, and the interest of the individual was drawn away from national to local interest.

Next, the history of the gods possessed a much higher importance in their eyes than that of the kings of the earth, while at the same time the humanistic conception of their character rendered the myths concerning them of a nature to clash with and supersede the records of earthly notabilities. Their wars and their loves and their undertakings were indeed often superhuman in scale, but they were yet for the most part no more exalted in nature, than the occupations of men. But from this habit of making their divinities actors in gigantic human incidents, their mind grew used to regard the marvellous and unreal as possible and true, and was at no pains to fix any data with exactness.

Then their contemplative mode of life kept them out of actual contact with what was going on in the world around them. Most Brahmans lived engrossed by the service of the temple, or else occupied with their families or their disciples. Very few are the examples of their acting as ministers or judges, or taking any part in public life.

Further, many elements of history may be said to have scarcely existed at all. All changes of manners and customs, all growth of arts and sciences, were impeded by the appointment of fixed laws, and remained pretty much the same for long periods.

Again, the subdivision of the country into multitudinous governments, and the comparatively short duration of any large union of them under one dynasty—as, for instance, the Maurja or the Gupta—further weakened any tendency to the formation of a national spirit. The best preserved attempts at history are those of Lankâ (Ceylon), Orissa, Cashmere, the Dekhan, and other kingdoms or provinces which have all along preserved their identity. Where one country fell under the empire of another its history naturally lapsed in that of the conquering state, or became altogether lost; and as such annexations were mostly effected by violence, it is only to be expected that the conqueror should discourage any thing that would keep up the memory of the rulers he had superseded. The Chronicle of Cashmere, called the Râga Taraginî, or “Stream of Kings,” is perhaps the best written. It was compiled by Kalhana Pandita, who lived, however, as late as 1150 of our era, and is carried down to the year 1125. He appears to have laboured to make it as complete and reliable as the vague and scattered materials at his disposal admitted; yet so little was even he capable of appreciating the value of accuracy, that he ascribes to a reign (removed from his own date by no more remote period than 600 years) a length of 300 years. And this is but a small fable by comparison with others of his statements. This Chronicle possesses the peculiarity of being almost the only work of an historical nature compiled under Brahman influence.

The only work which has any pretension to universality in its scope is the Karnâtaka Râgakula. But though it begins with an account of the creation of the world and the incarnations of Vishnu, and narrates the deeds of typical heroes like Pandarva and Vikramâditja, it yet only contains the history of the Dekhan, and is, after all, a modern work edited at the bidding of English rulers. The only earlier work of the same character is one professing to give the general history of India from Ashokja to Pratîtasena, written in the fourteenth century. This, however, is believed not to have been compiled by a native Indian, and is, at any rate, not the work of a Brahman, though possibly of a Buddhist.