Test: The Gupta Period - 2 - BPSC (Bihar) MCQ

Kuberanaga was the mother of Prabhavati Gupta. Chandragupta II married the Naga Princess Kuberanaga and gave his own daughter Prabhabati in marriage to Vakataka king Rudra Sena II. The Vakataka alliance was master stroke of diplomacy as it secured the subordinate alliance of the Vakataka king who occupied a strategic geographical position. It is noteworthy that Rudra Sena died young and his widow reigned until her sons came of age.

The travel account of Fa-hien is known as Fokwo-ki. Fa-hien or Faxian (AD 399 – 413): Fa-hien was the first Chinese monk to travel to India in search of great Buddhist scriptures. At the age of sixty-five, he travelled, mostly on foot, from Central China taking the southern route through Shenshen, Dunhuang, Khotan, and then over the Himalayas, to Gandhara and Peshawar.

 

VA Smith complimented Samudragupta as the Indian Napoleon. Samudragupta embarked upon a policy of conquest. In fact, Digvijay became the ultimate call of his life. For his military achievements, he has been aptly complemented by the historian VA Smith as the Indian Napoleon. He has described Samudragupta as the Hero of Hundred Battles.

The word Vishti means Forced labour.While the Kshatriyas acquired their share of the social surplus through the force of arms in the form of taxes (Kar, Shulka, Bali, etc.), forced labour (Vishti, Balutam, etc.), tithes and other privileges. The Brahmin clergy enforced its claim to the social surplus through a moral deterrent which was based on strength of the tribal morality of distribution.

Expansion of agricultural land took place on the largest scale in Gupta age. The degeneration of the Vaisyas (the third, or trader caste), which had begun earlier, intensified during this period. Because of advanced agricultural techniques and developments in handicrafts, the condition of the Sudra’ s (the fourth, or menial caste) improved and there was no great difference between a poor Vaisya and a prosperous Sudra.

Mrichchakatikam literacy works did not belong to the Gupta period. Of all the Sanskrit dramas, Mricchakatika remains one of the most widely celebrated and oft-performed in the West, in part because its plot structure more closely resembles that of Western classics than other Hindu plays. The work played a significant role in generating interest in Indian theatre among European audiences following several successful nineteenth century translations and stage productions.

Harisena was the court poet of Samudragupta. Samudragupta was brilliant commander and a great conqueror is proved by Harisena’s description of his conquests. He mentions that Samudragaupta exterminated nine north Indian states, Subdued eighteen Atavika kingdoms near Bajalpur and Chhota Nagpur, and in his blitz - like campaign humbled the pride of twelve South Indian Kings, Nine borders tribes, and five frontier states of Smatata, Devaka, Karupa, Nepal and Krtripur.

Veersena was the author of Mandasor inscription. There is an inscription about Bandhuverma at Mandalore. The silk workers had constructed a Sun temple here which was repaired by Bandhuverma in Samvat 493. This indicates that he was present there till 436 CE. The Risthal stone slab inscription discovered in 1983 has brought to light another Aulikara dynasty, which comprised the following kings in the order of succession: Drum Vardhana, Jayavardhana Ajitavardhana, Vibhishanavardhana, Rajyavardhana and Prakashadharma.

 

Samudragupta granted permission to Meghverma the ruler of Sri Lanka to build a Buddhist temple in Gaya. Kittisirimegha of Sri Lanka, a contemporary of Samudragupta, erected with the permission of Samudragupta, a Sangharama near the Mahabodhi Vihara, chiefly for the use of the Singhalese monks who went to worship the Bodhi tree.

In the Gupta administration, purpala was the administrator of conquered territories. The person was mostly from the authority who reigned in that region itself but sometimes the faithful of the king also took control of these territories.

In 5th century AD, the famous Chinese pilgrim Fa Hien visited India. Travelling through central Asia and northwest India, Fa-hien reached northern India and then visited the holy Buddhist sites located in the Ganges valley: Kapilavastu, the birthplace of Buddha; Bodhgaya, the site of Buddha’s enlightenment; Sarnath, where Buddha preached his first sermon, and Kushinagara, the place of Buddha’s nirvana.

The six district school of Indian philosophy Sankhya, Yoga, Nyaya, Vaisheshika, Mimansa, Vedanta became fully articulated during the Gupta period.

Vagbhatta was the author of a famous Ayurvedic text Ashtanga Hridaya. The science of chemistry, due to its Vedic antiquity might have been first recognized in India, as a separate discipline. Alchemy and the science of medicine gave rise to the study of chemistry in India. The ancient masters as mentioned in connection with chemistry are: Patanjali, Bhavya Dattadeva, Vyadi, Svacchanda, Damodara, Vasudeva, Charaka, Sushruta, Harita and Vagbhata. Ancient Sanskrit documents about the advanced chemical science finds the expression in activities like distillation of perfumes and fragrant ointments. It is also found in activities like manufacturing of dyes and chemical preparation of pigments and colours and polishing of mirrors.

Amarsingh was the author of Amarakosha. Amara seems to have been a Buddhist, and most of his work was destroyed, with the exception of what is the celebrated Amara-Kosha (Treasury of Amara), a vocabulary of Sanskrit roots, in three books, and hence sometimes called Trikanda or the “Tripartite”. It is also known as “Namalinganushasana”. It contains 10,000 words, and is arranged, like other works of its class, in metre, to aid the memory. The first chapter of the Kosha was printed at Rome in Tamil character in 1798.

During the Gupta period, the great epics of Ramayan and Mahabharat were given the final form. Traditionally, the authorship of The Mahabharata is attributed to Vyasa. There there have been many attempts to unravel its historical growth and compositional layers. The oldest preserved parts of the text are thought to be not much older than around 400 BCE, though the origins of the epic probably fall between the 8th and 9th centuries BCE.

Dhanvantari was a physician. Dhanvantari is depicted as Vishnu with four hands, holding medical herbs in one hand and a pot containing rejuvenating nectar called amrita in another. He is often shown with a leech in his hand rather than the scriptures. The Puranas state that Dhanavantari emerged from the ‘Ocean of Milk’ and appeared with the pot of nectar during the story of the Samudra or Sagar Manthan whilst the ocean was being churned by the Devas and Asuras, using the Mandara mountain and the serpent Vasuki.

As mentioned by Hiuen Tsang, 10,000 students were studying in the Nalanda University. Founded in the 5th Century AD, Nalanda University is known as the ancient seat of learning. 2,000 teachers and 10,000 students from all over the Buddhist world lived and studied at Nalanda, the first Residential International University of the World. A walk in the ruins of the university, takes you to an era, that saw India leading in imparting knowledge, to the world – the era when India was a coveted place for studies. The University flourished during the 5th and the 12th century.

None of the above had the title ‘Amoghavarsha’. The Arab traveller Sulaiman described Amoghavarsha as one of the four great kings of the world. Sulaiman also wrote that Amoghavarsha respected Muslims and that he allowed the construction of mosques in his cities. Because of his religious temperament, his interest in the arts and literature and his peace-loving nature, historian Panchamukhi has compared him to the emperor Ashoka and given him the honorific title “Ashoka of the South”

Bakhtiyar Khilji destroyed Nalanda University in 1202 AD. The prince of perverts – Muhammad Bakhtiyar Khalji – is a blot on the human race. And yet the town of Bakhtiyarpur in Bihar, close to the site of his cruel depredations, bears his name. Bakhtiyar Khalji holds a pride of place because, unlike the other Muslim marauders, he was not content with destroying the areas he traversed.

 

Trayipurusha temple at Salotgi was a well known centre of higher education. Shri Narayan, minister to the Rastrakulta king of South India, constructed a temple in Salotgi (Bijapur) which in the twelfth century became a centre for Vedic education. Many buildings were built there for students to stay in. A description of this says that five hundred acres of land were donated (Epigraphia India) for classrooms, lodging and boarding.