The Penguin History of Early India

by Romila Thapar

  The status of the village and the tenures varied and eventually three kinds came to prevail. The most frequent was the village with an inter-caste population paying taxes to the king on the amount of land cultivated, together with its produce and taxes from other occupations. Another category included grants of various kinds to individuals or particular groups, generally brahmans, although the king could choose to make a grant to someone else. The brahmadeya villages were created when either the entire village or some lands of the village were donated to a single brahman or a group of brahmans. These grantees were prosperous because the brahmans normally did not pay tax and the holdings could be much larger than usual. The agrahara grant applied to a village consisting of a settlement of brahmans, the land being given to them as a grant and exempt from tax, but the brahmans could provide free education locally if they so wished. The third kind were the devadana/devadeya, donated to the god – lands or villages functioning in a similar manner to the first category, except that their cultivators were tenants of a temple. The revenue from these villages was donated to the temple, and was consequently received by the temple authorities rather than the state. The temple authorities assisted the village by providing employment for the villagers. This last category of villages gained greater significance in later centuries when the temples became the central institutions of rural life. During the Pallava period the first two types of villages were predominant.

  The village included the homes of the villagers, gardens, irrigation works – mainly tanks or wells – cattle enclosures, wastelands, the village common, forests surrounding the village, streams passing through the village lands, the temple and the temple lands, the cremation ground, and the ‘wet’ (irrigated) and ‘dry’ lands under cultivation. Land owned in common and used for specific purposes, such as that kept for sifting paddy, was also included. Rice was the staple crop, used as both a unit of barter and a commercial crop when harvested in surplus. There were extensive coconut palm plantations, the produce of the tree being put to varied use. Both the palmyra and the areca palm were cultivated, the latter largely for the export of areca nuts. Groves of mangoes and plantains were a regular feature of the landscape. Oil extracted from the seeds of cotton and gingelly were much in demand.

  A special category of land, eripatti, or tank land, is mentioned. Donated by individuals, the revenue from this land was set apart for the maintenance of the village tank. This indicates the dependence of the village on tank irrigation, although irrigation with water from wells was next in importance. Rainwater increased the volume stored in the tank so that land could be irrigated during the long, dry spell each year. The tank, lined with brick or stone, was built and maintained through the co-operative effort of the village, and its water shared by the cultivators. Inscriptions from the Pallava period pertaining to rural affairs refer to the upkeep of such tanks. Water was taken from the tank by water lifts to canals, and these were fitted with stone sluices to regulate the water level and prevent an overflow at the source. A special tank committee appointed by the village supervised the distribution of water for irrigation. Water taken in excess of the amount permitted to a particular cultivator was taxed.

  Information on land tenures and taxation is available from the detailed records in the grants, which have survived mainly on copper plates. There were two categories of taxes levied in the village: the land revenue paid by the cultivator to the state varied from one-sixth to one-tenth of the produce of the land, and was collected by the village and paid to the state collector; the second category consisted of local taxes, also collected in the village but utilized for services in the village and its environs, ranging from the repair of irrigation works to the renovation or decoration of the temple. The state land tax was low and revenue was supplemented by additional taxes on draught cattle, toddy-drawers, marriage parties, potters, goldsmiths, washermen, textile-manufacturers, weavers, brokers, letter-carriers and the makers of ghi (clarified butter). Unfortunately, the percentage of tax was not always indicated and it doubtless varied according to the object taxed. Royal revenue came almost exclusively from rural sources, mercantile and urban institutions being as yet less intensively tapped.

  An example of a land grant engraved and preserved on copper plate is quoted below. The eleven plates on which it is inscribed were found near a village in the vicinity of Pondicherry in 1879. The plates were strung on a ring of copper, the two ends of which were soldered and stamped with a royal seal depicting a bull and a lingam – the Pallava symbol. It records the grant of a village made in the twenty-second year of the King Nandivarman (AD 753) and commences with a eulogy of the king in Sanskrit, followed by the details of the grant in Tamil and a concluding verse in Sanskrit. The grant appears to have been made to the preceptor of the king and the person who would have performed various rituals for him, including those pertaining to the Bhagavata sect. The temple built by the king would have been both a gesture honouring his preceptor, as well as a statement of his own political authority. The quotation below is from the Tamil section, and it is significant that the most relevant sections of these grants were in Tamil rather than Sanskrit.

  The author of the above eulogy was Trivikrama. The above is an order of the king dated in the twenty-second year of his reign. Let the inhabitants of Urrukkattukottam see. Having seen the order which was issued after the king had been pleased to give Kodukalli village of our country – having expropriated the former owners at the request of Brahmayuvaraja, having appointed Ghorasharman as the effector of the grant, having excluded previous grants to temples and grants to brahmans, having excluded the houses of the cultivators to the extent of altogether two patti [a measure of land] – as a brahmadeya (grant) to Shettiranga Somayajin [Shettiranga, who performs the Soma sacrifice], who belongs to the Bharadvaja gotra [a brahman exogamous sept], follows the Chhandogyasutra and resides at Puni, we, the inhabitants went to the boundaries which the headman of the nadu [district] pointed out, circumambulated the village from right to left, and planted milk-bushes and placed stones around it. The boundaries of this village are – the eastern boundary is to the west of the boundary of Palaiyur, the southern boundary is to the north of the boundary of Palaiyur, the western boundary is to the east of the boundary of Manarpaklcam and of the boundary of Kollipakkam, and the northern boundary is to the south of the boundary of Velimanallur. The donee shall enjoy the wet land and the dry land included within these four boundaries, wherever the iguana runs and the tortoise crawls, and shall be permitted to dig river channels and inundation channels for conducting water from the Seyaru, the Vehka, and the tank of Tiraiyan… Those who take and use the water in these channels by pouring out baskets, by cutting branch channels, or by employing small levers shall pay a fine to be collected by the king. He (the donee) and his descendants shall enjoy the houses, house gardens, and so forth, and shall have the right to build houses and halls of burnt tiles. The land included within these boundaries we have endowed with all exemptions. He himself shall enjoy the exemptions obtaining in this village without paying for the oil-mills and looms, the hire of the well-diggers, the share of the brahmans of the king, the share of shengodi [a plant], the share of the kallal [a type of fig tree], the share of kannittu, the share of corn-ears, the share of the headman, the share of the potter, the sifting of paddy, the price of ghi, the price of cloth, the share of cloth, the hunters, messengers, dancing-girls, the grass, the best cow and the best bull, the share of the district, cotton-threads, servants, palmyra molasses, the fines to the accountant and the minister, the tax on planting water-lilies, the share of the water-lilies, the fourth part of the trunks of old trees of various kinds, including areca palms and coconut trees… The grant was made in the presence of the local authorities, of the ministers, and of the secretaries.

  Kasakkudi Plates of Nandivarman, tr. E. Hultzsch, South Indian Inscriptions,

  II. 3, pp. 360 ff.

  In this system, the function of the brahman was not restricted to the performanc
e and the rhetoric of ritual. Beyond this the brahman grantees also had a role as settlers, colonizers and entrepreneurs, a role which is evident from the grant but is not always recognized. Up to a point the brahman settlements and the temples which developed alongside them acted as surrogates for the state, although they were required to work together with the officers of the state. They provided an administrative substructure in organizing the working of the lands and other resources gifted to them. To the extent that royal administration was concerned with integrating diverse economies into peasant economies this process was assisted by the nuclei of peasant economies that resulted from these grants. The grantees collected revenue and encouraged further extensions of agriculture, some of which would also provide revenue for the state. In addition they had responsibility for the effective management of irrigation, largely tanks, wells and channels that were maintained by the local village assemblies.

  Ideologically, the underlining of Brahmanism and the role of the brahman helped to strengthen monarchy by investing the ruling dynasty with legitimacy, by conferring kshatriya status on the royal family in some instances and by converting existing social groups into castes, which were then slotted into a hierarchy to make them more functional. The frequency with which dynasties claimed brahma-kshatra descent reveals the close functioning of political power and brahmanical ideology in parts of the peninsula during this period. The emphasis on brahman and nonbrahman status gradually became the foundational stratification in this area, drawing from the principles of varna organization to provide a framework for the juxtaposition of statuses, although it did not conform to the fourfold varna society. There were of course other ways of acquiring a high status. For example, the death of a hero in battle or in defending the village could be used by his kinsmen to claim status and land.

  The expansion of agriculture did not terminate other activities such as pastoralism. That cattle-keeping remained important in particular areas is evident from the early viragal, literally hero-stones, depicting and thus memorializing the local hero defending cattle or fending off attacks by predators, both animal and human. Such depictions began as simple representations, but became elaborate by the end of the millennium. They underline the frequency of raids and suchlike, all of which had to be met through the efforts of the village. The need for the village to protect itself by its own resources emphasizes a decentralized administration. There is an impressive increase in the sheer numbers of such stones from the late first millennium AD.

  Single memorial stones tend to occur in isolated areas and often depict a standing warrior or one with a horse. Where they occur in clusters it appears they were brought to the vicinity of the village, frequently in or near the temple used by the upper castes. Some memorials commemorate heroes who died in battle, but the heroic gradually became associated with all actions of defence. They occur in larger numbers in frontier zones or peripheral areas of forested land, presumably where state policing would be weak. Hero-stones are less common in agriculturally fertile areas. In the semi-arid zones of Maharashtra and Karnataka, fending off cattle-raids was a frequent theme. These raids may have reflected the dislocation of forest-peoples by agricultural settlements. In coastal areas such as Goa, representations of sea battles suggest attacks by pirates.

  The embellishment of the hero-stone led to the single panel being replaced by three or four horizontal panels, sculpted in bâs-relief. The topmost panel indicated the symbols of the hero’s sect, such as an image of Karttikeya, the son of Shiva; a lingam and yoni for a Shaiva; a small image of Mahavira for a Jaina; and invariably the sun and the moon, encapsulating eternity. The next panel depicted the fulfilment of the promise to the hero – carried to paradise by apsaras, celestial maidens. The lowest panels were representations of the event that had caused his death. Sometimes a brief inscription was included below the panels, providing information on the person and the occasion. In subsequent periods, when the wife of the hero was required to immolate herself on the funeral pyre of her husband, and thus become a sati, her death was also commemorated through a memorial. The sculpture on the slab was simple and generally depicted an open right forearm, with bangles still intact, symbolizing the continuation of the marriage. It was important to cultivate a heroic ethos in the defence of settlements not protected by the royal army.

  Some of the royal revenue went to maintain an army. A system of levies was used in addition to the king’s standing army. The army consisted mainly of foot soldiers, cavalry and a unit of elephants. Cavalry was the most expensive, since the availability of horses was limited and to import horses from north India or west Asia was costly. The Pallavas built dockyards at Nagapattinam and developed a navy, although this was inconsiderable compared to the naval strength that south India later acquired under the Cholas. The recent discovery of a possible wharf at Mahabalipuram also points to maritime activities.

  The navy assisted in the maritime trade with south-east Asia, by now constituting many kingdoms: Kambuja and Funan (Cambodia); Champa (Vietnam); and Shrivijaya (the southern Malay peninsula, Java and Sumatra). All of these were in contact with India, as well as the trade routes travelled by south Indian merchants. On the western coast, commercial maritime initiative was gradually taken over by intermediary traders, mainly the Arabs. Indian traders gradually became suppliers, rather than carriers, of goods to countries westward. However, cultural contacts with south-east Asia not only continued but increased.

  Continuing trade was one of the factors encouraging urbanization. In addition to maritime trade in coastal areas, trade was tied to internal networks traversing the peninsula. The cities of the Ganges Plain seem to have been in temporary decline, but in many other areas cities and commerce are evident. In the earlier period some items arriving at Indian ports were used as part of the ongoing gift-exchange necessary to chiefdoms. The emergence of kingdoms, with revenue from agriculture and commerce, probably reduced the role of gift-exchange. Growing wealth and stratification meant that exchanges took place through trade, rather than as gifts.

  Earlier, there had been a difference between the two main regions of the peninsula, the Deccan and the south: votive inscriptions from the Deccan mentioned artisans, guilds, traders and landowners, whereas Tamil brahmi inscriptions recorded the donations of individual professionals and merchants with fewer mentions of landowners. This changed when land became a major segment of the economy.

  A number of towns were mentioned in the Deccan inscriptions. Among them were Banavasi, Kolhapur, Vatapi, Aihole, Pattadakal and Shravana Belgola. Some, such as Puligere, were originally military camps that were gradually transmuted into administrative and commercial centres. Others were administrative centres to start with or else were the foci of local religious activity. Both categories acquired urban characteristics and were frequently the hub of exchange. Cash donations were recorded, although coins do not seem to have been minted in large amounts. Perhaps this was related to the greater expansion of agricultural interests at this time. Such an expansion would have encouraged the growth of exchange centres although the exchange may have been of local produce.

  The centrality of the town can be seen in descriptions of urban life in the Shilappadigaram and the Manimegalai. Kaveripattinam, also known as Puhar or Pumpuhar, was the cynosure with its harbour and wharf, the houses of merchants and the special part of the city where the Yavanas lived. Paddy came in boats from rural areas to Puhar, where it was exchanged for other merchandise destined for inland market centres such as Kanchipuram, Uraiyur and Madurai. Commercial production at Puhar was also linked to resources from other places: beryl from Palghat; pearls from further south; timber such as sandalwood, teak and ebony from inland forests; and textiles from many centres. Puhar was a lively city with an affluent lifestyle.

  Literary Culture

  In the early part of this period, education was provided by Jainas and Buddhists whose teaching pervaded the urban ethos. Gradually, however, the brahmans superseded them. The Jainas had a trad
ition of religious literature in Sanskrit, such as the Adipurana and the Yashatilaka. They had also used Prakrit and now began to use Tamil. They developed a few centres for religious instruction, including advanced education, near Madurai and Kanchipuram, and at Shravana Belgola. Many Jaina monks tended to scatter, isolating themselves in small caves tucked away in the hills and forests. The most beautiful of these caves was at Sittannavasal in Pudukkot-tai, with its traces of what must once have been murals of elegant design. Monasteries were the nucleus of the Buddhist educational system and were located in the region of Kanchipuram and the valleys of the Krishna and the Godavari Rivers. Buddhist centres focused on the study of the religion, particularly as there was intense controversy between Buddhist sects and those adhering to Vaishnavism and Shaivism. Considerable time was spent in debating the finer points of theology. Royal patronage, which the Buddhists now often lacked, gave an advantageous position to the others. The popularity of Jainism was also eroded to some degree in competition with Shaivism when it received less patronage. When Mahendravarman I, the Pallava king, lost interest in Jainism and took up the cause of Shaivism the Jainas were deprived of valuable royal patronage. Such swings in royal patronage were not common, since most rulers preferred to distribute their patronage tactfully. A change might be due to personal inclination, or to an assessment that a particular group was losing importance as a network of royal support or a provider of revenue.