Ch. 3 India & ChinaSection Two: New

Empires in India

I. The Mauryan Dynasty

•400 B.C. Persia threatened the Dynasty

•Alexander the Great invaded in 327 B.C.

A. The Founding of the Mauryan Dynasty

•Chandragupta Maurya 324 to 301 B.C.

•Highly centralized & impartial power

•Provinces, ruled by governors

B. The Reign of Asoka

•Asoka, grandson of Chandragupta Maurya

•*Asoka is considered the greatest ruler in the history of India

•Converted to Buddhism

II. The Kushan Kingdom & the Silk Road

•100 B.C. founded by nomadic warriors, in Afghanistan

•Prospered on trade•Silk Road – a route between the

Roman Empire & China, so called because silk was China’s most valuable product (p. 83)

The Kushan Kingdom & the Silk Road

•Stretched from the city of Changan in China to Antioch a port city in Syria on the Mediterranean Sea

III. The Kingdom of the Guptas

•Chandragupta & son Samudragupta

•Dominate political force in northern India

The Kingdom of the Guptas

•Faxian, a Chinese Buddhist monk spent years in northern India

•The Gupta Empire actively engaged in trade with China, Southeast Asia & the Mediterranean

•Mines of gold, silver

Caves

Prince Gautama

The Kingdom of the Guptas

•Profited from religious trade•Pilgrim – a person who travels to a shrine or other holy place (p.85)

•Invaded by the Huns in 5th century A.D.

IV. The World of Indian Culture

•Literature, architecture and Science

A. Literature: A Lasting Legacy

•Vedas, earliest known Indian literature

•Epic poems: Mahabharata & Ramayana

•Recount deeds of great warriors

Literature: A Lasting Legacy

•Most famous poem, Bhagavad Gita

•The Ramayana was an account of the fictional ruler Rama

•Kalidasa most famous Indian author

•The Cloud Messenger

B. Architecture

•The pillar, marked sites pertinent to the Buddha’s life

•The stupa, burial mounds & held relics

•The rock chamber, carved out of mountainsides

stupa

http://www.sudarshanaloka.org/images/stupa2.JPG

http://images.encarta.msn.com/xrefmedia/sharemed/targets/images/pho/000aa/000aab23.jpg

C. Science•Astronomy•Aryabhata, the most famous mathematician

•*Created Algebra•Devised a decimal system of counting in tens

•Introduced the concept of zero