Reading the evidence: how do we know?
Every name and date on this site rests on something a person can go and look at: a pillar, a coin, a trench, a page. In six short sittings you learn to ask of each one who made it, what it can show, and where it falls silent.
By the end you can
- name the kinds of record this site holds and say what each kind can and cannot tell us.
- say who is speaking in an inscription or a chronicle, and for whom it was written.
- separate what an object shows from what a scholar reads into it.
- explain how a date is fixed, and tell a settled date from one that is still argued.
- set a traditional reckoning beside a date drawn from evidence and state each one fairly.
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What counts as evidence
about 15 minutesThis site keeps more than a hundred evidence records, and each is marked with its kind. Inscriptions are cut in stone or copper. Coins and manuscripts sit in museum cases and libraries. Excavations are trenches and what came out of them. Texts and chronicles are books with an author. A few records are studies of ancient DNA. An inscription gives names and often a date, in words its maker chose. A trench shows where people lived and what they made. A genome shows one person’s ancestry. Before you trust a record, ask what kind it is.
Read
- The Rakhigarhi genomeLook for the caution the authors themselves gave, and for the one thing the record says this genome does settle.
- The Bakhshali manuscriptNote the three radiocarbon results, and why some historians of mathematics do not accept that one book spans six centuries.
Words to know
- inscription
- Writing cut into stone or metal, or painted on a wall, that records a gift, a reign or a victory.
- epigraphy
- The study and reading of inscriptions.
- numismatics
- The study of coins.
Look closely
The main caution, which the authors themselves gave, is that this is one genome from one city. It cannot speak for every Harappan town from Sindh to Gujarat. What it does settle is that farming in South Asia did not need a wave of farmers from western Asia; local people took it up.
This passage comes from a genetics record. Going by the passage alone, what can this one genome tell us, and what can it not?
Yes. The passage calls this one genome from one city and says it cannot speak for every Harappan town from Sindh to Gujarat. It then names the one thing the genome does settle, that farming in South Asia did not need a wave of farmers from western Asia.
Not quite. The passage says the opposite: one genome from one city cannot speak for every Harappan town. The authors of the study gave this caution themselves.
Not quite. One sample has limits, yet the passage names something it does settle: local people took up farming. Small evidence still answers the question that fits it.
Remember
- Ask first what kind of record you are reading.
- Every kind of record answers some questions well and others poorly.
- A careful record states its own limits, as the Rakhigarhi study does.
Inscriptions: what the stone says and who is speaking
about 15 minutesAt Girnar, Kalsi and Dhauli the rock still carries Ashoka’s edicts, and in them the emperor speaks in his own voice. That is the strength of an inscription. It was cut in its own time, it often stands where it was made, and the text survives in the original. It is also a voice with a purpose. A prashasti is a king’s praise composed at his own court: Harishena wrote for Samudragupta, Ravikirti for Pulakeshin II. Read such a text for names, places and dates. Then ask what a court poet would have reason to enlarge or leave out.
Read
- Edicts of AshokaNotice how the five Greek kings named in Rock Edict XIII fix the date, and what scholars still debate.
- Allahabad pillar prashasti of SamudraguptaLook for who wrote the poem, whom it praises, and why historians ask how literal the list of conquests is.
- Aihole inscription of RavikirtiSee how Ravikirti dates his poem in two reckonings and then names himself beside Kalidasa and Bharavi.
Words to know
- prashasti
- A eulogy of a king carved in stone or on copper, recording his lineage and deeds.
- edict
- A royal proclamation carved for the public to read.
- Brahmi
- The script of Ashoka’s edicts, written left to right, the parent of nearly every script of South and Southeast Asia.
- dhamma
- The Prakrit form of dharma.
Look closely
It lists the kings of Aryavarta whom Samudragupta uprooted, the twelve kings of Dakshinapatha, among them Vishnugopa of Kanchi, whom he captured and then set free, and the frontier kingdoms (Samatata, Kamarupa, Nepala and others) that paid tribute. It praises him as a poet and a musician.
The record says this text was composed by Harishena, “minister and poet of Samudragupta”. Who is speaking in the passage, and what kind of claim is its list of victories?
Yes. The passage is a list of kings uprooted, captured or made to pay tribute, followed by praise of the king as a poet and a musician, and the record names its author as the king’s own minister. The same record notes that historians debate how literal the conquest list is, above all the southern campaign, where kings were captured and then set free.
Not quite. The record names the author as Harishena, Samudragupta’s minister and poet, and calls the text a eulogy of his king. The passage itself praises the king as a poet and a musician, which is the mark of a court poem.
Not quite. Nothing in the passage comes from Vishnugopa of Kanchi or from the frontier kingdoms; they appear only as names in the victor’s list. An inscription gives the voice of whoever had it carved.
Remember
- An inscription speaks in the voice of whoever had it carved.
- A prashasti is firm for names, places and dates, and gives one side of everything else.
- A date may stand inside the text, as at Aihole, or come from other records, as with Ashoka’s five Greek kings.
Coins: small objects, firm names, careful dates
about 15 minutesA Gupta dinar is barely two centimetres across, yet the Brahmi letters around its rim can still be read with a glass. Coins were struck while the king lived, so his name, his titles and the deity he chose reach us from his own lifetime. They help settle the order of kings where inscriptions are thin. Their limits are as plain. A coin has room for a picture and a line of verse, and seldom says why. Agathocles, a Greek king of Bactria, is known only from his coins, and his reign is placed around 190–180 BCE by their style.
Read
- Agathocles’ coins of Balarama and KrishnaSeparate what is stamped on the coin from the scholars’ discussion of why a Greek king chose these two figures.
- Samudragupta’s Ashvamedha coinSee how the legend was pieced together from several coins, and how one word is read in two ways.
- Gupta gold dinarsLook at how each emperor chose to be shown, and what the falling gold content of the late coins is read as a sign of.
Words to know
- ashvamedha
- The horse sacrifice of a sovereign king.
- dinara
- The name that the Gupta emperors’ own inscriptions give to their gold coins.
- yupa
- The sacrificial post, to which the animal of the sacrifice was tied.
- legend
- The words written on a coin, usually the king’s name, a title or a line of verse.
Look closely
One face shows Balarama, also called Samkarshana, holding the plough and the pestle-club. The other shows Vasudeva-Krishna holding the chakra and a conch. The inscriptions are in Greek, “of King Agathocles”, and in Brahmi, “rajane agathukleyasa”.
Which statement stays closest to what these coins themselves show?
Yes. Each part of this can be seen on the coins as the passage describes them: the plough and pestle-club, the chakra and conch, and the two inscriptions. The statement records what was stamped and stops there.
Not quite. The passage describes the two figures and the king’s name, and says nothing of the king’s own faith. The record notes that scholars agree on who the figures are and still discuss why a Greek king chose them.
Not quite. No year appears in the passage; the inscriptions give only the king’s name. The record places his reign around 190–180 BCE by the style of his coins, which is a range reached by reasoning.
Remember
- A coin carries a name, a title and an image chosen in the king’s own lifetime.
- What is stamped on the coin is evidence; why it was chosen is interpretation.
- Coin dates often come from style and sequence, so they are given as a range.
Excavations: what the ground shows, and what it cannot
about 15 minutesAt Keezhadi the trenches show brick walls, ring wells, drains and potsherds scratched with names. People lived there, built in brick and wrote. What they believed is harder to dig up. At Kalibangan seven clay-lined pits stand in a row on a brick platform, with ash and charcoal inside. B. B. Lal read them as altars of a fire ritual; other archaeologists have suggested hearths or kilns. The pits are found things. Their purpose is a reading, argued from their size and setting. At Dholavira ten large signs lay by the city gate, and no one can yet read them.
Read
- Fire altars of KalibanganList what the excavators found, then the reasons given for and against reading the pits as altars.
- Keezhadi excavationsNote what the finds show about daily life, and why the date of the earliest layers is still discussed.
- The Dholavira signboardAsk what a public signboard shows about the people of the city even though its writing is unread.
Words to know
- yajna
- Offering into the sacred fire with Vedic mantras, the central rite of the Veda.
- agnihotra
- The daily offering of milk into the household fire at sunrise and sunset, kept by Vedic householders all their lives.
- Indus script
- The writing of the Harappan cities, about four hundred signs on seals, tablets and pots, which no one has yet read.
Look closely
On one platform of the southern citadel seven fire pits stood in a row, holding ash and charcoal, with a clay stele in the middle of some and animal bones near by. A well and paved bathing places were set beside them.
Which statement is supported by what was found in the ground, without adding an interpretation?
Yes. Every item here is in the passage as a thing found: the pits with ash and charcoal, the well, the paved bathing places. The statement describes what was built and leaves its purpose open.
Not quite. The passage lists pits, ash, a clay stele and bones, and names no rite. The record gives this as B. B. Lal’s reading, argued from the bathing places and the raised platform, while other archaeologists have suggested hearths or kilns, so it stands as an interpretation of the finds.
Not quite. This too is a reading, and the passage does not state it. The record’s answer to it is that the pits are too small for cooking, stand on a raised platform set apart from the houses, and show no sign of food waste.
Remember
- The ground shows what people built, made and used.
- What people believed is argued from the finds, and a good record shows the argument.
- The dates of the earliest layers of a site are often still under discussion.
Chronicles and travellers: who wrote, for whom, and why that matters
about 15 minutesKalhana finished the Rajatarangini in 1148–49 and wrote that a historian should be like a judge, free of love and hate. He also names his sources: earlier chronicles, temple inscriptions, royal grants. Al-Utbi was a secretary at the court of Mahmud of Ghazni, and his history is a work of praise for his patron. Al-Biruni came from outside, learned Sanskrit over years among pandits, and worked mostly in the north-west. Each of them wrote from somewhere and for someone. Knowing that tells you where a chronicle is strong and where it gives little voice to the other side.
Read
- Rajatarangini of KalhanaFind the sources Kalhana names, and see which of his books historians trust more and why.
- Tarikh-i-Yamini of al-UtbiNote whom the author served, when he wrote, and what historians allow for in a work of praise.
- Kitab al-Hind of Al-BiruniLook for what an outside scholar could see well, and for the limits the record sets on his picture of Bharat.
Words to know
- chronicle
- A history told in order of time, reign by reign or year by year.
- taranga
- One of the eight books into which Kalhana’s Rajatarangini is arranged.
- court panegyric
- A work of praise written for the author’s own patron.
- Sharada script
- The script of Kashmir, in which its Sanskrit manuscripts and inscriptions were written for centuries.
Look closely
It records the defeat and capture of the Shahi king Jayapala near Peshawar in 1001, and the raids on Thanesar, Mathura and Kannauj. Of Mathura, Mahmud is made to say that a building to equal its temple could not be raised for a hundred million dinars or in less than two hundred years.
The record calls this book a court history by a secretary of Mahmud of Ghazni, “written while Mahmud was still raiding Bharat”. How should a careful reader use the passage?
Yes. The passage names a battle, a year and the towns raided, and the record says the book was written within the lifetime of the men who rode with Mahmud. The same record calls it a work of praise in which army sizes and plunder are inflated, and the words “Mahmud is made to say” show the writer shaping his patron’s speech.
Not quite. The passage speaks only from Mahmud’s side; Jayapala appears as a defeated and captured king with no words of his own. The record states that in this work the enemy is given little voice.
Not quite. A writer with a patron can still record real events, and the passage names a battle near Peshawar in 1001 and three towns. The record calls this book the base of all later accounts of the Ghaznavid raids, because it comes from inside the attacker’s court in his own time.
Remember
- Ask who wrote, whom he served, and who was meant to read.
- A court’s own record is strong evidence for what that court did, and gives the other side little voice.
- The parts of a chronicle that coins and inscriptions confirm earn more trust than its distant beginnings.
Tradition and dated history, side by side
about 15 minutesEvery Hindu panchang counts the Kali years from 3102 BCE, and by that count 2026 CE is Kali 5127. The Mahabharata names the field, the season and the stars of the war, and does not give the year. Tradition places the war near 3138 BCE. Other reckonings on this site run down to about 1000 BCE, because each trusts a different kind of evidence. A careful student states the traditional reckoning first, then the dates drawn from inscriptions, astronomy and excavation, and marks which questions are open. The Vimarsha pages set out each position and say what would settle it.
Read
- When was the Mahabharata war?Compare the three positions, and read what the page gives as the weak point of each.
- Aihole inscription of RavikirtiRead it again for one thing only: how a poet of 634–635 CE counted his years from the Bharata war.
- Is the drowned city off Dwarka Shri Krishna’s Dvaraka?Note what is agreed, that something lies on the seabed, and what is still argued, its date and its use.
Words to know
- Kali Yuga
- The present age, which began at Shri Krishna’s departure in 3102 BCE by the traditional reckoning, and lasts 4,32,000 years.
- Shaka era
- The era that begins in 78 CE, used by astronomers and almanacs for nearly two thousand years and adopted as India’s national calendar in 1957.
- Itihasa
- Thus it happened: the Ramayana of Maharshi Valmiki and the Mahabharata of Maharshi Vyasa, the sacred history of Bharat.
Look closely
Two verses give the date in two reckonings: 3,735 years since the Bharata war, and 556 years of the Shaka kings, both elapsed in the Kali age. Shaka 556 is 634–635 CE, and 3,735 years earlier gives 3102 BCE, the traditional beginning of the Kali Yuga, which Ravikirti identifies with the war.
What does this inscription show about the date of the Bharata war?
Yes. The passage gives the date in two reckonings and works out that the count from the war leads back to 3102 BCE. The stone is firm evidence that this traditional reckoning was in public use by 634–635 CE, and the record notes it is the earliest inscription to use it.
Not quite. By its own count the poem was written 3,735 years after the war, so Ravikirti is using a reckoning and was no witness. The Vimarsha page on the war sets this reckoning beside others and treats the year as an open question.
Not quite. The praise is for Pulakeshin II, but the passage is about the date line, which is the kind of thing an inscription records well. It fixes the inscription itself at Shaka 556 and shows which reckoning of the war its author used.
Remember
- State the traditional reckoning first, then the dates drawn from evidence.
- An inscription can show that a tradition was already in use at the time it was carved.
- An open question is stated as open, along with what would settle it.
Printable worksheet: eight questions for a class or for yourself, with an answer guide and references.
The questions in this path are drawn from the records on this site and have not yet been reviewed by a teacher or subject expert.
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