Early India from the Origins to A.D. 1300

Journal of the American Oriental Society, The, Oct-Dec, 2005 by Ludo Rocher

A few minor annotations may be offered. Agreed that many Puranas do carry the name of a deity in their titles; yet, saying that "[e]ach Purana is a manual on the worship of a specific deity and a guide for the worshipper" (p. 275) is an oversimplification, as is evident from the many other reasons why the Puranas are referred to in the text (e.g., pp. 98-100). In view of the lengthy scholarly discussions the term janapada (not janapada) has provoked, the phrase "janapada--literally, the place where the tribe places its foot" (p. 121) may be too categorical an interpretation; cf. R. P. Kangle, "a janapada, in its origin, appears to have been the territory on which a particular people or tribe was settled" (The Kautiliya Arthasastra, vol. 3, 1965, p. 121, emphasis added). The principal forms of human evidence, according to the dharmasastras, indeed include documents and witnesses. The third form, however, is possession (bhukti), corresponding to the Western statute of limitation; "the possession of incriminating objects" (p. 305) is added to these three as a subsidiary type of evidence, yukti, which is more or less equivalent to circumstantial evidence. Finally, the phrase "[t]he two systems of family law, Dayabhaga and Mitakshara, became the basis of civil law and were to remain so until very recent years" (1966: 249-50), reappears only slightly modified: "Two systems of family law, Dayabhaga and Mitakshara, became basic to the upper castes and remained so until recent years." It is now added that the Dayabhaga "came to prevail in eastern India," whereas the Mitaksara "became the more widely prevalent system" (p. 466). There is no longer any doubt that both texts were written around, or shortly after, 1100, but, if Thapar's formulation, even with the restriction that this applies only "to the upper castes," can be substantiated for the period 800-1200, it means that the division between Dayabhaga law and Mitaksara law, which has been the cornerstone of the Anglo-Hindu law of inheritance until 1956--and, to some extent, still is today--can be traced back more than eight centuries. It would also mean that the decision made in Calcutta, in 1772, to apply "the law of the Shaster to the Gentoos," was not as ill conceived as many students of Hindu law, including this reviewer, have repeatedly claimed.

The bibliographie raisonnee (1966: 354-68) has been replaced with straightforward lists of "Select Bibliographies" of publications relevant to the successive chapters (and subsections within the chapters), followed by a brief "General Bibliography" (pp. 516-44). As a matter of policy, "not because [they] are no longer important" (p. 542), most older publications have been excluded. Looking at even this restricted list of mostly post-1966 books (with the exception of half a dozen in French, exclusively books in English or translated into English)--no articles are included--one marvels at how much Indian history has been researched, both in India and elsewhere.