Aśokan edicts: The genesis of the imperial idea and culture in early India and the debt to Iran

Abstract

The Mauryan Empire was preceded by the Achaemenian Empire, which in extent, and centralisation appears to have set a model for it. There is much on the surface to justify this thesis. Most remarkably there is the use of stone inscriptions for which the Achaemenid emperors, especially Darius and Xerxes, set a precedent. Stone and stone-cut art and architecture, not traceable in post-Indus India begin with Aśoka, and this too had Achaemenid precedents on a grand scale. This essay concedes the connection but argues that the contexts and contents of Aśokan inscriptions were essentially different from their Achaemenid precedents, and Mauryan art too, in both its forms and message, owed much to indigenous tastes and genius.