CHANDRAGUPTA MAURYA

PART-2 

Early Life:
 Chandragupta's ancestry, birth year and family as well as early life are unclear. This contrasts with abundant historical records, both in Indian and classical European sources, that describe his reign and empire. The Greek and Latin literature phonetically transcribes Chandragupta, referring to him with the names "Sandrokottos" or "Androcottus". According to Radhakumud Mookerji

• The Greek sources are the oldest recorded versions available, and mention his rise in 322/321 BCE after Alexander the Great ended his campaign in 324 BCE and began returning to Greece from northwest India. These sources state Chandragupta to be of non-princely and non-warrior ancestry, to be of a humble commoner birth.
• The Buddhist sources, written centuries later, claim that both Chandragupta and his grandson, the great patron of Buddhism called Ashoka, were of noble lineage. Some texts link him to the same family of Sakyas from which the Buddha came, adding that his epithet Moriya (Sanskrit: Maurya, Mayura) comes from Mora, which in Pali means peacock. Most Buddhist texts state that Chandragupta was a Kshatriya, the Hindu warrior class in Magadha and a student of Chanakya.The Buddhist texts are inconsistent, with some including legends about a city named "Moriya-nagara" where all buildings were made of bricks colored like the peacock's resplendent neck.
• The Jain sources, also written centuries later, claim Chandragupta to be the son of a village chief, a village known for raising peacocks.
• The Hindu sources are similarly from later centuries. They state that Chandragupta was a student of Chanakya (also called Kautilya) of humble birth. The Puranas composed after about the 3rd century CE mention that Kautilya was a Brahmin, praise Kautilya, mention Chandragupta but most are silent about his lineage or origins. A few Hindu texts state that he was born to a Shudra woman, alternatively in a peacock rearing family – a profession that is neither priestly nor warrior. An Ashokan pillar discovered and excavated in Nandangarh, suggests that a peacock was the emblem of Maurya dynasty and likely linked to the dynastic lineage.

According to Kaushik Roy, both Chandragupta Maurya and the Nanda dynasty he replaced were of Shudra lineage. After his birth, he was orphaned and abandoned, raised as a son by a cowherding pastoral family, then, according to Buddhist texts, was picked up, taught and counselled by Chanakya.The Buddhist literature, which places the Mauryas in the same royal dynasty as the Buddha, states that Chandragupta, though born near Patna (Bihar) in Magadha, was taken by Chanakya for his training and education to Taxila, a town in what is now northern Pakistan. There he studied for eight years. The Greek and Hindu texts state that Kautilya (Chanakya) was a native of the northwest Indian subcontinent, and Chandragupta was his resident student for eight years

                                                                                           

                                                                                                                 PART 3 Will be continued....