CSET Practice Test History Subtest I

The Ancient Civilization of India

From the earliest settlements along the Indus River, the
Dravidians and later the Aryans spread their settlements
deep into the sub-continent. Protected by geographic
barriers, the valley inhabitants had limited contact with
the outside world. Farmers cultivated cotton and processed
it into cloth which became a valuable trade commodity.
Their cities were well planned with shops, granaries,
extensive sewer systems and protective walls. Two major
religions, Buddhism and Hinduism, developed in India and
spread throughout Asia. 

Art served religion well in India. The artists of the area
cut unique Buddhist Temples from rocky cliffs with facades
and interiors intricately carved to imitate the wooden
constructions of the period. From the earliest simple
structures to the ornate and imposing later ones, the
Hindu Temples must be appreciated as sculpture as well as
architecture. Their paintings, particularly from the Gupta
dynasty, are classed as some of the finest in history.

Indian culture is an ancient and dynamic entity, spanning
back to the very beginnings of human civilization.
Beginning with a mysterious culture along the Indus River
and in farming communities in the southern lands of India,
the history of the sub-continent is one puncuated by
constant integration with migrating peoples and with the
diverse cultures that surround India. Placed in the center
of Asia, Indian history is a crossroads of cultures from
China to Europe, and the most significant Asian connection
with the cultures of Africa. 

Indian history, then, is more than just a set of unique
developments in a definable process; it is, in many ways,
a microcosm of human history itself, a diversity of
cultures all impinging on a great people and being
reforged into new, syncretic forms.

The most striking element of Indian geography is the
natural barrier formed by the mountain ranges in the north
of India. For India is a continental plate that is
crashing into the Asian continental plate. As it does,
both continental plates push up the earth where they meet
into a forbidding range of mountains. The central mountain
range, passing across in the shape of a sword near the
northern edge of the Indian subcontinent, is the Great
Himalayas. These northern mountains, which are less of a
barrier in the west, have naturally isolated India from
its neighbors. 

All along the southern edge of this great mountain wall
are rich soils that are generously rained on; even though
this region lies in the temperate zone, it is lush and
subtropical. To the south are the extensive flood plains
of the Indus River in the west and the Ganges in the east.
With rich soil renewed every year by river flooding and
with generous summer rains, these plains in the north are
among the richest agricultural areas in the world. It was
here that Indian civilization first arose, in the fertile
flood plains adjoining the Indus River. This vast stretch
of flood plain has been the home of the great Indian
empires as well, the Mauryans and the Guptas. 

The southern portion of India is a large peninsula with a
forbidding mountain range all along the western coast and
a large flat plateau called the Deccan in the center of
the sub-continent. The eastern coast is flat land and
affords many opportunities for harbors; from this area
Indian culture had the widest contacts with foreign
peoples. The western portion, however, being walled from
the sea and hard to reach by land, subsequently became the
seat of the powerful empires of the south, such as the
Muslim kingdoms. 

India is one of the most culturally, linguistically, and
ethnically diverse regions one can imagine. Four major
peoples, distinguished by the languages they speak, make
up the population of the region. The majority of the
population are Indo-European speaking a variety of
languages related to European languages such as Greek,
German, or English. Precisely when these peoples arrived
is subject to much debate, but they seem to have arrived
somewhere between 2000 BC and 1600 BC, and they brought
with them their own religion and social system. The bulk
of Indian religion and almost all of its literature is
Indo-European. Second to the Indo-Europeans, but more
ancient in India than the later immigrants, are a people
who speak languages from the Dravidian family of
languages. While we cannot be certain, the Dravidians were
probably the authors of the great Indus River
civilizations contemporary with the Mesopotamian
civilizations to the west. In addition, the peoples in the
northern mountains speak languages related to Chinese,
Tibetan, or Mongolian. Finally, the smallest group, but
most likely the oldest inhabitants of India, speak
languages from the Australoid family, which are the
languages spoken by indigenous peoples scattered
throughout southeast Asia and Australia. Australoids are
still present throughout the mountainous forests of the
Deccan, but their traditional way of life, which was still
vital only forty years ago, is beginning to die out. 

Each of these peoples speak a bewildering variety of
languages; each region of India is dominated by a single
language. The major languages, most of which are Indo-
European, are: Hindi Urdu (which is very closely related
to Hindi but uses Arabic script) Bengali Marathi Assamese
Sindhi Oriya Punjabi Kashmiri Nepali Telugu (Dravidian)
Tamil (Dravidian) Kannada (Dravidian) Malayalam
(Dravidian) Despite this variety of languages, Indian
culture is remarkably fluid and the contacts between
peoples frequent and productive. Very few cultures are so
tied into the overall geography of their region; Hinduism
requires frequent pilgrimages as part of one's spiritual
perfection, so the intercourse between different peoples
has been constant throughout Indian history. 

In the north, the great mountain barrier. To the south,
the great river plains of the Indus and the Ganges, and
the large, high plateau of the Deccan. This is the stage
on which a complex history took place, and the first act
began along the Indus River. 

Although agriculture seems to have come late to India,
arriving sometime around 5000 BC, India was one of the
first regions to give birth to civilization. Only a few
centuries after the first Mesopotamian cities sprang up, a
people living along the northern reaches of the Indus
River discovered urbanization, metalwork, and writing. It
is a mysterious civilization and one with no discernible
continuity, for it thrived for just several centuries and
then disappeared. The Indo-European immigrants who settled
the region did not adopt most of the aspects of this
civilization, and what precisely they did adopt is
difficult to ascertain. So while Egypt, Mesopotamia, and
the Yellow River civilizations lasted for millenia and
left their mark on all subsequent cultures, the Indus
River civilization seems to have been a false start. 

For the overwhelming majority of human history, this early
culture was truly a lost civilization. The mounds which
stood where great cities once thrived excited interest in
observers, but no one in their wildest dreams could have
imagined that beneath those large mounds lay cities that
had been lost to human memory. 

In the 1920's, excavations began on one of these mounds in
Harappa in Pakistan. While the archaeologists expected to
find something, they did not imagine that a city lay
beneath the earth. Archaeologists would later discover
another large city to the recovery of at least eighty
villages and towns related to this newly discovered
civilization. They named it Harappan after the first city
they discovered, but it is more commonly called the Indus
River civilization. While we have stones and tools and
fragments and bones, we really have no one's voice or
experience from the bustling days of the great Harappan
cities. We don't know who the people were who built and
lived there. We don't know, either, when they first built
their cities; some scholars argue that Harappan
civilization arises around 2250 BC, while others argue
that it can be dated back to 2500 BC or earlier. 

Like the civilizations in Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Greece,
Harappa grew on the floodplains of a rich and life-giving
river, the Indus. The original cities and many of the
towns seemed to have been built right upon the shores of
the river. The Indus, however, is destructive and
unpredictable in its floods, and the cities were
frequently levelled by the forces of nature. Mohenjo-Daro
in the south, where the flooding can be fairly brutal, was
rebuilt six times that we know about; Harappa in the north
was rebuilt five times. 

The Harappans were an agricultural people whose economy
was almost entirely dominated by horticulture. Massive
granaries were built at each city, and there most
certainly was an elaborate bureaucracy to distribute this
wealth of food. The Indus River valley is relatively dry
now, but apparently it was quite wet when the Harappans
thrived there. We know this because the bricks that they
built their cities with were fired bricks; since sun-dried
bricks are cheaper and easier to make, we can only assume
that over-abundant humidity and precipitation prevented
them from taking the cheaper way out. In addition, many of
the Harappan seals have pictures of animals that imply a
wet and marshy environment, such as rhinoceroses,
elephants, and tigers. The Harappans also had a wide
variety of domesticated animals: camels, cats, dogs,
goats, sheep, and buffalo. 

Their cities were carefully planned and laid out; they
are, in fact, the first people to plan the building of
their cities. Whenever they rebuilt their cities, they
laid them out precisely in the same way the destroyed city
had been built. The pathways within the city are laid out
in a perpendicular criss-cross fashion; most of the city
consisted of residences. 

Life in the Harappan cities was apparently quite good.
Although living quarters were cramped, which is typical of
ancient cities, the residents nevertheless had drains,
sewers, and even latrines. There is no question that they
had an active trade with cultures to the west. Several
Harappan seals have been found in excavations of Sumerian
cities, as well as pictures of animals that in no way
could have existed in Mesopotamia, such as tigers. There
is not, however, a wealth of Mesopotamian artifacts in
Harappan cities. 

We know nothing of the religion of the Harappans. Unlike
in Mesopotamia or Egypt, we have discovered no building
that so much as hints that it might be a temple or involve
any kind of public worship. The bulk of public buildings
in the city seemed to be solely oriented towards the
economy and making life comfortable for the Harappans. We
do, however, have a number of tantalizing figures on
various seals and statues. What we gather from these
figures (and we can not gather much), is that the
Harappans probably exercised some sort of goddess worship.
There is, however, some sort of male god (maybe) that has
the head of a man with the horns of a bull. In addition,
we believe from various artifacts that the Harappans also
may have worshipped natural objects or animistic forces,
but the circumstances of this worship can only be guessed
at. 

We know that the Harappans were eventually supplanted by
waves of migrations of Indo-Europeans. These new peoples,
however, did not seem to adopt the religious practices of
the Harappans, so it is not possible to reconstruct
Harappan religion through the religion of the Vedic
peoples, that is, the Indo-Europeans who constructed the
rudimentary Indian religion represented by the Vedas. 

Right at the heart of the mystery, like a person speaking
behind sound-proof glass, are the numerous writings on the
artifacts that have been unearthed. Harappan writing was a
pictographic script, or at least seems to be; as of yet,
however, no one has figured out how to decipher it or even
what language it might be rendering. The logical candidate
is that the Harappans spoke a Dravidian language, but that
conclusion, which may not be true, has not helped anybody
decipher the script. Like the rest of Harappan
civilization, the writing was lost to human memory after
the disappearance of the Harappans. 

And finally they disappeared. And they disappeared without
a trace. Some believe that they were overrun by the war-
like Aryans, the Indo-Europeans who, like a storm, rushed
in from Euro-Asia and overran Persia and northern India.
Some believe that the periodic and frequently destructive
flooding of the Indus finally took its toll on the
economic health of the civilization. It is possible that
the periodic changes of course that the Indus undergoes
also contributed to its decline. All we know is that
somewhere between 1800 and 1700 BC, the Harappan cities
and towns were abandoned and finally reclaimed by the rich
soil they had sprung from. 

The Aryans

They called themselves the "noble ones" or the "superior
ones." Their names are lost; their tribal names are lost.
But when they found themselves conquerors, they gave
themselves the name "superior" or "noble." 

They were a tribal and nomadic peoples living in the far
reaches of Euro-Asia in hostile steppe lands barely
scratching out a living. They were unquestionably a tough
people, and they were fierce and war-like. Their religion
reflects it dominated as it is by a storm-god or sky-god
that enjoins warfare and conquest. This god was called
something like "Dyaus," a word related to "Zeus," "deus"
(the Latin word for "god"), "deva" (the Sanskrit word for
"god"), and, of course, the English word "divine." Their
culture was oriented around warfare, and they were very
good at it. They were superior on horseback and rushed
into battle in chariots. They were a tribal people ruled
over by a war-chief, or raja (the Latin word "rex" (king)
comes from the same root word, along with the English
"regal"). Somewhere in the early centuries of the second
millenium BC, they began to migrate southwards in waves of
steady conquest across the face of Persia and the lands of
India. 

There, they would take on the name "superior" or "noble"
to distinguish themselves from the people they conquered.
Their name is derived from the Indo-European root word,
"ar," meaning "noble." In Sanskrit, they were the "Aryas"
("Aryans"); but that root, "ar," would also serve as the
foundation of the name of the conquered Persian
territories, "Iran." This concept of nobility, in fact,
seems to lie at the heart of Indo-European consciousness,
for it appears in another country's name, "Ireland," or
"Eire." You can bet, however, that when a people go around
calling themselves superior that it spells bad news for
other people. 

And there is no question that they were bad news for the
southern Asians. They swept over Persia with lightening
speed, and spread across the northern river plains of
India. Their nature as a warlike, conquering people are
still preserved in Vedic religion, the foundation of
Hinduism. In the Rig Veda, the collection of praises to
the gods, the god Indra towers over the poetry as a
conquering god, one that smashes cities and slays enemies.
The invading Aryans were originally nomadic peoples, not
agricultural. They penetrated India from the north-west,
settling first in the Indus valley. Unlike the Harappans,
however, they eventually concentrated their populations
along the Ganges floodplain. The Ganges, unlike the Indus,
is far milder and more predictable in its flooding. It
must have been a paradise to a people from the dry steppes
of central Asia and Iran, a paradise full of water and
forest. When they arrived, the vast northern plains were
almost certainly densely forested. Where now bare fields
stretch to the horizon, when the Aryans arrived lush
forests stretched to those very same horizons. Clearing
the forests over the centuries was an epic project and one
that is still preserved in Indian literature. 

The Aryans, or Vedic civilization were a new start in
Indian culture. Harappa was more or less a dead end (at
least as far as we know); the Aryans adopted almost
nothing of Harappan culture. They built no cities, no
states, no granaries, and used no writing. Instead they
were a warlike people that organized themselves in
individual tribal, kinship units, the jana. The jana was
ruled over by a war-chief. These tribes spread quickly
over northern India and the Deccan. In a process that we
do not understand, the basic social unit of Aryan culture,
the jana, slowly developed from an organization based on
kinship to one based on geography. The jana became a
janapada, or nation and the jana-rajya , or tribal
kingdom, became the jana-rajyapada, or national kingdom.
So powerfully ingrained into Indian culture is the jana-
pada , that Indians still define themselves mainly by
their territorial origins. All the major territories of
modern India, with their separate cultures and separate
languages, can be dated back to the early jana-padas of
Vedic India. 

The earliest history of the Aryans in India is called the
Rigvedic Period (1700-1000 BC) after the religious praise
poems that are the oldest pieces of literature in India.
These poems, the Rig Veda, are believed to represent the
most primitive layer of Indo-European religion and have
many characteristics in common with Persian religion since
the two peoples are closely related in time. In this early
period, their population was restricted to the Punjab in
the northern reaches of the Indus River and the Yamuna
River near the Ganges. They maintained the Aryan tribal
structure, with a raja ruling over the tribal group in
tandem with a council. Each jana seems to have had a chief
priest; the religion was focused almost entirely on a
series of sacrifices to the gods. The Rigvedic peoples
originally had only two social classes: nobles and
commoners. Eventually, they added a third: Dasas , or
"darks." These were, we presume, the darker-skinned people
they had conquered. By the end of the Rigvedic period,
social class had settled into four rigid castes: the
caturvarnas, or "four colors." At the top of the
caturvarnas were the priests, or Brahmans. Below the
priests were the warriors or nobles (Kshatriya), the
craftspeople and merchants (Vaishya), and the servants
(Shudra), who made up the bulk of society. These economic
classes were legitimated by an elaborate religious system
and would be eventually subdivided into a huge number of
economic sub-classes which we call "castes." Social class
by the end of the Rigvedic period became completely
inflexible; there was no such thing as social mobility. 

In the early centuries of Later Vedic Period or Brahmanic
Period (1000-500 BC), the Aryans migrated across the Doab,
which is a large plain which separates the Yamuna River
from the Ganges. It was a difficult project, for the Doab
was thickly forested; the Aryans slowly burned and settled
the Doab until they reached the Ganges. While the Rig Veda
represents the most primitive religion of the Aryans
during the Rigvedic Period, the religion of the Later
Vedic period is dominated by the Brahmanas, or priestly
book, which was composed sometime between 1000 and 850 BC.
Later Vedic society is dominated by the Brahmans and every
aspect of Aryan life comes under the control of priestly
rituals and spells. In history as the Indians understand
it, the Later Vedic Period is the Epic Age; the great
literary, heroic epics of Indian culture, the Mahabharata
and the Ramayana, though they were composed between 500
and 200 BC, were probably originally formulated and told
in the Later Vedic Period. Both of these epics deal with
heroes from this period and demonstrate how Aryan cultural
values, as we can understand them from the Rig Veda , are
being transformed by mixing with Indus cultures. 

What did the Aryans do with their time? They seem to have
had a well-developed musical culture, and song and dance
dominated their society. They were not greatly invested in
the visual arts, but their interest in lyric poetry was
unmatched. They loved gambling. They did not, however,
have much interest in writing even though they could have
inherited a civilization and a writing system when they
originally settled India. We do not know exactly when they
became interested in writing, but it may have been at the
end of the Brahmanic period somewhere between 650 and 500
BC. Still, there are no Aryan writings until the Mauryan
period-from Harappa (2500-1750 BC) to Maurya (300 BC) is
quite a long time. The script that the Mauryans used is
called "Brahmi" script and was used to write not only the
religious and literary language of the time, Sanskrit, but
also the vernacular languages. This script, Brahmi, is the
national alphabet of India. 

The Vedic period, then, is a period of cultural mixing,
not of conquest. Although the Aryans were a conquering
people when they first spread into India, the culture of
the Aryans would gradually mix with indigenous cultures,
and the war-religion of the Aryans, still preserved in
parts of the Rig Veda, slowly became more ritualized and
more meditative. By 200 BC, this process of mixing and
transforming was more or less complete and the culture we
call "Indian" was fully formed.  

In 331 BC, Alexander the Great of Macedon began one of the
greatest conquests in human history. After conquering
Egypt and defeating the Persian Empire Alexander had
pushed his army to the very limits of the world as the
Greeks knew it. But he wanted more; he saw that the world
extended further. By conquering the ancient lands of the
Mesopotamians, he came into contact with cultures to the
east, such as Pakistan and India. After almost a millenium
and a half, from the period of Harappa (2500-1750 BC), to
the end of the Brahmanic period, the peoples of India
entered into no commerce or trade with the Mesopotamians.
But starting around 700 BC, the Indians began to trade
again with the Mesopotamian cities, and by the time of
Alexander, that trade was dyanmic. Partly out of
curiosity, and partly out of a desire to conquer the
enitre world within the boundaries of the river Ocean (the
Greeks believed that a great river, called Ocean,
encircled all the land of the world), Alexander and his
army pushed east, through northern Iran and all the way to
Pakistan and India. He had conquered Bactria at the foot
of the western Himalayas, gained a huge Bactrian army, and
married a Bactrian princess, Roxane. But when he tried to
push on past Pakistan, his army grew tired, and he
abandoned the eastward conquest in 327 BC. 

Alexander only made it as far as the region of Gandhara,
the plain which lies directly west of the Indus River.
Alexander himself seems to have had literally no effect on
Indian history, for he left as soon as he reached the
Indus. Two important results, however, arose because of
Alexander's conquests: first, from this point onwards
Greek and Indian culture would intermix. But most
importantly, the conquest of Alexander may have set the
stage for the first great conqueror of Indian history,
Chandragupta Maurya (reigned 321-297 BC), who, shortly
after Alexander left, united all the kingdoms of northern
India into a single empire. 

The Mauryans

Chandragupta Maurya (321-297 BC)

He was an adventurer rather than a king. Like Alexander,
he began with almost no army whatsoever; with this army he
seized the region of Magadha just south of the lower
Ganges and then steadily conquered the whole of the Ganges
basin. Chandragupta Maurya had started his empire. When
Alexander the Great departed from Gandhara, a power vacuum
was left in western India which Maurya took advantage of.
Marching westward, he quickly conquered the whole of the
Indus Valley, and eventually gained Gandhara and Arachosia
(the mountainous region west of the Indus) after defeating
the Greek rulers of Persia and Bactria, the Seleucids. 

Hand in hand with this ambitious conqueror was a shrewd
and calculating Brahman named Kautilya. While Chadragupta
Maurya built his empire by the force of his arm, Kautilya
designed the government. Together they created the first
unified state in Indian history. The government Kautilya
and Chandragupta created strictly regulated economic
activities. The laws were harsh and the death penalty was
applied to a myriad of offenses. 

Bindusara (297-272 BC)

Chandragupta's son Bindusara extended the conquests even
further by setting his sights south to the Deccan. By the
end of Bindusara's reign, the Mauryan Empire included at
least a third of the peninsula and stretched all the way
from Bangladesh to the Hindu Kush mountains. 

Asoka (272-232)

Of the great conquering kings of the Maurya Empire, the
only one we know much about is Asoka, for it is in the
reign of Asoka that the first samples of Indian writing
since the fall of Harappa appear. Asoka kept careful
records of his edicts, so we have an excellent source for
the history of his reign. 

He seems to have been forged from the same mold as his
illustrious fathers. Once he rose to the throne, he began
an aggressive campaign to conquer the remainder of the
subcontinent. The last major regions yet to be conquered
were the Dravidian regions in the far south and the
Kalinga in North India. 

The conquest of Kalinga, which extended Mauryan rule to
its farthest boundaries, seems to have been a tremendous
shock to Asoka. War and conquest are always bloody and
cruel, and the experience of massive homicide is often an
experience that shakes people to their very souls. Asoka
was so troubled by the conquest that he underwent a
religious conversion. In the latter years of the Brahmanic
period, several religious movements arose in reaction to
the power and abuse of power by the Brahmans. The most
significant of these religious reactions was Buddhism,
which is discussed in more detail in the chapters on the
religious history of ancient India. Buddhism was really
much less of a religion and more of a philosophy--or,
better yet, a philosophical therapy. Its founder,
Siddhartha Guatama, the "Buddha," or "Awakened One," was
the son of a noble who, when he first encountered death
and sickness, resolved to find a way to end human
suffering. After years of struggle and meditation, he
"awakened" to the truth of things: that all human
suffering is caused by human desire and that human desire
can be quenched when one understands the impermanence of
all things, including the self. Unlike Brahmanism,
Buddhism eschews elaborate rituals and magic; unlike the
Rig Veda, Buddhism advocates a non-striving, non-coercive
and meditative life. 

The Buddhist way of life was a way out of Asoka's crisis.
He converted to Buddhism and strove to achieve the
Buddhist "middle way" between extremes. He became a
vegetarian, renounced all warfare, and attempted to build
a state based on Buddhist principles. First and foremost,
the state would strive for nonviolence, or ahimsa; in
place of violence, the state would rule by "law" or
"right" (dharma). 

Asoka, of course, could not put all of these reforms into
practice. He found that some level of violence and
retribution was necessary and declared as much. Although
he made the laws less harsh, they still involved physical
punishment and, in some cases, execution. Still, Asoka
began a process of transformation in Indian society. He
represented first and foremost the possibility of
exemplifying religious idealism in a lived life rather
than in a merely formal position. Although he took the
vows of Buddhism and even joined the order, he chose to
remain active in the real world and exemplify his religion
in his actions as king. He also demanded religious
toleration; under Asoka, all competing religious systems
were allowed to co-exist peacefully. The stunning ability
of Indian culture to tolerate competing religions
throughout its history begins with Asoka. Finally,
although he could never really fully translate Buddhist
ideals into government, he began a process of cultural
transformation that would completely remake India. By the
start of the Gupta dynasty, the bulk of Indian society had
become vegetarian and no laws carried the death penalty. 

His greatest achievement, however, was cultural. For he
was dedicated to his new religion and fervently patronized
its expansion. Under Asoka, Buddhist monks were sent in
every compass direction: to Burma, Tibet, Nepal, Persia,
Mesopotamia, Syria, and Israel. The eastern evangelical
missions were extremely successful; Buddhism spread very
quickly from Nepal and Burma into Tibet and China where it
was fervidly embraced. The western missions, however, were
less successful. However, Buddhism left traces in Middle
Eastern and even European culture. For instance, one of
the Catholic saints of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance
was Barlam, whose life is based on that of Siddhartha
Gautama, the Buddha. Not only is this Catholic saint the
Buddha, but one of the stories of Barlam is the conversion
of a cruel king, Iosaphat; this king, in many ways,
corresponds to Asoka, who is presented as intolerant and
cruel before his conversion in the Indian epic,
Asokavadana. So there is tantalizing evidence that
Buddhism has had some influence on Christianity, though we
are not quite sure to what extent. 

Needless to say, the spread of Buddhism under Asoka
greatly influenced the religious history of Asia. Asoka's
conversion also produced the first written literature in
India; it was not Vedic literature but the Buddhist
scriptures that were first committed to writing. Finally,
Asoka's zeal in spreading Buddhism beyond the borders of
India ensured its survival, for when the Muslims defeated
the Hindus and took control of India, Buddhism is
destroyed as an organized religion in India. 

Asoka was the last of the great kings of the Mauryan
dynasty. His successors were less energetic and capable;
in 184 BC, the last of the Mauryan kings was assassinated,
and the first empire of India came to an end. When the
last of the Mauryan kings was assassinated in 184 BC,
India once again became a collection of unfederated
kingdoms. During this period, the most powerful kingdoms
were not in the north, but in the Deccan to the south,
particularly in the west. The north, however, remained
culturally the most active, where Buddhism was spreading
and where Hinduism was being gradually remade by the
Upanishadic movements, which are discussed in more detail
in the section on religious history. The dream, however,
of a universal empire had not disappeared. It would be
realized by a northern kingdom and would usher in one of
the most creative periods in Indian history. 

The Gupta Dynasty (320-550)

Under Chandragupta I (320-335), empire was revived in the
north. Like Chandragupta Maurya, he first conquered
Magadha, set up his capital where the Mauryan capital had
stood (Patna), and from this base consolidated a kingdom
over the eastern portion of northern India. In addition,
Chandragupta revived many of Asoka's principles of
government. It was his son, however, Samudragupta (335-
376), and later his grandson, Chandragupta II (376-415),
who extended the kingdom into an empire over the whole of
the north and the western Deccan. Chandragupta II was the
greatest of the Gupta kings; called Vikramaditya ("The Sun
of Power"), he presided over the greatest cultural age in
India. 

This period is regarded as the golden age of Indian
culture. The high points of this cultural creativity are
magnificent and creative architecture, sculpture, and
painting. The wall-paintings of Ajanta Cave in the central
Deccan are considered among the greatest and most powerful
works of Indian art. The paintings in the cave represent
the various lives of the Buddha, but also are the best
source we have of the daily life in India at the time.
There are forty-eight caves making up Ajanta, most of
which were carved out of the rock between 460 and 480, and
they are filled with Buddhist sculptures. The rock temple
at Elephanta (near Bombay) contains a powerful, eighteen
foot statue of the three-headed Shiva, one of the
principle Hindu gods. Each head represents one of Shiva's
roles: that of creating, that of preserving, and that of
destroying. The period also saw dynamic building of Hindu
temples. All of these temples contain a hall and a tower. 

The greatest writer of the time was Kalidasa. Poetry in
the Gupta age tended towards a few genres: religious and
meditative poetry, lyric poetry, narrative histories (the
most popular of the secular literatures), and drama.
Kalidasa excelled at lyric poetry, but he is best known
for his dramas. We have three of his plays; all of them
are suffused with epic heroism, with comedy, and with
erotics. The plays all involve misunderstanding and
conflict, but they all end with unity, order, and
resolution. 

The Guptas tended to allow kings to remain as vassal
kings; unlike the Mauryas, they did not consolidate every
kingdom into a single administrative unit. This would be
the model for later Mughal rule and British rule built off
of the Mughal paradigm. 

The Guptas fell prey, however, to a wave of migrations by
the Huns, a people who originally lived north of China.
The Hun migrations would push all the way to the doors of
Rome. Beginning in the 400's, the Huns began to put
pressure on the Guptas. In 480 they conquered the Guptas
and took over northern India. Western India was overrun by
500, and the last of the Gupta kings, presiding over a
vastly dimished kingdom, perished in 550. A strange thing
happened to the Huns in India as well as in Europe. Over
the decades they gradually assimilated into the indigenous
population and their state weakened. 

Harsha, who was a descendant of the Guptas, quickly moved
to reestablish an Indian empire. From 606-647, he ruled
over an empire in northern India. Harsha was perhaps one
of the greatest conquerors of Indian history, and unlike
all of his conquering predecessors, he was a brilliant
administrator. He was also a great patron of culture. His
capital city, Kanauj, extended for four or five miles
along the Ganges River and was filled with magnificent
buildings. Only one fourth of the taxes he collected went
to administration of the government. The remainder went to
charity, rewards, and especially to culture: art,
literature, music, and religion. 

Because of extensive trade, the culture of India became
the dominant culture around the Bay of Bengal, profoundly
and deeply influencing the cultures of Burma, Cambodia,
and Sri Lanka. In many ways, the period during and
following the Gupta dynasty was the period of "Greater
India," a period of cultural activity in India and
surrounding countries building off of the base of Indian
culture. This medieval flowering of Indian culture would
radically change course in the Indian Middle Ages. From
the north came Muslim conquerors out of Afghanistan, and
the age of Muslim rule began in 1100.

The land surface of California covers almost 100 million
acres. It's the third largest of the states; only Alaska
and Texas are larger. Within this vast area are a greater
range of landforms, a greater variety of habitats, and
more species of plants and animals than in any area of
comparable size in all of North America.

California Coast The coastline of California stretches for
1,264 miles from the Oregon border in the north to Mexico
in the south. Some of the most breathtaking scenery in all
of California lies along the Pacific coast.

Standing alone on the spectacular coast of the Monterey
peninsula, this windswept Monterey cypress has long been a
favorite subject for artists and photographers

More than half of California's people reside in the
coastal region. Most live in major cities that grew up
around harbors at San Francisco Bay, San Diego Bay, and
the Los Angeles Basin. 

Mountains of California

Mountains cover most of the surface of California. The
various ranges tended to isolate the diverse Native
American cultures that flourished within the present
boundaries of the state. The mountains also were
formidable barriers during the early decades of European
American exploration and settlement. 

Mount Whitney, the highest point in the United States
outside Alaska, rises to a majestic 14,495 feet above sea
level in Sequoia National Park, at the headwaters of the
Kings and Kern rivers. In southeastern Siskiyou County is
Mount Shasta, a solitary peak of volcanic origin whose
summit is 14,162 feet. Just to the south stands Mount
Lassen at 10,457 feet. Mt. Lassen was an active volcano
between 1914 and 1921.

The Sierra Nevada and the Coast Ranges are California's
two major mountain ranges. The Klamath Mountains and the
Cascades are located along the northern border of the
state. The Transverse Ranges bisect southern California.
The mountainous spine of the Baja California peninsula
extends north into the Peninsular Ranges.

Sierra Nevada The Sierra Nevada is the largest mountain
range in California, occupying one-fifth of the total area
of the state. It extends more than 400 miles along
California's eastern border and contains many snow-capped
peaks over 13,000 feet. Several modern highways through
the range--including those that cross Tioga, Sonora, and
Ebbetts passes--are routinely closed in the winter. 

The eastern side of the Sierra Nevada rises steeply,
whereas the western side has a more gentle slope. Forests
of pine, fir, and cedar cover the lower elevations.
Rushing mountain rivers have cut dozens of deep canyons in
the western Sierra. Glaciers sculpted the sheer granite
cliffs of the spectacular Yosemite Valley.

The placer gold discovered in California in 1848 was
eroded from rock outcroppings in the high Sierra and
deposited in stream banks and ancient riverbeds of the
western foothills.

Coast Ranges The Coast Ranges extend from Cape Mendocino
in the north to Point Conception in the south. Consisting
of uplifted sedimentary material, much of which has been
metamorphosed, the Coast Ranges average less than 4,000
feet in height. On the seaward slopes of the northern
ranges are forests of coast redwoods, greatly diminished
by more than a century of commercial logging.

Mount Hamilton, a 4,261-foot peak located east of San
Jose, is the site of the Lick Observatory, built in 1888.
Mount Diablo, rising to 3,849 in eastern Contra Costa
County, was the scene of coal-mining activity in the
1860s.  

Central Valley

The Central Valley lies between the Coast Ranges and the
Sierra Nevada. More than four hundred miles long and about
fifty miles wide, the Central Valley is the most
productive agricultural area in California. 

Oak woodlands and bunchgrass prairies once covered the
valley floor and great tule marshes extended over the
flood plain. Beavers in the inland streams first lured
European Americans across the continent to California in
the 1820s. Overhead is the Pacific flyway, a heavily
traveled route for migrating birds. Beneath the surface of
the valley lie rich deposits of oil and natural gas,
created millions of years ago from the remains of marine
plants and animals. Irrigated cropland today covers most
of the valley and produces more agricultural products than
any comparable region in the world.

The Central Valley is really two valleys in one. In the
south is the San Joaquin Valley, drained by the northward
flowing San Joaquin River; the Sacramento Valley lies to
the north and is drained by the southward flowing
Sacramento River.

California Deserts 

Much of the eastern half of southern California is a large
desert triangle--a vast expanse of sandy valleys, dried
lake beds, and short ranges of rugged mountains. These
southern deserts were as much a barrier to overland
migration to California in the eighteenth century as the
steep eastern face of the Sierra Nevada was in the
nineteenth.

Among the deserts of California are the Mojave and
Colorado as well as the foreboding Death Valley.

Mojave Desert

The Mojave is the largest desert in California, covering
some 25,000 square miles. Much of the surface consists of
immense stretches of sandy soil. Active volcanoes erupted
long ago, depositing layers of lava, mud, and ash onto the
desert floor. Today the region is dotted with extinct
volcanic cones and small isolated mountain ranges. 

Several Native cultures, including the Quechan (Yuma) and
Mojave, flourished along the Colorado River. Others, such
as the Cahuilla and Serrano, lived farther west. The Old
Spanish Trail crossed the region in the late eighteenth
century, as did the Santa Fe railroad in the nineteenth.
Today the region supports several resort centers and
successful farming communities in the western Antelope
Valley. Dry lake beds contain rich deposits of boron, a
valuable mineral used for jet-engine and rocket fuels.

Colorado Desert

The Colorado Desert stretches over 4,000 square miles in
southeastern California. Part of a great depression that
extends southward to the Gulf of California, the desert
lies 245 feet below sea level at some points.

The Colorado Desert includes the Coachella and Imperial
valleys with the Salton Sea between. The Salton Sea was
formed in 1905-1907 when waters from the Colorado River
overflowed an irrigation system. Irrigation today supports
a thriving agricultural economy in both the Coachella and
Imperial valleys. Leading crops include lettuce, alfalfa,
cotton, and sugar beets. Palm Springs is an elegant resort
community, famous for its warm winter sunshine and star-
studded population.

Death Valley

The most notorious of the California deserts is Death
Valley, a deep trough about 130 miles long and six to
fourteen miles wide. In the center of the valley is
Badwater, the lowest point in the Western Hemisphere at
282 feet below sea level.

Death Valley was named by a group of gold-seekers who
struggled through the region in 1849. Following the
discovery of rich deposits of borax in 1873, the valley
became famous for its twenty-mule teams hauling out wagon-
loads of this valuable mineral. Because of its scenic,
scientific, and historical interest, the region was
included within the Death Valley National Monument in
1933.

The Climates of California

As early as 1840, author Richard Henry Dana flatly
asserted that "California is blessed with a climate of
which there can be no better in the world." 

The image of the state as a land of perpetual sunshine--
"It Never Rains in Southern California," as the song goes-
-has an obvious appeal. But California's climates are far
more complex than the popular image suggests. Indeed, the
climates of California are as diverse as those of southern
Ireland and the northern Sahara. California has four of
the five major climate zones found around the world (only
the hot and rainy tropical climate is not represented).
Included are the Mediterranean, semi-arid or steppe,
desert, and microthermal or Alpine climates.

Average yearly precipitation is about 24 inches, with
rainfall ordinarily occurring between late October and
early May. The heaviest precipitation falls along the
northwest coast where annual rainfall ranges up to 110
inches.

Mediterranean Climate

Historian Kevin Starr, in his Americans and the California
Dream (1973), called the state "an American
Mediterranean." The description is apt for much of coastal
California and parts of the interior valleys that enjoy a
Mediterranean climate with relatively warm, dry summers
and mild winters. 

Even within this zone, however, are important regional
variations. Along the coast, marine air and fog keep
temperatures more moderate than in the Central Valley
where summers are generally hot and cloudless. An
intermediate version of the Mediterranean climate is found
in the Coast Ranges and the foothills of the Sierra
Nevada. 

Semi-arid or Steppe Climate

The semi-arid or steppe climate zone encompasses much of
the San Joaquin Valley and the fringes of the Mojave
Desert. Rainfall here is less and temperatures are
generally warmer than in the Mediterranean zone. A cooler
version occurs in a narrow coastal strip from Los Angeles
to San Diego. 

Notable for its sunny summers, pleasant winters, and
little rain, this and the Mediterranean climate zone are
what best qualify California for inclusion in the nation's
booming "Sunbelt." The air pollution that has plagued the
region in the twentieth century--casting a noxious pall
over sunny California--is the result of a sunlight-
activated chemical reaction among pollutants trapped by a
combination of onshore winds, interior mountains, and
temperature inversions (in which cooler marine air is
trapped beneath warmer air above.) 

Desert Climate

A desert climate exists in the southeastern third of the
state, east of the Sierra Nevada and Peninsular ranges and
in the southwestern part of the San Joaquin Valley. Cut
off by mountains from moisture-laden Pacific storms, this
region receives very little precipitation. Here lies Owens
Valley, celebrated by author Mary Austin as "the land of
little rain" and scene of one of the most bitter water
disputes in California history. 

Summer temperatures in this region are the highest in the
state, averaging over 100 degrees Fahrenheit in July in
Death Valley. The highest temperature ever recorded in the
United States, 134 degrees, was recorded in Death Valley
on July 10, 1913. 

Microthermal or Alpine Climate

The microthermal climate of California is much like that
found in the Alps where summers are short and cool and
winters are vigorous. Average temperatures in the coldest
month are below freezing at the higher elevations of the
Sierra Nevada, the Modoc Plateau, and the Klamath
Mountains. 

Most of California's water supply originates in these
higher elevations as winter snowpack and spring runoff.
About three fourths of the annual precipitation occurs in
the mountainous northern third of the state, whereas about
80 percent of the water demand (mostly for agriculture)
occurs in the southern two-thirds. Moving water from where
it naturally occurs to where demand has been created has
been one of the greatest challenges in the history of
California.

The California State Flower

The official California State Flower is the Golden Poppy.
Easily distinguished by its four brilliant orange, satiny
petals and finely divided, gray-green leaves. It can be
found blooming from March through May on hillsides and
valleys across California. 

The Golden Poppy's scientific name, Escholtzia
californica, comes from an Estonian physician, Johann
Friedrich Gustav von Escholtz, who visited San Francisco
Bay aboard the Russian ship Rurik in 1816. Also aboard the
Rurik was the self-taught botanist Adelbert von Chamisso
who named the flower in honor of his friend and traveling
companion. 

In 1913 the legislature adopted the Golden Poppy as the
California State Flower: "Its satiny petals, bright with
the gleam of our gold mines, rich with the sheen of our
fruits, and warm with the radiance of our sunshine, typify
the ideal of California as no other flower could." 

The California State Bird

The California quail (Callipepla californica) was named
the official California State Bird in 1931. [Alternative
name: California Valley Quail (Laphotyx californica)]. A
plump bird, the California quail is easily recognized by
its prominent forward-curving, teardrop-shaped plume. The
adult male has a bluish-gray chest with white bands below
its chin and over its eyes. 

The California Quail is found in mixed woodlands, brushy
foothills, and in suburban parks, usually near permanent
sources of water. Highly gregarious, coveys of up to two
hundred individuals may assemble in the fall and winter to
descend on city parks and gardens to feed on seeds and
invertebrates. 

The California State Tree

In 1953 the magnificent California coast redwood (Sequoia
sempervirens) became the official California State Tree.
Among the coast redwoods are the world's tallest trees,
some having reached a height of more than 360 feet. Their
massive trunks are usually 10-15 feet in diameter, but
their tiny cones are only about one inch long. The fibrous
bark is reddish brown; the crown is open and irregular.

Once widespread on the seaward slopes of the northern
Coast Ranges, the redwoods have been greatly diminished by
more than a century of commercial logging. Conservation
efforts date back to the mid-nineteenth century. The Save-
the-Redwoods League, founded in 1918, was among the many
groups instrumental in funding and creating preserves of
old-growth trees. Activists in the early 1990s renewed the
campaign to block the cutting of the remaining 5 percent
of virgin redwood forests.

The California State Animal

The official California State Animal is the grizzly bear
(Ursus horribilis californicus), so designated by the
state legislature in 1953. Once common in California, the
grizzly bear was exterminated in the state because of its
reported ferocity. The last reported California grizzly
was killed in 1922.

Among the largest bears in the world, grizzlies grow up to
eight feet long and weigh more than eight hundred pounds.
Their name comes from the white-tipped fur that gives them
a grizzled or gray-streaked appearance. Their overall
color varies from creamy-brown to almost black.

The grizzly bear was feared and honored in many Native
American cultures. During the Spanish and Mexican periods,
grizzlies were hunted for meat and captured for sport.
Vaqueros would capture a grizzly, transport it to a bull
ring, and tie its hindleg to the foreleg of an enormous,
long-horned California bull. Spectators then placed their
bets on whichever animal they believed would survive the
fight. 

A favorite symbol for California, the grizzly bear appears
on the state seal and flag.

The California State Mineral

Not surprisingly, gold is the official mineral of the
Golden State. Treasured because of its scarcity, beauty,
softness, and malleability, gold has been valued
throughout the ages.

The origins of California gold stretch back through the
mists of geologic time to the very creation of California.
According to the theory of plate tectonics, the subduction
of the Pacific Plate beneath the western edge of the North
American Plate generated enormous heat. Within this molten
crucible, metal-rich compounds dissolved into solutions
that were injected into fissures of rocks being formed
above. Thousands of veins of gold thus were created in the
granite core of California's primordial mountains. Over
eons of time, erosion tore lose tiny particles of gold and
washed them into rivers and streams, where they lodged on
sandbars or behind stones. There most of the particles lay
undisturbed until their widely publicized discovery on
January 24, 1848.

As news of the gold discovery spread, newcomers came to
California from across the country and around the world.
Between 1848 and 1854, the peak year of production, miners
harvested nearly $350 million in gold. The gold rush was
the foundation for the economic history of California, and
for much of its social, cultural, and political history as
well.

The California State Rock

The official California State Rock is serpentine. It
serves as a host rock for such valuable minerals as
asbestos, chromite, magnesite, and cinnabar.

Often mottled in various shades of green, serpentine can
be polished to a marblelike sheen. It is often used as an
ornamental stone, known as verd antique or serpentine
marble. Buildings throughout California have decorative
elements fashioned from this beautiful native rock.

The California State Reptile

The state legislature designated the desert tortoise
(Gopherus agassizi) as the official California State
Reptile in 1973. The desert tortoise grows to ten to
fourteen inches long and can be found in dry, sandy areas
throughout southeastern California. Like its distant
relative, the giant tortoise of the Galapagos Islands, the
desert tortoise has a brown, dome-shaped shell and thick,
stumpy legs. 

A protected species, the desert tortoise is remarkably
long lived if not removed from its native habitat. It
typically feeds at dawn and dusk and lies in a shallow
burrow throughout the day, sometimes sharing its
underground home with the occasional rattlesnake or owl. 

The California State Fish

In 1947 the state legislature selected the golden trout
(Salmo aguabonita) as the official California State Fish.
[Alternative name: Oncorhynchus aguabonita.] 

A brilliantly colored fish, the golden trout has bright
red markings on its sides, underbelly, and cheeks. Along
its spine, dorsal and caudal fins, are large, black spots.
It grows to 28 inches in length.

The golden trout was originally found only in the waters
of the Kern River in the southern San Joaquin Valley.
Later it was introduced to mountain streams throughout the
higher elevations of the Sierra Nevada. 

The California State Insect

In 1973 the state legislature selected the dog face
butterfly (Zerene eurydice) as the official California
State Insect. [Alternative name: Colias eurydice.] The dog
face butterfly is brilliantly colored and has a wingspan
of less than two inches. The male's fore wing is purplish
to pinkish orange with dark purplish brown along the front
and outer edges. The pattern of the orange area resembles
a dog's face in profile. The female's fore wing is
entirely yellow except for a conspicuous black dot. The
hind wings of both sexes are a brilliant yellow.

The dog face butterfly is found in open woodlands along
coastal California south to the Baja California peninsula.

The California State Marine Mammal

In 1976 the state legislature named the gray whale
(Eschrichtius robustus) as the official California State
Marine Mammal. 

Gray whales were hunted almost to extinction in the
nineteenth century. Whalers from the United States and
England frequented California ports during the Spanish and
Mexican periods. Stations for offshore hunting were
established during the early American period from Crescent
City in the north to Point Loma on San Diego Bay in the
south.

The gray whale averages about 36 feet in length and can be
spotted from the California coast during their migration.
The gray whales summer in the Bering sea or other northern
waters and spend the winter in favored breeding areas in
coastal Baja California. In most years, the first
southern-migrating individuals pass along the California
coast in December with peak numbers passing by in early
January. Northward movement may begin as early as
February. Mother-calf pairs often travel at a leisurely
speed and very close to the shoreline from April to June.
Their migration is the farthest of any mammal.

The California State Fossil

The saber-toothed cat (Smilodon californicus) was named
the official California State Fossil in 1968. Common in
California 40 million years ago, the saber-toothed cat was
a powerful, tiger-sized carnivore with eight-inch fangs.
It hunted thick-skinned animals such as mastodons and
woolly mammoths.

The saber-toothed cat became extinct about 12,000 years
ago, but many bones have been excavated from the La Brea
tar pits in Los Angeles. The saber-toothed cat and other
prehistoric mammal bones from the tar pits are displayed
at the George C. Page Museum on Wilshire Boulevard.