The History of the Arthasastra
eBook - PDF

The History of the Arthasastra

Sovereignty and Sacred Law in Ancient India

  1. English
  2. PDF
  3. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - PDF

The History of the Arthasastra

Sovereignty and Sacred Law in Ancient India

About this book

The Artha??stra is the foundational text of Indic political thought and ancient India's most important treatise on statecraft and governance. It is traditionally believed that politics in ancient India was ruled by religion; that kings strove to fulfil their sacred duty; and that sovereignty was circumscribed by the sacred law of dharma. Mark McClish's systematic and thorough evaluation of the Artha??stra's early history shows that these ideas only came to prominence in the statecraft tradition late in the classical period. With a thorough chronological exploration, he demonstrates that the text originally espoused a political philosophy characterized by empiricism and pragmatism, ignoring the mandate of dharma altogether. The political theology of dharma was incorporated when the text was redacted in the late classical period, which obscured the existence of an independent political tradition in ancient India altogether and reinforced the erroneous notion that ancient India was ruled by religion, not politics.

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Yes, you can access The History of the Arthasastra by Mark McClish in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Politics & International Relations & Political History & Theory. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. Half-title page
  3. Series page
  4. Title page
  5. Copyright page
  6. Dedication
  7. Contents
  8. List of Figures and Tables
  9. Preface and Acknowledgments
  10. Note on the Text
  11. List of Abbreviations
  12. Chapter 1 Introduction
  13. Chapter 2 Arthaśāstra Historiography
  14. Chapter 3 The Resegmentation of the Arthaśāstra
  15. Chapter 4 Citation and Attribution
  16. Chapter 5 The Deep Structure of the Text
  17. Chapter 6 The History of the Arthaśāstra
  18. Chapter 7 The Politics of the Daṇḍanīti
  19. Chapter 8 Varṇadharma in the Arthaśāstra
  20. Chapter 9 Statecraft, Law, and Religion in Ancient India
  21. Appendix I Other Theories of Composition
  22. Appendix II Chapter Colophons
  23. Appendix III End Verses at Variance with Preceding Prose
  24. Appendix IV Possible Integration between Prose and End Verses
  25. Appendix V Proposed Interpolations at the End of Chapters
  26. Appendix VI Possible Instances of Unattributed Citation
  27. Appendix VII Proposed Interpolations Depending on Citations
  28. Appendix VIII Other Proposed Interpolations
  29. Appendix IX Manu’s Seventh Chapter and the Daṇḍanīti
  30. Appendix X Brāhmaṇical Privileges
  31. Bibliography
  32. Index Locorum
  33. Index