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Showing posts with label literary sources. Show all posts
Showing posts with label literary sources. Show all posts

Literary Historical Sources

We acquire knowledge about our past by historical sources, which are basically remains of past in the form of monuments, inscriptions, numismatics, pottery, tools, weapons, food grains, manuscripts, tablets, etc. Broadly, we divide historical sources into two categories as archaeological and literary sources. Both these historical sources, although divided into categories, have their unique identity and usage; we can’t neglect them in historical reconstruction and use them together. However, we found and accepted that archaeological sources are much reliable than literary sources.

14th-15th Century Manuscripts on Astrology from Nepal.

A historical source in the form of written evidence, termed as literary source. Basically, written symbols or scripts are speeches in the form of symbolic language which enable us to communicate with each other. In simple terms, ‘writing is the process of using symbols in specific form to communicate human thoughts and ideas in a readable form’. Writing marked a revolutionary transition in human history. Evidence shows that writing was known as early as 3rd Millennium BCE like Mesopotamian script (deciphered), Harrapan script (not deciphered yet); also we have a number of civilization who was acquitted with this art of writing in far later period. Remember that, paintings found in caves dated thousands of year back, suggest that our ancestors communicate through Pictographic form of writing as these paintings seem to tell a story, like in caves of Bhimbetka where historians discovery a number of rock paintings, some of them depict ancestors engaged in hunting practice.

 

 ||| Learn about various Archaeological Dating Method. |||

 

In history, literary source play a important role in creating different account of events as they provide detailed information which is not provided by archaeological sources; but important is that, sources must be deciphered, so we can understand what it exactly mean. Without decipherment of script, we cannot determined it’s degree of importance. Harrapan Script is the best example of it, which is not deciphered yet. Sources with deciphered scripts helps historians in assigning date, creating theories and accounts of historical events like Rajatarangini written by Kalhan (1148AD) tell us details about kings of Kashmir, on the basis of this masterpiece, scholars reconstruction the history of Kashmir easily. 


As discussed above, writing can be in any symbolic form with a particular pattern and script, which used in communication after arranging it in a specific form. However, today we have digital gadgets for writing like personal computers, mobile phones, laptops, tablets, etc. With the help of keyboard, stylus, etc. one can write or draw whatever he or she want. These modern gadgets just make life easier and provide an effective way of writing and learning. Even, we wrote this academic article by using one of these gadgets and similarly you are reading it too by using them. But, when we go back in past we found that people use palm leaves, birch bark, sheep leather, wooden tablets, copper plates, stone tablets, etc. as material on which they wrote. These materials are chosen on the basis of  their long lasting shelf life, convenience of writing on them and importantly for their purpose. Commonly birch bark and palm leaves were used. One of the tool for writing was hand made ink (made by mixture of lampblack and glue, etc.) and hand crafted stylus pen (mostly made by reeds, bones and metals), and in this method, after one or two letters writers need to dip again in inkpot. Other know method was carving and then spreading ink on it to make it clearly visible.



||| Making of Palm Leaves Manuscripts in Ancient Times. |||

 

We found a  number of palm leaf and birch bark manuscripts in India which are very important and informative source. From these resources we are able to reconstruct history of India’s past. Apart from them various stone and copper plates were found, for example – Sohgaura copper plate (3rd century BC) of Maurya mention about famine relief efforts. Birch bark and palm leafs were mostly used and majority of the texts were written on them. Wooden tablets, stone tablets and copper plates were mostly used for specific writing like commemorate events, messages, grants, etc. It is also important to note that, although these tablets and plates are included in literary sources but they are as good as archaeological source in the form of inscriptions. Infect, all literary sources at their material level are archaeological one but when we talk about texts or their contents they are part of literary source. Later, we see invention of paper in 104 AD by Chinese court official Ts’ai Lun of Han Dynasty in Lei-Yang, China. It become prominent writing material with time. Soon, printing techniques were available and these advancements facilities more literary works for future generations. So, literary sources were  now easily written off and available. And from them we are able to know a lot of details about our past.

As we know history is very vast subject, for making it more meaningful, historians divided literary sources into two broader categories, which are as follows:

1. Indigenous Texts

2. Foreign Texts

 

These two broader categories will subdivided into two to four categories which will vary according to historian and region as different geographical regions have their unique history and similarly different historians have different views. We classify it into following appropriate categories as:-

A. Religious Texts

B. Non-religious Texts

(i). Historical Texts

(ii). Semi-Historical Texts

(iii). Biographical Texts




Note 1. Harappan script was earliest Indian script but not deciphered yet. When we deciphered it, definitely we see a lot of changes in Indian history which definitely affect or change World history too. This script contents pictographic letters, due to this termed Pictographic Script. Mesopotamia and Egyptian civilizations were contemporary to the Indus Valley Civilization.


Note 2. The earliest Indian deciphered and best-known Brahmi inscriptions are the rock-cut edicts of Ashoka in north-central India region dating  250–232 BCE.




Bibliography

1. AFANDPA. “The History of Paper”. American Forest & Paper Association. July 9, 2021. United States of America.

[https://www.afandpa.org/news/2021/history-paper#:~:text=Paper%20was%20first%20made%20in,to%20dry%20in%20the%20sun]

 

2. Al-Atabi, Akram Jabar. “What is Writing”. Research Gate. June 2020. [https://www.researchgate.net/publication/341864922_What_is_Writing]

 

3. Cepi. “AD 105 China: birthplace of paper”. CONFEDERATION OF EUROPEAN PAPER INDUSTRIES. Brussels, Belgium.

[https://www.cepi.org/ad-105-china-birthplace-of-paper/#:~:text=The%20birth%20of%20paper%2C%20as,with%20which%20to%20make%20paper]

 

4. Dahiya, Poonam Dalal. Ancient and Medieval India. McGraw Hill Education (India) Private Limited. Delhi. 2nd Edition. 2020.

[ISBN10: 9390113644 /ISBN13: 978-9390113644]


5. Harris, Roy. "Rethinking Writing". Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd. United States of America. 2000.

[ISBN-10: 048-5115476 /ISBN-13: 978-0485115476]


6. MOC. “Manuscripts”. Ministry of Culture, Government of India. Culture. India.

[https://indiaculture.gov.in/manuscripts]


7. Singh, Upinder. A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India From the Stone Age to the 12th Century. Pearson Publications. New Delhi. 2009.

[ISBN10: 9788131716779 /ISBN-13: 978-8131716779]


8. Stein, M.A. "Kalhana's Rajatarangini: A Chronicle of the Kings of Kashmir -Vol.1". Motilal Banarsidass Publication. 2017.

[ISBN-10: 812-0803698 /ISBN-13: 978-8120803695]




See Also

1. Making of Palm Leaves Manuscripts in Ancient Times.

2. Archaeological Dating Method.

3. Akhmim Wooden Tablet from Ancient Egypt.

4. Negotiating with Historical Sources.

5. Invention of Printing in the World.

6. Archaeological Sources.

7. Primary, Secondary and Tertiary Sources of History.

8. Excavation and Exploration in Archaeological.

9. Evolution of Printing Industry in the World.

10. UGC NET JRF History Optional complete Notes on Latest Syllabus. 



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Negotiating with Historical Sources

All Sources that provide us the information of past events are called historical sources. The knowledge of any country's (for example India's) past can be gathered from these historical sources. 

There are various sources which lie in this category and broadly these sources can be divided into:
1. Literary Sources

However, reconstruction of history of ancient past have numerous difficulties as sources for this period are limited and extremely diverse in nature. In the absence of proper literary records, our knowledge is largely based on archaeological sources. So for a better comprehension of past, evidences from literary sources has to be correlated through the cross-checking with the archaeological evidence.



Next Articles:
2. Literary Sources 
4. Archaeological Dating Methods