The Awesome Commercial Highway Networks of Ancient Bharatavarsha

This episode narrates the extraordinary commercial highway networks of ancient Bharatavarsha and how the continuity of these routes were preserved intact till the downfall of the Mughal Empire.
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OUR STORY BEGINS at the southern gate of the Balhika city. This gate directly led to mainland Bharatavarsha.

On its first leg, the route crossed the Hindu Kush mountains and the Sindhu River and terminated in the bustling commercial city, which was also the ancient world’s educational magnet: Takshashila. This was the starting point of one of the oldest routes in the world. Within India, it is still known as the Grand Trunk Road.

Interestingly, Kautilya calls this route as Haimavat-patha or the route of the Himalayan Mountain range. He says that this route was explicitly used for transport and trade in horses, wool, woolen clothes, hides and furs, to the exclusion of all other goods. In direct contrast, he says that the Dakshinapatha was used for trade in conch, seashells, diamonds, precious stones, pearls and gold. He also gives a guidance of sorts regarding this route: the best sector in this route was that which proceeded to the mining districts and was regularly used by travelling merchants or Saarthas.

The Grand Route that began at Takshashila continued into mainland Bharatavarsha before splitting at Mathura. At Mathura, one branch of the route led to Pataliputra and culminated in the flourishing port of Tamralipti (today: Tamluk, in Midnapur district, West Bengal) at the mouth of the Bay of Bengal.

The Glory of Tamralipti

The name Tamralipti is derived from the Sanskrit word, Taamra or copper because it was available in the region in such abundance. It was mined at Ghatsila in the Singbhum district and transported to the port. Even today, the Government-run Hindustan Copper Ltd is engaged in copper mining operations in the region.

The Tamralipti port is one of the oldest in the world having a continuously recorded history of around 3000 years.

The Pataliputra-Tamralipti sector was heavily protected and patronized because it contributed substantial revenue to the Mauryan Empire. Ashoka sent his son Mahendra and daughter Sanghamitra to supervise the transportation of the sacred Bodhi Tree to Sri Lanka. Their voyage began from Tamralipti. In fact, the port was a flourishing hub of trade and cultural exchanges from India to Suvarnabhumi (Burma and Thailand). For centuries, Buddhism literally voyaged to South East Asia via Tamralipti.

The other branch from Mathura led to Ujjayini and culminated at yet another hectic seaport: Bhrugukaccha or Bharuch on the Gulf of Cambay.

When we trace its history, it becomes clear that it is not a mere coincidence that today, the Gulf of Cambay is one of the central sites of Marine Archeology in India, and it continues to supply invaluable knowledge of the history of ancient India.

What we’ve seen so far are the barest details of just one small slice of the extraordinary commercial network of routes and important commercial cities in ancient India.

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North by Northwest

Now, we can briefly look at some of the other important trading and mercantile routes and hubs of north and northwestern and western India.

But before that, we can mention perhaps the most important feature of this network: its awe-inspiring endurance and continuity over the centuries.

Since the establishment of these commercial routes of untold antiquity, most of them remained intact all the way till the downfall of the Mughal Empire. For example, even in the mid-18th century, the ancient route which started from Lahore and ended in Kashmir passed through Gujarat.

Here is a partial list of the great highways, branches of highways and other commercial routes and cities and towns in ancient northwestern and northern India:

·      Bamyan (now in Afghanistan)

·      Purushapura (Pakistan)

·      Kaapishi (Afghanistan) – one of the ancient world’s largest producer of grapes, it was also a flourishing international trading hub where goods poured in from Rome, Khorasan, and Iraq

·      Moolasthana (Multan, now in Pakistan) – the site where Narsimha took his Avatara. It was one of the most ancient pilgrimage sites for Hindus. It was also the first of the twelve Surya-kshetras in Bharatavarsha and therefore, a prosperous commercial centre comparable to say, Ludhiana, Surat or Coimbatore. Today, it has the world’s largest concentration of Sufi mosques.

  • Kabul

  • Jalalabad (Afghanistan)

  • Gandhara (Afghanistan)

  • Udbhandapura (now Hund in Pakistan)

  • Pushkalavati (Pakistan)…

Another busy route that passed entirely through forests, existed between Takshashila and Varanasi. It culminated at Mithila.

Another important route began at Purushapura leading to Saharanpur and ended at Lucknow. Yet another began at Lahore, touched Bhatinda and reached Delhi. From there, it crossed the Yamuna River, then proceeded to Prayaga, then to Varanasi, Bhagalpur, and ended at Calcutta via Patna.

There were also direct routes to Mathura from Rohtak and Rajagriha (Rajgir). For several centuries, Mathura was known as the Emporium of Bharatavarsha.

Other well-connected commercial cities and towns included Shravasti (known for long as the city of Bankers), Magadha, Champa, Vaishali, Kaushambi, Kurukshetra, Sthaneshwara (Thanesar), Indraprastha, Kanyakubja, Ahichchatra, Ayodhya, Mahishmati and most importantly, Ujjayini. Mahishmati was the gateway to the Deccan.

To be continued

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