Ancient ties that bond Chindian

Letter from Beijing...

Accounts of historical interactions between India and China have tended to focus rather excessively on the flow of Buddhist influences, monks and scholars between the two countries down the ages. Even given the centrality of the catalytic role of religion in facilitating the transmigration of people and ideas between India and China in earlier times, a narrow focus on just that aspect of people-to-people relations tends to paint something of a monochromatic picture. In fact, as Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen notes in The Argumentative Indian, interactions between the two countries extended to many other, ‘secular’, spheres. There is, as Sen notes, a need for a broader understanding of the reach of these relations in the interest of a fuller appreciation of the history of a third of the world’s population, and for the continuing relevance of these connections.  

There are several non-religious areas in which there is evidence to support Sino-Indian interactions since ancient times. Among them are trade, mathematics, astronomy, medicine, music, architecture, linguistics and literature. For instance, there are references in ancient Indian texts — such as the Mahabharata, Bana’s Harsacarita, Kautilya’s Arthasastra, and even in the Manusmriti – to the widespread use in India of ‘priceless articles’ and ‘objects of adoration’ from China. In Abhijnanasakuntalam, the peerless poet Kalidasa, reputed for his use of the simile, likens the lovelorn King Dusyanta’s mind to “a Chinese silk banner trembling against the wind.” In Shanghai, a bronze bust of Kalidasa was unveiled last year as a commemoration of the literary links between India and China in ancient times

Likewise, there are records of the extensive interaction between Chinese and Indian mathematicians and astronomers in earlier times. One of China’s greatest astronomers and mathematicians, Yi Xing, was profoundly influenced by Tantric mathematics, which he used for calendrical calculations to construct a Chinese almanac. Indian scientists held high positions in the Chinese scientific establishment: in the 8th century, Gautama Sidhartha (or Qutan Xida, as he was known in Chinese) became the president of China’s Astronomical Bureau, and authored the Kaiyuan Zhanjing, a compendium of Chinese astronomy. 

No less significant are the Sino-Indian influences in the areas of culture and linguistics. Thousands of words and idioms were introduced into the Chinese language through translations from Sanskrit. Indicatively, even the word ‘mandarin’ (which refers to officials in Chinese imperial courts) is believed to have its etymological roots in the Sanskrit word ‘mantri’ (minister). And the word ‘zen’ (which refers to the meditative practice) is believed to have evolved from the Sanskrit word dhyana (meditation), which was translated into Chinese as chan.