History · Ch 3 — Kinship, Caste and Class — Early Societies
Handling Texts: Historians and the Mahabharata
Handling Texts: Historians and the Mahabharata
Historians do not simply read a text and take its statements at face value. Before they can use a text as evidence about the past, they must first ask a series of questions about the text itself: Who wrote it? For whom? In what language? When and where was it composed? What kind of text is it — a ritual chant, a story, a legal manual? Only after answering these questions can a historian decide what the text actually tells us about the society that produced it.
The Mahabharata is a particularly challenging text for this kind of analysis because it is not a single work by a single author. It grew over centuries, and different layers of the text were shaped by different social groups with different purposes.
Language and content
The version of the Mahabharata that historians most often study is in Sanskrit. But this is not the complex, ritualistic Sanskrit of the Vedas or of royal prashastis (the praise inscriptions discussed in Chapter 2). The Sanskrit of the Mahabharata is far simpler, which suggests it was probably understood by a wider audience, not just by priests and elites.
Historians classify the contents of the Mahabharata under two broad heads:
- Narrative — sections that contain stories. These are the dramatic, moving parts of the epic.
- Didactic — sections that contain prescriptions about social norms. "Didactic" means intended for instruction.
This division is not watertight. The didactic sections include stories, and the narrative often carries a social message. Nevertheless, most historians agree that the Mahabharata was originally meant to be a dramatic story, and that the large didactic portions — including the most famous one, the Bhagavad Gita (where Krishna advises Arjuna on the battlefield) — were probably added later.
Within early Sanskrit tradition, the Mahabharata is described as an itihasa, which literally means "thus it was" and is usually translated as "history." Whether a real war lies behind the epic is uncertain: some historians think the memory of an actual conflict among kinfolk was preserved; others point out that there is no corroborative evidence for the battle.
Author(s) and dates
The question "Who wrote the Mahabharata?" has several answers, because the text was composed in stages over many centuries.
- Original composition (oral): The earliest story was probably composed by charioteer-bards known as sutas. These men accompanied Kshatriya warriors to battle and composed poems celebrating their victories. These compositions circulated orally.
- Fifth century BCE onwards: Brahmanas took over the story and began to commit it to writing. This was the period when chiefdoms like those of the Kurus and Panchalas (around whom the epic revolves) were gradually becoming kingdoms. It is possible that the new kings wanted their itihasa to be recorded more systematically. The upheavals of state formation — where old social values were replaced by new norms — may also be reflected in parts of the story.
- c. 200 BCE – 200 CE: Another phase of composition. This was the period when the worship of Vishnu was growing, and Krishna, a central figure of the epic, was coming to be identified with Vishnu.
- c. 200 – 400 CE: Large didactic sections resembling the Manusmriti were added. With these additions, a text that initially may have had fewer than 10,000 verses grew to about 100,000 verses.
This enormous composition is traditionally attributed to a sage named Vyasa.
The search for convergence
Historians try to see if the descriptions in the Mahabharata match archaeological or other evidence. This is called the search for convergence.
Example 1: Hastinapura
In 1951-52, archaeologist B.B. Lal excavated at a village named Hastinapura in Meerut (Uttar Pradesh). The location — in the Upper Ganga doab, where the Kuru kingdom was situated — suggests it may have been the capital of the Kurus mentioned in the text. Lal found evidence of five occupational levels. Two are of particular interest:
| Phase | Date | Evidence of houses |
|---|---|---|
| Second | c. 12th–7th centuries BCE | Walls of mud and mud-bricks; mud-plaster with reed marks suggesting some houses had reed walls plastered with mud. |
| Third | c. 6th–3rd centuries BCE | Houses built of mud-brick and burnt bricks; soakage jars and brick drains for waste water; terracotta ring-wells used as wells or drainage pits. |
The epic describes Hastinapura as a grand city "bursting like the ocean, packed with hundreds of mansions." Was this description added after the main narrative, when urban centres actually flourished in the region (after the sixth century BCE)? Or is it a flight of poetic fancy that cannot be verified by archaeology? The question remains open.
Example 2: Draupadi's polyandrous marriage
One of the most challenging episodes in the Mahabharata is Draupadi's marriage to all five Pandava brothers — an instance of polyandry that is central to the narrative. The text itself offers three different explanations for this unusual marriage:
- The mother's command: The Pandavas returned home with Draupadi and told their mother Kunti, "We have brought alms." Without looking up, Kunti said, "Share it among yourselves." Her command could not be violated, so Draupadi became the common wife of all five brothers.
- Divine destiny: The seer Vyasa told Drupada (Draupadi's father) that the Pandavas were incarnations of the god Indra, and Draupadi was the reincarnation of Indra's wife. They were thus destined for each other.
- A boon from Shiva: Vyasa also told a story of a young woman who had prayed to Shiva for a husband. In her enthusiasm, she prayed five times instead of once. That woman was reborn as Draupadi, and Shiva fulfilled her prayers by giving her five husbands.
Why did the author(s) offer three different explanations for a single episode? Present-day historians suggest: …