Abstract
How had early Indians recorded their identities in their donative inscriptions? This is the question that Snigdha Singh addresses, with a particular focus on the role of gender, through a detailed analysis of donative inscriptions from Bharhut, Sanchi, Western Ghats and Mathura. In addition to a foreword by Uma Chakravarti, and a discussion on gender studies in its introduction, this book consists of ten chapters divided into four parts: one chapter on Bharhut (part one); and three chapters, on Sanchi (Pt 2), Western Ghats (Pt 3) and Mathura (Pt 4). These chapters are followed by a conclusion, and three appendices, on Sanchi, Western Ghats and Mathura.
The author has adopted a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods to analyse donative inscriptions, taking further the earlier works of Kumkum Roy 1 and Upinder Singh 2 on Sanchi. While most of the epigraphs selected for this study are from Buddhist monastic-stūpa complexes (Bharhut and Sanchi) and Buddhist rock-cut caves (Western Ghats, viz, Nāsik, Junnār, Kanheri, Kuda, Karle, Bhājā), in the case of Mathura epigraphs from the Jain sanctuary (Kaṇkālī Ṭīlā) are also taken into account. A regional variation in donations by men and women is highlighted by the author, according to whom, men figure prominently as donors at Buddhist sites in Western Ghats; compared to Sanchi and Mathura (pp. 274–75) since women ‘did not find a place in the trading networks that emerged in this region’ (p. 279). On the other hand, the number of donations by individual men and women is almost equal at Mathura, where women are prominently visible at ‘ancient sanctuaries, Kaṇkālī Ṭīlā in particular, and at Mathura city’ (pp. 380–81).
This book questions the popular perception about Dharmaśāstric norms being central in the shaping of individual identities in early historic India, and argues that unlike the prescriptive texts that had ‘incarcerated’ women ‘within the household boundaries with fixed duties and obligations as mother, wife, or daughter’, the epigraphic evidence tells us ‘a different story’ and indicates ‘a certain amount of control by women over productive resources’ (p. 32). Like men, women ‘made themselves visible and also occupied space in the public sphere’ by getting a record of their donative act carved on stone. According to the author, donative acts by women underline women’s control over as well as their ability to dispose of their wealth (pp. 77, 397). By identifying themselves with their own names, women donors ‘wanted to be remembered by posterity in their own right’ (p. 77). Lay women’s control over resources, in the author’s view, contradicts the rule of the Dharmaśāstras, whereby ‘women only had the right to enjoy maintenance of property but did not have the right to alienate property’ (p. 173).
The absence of any reference to a donor’s varṇa or jāti (caste) in donative records, according to the author, evidences the absence of ‘an ascribed status through birth (like varṇa and jāti)’ (p. 401). A few epigraphs do show the use of varṇa as an identity marker, but this occurs only in the case of the Brahmana varṇa: a woman, for example, identified herself as brāhmanī (wife of a Brahmana upāsaka) in a donative inscription from Kuda in Western Ghats (p. 242): Similarly, a layman identified himself as a brahmana of Śaigrava gotra in a donative record from Mathura (pp. 302–03). Although the author does not touch on the significance of this aspect, it seems that varṇa identity mattered more to Brahmana donors than to non-Brahmanas, who usually did ‘not identify themselves in terms of any particular jāti’ (p. 56), the same being evident from the donative records of laywomen, who did not change ‘their gotra names’ after marriage. In other words, they did not practise gotrāntara—giving up the father’s gotra and adopting that of the husband’—recommended by the Dharmaśāstra (p. 67; see also, pp. 187–88, 199, 386, 412–13). In the author’s view, the use of a range of kinship ties by women donors shows
the way a woman perceived herself in a patriarchal society and what emerges as a point of importance is that she as an individual is in command of the ways she wanted to identify herself and earn merit for herself or for people close to her. (p. 386)
Because varṇa, jāti or caste was not apparently considered an identity marker by individual donors, the author has identified certain markers, viz, gender (man/woman), religion (monk/nun), residence, kinship ties, occupation, nature of donation (individual/joint/collective), to map the processes of identity construction at the time out of information gleaned from donative inscriptions from Bharhut, Sanchi, Western Ghats and Mathura. We are told:
There was only a marginal difference between men and women donors as a whole. Out of the total number of donors at all the sites, 55 per cent were men and 45 per cent were women - out of which monks constituted 18 per cent, nuns 13 per cent, laymen 37 per cent, and laywomen 32 per cent. (p. 415)
While laywomen mostly referred to kinship ties to establish their identity, laymen predominantly used their occupation as a marker (pp. 65, 69–70, 109, 115, 119, 317, 351). In some cases, where women too referred to occupation to identify themselves, the occupations were those of their husbands or sons (pp. 119, 233, 279, 312, 318, 352). Indeed, ‘not a single instance has been found where a man identified himself as husband, suggesting marital ties were not a real marker of identity for men’ (p. 317).
Monks and nuns too defined their identity differently in donative records: at Bharhut monks referred to their specialised learning (e.g., aya/ārya, i.e., ‘the venerable’; bhānaka, i.e., ‘reciter of the sacred text’), while nuns are simply referred to as bhikkhunīs (pp. 57–61). At Sanchi too, epithets like saint (sapurisa), arhat, thera, etc., are used as identity markers for monks, none of such epithets and titles being employed for nuns, who appear in almost equal number to monks as donors at Sanchi (p. 95). Nuns too could be learned, and epigraphs from Sanchi and Mathura inform us about nuns who knew the tripiṭaka (pp. 297–99). Based on epigraphs found at Kanheri, the author underlines the presence of donations by nuns for the benefit of monks; but, monks do not appear ever to have made donations for the benefit of nuns (pp. 235–38). Another point highlighted in this book is that nuns could have only women disciples, while monks could have both male and female disciples (pp. 240–41).
In brief, without denying the presence of gender differences within the Buddhist sangha, Snigdha Singh’s book rightly highlights the absence of varṇa, jāti or caste as a marker of identity, in the extensive range of epigraphic evidence at a time when Buddhism was a major religion of India. This reminds us of the remarkable absence of any reference to caste in Aśoka’s dhamma; and we learn from this book that Aśoka, on this score, did not stand alone.