Spread of Indian culture abroad

India had been in contact with the outside world commercially right from about the middle of the third millennium B.C

Even though India is surrounded by sea on three sides and the Himalayan in the north but that did not stop Indians from interacting with the rest of the world. In fact they travelled far and wide and left their cultural footprints wherever they went.

In return they also brought home ideas, impressions, customs and traditions from these distant lands. However, the most remarkable aspect of this contact has been the spread of Indian culture and civilisation in various parts of the world, especially Central Asia, South East Asia, China, Japan and Korea etc.

What is most remarkable of this spread is that it was not a spread by means of conquest or threat to life of an individual or society but by means of voluntary acceptance of cultural and spiritual values of India.

In this lesson we shall find out how Indian culture spread to other countries and the impact it had on these countries. This lesson also brings forward the beautiful idea that peace and friendship with other nations, other societies, other religions and other cultures help our lives and make it more meaningful.

Spread of Indian Culture through traders, teachers and missionaries In ancient times, traders from India went to distant lands in search of new opportunities in business. They went to Rome in the west and China in the east. As early as the first century BC, they travelled to countries like Indonesia and Cambodia in search of gold.

They travelled especially to the islands of Java, Sumatra and Malaya. This is the reason why these countries were called Suvarnadvipa (suvarna means gold and dvipa means island). These traders travelled from many flourishing cities like Kashi, Mathura, Ujjain, Prayag and Pataliputra and from port cities on the east coast like Mamallapuram, Tamralipti, Puri, and Kaveripattanam.

The kingdom of Kalinga had trade relations with Sri Lanka during the time of Emperor Ashoka. Wherever the traders went, they established cultural links with those places. In this way, the traders served as cultural ambassadors and established trade relations with the outside world. Like the east coast, many cultural establishments have also been found on and near the west coast.

Karle, Bhaja, Kanheri, Ajanta and Ellora are counted among the well known places. Most of these centres are Buddhist monastic establishments. The universities were the most important centres of cultural interaction. They attracted large numbers of students and scholars.

The scholars coming from abroad often visited the library of Nalanda University which was said to be a seven storey building. Students and teachers from such universities carried Indian culture abroad along with its knowledge and religion. The Chinese pilgrim Huien-tsang has given ample information about the universities he visited in India.

For example, Huien-tsang describes his stay at two very important universities— one in the east, Nalanda and the other in the west, Valabhi.Vikramashila was another university that was situated on the right bank of the Ganges. The Tibetan scholar Taranatha has given its description.

Teachers and scholars of this university were so famous that the Tibetan king is stated to have sent a mission to invite the head of the university to promote interest in common culture and indigenous wisdom.Another university was Odantapuri in Bihar which grew in stature under the patronage of the Pala kings.

A number of Monks migrated from this university and settled in Tibet. Two Indian teachers went to China on an invitation from the Chinese Emperor in AD 67. Their names are Kashyapa Martanga and Dharmarakshita. They were followcd by a number of teachers from universities like Nalanda, Takshila, Vikramashila and Odantapuri.

When Acharya Kumarajiva went to China, the king requested him to translate Sanskrit texts into Chinese. The scholar Bodhidharma, who specialised in the philosophy of Yoga is still venerated in China and Japan. Acharya Kamalasheel of Nalanda University was invited by the king of Tibet. After his death, the Tibetans embalmed his body and kept it in a monastery in Lhasa.

Another distinguished scholar was Jnanabhadra. He went to Tibet with his two sons to preach Dharma. A monastery was founded in Tibet on the model of Odantapuri University in Bihar. The head of the Vikramashila University was Acharya Ateesha, also known as Dipankara Shreejnana. He went to Tibet in the eleventh century and gave a strong foundation to Buddhism in Tibet.

Thonmi Sambhota, a Tibetan minister was a student at Nalanda when the Chinese pilgrim Huien-tsang visited India. Thonmi Sambhota studied there and after going back, he preached Buddhism in Tibet. A large number of Tibetans embraced Buddhism. Even the king became a Buddhist.

He declared Buddhism as the State religion. Among the noteworthy teachers, Kumarajiva was active in the fifth century. Spread of Indian culture through other modesRomas or Gypsies Some groups of Indians went abroad as wanderers. They called themselves Romas and their language was Romani, but in Europe they are famous as Gypsies.

They went towards the West, crossing the present-day Pakistan and Afghanistan. From there, their caravans went through Iran and Iraq to Turkey. Travelling through Persia, Taurus mountains and Constantinople, they spread to many countries of Europe. Today they live in Greece, Bulgaria, States of former Yugoslavia,

Romania, Hungary, the Czech and Slovak Republics, Russia, Poland, Switzerland, France, Sweden, Denmark and England. It took them almost four hundred years to spread to these countries. By that time, though they had forgotten their original home, they did retain their language, customs, ways of living, and their professions.