Thread by @subhra2jyoti

The India They Saw by Sandhya Jain. Nice read so far. So fascinating & informative book detailing the accounts of foreign travellers, diplomats, monks etc who visited India between 500 BCE and 700 CE. #StayAtHomeSaveLives ⁦⁦@dhingramahima9⁩ goodreads.com/book/show/3170…

There r some interesting insights about Indians as imagined & misinterpreted by some Greek diplomats and Historians..

.. like one Ancient Greek Historian, who is regarded as Father of History in Western World, writes that Indians had lot of gold bcoz we used to steal them from gold digging ants of size same as average men. 🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️ @UnbiasedSecular @iDrKaRiShMa @VertigoWarrior @apparrnnaa @icedtea28

@Vaidehee_5 @AartiAuthor @dipikaa_sai @harshapatel2013 @dharmicverangna @kaminirupani ur views please 🙏👆

Will share further as I read #StaySafe #StayHomeIndia #StayHomeStaySafe

This is yet another about collection of gold -

But Persians acknowledge that the Indian provinces to the west of Indus paid the maximum tribute to the crown bcoz they were the richest and most advanced among all. #history

Megasthenes, the Greek ambassador in the court of Chandragupta Maurya, has mentioned about women studying philosophy from a class of ascetics (sages/yogis) who worship nature. #ancient #history

Several Greek travelers have written about the fertility and unimaginable riches of Indian nations which leads to bountiful crop every year. They talk about tribes who stay in alliance with the King in exchange of weapons and other support from the royal families. #History

Just came to know how fascinated were the Greeks on sugarcane, cloves, pepper, several medicinal plants and fauna in Ganges. India was truly a magical land for them. #india #history

Megasthenes & several Greek accounts talk high of Indian physicians who were experts in treating snake bites, especially the when bitten by 6-16 foot long highly venomous snakes in India. They also are awe of huge variety of medicinal herbs used here @dhingramahima9 @icedtea28

“Leaving Desarene the course is northerly, passing a variety of barbarous tribes, among which are the Kirrhadai (Kiratas), savages whose noses are flattened to the face, and another tribe, that of the Bargusoi (of Nicobar Islands), as well as the Hippioprosopoi or Makroprosopoi..

.. (horse-faced or long-faced men), who are reported to be cannibals.”

— THE INDIA THEY SAW (VOL-1) by SANDHYA JAIN
amzn.in/9ezi558

This is what the Greeks have to say about the aborigines in Andaman & Nicobar Islands @dhingramahima9 @apparrnnaa @harshapatel2013

Claudius Aelianus in mid 2nd century AD while in Rome wrote this about Indian Dogs :-
“Book IV. c. xix. Indian dogs must also be reckoned as wild beasts, being unmatched for prowess and courage, and being of the largest size to be anywhere found.....(1)

..They regard with contempt all other animals. But with lion Indian dog sets himself to fight; he sustains his onset, barks back when he roars, and bites him when he bites. The dog is in the end beaten, but not till he has sorely harassed his antagonist and mangled him..(2)

.. And yet it sometimes happens that the lion is vanquished by the Indian dog and killed in the chase. In point of fact, if the dog once clutches him he holds on like grim death. Even if one should approach and with a knife cut off the leg of the dog,..(3)

... the pain will not reduce him to let go his grip. Rather than let go he suffers the limb to be severed & his jaws relax not till life is extinct. He then lies prostrate, forced only by death to abandon the fray.”.(4)

THE INDIA THEY SAW (VOL-1) by SANDHYA JAIN @dhingramahima9

“On Peacocks: C. xxi. Describes the peacock, ending with this remark: ‘Alexander, the Macedonian, on seeing these birds in India, was struck with astonishment,...

... and so charmed with their beauty that he threatened the severest penalties against any one who should kill a peacock.’”

— THE INDIA THEY SAW (VOL-1) by SANDHYA JAIN
amzn.in/91ObrdQ @apparrnnaa @harshapatel2013 @dhingramahima9 @icedtea28 @Vaidehee_5 @dharmicverangna

“On The gentle elephant of Porus: C. xxxvii.

When Porus the Indian King was wounded in the battle in which he engaged with Alexander, the elephant on which he rode, though suffering itself from many wounds, did nevertheless with gentleness and..>>

..>> caution draw out with its trunk the darts with which the body of Porus was pierced, and ceased not to do this until it observed that its master from the excessive loss of blood was becoming weak and ready to faint. Accordingly it lowered him slowly and gently, and..>>

..>> stood still with its knees bent in such a way as would prevent the body of Porus in descending to be thrown with violence on the ground.”

— THE INDIA THEY SAW (VOL-1) by SANDHYA JAIN @VertigoWarrior @harshapatel2013 @dhingramahima9 @apparrnnaa

On Ganga and its creatures: C. xli. “The Ganges, which is an Indian river on springing from its sources, while as yet it has no tributary streams but only its own waters, has a depth of twenty fathoms, and a breadth of eighty stadia; but when in its progress other rivers..

... have joined it and augmented its volume of waters, its depth reaches to sixty fathoms, and its breadth spreads out to four hundred stadia… It breeds fishes of monstrous size, and from the fat of these an unguent is prepared....

Turtles also are found in it with a shell not smaller than a cask which can hold as much as twenty amphorae (about 180 gallons). It breeds also two kinds of crocodiles, and of these one is quite harmless, while the other devours all sorts of flesh and is unsparingly cruel...

... They have an excrescence on their snout like that of the horned serpent. The natives employ their services in inflicting the supreme penalty on malefactors,...

... for they throw to them those who have been found guilty of the most heinous offences, and so they do not require the services of an executioner.”

— THE INDIA THEY SAW (VOL-1) by SANDHYA JAIN @icedtea28 @dhingramahima9 👆something on Ganga river as recorded by foreigners.

Roman chronicler Claudius Aelianus (mid-second century AD) wrote A Collection of Miscellaneous History; (translated by McCrindle) wherein he says the following regarding Ox races in India 👇 @dhingramahima9 @AartiAuthor @VaruKrutika @icedtea28 @harshasherni @apparrnnaa :-

“Oxen races: C. xxiv. The Indians make much ado also about the oxen that run fast; and both the king himself and many of the greatest nobles take contending views of their swiftness, and make bets in gold and silver, and think it no disgrace to stake their money on these animals.

They yoke them in chariots, and incur hazard on the chance of victory. The horses that are yoked to the car run in the middle with an ox on each side, and one of these wheels sharp round the turning-post and must run thirty stadia...

The oxen run at pace equal to that of the horses, and you could not decide which was the fleeter, the ox or the horse. And if the king has laid a wager on his own oxen with any one,

.. he becomes so excited over the contest that he follows in his chariot to instigate the driver to speed faster. The driver again pricks the horses with the goad till the blood streams, but he keeps his hand off the oxen, for they run without needing the goad.

And to such a pitch does the emulation in the match between the oxen rise, that not only do the rich and the owners of the oxen lay heavy bets upon them but even the spectators, just as Idomeneus the Cretan and the Locrian Ajax are represented in Homer betting against each other.

.. There are in India oxen of another kind, and these look like very big goats. These are yoked together, and run very fast, being not inferior in speed to the horses of the Getae.”

— THE INDIA THEY SAW (VOL-1) by SANDHYA JAIN

As I read the Buddhist accounts of India belonging 2 beginning of CE, I get a feeling that every Buddhist author leaves no stone unturned to put their belief system on a higher pedestal wrt to Hinduism by addressing it as heresy and..@dhingramahima9 @VaruKrutika @AartiAuthor

...showcasing the rulers, nobles & Buddhist patrons to be all inhuman, barbaric criminals of the society before joining Buddhism.The purpose seems to be to glorify their fold exaggeratedly. Also, ancient Buddhist beliefs appear to be exorbitantly mythical and unscientific.

Roman chronicler Claudius Aelianus (mid-second century AD) in Collection of Miscellaneous History; (translated by McCrindle) writes this abt ‘Myriad birds: Book XVI.c.ii.’ 👇@dhingramahima9 @Divii_Sharma @AartiAuthor @visa_pro @harshasherni @icedtea28 @SRaEarth09 @durga_shakti_

They are also peacocks in India, the largest of their kind anywhere found, and wood-pigeons with pale-green feathers, which one ignorant of ornithology on seeing for the first time would take to be parrots and not pigeons.

They have bills and legs of the same colour as Greek partridges. There are in India cocks also of the largest size, with crests not red-coloured like those of our cocks at least, but many-hued like a coronal of flowers.

Their rump feathers are neither curved nor curled, but broad, and they trail them as peacocks do their tails when they do not lift and erect them.

... The plumage of these Indian cocks (monal pheasants) is of a golden and a gleaming azure colour like the smaragdus stone.”

— THE INDIA THEY SAW (VOL-1) by SANDHYA JAIN
amzn.in/eoE4a83

Roman chronicler Claudius Aelianus (mid-second century AD) in Collection of Miscellaneous History; (translated by McCrindle) writes this abt ‘Taming of Panthers by Indians.’ 👇@dhingramahima9 @Divii_Sharma @AartiAuthor @visa_pro @harshasherni @icedtea28 @SRaEarth09 @durga_shakti_

I have no reason whatever to doubt that lions of the largest size r found in India, & what convinces me is that this country is such an excellent mother of other animals. But of all the beasts that one can encounter these r the most savage & ferocious..@VaruKrutika @Angriy_BiRd

....The skins of these lions look black–the bristly hair of their mane stands erect, and their very aspect strikes the soul with terror and dismay. If they can be captured before they are full-grown and not otherwise, they can be led by the leash,...

.. and with the huntsmen and their hounds take part in hunting young deer and stags, and boars and buffaloes and wild asses, for, as I am told, they have a very keen scent.”

— THE INDIA THEY SAW (VOL-1) by SANDHYA JAIN
amzn.in/6uq9Y0Y @Angriy_BiRd

Roman chronicler Claudius Aelianus (mid-second century AD) in Collection of Miscellaneous History further writes abt ‘Character of Indians.’ 👇@dhingramahima9 @Divii_Sharma @AartiAuthor @visa_pro @harshasherni @icedtea28 @SRaEarth09 @durga_shakti_ @VaruKrutika @Angriy_BiRd

“The Indians neither put out money at usury, nor know how to borrow. It is contrary to established usage for an Indian either to do or suffer a wrong, and therefore they neither make contracts nor require securities.”

— THE INDIA THEY SAW (VOL-1) by SANDHYA JAIN

Philostratus in 220 AD, wrote abt Apollonius, a Greek mystic/wise man of Tyana, who traveled India searching for true wisdom👇@dhingramahima9 @Divii_Sharma @AartiAuthor @visa_pro @harshasherni @icedtea28 @SRaEarth09 @durga_shakti_ @VaruKrutika @Angriy_BiRd

Apollonius, the wise man from Tyana, says the following abt the Brahmins of India 👇 @dhingramahima9 @Divii_Sharma @AartiAuthor @visa_pro @harshasherni @icedtea28 @SRaEarth09 @durga_shakti_ @VaruKrutika @Angriy_BiRd

As recorded by Philostratus, “On the Indian Brahmins: 15. The Wise Men’s nature and their way of life on the hill are described by Apollonius himself, since in one of his addresses to the Egyptians he says, ‘I saw the Indian Brahmans living on the earth and not on it...

... Walled without walls, and with no possessions except the whole world’s. This is his rather philosophical account: Damis says that they sleep on the earth, but the earth makes a bed for them of any kind of grass they choose...

.. He also says he saw them levitating as much as three feet from the ground, not for ostentation, since that kind of vanity is foreign to them,

but because all the rites they perform to the Sun they do above the earth like him, considering this practice appropriate for the god.”

— THE INDIA THEY SAW (VOL-1) by SANDHYA JAIN

Apollonius of Tyana (15-100 CE), the legendary Greek philosopher & anti Christ on concept of soul as learned from Indian sages, has said this l👇: @dhingramahima9 @Divii_Sharma @AartiAuthor @visa_pro @harshasherni @icedtea28 @SRaEarth09 @durga_shakti_ @VaruKrutika @Angriy_BiRd

My philosophy has been concerned with the being and the origins of the art: and I have observed that it belongs to men who are expert in divine science and have the truest conception of the soul...

... because it is the soul, subject neither to death nor to birth, that is the source of being.’”

— THE INDIA THEY SAW (VOL-1) by SANDHYA JAIN