History Test - 4

The correct answer is Indra.

Key Points

Indra

• Here is an excerpt of a mantra from the Rigveda, which was probably inserted in the text c. 1000 BCE, to be chanted by the priest while conducting the marriage ritual.
• It is used in many Hindu weddings even today: I free her from here, but not from there.
• I have bound her firmly there so that through the grace of Indra she will have fine sons and be fortunate in her husband’s love.
• Indra was one of the principal deities, a god of valour, warfare and rain.
• Hence the correct answer is option 4.
• Indra is an ancient Vedic deity in Hinduism. He is the king of Svarga and the Devas.

The correct answer is NishadaKey Points

Eklavya's -

• Eklavya belonged to the low caste Nishada.
• Once Drona, a Brahmana who taught archery to the Kuru princes, was approached by Ekalavya, a forest-dwelling Nishida (a hunting community).
• When Drona, who knew the dharma, refused to have him as his pupil, Ekalavya returned to the forest, prepared an image of Drona out of clay, and treating it as his teacher, began to practise on his own. Hence the correct answer is option 2.
• In Mahabharata, Eklavya first appears in Dronacharya’s royal academy of military sciences (gurukul).
• Dronacharya was selected as the teacher (guru) of Kuru princes and continued teaching the Pandavas and Kauravas, and his reputation became widespread.
• On witnessing the skills of Kuru princes, gradually thousands of kings and princes from different kingdoms assembled to learn the science of military skills; especially the art of archery (Dhanur Veda).
• Eklavya, the son of Nishada King Hiranyadhanu, flocked to Hastinapur to become his disciple and learn the skills of archery.

The correct answer is Eight.

Key Points

Marriages in Dharmasutras and Dharmashastras -

• The Dharmasutras and Dharmashastras recognised as many as eight forms of marriage. Hence the correct answer is option 1.
• Of these, the first four were considered “good” while the remaining were condemned.
• It is possible that these were practised by those who did not accept Brahmanical norms.
• They were Brahma Vivah, Daiva Vivah, Arsha Vivah, Prajapatya Vivah, Gandharva Vivah, Asura Vivah, Rakshasa Vivah and Paisasha Vivah.

Brahma Vivah -

• In this Vivah the bride and bridegroom are from the same caste/Varna.
• This marriage is done through the process of Kanyadan.

Daiva Vivah -

• This marriage is not encouraged.
• In this marriage, the girl should marry a priest or a god generally we call the girl "DevaDasi".

Arsha Vivah -

• This marriage is encouraged to a certain extent.
• In this marriage, the boy himself gives gifts to the family of the girl if they are poor.

Prajapatya Vivah -

• This marriage is similar to Brahma Vivah.
• But here we don't see the Kanyadan but we can see the Panigrahan.
• The process of making the girl study Veda is Panigrahan.

Gandharva Vivah -

• This marriage is the most interested in nowadays.
• This marriage is a love marriage.
• Boy and girl marry with their will.

Asura Vivah -

• We saw in Arsha Vivah that the groom gives gifts to the bride's family.
• But in this marriage, the bride gives gifts to the family.

​Rakshasa Vivah -

• In the name itself, we can say that this is a cruel marriage.
• In this marriage, if the bride likes the groom then the groom's family marries them against the will of the bride's family.

Paisasha Vivah -

• This is the cruellest marriage.
• In this marriage, the boy marries a girl against her will by using toxicants or drugs. 

The correct answer is Mahashweta Devi.

Key Points

Dynamic Text -

• In a short, story titled “Kunti O Nishadi”, Mahashweta Devi takes up the narrative from where the Mahabharata ends it. Hence the correct answer is option 2.
• She sets the story in a forest, where Kunti retires after the war.
• Kunti now has time to reflect on her past, and often confesses to what she regards as her failings, talking with the earth, the symbol of nature.
• Every day she sees the nishadas who come to collect wood, honey, tubers and roots.
• One Nishida (a nishada woman) often listens to Kunti when she talks with the earth.

The correct answer is Shudraka

Key Points

The case of the merchants 

• In the case of the merchants, Sanskrit texts and inscriptions used the term vanik to designate merchants.
• While trade was defined as an occupation for Vaishyas in the Shastras, a more complex situation is evident in plays such as the Mrichchhakatika written by Shudraka. Hence the correct answer is option 3.
• Here, the hero Charudatta was described as both a Brahmana and a sarthavaha or merchant a fifth-century inscription describes two brothers who made a donation for the construction of a temple as Kshatriya-vaniks.
• Mrichchhakatika is a ten-act Sanskrit drama attributed to Shudraka, an ancient playwright who is possibly from the 5th century CE, and who is identified by the prologue as a Kshatriya.

The correct answer is ​Polyandry

Key Points

Marriage system

• One of the most challenging episodes in the Mahabharata is Draupadi’s marriage with the Pandavas, an instance of polyandry that is central to the narrative.
• Hence the correct answer is option 1.
• Endogamy refers to marriage within a unit this could be a kin group, caste, or a group living in the same locality.
• Exogamy refers to marriage outside the unit.
• Polygyny is the practice of a man having several wives.
• Polyandry is the practice of a woman having several husbands.
• Present-day historians suggest that the fact that the author(s) describe a polyandrous union indicates that polyandry may have been prevalent amongst ruling elites at some point in time. 
• Polyandry may have seemed unusual or even undesirable from the Brahmanical point of view, it was prevalent in the Himalayan region.

The correct answer is Sutta Pitaka.

Key Points

A Social Contract 

• The Buddhists also developed an alternative understanding of social inequalities, and of the institutions required to regulate social conflict.
• In a myth found in a text known as the Sutta Pitaka, they suggested that originally human beings did not have fully evolved bodily forms, nor was the world of plants fully developed. Hence the correct answer is option 4.
• All beings lived in an idyllic state of peace, taking from nature only what they needed for each meal.
• The Sutta Pitaka - contains the Buddha's teachings recorded mainly as sermons delivered in historical settings.
• It includes the Dhammapada.
• The Dhammapada means 'the path or verses of truth' and is the best known of all the Buddhist scriptures in the West.
• The writer of Sutta Pitaka was Ananda.

The correct answer is Puranaruru.

Key Points

The poor generous chief -

• Poems included in the Tamil Sangam anthologies often illuminate social and economic relationships, suggesting that while there were differences between rich and poor, those who controlled resources were also expected to share them.
• In the Puranaruru composition, one of the anthologies of poems of the Tamil Sangam literature (c. first century CE), a bard describes his patron to other poets thus -
  • He (i.e. the patron) doesn’t have the wealth to lavish on others every day
  • Nor does he have the pettiness to say that he has nothing and so refuse!
  • he lives in Irantai (a place) and is generous. He is an enemy to the hunger of bards!
  • If you wish to cure your poverty, come along with me, bards whose lips are so skilled!
  • we request him, showing him our ribs thin with hunger, he will go to the blacksmith of his village.
  • And will say to that man of powerful hands:
    “Shape me a long spear  for war, one that has a straight blade!”
  • Hence the correct answer is option 3.

The correct answer is Kshatriyas.

Key Points

Non-Kshatriya kings -

• According to the Shastras, only Kshatriyas could be kings.
• Hence the correct answer is option 3.
• However, several important ruling lineages probably had different origins.
• The social background of the Mauryas, who ruled over a large empire, has been hotly debated.
• While later Buddhist texts suggested they were Kshatriyas, Brahmanical texts described them as being of “low” origin.
• The Shungas and Kanvas, the immediate successors of the Mauryas, were Brahmanas.
• In fact, political power was effectively open to anyone who could muster support and resources and rarely depended on birth as a Kshatriya.

The correct answer is ​Mahabharata.

Key Points

Text -

• Perhaps the most important didactic section of the Mahabharata is the Bhagavad Gita, which contains the advice offered by Lord Krishna to Arjuna.
• Hence the correct answer is option 2.
• This scene is frequently depicted in painting and sculpture.
• Arjuna was one of the five Pandava brothers, who are the hero of the Indian epic the Mahabharata.
• Arjuna, son of the god Indra, is famous for his archery and for the magical weapons that he wins from the god Shiva.
• His hesitation before the decisive battle against a branch of his family became the occasion for his friend and charioteer, the incarnate god Krishna, to deliver a discourse on dharma, or the right course of human action.
• Those verses are collectively known as the Bhagavadgita.