Daily Quiz: UPSC Prelims Marathon (History, Art & Culture) – September 7, 2020

Chirand: Chirand is a place in Saran district of bihar and has significant importance archaeological and historical study of bihar as well as India.

• In Chapra-Sonpur road, Chirand Village is situated near Doriiganj has its unprecedented archaeological, historical and cultural heritage.
• This region was dominated by Charo Dynasty hence it was named Chirand.
• In 1871, Sir W. W Hunter brought light to the archaeological significance of this area.

Daojali Hading: The excavation site at Daojali Hading (Assam) occupies an important place in the archaeological history of India as the first evidence of an Eastern Asiatic Neolithic complex of double-shouldered Celts and cord-marked pottery in India was reported from there.

• The discovery had put Northeast India on the Neolithic map of the world for the first time.
• However, the precise age of the artifacts were not known.

Koldihwa: Belan Valley in Uttar Pradesh near Prayag in Uttar Pradesh is one site where evidences of Paleolithic, Mesolithic and Neolithic sites have been found in sequence.

• The prehistoric sites of Belan valley include Mahgara, Chopani Mando, and Koldihwa.
• Koldihwa in Belan valley has provided earliest evidence of rice cultivation.

Raw materials are substances that are either found naturally (such as wood, or ores of metals) or produced by farmers or herders.

• While some of the raw materials that the Harappans used were available locally, many items such as copper, tin, gold, silver and precious stones had to be brought from distant places.
• The Harappans probably got copper from present-day Rajasthan, and even from Oman in West Asia.
• Tin, which was mixed with copper to produce bronze, may have been brought from present-day Afghanistan and Iran.
• Gold could have come all the way from present-day Karnataka, and precious stones from present-day Gujarat, Iran and Afghanistan.

The city of Dholavira was located on Khadir Beyt (also spelled as Bet) in the Rann of Kutch, where there was fresh water and fertile soil.

• Unlike some of the other Harappan cities, which were divided into two parts, Dholavira was divided into three parts, and each part was surrounded with massive stone walls, with entrances through gateways.
• There was also a large open area in the settlement, where public ceremonies could be held.
• Other finds include large letters of the Harappan script that were carved out of white stone and perhaps inlaid in wood.
• This is a unique find as generally Harappan writing has been found on small objects such as seals.

There were two major changes in agriculture around Janapadas period.

• One was the growing use of iron ploughshares. This meant that heavy, clayey soil could be turned over better than with a wooden ploughshare, so that more grain could be produced.
• Second, people began transplanting paddy. This meant that instead of scattering seed on the ground, from which plants would sprout, saplings were grown and then planted in the fields.
• This led to increased production, as many more plants survived. However, it was back breaking work.
• Generally, slave men and women, (dasas and dasis) and landless agricultural labourers (kammakaras) had to do this work.

Over centuries, India’s intellectual exploration of truth has come to be represented by six systems of philosophy.

• These are known as Vaishesika, Nyaya, Samkhya, Yoga, Purva Mimansa and Vedanta or Uttara Mimansa.
• These six systems of philosophy are said to have been founded by sages Konada, Gotama, Kapila, Patanjali, Jaimini and Vyasa, respectively.
• These philosophies still guide scholarly discourse in the country.
• German-born British indologist, Friedrich Max Muller, has observed that the six systems of philosophy were developed over many generations with contributions made by individual thinkers.
• However, today, we find an underlying harmony in their understanding of truth, although they seem distinct from each other.

Both the Mahavira and the Buddha felt that only those who left their homes could gain true knowledge.

• They arranged for them to stay together in the sangha, an association of those who left their homes.
• The rules made for the Buddhist sangha were written down in a book called the Vinaya Pitaka.
• From this we know that there were separate branches for men and women. All men could join the sangha.
• However, children had to take the permission of their parents and slaves that of their masters.
• Those who worked for the king had to take his permission and debtors that of creditors.
• Women had to take their husbands’ permission.

Mughal emperor Humayun attacked Sherkhan, the ruler of Bengal and Bihar, in 1537 with aim of bringing the latter’s province under the control of the Mughals.

• Sherkhan was an able strategist than Humayum and he coped up a peace treaty with the Mughal king.
• When Humayun turned his attention from the east Sherkhan attacked him at a place called Chausa.
• In this battle of Chausa in 1539, Humayun was defeated and he escaped to Agra.
• Sher Khan after defeating a Bengal army, he took over the rule of Bihar.
• In early 1539 he conquered Bengal and, through clever deception, the Rohtas stronghold southwest of Bengal.
• At the Battle of Chausa on June 26, 1539, he defeated the Mughal emperor Humāyūn and assumed the royal title of Farīd al-Dīn Shēr Shah.

The Arya Samaj Movement, revivalist in form though not in content, was the result of a reaction to Western influences.

• Its founder, Dayananda Saraswati or Mulshankar (1824-1883) was born in the old Morvi state in Gujarat in a brahmin family.
• He wandered as an ascetic for fifteen years (1845-60) in search of truth.
• The first Arya Samaj unit was formally set up by him at Bombay in 1875 and later the headquarters of the Samaj were established at Lahore.
• The Arya Samaj fixed the minimum marriageable age at twenty-five years for boys and sixteen years for girls.
• Swami Dayananda once lamented the Hindu race as “the children of children”.
• Inter-caste marriages and widow remarriages were also encouraged.
• Equal status for women was the demand of the Samaj, both in letter and in spirit.

The settlement of Kalibangan is located in Rajasthan along the dried up bed of the river Ghaggar.

• Kalibangan was excavated in the 1960s under the guidance of B.K. Thapar.
• This place has yielded evidence for the existence of Pre-Harappan and Harappan habitations.
• It shows significant variation from Harappan in the sphere of religious beliefs.
• Some scholars have suggested that Kalibangan might have been part of the ‘Eastern Domain’ of the Harappan Civilization.
• In the areas of present day Haryana, East Punjab and Western U.P. Harappan sites like Bara, Siswal and Alamgirpur have been distovered.
• They give evidence of the presence of distinct local traditions in pottery along with the Harappan pottery.
• Kalibangan might have been a mediator between the Harappan cultural zone and the eastern provinces.

Ajanta groups of caves, a World Heritage Site which overlooks a narrow sinuous gorge, through which flows the stream of Waghora.

• The river is descended from the head of the Cave 28 from a waterfall of seven leaps. Waghore means Tiger River in Marathi.
• Located at Aurangabad in the Indian State of Maharashtra, the thirty excavted rock cut temples at Ajanta are famous for Buddhist monuments and paintings.
• The caves at Ajanta are excavated in the semi-circular scarp of a steep rock about 76 m high.