Archaeology, epigraphical studies and the existence of Krishna

The history of Bharat is indeed overwhelmed with enigma. Right from Kailash Mandir in the precinct of Ellora to more and more. Enigma is what appears to be the best adjective of our past. If I look back at my own journey in life so far and zoom on the phase till reaching teenage, big transformations barged in, in terms of looking at various personalities that included Shri Ram and Shri Krishna too.

I can faintly remember, but yes that was the period of post the day my grandfather had passed away and my father had observed all the samskara being the eldest son. He would sing bhajans as praise to Shri Ram and Shri Krishna and I would be the parrot to repeat in broken words at age approaching three. That would be my first interaction with these two personalities whom we are supposed to see as Bhagwan. A bit older I would grow, and the evenings would be spent listening Ramcharit Manas that my grandmother would read and the Sundays would pass watching Ramanand Sagar series.

My belief in existence of my Bhagwan would go manifolds high with Shri Ram and Shri Krishna being his avatar and my heroes in true sense until the encounter with history chapters in days to come. Truth had to be chosen path as that indeed was a virtue and the tales of Ramayana and Mahabharat to be seen as mythologies which were all but truth. It was devasting for me to take up the given “truth” that indeed Shri Ram and Shri Krishna were figment of imaginations. I lived almost a decade of my life with this given truth only till when encounter with the hidden (from academic discourses) archaeologies came across my eyes.

In this essay, I thereby put across archaeological records which vouch strongly that my books of history at school were lying in the name of giving a truth and Shri Krishna did exist in flesh and bone. The most interesting part is that while the academic history books did teach that every development of best of Hindu practices emerged in Bharat post the claimed birth of Jesus of Nazareth, the truth is light years away from such teachings.

Tracing the V?sudeva Krishna from sources before Christ

One of the earliest literary records that speak about V?sudeva as one of the five God-Heroes of Vrishnis comes from A???dhy?y? of P??ini, who lived in Gandhara in 7th or 6th century BC (Bod, 2013, p. 14). V?sudeva appears as deity in P??ini’s writings in concurrence with Arjuna. He explains Arjuna as V?sudevaka for being a devotee (bhakta) of V?sudeva.

The dating of the period in which Panini lived may well be years older than the accepted date as of now but going by the academic standards unanimously accepted, it becomes clear that V?sudeva was certainly a person who lived and was worshiped way before 6th century before BC. On the other hand one of the oldest text (apart from Mahabharat) to speak about Krishna Devakiputra as a student of sage Ghora Angirasa is Chandogya Upanishad (3.17.6) whose dating in academic discourse goes as old as 9th to 7th century BC (Olivelle, 1998).

Though there are a few scholars like Gavin Flood who gives a take about V?sudeva & Krishna as different entities, which again must be seen as far from the truth. While he talks about V?sudeva & Arjun being mentioned in the works of Panini, he goes on to state that Krishna was a deity of Yadava Clan, who probably became fused with the deity V?sudeva. He claims that it was by the second century BC that V?sudeva Krishna was worshiped a distinct deity and finally got identified with Vishnu in Mahabharat (Flood, 1996, pp. 119-20).

Mahabharat observes Krishna both as from the clan of Vrishni (Bhagwat Gita, 3.36) and being V?sudeva (Mahabharata, 5.48.6). In the earlier section, we have come across Panini talking about the characters of Mahabharat and then we have references to bh?rata and the compound mah?bh?rata in A???dhy?y? (6.2.38). This falsifies the hypothesis that Krishna and V?sudeva, were two distinct deities to get fused by 2nd century BC.

Now, that it is established till above section about that V?sudeva and Krishna were the same identities, in the section that follow I’ll throw light on archaeological and foreign accounts for the observance of V?sudeva as a historical personality.

Heliodorus pillar was erected around 113 BC in Besnagar by Heliodorus, an ambassador of the Indo-Greek king Antialcidas. There lies an inscription on the pillar that venerates “V?sudeva,” as the Supreme Deity and goes on to state that it was constructed by “the Bhagavata Heliodorus,” (Salomon, 1998, pp. 265-267). We also find an interesting aspect in the inscription. It is very much in line with the core of Mahabharat 11.7.3. This would take us to believe that the word of Mahabharat had reached Greece long back (Preciado-Sol?s, 1984, p. 34). Though the pillar was first discovered by Alexander Cunningham in 1877, two more excavations were done with final one getting over in 1960s. The excavations gave us large brick foundations of a huge ancient elliptical Mandir complex with a sanctum, mandapas, & seven additional pillars. According to the “Indian Archaeology 1964-65-A Review” the Mandir was destroyed by the 3rd century BC.

This built a strong case for the Pillar to be part of a large ancient V?sudeva mandir. This discovery of large Mandir Complex not only reinforces worship of Krishna way older times, but it also gives setback to those who believe Mandirs became popular only in Gupta Period.

Then we have the Hathibada Ghosundi Inscriptions from Rajasthan which were found in three different spots of same vicinity going as old as 2nd Century BC talking of Krishna, Balram & construction of Mandir. The three spots where they were found are as under:

Inside an ancient water well in Ghosundi
At the boundary wall between Ghosundi & Bassi
On a stone slab in the inner wall of Hathibada

Although all three fragments are each incomplete but make sense when studied together. Scholars agree that they were displaced because the Timurid Padishah Akbar had got facilities built by breaking the old structures while he camped here during seize of Chittorgarh. The eminent archaeologist D. R. Bhandarkar translated the inscription as below by bringing them together (Bhandarkar, 1938, pp. 198-205):

“(This) enclosing wall round the stone (object) of worship, called Narayana-vatika (Compound) for the divinities Samkarshana-V?sudeva who are unconquered and are lords of all (has been caused to be made) by (the king) Sarvatata, a Gajayana and son of (a lady) of the Parasaragotra, who is a devotee of Bhagavat (Vishnu or Samkarshana/V?sudeva) and has performed an Asvamedha sacrifice.”

Then we have the coin of Agathocles of Bactria dated to 180 BC showing V?sudeva-Krishna with attributes of the conch & the Sudarshana Chakra wheel on one side while Balram holding gada & plough on other side.

One may refer to following sources for study on same:

Emergence of Vi??u and ?iva Images in India: Numismatic and Sculptural Evidence by Osmund Bopearachchi
Iconography of Balar?ma by NP Joshi, page 22

Then we come across evidence from Chilas, in northwestern region from Pakistan. It is an imagery showing Balarama and dated to 1st century AD. The imagery has been identified as such based on the attributes reflected and on the Kharosthi script inscription that has been deciphered as Rama-Krsna (Srinivasan, 1997, p. 215).

One very interesting evidence that we come across is the Mora Well inscription (Sanskrit) found in the village of Mora at around eleven kilometres from Mathura, India dated to 15 AD. Scholars find it important given the mention of pratima (images), stone Mandir, and the Pancaviras (five Vrishni War Heroes) (Srinivasan, 1997, p. 211) (Quintanilla, 2007, p. 260). Although the inscription is incomplete it has been translated by Sonya Quintanilla as below:

(…) of the son of mahaksatrapa Ramjuvula, svami (…)

the images of the holy pamcaviranam of the Vrishnis (…)

the stone shrine (…) whom the magnificent matchless stone house of Tosa was erected and maintained (…)

five objects of adoration made of stone, radiant, as it were with highest beauty (…)

As mentioned in the inscription, the construction was done by the Sasoda, the Great Satrap of Mathura.

We come across very interesting evidence in form a relief from Mathura dated to 1st century AD. The relief shows V?sudeva, Krishna’s father, carrying baby Krishna in a basket across the Yamuna. We also see a seven-hooded Naga and a crocodile is thrashing around in one end.

In earlier paragraph I did mention about Greeks having the knowledge of Mahabharat and Shri Krishna. There is one very interesting anecdote from 4th century BC. Megasthenes, a Greek ethnographer was an ambassador of Seleucus-I to the court of Chandragupta Maurya. In his book Indica, he referred to Herakles. As of now we do not have direct access to the text written by him, but it survives through the works of Arrian, Diodorus, and Strabo. They clearly state building upon the works of Megasthenes about the Sourasenoi tribe of India, who worshipped Herakles. They two major cities named Methora and Kleisobora, with navigable river named the Jobares.

Indologist Edwin Bryant, known for his works on Krishna states that, “there is little doubt that the Sourasenoi refers to the Shurasenas, a branch of the Yadu dynasty to which Krishna belonged.” He also explains that the word Herakles, is likely a Greek phonetic equivalent of Hari-Krishna, as is Methora of Mathura, Kleisobora of Krishnapura, and the Jobares of Jamuna. We also have records which state that when Alexander launched his campaign in the northwest Indian subcontinent, his people recalled that the soldiers of Porus were carrying an image of Herakles (Bryant, 2007, p. 5).

Conclusive notes

There are many more evidence and sources which stand as straight evidence to withstand the claim that the land of Baharat and neighbours were very much aware about a someone who lived by the name V?sudeva Krishna with grand heroic deeds. People across the geographies won’t have been talking about someone with so much dedication until there actually was a continued experience of one such grand persona.

As a matter of faith, historicity is a bit too small aspect but the truth remains that archaeology and epigraphical studies sway very much by the side of existence of Krishna.

The writer is an architect and an author. Views expressed are personal.

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