The history of the Arthaśāstra : sovereignty and sacred law in ancient India
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
The history of the Arthaśāstra : sovereignty and sacred law in ancient India
(Ideas in context / edited by Quentin Skinner (general editor) ... [et al.], 120)
Cambridge University Press, 2020, c2019
- : pbk
Available at 4 libraries
  Aomori
  Iwate
  Miyagi
  Akita
  Yamagata
  Fukushima
  Ibaraki
  Tochigi
  Gunma
  Saitama
  Chiba
  Tokyo
  Kanagawa
  Niigata
  Toyama
  Ishikawa
  Fukui
  Yamanashi
  Nagano
  Gifu
  Shizuoka
  Aichi
  Mie
  Shiga
  Kyoto
  Osaka
  Hyogo
  Nara
  Wakayama
  Tottori
  Shimane
  Okayama
  Hiroshima
  Yamaguchi
  Tokushima
  Kagawa
  Ehime
  Kochi
  Fukuoka
  Saga
  Nagasaki
  Kumamoto
  Oita
  Miyazaki
  Kagoshima
  Okinawa
  Korea
  China
  Thailand
  United Kingdom
  Germany
  Switzerland
  France
  Belgium
  Netherlands
  Sweden
  Norway
  United States of America
Note
"First published 2019, first paperback edition 2020"--T.p. verso
Includes bibliographical references (p. 245-255) and indexes
Description and Table of Contents
Description
The Arthasastra is the foundational text of Indic political thought and ancient India's most important treatise on statecraft and governance. It is traditionally believed that politics in ancient India was ruled by religion; that kings strove to fulfil their sacred duty; and that sovereignty was circumscribed by the sacred law of dharma. Mark McClish's systematic and thorough evaluation of the Arthasastra's early history shows that these ideas only came to prominence in the statecraft tradition late in the classical period. With a thorough chronological exploration, he demonstrates that the text originally espoused a political philosophy characterized by empiricism and pragmatism, ignoring the mandate of dharma altogether. The political theology of dharma was incorporated when the text was redacted in the late classical period, which obscured the existence of an independent political tradition in ancient India altogether and reinforced the erroneous notion that ancient India was ruled by religion, not politics.
Table of Contents
- 1. Introduction
- 2. Arthasastra historiography
- 3. The resegmentation of the Arthasastra
- 4. Citation and attribution
- 5. The deep structure of the text
- 6. The history of the Arthasastra
- 7. The politics of the Dandaniti
- 8. Varnadharma in the Arthasastra
- 9. Statecraft, law, and religion in ancient India
- Appendices.
by "Nielsen BookData"