Megasthenes

Megasthenes (c. 350 BC; † 290 BC) was an ancient Greek diplomat, historian and geographer. He traveled as an envoy of the Indian royal court of the Maurya and wrote a famous treatise on India, but which is not completely preserved.

Life

Megasthenes was probably born in Asia Minor, and lived according to the historian Arrian some time in the territory of the Seleucid Empire Gedrosia part - Arachosia:

" Megasthenes, who was with Sibyrtios, the satraps Arachosiens and often claimed to be too Sandrokottos, the king of the Indians, come."

Although Arrian lived about 300 years after Megasthenes, but still had access to his historical work. As mentioned in the quote, Megasthenes was in connection with Sibyrtios, who played a not unimportant role in the period immediately after the death of Alexander. At an exactly determinable date Megasthenes then traveled as an envoy of the Seleukidenkönigs Seleucus I Nicator (possibly several times) to the court of the Indian king Sandrokottos ( Chandragupta Maurya ) in Pataliputra. In this case, the beginning of the embassy of Megasthenes would be dated after 305 BC, when it came to a peaceful balance between Seleucus and Sandrokottos.

What exact role played Megasthenes in the diplomatic relations between the Seleucids and the Mauyra Empire can not be determined. Maybe he had already traveled the western India during the Alexanderzugs. Since Arrian also reports Megasthenes also visited King Poros, a former embassy residence can not be excluded. It is also sometimes suggested that Megasthenes not traveled on behalf of Seleucus, but the Sibyrtios to India and this has actually happened shortly after Alexander's death. But this will depend on the interpretation of the relevant source statements. In research, it is assumed usually assume that Megasthenes served as ambassador of Seleucus.

About the later life of Megasthenes nothing is known, the diplomatic relations between the Seleucids and the Mauryas but clearly remained composed. A certain Daimachos seems to have subsequently acts as a Seleucid envoy at Mauryahof.

Work

Megasthenes collected during his legation material about India, which appeared to the Greeks as a halbmythisches Wonderland. Megasthenes has his memoirs later published in a well- four-volume work titled Indika, which was written in Ionic Greek. He was one of the very few Greeks who have India at least partially met in its eastern parts from his own experience. His indicators based primarily on information that he himself had made ​​his own observations, explorations and conversations with locals ( including Brahmin priests ) related; only to a small extent they were based on earlier Greek accounts of India, often novelistic traces were ( Herodotus, Ctesias of Cnidus and Onesicritus ). Although Megasthenes was not the only Greek who wrote after the Alexandrian over India; are known as the de facto completely lost records of the Daimachos, the successor of Megasthenes as ambassador at Mauryahof, and a certain Dionysius. But the work of Megasthenes was apparently the most extensively and was relatively frequently used by later authors. Diodorus, the aforementioned historian Arrian and Strabo (but only indirectly through Eratosthenes ) there have apparently used.

In the first book of the indicators geography, flora, fauna and ethnography of India were treated. This included a description of the river systems of the Indus and Ganges, a comprehensive 118 peoples names catalog, descriptions of the Himalayas and Sri Lanka. The second book was devoted to the description of the local customs, also ( for the first time in Greek authors ) of the Indian caste system, and finally the civil service. This presentation was focused on the middle Ganges River, Mauryan Empire, lived in its capital Pataliputra Megasthenes during his embassy. In the third book he dealt with the Indian social relations and Indian philosophy. In the fourth book, finally, archeology, myths and history of India were described up to the present.

Megasthenes seems to have collected a lot of valuable material; Some errors are also due to misunderstandings. He reported not always from his own experience, he primarily stayed at the royal court, but was also based on information from local Indian sources, which were not always reliable. Some specific Greek ideas are clearly incorporated into the image of India Megasthenes. These include statements about the Indian civil service (Fragment 31). An apparently important role played by the myth of the Indian train of Dionysus: The development of Indian religion led Megasthenes on Dionysus back, the coming conquered from the West, the country with his troops, civilized people and finally attains immortality because these services have (fragment 4 and 12). Second bearer of culture was Heracles (fragment 4 and 13). Megasthenes traditional and clichéd stories traditionally used in Greek India - description, so the " one-eyed ", it extends even to the " mouth lots ". In addition, he transfigured partially Indian society at different points; he boasted of their alleged honesty, love of truth, justice, simplicity, celibacy, etc. (fragment 32) and denied the existence of slaves (fragment 4, 16 and 32). An idealization of foreign countries, in Greek historiography, however, not unusual, as the example of Herodotus and Hecataeus of Abdera regarding Egypt shows.

Legend material in the indicators apparently came to a considerable extent also from Indian sources, the uncritical took Megasthenes and reproduced. Other more implausible stories did indeed correspond to the canon of Greek ideas regarding India as the descriptions to Dionysus, as seems more like mythical king as God, founded cities and have civilized the country. But Megasthenes also brings many valuable and historically accurate first-hand information, so that it can in no way be referred to as " lies Author". However, he was already some very critical view in antiquity, although he apparently served as the main source for Indian history. In addition to the not always reliable source material that was Megasthenes available, however, is to consider that his description of us present only in very brief summaries of later authors; It is in this respect also not always clear exactly how these authors are procedural. The fragments of the historical work are certainly the most important source for Indian history around 300 BC and are often used by Indologists yet. They are also an important source regarding the Greek India image that has been greatly expanded by the Alexandrian and the following development.

The fragments are collected in: The fragments of Greek historians (No. 715). A new edition with an English translation, a new commentary and further references provides Brill 's New Jacoby (No. 715).