Shakya Republic | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| c. 7th century BCE–c. 5th century BCE | |||||||||
.jpg) Shakya among theGaṇasaṅghas | |||||||||
.png) Shakya to the north of theMahajanapadas in the post-Vedic period | |||||||||
| Status | Vassal state ofKosala | ||||||||
| Capital | Kapilavastu | ||||||||
| Common languages | Prakrits Munda languages[1] | ||||||||
| Religion | Nature-worship | ||||||||
| Government | Aristocratic Republic | ||||||||
| Historical era | Iron Age | ||||||||
• Established | c. 7th century BCE | ||||||||
• Conquered byViḍūḍabha of Kosala | c. 5th century BCE | ||||||||
| |||||||||
| Today part of | India Nepal | ||||||||
Shakya (Pāḷi:Sakya;Sanskrit:शाक्य,romanized: Śākya) was an ancientclan of the northeastern region ofSouth Asia, whose existence is attested during theIron Age. The Shakyas were organised into agaṇasaṅgha (anaristocraticoligarchicrepublic), also known as theShakya Republic.[2] The Shakyas were on the periphery, both geographically and culturally, of the easternIndo-Gangetic Plain in theGreater Magadha cultural region.[1][3]
The Shakyas lived in theTerai – an area south of the foothills of theHimalayas and north of theIndo-Gangetic Plain with their neighbors to the west and south being the kingdom ofKosala, their neighbors to the east across theRohni River being the relatedKoliya tribe, while on the northeast they bordered on theMallakas ofKushinagar. To the north, the territory of the Shakyas stretched into the Himalayas until the forested regions of the mountains, which formed their northern border.[2]
The capital of the Shakyas was the city ofKapilavastu.[2][4]
The name of the Shakyas is attested primarily in thePali formsSakya andSakka, and theSanskrit formŚākya.[5]
The Shakyas' name was derived from the Sanskrit rootśak (शक्) (śaknoti (शक्नोति), more rarelyśakyati (शक्यति) orśakyate (शक्यते)) meaning "to be able," "worthy," "possible," or "practicable."[2][6]
The name of the Shakyas was also derived from the name of theśaka orsāka tree,[7][6] which Bryan Levman has identified with either theteak orsāla tree,[6][1] which is ultimately related to wordśākhā (शाखा), meaning 'branch,’[8] and was connected to the Shakyas' practice ofworshipping theśaka orsāka tree.[1]
The Shakyas were an eastern sub-Himalayan ethnic group on the periphery, both geographically and culturally, of the eastern Gangetic plain in theGreater Magadha cultural region.[9][3] The Shakyas were of 'mixed origin' (saṃkīrṇa-yonayaḥ) ofIndo-Aryan andMunda descent, with the former group forming a minority according to Bryan Levman.[10] The Shakyas' legends link their ancestry to Okkāka (Ikshvāku) whose name is of Munda origin. According to Edward Thompson, they were likely partly of Mongolian descent, while in the view of E. J. Thomas, they were mainly of Kol or Munda origin.[11][9] The Shakyas were closely related to their eastern neighbours, theKoliya tribe, with whom they intermarried.[12]
Scholars such asMichael Witzel andChristopher I. Beckwith have equated the Shakyas with Central Asian nomads who were calledScythians by the Greeks,Sakās by the Achaemenid Persians, andŚāka by the Indo-Aryans. These scholars have suggested that the people of the Buddha were Saka soldiers who arrived in South Asia in the army ofDarius the Great during theAchaemenid conquest of the Indus Valley, and saw inScytho-Saka nomadism the origin of the wandering asceticism of the Buddha.[13][14]
Scholars criticize the Scythian hypothesis due to a lack of evidence, with Bryan Levman maintaining that the Shakyas were native to the north-eastGangetic plain and unrelated to the Iranic Sakas.[15]
By the sixth century BCE, the Shakyas, theKoliyas,Moriyas, andMallakas lived between the territories of theKauśalyas to the west and theLicchavikas andVaidehas to the east, thus separating theVajjika League from the Kosala kingdom.[2] By that time, the Shakya republic had become a vassal state of the largerKingdom of Kosala.[16][17]
During the fifth century itself, one of the members of the ruling aristocratic oligarchy of the Shakyas wasSuddhodana. Suddhodana was married to the princessMāyā, who was the daughter of a Koliya noble, and the son of Suddhodana and Māyā wasSiddhartha Gautama, the historical Buddha and founder ofBuddhism.[2]
During the life of the Buddha, an armed feud opposed the Shakyas and the Koliyas concerning the waters of the river Rohiṇī, which formed the boundary between the two states and whose water was needed by both of them to irrigate their crops. The intervention of the Buddha finally put an end to these hostilities.[2]
After the death of the Buddha, the Shakyas claimed a share of his relics from the Mallakas ofKusinārā on the grounds that he had been a Shakya.[2]
Shortly after the Buddha's death, theKauśalya kingViḍūḍabha, who had overthrown his fatherPasenadi, invaded the Shakya and Koliya republics, seeking to conquer their territories because they had once been part ofKosala. Viḍūḍabha finally triumphed over the Shakyas and Koliyas and annexed their state after a long war with massive loss of lives on both sides. Details of this war were exaggerated by later Buddhist accounts, which claimed that Viḍūḍabha exterminated the Shakyas in retaliation for having given in marriage to his father the slave girl who became Viḍūḍabha's mother. In actuality, Viḍūḍabha's invasion of Shakya might instead have had similar motivations to the conquest of theVajjika League by Viḍūḍabha's relative, theMāgadhī kingAjātasattu, who, because he was the son of a Vajjika princess, was therefore interested in the territory of his mother's homeland. The result of the Kauśalya invasion was that the Shakyas and Koliyas merely lost political importance after being annexed into Viḍūḍabha's kingdom. The Shakyas nevertheless soon disappeared as an ethnic group after their annexation, having become absorbed into the population of Kosala, with only a few displaced families maintaining the Shakya identity later. The Koliyas likewise disappeared as a polity and as a tribe soon after their annexation.[2][12]
The massive life losses incurred by Kosala during its conquest of Shakya and Koliya weakened it significantly enough that it was itself soon annexed by its eastern neighbour, the kingdom ofMagadha, and its kingViḍūḍabha was defeated and killed by the Māgadhī kingAjātasattu.[2]
The Buddha was given the epithet of the "Sage of the Shakyas,"Sakka-muni in Pali andŚākya-muni in Sanskrit, by his followers.[19]
The functioning of the proceedings in theTrāyastriṃśa heaven ruled bySakka, lord of thedevas inBuddhist cosmology, are modelled on those of the Shakyasanthāgāra or general assembly hall.[2]
Tharu people of Tarai region of India and Nepal claim descent from Sakya.[20] Significant population ofNewars ofKathmandu valley in Nepal use the surname Shakya and also claim to be the descendants of the Shakya clan with titles such as Śākyavamsa (of the Shakya lineage) having been used in the past.[21]
According toHmannan Yazawin, first published in 1823, the legendary kingAbhiyaza, who founded theTagaung Kingdom and the Burmese monarchy belonged to the same Shakya clan of the Buddha.[22] He migrated to present-day Burma after the annexation of the Shakya kingdom by Kosala. The earlier Burmese accounts stated that he was a descendant ofPyusawhti, son of a solar spirit and a dragon princess.[23]
The Shakyas lived in what scholars presently call theGreater Magadha cultural area, which was located in the eastern Gangetic plain to the east of the confluence of the Gaṅgā and Yamunā rivers. Like the other eastern groups of the Greater Magadha region, the Shakyas weresaṃkīrṇa-yonayaḥ ("of mixed origin"), and therefore did not subscribe to thecaturvarṇa social organisation consisting ofbrāhmaṇas,khattiyas,vessas, andsudda. While non-Indo-Aryan indigenous clans were given the status ofsuddas, that is of slaves or servants, indigenous clans who collaborated with the Indo-Aryan clans were the status ofkhattiyas. The Buddhist suttas are ambiguous on the status of the Buddha, sometimes calling him a kshatriya, but mostly ignoring the varna system. Additionally, the populations of Greater Magadha did not subscribe to the supremacy of thebrāhmaṇas of the peoples ofĀryāvarta, andkhattiyas were regarded as higher in the societies of Greater Magadha.[1]
Vedic literature therefore considered the populations ofGreater Magadha as existing outside of the limits ofĀryāvarta, with theManusmṛiti grouping theVaidehas,Māgadhīs,Licchavikas, andMallakas, who were the neighbours of the Shakyas,[10] as being "non-Aryan" and born from mixed caste marriages, and theBaudhāyana-Dharmaśāstras requiring visitors to these lands to perform purificatory sacrifices as expiation.[1]
This negative view of the peoples of the Greater Magadha region by the Vedic peoples extended to the Shakyas, as recorded in theAmbaṭṭha Sutta, according to which thebrāhmaṇas described the Shakyas as "fierce, rough-spoken, touchy and violent," and accused them of not honouring, respecting, esteeming, revering or paying homage to thebrāhmaṇas owing to their "menial origin."[1]
The Shakyans were at least bilingual, under the linguistic influence ofMunda languages, as attested by many of their villages having Mundari names, and the name of the founder of their clan, which has been recorded in the Sanskrit formIkṣvāku and the Pali formOkkāka, being ofMunda origin.[9]
The society of the Shakyas and Koliyas was a stratified one which did not subscribe to thecaturvarṇa social organisation consisting ofbrāhmaṇas,khattiyas,vessas, andsuddas, but instead consisted of an aristocratic class ofkhattiyas and a slave or servant class ofsuddas,[1] themselves comprising at least an aristocracy, as well as land-owners, attendants, labourers, and serfs.[2][12]
Landholders held the title ofbhojakās, literally meaning "enjoyers (of the right to own land)," and used in the sense of "headmen."[2][12]
The lower classes of Shakya society consisted of servants, in Pāli calledkammakaras (lit. 'labourers') andsevakas (lit. 'serfs'), who performed the labour in the farms.[1][12]
The Sakyas were organised into agaṇasaṅgha (anaristocraticoligarchicrepublic) similarly to theLicchavikas.[2][1]
The heads of the Sakyakhattiya clans of theGotamagotta formed an Assembly, and they held the title ofrājās. The position ofrājā was hereditary, and after arājā's death was passed to his eldest son, who while he was living held the title ofuparājā ("Viceroy").[2][6]
The political system of the Sakyas was identical to that of the Koliyas, and like the Koliyas and the othergaṇasaṅghas, the Assembly met in asanthāgāra, the main of which was located at Kapilavatthu, although at least one other Sakya santhāgāra also existed at Cātuma. The judicial and legislative functions of the Assembly of the Sakyas were not distinctly separated, and it met to discuss important issues concerning public affairs, such as war, peace, and alliances. The Sakya Assembly deliberated on important issues, and it had a simple voting system through either raising hands or the use of wooden chips.[2]
Similarly to the othergaṇasaṅghas, the Sakya Assembly met rarely and it instead had an inner and smaller Council which met more often to administer the republic in the name of the Assembly. The members of the council, titledamaccās, formed a college which was directly in charge of public affairs of the republic.[2]
The head of the Sakya republic was an elected chief, which was a position offirst among equals similar toRomanconsuls andGreekarchons, and whose incumbent had the title ofmahārājā. Themahārājā was in charge of administering the republic with the help of the council.[2][12]
When sessions of the Assembly were held, therājās gathered in the santhāgāra; while fouramaccās were posted in the four corners or sides of the hall so as to clearly and easily hear the speeches made by therājās; and the consulrājā took his appointed seat and put forward the matters to be discussed once the Assembly was ready.[2]
During the session, the members of the Assembly expressed their views, which the fouramaccās would record. The Assembly was then adjourned, after which the recorders compared their notes, and all theamaccās came back and waited for the recorders' decision.[2]
Another reflection of non-Indo-Aryan cultural practices of the Shakyas was the practice of sibling marriages among their ruling clans, which was forbidden amongVaidika peoples, and was a practice of social demarcation and of maintaining power within a smaller sub-group of the Shakya clan, and was therefore not permitted among the lower classes of the Shakya.[1]
Since they lived in theGreater Magadha cultural area, the Shakyas followed non-Vedic religious customs which drastically differed from theBrahmanical tradition,[1] and even by the time of the Buddha, Brahmanism and thebrāhmaṇas had not acquired religious or cultural preponderance in the Greater Magadha area to which Shakya belonged.[24]
It was in this non-Vedic cultural environment thatŚramaṇa movements existed, with one of them,Buddhism, having been founded by the Shakya Siddhartha Gautama, the historicalBuddha.[1]
The Shakyas worshipped theSun-god, whom they considered their ancestor,[25] hence why the Shakyakhattiya clan claimed to be of theĀdicca (Āditya in Sanskrit)gotta,[26][27] and of theSūryavaṃśa ("Solar dynasty").[6]
The Shakyakhattiya clan claimed descent from the Sun-god via his descendant, namedOkkāka (inPāli) andIkṣvāku (inSanskrit), and whose eight twin sons and daughters who were married to each other had founded the capital city of the Shakyas and were the tribe's ancestors. This was an origin myth of the ruling status of thekhattiya families of the Shakya clan, who had the right to be represented in thesanthāgāra, were often related to each other, and possessed adjacent areas of land, thus establishing kinship, which itself helped form rights of landownership, and, therefore, of political authority.[6]
This myth was also a foundation myth of the city which, as the residence of the ruling families of the clan, the city, which was the centre of political and economic activity, was associated with that clan'sjanapada (territory), and was equated with the wholejanapada itself.[6]
The myth of the Shakyas' ancestors being four pairs of married twin siblings was a myth which traced the origins of the ruling Shakya families to a common ancestor, and was also a myth of an early human utopia where humans were born as couples.[6]
The important role of theSāl tree in the life of the Buddha according to the Buddhist texts, as well as his representation as aBodhi tree and his Enlightenment occurring under one such tree, suggest that the Shakyas practised tree worship, a custom likely derived from Munda religious customs of worshipping sacred groves, and the important role in their traditions of the Sāl tree, whose flowering marks the beginning of their New Year and Flower Feast festivals: theSantal tribe worship the Sāl tree and gather to make communal decisions under them Sāl trees.[1]
The importance of the tree spirits calledyakkhas andyakkhīs in Pali (yakṣas andyakṣīs in Sanskrit) in early Buddhist texts is an attestation of the worship of these beings done atyakkhacetiyas. The worship ofyakkhas andyakkhīs, which was of pre-Indo-Aryan autochthonous origin, was prevalent in the Greater Magadha region.[1]
Thenāga kingMucalinda, who in Buddhist mythology protected the Buddha during a storm under a mucalinda tree, was a both snake- and a tree-deity, thus alluding to the practice of serpent worship among the Shakyas, which originated from among the pre-Indo-AryanTibeto-Burman populations of northern South Asia.[1]
The cremation rituals of the Shakyas which were performed for the funeral of the Buddha as described by Buddhist texts involved wrapping his body in 500 layers of cloth, placing it in an iron vat full of oil as a mark of honour, and then covering it with another iron pot before being cremated. These rites originated from the pre-Indo-Aryan autochthonous populations of the eastern Gangetic plains, as were the practices such as honouring the Buddha's body with singing, dancing, and music, as well as placing his bones in a golden urn, the veneration of these remains and their burial in a roundstūpa which possessed a central mast, flags, pennants, and parasols at a public crossroads, which were rituals that were performed by the pre-Indo-Aryan populations for their greater rulers.[1]
we find only a fanciful desire to account for the name Sakya by identifying it with the wordsakya,śakya, in the sense of 'able, capable, smart.' But, looking below the surface, we find in the allusion tosākasaṇḍa,sākavanasaṇḍa, the grove of teak-trees, the real origin of the other name, Sākiya, Śākiya, Śākya.
The eastern ethnic groups were looked down upon as inferior by the incom-ing Aryans from the northwest. The centre of the Aryan homeland (Āryāvarta, 'the abode of the noble ones') lay west of the intersection of the Yamuna and Ganges rivers, while the Buddha belonged to the Sakyas (P, Skt. Śākya), an eastern sub-Himalayan ethnic group, in the eastern borderlands. Like the other eastern groups, the Sakyas were of 'mixed origin' (saṃkīrṇa-yonayaḥ), which presumably meant that their ancestry was part Aryan and part indigenous, the former com-ponent probably being in the minority (Dutt 1960, 52; Emeneau 1974, 93; also in Dil 1980, 198; Deshpande 1979, 297). The Baudhāyana-dharmaśāstra (1.1.2.13–4) lists all the groups (including that of Magadha, where the Buddha spent much of his teaching career) outside the pale of the Āryāvarta; just visiting them required a purificatory sacrifice as expiation.18 In Manu (10.11, 22) the Vaidehas, Magadhas, Licchavis, the Mallas, and the rulers of Kusinārā and Pāvā (cities of the Malla ethnic group, and the near neighbours of the Sakyas) — that is all the eastern clans including the Dravidians — are deemed to be the result of mixed caste marriages and treated 'as though being non-Aryan' (Oldenberg 1882, 399).
