Maurya Empire

The Maurya Empire was the first political entity to unite most of the Indian subcontinent under a single administration. Chandragupta Maurya, guided by his minister Chanakya, overthrew the Nanda dynasty around 322 BCE and rapidly expanded Maurya territory. His synchronism with Alexander the Great's invasion (327-325 BCE) provides the foundational chronological anchor for all of Indian historical dating — Chandragupta's meeting with Seleucus Nicator and the subsequent treaty are recorded in both Indian and Greek sources. Megasthenes, Seleucus's ambassador to Pataliputra, described a sophisticated urban administration with a six-board municipal government. Chandragupta's grandson Ashoka (r. ~268-232 BCE) transformed the empire's character after the devastating Kalinga War. His rock and pillar edicts — the oldest decipherable Indian inscriptions — record the adoption of dhamma (righteous governance) as state policy and the dispatching of Buddhist missionaries across Asia. The Ashokan pillars, with their polished sandstone and lion capitals, represent the peak of Mauryan material culture. The lion capital from Sarnath became independent India's national emblem. Ashoka's edicts in Brahmi script, deciphered by James Prinsep in 1837, unlocked the entire field of Indian epigraphy. The empire's administrative apparatus — described in Kautilya's Arthashastra and corroborated by Megasthenes's Indica — included a spy network, standardized coinage, a maintained road system, and provincial governors. The Maurya Empire declined after Ashoka, with the last ruler Brihadratha assassinated by his general Pushyamitra Shunga in 184 BCE.