Great Story on Great Indian Civilisation :::: "If you were a scholar in 7th-century Afghanistan, you would be speaking Sanskrit" :::: "Buddhism not only conquered Southeast Asia - Thailand, Laos, Cambodia - but also China"

Historian William Dalrymple argues that between 200 BCE and 1200 AD, Sanskrit played the same role across Asia that Latin did in mediaeval Europe. "If you were a scholar or ambassador in 10th-century Java or 7th-century Afghanistan, you would be speaking Sanskrit". 

In his new book 'The Golden Road: How Ancient India Transformed the World', the noted historian says India's pivotal role in shaping global civilisation has been overlooked for centuries. 

                                 Scottish historian William Benedict Hamilton-Dalrymple 

Far from being a passive corner of the ancient world, Dalrymple paints India as its beating heart, a crossroads of trade, intellect, and spirituality whose influence stretched from Rome to China.  

India, the birthplace of the game of chess, the concept of zero, and the idea that the Earth revolves around the Sun, has long been the source of some of humanity's most revolutionary ideas.  

Speaking to Fareed Zakaria on CNN's GPS, Dalrymple said his book seeks to recover the "enormous Indian influence throughout Asia," describing ancient India as "the cultural superpower of Asia". 

He explained that over half the world today lives in countries that were once shaped by Indian religions or philosophies such as Buddhism and Hinduism.  

"Buddhism not only conquered Southeast Asia - Thailand, Laos, Cambodia - but also China itself", he said, adding that India spread its ideas "through culture and trade, not conquest".

Calling it an "empire of the spirit", Dalrymple pointed to how Hindu and Buddhist imagery still endures far beyond India's borders, from Indonesia's national airline, Garuda (named after Vishnu's mount), to Cambodia's grand Angkor Wat temple and the Buddhist monument of Borobudur in Java.

It is often argued that the Indian civilization is spiritual and has kept spirituality at the forefront, allowing people the freedom to reform the system. 

For example, the enlightened Kabir speaks of all those who worship God as children of God without any discrimination of caste. The climax of India’s religious ideal has been renunciation. 

The great Indian epics, the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, were retold and revered across continents, their stories appearing on temple walls in Thailand and Sumatra.

Behind these cultural exports, Dalrymple said, lay a vast body of Indian science and mathematics long forgotten in the West. "We call our numbers Arabic numbers because that's where the West got them from. But the Arabs got them from the Indians, they still call them Hindu numbers," he said.

He credited mathematician Aryabhatta with introducing the concept of zero and place value, innovations that made modern mathematics and computing possible. "Thanks to him, we have algebra, algorithms, and binary," he added, noting that even the words "algebra" and "algorithm" trace back to translations of Indian texts.

Reflecting on India's continuity from its ancient achievements to its modern resurgence, Dalrymple said, "Islamic scholars in 12th-century Spain described Indians as masters of mathematics, and if you go to Silicon Valley today, people will tell you the same story."

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