Page:Indian Shipping, a history of the sea-borne trade and maritime activity of the Indians from the earliest times.djvu/43



The epochs of Indian history round which these various evidences regarding the shipping and maritime activity of India will be grouped, may be roughly indicated as follows:—

1. The Pre-Mauryan Epoch, extending from the earliest times to about the year B.C. 321.—For this period we shall discuss the evidences that can be gleaned from some of the oldest literary records of humanity like the Ṛig-Veda, the Bible, and some of the old Pali and Tamil works, as also from the finds of Egyptian and Assyrian archaeologists, regarding the early maritime intercourse of India with the West. Evidences for this period are also to be derived from the writings of the Greek authors Herodotus and Ctesias, in the 5th century B.C., containing references to India.

2. The Mauryan Epoch (B.C. 321-184).—For this period the available evidences are those preserved in the works of many Greek and Roman authors who essayed to tell the story of Alexander's Indian campaign and recorded the observations made on India by the Greek ambassadors to the courts of the Maurya emperors. These Greek and Roman notices of India have been mostly made accessible to Indian students by the translations of Mr. McCrindle. More important and interesting than these foreign evidences is the evidence