10 Tools of Economic Connectivity in Early Historic South Asia

Abstract

This chapter discusses various institutions, both physical and ideological, that linked actors vertically and horizontally and facilitated the movement of people, goods, and ideas in early historic South Asia. Between 300  and 300 , the region saw the emergence of various standardized institutions despite the lack of political cohesion. The development of the śāstric literary tradition is a clear evidence for this. It is true that a majority of these institutions presuppose a state structure, but their adoption was not limited to one dynasty or a particular type of polity. The organizing factor of these institutions, rather, is a network of ideas and ideals within which various actors negotiated with each other at different levels. This chapter, therefore, is organzed to emphasize the cohesiveness of the tools that transcended political boundaries. The first section describes the fiscal structures mentioned in different sources. The dominant fiscal systems presuppose the presence of a state structure in which the processes of resource appropriation were shaped by negotiations between various participants. The next section outlines the monetary systems in India, which were shaped by the involvement of multiple actors. These actors were able to issue coins that often cocirculated and served as media of communication. The third section concerns legal systems. These were fundamentally predicated on the presence of a monarchical polity, but they were not limited to it. Rather, the normative texts recognize a variety of semiautonomous legal spheres. The fourth section discusses the process of standardization itself, which affected the three previous domains. The geographical spread of scripts and languages, particularly Sanskrit, highlights the need to consider the normative texts as products of and participants in the process of standardization, while archaeological evidence attests to the spread of normative ideals about expenditure on luxury items and euergetic practices. At the same time, local diversity persisted. The fifth and final topic, infrastructure, focuses on the variety of ways that people responded to their environment as they practiced agriculture, built cities, and transported goods.