DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.2371#0026
ETHNOGRAPHY. O
government. There seems certainly no physical reason why India,
like China, should not always have been one country, and governed,
at least, at times, by one dynasty. Yet there is no record of any such
event in her annals. Asoka, in the third century B.C.. may have
united the whole of the north of India under his sway, but nothing
of the sort seems again to have occurred till nearly 2,000 years
afterwards, when the Moguls tinder Akbar and Aurangzib nearly
accomplished what it has been left for us, to carry practically into
effect. During the interval, India seems to have been divided into
five great divisions, nearly corresponding to our five presidencies,
existing as separate kingdoms and ruled by different kings, each
supreme over a host of minor kinglets or chiefs, among whom the
country was divided. At times, one of the sovereigns, of one of the
five Indias, was acknowledged as lord paramount, nominally at least,
bat the country never was united as a whole, capable of taking a
place among the great monarchies of the earth, and making its
influence felt among surrounding nations. It never, indeed, was
so organised as to be capable of resisting any of the invaders who
from time to time forced the boundary of the Indus, and poured
their hordes into her fertile and much-coveted plains. It is, indeed,
to this great fact that we owe all that wonderful diversity of peoples
we find in India, and, whether for good or for evil, render the popu-
lation of that country as picturesquely various, as that of China is
tamely uniform. It is this very variety, however, that renders it so
difficult for even those who have long studied the question, on the
spot, to master the problem in all its complexity of detail. It un-
fortunately, too, becomes, in consequence, almost impossible to con-
vey to those who have not had these advantages, any clear ideas
on the subject, which is nevertheless both interesting and instruc-
tive, though difficult and complex, and requiring more study than
most persons are able or inclined to bestow upon it.
Ethnography.
The great difficulty of writing anything very clear or consecutive
regarding Indian ethnography or art arises principally from the fact
that India was never inhabited by one, but in all historical times, by
at least three distinct and separate races of mankind. These occa-
sionally existed and exist in their original native purity, but at
others are mixed together and commingled in varying proportions
government. There seems certainly no physical reason why India,
like China, should not always have been one country, and governed,
at least, at times, by one dynasty. Yet there is no record of any such
event in her annals. Asoka, in the third century B.C.. may have
united the whole of the north of India under his sway, but nothing
of the sort seems again to have occurred till nearly 2,000 years
afterwards, when the Moguls tinder Akbar and Aurangzib nearly
accomplished what it has been left for us, to carry practically into
effect. During the interval, India seems to have been divided into
five great divisions, nearly corresponding to our five presidencies,
existing as separate kingdoms and ruled by different kings, each
supreme over a host of minor kinglets or chiefs, among whom the
country was divided. At times, one of the sovereigns, of one of the
five Indias, was acknowledged as lord paramount, nominally at least,
bat the country never was united as a whole, capable of taking a
place among the great monarchies of the earth, and making its
influence felt among surrounding nations. It never, indeed, was
so organised as to be capable of resisting any of the invaders who
from time to time forced the boundary of the Indus, and poured
their hordes into her fertile and much-coveted plains. It is, indeed,
to this great fact that we owe all that wonderful diversity of peoples
we find in India, and, whether for good or for evil, render the popu-
lation of that country as picturesquely various, as that of China is
tamely uniform. It is this very variety, however, that renders it so
difficult for even those who have long studied the question, on the
spot, to master the problem in all its complexity of detail. It un-
fortunately, too, becomes, in consequence, almost impossible to con-
vey to those who have not had these advantages, any clear ideas
on the subject, which is nevertheless both interesting and instruc-
tive, though difficult and complex, and requiring more study than
most persons are able or inclined to bestow upon it.
Ethnography.
The great difficulty of writing anything very clear or consecutive
regarding Indian ethnography or art arises principally from the fact
that India was never inhabited by one, but in all historical times, by
at least three distinct and separate races of mankind. These occa-
sionally existed and exist in their original native purity, but at
others are mixed together and commingled in varying proportions