King Asoka and Buddhism - Urban Dharma

We are used to treating the Mauryan empire as undifferentiatedterritory extending over almost the entire sub-continentexcluding only the area south of Karnataka. In effect, however,as I have argued elsewhere, the empire has to be seenin terms of differentiated political control. This is also partiallyreflected in the location of the inscriptions. There weresome areas which had experienced state systems prior to therise of the Mauryas such as the Ganges valley, Gandhara andMalwa. Magadha in particular had been the nucleus of politicalpower controlling the Ganges valley in the preceding periodunder the Nandas and it continued to play that role under theMauryas. It emerged therefore as a metropolitan area withinthe empire. That Aśoka referred to himself as rājā māgadha wasnot altogether an act of humility. Earlier states which had beenannexed provided the core areas of the empire and traditionhas it that Aśoka while still a prince was placed in charge ofthe administration both at Taxila and at Ujjain. The agriculturallyrich regions of Kalinga, Saurashtra and Raichur with theirpotential as states can also be viewed as core regions. Intermediateareas were probably regarded as peripheral. The degreeof political control would vary in these regions. The metropolitanarea was under a highly centralized system of administrationand this was doubtless what Kauṭalya had in mind whenhe wrote of the political economy of a state.It was to this region that the revenue was directed and itwas regarded as economically the most developed area. Theset of seven pillar edicts are addressed to this region. The coreareas had the potential of becoming metropolitan areas, whichmany of them did in the post-Mauryan period. The Major RockEdicts are largely located in such areas. The ones at Kalsi andSopārā indicate not so much the importance of agriculture as26