By c. 185BCE, the last Maurya was driven from the throne by a usurper, along
with the almost simultaneous arrival of more invaders into the subcontinent, again from the northwest. The first new arrivals were Greek rulers of Bactria but the previous trend of movement of peoples across oases and steppes from west to east began to reverse. Tribes of Sakas, moving west from the steppes of Central Asia, settled in western India. Another nomadic people, the Yuezhi, ethnically Turkish but speaking an Iranian language, were forced out of the Central Asian steppes and established the Kushana kingdom (c. first century BCE–third century CE), which at its height controlled parts of
Afghanistan, Iran, and, in the subcontinent, land stretching from modern Peshawar, Pakistan in the northwest to Varanasi (Uttar Pradesh) in the east and Sanchi (Madhya Pradesh) in the north. The Kushanas were patrons of Gandharan art (a significant synthesis between Greek and Indian styles) and Sanskrit literature.
By the first centuryCE, the consolidation of a Kushana empire, forging a link
between Iran and China, completed a chain of empires that extended all across Eurasia from the Pacific to the Atlantic. Heretofore, sea lanes offered an easy highway between South Asia and the West, as well as a more limited link to the East. Regular land contact across Asia began in the first centuryBCEwith the
opening of the legendary Silk Road across Central Asia by powerful military empires in China and Persia, firmly connecting South Asia to the East by trade. The trans-Eurasian trade routes that flourished during the first millennium of the Common Era were crowded with missionaries as well as merchants (often one and the same). Buddhism, having risen to prominence under Ashoka, flourished on the subcontinent and spread through Central Asia to China in the early centuriesCE; it was perhaps the most enduring legacy of the
Silk Road. Indian Buddhists were among the first people to venture forth as diasporic trading colonies in Central Asia and in China – traveling out much the same way that earlier invaders had traveled in. Oasis-based city-states, dependent on trade and thus anxious to provide congenial surroundings for their foreign guests, were not only generally tolerant of foreign faiths but also showed no reluctance to adopt new faiths or to incorporate elements of them into local syncretisms. From China, Buddhism spread in the late fourth century CE to Korea and Japan. Around the seventh century, Buddhist-
influenced cultures extended from Java to Nepal and from Afghanistan to Japan. Pali, the language of canonical Buddhist texts, was and remains today the canonical and ritual language of Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia. Sanskrit texts spread throughout East and Central Asia and were translated into Chinese. Canonic texts translated into Tibetan still stand as the Buddhist language of the Himalayan areas of Mongolia and Siberia. Unfortunately, Buddhist ideas and practices are not documented in the writings of musical theorists who belonged to Hindu religious and cultural traditions. According to Ter Ellingson, however, attempts at reconstructing early Buddhist vocal and melodic theories have led scholars to conclude that they were relatively similar to those found in the later treatises of Indian music theory (Ellingson 1979, cited in Tarocco n.d., 550).
Wherever Buddhism traveled, teachings were preserved and transmitted by collective musical vocalization (generally called chants). In the chant, the melodic phrases begin and end together with the text phrases, and rhythm and melody seem to depend on the syllabic patterns of the Pali canon texts. Choral chanting is embedded in monastic liturgical practice, although the style of chant became somewhat changed in different places.
One significant example of global encounter that resulted from the dissem- ination of Buddhism resides in a musical instrument: the ovoid-shaped lute Indian music history in the context of global encounters 133
that we know as the oud/pipa/biwa, which originated at the far western end of the Silk Road. Surviving sculptures from the second century BCE to the
seventh centuryCEshow that this instrument type flourished in ancient India –
that is to say, a plucked lute with an ovoid-shaped resonating chamber and a short neck appears to have been present. There, by undocumented steps, it became disassociated from its West Asian cultural origins and became linked with Indian religion. Iconographically it was associated with Buddhism and particularly with gandharvas, the lowest-ranking of devas in Buddhist theology. Gandharvas are known for their skill as musicians and have the power of flight; consequently, in iconography the lute is held in the hands of heavenly musi- cians, who manage to hold the instruments in playing positions while in flight. Linked with Buddhism, however, the instrument-type seems to have left India; that is, it did not remain in India as part of the sustained instrumenta- rium from ancient times. Along with the persistent Indian association of music and religious thought from Vedic times, and with the imagery of heavenly musicians, the ovoid-shaped, short-necked lute was carried – even by real travelers – north and east from India along the Silk Road to China.