Indian Achievements

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Indian Achievements
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Quick Review

• What continent is India located on?
• What is a subcontinent?
• What is a monsoon?
• What are some of the Harrapans Achievements?
• How was the Aryan culture different from
  Harrapan?
• What are the 4 Varnas/Castes?
• What were some of the Caste rules?
• What is the largest religion in India today?
• How do Hindus believe karma effects
  reincarnation?
• Who was Siddhartha Guatama?
• What is Nirvana?
• Describe what the Jains believe.
• What did Asoka do?
• What religion did Gupta promote?

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Sanskrit Literature

• Main language of the ancient Aryans
• During the Maurya and Gupta periods many works
  were created and later translated into many other
  languages
• Mahabharata - one of the worlds longest sacred
  texts a struggle between two families for
  control of a kingdom
• Bhagavad Gita - long passage within the
  Mahabharata about Hindu beliefs

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Hindu Temples

• Gupta temples were complex
• Hindu temples had a tower on top and the outside
  of the temple had carvings in honor of the
  specific god being worshipped

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Buddhist Temples

• During the Gupta period, some temples were carved
  out of a mountainside and contained beautiful
  paintings
• The stupa (a type of Buddhist temple) had a dome
  and intricate carvings

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Paintings and Sculptures

• Artists were well-respected people in ancient
  India
• The paintings were very vibrant, and most were
  done in Hindu and Buddhist temples
• Most sculptures were also created for Hindu
  temples and Buddhist cave temples

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Scientific Advances

• Indians were the first to find ways to work with
  metal (metallurgy) to create tools.
• The numbers we use today Hindu-Arabic numerals
  were created by Indian scholars.
• Inoculation (injecting a person with a small
  amount of a virus) began with ancient Indian
  doctors. We still use the process when receiving
  vaccinations.
• Astronomy - ancient Indians knew of seven of the
  9 planets by studying the skies.