Ancient India was the hub of learning. With the most gifted and sharp minds being born here, India was a boiling pot of thoughts, ideas, and philosophies that transformed the world. The earliest known universities were in India, from Nalanda which had the biggest library in the world to Takshashila which graduated great thinkers like Chanakya. Many scholars contributed to a variety of fields. For instance, Acharya Pingala who invented the binary number system, Adi Shankara who was the pioneer of Advaita Vedanta, and many more. It is these revolutionary bright minds who made the history of India so glorious.
He was one of the most influential thinkers of ancient India who penned the Arthashastra, a political treatise on governance and economics. This text mentioned how a ruler was supposed to rule and expand his kingdom. It is still studied by people all over the world. It was he who trained Chandra Gupta Maurya and helped him win the throne of Magadha. The Mauryan Empire, which was one of the most powerful and glorious empires of India, was built with his guidance. He mastered the art of statecraft.
He was a mathematician from the 5th century but also made contributions in the fields of astrology, physics, and astronomy. It was he who discovered zero and his discovery made it possible for Indian people to calculate the distance from the earth to the moon. He also gave the accurate value of "pi". He authored the text Aryabhatiya which had information on Algebra, Trigonometry, Geometry, and Astronomy. Among his many contributions to astronomy, one is that he correctly mentioned that the earth was spherical and rotated on its axis.
He was a great mathematician from ancient India and was a pioneer in the field of Mathematics. Out of his many contributions to the field of Mathematics one is his finding the value of pi something that Western thinkers were only able to achieve much later. Even the value of pi given by him was very close to what is known today. He also penned the text Sulva Sutra which had the Pythagorean theorem much before Pythagoras gave the theorem.
He was a great thinker of the Gupta period and was a scholar in the court of King Vikramaditya. His text Brhat Samhita mentions various signs that inform about an incoming earthquake like cloud formations, the behavior of animals, activities under the sea, etc. His text remains one of the most important texts of Indian culture.
He also explained how one could detect the presence of water underground by observing certain animals and plants. Apart from this, he made many notable contributions to the field of Astrology as well.
Surgery was first performed in India and the person who led this field was Sushruta. He performed complex surgeries on people like Rhinoplasty and cataract surgery, cesareans, kidney stone operations, etc. Detailed procedures of these surgeries are mentioned in his book Sushruta Samhita. It also gives information about 1100 diseases and their symptoms and cures. 760 types of plants are mentioned in it along with how they can be used to make medicines. He also described surgical instruments in his treatise.
He was another prominent figure in the field of medicine in ancient India. He authored the text Charak Samhita which described a lot of diseases extensively giving information on their causes, symptoms, and their treatment, he also mentioned how one could prevent these diseases from occurring in the first place, his school of medicine was based on a holistic approach while treating patients. He even gave information on genetics which was a major contribution to the history of India.
He is one of the greatest thinkers from ancient India and was considered to be a divine being. He brought the sacred art of Yoga to humans and made it a part of Indian culture. He taught them how to practice it to attain salvation. The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali are still read by modern practitioners of yoga because of the abundance of information it has. This text mentions the various yoga asanas and talks about the concept of the soul. He also authored other important texts, one of which was a commentary on grammarian Panini’s text, Mahabhashya.
Born as Siddhartha Gautam, he was a notable thinker and leader from ancient India who founded Buddhism on the principles of peace. Not only did he achieve enlightenment himself through a lot of meditation but also showed other people the path to do the same. He taught Dhamma to people and led them to salvation. His teachings and the religion founded by him have contributed immensely to the diversification of Indian culture. Even today millions of people across the world walk on the path shown by him.
He was a very prominent leader of the Sikh faith and was their first guru. He founded the religion the world today knows as Sikhism. His teachings were followed by many and he taught compassion, unity, honesty, and selfless service to people. His teachings are part of the hymns of the holy book Guru Granth Sahib which is considered the most sacred by the followers of Sikhism. When we look at the history of India, Guru Nanak Dev Ji emerges as one of the most influential spiritual thinkers.
He was another well-known figure in the field of Mathematics. His famous text is known as Siddhanta Shiromani and it covers topics like arithmetic and algebra. He is also credited with information on the mathematics of planets of the solar system which is also called Grahaganita. What is known today as the inverse cycle was discovered in the 12th century by him to solve equations of algebra and was called the Chakrawat Method.
Many Jain thinkers contributed to the field of mathematics by giving information on several concepts like fractions and one of them was Mahaviracharya. He was a thinker of the Jain faith who wrote a text called the Ganit Sara Sangraha. It is regarded as the first text on arithmetics. This text was penned in 850 A.D. He is also credited with giving the Indian people the method to find solutions to the Least Common Multiple.
The history of India is very rich when it comes to philosophers, scholars, and thinkers. The fields of physics, philosophy, astronomy, mathematics, spirituality, astrology, etc have seen vast contributions made by many thinkers from ancient India. While they all came from different parts of the country, they all had a profound impact on the world and made the history of India very intellectually rich and proud. From laying paths of spirituality for people to follow, to giving concepts of mathematics and making discoveries and developments in medicine, there is no field where they have not left their mark.
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