Crafts and Technology in Ancient India: From the Earliest Times to the Gupta Period

The present work attempts to deal with the history of crafts and technology starting from the pre-historic and proto-historic periods of India down to the age of the imperial Guptas on the basis of available literary and archaeological evidence. The term ‘craft’ has been used here in a broad sense which includes all the activities that produced or modified objects by manual means and with the use of mechanical aids like tools, etc. ‘Technology’ here means a systematic knowledge and action usually of the industrial process but applicable to any recurrent activity. It is closely related to science and engineering and also deals with tools and techniques for the purpose of accomplishing a specified function with knowledge and skill. This definition of technology, suggested by Sherwood and Maynard, has been followed in this work. Crafts and technology played a pivotal role in constructing the socio-economic and cultural history of India. The study of crafts and technology therefore is a vast subject and it has drawn attention of the historians and archaeologists in India and abroad. Some monographs on ancient arts and crafts has been published. But there is no comprehensive work on the subject in ancient India on broad perspectives.