Our Revision Notes for GSEB Class 10 Social Science Notes Chapter 4 Literary Heritage of India summarises the key points of a chapter and useful resource to prepare effectively for the upcoming board exams.
Literary Heritage of India Class 10 GSEB Notes Social Science Chapter 4
Literary Heritage of India Class 10 GSEB Notes
→ Indian literature is known for its diversity and uniqueness. Indian scholars divided ancient literature into vedic and classical literature.
→ India’s most ancient script is that of Harappan civilization.
→ Maharshi Panini was a great Sanskrit grammarian.
→ Sanskrit was the chief language for knowledge, science, religion and philosophy.
→ Veda means knowledge. There are four Vedas i.e., Rigveda, Samveda, Yajurveda and Atharvaveda
→ Rigveda consists of 1028 verses. It divided into 10 divisions.
→ Samveda was composed to focus on the process of recitation of verses. It is known as Gangotri of music.
→ Yajurveda describes hymns recited at the time of Yagyas, the religious practices and rituals.
→ Atharvaveda describes various types of rituals and sanskaras.
→ Upanishada gives us vivid description and analysis of the beginning of the universe, the mysteries of life and death materialistic and spiritual world, etc.
→ Many brahminical epics were composed to understand the meaning of vedic literature.
→ Aranyakas composed literature based on philosophy, which was the result of their deep thinking.
It is known as ‘Aranyakas’.
→ The Vedangas literature deals with religious practices and rituals, grammar, astrology and astronomy.
→ The Ramayana and the Mahabharata are two great Indian epics. The present form of these epics can be traced back to the second century. The Ramayana is the smaller epic than the ‘
Mahabharata.
→ Mahabharata is the world’s largest epic. It has one lakh verses. The Bhagwad Gita, a part of Mahabharata, expounds the deep philosophical principles. It conveys the message of achieving Moksha or salvation through Gyana, Karma and Bhakti.
→ During this period, many scriptures and granthas were composed. These scriptures dealt with science and philosophy. Kautilya’s Arthashastra is a book of management as well as books on various topics such as arts, mathematics and other sciences.
→ The earlier Buddhist literature was written in Pali. It is divided into three sections, known as ‘Tripitika’. It consists of Sukta Pitika, Vinaya Pitika and Abhidhamma Pitika.
→ Gupta period was known as the golden period for the growth and development of Sanskrit poems and dramas.
→ Kalidas is known all over the world. His works i.e., Kumarsambhava, Raghuvansham, Meghdoot, Abhigyan Shakuntalam and Rutusambhar are renowned. Bana, Bharavi, Vishakhadatta, Shudraka, Dandi, etc. were also great writers belonged to Gupta period.
→ The heritage of Gujarati literature was made prosperous by literary contribution of Narsinh Mehta, Mirabai, Dayaram, Akho, Premchand, Pritam and others who composed beautiful verses songs, narrative poems, chhappas, etc.
→ The four Dravidian languages i.e. Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam developed their own script and literature.
→ In the Medieval age great books were written. First was Somdeva’s Kathasaritsagar, and second was Kalhana’s Rajatarangini.
→ Another famous work of this time is the Geetgovind by Jaydeva.
→ This was the period when the Apabharams languages have started developing into modern Indian languages.
One of the earliest works in an early form of Hindi was Prithviraj Raso by Chand Bardai.
→ Sanskrit literarture made great stride in South India.
→ Jainism influenced Kannada literature. The poets like Pampa, Ponna and Ranna are known as the trio of early Kannada literature.
→ Two forms of Delhi language i.e. Khadi Boli and Brij Bhasha began to be used for writing literature during the time of Delhi Sultanate.
→ The heroic works like Alha, Udal and Visaldev Raso were popular at that time.
→‘Chandrayan’ written by Mulla-Daood is the oldest book of Awadhi language.
→ Persian was the language of the court of Delhi Sultanate. Ziauddin Barani wrote the Tarik-e-Firoz Shahi which gives a detailed account of the region of the Khilji and Tughluq kings. He also wrote a book on political theory called Fatwa-e-Jahangiri.
→ Amir Khusro was a poet, historian, mystic saint and composer of music. He wrote the Ashiqua, the Nah, Sipiher, Kiratul Sadayan, Khazain-ul-Futuh and several other works of poetry.
→Bhakti saints preached in the language of the people. Many of them like Kabirwere great poets.
→ Bhojpuri and Awadhi were the major dialects during those days.
→ Well-known Ramcharitmanas by Tulsidas was written in Awadhi.
→ In Bengali, the Ramayana by Kritta Vasa and the hundred of lyrics by the famous poet Chandidas were written under the patronage of the rulers.
→ Narsinh Mehta wrote devotional songs in Gujarati, and Namaev and Saint Eknath in Marathi. Raja Krishnadev Rai, the great king of Vijayanagar wrote the Amukra malayad.
→ Mughal period also saw a great development in literature.
→ Babur, the first Mughal ruler, was one of the pioneers of Turkish-e-Babar’ in Turkish.
→ Gulbadan Begum, sister of emperor Humayun, wrote Humayun-nama.
→ Jahangir wrote his autobiography the Tuzuk-e-Jahangiri.
→ Tulsidas and Surdas wrote in this period. Rahim’s dohas are still popular all over India.
Abdul Fazl wrote the Ain-e-Akbari and the Akbamama.
→ Abul Fazl’s brother Faizi was great Persian poet and he translated many Sanskrit works into Persian. One of the most significant development during the medieval period was the birth of Urdu language. It produced great poets like Wali, Mir Dard, Mir Taqi Mir, Nazir Akbarabadi, Abdullah Khan, Galib, Iqbal and others.
→ At the same time original prose work in Urdu was written. Muhammad Hussain Azad’s ‘Darbar- e-Akbari’ is one of the best works of Urdu language.
→ Nalanda is situated at Badgaon village of Patna district in Bihar.
→ It also became pilgrimage of Jains and Mahavir Swami had performed fourteen chaturmas here. « In fifth century Kumar Gupta had build a monastery here.
→ Students from various parts of the world used to come here for study.
→ The great traveller Heun Tsang also came here.
→ Education was best at Nalanda University. Many students of India and abroad used to come for study and research in the library of Takshshila.
→ This university was named after the name of Taksha, the son of Bharata, brother of Lord Rama, s Huen Tsang took 657 books from here to China.
→ There were seven huge Halls in the University.
→ There were about 300 rooms for delivering lectures.
→ Food and clothing facilities were provided free of cost from the earnings obtained from these villages.
→ Library area was known as ‘Dharmgunj’.
→ Takshashila was a located at Rawalpindi of present Pakistan, the capital city of ancient Gandhar region.
→ This university imparted education in 64 subjects.
→ Jivak, the disciple of Lord Buddha, learnt the lessons of Ayurveda here.
→ Princes of Varanasi and Prasenjit got the king of Kaushal studied here.
→ Great grammarian Panini and expert politician Kautilya got education from this university.
→ Chadragupta Maurya also studied here. Chinese scholer Fa-Hien visited this university in the beginning of 15th century.
→ Varanasi was the place of pilgrimages during the 7th century. It grew as the religious centre for the Aryan culture in Upanishad period.
→ Lord Buddha chose Varanasi a suitable place for the propagation of his preachings.
→ Vallabhacharya and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, the pioneer of Pushtimarg, attained prestige for their Vaishnav sects in Kashi.
→ Vallabhi was very famous education centre of Gujarat in 7th century.
→ The ruler of Vansh dynasty and its people make Vallabhi a well-renowned and a huge centre of education.
→ Buddhist scholars like Sthirmati and Gunmati were the leading principals of Vallabhi.
→ The rulers of Vallabhi dynasty belonged to Maitrak dyansty. They patronized education and university as well.
→ In 775 AD, due to Arabians attack university was closed down.
Literary Heritage of India Class 10 GSEB Notes Important Terms
• Maharshi Panini: Ashtadhyayi Granth.
• Samveda: Gangotri of music.
• Kautilya’s Arthashastra: A book of management.
• Tripitaka: Main granth of Buddhism.
• Mulla Daood: Chandrayan, oldest granth of Awadhi language.
• Hazarat Nizamuddin Auliya: Mentor of Aamir Khusro.
• Padmavat epic: Malik Muhammad Jayasi.
• The most important event of medieval age: Birth of Urdu language