Notes On Early Newar History

According to D. R. Regmi (1969, 14), the first written examples of the term "Newar" to denote the people and society of the Kathmandu Valley date from the seventeenth century, but, as he remarks, the term may well have had a long usage before then. Although, as we shall see, contemporary Newars in some contexts limit the "Newars" to the "climax" society that began to form in the time of the "medieval" Malla kings, as the society and culture seems to have developed more or less continuously from its most ancient roots, we can follow Regmi in referring to the Kathmandu Valley society, culture, and language from the earliest days until its capture by the Gorkhalis in the late eighteenth century as Newar.

Local inscriptions and foreign accounts, mainly Chinese, on which a

history of early Valley Nepal can be based date only from the fourth century A.D. In the absence of adequate archaeological studies, which may some day clarify and alter our conceptions of the early history, inferences about early periods are based on Nepalese chronicles and legends and on problematic allusions in Hindu epic literature.^[7] There is still much debate on the interpretation of these sources for histories of political dynasties and events, and even for a correct chronology. But for the purposes of locating Bhaktapur, a provisional history can be sketched out.

The earliest written inscriptions (from the period of the Sanskrit-speaking court of the Licchavi dynasty) show that more than 80 percent of the place names in the Valley were non-Sanskritic. This supports a tradition that non-Sanskritic dynasties ruled early Nepal, perhaps from (at least) as early as the seventh century B.C. This society, referred to as "Kirata," was apparently of Mongoloid origin, speakers of a Tibeto-Burman language.^[8] According to P. R. Sharma (1973, 67f. [spelling standardized]):

Despite the lack of proof, the Kirata tradition in Nepalese history is too deeply rooted to be dismissed easily. The Kiratas are a widely mentioned tribe in ancient Sanskrit literature, especially the Epics. Many references point to the northeastern Himalayan foothills as the home of these people. The Himalayas were still an area outside the sphere of Aryan domination, and the Kiratas therefore seem to differ from them racially. The Rais and Limbus [of contemporary Eastern Nepal] claim to be the Kiratas. The features of these people distinctly betray their Mongoloid origin. The use of the term Kirata in ancient literature seems to have been wide enough to encompass all groups [in Nepal] of Mongoloid stock. . . . The matrix of Nepalese culture in the valley must have been laid by these Kiratas. The modern inhabitants of the valley, the Newars, are believed to be an intermixture of Aryan and Mongoloid strains resulting from the unions between the Kiratas and the Aryans migrating from the plains of India. The early prototype of the Newari language might have struck its first roots also during this time, as the language is considered to be basically of the Tibeto-Burmese group. The liberal assimilation of the Indo-Aryan Sanskrit into the language proceeds only from the time of the Licchavis, who were responsible for introducing Sanskrit into the land.

By the first or second century A.D. , a Sanskrit-using and Prakrit-speaking court, the Licchavis,^[9] had replaced the Kirata court. They were presumably related to the Licchavi rulers of Vaisali in Bihar in North India. This was the beginning of a continuing pattern of Sanskritic courts derived from North India ruling over a Tibeto-Burman-

speaking people.^[10] Gradually the language and customs of the courts and the people were to blend in a Newar synthesis. Always within this synthesis, however, there were certain segments of religion and court life that followed Sanskrit models and some aspects of the life of the people that maintained residues of ancient Himalayan and Northern modes.

Irrigation of the Kathmandu Valley was developed under the Licchavis as many inscriptions attest,^[11] with the construction of tanks and canals enabling farmers to husband and distribute the monsoon rains In concord with the rich soil of the Valley, irrigation led to the kind of agricultural surplus that eventually made extensive urbanization possible.

In the later days of Licchavi rule (from the late sixth century A.D. ) Tibet was developing a unified state, which was eventually to center at Lhasa. Now "Himalayan passes to the north of the Valley were opened. Extensive cultural, trade, and political relations developed across the Himalayas, transforming the Valley from a relatively remote backwater into the major intellectual and commercial center between South and Central Asia" (Rose 1974, 956). Much of the art and religion of the Newars and the Tibetans grew out of shared Indian sources, but also in mutual interchange and stimulation, and thus had many common features.

According to Prayag Raj Sharma (1973, 71):

In the early Licchavi period, Nepal, together with India undertook the cultural colonization of Tibet. Buddhism and its concomitant art spread from Nepal to Tibet in the 7th Century A.D. According to Tibetan tradition the famous Nepali King Amshuvarman^[12] married his daughter to the first historical King of Tibet, Srongtsan-Sgam-po. Brikuti is said to have carried an image of Buddha among other things as her nuptial present to her husband, and during her lifetime in Tibet knowledge of Buddhism spread far and wide. . . . From the Seventh Century to the present days, Nepal's relationship with Tibet has been continuously reaffirmed. Nepalese [that is Newar] artists, especially bronze makers, painters, and architects went to work in Tibetan monasteries and seminaries. Buddhist scriptures were taken to Tibet to be copied or translated. Ranjana, an ornately elaborate Newari script became the divine script in Tibet. . . . The different Tantric schools which overwhelmed Tibet, also found their way from Nepal as well as India.

Nepal and her princess were, of course, only one component of the influences forming seventh-century Tibet, but one of considerable importance.

Nepal during the Licchavi period reflected most of the Indian reli-

gious developments of the times. Early inscriptions and art indicate that there were sects devoted to Visnu^[*] , Siva, and the Buddha and their associated deities. Visnu^[*] and his cult may have been more associated with the courts, and Siva, in this early period, perhaps somewhat more with the non-Ksatriya^[*] classes.^[13]

Some writers, notably the Sanskritist Sylvain Lévi (1905), believed that the major popular Indian religion of Nepal during this early period, the religion of the Tibeto-Burman segment of the people, was Buddhism superimposed on old Himalayan forms, while the religion of the court aristocracy was one or another sect of Hinduism. During this period both Theravada and Mahayana Buddhist monasteries were founded.

Lévi (1905, 255 [our translation]) proposed further that the first form of high Indian religion introduced into Nepal had, in fact, been Buddhism:

Buddhism, malleable and accommodating, was able to introduce itself into the organized life of the Newars, without greatly disturbing it; it discretely sowed Indian ideas and doctrines, and let the harvest ripen slowly. But from the moment it was ripe, a brutal adversary came to dispute it. Sacerdotal Brahmanism menaced with death by the triumph of heresies had skillfully searched for refuge in popular cults; it had adopted them, consecrated them, and took up the struggle with rejuvenated gods and a renewed pantheon.

The rejuvenated Hinduism that contested Buddhism was Saivism.

David Snellgrove noted that the earliest Kathmandu Valley monuments are "definitely" Buddhist. "It is likely therefore that Buddhist communities established themselves in this valley well before the beginning of the Christian era" (1957, 93f.), which would mean that the Licchavi dynasty found themselves from the beginning in contact with a Buddhist community, adhering also presumably to local Himalayan religious forms. Whether or not Buddhism preceded "Brahmanical religion," all early evidence shows them operating side by side, Brahmanical religion presumably being that of the "foreign" court and its "foreign" Brahmans and, Buddhism, being that of the "people." These speculations, like those regarding an early courtly Vaisnavism versus a popular Saivism, reflect a scholarly conviction that the Brahmanical ideal of an intimate organic interrelation of Brahman, king, and people was still on a far horizon.

There is also evidence for the Licchavi period of Sakti worship, of the worship of the sun and other astral deities, and some indication of early Tantric forms^[14] that were to become of major importance for the Kathmandu Valley, and for Lhasa beyond it. These latter were the precur-

sors of the massive invasion of Tantrism which was to come later as a result of the dislocations produced by the Islamic invasions of India.