Proving historicity of Krishna-Archaeological and astronomical evidences
This is in continuation with my previous article proving historicity of lord Krishna. if you haven’t read the previous articles, then please go through the below link:
Proving historicity of Krishna-Birth and names of lord krishna
Proving Historicity of Krishna-Scriptural, historical and archaeological evidences <https://www.mallstuffs.com/Blogs/BlogDetails.aspx?BlogId=150&BlogType=Spiritual&Topic=Proving%20Historicity%20of%20Krishna-Scriptural,%20historical%20and%20archaeological%20evidences>
In my previous article, we saw the discovery of lord Krishna kingdom ‘Dwarka’ near the coast of Gujarat. In this article, we will explore more details of this discovery and will also see many other archeological and astronomical evidences regarding the existence of lord Krishna.
According to Mahabharata, city of dwaraka was constructed by the Architect-god Vishwakarma by requesting 12 Yojanas of land from sea god, near the western shore of Saurashtra . This city had six well-organized sectors with commercial and residential zones, palaces, plazas, wide roads, ports and other public utilities along with an eye-catching sea harbor.
The description of the underwater discovered city matches exactly with the description mentioned in our ancient texts. The belief that 12 yojanas of land was requested from Sea god is well supported from the designs and foundations seen in the walls of the discovered city.
Interestingly, there is also a mention of the passport type system according to which all dwaraka citizens need to carry a seal (having three headed mythical animal) as their identity while entering or leaving the dwaraka massive gates. Coincidently, a similar Dwarka seal has been found in the underwater excavated city near the coastal line of Gujarat.
The seal of Dwaraka
On carbon dating, this seal has been dated to the Late Harappan period at least 3000 years old, approximately around 1528 BCE.
Many other artifacts like citadels, Brick walls, fortifications, Roman amphoras, Stone anchors for ships etc. have been carbon dated from 2500 BCE to 4th century BCE thus perceiving dwarka as the busiest port of western India of that era.
Other Archaeological Evidence
You can find many other archaeological evidences of dwarka in hundreds of videos on youtube and many other articles written on that underwater discovery. So keeping dwarka aside, I will now switch to various other evidences (direct or indirect) regarding Krishna worship around the 1st millennium BCE.
A cave painting of 800 BÑE in Mirzapur(U.P) shows a warrior looking charioteer about to throw a chariot-wheel on a warrior staring at him. Now, this painting can be pointed to the incident of Mahabharata where lord Krishna is about to hurl the chakra (wheel) on Bhishma-Pitamah.
Krishna about to throw a chariot-wheel on Bhishma Pitamah
Even the Greek authors in their works have the description of lord Krishna worship as Vasudev during the early 4th century BCE.
Greatest of all emperors ALEXANDER’s conquest of ruling east more or less came ended after their encounter with PORUS (Parvateshwar), the powerful king of the Indus civilization. However, Alexander still had some success in ruling north-western cities like Takshila.
To expand their conquest of ruling east, greek ambassadors frequently exchanged words with Indian kings. Heliodors, one such Greek ambassador was sent to kingdom of Videsha (Besnagar, central India) from Taxila to meet king bhagabhadra.
Greek Embassies in Ancient India
Amazingly, this Greek ambassador created a historical record of becoming the first non-Indian devotee of lord Krishna.
He was so devoted to lord Krishna that on his visit to Besnagar, he erected a Garuda-pillar to honor the'God of all Gods' lord Krishna. This incident is well-documented by many other authors as well and so, is considered as one of the direct earliest archaeological evidence of Krishna-consciousness.
Heliodorus Garud-pillar with Inscription
This pillar with inscription can be still seen in besnapur region of Uttar Pradesh. Inscription says
This Garuda-pillar of Vasudev (Krishna),
God of all gods,
Is here erected by Heliodorus,
An obedient follower of lord Vishnu,
Inhabitant of Taxila, The son of Dion,
Who came to vidisha as Greek ambassador
Under the order of Great King Antialkidas,
To meet King Bhagabhadra,
Then ruling successfully in fourteenth year of his rule.
Vasudev Krishna-God of all Gods
Heliodors have been recognized as the first westerner convert to Vaishnavism by many historians and scholars. Similar inscriptions are also found in 2nd century BCE Hathibara and Ghosundi where an entire enclosure is consructed around Narayana Vatika. Also, there lays a fossil stone called Shaligram resembling Vasudeva & Samkarshana in Nagari village of Udaipur district(Rajashthan).
Other evidences from Indo Greek period are paintings and gold coins of Agathocles kingdom (200 BCE). Images of Balaram holding plough on his hand and brother Krishna with a discuss (Sudarshan Chakra) engrossing one finger can be found on the opposite sides of such gold coins.
Agathocles Coins showing Krishna and Balarama.
This coin is carbon dated to year 172 BCE and was excavated from Oxus valley at Ai-Khanum region of Afghanistan. This coin with Sudarshan chakra-bearer krishna and plough-bearer balarama was a very significant discovery questioning the entire history taught in India. This also shows that Indian empire included the entire Pakistan, Afghanistan and parts of Persia.
Krishna and Balarama together
In the graffiti embedded on stones of Chilas cave (2000 BCE) in Western Pakistan, evidence of Vasudeva-Balaram worship can be found. Paintings of lord krishna and brother Balaram are engrossed on the rocks with the names mentioned below their images as Vasudev and Samkarshan respectively.
Inscriptions of lord Krishna on seals, coins and stones shows that real life heroes were worshipped across the whole Indian sub-continent. There are many archaeological evidences(1st century BCE) of worshipping five vrishni heroes - Krishna, Balaram, Samba (Krishna's younger son),Pradyumna (Krishna's elder son), and Aniruddh (Krishna's grandson).
11 kilometers west from Mathura, lies a Mora well, where the inscription tells the erection of a stone temple by a princess, named Tosho, to honor the Five Vrishini heroes together termed as Bhagavatam Panchavirana.
Maues (85 BCE), an Indo-Scythian king was a devotee of Balarama(Krishna brother) along with the Greek gods Nike and Zeus. Many of his coins had the inscription of a King in a cross legged seated posture and one of his coins, carbon dated to 1st century BCE, depicts Balarama.
Balarama engraved in Coin of Maues.
The last Kushan king of Bactria and North India named himself as Vasudeva I (c. 200CE) and honor Krishna by minting his images on coins.
Coin belonging to Indo Bactrian emperor Vasudev I
One of the major evidence is the Aihole Inscription of emperor Pulakesin II (634 CE). Inscription declares that the War of Mahabharata was fought 3735 years ago. So, the date of Mahabharata can be calculated as 3735-634=3101 BCE.
From all the above archaeological evidences one can safely believe that lord Krishna and brother Balarama were historical characters of 3rd Millenium BCE and were worshipped as divine entities since their death.
If you are still not convinced than I have more evidences for you. Let us analyze the astrological description from our ancient texts.
Astrological Evidence for dating Krishna
there are many archaeological details mentioned in ancient scriptures which many scholars are trying to decode continuously to derive the lord Krishna birth and time period of Mahabharata war.
Using astronomical details, Dr Narhari Achar, who works as a physics professor at Memphis University, Tennessee, has derived the probabilistic date of Mahabharat war and calls it as the most genuine historical document of whole human civilization.
Dr. Achar used more than 140 astronomical details mentioned in Mahabharat as a feed data to the well known Planetarium software (NASA uses this to launch artificial satellites).
This software validated all the astronomical details mentioned in ved vyasa Mahabharata and derived the year 3067 BCE as the exact year of war between Pandavas and Kauravas army.
Image from Narahari Achar's presentation on Mahabharata war
Whole series of Narahari Achar's research can be found in the below youtube links
Determining the date of the Mahabharata war by Dr. Narahari Achar- 01 <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=en2pXlLrlR4>
Determining the date of the Mahabharata war by Dr. Narahari Achar- 02 <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ArJuVaIYMg>
Determining the date of the Mahabharata war by Dr. Narahari Achar- 03 <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uplsKrMatdc>
Determining the date of the Mahabharata war by Dr. Narahari Achar- 04 <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSsy377utec>
Determining the date of the Mahabharata war by Dr. Narahari Achar- 05 <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qETuLlIYHEE>
Making use of the same software, Dr. Achar derived Krishna�s birth year as 3112 BCE.
Now the astrological references mentioned in Mahabharata is so unique that such a situation (like three eclipses occurring continuously after 36 years) that they can occur only once in 10,000 years.
Motivated by Dr. Achar's research, another Indian scientist, Dr. Manish Pandit who works in UK as a Nuclear Medicine Physician, provided numerous archaeological, astronomical, linguistic evidences to validate the case. To make his evidences simple to understand, he created a well-structured documentary showcasing all evidences that came out from his research.
Astronomical proof of lord Krishna existence by Manish pandit <https://www.mallstuffs.com/Blogs/BlogDetails.aspx?BlogId=81&BlogType=Spiritual&Topic=Scientific%20Proof%20of%20lord%20Krishna%20existence>
Contrary to above research, an Indian professor, Dr. P.V. Vartak, came up with the date of 5561 BCE based on his decoding of astronomical positions and Tithis specified for the Nakshatras in the Mahabharata..
Dr. vartak approach differed greatly which might be the reason for this difference in time period. For instance: Dr. Vartak accounted celestial entities mentioned in Mahabharata as the planets Pluto, Neptune and Uranus while Dr. Achar considered them as visiting comets.
Sanjay describes the 3 inauspicious eclipses to king Dhritrashtra
However based on the scientific and more detailed study & research undertaken by Dr. Achar, we should take the findings of Dr. Achar are true because it also matches the dates we got from various other Archaeological and literary data.
Historical veracity of Krishna
The Ancient scriptures, Archaeological evidences (marine as well as terrestrial), and Astrological details all refering a particular time span of lord Krishna.
Because of too much complexity and long time period, we were not able to derive the exact date of lord Krishna birth. Still based on the evidences we got, we can derive the most probable time-frame of lord Krishna existence and we can at least be sure that he existed. Based on all the analyzed data and evidences shared with you, the most appropriate time-period of Krishna's should be 3300-3100 BCE.
Krishna, the Historical Enigma
At the end of this article, let us rejoice with the fact that the most exciting renowned figure of Indian Culture, Dance, Philosophy, Music, Art, Drama and Religion ruled the Earth just 5 millennium ago. Also give thumbs up to all the great ancient sages of our country for their oral and cultural value based teachings to their students because of which we are proud of our ancient past.
I dedicate this whole series of article to lord Krishna, naughty kid of mother Yashoda; the honour of Gokul; Savior of the weak; love of the Gopis; Friend of the virtous; and one who is above all (God of the gods)
Jai Shree Krishna ............
Note: Images used on this website
are either a production of Bhaktivedanta Book Trust(https://www.krishna.com), Iskcon
Foundation or were found in google search under "Free to use and share". If any
of the images presented here violates copyright issues or infringes anyone copyright
or are not under "Fair use", then please bring it to our notice. Read
Disclaimer for more.
Share this to your friends. One of your friend is
waiting for your share.
Related Articles
How music affects plant growth
Science in Hinduism-Gravitational force and repulsive force
Common questions and myths of caste system
Do plants sing or create music
Fall and Rise of river saraswati-India most sacred river
Never accept defeat until you are Mr.Late
Rama Sethu-Proof of India great ancient science
Living in an illusionist world-Part 1
How Saraswati- india most sacred river disappeared
Chakravyuha-The most deadliest and brilliant military formation
Post Comment