The Gupta DynastyJulieJinySunny

The Gupta Dynasty

The Gupta Empire is the ancient Indian empire that existed from A.D. 320 to about 540 in

northern India. It is also called the Golden Age of India because of its prosperous inven-

tion and discoveries.

Thesis Statement

Gupta Empire culture had its own indigenous characteristics. All political, economical,

religious, social, intellectual, and artistic parts played essential role in the Empire, but

intellectual an artistic were most significant cultural elements of Gupta Empire.

Power

How power is distributed and how decisions are made.

Since its culture was heavily influenced by religion, the Gupta leaders considered social status very important. Thus, they took a step toward stable development by setting a strong central government.

500 years after the Maurya Empire col-lapsed, the Gupta Empire ruled over region for 220 years, which brought the Golden Age in the India, and yielded its power over India to next rulers who won the war.

Merchants and artisans could prac-tice their political power by electing city governors. Both the central government and villages shared their power in order to rule the people ef-ficiently.

Economic

The making and distributing of money and wealth

In the Gupta Empire, farm-ing and trade flourished, so farmers ,merchants, and arti-sans were common jobs.

Villages mostly used domestic goods, but people also exported goods such as cotton cloth, pottery and metal ware to East Africa, Southwest Asia, and Southeast Asia for such goods as salt, spices, and manufactured goods.

Agriculture flour-ished in Gupta Empire; landlords let farmers use their lands and re-ceive some parts of harvest. Framers usually harvested wheat, rice, and sugar cane.

Religion

How a society describes the super-natural

In Gupta Empire, religion even af-fected the education. Students went to religious schools, so they were exposed to religions from when they were young.

Caste system, which is social leveling sys-tem of Hinduism, and dowry are ex-amples of how reli-gion influenced in their society, and built many aspects of Gupta people’s lives.

Primarily, Hinduism and Buddhism were domi-nant religions in the Gupta Empire, so the rit-uals were highly devel-oped, and people con-sidered those rituals to be very important. Gupta people favored Hinduism at first, but later they started to support Bud-dhism and Jainism.

Social

How individuals in a society interact with each other

Family affairs usually focused on men. For example, the eldest man was the head of joint family, and en-joyed the authority.

People were gathered in the Gupta court to watch the performances, weddings, relatives’ houses, market places. They also assembled to in-teract with each other at village council.

In India, education flourished during the Gupta period; their mathematics and science developed a lot.

Intellectual

How a society tends to solve prob-lems

People in the Gupta Empire recorded rules and laws, where as they did not write down current events because they considered current events less important than rules and laws.

Mathematicians of Gupta Empire created the concept of zero, started using Arabian numbers, and devel-oped the decimal system, which we still use today.

In Gupta Empire, doctors first started to inject vaccines to prevent people from getting diseases such as smallpox, set bones, and deliver surgery. These facts prove that the Gupta people’s technology was highly devel-oped.

Artistic

What a society sees as beautiful, how it defines beauty and how it en-tertains itself

Their literature was developed; peo-ple liked telling stories such as folk tales to other people, and they also recorded those content.

Religion highly af-fected the Gupta art such forms as danc-ing, paintings, sculp-ture, and music. The Gupta art later spread to other parts of Asia, introducing Gupta Empire to other cul-tures.

A lot of Gupta architects dedicated their lives to build some Buddhist shrines, and Hindu

stone temples to respect their gods.

Summary

Among other PERSIA elements, Intel-lectual

and Art are the most important el-ements of

the Gupta Empire.

Extraordinarily well-developed tech-nology and prudent and delicate art reflect Gupta people’s high-quality lives.

Thank You