Royal Ram hunted deer, not lions

Ram of the Ramayana is a great archer but he is never depicted in art or story as hunting lions or tigers That is strange considering his royal status Ram is never shown seated on lionthrone simhaasansIt was after 1500 BC that composite bow and horsedrawn chariots were introduced to the world by Steppe nomads They marked a military innovation that kings were eager to display Hunting lions with arrows while riding a horsedrawn spoked wheel chariot became the symbol of kings after the Egyptian pharaohs carved this image on temple walls around 1300 BC The Persian shahenshah adopted this symbol around 500 BC Indiarsquos Ashoka adopted only the lion as a royal symbol in 250 BC not the lionhunting ritualRam is never shown riding a chariot with a charioteer images that are common in the Mahabharata indicating Ramayana story is older His story comes from the eastern part of India where dense jungles block the path of chariots Ramrsquos bow Saranga was probably made using horns shringa in sanskrit and sinew and entrails of the deer the mighty composite bow created by Eurasian Steppe nomads as per archaeologists Hence Ramrsquos ability to shoot an arrow through seven Sala trees in KishkindaThe oldest manuscripts of Ramayana and Mahabharata were composed by generations of poets who knew about Yavanas Sakas Pahalavas who came to India around 100 BC But the story is older as there is reference to honeybased drinks but never sugarbased drinks Sugarbased drinks were known by the time of the grammarian Panini 500 BC Ramrsquos family name Ikshavaku referred to bottle gourd initially and later sugarcane So we can guesstimate a date of 1000 BCAlsomdashcontrary to modern beliefmdashas per Surgrivarsquos Atlas Ramrsquos exile was restricted to the North of the Vindhyas and the Narmada to lands where Sala tree grows Chattisgarh Jharkhand Odisha Ramrsquos father performs Ashwamedha yagna to get favours from gods Ram however performs the Ashwamedha yagna to expand territory In Ramrsquos ritual there is no queenmdashfor she has been abandoned Queens were integral to Ashwamedha rituals as we learn from Shatapatha Brahmana The march of Ramrsquos horse is stopped by his sons who stand by the abandoned queen Ramrsquos story thus comes from the earliest layer of the Vedic period at a time when the enemy was not rival Aryan kingdoms as in Mahabharata but nonAryan forest tribes who worshipped monkeys or bears As per Jain Ramayanas composed around 300 AD vanars are people whose flags displayed images of monkeys They also describe Ravana as belonging to the Meghavahan family This surname is used by Kharavela the Jain king of Odisha who lived around 100 BC whose Hathigumpha inscription refers to Bharat as a northern Gangetic kingdom probably Haryana as does Sugriva in his AtlasWas Ramayana a war between Vedic people and early Shramanas protoJains protoBuddhists who lived east of Gandak river Was Janak a Shramana upasaka worshipper like Ravana whose father was a Vedic priest Is that why some say Sita was Ravanarsquos daughter a metaphor for her links with ldquosouthernrdquo kingsRam tells Vali that Kishkinda is ruled by Iskhavakusmdashthus declaring the monkey kingdom to be Dakshina Koshala the southern half of his kingdom located north of Ganga This Dakshina Koshala is also called Paschim Lanka by Gond tribes as late as 16th century It is the forests near Sirpur in Chattisgarh famous for its Buddhist sites Kings of this land equated themselves with lions and tigers Sharabha These aspects need considering if we want to see mythology as historyThe author writes and lectures on the relevance of mythology in modern times Reach him at devduttpattanaikmiddaycomatOptionskeyd0ddb8ef8f1a62a8cdd22fac27fc5ea7formatiframeheight90width728params