O L K ARAHVINTH (2008262606)

ANCIENT INDIAN SCIENCE

(FASCINATING FACTS ABOUT OUR ANCESTRY)
Modern west and the English has contributed plethora of technological
advancements to the world. But in the same time, Indias scientific heritage, besides its
philosophical and cultural legacy, is not being properly explored by many. The following are
the facts that may aid in understanding the genius of Indian civilization better.
Rust-free steel was an Indian invention and remained an Indian skill for centuries.
Delhis famous Iron pillar dated 402CE, built in the period of Chandragupta Vikramaditya of
the Gupta empire, showed minimal sign of rust. This pillar which weighs more than 6 tons,
7m in height has attracted the attention of archaeologists and metallurgists and has been
called "a testament to the skill of ancient Indian blacksmiths" because of its high resistance
to corrosion. Similarly, another rust proof erection in Kodachadri village near Kollur, a pillar
more than 40ft in height stands nearly for 2400 years, was built by the tribals of the locality
to welcome Adi Sankaracharya during his visit to Moola Mookambika temple.
India also held the soul knowledge of smelting Zinc from its ore for 4000 years. Zinc
is normally smelted using charcoal from Calamine (hemimorphite). But the difficulty lies in
the fact that Zn vaporizes at 907oC, but reduces to Zn from ZnO only at 1000oC. Every
smelter around the world tried in conventional way, but the smart Indians held the furnace
upside down, allowing the Zn vapors to descend and condense to solid using ice bar at the
bottom. There were evidences of Zinc ore mines in Zawar, Rajasthan from early 12 th
centuries. But only in 18th century, William Champion, GB was credited for patenting a
process of Zn isolation from its ore.
Ancient Indians were strong in astronomy too. In Ursa-major constellation, the midneck portion consists of two closely located stars namely Arundhati and Vasistha (AlcorMiraz in English). The specialty in that is this twin star system wont follow the
conventional rotation system (one star at centre, other rotating around), instead both the
stars rotate around each other, tracing a circular orbit. Observing this, our South Indian
ancestors followed it as a tradition (After marriage, the husband and the wife should leave
out after twilight to watch these stars) to set an example how the after-marriage life should
be. Our Indians were so brilliant to find that it was not just a single star, and has a unique
form of rotation and to observe it without a telescope.
Not just in astronomy and material sciences, our ancestors even did encryption in
the form Katapayadi Sankhya, a oldest form of coding certain grouped alphabets into
numerical
values.
A
typical
verse
found
in
Sadratnamala,
bhadrbuddhisiddhajanmagaitaraddh sma yad bhpag when decrypted gave
31415926535897932384626433832792 (the value of pi corrected to 30 decimal points).
There are innumerous examples which can be shown to prove our ancient science.
The Indus civilization (with cotton cultivation, well laid roads and irrigation system), Lothal
(worlds first dock), Sushruthas cataract surgery and Math war with Europe (concept of
zero, development of calculus, Indian algorithmic approach) etc.