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Jainism is one of the world’s great religions. It was started in India during the Axial Age by the religious reformer Nataputta Vardhamana Mahavira. Like Gautama Buddha, with whom he was a contemporary, he was from a noble warrior family and also rejected the Vedas and the formalism of Vedic religion.

Indo-Europeans are representatives of a language family now widely distributed all over the world, with primary concentration in Europe, the Middle East, and northern Asia.

Between the years 264 and 146 b.c.e., the Romans and Carthaginians fought three wars known as the Punic Wars that eventually led to the destruction of Carthage.

Northern India was reunified in 320 c.e. under the Gupta dynasty. For more than 200 years under the Guptas, India achieved great heights in culture and the arts. While Buddhism still prospered, popular Hinduism was emerging in a trend that persisted to modern times.

Beginning in 324 b.c.e. three northern Chinese states with nomadic neighbors—Qin (Ch’in), Zhao (Chao), and Yan (Yen)—began to build defensive walls. After Qin unified China in 221 b.c.e. the first emperor ordered his most able general, Meng Tian (Meng T’ien), to connect these existing walls and extend them to form a unified system of defense.

Gautama Buddha is the historical personage referred to when people speak of Lord Buddha or simply the Buddha.

This term has traditionally been applied to groups from the Indian subcontinent that speak Dravidian languages: Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Brahui, and Tulu. Most of these linguistic groups live in the southern portion of the subcontinent.

The Dharma Sutras are manuals on correct behavior inspired by the Vedas and which exist in a number of different formats and styles.

The designation “Desert Fathers and Mothers” refers to sources of ascetic literature from late antiquity that are associated with monasticism principally in the deserts of Egypt, Palestine, Syria, and Arabia.

Among the most lasting accomplishments of the Byzantine emperor Justinian I (527–565 c.e.) was his comprehensive compilation and organization of Roman law. The emperor believed that law was as essential to the security of the empire as military power.

The oldest known cave paintings were found in the Chauvet Cave, located in southeast France. Discovered in 1994, the cave was filled with images of diverse animal species, including rhinoceroses, cats, and bears. Radiocarbon dating showed the images to be more than 30,000 years old.

Ceylon was the name of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka before 1972. It is an island nation off the southeast coast of the Indian subcontinent, located in the tropics.

Chandragupta II was the third ruler of the Gupta Empire of India. He reigned when the Gupta dynasty reached its zenith of power, and Indian classical culture was at its high watermark.

The Bhagavad Gita is regarded as one of the most beautiful and infl uential of Hindu poems. The translation from Sanskrit is the “Song of God.” It forms part of chapter 6 of the Mahabharata (epic of the Bharata dynasty).

Ashoka (Asoka) was the third ruler of the Mauryan Empire. Under his long rule the empire that he inherited reached its zenith territorially and culturally. Soon after his death the Mauryan Empire split up and ended. He is remembered as a great ruler in world history and the greatest ruler in India.

Aristophanes was a leading dramatist of ancient Athens and, owing to the quantity and quality of his works that have been preserved, is customarily recognized as being the leading comic playwright of his society and age.