tial art practice forms have rectilinear patterns whose designs
are similar to those used by Vedic astrologers to cast birth
charts and horoscopes. (Practice inside tiled courtyards is an-
other possible explanation, but defining social space using geo-
metric methods was vastly more important to thirteenth-cen-
tury Muslims and sixteenth-century Western Europeans than to
seventh-century Chinese.)
About 630 Norasimhavarman I Marmalla, the Vaishnavite king of south-
ern India’s Pallava dynasty, commissions dozens of granite
sculptures showing unarmed fighters disarming armed
opponents.
About 647 The White Huns settle in northern India. Various Rajput
(King’s Sons) clans claim descent from these warriors. This
seems unlikely. First, reliable Rajput genealogies rarely go back
further than the eleventh century. Second, Muslim chroniclers
do not start describing Hindu warriors as Rajput rather than
kshatriyauntil the tenth century. So the Rajputs are probably
not White Huns, but Hindus who got tired of the passive resis-
tance that many Brahmans preached.
668 The Chinese capture the Koguryo capital of Pyongyang, leaving
a political vacuum in Korea that Silla quickly fills. The question
has been raised of why the Chinese did not also conquer Silla.
Evidently the government was too well organized and the mili-
tary too strong. Koreans also believe that the Silla warriors’
hwarangspirit deserves some of the credit. It is also unclear
what hwarang refers to. The name translates into something
akin to “Young Flower Masters.” It could refer to an earlier
women’s group that its members replaced politically, the flower
of manhood the members represented, a flower that the Bud-
dha once held aloft to admire, a Korean gambling game that
involves fencing with reeds, or something else altogether. In any
case, the followers of hwarang were said to refine their morals,
learn right from wrong, and select the best from among them-
selves to be their leaders. Aristocratic youths were inducted
into this organization while aged 14–18 years. Usually there
were about 200 hwarang scattered throughout the kingdom,
each with an entourage of about a thousand, and they fre-
quently served as generals or political advisors.
About 671 The Byzantines develop a liquid incendiary called by the Franks
Greek fire.
680 During a battle at Karbala, Iraq, the third Shiite imam, al-Hus-
sein ibn ‘Ali, disappears under a shower of arrows. To com-
memorate his martyrdom, the Shiites instituted a forty-day pe-
riod of mourning in 1109. Known as Muharram (abstinence),
this observance originally meant little more than hanging black
sheets from windows. But over time people took to showing
their piety in more sanguinary ways. Lent served a similar pur-
pose for Christians, while for Rajputs, it was Dussehra.
682 In an essay called The Canon on the Philosopher’s Stone,the
Chinese alchemist Sun Simiao becomes the first person known
to have written that saltpeter, charcoal, and sulfur are explosive
when mixed.
Chronological History of the Martial Arts 793