Caesarean birth
AI-drafted · awaiting admin review
Was the Mauryan emperor Bindusara delivered by caesarean section around 320 BCE, as some popular histories say?
Indian claim not supported by evidenceMedicine & health
Indian claim
A legend says Chanakya cut open the womb of Chandragupta Maurya's queen after she was accidentally poisoned, saving the baby Bindusara.
Evidence for the Indian claim
- The story is told in Jain tradition, in Hemachandra's Parishishtaparvan, written in the 12th century CE, some 1,400 years after the events.
- Ancient Indian medical texts do discuss removing a dead foetus to save the mother.
Commonly credited to
Roman law required a baby to be cut from a mother who died in pregnancy. The first reported caesarean in which the mother survived is credited to Jacob Nufer in Switzerland in 1500, though that account is also doubted.
Evidence for the other claim
- No source from Mauryan times mentions how Bindusara was born.
- Cutting a baby from a dying or dead mother is mentioned in several ancient cultures, so the legend would not be a unique first even if true.
What historians and scientists say
The Bindusara caesarean is a late legend without contemporary evidence. Post-mortem caesareans were known in several ancient societies; reliably documented operations with surviving mothers come from much later.