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Buddhist Literature of Ancient Gandhara by Salomon Richard Pdf
Discover the fascinating history of a long-hidden Buddhist culture at a historic crossroads. In the years following Alexander the Great’s conquest of the East, a series of empires rose up along the Silk Road. In what is now northern Pakistan, the civilizations in the region called Gandhara became increasingly important centers for the development of Buddhism, reaching their apex under King Kaniska of the Kusanas in the second century CE. Gandhara has long been known for its Greek-Indian synthesis in architecture and statuary, but until about twenty years ago, almost nothing was known about its literature. The insights provided by manuscripts unearthed over the last few decades show that Gandhara was indeed a vital link in the early development of Buddhism, instrumental in both the transmission of Buddhism to China and the rise of the Mahayana tradition. The Buddhist Literature of Ancient Gandhara surveys what we know about Gandhara and its Buddhism, and it also provides translations of a dozen different short texts, from similes and stories to treatises on time and reality.
Ancient Buddhist Scrolls from Gandhāra by Richard Salomon,Frank Raymond Allchin,Mark Barnard Pdf
As the Dead Sea Scrolls have changed our understanding of Judaism and early Christianity, so a set of 29 scroll fragments acquired in 1994 by The British Library promise to improve our knowledge of the history of Buddhism in India.
History of Ancient India by Khoinaijam Rita Devi Pdf
This Volume Presents Well-Researched Material On History Of Ancient India, With Special Emphasis On Socio-Economic And Political Life. The Entire Information Is Culled From The Available Authoriative Texts Of Buddhist Literature From 6Th To 2Nd Century B.
A Gāndhārī Version of the Rhinoceros Sūtra by Richard Salomon,Andrew Glass Pdf
Launches the series of text editions and studies of the birth bark scrolls in the British Library's Kharosthi manuscript collection, dating from about the first century AD. Most of the Gandhari fragments have yet to be identified, but the Rhinoceros Sutra is also known in Pali and Sanskrit versions. A 100-page introduction to the language and manuscript is followed by a transcribed text with translation and an annotated text with translation and commentary. Color photographs of the fragments themselves are also included. Ghandhari words are indexed, but not subjects. c. Book News Inc.
Gandharan Buddhist Reliquaries by David Jongeward,Elizabeth Errington,Richard Salomon,Stefan Baums Pdf
Gandhara, the ancient name for the region around modern Peshawar in northern Pakistan, was of pivotal importance in the production of Buddhist texts and art in the first centuries CE. Since the mid-nineteenth century, excavations of Gandharan monastery sites have revolutionized the study of early Buddhism. Among the treasures unearthed are hundreds of reliquaries--containers housing relics of the Buddha. This volume combines art history, Buddhist history, ancient Indian history, archaeology, epigraphy, linguistics, and numismatics to clarify the significance and function of these reliquaries. The story begins with the Buddha's last days, his death and funerary arrangements, and the distribution of the cremated remains, which initiated a relic cult. Chapters describe Gandharan reliquary types and subgroups, the archaeological and historical significance of collections, and the paleographic and linguistic interpretation of the inscriptions on the reliquaries. The 400 reliquaries illustrated and surveyed are from museums and private collections in Pakistan, India, Japan, Europe, and North America. Stone is the primary material of construction, along with bronze, gold, and silver. Shapes range from spherical and cylindrical to miniature stupas, a configuration that provides valuable information about the history of this Buddhist monumental form. David Jongeward is a visiting scholar at the Asian Institute, Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto. Elizabeth Errington is curator of the Charles Masson Project, British Museum Department of Coins and Medals. Richard Salomon is professor of Asian languages and literature at the University of Washington. Stefan Baums is assistant adjunct professor of South and Southeast Asian studies at the University of California, Berkeley, and a research fellow at the School of Asian Studies, Leiden University.
The northwestern regions of Pakistan and southeastern regions of Afghanistan were once the heart of a highly developed civilization whose cultural impact was felt from China to Persia. A major center of Buddhism, its cultural attainments were highlights of ancient civilization. The author's research, accompanied by some 60 illustrations, offers Americans an entirely new understanding of the desolate region shown on the nightly news. The Persian, Greek and Central Asian invasions of Gandhara, rather than causing wide scale destruction in the region, promoted the development of a multi-cultural, multi-ethnic society. After a gestation period of about half a millennium, this region blossomed into a unique civilization in the opening years of the Common Era. Detailed archaeological excavations were started at sites in northern Pakistan and Afghanistan in the late-19th century. Through these excavations, eminent archaeologists such as Aurel Stein, Alexander Cunningham, John Marshall, J. Barthoux and Professor A.H. Dani recovered hundreds of thousands of beautiful stone sculptures belonging to the Gandhara Civilization. In the last century or so, much has been written about the artistic quality of these beautiful stone sculptures. But hardly anything has been written about the Civilization itself that gave birth to these extraordinary pieces of art. In this book an effort has been made to present Gandhara in its wider perspective, highlighting the different features of a unique civilization in which many different races contributed and many cultures merged to bring about a major sociological change and establish a distinct cultural identity in this region of the South Asian sub-continent. This book is based on the author's analysis of archaeologists' reports, information gathered through extended visits to numerous archaeological sites associated with the lost Gandhara Civilization including those in the Taxila, Peshawar, Charsadda, Mardan and Swat regions in Pakistan, and study in museums. His research reveals a great deal of continuity in the field of socio-cultural development of the region, which is referred to in this book as Greater Gandhara, from the time it became a part of the Achaemenid Empire in the 6th century BCE till the end of Kidara Kushan's rule in the 5th century CE. Further, it reveals that after the Achaemenids had established the physical and administrative infrastructure in Greater Gandhara, the continuity in socio-cultural development in the region was maintained mainly by the growing Buddhist population. This book illustrates the spirit of independence and features in the character of the ancient people of the Gandhara region which facilitated the sustained progress towards the emergence of the Gandhara Civilization. Following the invasion of Alexander the Great, his successors had no difficulty in colonizing Bactria (Northern Afghanistan) and Sogdia (Uzbekistan), but they could not do the same in Gandhara. Similarly the Scythians, Parthians and the Kushans ruled over the Central Asian region as colonizers, but not so in Gandhara. Here they ruled not over the people, but with the people. Their administration was highly de-centralized, with the locals playing a major role in the regional administration and having a major say in the social and cultural affairs of the entire population. Finally, the book highlights the interactive environment which prevailed in Gandhara throughout the transient and mature phases of the Gandhara Civilization: Alexander's companions hobnobbing with the naked fakirs of Taxila; Menander, the great Indus-Greek ruler, finding time to engage in prolonged question-and-answer sessions with Buddhist scholars at the monastery near Sagala (Sialkot); and the greatest of the Kushan conquerors, Kanishka, finding pleasure in the company of local intellectuals and artists such as Asvaghosha and Vasumitra, and presiding over the official launch of Mahayana Buddhism.
Literary History of Sanskrit Buddhism (from Winternitz, Sylvain Levi, Huber) by Gushtaspshah Kaikhushro Nariman,Moriz Winternitz,Sylvain Lévi,Eduard Huber Pdf
Three Early Mahāyāna Treatises from Gandhāra by Andrea Schlosser Pdf
Buddhist texts on the path to liberation The Gandhāran birch-bark scrolls preserve the earliest remains of Buddhist literature known today and provide unprecedented insights into the history of Buddhism. This volume presents three manuscripts from the Bajaur Collection (BC), a group of nineteen scrolls discovered at the end of the twentieth century and named after their findspot in northwestern Pakistan. The manuscripts, written in the Gāndhārī language and Kharoṣṭhī script, date to the second century CE. The three scrolls—BC 4, BC 6, and BC 11—contain treatises that focus on the Buddhist concept of non-attachment. This volume is the first in the Gandhāran Buddhist Texts series that is devoted to texts belonging to the Mahāyāna tradition. There are no known versions of these texts in other Buddhist traditions, and it is assumed that they are autographs. Andrea Schlosser provides an overview of the contents of the manuscripts and discusses their context, genre, possible authorship, physical layout, paleography, orthography, phonology, and morphology. Transliteration and translation of the texts are accompanied by notes on difficult terminology, photographs of the reconstructed scrolls, an index of Gāndhārī words with Sanskrit and Pali equivalents, and a preliminary transliteration of the scroll BC 19.
Ancient Buddhist Scrolls from Gandhāra by Richard Salomon Pdf
As the Dead Sea scrolls have changed our understanding of Judaism and early Christianity, so a set of twenty-nine scrolls recently acquired by the British Library promise to provide a window into a crucial phase of the history of Buddhism in India. The fragmentary birch bark scrolls, which were found inside one of a set of inscribed clay pots, are written in the Gandhari Prakrit language and in Kharosthi script. Dating from around the beginning of the Christian era, the scrolls are probably the oldest Buddhist manuscripts ever discovered. The manuscripts and pots come from a region known in ancient times as Gandhara, corresponding to modern northern Pakistan and eastern Afghanistan. At the peak of its influence, Gandhara was the capital of a series of wealthy and powerful dynasties and became one of the world?s most important centers of Buddhism and the gateway through which Buddhism was transmitted from India to China and other parts of Asia. Gandhara was also a principal point of contact between India and the Western world. Despite abundant archeological evidence of Gandhara?s thriving culture, until now there has been virtually no documentary evidence of its literary and religious canon. This volume introduces a groundbreaking project to decipher and interpret the Gandhäran texts. It provides a detailed description of the manuscripts and a survey of their contents, along with a preliminary evaluation of their significance. Also included are representative samples of texts and translations. This discovery sheds new light on the regional character of early Indian Buddhist traditions, the process of the formation of standardized written canons, and the transmission of Buddhism into central and east Asia. Ancient Buddhist Scrolls from Gandhara will appeal to a broad audience with interests in Buddhism, comparative religion, and Asian languages. For more information go to the Early Buddhist Manuscript Project web site at http://www.ebmp.org/
Presents a history of early Buddhism based solely on dateable artefacts and archaeology rather than received tradition, much of which data is provided by studying Pyrrho's history
Four Gāndhārī Saṃyuktāgama Sutras by Andrew Glass Pdf
Four Gandhari Samyuktagama Sutras continues the study of Gandharan Buddhist texts and is the first investigation of a scroll from the Senior Collection of Kharosthi manuscripts. Senior scroll number 5, one of the best preserved of all Kharosthi manuscripts, contains four short sutras that give a first-hand account of meditation practice in Gandhara in the middle of the second century A.D. Andrew Glass is the lead researcher on the Gandhari Dictionary Project and a member of the British Library/University of Washington early Buddhist Manuscripts Project (www.ebmp.org).
Handbuch der Orientalistik by Kurt A. Behrendt Pdf
Kurt Behrendt in this book for the first time and convincingly offers a description of the development of 2nd century B.C.E. to 8th century C.E. Buddhist sacred centers in ancient Gandhara, today northwest Pakistan.
Two Gāndhārī Manuscripts of the Songs of Lake Anavatapta (Anavatapta-gāthā) by Richard Salomon Pdf
This fifth volume in the Gandharan Buddhist Texts series (GBT) presents two fragmentary manuscripts of the poem "Songs of Lake Anavatapta." Previously known from versions in Sanskrit, Pali, Tibetan, and Chinese, the two recently discovered Gandhari-language versions confirm the poem's popularity in the ancient Buddhist world. The "Songs of Lake Anavatapta" consists of a series of narrations by the Buddha's foremost disciples (and finally by the Buddha himself) in which each reveals his own complex karmic history over many past lives and explains how, as a result of good deeds, he has come to be an enlightened disciple of the Buddha. An important theme is the complexity of karma, whereby not only the enlightened beings but even the Buddha himself suffer the effects of remnants of bad karma from evil deeds long-ago. For more information go to the Early Buddhist Manuscript Project web site at http: //www.ebmp.org/
