Handbook of Oriental Studies. Section 2 South Asia – serie

Gandhara, with its wide variety of architectural remains and sculptures, has for many decades perplexed students of South and Central Asia. Kurt Behrendt in this volume 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. Regional variations in architecture and sculpture in the Peshawar basin, Swat, and Taxila are discussed. At last a chronological framework is given for the architecture and the sculpture of Gandhara, but also light is being shed on how relic structures were utilized through time, as devotional imagery became increasingly significant to Buddhist religious practice. With an important comparative overview of architectural remains, it is indispensable for all those interested in the development of the early Buddhist tradition of south and central Asia and the roots of Buddhism elsewhere in Asia.

Greater Magadha, roughly the eastern part of the Gangetic plain of northern India, has so far been looked upon as deeply indebted to Brahmanical culture. Religions such as Buddhism and Jainism are thought of as derived, in one way or another, from Vedic religion. This belief is defective in various respects. This book argues for the importance and independence of Greater Magadha as a cultural area until a date close to the beginning of the Common Era. In order to correct the incorrect notions, two types of questions are dealt with: questions pertaining to cultural and religious dependencies, and questions relating to chronology. As a result a modified picture arises that also has a bearing on the further development of Indian culture.

The art history of South Asia covers a time span of roughly four and a half thousand years. During this period, a vast number of animal stone sculptures has been produced, ranging from the pre-historic period till today and covering a great variety of motifs and imagery in different regions and religious traditions. Even so, the number of studies devoted to these animal sculptures has remained extremely limited. The present book aims at filling this knowledge gap. With this richly illustrated book, the first of its kind, Van der Geer offers a comparative study of the ways in which various animals have been depicted and a lucid analysis of the sculptors’ treatment of their “models”: living animals. The art history of sculptured animals is contextualized with a description of the use of animals as can be read from ancient texts, archaeological evidence and contemporaneous culture. In doing so, parallels as well as differences in style or iconography are highlighted, elucidating the variety of animal depictions across regions, religious contexts and through time. The corpus of discussed material ranges from Indus seals, stupa panels and railings, monumental temples from North and South India, non-religious palace and fort architecture to loose sculptures in museum collections.

In the study of Indian art prior to the Mughal period, portraiture has so far been much neglected, when its existence has not simply been denied. This book is an attempt to reassess this issue, by showing that portraits have existed in great number in early India, since probably the first artistic achievements. Through a close scrutiny of sculpted and (more rarely) painted images brought together with textual and epigraphical references, it aims at highlighting the specificities of Indian portraiture, its relationship with divine images and, consequently, at understanding the development of Indian imagery. It questions also the social and religious implications related to this issue.

The Hindu-Buddhist Sculpture of Ancient Kashmir and Its Influences is primarily based on the study of the largely unpublished corpus of sculpture, mostly of stone, in the Sri Pratap Singh Museum in Srinagar, and of other examples in situ elsewhere in the valley. The disparate nature and fragmentary condition of these sculptures as well as their artistic and iconographical influences have for long defied accurate analysis. The method used in the classification of these sculptures is based on close analysis of their style concentrating on recurring features such as facial and physical typology, modelling, dress and ornamentation. Comparisons are made with other examples of Kashmir bronze, ivory and stone sculpture in private and public collections both within India and abroad.

In the present work, the first of its kind in the field of Indian philology, Marc Tiefenauer outlines the history of representations of hell in Indian religious traditions. His study is based on primary sources in Sanskrit, Pali, Ardhamagadhi, Chinese, Braj, Persian and Hindi, extending over three millennia. He identifies the main ideological contributions to Brahmanical representations of the afterlife, particularly those stemming from Buddhism, Jainism, devotional currents (Bhakti) and Islam. He shows the utility of eschatological research to hermeneutics, especially in view of improving the understanding of the literatures of ancient India.

Islam in South Asia: Revised, Enlarged and Updated Second Edition traces the roots and development of Muslim presence in South Asia. Trajectories of normative notions of state-building and the management of diversity are elaborated in four clusters, augmented by topical subjects in excursuses and annexes offering an array of Muslim voices. The enormous time span from 650 to 2019 provides for a comprehensive and plural canvas of the religious self-presentation of South Asian Muslims. Making use of the latest academic works and historical materials, including first-hand accounts ranging from official statements to poetry, Malik convincingly argues that these texts provide sufficient evidence to arrive at an interpretation of quite a different character. With major and substantial revisions, changes, abridgements and additions follow the academic literature produced during the last decades.

Reading Śiva is an illustrated bibliography on the Hindu god Śiva in the arts, crafts, coins, seals and inscriptions from South and Southeast Asia. It results from a century of ABIA bibliographic work and covers over 1500 academic publications since 1672. This scholarly and multi-disciplinary volume offers keyword-indexed annotations. The detailed indices on authors, geographic terms and subjects enable an easy search through the data. Links with the entries to resource repositories (such as JSTOR, Persée, Project MUSE, Academia.edu, ResearchGate and the Internet Archive) and links added to the sumptuous illustrations immediately take you to these resource sites.