The Bejewelled Buddha from India to Burma
The Bejewelled Buddha from India to Burma

Author: Claudine Bautze-Picron

Publisher: Sanctum Books

Published: 2010-12-01

Total Pages: 771

ISBN-13: 8190995006

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This book represents a comprehensive study of 'The Bejewelled Buddha' considering stylistic as well as iconographic issues. A crucial moment in the Buddha's life seems to have been referred to through this image, namely, the sojourn on Mount Meru, where the Buddha sat on Indra's seat and taught all the gods. By occupying the seat of the king of the gods he was able to endorse the royal function of this deity; this becomes particularly evident in the late fifth century, and probably reflects the dramatic situation that the Buddhist community was confronted with, i.e. the political power essentially fostering the Hindu religion and social structure. Hence, the Buddha is depicted as a perfect and powerful ruler sitting at the top of the universe and showing himself adorned as a king; more than any human ruler, the Buddha rules over the universe. There is also another dimension that should never be neglected - as in any other Indian cult, worship of his image entailed offerings of various kinds, such as flower garlands or jewels, being made to the Buddha. The image of the Bejewelled Buddha thus included various constituents while at the same time it was used as the locus where different religious or political concepts found a way of expression. The result was the creation of an image of multi-layered significance which found its way into all Asian cultures.

Myanmar (Burma) since the 1988 Uprising
Myanmar (Burma) since the 1988 Uprising

Author: Andrew Selth

Publisher: ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute

Published: 2022-01-24

Total Pages: 370

ISBN-13: 9814951781

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Updated by popular demand, this is the fourth edition of this important bibliography. It lists a wide selection of works on or about Myanmar published in English and in hard copy since the 1988 pro-democracy uprising, which marked the beginning of a new era in Myanmar’s modern history. There are now 2,727 titles listed. They have been written, edited, translated or compiled by over 2,000 people, from many different backgrounds. These works have been organized into thirty-five subject chapters containing ninety-five discrete sections. There are also four appendices, including a comprehensive reading guide for those unfamiliar with Myanmar or who may be seeking guidance on particular topics. This book is an invaluable aid to officials, scholars, journalists, armchair travellers and others with an interest in this fascinating but deeply troubled country.

Connected Histories of India and Southeast Asia
Connected Histories of India and Southeast Asia

Author: Dhar, Parul Pandya

Publisher: SAGE Publishing India

Published: 2022-11-29

Total Pages: 398

ISBN-13: 9354795579

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Connected Histories of India and Southeast Asia unravels the fascinating history of cultural interactions, of outstanding and universal significance, between India and Southeast Asia, with special emphasis on artistic expressions. India's connections with Southeast Asian countries, namely, Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao People's Democratic Republic, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam are seen not only in trade and commerce but also in cultural and religious exchanges. Such histories are well-documented in their monuments, icons, narratives, inscribed artefacts, texts, and ritual paraphernalia. The first part of the book offers an overview of the nature of cultural and artistic interactions and the trade routes that facilitated an exchange of ideas, objects, people, and knowledge systems since ancient times. The second part addresses issues relating to architectural forms, motifs, and mobility across long distances and time periods. The final segment includes essays that discuss narratives and iconographies arising from cross-cultural artistic exchanges. With contributions by eminent scholars and over 170 colour photographs, maps, and illustrations, this book is an invaluable resource for understanding connected histories, which play a key role in revitalizing cultural connectivity and people-to-people contacts between India and Southeast Asia.

Buddhist Pilgrim-Monks as Agents of Cultural and Artistic Transmission
Buddhist Pilgrim-Monks as Agents of Cultural and Artistic Transmission

Author: Dorothy C. Wong

Publisher: NUS Press

Published: 2018-04-28

Total Pages: 377

ISBN-13: 9814722596

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The period ca. 645-770 marked an extraordinary era in the development of East Asian Buddhism and Buddhist art. Increased contacts between China and regions to both its west and east facilitated exchanges and the circulation of ideas, practices and art forms, giving rise to a synthetic art style uniform in both iconography and formal characteristics. The formulation of this new Buddhist art style occurred in China in the latter part of the seventh century, and from there it became widely disseminated and copied throughout East Asia, and to some extent in Central Asia, in the eighth century. This book argues that notions of Buddhist kingship and theory of the Buddhist state formed the underpinnings of Buddhist states experimented in China and Japan from the late seventh to the mid-eighth century, providing the religio-political ideals that were given visual expression in this International Buddhist Art Style. The volume also argues that Buddhist pilgrim-monks were among the key agents in the transmission of these ideals, the visual language of state Buddhism was spread, circulated, adopted and transformed in faraway lands, it transcended cultural and geographical boundaries and became cosmopolitan.

Buddhist Encounters and Identities Across East Asia
Buddhist Encounters and Identities Across East Asia

Author: Ann Heirman

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2018-05-07

Total Pages: 453

ISBN-13: 9004366156

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Encounters, networks, identities and diversity are at the core of the history of Buddhism. They are also the focus of Buddhist Encounters and Identities across East Asia, edited by Ann Heirman, Carmen Meinert and Christoph Anderl. While long-distance networks allowed Buddhist ideas to travel to all parts of East Asia, it was through local and trans-local networks and encounters, and a diversity of people and societies, that identities were made and negotiated. This book undertakes a detailed examination of discrete Buddhist identities rooted in unique cultural practices, beliefs and indigenous socio-political conditions. Moreover, it presents a fascinating picture of the intricacies of the regional and cross-regional networks that connected South and East Asia.

The Archaeology of Early Medieval and Medieval South Asia
The Archaeology of Early Medieval and Medieval South Asia

Author: Swadhin Sen

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2022-11-30

Total Pages: 303

ISBN-13: 1000780759

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This book looks at the ways in which archaeological methods have been used in debates concerning the early medieval and medieval periods in South Asia. Despite the incorporation and use of archaeological data to corroborate historical narratives, the theories and methods of archaeology are largely ignored in and excluded from the dominating, institutionalized, and hegemonic disciplinary discourses. The volume offers contesting insights, polemical narratives, and new data from archaeological contexts to initiate a debate on many foundational premises of archaeological and historical narratives. It focuses on the much-neglected region of the Eastern Ganga-Brahmaputra Basin as a spatial frame to do this and studies themes such as spatial and temporal scales of concepts and methods, multi-scaler factors and processes of continuity and changes, the settlement archaeology of the alluvial landscape, changing patterns of agrarian transformation, and material cultures, including coins, inscriptions, pottery, and sculptures, in their contexts in sub-regional, regional, and supra-regional intersections. Dedicated to historian Brajadulal Chattopadhyaya, this volume presents a crucial and unprecedented intervention in the study of the early medieval and the medieval periods. It will be useful for scholars and researchers of archaeology, ancient history, medieval history, water history, earth sciences, palaeoecology, historical ecology, epigraphy, art history, material culture studies, Indian history, and South Asian studies in general.

Esoteric Buddhism in Mediaeval Maritime Asia
Esoteric Buddhism in Mediaeval Maritime Asia

Author: Andrea Acri

Publisher: ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute

Published: 2016-09-05

Total Pages: 484

ISBN-13: 9814695084

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This volume advocates a trans-regional, and maritime-focused, approach to studying the genesis, development and circulation of Esoteric (or Tantric) Buddhism across Maritime Asia from the seventh to the thirteenth centuries ce. The book lays emphasis on the mobile networks of human agents (‘Masters’), textual sources (‘Texts’) and images (‘Icons’) through which Esoteric Buddhist traditions spread. Capitalising on recent research and making use of both disciplinary and area-focused perspectives, this book highlights the role played by Esoteric Buddhist maritime networks in shaping intra-Asian connectivity. In doing so, it reveals the limits of a historiography that is premised on land-based transmission of Buddhism from a South Asian ‘homeland’, and advances an alternative historical narrative that overturns the popular perception regarding Southeast Asia as a ‘periphery’ that passively received overseas influences. Thus, a strong point is made for the appreciation of the region as both a crossroads and rightful terminus of Buddhist cults, and for the re-evaluation of the creative and transformative force of Southeast Asian agents in the transmission of Esoteric Buddhism across mediaeval Asia.

Jewels, Jewelry, and Other Shiny Things in the Buddhist Imaginary
Jewels, Jewelry, and Other Shiny Things in the Buddhist Imaginary

Author: Vanessa R. Sasson

Publisher: University of Hawaii Press

Published: 2021-09-30

Total Pages: 383

ISBN-13: 0824889525

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Renunciation is a core value in the Buddhist tradition, but Buddhism is not necessarily austere. Jewels—along with heavenly flowers, rays of rainbow light, and dazzling deities—shape the literature and the material reality of the tradition. They decorate temples, fill reliquaries, are used as metaphors, and sprout out of imagined Buddha fields. Moreover, jewels reflect a particular type of currency often used to make the Buddhist world go round: merit in exchange for wealth. Regardless of whether the Buddhist community has theoretically transcended the need for them or not, jewels—and the paradox they represent—are everywhere. Scholarship has often looked past this splendor, favoring the theory of renunciation instead, but in this volume, scholars from a wide range of disciplines consider the role jewels play in the Buddhist imaginary, putting them front and center for the first time. Following an introduction that relates the colorful story of the Emerald Buddha, one of the most famous jewels in the world, chapters explore the function of jewels as personal identifiers in Buddhist and other Indian religious traditions; Buddhaghosa’s commentary on the Jewel Sutta; the paradox of the Buddha’s bejeweled status before and after renunciation; and the connection in early Buddhism between jewels, magnificence, and virtue. The Newars of Nepal are the focus of a chapter that looks at their gemology and associations between gems and celestial deities. Contributors analyze the Fifth Dalai Lama’s reliquary, known as the “sole ornament of the world”; the transformation of relic jewels into precious substances and their connection to the Piprahwa stupa in Northern India and the Nanjing Porcelain Pagoda. Final chapters offer detailed studies of ritual engagement with the deity known as Wish-Fulfilling Jewel Avalokiteśvara and its role in the new Japanese lay Buddhist religious movement Shinnyo-en. Engaging and accessible, Jewels, Jewelry, and Other Shiny Things in the Buddhist Imaginary will provide readers with an opportunity to look beyond a common misconception about Buddhism and bring its lived tradition into wider discussion.

Archaeology of Religion in South Asia
Archaeology of Religion in South Asia

Author: Birendra Nath Prasad

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2021-06-17

Total Pages: 475

ISBN-13: 1000416755

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In the religious landscape of early medieval (c. AD 600-1200) Bihar and Bengal, poly-religiosity was generally the norm than an exception, which entailed the evolution of complex patterns of inter-religious equations. Buddhism, Brahmanism and Jainism not only coexisted but also competed for social patronage, forcing them to enter into complex interactions with social institutions and processes. Through an analysis of the published archaeological data, this work explores some aspects of the social history of Buddhist, Brahmanical and Jaina temples and shrines, and Buddhist stūpas and monasteries in early medieval Bihar and Bengal. This archaeological history of religions questions many ‘established’ textual reconstructions, and enriches our understanding of the complex issue of the decline of Buddhism in this area. Please note: Taylor & Francis does not sell or distribute the Hardback in India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

Maṇḍalas in the Making
Maṇḍalas in the Making

Author: Michelle C. Wang

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2017-12-18

Total Pages: 336

ISBN-13: 9004360409

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The first scholarly monograph on Buddhist maṇḍalas in China, this book examines the Maṇḍala of Eight Great Bodhisattvas. This iconographic template, in which a central Buddha is flanked by eight attendants, flourished during the Tibetan (786–848) and post-Tibetan Guiyijun (848–1036) periods at Dunhuang. A rare motif that appears in only four cave shrines at the Mogao and Yulin sites, the maṇḍala bore associations with political authority and received patronage from local rulers. Attending to the historical and cultural contexts surrounding this iconography, this book demonstrates that transcultural communication over the Silk Routes during this period, and the religious dialogue between the Chinese and Tibetan communities, were defining characteristics of the visual language of Buddhist maṇḍalas at Dunhuang.