In the history of the Indian grammatical tradition, Bhartṛhari (about fifth century C.E.) is the fourth great grammarian - after Pāṇini, Kātyāyana and Patanjali - and the first to make the philosophical aspects of language and grammar the main subject of an independent work. This work, the Vākyapadīya (VP), consists of about 2000 philosophical couplets or kārikās. Since the latter half of the nineteenth century, the VP has been known to Western Sanskritists, but its language-philosophical contents have started to receive serious attention...

In Herrschergenealogie und religioses Patronat, Annette Schmiedchen analyses some 250 inscriptions from the time of the early medieval royal dynasties of the Rāṣṭrakūṭas, Śilāhāras, and Yādavas, who reigned in central India from the 8th to the 13th centuries. The information derived from copper-plate charters and stone inscriptions primarily consists of genealogies of the ruling kings as well as of data regarding their religious foundations and endowments and the donations of other members of society. Annette Schmiedchen shows how...

Dharma Pātanjala presents a Śaiva scripture from ancient Java studied in the light of related old Javanese and Sanskrit texts. A comprehensive introduction places the scripture in context, and a critical edition of the text is provided with parallel translation.

In what is often considered to be the heyday of classical Indian culture, the 4th and 5th centuries AD, the dynasty of the Vākāṭakas emerged as one of the major patrons of religion and art. Covering the greater part of the northern Deccan, the Vākāṭaka kingdoms were situated at the crossroads of the main north-south and west-east caravan routes. This situation in the heart of the South-Asian subcontinent may partly explain the prosperity of the Vākāṭaka kingdoms and certainly accounts for their cultural diversity and richness, to which the Hindu...

In Universal Śaivism Peter Bisschop provides a critical edition and annotated translation of the sixth chapter of the Śivadharmaśāstra `Treatise on the Religion of Śiva’, the so-called Śāntyadhyāya 'Chapter on Appeasement’. The Sanskrit text is preceded by an extensive introduction on its composition, transmission and edition. The Śivadharmaśāstra has arguably played a crucial role in the formation, development and institutionalisation of Śaivism. Through a detailed study of its extensive śānti mantra, Peter Bisschop shows how the text advocates a system in which all...

How did ‘Vedic man’ think about the destiny of man after death and related ethical issues? That heaven was the abode of the gods was undisputed, but was it also accessible to man in his pursuit of immortality? Was there a realm of the deceased or a hell? What terms were used to indicate these ‘yonder worlds’? What is their location in the cosmos and which cosmographic classifications are at the root of these concepts? The articles by Henk Bodewitz collected in this volume, published over a period of 45 years, between 1969 and 2013, deal with these issues on the basis of a systematic...

In Mapping the Pāśupata Landscape: Narrative, Place, and the Śaiva Imaginary in Early Medieval North India, Elizabeth A. Cecil explores the sacred geography of the earliest community of Śiva devotees called the Pāśupatas. This book brings the narrative cartography of the Skandapurāṇa into conversation with physical landscapes, inscriptions, monuments, and icons in order to examine the ways in which Pāśupatas were emplaced in regional landscapes and to emphasize the use of material culture as media through which notions of belonging and identity were expressed. By exploring the...

Academic study of the tantric traditions has blossomed in recent decades, in no small measure thanks to the magisterial contributions of Alexis G. J. S. Sanderson, until 2015 Spalding Professor of Eastern Religions and Ethics at Oxford University. This collection of essays honours him and touches several fields of Indology that he has helped to shape (or, in the case of the Śaiva religions, revolutionised): the history, ritual, and philosophies of tantric Buddhism, Śaivism and Vaiṣṇavism; religious art and architecture; and Sanskrit belles lettres. Grateful former students, joined by...