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This book is a collection of some of the published papers of the author, published mostly abroad, and unravels some significant yet hitherto neglected aspects of history, culture and religion of Bihar and Bengal: two areas that were connected through an intricate network of rivers. Themes looked into are: early historic urbanisation in the Mithil¿ plains of North Bihar; the social history of Brahmanical religious institutions (temples and Mathas) in early medieval Bihar and Bengal; the social history of Buddhist monasticism in early medieval Bihar and Bengal; the integration of a local goddess into the institutional fabric of Mahayana Buddhism; the survival of Buddhism in the thirteenth and fourteenth century AD; pilgrimage from Central India and Deccan to a Hindu pil grimage centre of Bihar in the medieval period; and the debate on the Islamisation of medieval eastern Bengal.
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List of contents
1. Urbanization in Early Historic Vai¿¿l¿ c. 600 BCE-400 CE 2. The Socio-Religious Dimensions of Dedicatory Inscriptions on Sculptures Donated to a Buddhist Establishment in Early Medieval Magadha: Kurkihar, c. 800 CE -1200 CE 3. A Folk Tradition Integrated into Mah¿y¿na Buddhism: Some Observations on the Votive Inscriptions on Sculptures of Pu¿¿e¿var¿/P¿r¿e¿var¿/Pu¿ye¿var¿ Discovered in the Kiul-Lakhisarai Area, Bihar 4. The Social Bases of Patronage to the Vikramäil¿ Mah¿vih¿ra: An Epigraphic Enquiry 5. Evolution of the Social Bases of Patronage to the Sacred Complex of Mand¿ra Hill: An Inscriptional Enquiry 6. Brahmanical Temples, Mathas, Agrah¿ras and a Buddhist Establishment in a Marshy and Forested Periphery of Two 'Frontier' States: Early Medieval Surma Valley (Sylhet and Cachar), c. 600 CE-1100 CE 7. A 'N¿land¿ Monk' in the Late Thirteenth-Early Fourteenth Century India, Tibet, China and Korea: A Note on the 'Poetic Inscription' on a Korean St¿pa Erected in the Memory of Dhy¿nabhadra 8. Pilgrimage to Gay¿, c. 1200 CE -1550 CE: A Study of Some Sanskrit Inscriptions Discovered at Gay¿
About the author
Birendra Nath Prasad is Assistant Professor at the Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, where he teaches social history of religion in India and Southeast Asia. His publications include Monasteries, Shrines and Society: Buddhist and Brahmanical Religious Institutions in India in their Socio-Economic Context (edited, Delhi, 2011); Buddhism in a Poly-Religious Context: An Archaeological History of Buddhist, Brahmanical and Jaina Religious Centres in Early Medieval Bihar and Bengal (Delhi, 2021); Social History of Indian Buddhism: New Researches (edited, Delhi, 2021, forth coming), and many peer-reviewed research articles in prestigious international journals such as Journal of the Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies (Oxford), Buddhist Studies Review (London), Religions of South Asia (London/Sheffield) and Berlin Indological Studies.
Summary
This book discusses the history, culture and religion of Bihar & Bengal. Topics include: early historic urbanisation in Northern Bihar; the social history of Brahmanical religious institutions and Buddhist monasticism; the survival of Buddhism in the 13th and 14th century AD; and the debate on the Islamisation of medieval eastern Bengal.
