The History of the Buddha's Relic Shrine

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Author :
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0195301390
Total Pages : 321 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (953 download)

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Book Synopsis The History of the Buddha's Relic Shrine by : Parākrama Paṇḍita

Download or read book The History of the Buddha's Relic Shrine written by Parākrama Paṇḍita and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2007 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Buddhist chronicles have long been had a central place in the study of Buddhism. Scholars, however, have relied almost exclusively on Pali works that were composed by elites for learned audiences, to the neglect of a large number of Buddhist histories written in local languages for popular consumption. The Sinhala Thupavamsa, composed by Parakama Pandita in thirteenth-century Sri Lanka, is an important example of a Buddhist chronicle written in the vernacular Sinhala language. Furthermore, it is among those works that inform public discussion and debate over the place of Buddhism in the Sri Lankan nation state and the role of Buddhist monks in contemporary politics.In this book Stephen Berkwitz offers the first complete English translation of the Sinhala Thupavamsa. Composed in a literary dialect of Sinhala, it contains a richly descriptive account of how Buddhism spread outside of India, replete with poetic embellishments and interpolations not found in other accounts of those events. Aside from being an important literary work, the Sinhala Thupavamsa. is a text of considerable historical and religious significance. It comprises several narrative strands that relate the life story of the Buddha and the manner in which Buddhist teachings and institutions were established on the island of Sri Lanka in ancient times. The central focus of this work concerns the variety of relics associated with the historical Buddha, particularly how the relics were acquired and the presumed benefits of venerating them. The text also relates the mythological history of the Buddha's previous lives as a bodhisattva and concludes with a prediction about the future Buddha Maitreya. Reflection on Buddhist ethics and instruction on the Dharma, or the Buddha's teaching, are found throughout the work, indicating that this historical narrative was meant both to recall the past and give rise to religious practice among contemporary readers and listeners.This new translation makes a significant work more widely accessible in the West and adds to our knowledge of how local Buddhist communities imagined and represented their religious and cultural heritages in written works.

The History of the Buddha's Relic Shrine

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Author :
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0198041268
Total Pages : 321 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (98 download)

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Book Synopsis The History of the Buddha's Relic Shrine by : Stephen C. Berkwitz

Download or read book The History of the Buddha's Relic Shrine written by Stephen C. Berkwitz and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2006-12-14 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Buddhist chronicles have long been had a central place in the study of Buddhism. Scholars, however, have relied almost exclusively on Pali works that were composed by elites for learned audiences, to the neglect of a large number of Buddhist histories written in local languages for popular consumption. The Sinhala Thūpavamsa, composed by Parakama Pandita in thirteenth-century Sri Lanka, is an important example of a Buddhist chronicle written in the vernacular Sinhala language. Furthermore, it is among those works that inform public discussion and debate over the place of Buddhism in the Sri Lankan nation state and the role of Buddhist monks in contemporary politics. In this book Stephen Berkwitz offers the first complete English translation of the Sinhala Thūpavamsa. Composed in a literary dialect of Sinhala, it contains a richly descriptive account of how Buddhism spread outside of India, replete with poetic embellishments and interpolations not found in other accounts of those events. Aside from being an important literary work, the Sinhala Thūpavamsa. is a text of considerable historical and religious significance. It comprises several narrative strands that relate the life story of the Buddha and the manner in which Buddhist teachings and institutions were established on the island of Sri Lanka in ancient times. The central focus of this work concerns the variety of relics associated with the historical Buddha, particularly how the relics were acquired and the presumed benefits of venerating them. The text also relates the mythological history of the Buddha's previous lives as a bodhisattva and concludes with a prediction about the future Buddha Maitreya. Reflection on Buddhist ethics and instruction on the Dharma, or the Buddha's teaching, are found throughout the work, indicating that this historical narrative was meant both to recall the past and give rise to religious practice among contemporary readers and listeners. This new translation makes a significant work more widely accessible in the West and adds to our knowledge of how local Buddhist communities imagined and represented their religious and cultural heritages in written works.

The Buddha: a Storied Life

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Author :
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0197649467
Total Pages : 281 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (976 download)

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Book Synopsis The Buddha: a Storied Life by : Vanessa R. Sasson

Download or read book The Buddha: a Storied Life written by Vanessa R. Sasson and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2023 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Retellings of the Buddha's life story have animated and sustained Buddhist thought and practice through some 2,500 years of history. To this day, Buddhist holidays and rituals are pinned to the arc of his biography, celebrating his birth, awakening, teaching, and final nirvana. His story is the model that exemplary Buddhists follow. Often, there is a moment of insight akin to the Buddha's experience with the Four Sights, followed by a great departure from home, and a period of searching that it is hoped will lead to final awakening. The Buddha's story is not just the Buddha's story; it is the story of Buddhism. In this book, twelve leading scholars of South Asian texts and traditions articulate the Buddha-life blueprint--the underlying and foundational pattern that holds the life story of a buddha together. They retell the episodes of Buddha Gautama's extended life story, while keeping in mind the cosmic, paradigmatic arc of his narrative. The contributors have dedicated their careers to exploring hagiographical materials, each applying their own methodological and theoretical interests to shed new light on the enduring story of Buddhism. Using multiple perspectives, voices, and sources, this volume underscores the multivalent centrality of this story. The book will be an invaluable resource to practicing Buddhists and students of Buddhist Studies to help them engage in the most foundational story of the tradition.

The Buddha's Tooth

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Author :
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 022680173X
Total Pages : 366 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (268 download)

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Book Synopsis The Buddha's Tooth by : John S. Strong

Download or read book The Buddha's Tooth written by John S. Strong and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2021-10-22 with total page 366 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Part One: The Portuguese and the Tooth Relic -- Chapter One: The Tale of the Portuguese Tooth and Its Sources -- Chapter Two: Where the Tooth Was Found: Traditions about the Location of the Relic in Sri -- Lanka -- Chapter Three: Whose Tooth Was It? Traditions about the Identity of the Relic -- Chapter Four: The Trial of the Tooth -- Chapter Five: The Destruction of the Tooth -- Conspectus of Part One: The Storical Evolution of the Tales of the Portuguese Tooth -- Part Two: The British and the Tooth Relic -- Chapter Six: The Cosmopolitan Tooth: The Relic in Kandy before the British Became Aware of -- It -- Chapter Seven: The British Takeover of 1815 and the Kandyan Convention -- Chapter Eight: The Relic Returns: The Tooth and Its Properties Restored to the Temple -- Chapter Nine: The Relic Lost and Recaptured: The Tooth and the Rebellion of 1817- -- Chapter Ten: The Relic Disestablished: Missionary Oppositions to the Tooth -- Chapter Eleven: Showings of the Tooth: The Story of the King of Siam's Visit (1897) -- Chapter Twelve: Showings of the Tooth: The Story of Queen Elizabeth's Shoes (1954).

Relics of the Buddha

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Author :
Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 0691188114
Total Pages : 316 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (911 download)

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Book Synopsis Relics of the Buddha by : John S. Strong

Download or read book Relics of the Buddha written by John S. Strong and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2018-06-05 with total page 316 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Buddhism is popularly seen as a religion stressing the truth of impermanence. How, then, to account for the long-standing veneration, in Asian Buddhist communities, of bone fragments, hair, teeth, and other bodily bits said to come from the historic Buddha? Early European and American scholars of religion, influenced by a characteristic Protestant bias against relic worship, declared such practices to be superstitious and fraudulent, and far from the true essence of Buddhism. John Strong's book, by contrast, argues that relic veneration has played a serious and integral role in Buddhist traditions in South and Southeast Asia-and that it is in no way foreign to Buddhism. The book is structured around the life story of the Buddha, starting with traditions about relics of previous buddhas and relics from the past lives of the Buddha Sakyamuni. It then considers the death of the Buddha, the collection of his bodily relics after his cremation, and stories of their spread to different parts of Asia. The book ends with a consideration of the legend of the future parinirvana (extinction) of the relics prior to the advent of the next Buddha, Maitreya. Throughout, the author does not hesitate to explore the many versions of these legends and to relate them to their ritual, doctrinal, artistic, and social contexts.

Buddhist History in the Vernacular

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Author :
Publisher : BRILL
ISBN 13 : 9004139109
Total Pages : 370 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (41 download)

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Book Synopsis Buddhist History in the Vernacular by : Stephen C. Berkwitz

Download or read book Buddhist History in the Vernacular written by Stephen C. Berkwitz and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2004 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book on vernacular Buddhist histories written in late medieval Sri Lanka demonstrates that narrative representations of the past were designed to effectively constructing new moral communities in translocal spaces.

The Wheel-Turner and His House

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Publisher : Northern Illinois University Press
ISBN 13 : 1501757997
Total Pages : 269 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (17 download)

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Book Synopsis The Wheel-Turner and His House by : Geok Goh

Download or read book The Wheel-Turner and His House written by Geok Goh and published by Northern Illinois University Press. This book was released on 2014-11-30 with total page 269 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The recorded history of precolonial Burmese empire and the modern state of Myanmar starts with the kingdom of Bagan in the eleventh century. The oldest surviving written records and structures are from the reign of King Anawrahta (1044–1077). Anawrahta converted to Theravada Buddhism and created a vibrant Buddhist state in the Irrawaddy River basin. Anawrahta is a folk hero to this day in Myanmar and is widely credited as a charismatic and pious leader who consolidated various ethnic groups throughout the region into a single nation. The Wheel-Turner and His House traces the archaeological and historical record of Anawrahta and his seminal position in forming modern Myanmar, based on the few sources that have been recovered. The Great Chronicle, an important history of the country written by the 18th-century Burmese nobleman U Kala, forms the basis for much of the knowledge we have about Anawrahta today. Geok Yian Goh examines U Kala's work in light of the context of U Kala's own time and points out the bias of his royal court, as well as the scribe's personal views from the elaborate narratives he produced. She looks at other sources as well, including unpublished palm-leaf manuscripts, to disentangle earlier knowledge about Anawrahta and eleventh-century Bagan. Placing the overall study of Burmese historical tradition within the larger manuscript culture of Asia, Goh presents a critique of theoretical issues in history, especially the relationship between the past and memory. In order to analyze the expansion of Anawrahta's historical image that formed the development of a Buddhist ecumene in the eleventh and twelth centuries, Goh utilizes published and unpublished texts in Burmese and classical Chinese, along with northern Thai and Sri Lankan texts, many of which Goh makes available for the first time in English.

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

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Author :
Publisher : University of Hawaii Press
ISBN 13 : 0824889525
Total Pages : 383 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (248 download)

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Book Synopsis Jewels, Jewelry, and Other Shiny Things in the Buddhist Imaginary by : Vanessa R. Sasson

Download or read book Jewels, Jewelry, and Other Shiny Things in the Buddhist Imaginary written by Vanessa R. Sasson and published by University of Hawaii Press. This book was released on 2021-09-30 with total page 383 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 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.

The Oxford Handbook of Buddhist Practice

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Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0190632925
Total Pages : 689 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (96 download)

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Book Synopsis The Oxford Handbook of Buddhist Practice by : Kevin Trainor

Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Buddhist Practice written by Kevin Trainor and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2022 with total page 689 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This Handbook provides a state-of-the-art exploration of several key dynamics in current studies of the Buddhist tradition with a focus on practice. Embodiment, materiality, emotion, and gender shape the way most Buddhists engage with their traditions, in contrast to popular representations of Buddhism as spiritual, disembodied, and largely devoid of ritual. This volume highlights how practice often represents a fluid, dynamic, and strategic means of defining identity and negotiating the challenges of everyday life. Essays explore the transformational aims of practices that require practitioners to move, gesture, and emote in prescribed ways, including the ways that scholars' own embodied practices are integral to their research methodology. The chapters are written by acknowledged experts in their respective subject areas and taken together offer an overview of current thinking in the field. The volume is of particular value to scholars who seek an orientation to current perspectives on important conceptual, theoretical, and methodological concerns that are shaping the field in areas outside their primary expertise. The inclusion of substantial, up-to-date bibliographies also makes the volume an important guide to current scholarship"--

Virtuous Bodies

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Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0190294019
Total Pages : 200 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (92 download)

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Book Synopsis Virtuous Bodies by : Susanne Mrozik

Download or read book Virtuous Bodies written by Susanne Mrozik and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2007-07-20 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Virtuous Bodies breaks new ground in the field of Buddhist ethics by investigating the diverse roles bodies play in ethical development. Traditionally, Buddhists assumed a close connection between body and morality. Thus Buddhist literature contains descriptions of living beings that stink with sin, are disfigured by vices, or are perfumed and adorned with virtues. Taking an influential early medieval Indian Mah=ay=ana Buddhist text-'S=antideva's Compendium of Training ('Sik,s=asamuccaya)-as a case study, Susanne Mrozik demonstrates that Buddhists regarded ethical development as a process of physical and moral transformation. Mrozik chooses The Compendium of Training because it quotes from over one hundred Buddhist scriptures, allowing her to reveal a broader Buddhist interest in the ethical significance of bodies. The text is a training manual for bodhisattvas, especially monastic bodhisattvas. In it, bodies function as markers of, and conditions for, one's own ethical development. Most strikingly, bodies also function as instruments for the ethical development of others. When living beings come into contact with the virtuous bodies of bodhisattvas, they are transformed physically and morally for the better. Virtuous Bodies explores both the centrality of bodies to the bodhisattva ideal and the corporeal specificity of that ideal. Arguing that the bodhisattva ideal is an embodied ethical ideal, Mrozik poses an array of fascinating questions: What does virtue look like? What kinds of physical features constitute virtuous bodies? What kinds of bodies have virtuous effects on others? Drawing on a range of contemporary theorists, this book engages in a feminist hermeneutics of recovery and suspicion in order to explore the ethical resources Buddhism offers to scholars and religious practitioners interested in the embodied nature of ethical ideals.

The Thousand and One Lives of the Buddha

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Publisher : University of Hawaii Press
ISBN 13 : 0824893549
Total Pages : 332 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (248 download)

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Book Synopsis The Thousand and One Lives of the Buddha by : Bernard Faure

Download or read book The Thousand and One Lives of the Buddha written by Bernard Faure and published by University of Hawaii Press. This book was released on 2022-08-31 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Praise for the French edition “This is a book that should be read by all those who are interested, whether near or far, in Buddhism, its history and its interpretations. . . . [Faure] proposes considering the ‘Life of the Buddha’ as a kind of treasure that never ceases to be reinvented and experienced, from story to story, from language to language, from culture to culture.” —Roger-Pol Droit, Le Monde Many biographies of the Buddha have been published in the last 150 years, and all claim to describe the authentic life of the historical Buddha. This book, written by one of the leading scholars of Buddhism and Japanese religion, starts from the opposite assumption and argues that we do not yet possess the archival and archaeological materials required to compose such a biography: All we have are narratives, not facts. Yet traditional biographies have neglected the literary, mythological, and ritual elements in the life of the Buddha. Bernard Faure aims to bridge this gap and shed light on a Buddha that is not historical but has constituted a paradigm of practice and been an object of faith for 2,500 years. The Thousand and One Lives of the Buddha opens with a criticism of the prevalent historicism before examining the mythological elements in a life of the Buddha no longer constrained by an artificial biographical framework. Once the search for the “historical Buddha” is abandoned, there is no longer any need to limit the narrative to early Indian stories. The life—or lives—of the Buddha, as an expression of the creative imaginations of Buddhists, developed beyond India over the centuries. Faure accordingly shifts his focus to East Asia and, more particularly, to Japan. Finally, he examines recent developments of the Buddha’s life in not only Asia but also the modern West and neglected literary genres such as science fiction.

The Life of Buddha as Legend and History

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Publisher : Asian Educational Services
ISBN 13 : 9788120609792
Total Pages : 338 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (97 download)

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Book Synopsis The Life of Buddha as Legend and History by : Edward Joseph Thomas

Download or read book The Life of Buddha as Legend and History written by Edward Joseph Thomas and published by Asian Educational Services. This book was released on 2000 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: GAUTAMA BUDDHA - BIOGRAPHY, CHRISTIANTY & OTHER RELIGIONS, BUDDHISM

Pictorial History of Civilization in Java

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Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 204 pages
Book Rating : 4.L/5 ( download)

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Book Synopsis Pictorial History of Civilization in Java by : Willem Frederik Stutterheim

Download or read book Pictorial History of Civilization in Java written by Willem Frederik Stutterheim and published by . This book was released on 1927 with total page 204 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Sacred Biography in the Buddhist Traditions of South and Southeast Asia

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Author :
Publisher : Motilal Banarsidass Publ.
ISBN 13 : 9788120818125
Total Pages : 396 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (181 download)

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Book Synopsis Sacred Biography in the Buddhist Traditions of South and Southeast Asia by : Juliane Schober

Download or read book Sacred Biography in the Buddhist Traditions of South and Southeast Asia written by Juliane Schober and published by Motilal Banarsidass Publ.. This book was released on 2002 with total page 396 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This interdisciplinary collection of essays explores the biographical genre of the Buddhist traditions of South and Southeast Asia. Scholars in the history of religions, anthropology, literature and art history present a broad range of explorations into sacred biography as an interpretive genre. Easch essay makes unique contributions and the collection as a whole engages methodological and interpretive approaches that are central to scholars of Buddhism and those specializing in the study of south and Southeast Asia.

A Text Book of the History of Architecture

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Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 508 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (91 download)

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Book Synopsis A Text Book of the History of Architecture by : Alfred Dwight Foster Hamlin

Download or read book A Text Book of the History of Architecture written by Alfred Dwight Foster Hamlin and published by . This book was released on 1909 with total page 508 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

The History of the Buddha's Relic Shrine

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Author :
Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN 13 : 9781435620056
Total Pages : 272 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (2 download)

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Book Synopsis The History of the Buddha's Relic Shrine by : Stephen C. Berkwitz

Download or read book The History of the Buddha's Relic Shrine written by Stephen C. Berkwitz and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2007 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Offering the complete English translation of the Buddhist chronicle called the 'Sinhala Thupavamsa', composed by Parākrama Paṇḍita in 13th century Sri Lanka, this work also relates the mythological history of the Buddhas previous lives as a bodhisattva and concludes with a prediction about the future Buddha Maitreya.

History of Indian and Eastern Architecture

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Author :
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 526 pages
Book Rating : 4.E/5 ( download)

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Book Synopsis History of Indian and Eastern Architecture by : James Fergusson

Download or read book History of Indian and Eastern Architecture written by James Fergusson and published by . This book was released on 1910 with total page 526 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Illustrations: 2 Maps, Numerous B/w Illustrations Description: The present reprint of Fergusson's History of Indian and Eastern Architecture is being brought out to meet the growing demand from scholars for whom this book is still the basic work of reference on Indian Architecture. In the preface to the second edition (1910) of this work James Burgess wrote, Though descriptions of Indian monuments may be written in various ways, no one could pretend to take up the systematic study of Indian Architecture without the aid of this work, and no history of Architecture can be scientifically written without appropriating the principles Mr. Fergusson showed how to apply. This work, in a way, fulfils the desire of Fergusson. In the Preface to the first edition of the book (1876) the author expressed his desire to open an hitherto unknown field of Indian Architecture and to give an impulse to its study, and assist in establishing Indian Architecture on a stable basis, so that it may take its true position among the other great styles which have ennobled the arts of mankind. It is needless to go into the merits of the present work. Fergusson covered in his study of Indian Architecture the vast range of time and space. Tracing the Indian Architecture from its remote antiquity, Fergusson covered the entire panorama of India with its diverse monuments including even the contemporary modes. In order to provide the reader with an all-encompassing view, he included in the present work, the Architecture of the neighbouring countries which were vastly influenced by the present-tradition of India. The books thus became, and still is, an authentic compendium on Architecture. The excellent woodcuts and photographs are still utilized for primary reference work.