“Vedic period” refers to the period when the Vedic corpus, the oldest body of South Asian literature, was composed. The Early Vedic period corresponds to the second half of the second millenniumbce, when the oldest Vedic text – theSaṃhitāof theR̥gveda– was composed. The Vedic Aryans were agro‐pastoralist nomads who migrated from Iran and spoke an Indo‐European language. Possibly a cultic confrontation led to the schism between the Indo‐Iranian speakers and the Indo‐Aryans whose entry in the Indian subcontinent entailed clashes and negotiations with different cultural communities known as the Dāsas and Dasyus. The Early Vedic tribes also fought among themselves, mainly for cattle, and eventually the Bharatas established themselves as the most prominent of them all, especially after their chief Sudās won the famous battle of Ten Kings. Vedic Aryans moved eastwards in the Later Vedic period (ca. 1000–600bce) and adopted sedentary agricultural life. The Kuru‐Pāñcālas dominated the early phase of the Later Vedic period, when rudimentary hereditary kingship was emerging. However, their position waned at the end of the Later Vedic age, and territories further east – such as Kosala, Kāśī, and Videha – gained prominence.
Trigonometry is an indispensable tool of Indian mathematical astronomy. The concept of trigonometry originated in Greece and it was transmitted to India together with astronomy.
How should we read claims about health and well-being which defy common sense? Are claims of extreme longevity to be viewed as fraudulent, or as pushing the boundaries of possibility for the human body? This article will consider the narrative and context around a particularly well-publicized incident of rejuvenation therapy, advertised as kāyakalpa (body transformation or rejuvenation), from 1938. In this year, the prominent Congress Activist and co-founder of Banaras Hindu University, Madan Mohan Malaviya (1861–1946), underwent an extreme – and very public – rejuvenation treatment under the care of a sadhu using the name of Shriman Tapasviji (c.1770?-1955). The first half of the article will explore the presentation of Malaviya’s treatment and how it inspired a focus on rejuvenation therapy within Indian medicine in the years immediately following. Exploring this mid-twentieth century incident highlight some of the themes and concerns of the historical period, just out of living memory, but in many ways similar to our own.
In the late nineteenth century, the Japanese were ill at ease about the nation’s place in the world. The Mejii Restoration ended the hereditary rule of the shoguns, but Japan, and indeed most of East Asia, was increasingly dominated by the Western powers, leaving Asians, including the Japanese, feeling vulnerable and out of touch with world developments. In this context, Fukuzawa Yukichi published this editorial in the newspaper he had founded that year. Its title, “Datsu- A-Ron,” is variously translated as “Good-Bye Asia,” “De-Asianization, “Shedding Asia,” and “On Leaving Asia.” The purpose of the editorial was to convince the Japanese that if Japan was to survive as a world power, it had to shed its Asian connections and identity and turn to the West for its economic, scientific, governmental, educational, and cultural institutions. The document can be regarded as an early step in the development of Japan as a modern rather than a feudal nation.
In 1849, thousands of Chinese migrants arrived in California to take part in the Gold Rush. In December 1849, a huiguan, or Chinese mutual-aid society, was established in San Francisco to help the new immigrants adjust to life in America. The huiguan, which were organized and led by the local Chinese merchant community, helped recent Chinese immigrants find jobs and acquire accommodation. They also acted as post offices, enabling immigrants to send and receive letters, and they provided a place where Chinese immigrants would meet and socialize. The huiguan also provided medical services for sick immigrants, and they would arrange the transportation of dead Chinese immigrants to their home towns.
AbstractThis paper aims to stimulate discussion about the complexity of oral history as a practice by recalling its origins and early associations, such as criminal confessions, war-reporting, the novel, exotic art and other early forms of first-person narratives, and by tracing some of their recurrent echoes in contemporary work. It looks at some of the uses to which oral history or related practices have been put in the field of Tibetan studies, ranging from rigorously academic studies through nostalgic political testimonies to wholly invented pseudo-histories. It discusses the importance of silent oral histories, the ones that cannot be recorded, as well as of failed ones, which are recorded but rejected by certain types of researchers because they do not meet their desires for a certain kind of narrative. Commoditisation of the archive is described, not just in the obvious cases where large amounts of money are exchanged, but also an instance in Tibetan studies in which an important archive was stolen, apparently just for the prestige of secretly possessing it. These forms of prototypical oral history and its near relatives still hover on the sidelines of the practice, despite the efforts of scholars to insulate academic practice from them. The widespread circulation of fabricated narratives produced within the contemporary Tibetan exile economy to gain access to western countries underlines the pervasive and under-acknowledged role of the state throughout all these practices, banning, allowing, celebrating, regulating and exploiting all forms of oral history.
Study of the distant past always begins with critical examination of sources. In the present case we might ask, “How do we know about early China?” We are speaking, after all, of a time removed from our own by two or more millenia. The sources upon which we base such knowledge are simply traces of the past, and these traces are largely of two types: written texts and physical objects.1 While physical objects should never be overlooked and give material reality to the written word, texts are ultimately of greater value. Jean Bottéro’s comment about the ancient Mesopotamian world can in general be applied to China as well: