In the early medieval period, the Indian subcontinent saw the emergence of a number of “imperial kingdoms”, with a common legal language (Kulke 2021, Lubin 2018), administrative structures, and political as well as religious methods of self-representation using Sanskrit as a language (Salomon 1998, Thapar 2004, Pollock 2006, Kulke et. al. 2021). However, this shared cultural, social and linguistic blueprint often obfuscates regional dynamics. This case study will investigate the adoption and adaption of these transregional political and socio-religious models in the Himalayan area, as the northern frontier region of the Indosphere bordering the Sinosphere (cf. sub-nodes 2B and 2C). What strategies of religious and ethnic identification were pursued after the implementation of the Sanskrit cultural and political idiom in this multi-linguistic and multi-ethnic region from the 3rd century CE onwards? (cf. Node 3) How far can we trace cultural influence from the Sinosphere? How was Sanskrit used in the public sphere? What was the role of religious networks and the influence of religious professionals in consolidating power in such cultural border zones?
These questions will be investigated with a particular focus on imperial formations and their long-term dynamics in the Nepalese Kathmandu Valley, which – despite its remoteness – emerged as one of the economically and culturally most significant contact zones within the otherwise sparsely populated Himalayan foothills and became a contested site of urban expansion and a major cultural hub throughout history (Lévi 1905-8, Regmi 1965, Slusser 1982). The research will also raise the question of the so- called historic ‘Dark Age’ of Nepalese History between the 8th and 13th centuries CE (Petech 1984) in the light of recent epigraphic discoveries (Acharya&Mirnig forth.) and of the abundance of religious and cultural production visible through extant manuscript collections, art, as well as in material traces of urban expansion such as infrastructure for water management, and through the the institutionalisation of religious networks. This research will contribute to TWG 1 ‘Transregional Conduits of Communication’.
This line of research addresses communication and mobility across the trans-Himalayan region, which constitutes an important multi-lingual and multi-ethnic contact zone between the Indo- and Sinosphere. Himalayan corridors along the North-South axis acted as major pathways of connectivity and cultural exchange, connecting Inner Asia and the Tibetan plateau – and further on China – to the major route systems through the Gangetic plain (Chakrabarti 2011, Neelis 2011; Lévi 1905–8, Slusser 1982, Sen 2015, Deeg 2016, McAllister et. al. 2015). This case study will investigate how cultural encounters and local socio-religious developments – a blend of Buddhist, Hindu Śaiva and Vaiṣṇava, Tantric and other traditions, still visible today (Michaels 2018, Gellner 1992) – influenced the transmission and transformation of Indic cultural concepts. It will also analyse the resilience of religious networks in the light of frequently shifting patterns of power in this fragmented region and throughout alternating periods of isolation and connectivity due to extreme climatic conditions in the mountainous regions. Combined with the research in 2C, a focus will be on transformations and transregional imaginations of the Himalayan sacred landscape (Gutschow et al. 2003, McKay 2015). In this context, we will study the formation and development of Tantric cults (Sanderson 2009, Mirnig et. al 2019) from the seventh century onwards, when several sites turned into Tantric pīṭhas or seats of power (Sircar 1998). By combining text studies and fieldwork, we will investigate how the blending of worship and mythology of earlier local folk Gods with those of Hindu, Śākta, and/or Buddhist deities or saints shaped the history of these locations, and analyse the integration of such sites into pilgrimage networks and the spread of Himalayan perceptions through pilgrims, merchants and religious specialists. We will also explore how environmental ethics rooted in local religious beliefs shaped land usage over the long durée, and how sacred spaces were preserved until modern times; this will feed into TWG 6.
The objective of this case study is to reconstruct the movement of agents of communication and written artefacts. The focus is on the Kathmandu Valley as a major hub for scholars and religious specialists from the Indo- and Sinosphere to exchange, study, and copy Sanskrit works, yielding what is today the oldest and most valuable collection of palm-leaf manuscripts in South Asia. Kathmandu Valley is particularly known as a conduit of transmission for Buddhist works between India and Tibet during the mediaeval period (see sub-node 2B), but manuscript production and exchange in this period also extended to most of the major “Hindu” and Tantric bodies of scriptures, as well as works from all the branches of Indic sciences. Data from manuscript colophons attest to a vibrant transregional scribal culture as well as the import and export of manuscripts, and also allow us to reconstruct the movement of scholars, teachers, scribes or political and private patrons. The long-distance impact of these activities is also visible in Inner and East Asia, as colophons and script styles of palm-leaf manuscripts that were preserved there suggest these had been copied or traded through the Kathmandu Valley. As the majority of such manuscripts still await study beyond the most basic and general cataloguing, our knowledge of the kind of works that were copied, brought to or transported through this zone between the 8th and 13th centuries – the period of the so-called historic ‘Dark Age’ of Nepal (Petech 1984) – is limited. A more comprehensive understanding of the range of works copied in Kathmandu Valley and the modalities of their production is crucial for reconstructing the transmission of Buddhist and non-Buddhist Indic knowledge into Central, Inner and East Asia through trans-Himalayan corridors (see Node 2A, case study 1). These investigations will form the basis for comparing scribal habits and archiving practices across the Eurasian sphere, which will serve to identify commonalities that have shaped modalities of communication across this region (TWG 5).
One of the many ways to create group identity among a religious community is the use of external signs that are worn or inscribed on the body. This might involve special clothing or hair dress, ornaments, accessories, branding or make-up. Such signs engage with different cultural conceptions of the body (Michaels and Wulff 2009) and may mark the result of transformation rituals, may be taken up temporarily as part of a particular observance, or simply serve to distinguish certain ranks and social groups within a religious community. These external religious signs are at times utilised in religio-political discourses for purposes of propagation, differentiation or exclusion of others (Hüsken 2009, Fisher 2017). The aim is to identify the historical circumstances in which such external signs have been explicitly drawn upon to negotiate competition or the contesting of power. How are religious symbols constructed and contextualised in particular historical contexts? Which mythical, ritual and historical narratives are used for conferring meaning to these marks? How does the interpretation of such external religious symbols change according to political and historical circumstances and when can we identify an “invention of tradition”? When are such markers constructed by the community, when are they imposed by “others”? The case study will explore the different ways through which these discourses are negotiated – be it the ritual arena, scholastic debates, or narratives expressed in literature or through visual and performative art – in South Asia. The goal is to facilitate and stimulate broad comparison on a Eurasian level.