Nalanda was a renowned Buddhist monastic university in ancient Magadha, India. Considered by historians to be the world's very first residential university, and among the greatest centers of learning in the ancient world, it was located near the city of Rajagriha and about 90 kilometres (56 mi) southeast of Pataliputra, operating from 427 to 1197 CE. Nalanda played a vital role in promoting the patronage of arts and academics during the 5th and 6th century CE, a period that has since been described as the "Golden Age of India" by scholars.
Kanishka I, or Kanishka the Great, was an emperor of the Kushan dynasty, under whose reign the empire reached its zenith. He is famous for his military, political, and spiritual achievements. A descendant of Kujula Kadphises, founder of the Kushan empire, Kanishka came to rule an empire, extending from Central Asia and Gandhara to Pataliputra on the Gangetic plain. The main capital of his empire was located at Puruṣapura (Peshawar) in Gandhara, with another major capital at Mathura. Coins of Kanishka were found in Tripuri.
Greco-Buddhism, or Graeco-Buddhism, is the cultural syncretism between Hellenistic culture and Buddhism, which developed between the fourth century BCE and the fifth century CE in Gandhara, in present-day north-western Pakistan and parts of north-east Afghanistan. It was a cultural consequence of a long chain of interactions begun by Greek forays into India from the time of Alexander the Great. A few years after Alexander's death, the Easternmost fringes of the empire of his general Seleucus were lost in a war with the Mauryan Empire, under the reign of Chandragupta Maurya. The Mauryan Emperor Ashoka would convert to Buddhism and spread the religious philosophy throughout his domain, as recorded in the Edicts of Ashoka. This spread to the Greco-Bactrian kingdom, which itself seceded from the Seleucid empire. Within its borders, the Greek fondness for statuary produced the first statues of the Buddha, leading ultimately to the modern tradition.
The Kharosthi script, also spelled Kharoshthi and Kharoṣṭhī, was an ancient Indo-Iranian script used by various Indo-European peoples in present-day northern Pakistan and eastern Afghanistan. It was used in Central Asia as well. Also known as 'Indo-Bactrian' and 'Aryan-Pali', the script was originally developed in northern Pakistan, between the 4th and 3rd century BCE. An abugida, it was introduced at least by the middle of the 3rd century BCE, possibly during the 4th century BCE, and remained in use until it died out in its homeland around the 3rd century CE.
Kucha, or Kuche, was an ancient Buddhist kingdom located on the branch of the Silk Road that ran along the northern edge of what is now the Taklamakan Desert in the Tarim Basin and south of the Muzat River.
The history of Buddhism spans from the 6th century BCE to the present. Buddhism arose in Ancient India, in and around the ancient Kingdom of Magadha, and is based on the teachings of the ascetic Siddhārtha Gautama. The religion evolved as it spread from the northeastern region of the Indian subcontinent throughout Central, East, and Southeast Asia. At one time or another, it influenced most of Asia.
The Edicts of Ashoka are a collection of more than thirty inscriptions on the pillars, as well as boulders and cave walls, attributed to Emperor Ashoka of the Mauryan Empire who reigned from 268 BCE to 232 BCE. Ashoka used the expression Dhaṃma Lipi to describe his own Edicts. These inscriptions were dispersed throughout the areas of modern-day Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Afghanistan and Pakistan, and provide the first tangible evidence of Buddhism. The edicts describe in detail Ashoka's view on dhamma, an earnest attempt to solve some of the problems that a complex society faced. According to the edicts, the extent of Buddhist proselytism during this period reached as far as the Mediterranean, and many Buddhist monuments were created.
Buddhism entered Han China via the Silk Road, beginning in the 1st or 2nd century CE. The first documented translation efforts by Buddhist monks in China were in the 2nd century CE via the Kushan Empire into the Chinese territory bordering the Tarim Basin under Kanishka. These contacts transmitted strands of Sarvastivadan and Tamrashatiya Buddhism throughout the Eastern world.
The Bujang Valley is a sprawling historical complex and has an area of approximately 224 square kilometres (86 sq mi) situated near Merbok, Kedah, between Gunung Jerai in the north and Muda River in the south. It is the richest archaeological area in Malaysia.
Buddhism, an Indian religion founded by Gautama Buddha, first arrived in modern-day Afghanistan through the conquests of Ashoka, the third emperor of the Maurya Empire. Among the earliest notable sites of Buddhist influence in the country is a bilingual mountainside inscription in Greek and Aramaic that dates back to 260 BCE and was found on the rocky outcrop of Chil Zena near Kandahar.
Several instances of interaction between Buddhism and the Roman world are documented by Classical and early Christian writers. Textual sources in Tamil language, moreover, suggest the presence of Buddhism among some Roman citizens in the 2nd century AD.
Buddhist art is visual art produced in the context of Buddhism. It includes depictions of Gautama Buddha and other Buddhas and bodhisattvas, notable Buddhist figures both historical and mythical, narrative scenes from their lives, mandalas, and physical objects associated with Buddhist practice, such as vajras, bells, stupas and Buddhist temple architecture. Buddhist art originated in the north of the Indian subcontinent, in modern India, Pakistan and Afghanistan, with the earliest survivals dating from a few centuries after the historical life of Siddhartha Gautama from the 6th to 5th century BCE.
By around 788 BCE, a large settlement had been established on the northern bank of the Merbok River. The settlement was one of several in the Bujang Valley, covering the Merbok and Muda Rivers, about 1000 square miles. The Merbok settlement was built near the estuary of the tributary river, the Sungai Batu. Around 170 CE groups of Hindu faith arrived at Kedah, joining them soon were peoples from nearby islands and from the northern Mon-Khmer region. At the same time traders from India, Persia and Arab, arrived the brink of the Malacca Strait, using Gunung Jerai the Kedah Peak as marking point. Ancient Kedah covered the areas of Kuala Kedah, Kuala Bara, Kuala Pila and Merpah.
Tamil-Brahmi, also known as Tamizhi or Damili, was a variant of the Brahmi script in southern India. It was used to write inscriptions in the early form of Old Tamil. The Tamil-Brahmi script has been paleographically and stratigraphically dated between the third century BCE and the first century CE, and it constitutes the earliest known writing system evidenced in many parts of Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and Sri Lanka. Tamil Brahmi inscriptions have been found on cave entrances, stone beds, potsherds, jar burials, coins, seals, and rings.
The earliest undisputed deciphered epigraphy found in India are the Edicts of Ashoka of the 3rd century BCE, in the Brahmi script.
Eran is an ancient town and archaeological site in the Sagar district of Madhya Pradesh, India. It was one of the ancient mints for Indian dynasties as evidenced by the diverse coins excavated here. The site has 5th and 6th-century Gupta era temples and monuments, particularly the colossal stone boar with sages and scholars depicted on the body of the sculpture. The inscription stones found at Eran are important to reconstructing the chronology of Gupta Empire history. Eran or Erakina was the capital of Erakina (Airikina) Pradesha or Airkina Vishaya, an administrative division of the Gupta empire.
Southeast Asia was in the Indian sphere of cultural influence from 290 BCE to the 15th century CE, when Hindu-Buddhist influences were incorporated into local political systems. Kingdoms in the southeast coast of the Indian Subcontinent had established trade, cultural and political relations with Southeast Asian kingdoms in Burma, Thailand, Indonesia, Malay Peninsula, Philippines, Cambodia and Champa. This led to the Indianisation and Sanskritisation of Southeast Asia within the Indosphere, Southeast Asian polities were the Indianised Hindu-Buddhist Mandala.
The Northern Satraps, or sometimes Satraps of Mathura, or Northern Sakas, are a dynasty of Indo-Scythian rulers who held sway over the area of Eastern Punjab and Mathura after the decline of the Indo-Greeks, from the end of the 1st century BCE to the 2nd century CE. They are called "Northern Satraps" in modern historiography to differentiate them from the "Western Satraps", who ruled in Gujarat and Malwa at roughly the same time and until the 4th century CE. They are thought to have replaced the last of the Indo-Greek kings in the Eastern Punjab, as well as the Mitra dynasty and the Datta dynasty of local Indian rulers in Mathura.
The Art of Mathura refers to a particular school of Indian art, almost entirely surviving in the form of sculpture, starting in the 2nd century BCE, which centered on the city of Mathura, in central northern India, during a period in which Buddhism, Jainism together with Hinduism flourished in India. Mathura "was the first artistic center to produce devotional icons for all the three faiths", and the pre-eminent center of religious artistic expression in India at least until the Gupta period, and was influential throughout the sub-continent.
Indo-Scythian art developed under the various dynasties of Indo-Scythian rulers in northwestern India, from the 1st century BCE to the early 5th century CE, encompassing the productions of the early Indo-Scythians, the Northern Satraps and the Western Satraps. It follows the development of Indo-Greek art in northwestern India. The Scythians in India were ultimately replaced by the Kushan Empire and the Gupta Empire, whose art form appear in Kushan art and Gupta art.
