Re-emergence of Buddhism in Bihar: Early Medieval Period

DescriptionThe Palas called themselves Paramasaugata, and Buddha is almost invariably invocated at the beginning of their official records. Their age coincided with a new ideology of Buddha and Bodhisattvas in the most developed form of Mahayana Buddhism. During their long rule of four centuries Bihar emerged as the last stronghold of Buddhism on the Indian soil. It was precisely during this period that Mahayana form of Buddhism under the patronage of royal Palas, became a transnational civilizational force exercising dominant influence from Tibet in the north to the Malayan Archipelago in the South. Beside minute detail observed on the basis of conjectures and earlier sources of the greatest Buddhist mahaviharas of Odantapuri, Vikramsila, Vajrasana (Bodh Gaya) and Nalanda (major construction of this mahavihara has been dated to the Pala period), a separate treatment of art associated with the architecture of Nalanda, Kurkihara, Vikramsila and Bodh Gaya has been done. The book reviews the status of Buddhism in whole of Bihar-Jharkhand zone during Early Medieval Period.