Rethinking Bihar and Bengal

Birendra Nath Prasad is Assistant Professor at the Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, where he teaches social history of religion in India and Southeast Asia. His publications include Monasteries, Shrines and Society: Buddhist and Brahmanical Religious Institutions in India in their Socio-Economic Context (edited, Delhi, 2011); Buddhism in a Poly-Religious Context: An Archaeological History of Buddhist, Brahmanical and Jaina Religious Centres in Early Medieval Bihar and Bengal (Delhi, 2021); Social History of Indian Buddhism: New Researches (edited, Delhi, 2021, forth coming), and many peer-reviewed research articles in prestigious international journals such as Journal of the Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies (Oxford), Buddhist Studies Review (London), Religions of South Asia (London/Sheffield) and Berlin Indological Studies.

• 1. Urbanization in Early Historic Vaiśālī c. 600 BCE-400 CE 2. The Socio-Religious Dimensions of Dedicatory Inscriptions on Sculptures Donated to a Buddhist Establishment in Early Medieval Magadha: Kurkihar, c. 800 CE -1200 CE 3. A Folk Tradition Integrated into Mahāyāna Buddhism: Some Observations on the Votive Inscriptions on Sculptures of Puṇḍeśvarī/Pūrṇeśvarī/Puṇyeśvarī Discovered in the Kiul-Lakhisarai Area, Bihar 4. The Social Bases of Patronage to the Vikramaśilā Mahāvihāra: An Epigraphic Enquiry 5. Evolution of the Social Bases of Patronage to the Sacred Complex of Mandāra Hill: An Inscriptional Enquiry 6. Brahmanical Temples, Mathas, Agrahāras and a Buddhist Establishment in a Marshy and Forested Periphery of Two ‘Frontier’ States: Early Medieval Surma Valley (Sylhet and Cachar), c. 600 CE-1100 CE 7. A ‘Nālandā Monk’ in the Late Thirteenth–Early Fourteenth Century India, Tibet, China and Korea: A Note on the ‘Poetic Inscription’ on a Korean Stūpa Erected in the Memory of Dhyānabhadra 8. Pilgrimage to Gayā, c. 1200 CE -1550 CE: A Study of Some Sanskrit Inscriptions Discovered at Gayā