Inviting Death: Historical Experiments on Sepulchral Hill

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This book presents the history of the Jaina rules of inviting death, descriptive accounts of Puranic and historical personalities who embraced it, and an interesting body of epigraphical and archaeological remains over a millennium and a half on the Samadhi-betta, the Sepulchral Hill, at Sravana Belgola, one of the foremost Digambara Jaina centres in the world. The Jaina preoccupation with death has been so intense that without understanding their philosophy of death it is almost impossible to comprehend their notion of life. Jainism recognizes forty-eight types of deaths, grouped under three major heads called bala-marana (foolish death), pandita-marana (wise-death), and pandita-pandita marana (the wisest of the wise death). For them, death is a subject of intellectual exercise, they hold it as a force that permeates the social, religious and philosophical sinews of life. This book, the revised edition of this classic of Jaina scholarship, includes fresh data and more illustrations which critically complement the author’s insights and arguments on the art and rituals of inviting death.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR S. Settar

S. Settar was Chairman of the Indian Council of Historical Research (1996-9), served as Professor, Department of History and Archaeology (1971-96) and as the Director, Institute of Indian Art History (1978-95), Karnatak University, Dharwad. Among his well-known publications are The Hosyala Temples (2 vols.), Inviting Death, Pursuing Death, Sravana Belgola, Hampi: a Medieval Metropolis, Hoysala Sculptures in the National Museum, Copenhagen. He has edited several volumes of which those relating to the fields of archaeology are: Archaeological Survey of Mysore:P Annual Reports: A Study (3 vols.) and Memorial Stones: A Study of Their Origin, Significance and Variety (in collaboration with G.-D. Sontheimer). Since 1995 he has been collaborating with a team of scholars on the ABIA South and Southeast Asian Art and Archaeology Index project as the chief of Indian section and as the editor for South Asia.

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Bibliographic information

Title
Inviting Death: Historical Experiments on Sepulchral Hill
Author
Edition
Revi. ed.
Publisher
ISBN
9789380607429
Length
285p.,
Subjects