culture

Nalanda

Though the Buddha visited Nalanda several times during his lifetime, this famous center of Buddhist learning shot to fame much later, during 5th - 12th centuries. The Chinese scholar and traveler Hiuen Tsang stayed here in the 7th century, and has left an elaborate description of the excellence, and purity of monastic life practiced here.

He shows the monastery in the 7th century as being full of intellectual activity. Under its abbot Silabhadra, Nalanda did not confine itself to training Buddhist novices, but also taught the Vedas, Hindu philosophy, grammar, logic and medicine. The student population was not restricted to Buddhist order. Candidates of other faith who succeeded in passing a strict oral examination were admitted.

According to Hiuen Tsang, Nalanda was supported by the revenues of an enormous estate of one hundred villages, and by the alms of many patrons. About 2,000 teachers and 10,000 students from all over the Buddhist world, lived and studied in this international university.

The Gupta kings patronized these monasteries, built in old Kushan architectural style, in a row of cells around a courtyard. Kings Ashoka and Harshavardhana were some of its most famous patrons, who built impressive temples and monasteries. Recent excavations have unearthed elaborate structures.