“The Portal to Ancient India” is a new website that attempts to be an open door to one of the most outstanding cultures ever developed. Written initially in Spanish is now being translated into English. The main long-term goal of this project is to explore many facets of the ancient Indian civilization: history, religions and philosophies, literature and art, without neglecting Sanskrit, the sacred language.
For those who understand Spanish (if not you can use Google Translate), I enumerate below, and provide links to, the main sections of the Spanish part:
With the aid of two maps, I sketch the main morphological subdivisions of the subcontinent and a number of cultural regions that played a vital part in its history.
-History and Art of the Mauryas
An article dealing with the emergence and achievements of the Maurya dynasty, including a section about its art and architecture.
-Introduction to the Religions of India
In a clear and concise manner, the basic tenets of Vedism, Buddhism, Jainism and Hinduism are mentioned, including information about their gods, ethics and scriptures.
-Articles about the Rig Veda
Two articles explore the beliefs and ideas manifested in the Rig Veda (the most ancient text of India) about the birth of the universe and the final destination of men. The first one is “La Creación del Universo en el Rigveda”, and the second “Muerte y Escatología en el Rigveda”. In the process, a dozen hymns of great literary value are translated directly form archaic Sanskrit.
They are mystic texts obsessed with the concept of the Absolute, deeply spiritual. In this page, they are mentioned in chronological order, their main ideas are summarized and three of them are translated (Kena, Isa, Mandukya).
A classification of this all-important linguistic family, summarizing its phonology, morphology and syntax.
A detailed panorama of the many languages spoken in India and neighbouring countries including several maps and tables.
These six lessons present the language and the alphabet, deal with devanagari writing, give some basic vocabulary, explain the phonetics of sandhi, and initiate the study of the verbal system and of the case system. Sanskrit classes are now available in English via Skype.
-Books written/translated by me (thumbnails to the right)
-
* “La Civilización de la India Antigua” is a two-volume introductory work to this great culture, giving a panoramic view of it with the aid of numerous tables and more than 200 figures, bilingual bibliography, several appendices and a glossary.
-
*“Bhagavad Gita” is a translation (direct from Sanskrit) of the famous poem, one of the most significant religious documents of all times, which tries to preserve the undeniable literary qualities of the original while giving in the introduction, notes, analysis and glossary the tools to its understanding.
-
*“Trescientos Poemas de Bhartrihari” rends in Spanish from Sanskrit, for the first time, the work of one of the most original poets of classical Sanskrit literature, a strong personality torn between desire and renunciation.
-
*The Buddhacarita (“Life of Buddha”) is the first Spanish translation (in collaboration with Beatriz Avanzati) of a long Sanskrit poem composed by Asvaghosa at the beginning of our era. It narrates the main events of Buddha’s life in a refined style, providing insights about the society of his time.
What is available in English now is the result of another concern: to try to organize in some measure, within my limited possibilities, the increasing amount of information obtainable in the web about ancient India. With this in mind, I present here:
-Links to free books about ancient India, classified and commented
This section, updated periodically, compiles links to 300 books, which are scattered through the web, covering all aspects of ancient Indian civilization. They are:
-
in a Western language (the vast majority are, in fact, in English) -
free
-
entire (except for a few ones)
-
useful
They are classified by subject and divided into three pages. One page links to Dictionaries, Grammars and History books. The next page links to Religious and Philosophical books. The third one links to books on Literature, Science & Art (including image databases). Each one is accompanied by a brief commentary telling about the scope and nature of the work.
-Links to free articles about ancient India, classified and commented
With the same design and purpose of the previous section, this one links to 150 valuable articles (more coming) published in journals that have decided to put their collections online. They are classified by subject and divided into two pages. The first one links to Historical, Religious and Philosophical articles. The second page links to articles on Literature, Science and Art. Each one is accompanied by my own summary.
© 2009 Alejandro Gutman
