Professional Documents
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Indian Manuscripts
Indian Manuscripts
Indian Manuscripts
Manuscripts
Indian
Manuscripts
INTRODUCTION
Indian literature dates back to the courts of monarchs
over 5000 years ago. Back then literature was not in the
form of written texts as we know it today, but in the form
of oral poetry, song, and verse. Classical Indian languages were warehouses of ancient wisdom that were
stocked by folklore imagination. The literature of ancient
India was based in inquiry into questions about life, death
and nature. Even mathematics, astronomy, cosmology and
science were keenly inspected. The act of passing down
knowledge took place in the gurukuls (schools) of the
monarchs of Indian antiquity and is known as the oral tradition.
Gurukul system
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Indian
Manuscripts
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Indian
Manuscripts
Indian
Manuscripts
Valmiki writting
Ramayana
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Indian
Manuscripts
Devimahatmya manuscript on palm-leaf, in an early Bhujimol script, Bihar or Nepal, 11th century
Indian
Manuscripts
Manuscript
illustration
of the Battle of
Kurukshetra
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Indian
Manuscripts
Suryaprajnapati Sutra
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Indian
Manuscripts
Palm Tree
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Indian
Manuscripts
Prayers on the
Palm leaf
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Indian
Manuscripts
Copyright 2012 Mocomi & Anibrain Digital Technologies Pvt. Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Indian
Manuscripts
ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS
Indian
Manuscripts
ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS
This tradition came to India by 800 AD. Jain, Hindu and
Buddhist traditions of illuminated manuscripts exist in various parts of India. However it became the dominant style
of creating manuscripts during the Mughal period.
Akbar the great was by far the biggest patron of illuminated manuscripts in India. He had studied painting himself in his youth and had inherited his father's library of
After he moved his capital to Fatepur Sikri he set up a
school dedicated to miniature painting under the tutelage of Persian master artists.
Indian
Manuscripts
ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS
This style soon spread to the surrounding Hindu courts and
the Hindu epics of the Ramayana, Mahabharata,
smaller fables and fairy tales began to find themselves
in this format in all languages and scripts.
The people of the Indian subcontinent have historically
been a culture of knowledge. Thousands of texts and illuminated manuscripts have survived to this day. It is proof
that whether in the midst of war or prosperity, kings and
scholars worked to preserve the culture and histories of
their people. So the next time you write a note, imagine
who might find it years from now.
Illuminated miniature of
Sri Guru Granth Sahib Nishan
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Indian
Manuscripts
PROJECT
There are scores of scripts that originated in the Indian
subcontinent. Can you find out which ones are still used
today?
Hint: You might find more than one language that uses the
same script.
Learn how to write your name in 3 different scripts you
don't already know.
Write a report about what you read in the style of an
illuminated manuscript. Have a small picture in one
corner and place your text around it.