Polemics and Patronage in the City of Victory: Vyasatirtha, Hindu Sectarianism, and the Sixteenth-Century Vijayanagara Court

How did the patronage activities of India’s Vijayanagara Empire (c. 1346–1565) influence Hindu sectarian identities? Although the empire has been commonly viewed as a Hindu bulwark against Islamic incursion from the north or as a religiously ecumenical state, Valerie Stoker argues that the Vijayanag...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Stoker, Valerie (Author)
Format: Electronic Book
Language:English
Check availability: HBZ Gateway
Fernleihe:Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste
Published: Oakland, California University of Californiarnia Press 2016
In:Year: 2016
Further subjects:B Asian History
B Religion: general
B History
B Other non-Christian religions
Online Access: Volltext (kostenfrei)
Description
Summary:How did the patronage activities of India’s Vijayanagara Empire (c. 1346–1565) influence Hindu sectarian identities? Although the empire has been commonly viewed as a Hindu bulwark against Islamic incursion from the north or as a religiously ecumenical state, Valerie Stoker argues that the Vijayanagara court was selective in its patronage of religious institutions. To understand the dynamic interaction between religious and royal institutions in this period, she focuses on the career of the Hindu intellectual and monastic leader Vy?sat?rtha. An agent of the state and a powerful religious authority, Vy?sat?rtha played an important role in expanding the empire’s economic and social networks. By examining his polemics against rival sects in the context of his work for the empire, Stoker provides a remarkably nuanced picture of the relationship between religious identity and sociopolitical reality under Vijayanagara rule
ISBN:0520965469
Access:Open Access
Persistent identifiers:HDL: 20.500.12854/36743