Bratindra Nath Mukherjee (1 January 1932 – 4 April 2013) was an Indian

historian A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human species; as well as the ...

numismatist A numismatist is a specialist, researcher, and/or well-informed collector of numismatics, numismatics/coins ("of coins"; from Late Latin , genitive of ). Numismatists can include collectors, specialist dealers, and scholar-researchers who use coi ...

, epigraphist and iconographist, known for his scholarship in central Asian languages such as Sogdian. He was a

Carmichael Professor of Ancient Indian History and Culture The Carmichael Chair of Ancient Indian History and Culture is a history professorship in the University of Calcutta, India; its holder is known as Carmichael Professor. The post was created by Ashutosh Mukherjee in 1912 after Baron Carmichael th ...

Calcutta University The University of Calcutta, informally known as Calcutta University (), is a Public university, public State university (India), state university located in Kolkata, Calcutta (Kolkata), West Bengal, India. It has 151 affiliated undergraduate c ...

and is reported to have deciphered many ancient scripts. He was the author of 50 books and over 700 articles on ancient history, numismatics and epigraphy. The Government of India awarded him the fourth highest civilian honour of the

Padma Shri The Padma Shri (IAST: ''padma śrī'', lit. 'Lotus Honour'), also spelled Padma Shree, is the fourth-highest Indian honours system, civilian award of the Republic of India, after the Bharat Ratna, the Padma Vibhushan and the Padma Bhushan. In ...

in 1992.

Early life and education

B. N. Mukherjee was born on the New Year's Day of 1932. He obtained his master's degree in Ancient Indian History and Culture from

, learning under Sarasi Kumar Saraswati, J. N. Banerjee and R. G. Basak and did research under the guidance of Arthur Llewellyn Basham, renowned scholar and historian, to secure a doctoral degree from the

School of Oriental and African Studies The School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS University of London; ) is a public research university in London, England, and a member institution of the federal University of London. Founded in 1916, SOAS is located in the Bloomsbury area ...

, London. He continued in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

Cambridge University The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

to research under Harold Walter Bailey on historical linguistics of West and Central Asia, focusing on Iranian,

Saka The Saka, Old Chinese, old , Pinyin, mod. , ), Shaka (Sanskrit (Brāhmī): , , ; Sanskrit (Devanāgarī): , ), or Sacae (Ancient Greek: ; Latin: were a group of nomadic Iranian peoples, Eastern Iranian peoples who lived in the Eurasian ...

, Saka–Khotanese and

Aramaic Aramaic (; ) is a Northwest Semitic language that originated in the ancient region of Syria and quickly spread to Mesopotamia, the southern Levant, Sinai, southeastern Anatolia, and Eastern Arabia, where it has been continually written a ...

studies.

Scholarship

Mukherjee wrote several books on the epigraphy and iconography of the central Asia, such as the Kushans and

Yuezhi The Yuezhi were an ancient people first described in China, Chinese histories as nomadic pastoralists living in an arid grassland area in the western part of the modern Chinese province of Gansu, during the 1st millennium BC. After a major defea ...

s. His 1989 book, ''The Rise and Fall of the Kushanas'', ''India in Early Central Asia'' (1996) and the last of his works, ''Kushana Studies, New Perspectives'', released in 2004, account his observations on these topics. His exploration of Ancient India led him to

numismatic Numismatics is the study or collection of currency, including coins, tokens, paper money, medals, and related objects. Specialists, known as numismatists, are often characterized as students or collectors of coins, but the discipline also inclu ...

studies and he wrote two books on the subject, namely '' Numismatic Art of India'' and ''Coins of Bengal''. Three of his books, ''The Kushana Genealogy and Chronology'' (1967), ''An Agrippan Source: Studies in Indo-Parthian History'' (1969) and ''Kushana Coins in the Land of Five Rivers'' (1978), employ the study of coins as a means of reconstructing the political and dynastic histories of Saka-Kushana eras. Known to be a scholar of

and

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

edicts, he elucidated the edicts of

Asoka Ashoka, also known as Asoka or Aśoka ( ; , ; – 232 BCE), and popularly known as Ashoka the Great, was Emperor of Magadha from until his death in 232 BCE, and the third ruler from the Mauryan dynasty. His empire covered a large p ...

which assisted in the study of the

Maurya empire The Maurya Empire was a geographically extensive Iron Age historical power in South Asia with its power base in Magadha. Founded by Chandragupta Maurya around c. 320 BCE, it existed in loose-knit fashion until 185 BCE. The primary source ...

. He asserted that these edicts were translations and transliterations of

Prakrit Prakrit ( ) is a group of vernacular classical Middle Indo-Aryan languages that were used in the Indian subcontinent from around the 5th century BCE to the 12th century CE. The term Prakrit is usually applied to the middle period of Middle Ind ...

inscriptions and revealed the political intonations of Ashoka's policy of Dhamma. His findings were published in a book, ''Studies in the Aramaic Edicts of Asoka'' (1984). Mukherjee wrote a 300-page commentary on the treatise, ''Political History of Ancient India: From the Accession of Parikshit to the Extinction of the Gupta Dynasty'', considered to be a classic text on ancient India, written by Hem Chandra Raychaudhuri. His studies helped in the understanding of

Brahmi Brahmi ( ; ; ISO: ''Brāhmī'') is a writing system from ancient India. "Until the late nineteenth century, the script of the Aśokan (non-Kharosthi) inscriptions and its immediate derivatives was referred to by various names such as 'lath' or ...

and

Kharoshti Kharosthi script (), also known as the Gandhari script (), was an ancient script originally developed in the Gandhara Region of modern-day Pakistan, between the 5th and 3rd century BCE. used primarily by the people of Gandhara alongside var ...

scripts and their etymologies. His style of writing was heavily leaned on to footnotes and his findings have, at times, attracted criticisms. Besides 50 books, he also published over 700 articles in various national and international journals.

Honours

Mukherjee was a professor at

and held the Carmichael chair of the Ancient Indian History and Culture from 1975 to 1998. He was a fellow of the

Royal Asiatic Society The Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, commonly known as the Royal Asiatic Society, was established, according to its royal charter of 11 August 1824, to further "the investigation of subjects connected with and for the encourag ...

, UK. The Government of India awarded him the civilian honour of the

in 1992. He was the president of the Indian History Congress and was a recipient of the H. C. Raychaudhuri Centenary Medal of the Asiatic Society, Kolkata. Mukherjee died on 4 April 2013, at the age of 79, survived by his wife and son.

Selected works

* * * * *

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Mukherjee, B. N. Recipients of the Padma Shri in other fields 1932 births 2013 deaths 20th-century Indian linguists Indian numismatists Indian epigraphers Historians of Indian art University of Calcutta alumni Academic staff of the University of Calcutta Fellows of the Royal Asiatic Society Scholars from Kolkata Bengali historians