Indology, also known as South Asian studies, is the academic study of the

history History is the systematic study of the past, focusing primarily on the Human history, human past. As an academic discipline, it analyses and interprets evidence to construct narratives about what happened and explain why it happened. Some t ...

and

cultures Culture ( ) is a concept that encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and Social norm, norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, Social norm, customs, capabilities, Attitude (psychology), attitudes ...

languages Language is a structured system of communication that consists of grammar and vocabulary. It is the primary means by which humans convey meaning, both in spoken and signed forms, and may also be conveyed through writing. Human language is ch ...

, and

literature Literature is any collection of Writing, written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially novels, Play (theatre), plays, and poetry, poems. It includes both print and Electroni ...

of the

Indian subcontinent The Indian subcontinent is a physiographic region of Asia below the Himalayas which projects into the Indian Ocean between the Bay of Bengal to the east and the Arabian Sea to the west. It is now divided between Bangladesh, India, and Pakista ...

, and as such is a subset of Asian studies. The term ''Indology'' (in German, ''Indologie'') is often associated with German scholarship, and is used more commonly in departmental titles in German and continental European universities than in the anglophone academy. In the

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

, the term ''Indologie'' was used to designate the study of Indian history and culture in preparation for colonial service in the

Dutch East Indies The Dutch East Indies, also known as the Netherlands East Indies (; ), was a Dutch Empire, Dutch colony with territory mostly comprising the modern state of Indonesia, which Proclamation of Indonesian Independence, declared independence on 17 Au ...

. Classical Indology majorly includes the linguistic studies of Sanskrit literature,

Pāli Pāli (, IAST: pāl̤i) is a classical Middle Indo-Aryan language of the Indian subcontinent. It is widely studied because it is the language of the Buddhist ''Pāli Canon'' or '' Tipiṭaka'' as well as the sacred language of '' Therav� ...

and

Tamil literature Tamil literature includes a collection of literary works that have come from a tradition spanning more than two thousand years. The oldest extant works show signs of maturity indicating an even longer period of evolution. Contributors to the T ...

, as well as study of Dharmic religions (like

Hinduism Hinduism () is an Hypernymy and hyponymy, umbrella term for a range of Indian religions, Indian List of religions and spiritual traditions#Indian religions, religious and spiritual traditions (Sampradaya, ''sampradaya''s) that are unified ...

Buddhism Buddhism, also known as Buddhadharma and Dharmavinaya, is an Indian religion and List of philosophies, philosophical tradition based on Pre-sectarian Buddhism, teachings attributed to the Buddha, a wandering teacher who lived in the 6th or ...

Sikhism Sikhism is an Indian religion and Indian philosophy, philosophy that originated in the Punjab region of the Indian subcontinent around the end of the 15th century CE. It is one of the most recently founded major religious groups, major religio ...

, etc.). Some of the regional specializations under South Asian studies include: * Bengali studies – study of culture and languages of

Bengal Bengal ( ) is a Historical geography, historical geographical, ethnolinguistic and cultural term referring to a region in the Eastern South Asia, eastern part of the Indian subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal. The region of Benga ...

* Dravidology – study of

Dravidian languages The Dravidian languages are a language family, family of languages spoken by 250 million people, primarily in South India, north-east Sri Lanka, and south-west Pakistan, with pockets elsewhere in South Asia. The most commonly spoken Dravidian l ...

Southern India South India, also known as Southern India or Peninsular India, is the southern part of the Deccan Peninsula in India encompassing the states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Telangana as well as the union territories of ...

** Tamil studies * Pakistan studies * Sindhology – the study of the historical Sindh region Some scholars distinguish ''Classical Indology'' from ''Modern Indology'', the former more focussed on Sanskrit, Tamil and other ancient language sources, the latter on contemporary India, its

politics Politics () is the set of activities that are associated with decision-making, making decisions in social group, groups, or other forms of power (social and political), power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of Social sta ...

and

sociology Sociology is the scientific study of human society that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. The term sociol ...

History

Precursors

The beginnings of the study of India by travellers from outside the subcontinent date back at least to Megasthenes (–290 BC), a Greek ambassador of the Seleucids to the court of Chandragupta (ruled 322-298 BC), founder of the Mauryan Empire. Based on his life in India Megasthenes composed a four-volume ''Indica'', fragments of which still exist, and which influenced the classical geographers Arrian, Diodor and

Strabo Strabo''Strabo'' (meaning "squinty", as in strabismus) was a term employed by the Romans for anyone whose eyes were distorted or deformed. The father of Pompey was called "Gnaeus Pompeius Strabo, Pompeius Strabo". A native of Sicily so clear-si ...

Islamic Golden Age The Islamic Golden Age was a period of scientific, economic, and cultural flourishing in the history of Islam, traditionally dated from the 8th century to the 13th century. This period is traditionally understood to have begun during the reign o ...

scholar Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad Al-Biruni (973–1048) in Tarikh Al-Hind (''Researches on India'') recorded the

political Politics () is the set of activities that are associated with decision-making, making decisions in social group, groups, or other forms of power (social and political), power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of Social sta ...

and military history of India and covered India's

cultural Culture ( ) is a concept that encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and Social norm, norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, Social norm, customs, capabilities, Attitude (psychology), attitudes ...

scientific Science is a systematic discipline that builds and organises knowledge in the form of testable hypotheses and predictions about the universe. Modern science is typically divided into twoor threemajor branches: the natural sciences, which stu ...

, social and

religious Religion is a range of social- cultural systems, including designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relate humanity to supernatural ...

history in detail. He studied the

anthropology Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, society, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including archaic humans. Social anthropology studies patterns of behav ...

of India, engaging in extensive

participant observation Participant observation is one type of data collection method by practitioner-scholars typically used in qualitative research and ethnography. This type of methodology is employed in many disciplines, particularly anthropology (including cultur ...

with various Indian groups, learning their languages and studying their primary texts, and presenting his findings with objectivity and neutrality using cross-cultural comparisons.

Academic discipline

Indology as generally understood by its practitioners began in the later

Early Modern period The early modern period is a Periodization, historical period that is defined either as part of or as immediately preceding the modern period, with divisions based primarily on the history of Europe and the broader concept of modernity. There i ...

and incorporates essential features of

modernity Modernity, a topic in the humanities and social sciences, is both a historical period (the modern era) and the ensemble of particular Society, socio-Culture, cultural Norm (social), norms, attitudes and practices that arose in the wake of the ...

, including critical self-reflexivity, disembedding mechanisms and globalization, and the reflexive appropriation of knowledge. An important feature of Indology since its beginnings in the late eighteenth century has been the development of networks of academic communication and trust through the creation of learned societies like the Asiatic Society of Bengal, and the creation of learned journals like the ''Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society'' and ''Annals of the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute''. One of the defining features of Indology is the application of scholarly methodologies developed in European

Classical Studies Classics, also classical studies or Ancient Greek and Roman studies, is the study of classical antiquity. In the Western world, ''classics'' traditionally refers to the study of Ancient Greek and Roman literature and their original languages ...

or "Classics" to the languages, literatures and cultures of South Asia. In the wake of eighteenth century pioneers like William Jones, Henry Thomas Colebrooke, Gerasim Lebedev or August Wilhelm Schlegel, Indology as an academic subject emerged in the nineteenth century, in the context of

British India The provinces of India, earlier presidencies of British India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British governance in South Asia. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one form or another ...

, together with Asian studies in general affected by the romantic

Orientalism In art history, literature, and cultural studies, Orientalism is the imitation or depiction of aspects of the Eastern world (or "Orient") by writers, designers, and artists from the Western world. Orientalist painting, particularly of the Middle ...

of the time. The Asiatic Society was founded in Calcutta in 1784, Société Asiatique founded in 1822, the Royal Asiatic Society in 1824, the

American Oriental Society The American Oriental Society is a learned society that encourages basic research in the languages and literatures of the Near East and Asia. It was chartered under the laws of Massachusetts on September 7, 1842. It is one of the oldest learned ...

in 1842, and the German Oriental Society ( Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft) in 1845, the Japanese Association of Indian and Buddhist Studies in 1949. Sanskrit literature included many pre-modern dictionaries, especially the '' Nāmaliṅgānuśāsana'' of Amarasiṃha, but a milestone in the Indological study of Sanskrit literature was publication of the St. Petersburg ''Sanskrit-Wörterbuch'' during the 1850s to 1870s. Translations of major Hindu texts in the Sacred Books of the East began in 1879. Otto von Böhtlingk's edition of Pāṇini's grammar appeared in 1887.

Max Müller Friedrich Max Müller (; 6 December 1823 – 28 October 1900) was a German-born British comparative philologist and oriental studies, Orientalist. He was one of the founders of the Western academic disciplines of Indology and religious s ...

's edition of the

Rigveda The ''Rigveda'' or ''Rig Veda'' (, , from wikt:ऋच्, ऋच्, "praise" and wikt:वेद, वेद, "knowledge") is an ancient Indian Miscellany, collection of Vedic Sanskrit hymns (''sūktas''). It is one of the four sacred canoni ...

appeared in 1849–1875. Albrecht Weber commenced publishing his pathbreaking journal ''Indologische Studien'' in 1849, and in 1897 Sergey Oldenburg launched a systematic edition of key Sanskrit texts, "Bibliotheca Buddhica".

Professional literature and associations

Indologists typically attend conferences such as the American Association of Asian Studies, the American Oriental Society annual conference, the World Sanskrit Conference, and national-level meetings in the UK, Germany, India, Japan, France and elsewhere. They may routinely read and write in journals such as '' Indo-Iranian Journal'', '' Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society'', '' Journal of the American Oriental Society'', '' Journal asiatique'', the '' Journal of the German Oriental Society'' (ZDMG), '' Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde Südasiens'', '' Journal of Indian Philosophy'', '' Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute'', '' Journal of Indian and Buddhist Studies'' (Indogaku Bukkyogaku Kenkyu), '' Bulletin de l'École française d'Extrême Orient'', and others. They may be members of such professional bodies as the American Oriental Society, the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, the Société Asiatique, the Deutsche Morgenlāndische Gesellschaft and others.

List of indologists

The following is a list of prominent academically qualified Indologists.

Historical scholars

* Megasthenes (350–290 BC) * Al-Biruni (973–1050) * Gaston-Laurent Cœurdoux (1691–1779) * Anquetil Duperron (1731–1805) * William Jones (1746–1794) * Charles Wilkins (1749–1836) * Colin Mackenzie (1753–1821) * Dimitrios Galanos (1760–1833) * Henry Thomas Colebrooke (1765–1837) * Jean-Antoine Dubois (1765–1848) * August Wilhelm Schlegel (1767–1845) * James Mill (1773–1836) * Horace Hayman Wilson (1786–1860) *

Franz Bopp Franz Bopp (; 14 September 1791 – 23 October 1867) was a German linguistics, linguist known for extensive and pioneering comparative linguistics, comparative work on Indo-European languages. Early life Bopp was born in Mainz, but the pol ...

(1791–1867) * Duncan Forbes (linguist) (1798–1868) *

James Prinsep James Prinsep (20 August 1799 – 22 April 1840) was an English scholar, Orientalism, orientalist and antiquary. He was the founding editor of the ''Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal'' and is best remembered for deciphering the Kharost ...

(1799–1840) * Hermann Grassmann (1809–1877) * John Muir (indologist) (1810–1882) * Edward Balfour (1813–1889) * Robert Caldwell (1814–1891) *

Alexander Cunningham Major General Sir Alexander Cunningham (23 January 1814 – 28 November 1893) was a British Army engineer with the Bengal Sappers who later took an interest in the history and archaeology of India. In 1861, he was appointed to the newly crea ...

(1814–1893) * Hermann Gundert (1814–1893) * Otto von Bohtlingk (1815–1904) * Monier Monier-Williams (1819–1899) * Henry Yule (1820–1889) * Rudolf Roth (1821–1893) * Theodor Aufrecht (1822–1907) *

(1823–1900) * Albrecht Weber (1825–1901) * Ralph T. H. Griffith (1826–1906) * William Dwight Whitney (1827–1894) * Ferdinand Kittel (1832–1903) * Edwin Arnold (1832–1904) * Johan Hendrik Caspar Kern (1833–1917) * Gustav Solomon Oppert (1836–1908) * Georg Bühler (1837–1898) * Chintaman Vinayak Vaidya (1861–1938) * Ramakrishna Gopal Bhandarkar (1837–1925) * Arthur Coke Burnell (1840–1882) * Julius Eggeling (1842–1918) * Paul Deussen (1845–1919) * Vincent Arthur Smith (1848–1920) * James Darmesteter (1849–1894) * Hermann Jacobi (1850–1937) * Kashinath Trimbak Telang (1850–1893) * Alois Anton Führer (1853–1930) * Jacob Wackernagel (1853–1938) * Arthur Anthony Macdonell (1854–1930) * Hermann Oldenberg (1854–1920) * Maurice Bloomfield (1855–1928) * E. Hultzsch (1857–1927) * Mark Aurel Stein (1862–1943) * P. T. Srinivasa Iyengar(1863–1931) * Moriz Winternitz (1863–1937) * Fyodor Shcherbatskoy (1866–1942) * F.W. Thomas (1867–1956) * Jadunath Sarkar (1870–1958) * S. Krishnaswami Aiyangar (1871–1947) * Percy Brown (1872–1955) * John Hubert Marshall (1876–1958) * Arthur Berriedale Keith (1879–1944) * Pandurang Vaman Kane (1880–1972) * Pierre Johanns (1882–1955) * Andrzej Gawronski (1885–1927) * Willibald Kirfel (1885–1964) * Johannes Nobel (1887–1960) * Betty Heimann (1888–1961) * Alice Boner (1889–1981) *

Heinrich Zimmer Heinrich Robert Zimmer (6 December 1890 – 20 March 1943) was a German Indologist and linguist, as well as a historian of South Asian art, most known for his works, ''Myths and Symbols in Indian Art and Civilization'' and ''Philosophies of Indi ...

(1890–1943) * Ervin Baktay (1890–1963) * Mortimer Wheeler (1890–1976) * B. R. Ambedkar (1891–1956) * K. A. Nilakanta Sastri (1892–1975) * Mahapandit Rahul Sankrityayan (1893–1963) * Vasudev Vishnu Mirashi (1893–1985) * V. R. Ramachandra Dikshitar (1896–1953) * Dasharatha Sharma (1903–1976) * S. Srikanta Sastri (1904–1974) * Joseph Campbell (1904–1987) * Murray Barnson Emeneau (1904–2005) * Jan Gonda (1905–1991) * Paul Thieme (1905–2001) * Jean Filliozat (1906–1982) * Alain Danielou (1907–1994) * F B J Kuiper (1907–2003) * Thomas Burrow (1909–1986) * Jagdish Chandra Jain (1909–1993) * Ramchandra Narayan Dandekar (1909–2001) * Arthur Llewellyn Basham (1914–1986) * Richard De Smet (1916–1997) * Ahmad Hasan Dani (1920–2009) * Frank-Richard Hamm (1920–1973) * Madeleine Biardeau (1922–2010) * V. S. Pathak (1926–2003) * Kamil Zvelebil (1927–2009) * J. A. B. van Buitenen (1928–1979) * Tatyana Elizarenkova (1929–2007) * Bettina Baumer (1940–) * Anncharlott Eschmann (1941–1977) * William Dalrymple (1965–present) * Arvind Sharma (1940–present) * Harilal Dhruv (1856–1896) * Ram Swarup (1920–1998) * Mikhail Konstantinovich Kudryavtsev (1911–1992) * Daniel H. H. Ingalls, Sr. (1916–1999), Wales Professor of Sanskrit,

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

* Sita Ram Goel (1921–2003) * Natalya Romanovna Guseva (1914–2010) * Ram Sharan Sharma (1919–2011), Founding Chairperson of

Indian Council of Historical Research Indian or Indians may refer to: Associated with India * of or related to India ** Indian people ** Indian diaspora ** Languages of India ** Indian English, a dialect of the English language ** Indian cuisine Associated with indigenous peoples o ...

;

Professor Emeritus ''Emeritus/Emerita'' () is an honorary title granted to someone who retirement, retires from a position of distinction, most commonly an academic faculty position, but is allowed to continue using the previous title, as in "professor emeritus". ...

, Patna University * Bhadriraju Krishnamurti (1928–2012),

Osmania University Osmania University is a collegiate university, collegiate Public university, public State university (India), state university located in Hyderabad, Telangana, India. Mir Osman Ali Khan, the 7th Nizam of Hyderabad, issued a ''firman'' calling f ...

* Fida Hassnain (1924–2016) Sri Pratap College, Srinagar * Heinrich von Stietencron (1933–2018),

University of Tübingen The University of Tübingen, officially the Eberhard Karl University of Tübingen (; ), is a public research university located in the city of Tübingen, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The University of Tübingen is one of eleven German Excellenc ...

, Germany * Iravatham Mahadevan (1930–2018)-

* Stanley Wolpert (1927–2019)-

University of California, Los Angeles The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school the ...

(emeritus) * Karel Werner (1925–2019) * Dietmar Rothermund (1933–2020), Professor of the history of South Asia at the Ruprecht-Karls University in

Heidelberg Heidelberg (; ; ) is the List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, fifth-largest city in the States of Germany, German state of Baden-Württemberg, and with a population of about 163,000, of which roughly a quarter consists of studen ...

* Bannanje Govindacharya (1936–2020), scholar in Tatva-vada school of philosophy and Vedic tradition * Stanley Insler (1937–2019), Edward E. Salisbury Professor of Sanskrit and Comparative Philology, Yale University * Gérard Fussman (1940–2022) Collège de France

Contemporary scholars with university posts

Romila Thapar Romila Thapar (born 30 November 1931) is an Indian historian. Her principal area of study is ancient India, a field in which she is pre-eminent. Quotr: "The pre-eminent interpreter of ancient Indian history today. ... " Thapar is a Professor ...

(1931–present), Professor of Ancient History, emerita, at the Jawaharlal Nehru University * Hermann Kulke (1938–present), Professor of South and Southeast Asian history at the Department of History, Kiel University *

Asko Parpola Asko Heikki Siegfried Parpola (born 12 July 1941, in Forssa) is a Finnish Indologist, current professor emeritus of Indology at the University of Helsinki. He specializes in the Indus Valley Civilization, specifically the study of the Indus scr ...

(1941–present), professor emeritus of Indology and South Asian Studies at the

University of Helsinki The University of Helsinki (, ; UH) is a public university in Helsinki, Finland. The university was founded in Turku in 1640 as the Royal Academy of Åbo under the Swedish Empire, and moved to Helsinki in 1828 under the sponsorship of Alexander ...

* Patrick Olivelle (1942–present) Professor Emeritus of Asian Studies at the

University of Texas at Austin The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public university, public research university in Austin, Texas, United States. Founded in 1883, it is the flagship institution of the University of Texas System. With 53,082 stud ...

Michael Witzel Michael Witzel (born July 18, 1943) is a German-American philologist, comparative mythologist and Indologist. Witzel is the Wales Professor of Sanskrit at Harvard University and the editor of the Harvard Oriental Series (volumes 50–100). He ...

(1943–present)- Wales Professor of Sanskrit at

* Ronald Inden- Professor Emeritus of History, South Asian Languages and Civilizations at the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...

* George L. Hart (1945–present)- Professor Emeritus of Tamil at the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

* Stephanie Jamison (1948–present), Distinguished Professor of Asian Languages and Cultures and of Indo-European Studies at the

* Alexis Sanderson (1948–present) Emeritus Fellow and former Spalding Professor of Eastern Religion and Ethics at All Souls College, Oxford * Michael D. Willis (

The British Museum The British Museum is a Museum, public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is the largest in the world. It documents the story of human cu ...

) * Wendy Doniger (1940–present) University of Chicago Divinity School, as Mircea Eliade Distinguished Service Professor of the History of Religions * Thomas Trautmann (1940–present), former Head of the Center for South Asian Studies, University of Michigan * Kapil Kapoor (1940–present), scholar of English Literature, Linguistics, Paninan Grammar, Sanskrit Arts and Aesthetics, Director of Indian Institute of Advanced Studies, Shimla * Shrivatsa Goswami (1950–present), Indian scholar of Hindu philosophy and art at ( Banaras Hindu University), as well as Gaudiya Vaishnava religious leader. * Edwin Bryant (1957–present)

Rutgers University Rutgers University ( ), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a Public university, public land-grant research university consisting of three campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's C ...

New Jersey New Jersey is a U.S. state, state located in both the Mid-Atlantic States, Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern United States, Northeastern regions of the United States. Located at the geographic hub of the urban area, heavily urbanized Northeas ...

Other indologists

* Michel Danino, French-Indian author and historical negationist *

Georg Feuerstein Georg Feuerstein (27 May 1947 – 25 August 2012) was a Germans, German Indology, Indologist specializing in the philosophy and practice of Yoga. Feuerstein authored over 30 books on mysticism, Yoga, Tantra, and Hinduism. He translated, among othe ...

* Hans T. Bakker

Indology organisations

* Faculty of Sanskrit Vidya Dharma Vigyan, Banaras Hindu University * Adyar Library and Research Centre, Chennai * Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Pune * Oriental Research Institute Mysore * Oriental Research Institute & Manuscripts Library, Thiruvananthapuram * Lalbhai Dalpatbhai Institute of Indology along with Lalbhai Dalpatbhai Museum which is adjacent to the institute, Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India * American Institute of Indian Studies * French Institute of Pondicherry
The Oxford Centre For Hindu Studies

References

Library guides

* * * * * * {{Authority control Asian studies