Casile Anne. (2017). Changing religious landscapes in Gupta times : archaeological evidence from the area of Badoh-Pathari in central India. In :
Willis M. (ed.), Van Schaik S. (ed.), Maheshwari K.K. (ed.). Politics, ritual and religion. South Asian Studies, 30 (2), 245-268. ISSN 0266-6030.
Titre du document
Changing religious landscapes in Gupta times : archaeological evidence from the area of Badoh-Pathari in central India
Année de publication
2017
Type de document
Article
Auteurs
Casile Anne
In
Willis M. (ed.), Van Schaik S. (ed.), Maheshwari K.K. (ed.) Politics, ritual and religion
Source
South Asian Studies, 2017,
30 (2), 245-268 ISSN 0266-6030
The time of the imperial Guptas (c. fourth to sixth centuries CE) represents a pivotal moment in the development of "mature Hinduism". This was characterised by many changes, but most conspicuously by the establishment of institutional worship in temples. Clear archaeological signatures were inscribed across the cultural and physical landscapes of India in the fourth and fifth centuries: away from zones of urbanisation, numerous settlement areas retain sculptural and architectural vestiges in stone, most of them religious in nature. These vestiges, anchored and distributed in space, and with site-specific contexts, reveal much about the production and reproduction of sacred and socio-economic space, which were inextricably tied to water and the environment. For the purpose of this special issue, this article focuses on the archaeological landscapes of Badoh-Pathari (Vidisa District, Madhya Pradesh), an historical site which developed as an important population centre from at least early historic times onwards, if not before, and was connected to the political, trade, and defensive networks of the upper Betwa Basin. Some important remains from Gupta and later Gupta times are found in the immediate surroundings of this place. Their study provides an interesting basis upon which to explore issues relating to the conception and spatiality of new devotional, institutional, and socio-economic domains; and the integration, articulation, and transformation of natural features and local geography in the making of gods' territory during this crucial period.
