Conference theme

In his 2007 book Greater Magadha, Johannes Bronkhorst proposed a new theory for the historical formation of Indian culture in the mid-first millennium BCE. The theory proposed that a cultural and geographical area, Greater Magadha, was settled by an early group of Indo-European speakers.  A different group of Indo-European speakers, carriers of Vedic culture, subsequently encountered the Greater Magadhans to the east and the resultant cultural meeting gave rise to the main features known in later Indian history.  The Greater Magadha theory addresses many deep problems about the early formation of Indian culture that have long puzzled historians.  It has been widely accepted, but has also given rise to serious criticism.  This symposium will bring together some of the principal scholars who have engaged with the theory to discuss and retrospectively evaluate the theory just over a decade after it was proposed.