Exceptionally, volume 22 focuses on one topic only: the manuscript corpus from the period of Ilkhanid rule in Baghdad (13th and 14th century CE). Entitled The Mongols’ Baghdad: Knowledge Transmission through Manuscript Cultures before and after the Conquest, guest editors Bruno De Nicola and Nadine Löhr aim to challenge with this volume the well-established narrative of Baghdad’s cultural decline after the Mongol conquest of Baghdad in 1258 CE. They consider the corpus a valuable resource for reconstructing intellectual and cultural trends from a multidisciplinary perspective. Accordingly, focusing on legal, medical, astronomical, literary or theological texts, the case studies offer insights into a great variety of topics: the change in linguistic and literary interest of the ruling elites (B. De Nicola), the processes of editing, disseminating and canonisation (S. Kamola, T. Mimura), the resilience of theological networks (S. Brinkmann) and the continuity of legal scholarship (K. Ivanyi). The rich layers of marginal notes in two specific manuscripts are utilized by G. Gharib and N. Löhr: the one to trace the extent of manuscript destruction and continuity, the other to map the scholarly environment in which scientific traditions were maintained. From historical sources and surviving medieval buildings A. Petersen reconstructs which urban infrastructure may have persisted after Mongol conquest. 

The Mongols’ Baghdad. Knowledge Transmission through Manuscript Cultures before and after the Conquest (Guest Editors: Bruno De Nicola and Nadine Löhr)

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medieval worlds ‒ comparative and interdisciplinary studies, No. 22/2025

medieval worlds ‒ comparative and interdisciplinary studies, No. 22/2025 2025 22 22 

Introduction | How public was Śaivism? | Sisters and consorts, adepts and goddesses: Representations of women in the Brahmayāmala | The Bhasmāṅkura in Śaiva texts | Renegotiating ritual identities: Blurred boundaries between Pāñcarātra ritual communities in South India | *Sahajavajra’s integration of Tantra into mainstream Buddhism: An analysis of his *Tattvadaśakaṭīkā and *Sthitisamāsa | Bāṇa’s literary representation of a South Indian Śaivite | Whose dharma? Śaiva and Śākta community rules and Dharmaśāstric prescriptions | Tantric ritual components in the initiation of a Digambara Jain | Minor Vajrayāna texts V: The Gaṇacakravidhi attributed to Ratnākaraśānti | The recipient of the Tantric Buddhist funeral | Narratives as a medium for appealing to the royal court: A look into the Ahirbudhnyasaṃhitā | In case of emergency: Addressing rulers in the Ahirbudhnyasaṃhitā | Damanotsava: On love in spring, on what Jñānaśambhu wrote, and on the spread of public festivals into the Mantramārga | Hanumān worship under the kings of the late Malla period in Nepal | “Rudras on Earth” on the eve of the Tantric Age: The Śivadharmaśāstra and the making of Śaiva lay and initiatory communities | Inclusivism revisited: The worship of other gods in the Śivadharmaśāstra, the Skandapurāṇa, and the Niśvāsamukha | Mātṛtantra texts of South India with special reference to the worship of Rurujit in Kerala and to three different communities associated with this worship | Further Mahāpratisarā fragments from Gilgit | Index

Die Entstehung und Verbreitung des Tantrismus in Südasien ab Mitte des ersten Jahrtausends n. Chr. hat viele religiöse Traditionen der Region geprägt: die śivaitischen Traditionen, das viṣṇuitische Pāñcarātra, den Mantrayāna-Buddhismus und den Jainismus. Trotz dieser fundamentalen Bedeutung des Tantrismus für die religiöse Entwicklung Südasiens wissen wir bisher nur wenig darüber, wie frühe tantrische Gemeinschaften organisiert waren und welche Stellung sie in der Gesellschaft innehatten. Dieser Sammelband bietet neue Einblicke in die sozio-religiöse Geschichte tantrischer Traditionen. From the middle of the first millennium CE, South Asia saw the emergence and rise of Tantrism within all of its major religious traditions: Śaivism, the Vaiṣṇava Pāñcarātra, the Buddhist Mantrayāna, and Jainism. Despite the fact that Tantrism grew to become such an integral part of the religious landscape, our understanding of how early Tantric communities were actually organized and how they positioned themselves in society is still limited. This collection of articles by leading scholars offers new insights into the socio-religious history of premodern Tantric traditions.

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Tantric Communities in Context

Introduction: On Śaiva Tantric Death Rites in the Early Medieval Religio-historical Context | Chapter 1: Doctrinal and Structural Premises for Śaiva Tantric Funerary Practices | Chapter 2: The Emergence and Formation of Śaiva antyeṣṭi in the Earliest Extant Śaiva Siddhānta Scriptures | Chapter 3: Śaiva Cremation in Early Saiddhāntika Ritual Manuals | Chapter 4: The Cremation Ritual | Chapter 5: Ancestor Worship in Early Śaiva Siddhānta | Appendix A: Sanskrit Texts | Appendix B: Translations | Bibliography | Index

Dieser Band widmet sich der Entstehung und Entwicklung von shivaitischen tantrischen Bestattungsritualen (antyeṣṭi) und Formen der Ahnenverehrung (śrāddha) im frühmittelalterlichen Indien. Eine genaue Analyse von gesammelten Textbelegen aus dem 5. bis 12. Jahrhundert n. Chr. zeigt, wie die zunehmende Einbeziehung von Totenritualen in das tantrische Ritualrepertoire direkt mit dem Aufstieg des tantrischen Shivaismus von einer esoterischen Randbewegung asketischen Ursprungs zu einer dominanten und einflussreichen Religionsströmung zusammenhängt. Im Zentrum der Studie steht dabei, wie die shivaitischen Ritualisten auf die Bedürfnisse derjenigen Initiierten eingingen, die eng mit der brahmanisch-orthodoxen Gesellschaft verbunden waren, wobei vor allem der Bereich der Toten- und Ahnenrituale bedeutungsvoll war. Um das brahmanische Modell dieser Rituale mit der shivaitischen Befreiungslehre in Einklang zu bringen, wurde das Verbrennungsritual als Teil einer tantrischen Toteninitiation interpretiert, welche die Seele reinigt und sofort vom Kreislauf der Wiedergeburt (saṃsāra) befreit. Die traditionelle Ahnenverehrung wiederum wandelte sich in eine Verehrung des Verstorbenen als Manifestation des Gottes Shiva.

Das Buch bietet in der Einleitung zunächst einen Überblick über den soziohistorischen Kontext des frühen Shivaismus und widmet sich dann in fünf Kapiteln der Entwicklung von shivaitischen Bestattungsriten und Formen der Ahnenverehrung anhand von zuvor noch nie edierten Sanskrit-Texten. Die Kapitel beinhalten Beschreibungen und Analysen der Rituale und widmen sich dabei auch den Paradoxa, die sich aus den theoretischen Unstimmigkeiten zwischen shivaitischer Doktrin und ritueller Praxis in Folge der tantrischen Umdeutung brahmanischer Totenriten ergaben. Das Buch wird durch Appendizes ergänzt mit kritischen Texteditionen und englischen Übersetzungen samt Kommentaren von ausgewählten Passagen aus den frühesten erhaltenen tantrischen Sakraltexten (ca. 5.–9. Jh. n. Chr.), nämlich Svāyambhuvasūtrasaṃgraha 22.9–20, Sarvajñānottara 12 und 13 und Kiraṇa 60 und 61 sowie auch aus dem südindischen Ritualhandbuch Jñānaratnāvalī aus dem 12. Jahrhundert. This volume examines the formation and development of Śaiva tantric funerary practices (antyeṣṭi) and rituals of post-mortem ancestor worship (śrāddha) as preserved in the earliest extant strata of textual sources. These tantric scriptures and ritual manuals of the Śaiva Siddhānta cover a period from about the 5th to the 12th century CE. A close analysis of individual texts shows how the incorporation of death rites into the tantric repertoire was directly linked to the tradition’s development from once focused on private worship and limited to ascetics living outside society to a dominant religion throughout the Indic world. A focal point of the study is how, in this process, Śaiva ritual specialists catered to initiates who were established in the brahmanical householder society, with their death rites essentially coming to serve as the model for Śaiva equivalents. To make these rites more meaningful in terms of Śaiva doctrine, cremation and post-mortem ancestor worship were redefined as a means for liberating the deceased person’s soul, this through its funerary initiation and subsequent worship in manifestations of increasingly potent forms of Śiva.

The book first introduces the socio-historical context of early Śaivism, and then in five chapters traces the development of Śaiva funerary rites in the available text sources, examining also the extent to which Śaiva propagators were willing to tolerate doctrinal compromises to be able to include a wider clientele. The appendices contain editions and annotated translations of the passages on cremation and post-mortem ancestor worship from the pre-9th century tantric scriptures Svāyambhuvasūtrasaṃgraha 22.9–20, Sarvajñānottara 12 and 13, and Kiraṇa 60 and 61, as well as the chapters on cremation and post-mortem ancestor worship in the 12th-century South-Indian ritual manual Jñānaratnāvalī.

Early Śaiva Tantric Death Rites

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Nina Mirnig

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medieval worlds ‒ comparative and interdisciplinary studies, No. 22/2025

Tantric Communities in Context

Liberating the Liberated