The main sources for an understanding of classical Hindu law are the Sanskrit treatises on religious and legal duties, known as the Dharma stras. In this collection of his major studies in the field, Ludo Rocher presents analytical and interpretive essays on a wide range of topics, from general themes such as the nature of Hindu law and Anglo-Hindu law to technical matters including word studies and text criticism. Rocher's deep engagement with the language and worldview of the authors in the Dharma stra tradition yields distinctive and corrective contributions to the field, which are informed by knowledge both of the Indian grammatical tradition and of Roman and civil law. Davis's introduction presents an interpretative account of Rocher's many contributions to the field, organized around the themes that recur in his work, and examines his key advances, both methodological and substantive. Comparisons and contrasts between Rocher's ideas and those of his Indological colleagues serve to place him in the context of a scholarly tradition, while Rocher's fundamental view that the Dharma stra is first and foremost a scholarly and scholastic tradition, rather than a practical legal one, is also explored. This invaluable collection serves both as summary review of the ideas of Rocher, a leading authority in the field, and as a critical evaluation of the impact of these ideas on the present study of law and Indology.

For thirty years in India at the cusp of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Henry Thomas Colebrooke was an administrator and scholar with the East India Company. The Making of Western Indology explains and evaluates Colebrooke's role as the founder of modern Indology. The book discusses how Colebrooke embodies the significant passage from the speculative yearnings attendant on eighteenth-century colonial expansion, to the professional, transnational ethos of nineteenth-century intellectual life and scholarly enquiry. It covers his career with the East India Company, from a young writer to member of the supreme council and theorist of the Bengal government. Highlighting how his unprecedented familiarity with a broad range of literature established him as the leading scholar of Sanskrit and president of the Asiatic Society in Calcutta, it shows how Colebrooke went on to found the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, and set standards for western Indology. Written by renowned academics in the field of Indology, and drawing on new sources, this biography is a useful contribution to the reassessment of Oriental studies that is currently taking place.

For thirty years in India at the cusp of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Henry Thomas Colebrooke was an administrator and scholar with the East India Company. The Making of Western Indology explains and evaluates Colebrooke's role as the founder of modern Indology. The book discusses how Colebrooke embodies the significant passage from the speculative yearnings attendant on eighteenth-century colonial expansion, to the professional, transnational ethos of nineteenth-century intellectual life and scholarly enquiry. It covers his career with the East India Company, from a young writer to member of the supreme council and theorist of the Bengal government. Highlighting how his unprecedented familiarity with a broad range of literature established him as the leading scholar of Sanskrit and president of the Asiatic Society in Calcutta, it shows how Colebrooke went on to found the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, and set standards for western Indology. Written by renowned academics in the field of Indology, and drawing on new sources, this biography is a useful contribution to the reassessment of Oriental studies that is currently taking place.

This is a translation of a 12th century Sanskrit legal text, with the original text. The Dayabhaga was one of the most important texts in the history of Indian law. It is important because the British elevated it to such prominence in their new colony in the early 19th century. This text was taken as the authority on inheritance and significant aspects of family law for the eastern Indian region. The case law and scholarship that surround this text have shaped Indian personal law right up to the present day. Until now, there has been only one very inadequate English translation of this text (now 190 years old) - virtually without reference to the Sanskrit. This new translation will make this crucial text genuinely avaliable to those without Sanskrit for the first time.