The Glory that was Vaisali (From the Earliest Times to C. 600 C.E.)

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Vaisali, the birthplace of republics, the land of Buddha and Mahavira, is a celeberated city in Indian literature - Brahamanic, Buddhist and Jain alike. Archaeologists like Alexander Cunningham, T. Bloch, D.B. Spooner and later Indian archaeologists did their best to unravel the past glory of Vaisali. This effort is still going on. Vaisali attracted the attention of historians and research scholars also. Several books and research papers were published on the history and culture of this city. The first significant collection of research papers on different aspects of Vaisali appeared in the form of Homage to Vaiśāli (1948). Later on Yogendra Mishra published his pioneering work An Early History of Vaisali (1962). Since then several publications on the subject, the latest being Viswa Kā Pratham Gantantra Vaisali (in Hindi) by Jayshri Mishra appeared on the occasion of the centenary celebration of Bihar Vidhan Sabha (2012). All the publications have their own plus and minus points but still there is need of a handy monograph on Vaisali incorporating all available literary and archaeological evidences. It is ironic that monographs published by the Archaeological Survey of India on several historical sites are available in Museums and at excavated sites for readers and tourists but no such publication exists on Vaisali. Keeping in mind this need and to provide a comprehensive monograph dealing with all aspects of history, culture and archaeology of Vaisali, the K.P. Jayaswal Research Institute, Patna decided to bring out a book on Vaisali under Bihar Heritage Series. This project was assigned to me a few years back but due to other academic and domestic engagements, the completion of the project was inordinately delayed. I am happy that it has been completed at last.