Sanskrit scholarship in southern India did not die out before the modern era—it thrived in Brahman settlements and monasteries across the Kaveri river delta between 1650 and 1800, but historians have largely overlooked these non-courtly hubs. This project challenges the entrenched narrative that traditional Sanskrit intellectual life collapsed on the eve of British rule. By surveying manuscript collections, library catalogues, and epigraphical records, the team will map for the first time how these institutions functioned as independent centres of expert knowledge—producing philosophy, theology, devotional literature, and belles-lettres—and how they connected with the Thanjavur court and Tamil-speaking learning centres. If successful, the research will rewrite the social history of India’s intellectual traditions in the century before colonialism, revealing the dynamism of networks that survived into the present day. This is primarily fundamental historical scholarship with no immediate practical application. However, understanding how pre-colonial knowledge systems operated outside court patronage could reshape how modern India understands its own institutional and intellectual heritage, and may inform contemporary debates about the role of traditional scholarship in pluralistic societies.
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Between the 17th and mid 19th-century, the Maratha-ruled court of Thanjavur, the last great dynasty of Sanskrit patrons before the establishment of British rule in India, richly contributed to the flourishing of Sanskritic intellectual culture and fine arts. Recently unearthed evidence suggests that most of the Sanskrit works produced under their patronage were composed in the nexus of brahman settlements (agrahara) and monasteries (ma?ha) located in the Kaveri river delta, a fertile region of southern India hosting, among others, large communities of erudite brahman scholars writing in Sanskrit. However, due to the still prevalent narrative according to which traditional Sanskrit scholarship ‘died out’ on the eve of the modern era, Indological research has largely neglected the key role of these peripheral institutions as stand-alone hubs of a sophisticated Sanskrit intellectual life in the Tamil region. This project brings together historians and philologists with expertise in early modern India to fill this important gap and conduct the first large-scale investigation of how these institutions and their networks of innovative scholars interacted and cooperated in the production of Sanskrit expert knowledge (philosophy, theology, devotional literature, belles-lettres, etc.) in the long eighteenth century. Our team will produce the first extensive survey of brahman settlements and monasteries in the Kaveri delta in the prolific period 1650-1800 based on manuscript collections, library catalogues, and epigraphical records. We will make use of data analysis, prosopography, and collaborative specialist readings to: a) understand how these institutions functioned as intellectual communities, both internally and in relation to the court and the several Tamil-speaking centres of learning and religious life in Tamilnadu; b) shed light on the lineages of families, teachers, pupils, and patrons that created the complex networks of Sanskrit expert knowledge in the region; and c) answer key questions about prominent Sanskrit authors active in these communities clarifying their disciplinary affiliations, intellectual practices, and most influential works. By pooling expertise and knowledge of different disciplinary areas and languages, our international team will gain a fuller picture of Sanskrit as a literary language in the Tamil-speaking region of the Kaveri delta. The project will also highlight the still poorly understood role played by Sanskrit expert scholars in the production, transmission, and dissemination of works and ideas in non-courtly settings. Our work will yield important insights into the social history of Sanskrit intellectual cultures and highlight the dynamism of India’s intellectual history in the century leading into the age of British colonialism. The project will also directly feed into the study of modern and contemporary Indian history as many of the institutions, lineages, and scholarly traditions studied in this project survive to the present day. Based at the Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Cambridge, the project will produce a shareable database of works and authors, one co-edited volume, one special issue, articles in peer-reviewed journals and popular media, a website, and public talks in interactive spaces.
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