Roxann prazniak biography of william

Comparative Studies in Society and History, 2014

Buddhism contributed to the culture and politics of thirteenth-century Eurasian intellectual exch...

more Buddhism contributed to the culture and politics of thirteenth-century Eurasian intellectual exchange, depositing literary, artistic, and architectural traces subsequently eclipsed by layers of Islamic and Eurocentric history.

Within extensive cross-continental networks of diplomatic and commercial activity, Ilkhanid Buddhism and the Buddhist revival of which it was a part drew serious attention among contemporary travelers, scholars, and statesmen including Ibn Taymiyah, Roger Bacon, and Rashid al-Din.

This article argues that awareness of a Buddhist scholarly and political elite in the Muslim heartland, with its