Posted on: 29 April 2013

NALANDA - The ancient seat of learning

Towards the Southeast of Patna, the Capital City of Bihar State in India, is a village called the 'Bada Gaon', in the vicinity of which, are the world famous ruins of Nalanda University.

Founded in the 5th Century A.D., Nalanda is known as the ancient seat of learning. 2,000 Teachers and 10,000 Students from all over the Buddhist world lived and studied at Nalanda, the first Residential International University of the World.

A walk in the ruins of the university, takes you to an era, that saw India leading in imparting knowledge, to the world - the era when India was a coveted place for studies. The University flourished during the 5th and 12th century.

Although Nalanda is one of the places distinguished as having been blessed by the presence of the Buddha, it later became particularly renowned as the site of the great monastic university of the same name , which was to become the crown jewel of the development of Buddhism in India. The name may derive from one of Shakyamuni's former births , when he was a king whose capital was here. Nalanda was one of his epithets meaning "insatiable in giving."

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Nalanda's name origin is a Tamil word : 'Nalum Thaa' which means "Share everyday". These two words were joined together to form 'Nalanda'

Nalanda is a Sanskrit word which means means "giver of knowledge" . It is a combination of "Nalam" (lotus, representing knowledge) and "Da" ("to give").

Nice photo sarat.

Where does the "founded in 5th AD century" for Nalanda comes from?? Wiki quotes Xuanzang thus Xuanzang also writes: "The lives of all these virtuous men were naturally governed by habits of the most solemn and strictest kind. Thus in the seven hundred years of the monastery's existence no man has ever contravened the rules of the discipline. The king showers it with the signs of his respect and veneration and has assigned the revenue from a hundred cities to pay for the maintenance of the religious."[20] [edit] Xyanzang was 602-664. So that takes the foundation of the university at least to 100 BCE. And this is bih.nic.in site. Wonderful. Sumedha Verma Ojha -- Please interject with your views. Is this 5th century dating driven by an need to keep the Gupta's to post AD era, from their natural time of 3-4th BCE?

I share for Badshah!

Satyakam The origins of Nalanda are shrouded in mist. There are indications that this site for the establishment of a university was mentioned during Mauryan times also.

It makes me proud when I think of Nalanda and sad when I think that now we have to go abroad for knowledge . Hope we rise to our past glory and live up to it - needs honesty and dedication

vilas sir, every brahmin who argues with me to prove their intelligence try to stroke me with the invention of ''0'' i.e zero. And Iam trying gather lot of information on it and and indications are something which droves me to buddhism and zero wasnt a invention of aryabhatta it was discovery (a sophisticated theift) from buddhist universities and teachings. * Shunyata = null = no value = zero = shunya ananta = uncountable = not defined = infinite nirvana etc... Facts needs more study and authentication of information!

@Shrikant Ramteke: Would like to know more about the Buddhist origins of Zero. Can you share any sources you may know?

these are all BUILT! that is the beauty UltimatE! what else you want to be trustful. :)

1)in childhood i had an impression that nalanda is from B C. later i learnt that it is from A D. this did not harm my respect. but one thing, the buddha could never have visited this place then. the buddha was born around 500 BC and nalanda was founded around 500 AD. 2) i have my greatest respect for this seat of learning. 3) that this university is being revived is one greatest news.