Talk:Takshashila University

University ?
Aren't these "university's" in India more like the Greek "Lyceum" or "Academy"? It seems a bit irresponsible and far-fetched to call them a university. Did they have an established curriculum, building complexes, paid professors? The Europeans don't really begin to call them universities until they incorporate as a university and have paid professors... Stevenmitchell 06:23, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Dear Stevenmitchell, I don't think it was like a Greek Lyceum; more, perhaps, like a monastery town&mdash;like a Mont Saint-Michel, with students living nearby. According to Encyclopaedia Britannica: Taxila, besides being a provincial seat, was also a centre of learning. It was not a university town with lecture halls and residential quarters, such as have been found at Nalanda in the Indian state of Bihar. At Taxila, the preceptor housed his own pupils, who paid for their board and lodging in cash or in the form of service to the teacher and his family. The Buddhist monasteries also catered to the needs of the students and monks.


 * I hope this quote is not too long (i.e. a copyvio), but it does seem to settle the "university" question.  Fowler&amp;fowler  «Talk»  12:28, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Does that sound like a European monastery to you? Where students or pupils stayed at someone's house and paid for a room to learn. Doesn't sound like the production facility of a monastery. I think monasteries were a bit flatter in their hierarchy. It may be the Britannica's analogy but it sounds very confusing.

The Buddhist monasteries also catered to the needs of the students and monks seems a bit ambiguous. I would think it would be better if we could get a more effective description, rather than one as speculative.

Regards, Steve Stevenmitchell 13:15, 27 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Steven, Takshashila is wrongly associated as being ONLY a centre of Buddhist learning, whereas it was a centre of Vedic (or in modern sense, "Hindu") learning also. The Indian equivalent of Michiavelli, Chanakya was a teacher there and he composed his magnum opus, the Arthashastra there.


 * Takshashila would be incorrectly attributed as only a large Academy or a collection of religious schools. Considering its time, its importance at that time, and the large amount of intellectual products (both Vedic & Buddhist) which were churned out from there, it would be appropriate to call it a University of that time. IAF


 * Hi Steve, Yes, come to think of it, a monastery (as in Benedectine) is not the best analogy. I've added an extended quote from a book below.  It will give you a better idea.  In any case, what I was trying to say above, was that Taxila was not a university and shouldn't be labeled as such.  Fowler&amp;fowler  «Talk»  21:33, 27 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Hi IAF, As both Encyclopaedia Britannica (quoted above) and Scharfe's book, Education in Ancient India, quoted below, take pains to state, Taxila, was not a university.  A university has a specific meaning in current parlance: established curriculum, lecture halls and other buildings, (often) residential quarters, paid professors, and the authority to grant degrees.  Taxila did not meet these criteria.  It may have been a precursor to a university, but being a precursor doesn't make it the real thing.   Fowler&amp;fowler  «Talk»  21:33, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Guinness Book
I have removed the incorrect claim that Guinness Book recognizes Taxila as the world's oldest university. The Guinness book recognizes a university in Morrocco, see here, as the world's oldest. As I have mentioned above, Taxila was a center of learning, but (as Britannica says as well) it was not a university in the usual sense of the word. Fowler&amp;fowler «Talk»  14:47, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Why does this page exist?
Why is this page even here (i.e. in Wikipedia)? The Taxila page is more extensive and has everything here and more. This page should simply be deleted, as there is not one sentence in it that is not already in the Taxila page. Fowler&amp;fowler «Talk»  15:08, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Why do people lie?
Why do people feel the need to add text that is plainly not true? The text mentioned that the Guinness book considered Taxila to be the world's oldest university. That, however, is not true. Next, another reference, Hartmut Scharfe's Education in Ancient India was cited as mentioning Taxila to be the world's oldest university. I read through the relevant pages of Scharfe's book. Nowhere does he call Taxila a university, let alone the world's oldest! He is very careful to only refer to it as a center of learning. Here is what he says: The earliest reports about instructional institutions that we have refer to the city of Taxila, as the Greeks called it, corresponding to Sanskrit Taksasila (Panini IV 3 93) and Pali Takkasila in Gandhara that contained several monasteries (vihara), all, it seems, involved in teaching. The archaeological site is quite large; but no large lecture halls or dormitories have been discovered. By all indications instructions in these early schools and monasteries was conducted still in an individualistic fashion, not totally unlike the acarya-kula-system, or perhaps more like in an asrama. Independent teachers or individual monks taught single individuals or small groups of students, even if they were part of a larger monastic institution, and perhaps even supervised by the monastic community at large. It was probably another matter when the physician Jivaka Komarabhacca from Rajagaha (Rajagrha) is said to have received his medical training over seven years from his teacher at Takkasila, because there is no indication that the teacher was a monk or even affiliated with a monastery; but his report, too, shows the city as a center of higher learning at an early time....

We have to be extremely cautious in dealing with the literary evidence, because much of the information offered in the secondary literature on Taxila is derived from Jataka prose that was only fixed in Ceylon several centuries after the events that it purports to describe, probably some time after Buddhaghosa, i.e. around A. D. 500. Since the data gleaned from the Jatakas probably represent more the imagination of a late commentator than a tradition of factual knowledge, it will be best to neglect these tales and to rely on more authentic sources. We may accept, though, that Taxila was a well known as a center for higher studies in the Buddhist tradition, as it is mentioned again and again.

It's one thing to make a good faith mistake, but it's another to deliberately cite the Guinness Book or Scharfe's book for a claim, when there is no evidence for it in these sources. That is falsification, plain and simple! Fowler&amp;fowler «Talk»  16:48, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

UNESCO World Heritage Site Citation
The UNESCO World Heritage List brief description describes Taxila as: From the ancient Neolithic tumulus of Saraikala to the ramparts of Sirkap (2nd century B.C.) and the city of Sirsukh (1st century A.D.), Taxila illustrates the different stages in the development of a city on the Indus that was alternately influenced by Persia, Greece and Central Asia and which, from the 5th century B.C. to the 2nd century A.D., was an important Buddhist centre of learning.

Again, as I have repeatedly said above, no mention is made of a university. Fowler&amp;fowler «Talk»  21:58, 27 February 2007 (UTC)