Bibliotheca Jainica
Summary
Satya Ranjan Banerjee’s ‘Bibliotheca Jainica’ is a curated bibliography rather than an argumentative essay. Organised in sections, it catalogues modern scholarship related to Jainism and allied subjects. Section A (General) lists works on Jain cultural organisation, sociolinguistics, literature and philosophy. Examples include Marcus Banks’s study of Jain communities in India and England (Clarendon Press 1992), Cardona and Dhanesh Jain’s comprehensive survey of Indo‑Aryan languages (Routledge 2003) covering writing systems, Sanskrit, Prakrits and modern languages, Madhav Deshpande’s analysis of Sanskrit and Prakrit sociolinguistics (Motilal Banarsidass 1993), and Krishna Kanta Handique’s discussion of Somadeva’s Yaśastilaka and Jain cultural history. The section also notes bibliographies of Prakrit and Jain research by Karpoor Chand Jain and studies of Jain karmanology by Nanda Lal Jain. Subsequent sections (not fully reproduced) presumably cover textual sources, epigraphy, archaeology and other specialised topics. By providing publication details, page counts and occasional content summaries, the compilation offers researchers a ready reference to a wide spectrum of Jain studies, spanning history, language, philosophy, art and ritual. It highlights the breadth of scholarship available up to the early 2000s and serves as a gateway for further exploration of Jain literature and culture.
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Conclusion
This piece is essentially a bibliographic resource. Instead of advancing new arguments, it gathers published works on Jainism across disciplines and summarises their scope. By clustering titles under thematic headings and providing basic annotations, ‘Bibliotheca Jainica’ assists scholars in locating sources for research and underscores the richness of existing scholarship on Jain philosophy, history, language and literature.