Abstract
AN account of the heroic age of India fittingly finds a place in a series which aims at covering the history of civilisation. Regarded integrally in its effect on the life of the peoples of India, the heroic age, as a phase of culture, must rank as an epoch of fundamental importance; but it has also to be recognised that in all probability it is, in mythical form, a record of one of a number of racial movements in world history which, having certain features in common, are mutually illuminative, and even in some cases may be interrelated. Prof. Sidhanta, throughout his study of the heroic age of India, points out again and again the similarities in the epic stories contained in the Mahabharata, the Puranas, and the Ramayana, and those of the Iliad and Odyssey, Beowulf, and the Serbian cycle of Marko, the hero of the battle of Kossovo.
The Heroic Age of India: a Comparative Study.
By Prof. N. K. Sidhanta. (The History of Civilization Series.) Pp. viii + 232. (London: Kegan Paul and Co., Ltd.; New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1929.) 12s. 6d. net.
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[Book Reviews]. Nature 125, 375 (1930). https://doi.org/10.1038/125375b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/125375b0