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The dates of ancient texts from India are claimed over a whole wide range. There is as much as 2,000 years of divergence between the earliest speculative date a

The dates of ancient texts from India are claimed over a whole wide range. There is as much as 2,000 years of divergence between the earliest speculative date and absolutely attested known date for the Vedas, for example. A good outline of the issues in historiography of India can be found in Mathematics in India by Kim Plofker[1], who was trained both as a mathematician and Sanskrit scholar. Not always knowing when a particular text was composed has a lot of influence on knowing or not knowing which ideas appeared in what era in the development of science and mathematics in India. (One difference between India and either China or the near east is that the writing materials used in India, often plaited sheets of palm leaves, were much less durable than the silk sheets or bamboo slats used in China, or the fired clay tablets or papyrus sheets or parchment hides used in the near east. So many of the earliest writings from India have perished, while remarkably old writings still exist from either China or Sumer.) [1] http://www.amazon.com/Mathematics-India-Kim-Plofker/dp/0691120676 http://www.amazon.com/Mathematics-India-Kim-Plofker/dp/06911...

maaku 13y ago
The oldest writings in China are not much more than 2,000 years old. Maybe you're thinking of oracle bones & bronze inscriptions? But those are rarely more than a sentence or two in isolation.
- tokenadult 13y ago
  The formation of the texts of Confucius and Mencius of course is older than that. The Qin book-burning destroyed a lot of the books that were that old, but bamboo manuscripts and silk manuscripts are still being discovered from archeological sites that are much older than any surviving writings from India. I have personally read in museums bronze inscriptions that are more than just a few sentences long, dating back about three millennia. http://blog.seattlepi.com/bookpatrol/2010/01/29/rare-bamboo-strip-books-discovered-in-chinese-tomb/ http://blog.seattlepi.com/bookpatrol/2010/01/29/rare-bamboo-... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mawangdui_Silk_Texts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mawangdui_Silk_Texts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamboo_and_wooden_slips https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamboo_and_wooden_slips
  - maaku 13y ago
    The Qin book-burning was mainly what I was referring to, but I didn't know there was significant recovery of bamboo or silk manuscripts going on (such material does not generally last 2,000 years without unusual environmental conditions). I've also seen the long-form bronze inscriptions in museums - but those are the exceptions. That's why they're in museums ;)

maaku 13y ago

The oldest writings in China are not much more than 2,000 years old. Maybe you're thinking of oracle bones & bronze inscriptions? But those are rarely more than a sentence or two in isolation.

tokenadult 13y ago
The formation of the texts of Confucius and Mencius of course is older than that. The Qin book-burning destroyed a lot of the books that were that old, but bamboo manuscripts and silk manuscripts are still being discovered from archeological sites that are much older than any surviving writings from India. I have personally read in museums bronze inscriptions that are more than just a few sentences long, dating back about three millennia. http://blog.seattlepi.com/bookpatrol/2010/01/29/rare-bamboo-strip-books-discovered-in-chinese-tomb/ http://blog.seattlepi.com/bookpatrol/2010/01/29/rare-bamboo-... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mawangdui_Silk_Texts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mawangdui_Silk_Texts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamboo_and_wooden_slips https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamboo_and_wooden_slips
- maaku 13y ago
  The Qin book-burning was mainly what I was referring to, but I didn't know there was significant recovery of bamboo or silk manuscripts going on (such material does not generally last 2,000 years without unusual environmental conditions). I've also seen the long-form bronze inscriptions in museums - but those are the exceptions. That's why they're in museums ;)