Vedic India

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During its development the Vedic civilisation came into contact with the indigenous culture of the Dravidians and Mundas, and to an extent which cannot be determined, with the urban culture of Mohenjo-Daro (Przvluski). Though probably inferior to both, and certainly inferior to the latter in technical ability, it impose itself upon them primarily by its military power. The Indians of the Veda, of the mixed pastoral-agricultural type and perhaps semi-nomads, were above all warriors. The dominant concern expressed in the hymns is to defend the. wealth they have conquered, to extend their domains, and to enjoy the "wide open" plains after having emerged from the "narrow" confines of their Iranian home. The intense development of the priestly spirit in the post-Rig-vedic texts was not able entirely to overcome this state of mind, which spontaneously modified the more pacific trend of the Brahmanic culture which supervened after die first invasions. But the Vedic culture was also enabled to impose itself by the richness of its religious ideas, which were powerful enough to set the framework of all the forms assumed by the religions of India through the centuries which followed.

After passing the agrégation examination in 1920, Louis Renou taught for a year at the lycée in Rouen. He then took a sabbatical, read the works of Sanskrit scholars and attended the classes of Antoine Meillet. Henceforth he opted exclusively for the study of Sanskrit. He attended the lectures of Jules Bloch at the École des hautes études. The work he did at this time gave rise to Les maîtres a philologie védique (1928). His doctoral thesis, submitted in 1925, was La valeur du parfait dans les hymnes védiques. After a short time at the Faculté de lettres in Lyon, he moved to L'École des hautes études and then to the Sorbonne where he succeeded Alfred A. Foucher. In 1946 he was elected to the Académie des Inscriptions.

In the following years he undertook three journeys: India in 1948-1949, Yale University in 1953, and Tokyo in 1954-1956 where he was director of the Maison franco-japonaise. He hardly travelled after this.

He had settled on his line of study early on and never wrote about any subject other than India. He left to one side archaeology, political history and Buddhism and concentrated firmly on the tradition that, beginning with the Rig Veda, runs through all aspects of belief and practice right up to the present. For forty years he regularly published articles and books that were often voluminous, were based on original research, and are of considerable merit. The study of the Indian theory of grammar lies at the heart of his work. This can be seen in the Études védiques et paninéennes published between 1955 and 1966. The Etudes consist of more than two thousand pages of translation and commentary of Vedic hymns. The Études covered two thirds of the Rig Veda by the time of his death.

He, in his 1953 lectures on the religions of India, observe that "the Jaina movement presents evidence that is of great interest both for the historical and comparative study of religion in ancient India and for the history of religion in general. Based on profoundly Indian elements, it is at the same time a highly original creation, containing very ancient material, more ancient than that of Buddhism, and your highly refined and elaborated."

Louis Renou was director of the Institut de civilisation indienne and attended regularly meetings of the Académie and the Societé Asiatique. He died in 1966.

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