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Photo: Thomas Hickey (1741–1824) · Public domain
Manuscript · Collected c. 1796–1821

The Mackenzie manuscripts

Found
Gathered across South India by Colin Mackenzie, later the first Surveyor General of India, and his Indian assistants led by Kavali Venkata Borayya and his brother Lakshmayya
Kept at
Government Oriental Manuscripts Library, Chennai; British Library, London; and in Kolkata

The largest collection of South Indian manuscripts, local histories and copied inscriptions ever made, much of it recorded from village elders, temple priests and family archives.

What it says

H. H. Wilson’s catalogue of 1828 lists 1,568 manuscripts, besides volumes of local tracts and copied inscriptions, coins, images and drawings. The heart of it is the kaifiyats, histories of villages, temples, forts and chiefs written down in Telugu, Kannada, Tamil and Marathi. After Mackenzie’s death in 1821 the East India Company bought the collection from his widow for £10,000.

What it proves

Much of what is known about the Vijayanagara empire, the Nayakas and the palegars rests on these records, gathered by Indian scholars just before the old memory faded.

Evidence for

Vijayanagara Empire (Sangama, Saluva, Tuluva, Aravidu)

The Vijayanagara empire

Hampi (Vijayanagara)

Hampi’s first survey

Evidence

The Arthashastra manuscript found in 1905Manuscript
Text of Kautilya, minister of Chandragupta Maurya; this Grantha copy c. 16th century, identified 1905

The Arthashastra manuscript found in 1905

The palm-leaf copy that brought Kautilya’s Arthashastra, the ancient book of statecraft, back into print after centuries in which it was known only by quotation.

The Spitzer manuscriptManuscript
c. 2nd century CE (radiocarbon 80–230 CE)

The Spitzer manuscript

The oldest philosophical manuscript in Sanskrit, named after Moritz Spitzer who first studied it, which holds a list of the parvas of the Mahabharata.

The Bower manuscriptManuscript
c. 6th century CE; acquired 1890

The Bower manuscript

Birch-bark leaves in Gupta-era Brahmi holding seven texts, three of them on medicine, including the Navanitaka.

The Gilgit manuscriptsManuscript
c. 5th–7th century CE; found 1931

The Gilgit manuscripts

Birch-bark books of Buddhist scripture in Sanskrit, the oldest manuscript collection to survive in the subcontinent.

The Bakhshali manuscriptManuscript
Radiocarbon dates between the 3rd and 10th centuries CE (2017; the dating is debated)

The Bakhshali manuscript

Seventy fragile leaves of birch bark holding a book of arithmetic in Sharada script, in which zero is written as a dot.

Manuscripts of the Sushruta SamhitaManuscript
Oldest dated copy 878 CE

Manuscripts of the Sushruta Samhita

A palm-leaf copy of the Sushruta Samhita made in Nepal in 878 CE, older than any other dated copy and older than the commentary of Dalhana that shaped the printed text.

Rigveda manuscripts at BORI, PuneManuscript
Copied c. 1464–1800s CE; on the UNESCO register since 2007

Rigveda manuscripts at BORI, Pune

Thirty manuscripts of the Rigveda, some with Sayana’s commentary, that UNESCO entered in its Memory of the World Register in 2007.

The Mewar RamayanaManuscript
1649–1653 CE

The Mewar Ramayana

Valmiki’s Ramayana in more than four hundred paintings, made at the Sisodia court while Mewar still refused to bow to the Mughals in spirit.