Traditional dates of Buddha?

[Valerie J Roebuck]

'The Dating of the Historical Buddha' is also available in English.

Valerie J Roebuck
Manchester, UK

Dean Anderson writes:

>Thanks for the reply. My German has gotten a bit rusty with disuse over the
>years but I'm dusting it off.
>
>So, the traditional dates of 1700 and 1000 BC are just one of a multitude of
>claimed dates and don't have any particularly large or influential groups
>that hold to them?
>
>Dean
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Peter Wyzlic" <pwyzlic at UNI-BONN.DE>
>To: <INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk>
>Sent: Wednesday, April 02, 2003 4:02 AM
>Subject: Re: Traditional dates of Buddha?
>
>
>On Tue, 1 Apr 2003 dean_anderson at SACARI.ORG wrote:
>
>>  I recently ran across mention that (some) Buddhists hold the Buddha's date
>>  to be around 1700 B.C. Perhaps this is a Tibetan tradition?
>>
>>  Another source said that some hold it to be 1000 B.C. I believe this may
>be
>>  a date from some in the Sankaracarya tradition who would then put Sankara
>at
>>  around 5-600 B.C.
>>
>>  These dates are obviously much earlier than those commonly accepted among
>>  scholars -- even given the range of differing opinions among them.
>>
>>  Are these dates accepted by a large number of followers in Buddhism and
>>  Vedanta?
>>
>>  What are their reasons for choosing these dates?
>
>Concerning the dating of Buddha Sakyamuni, see the congress volumes ed. by
>H. Bechert. There you will find lots of possible and impossible dates and
>where they may come from.
>
>See: The dating of the historical Buddha = Die Datierung des
>historischen Buddha / ed. by Heinz Bechert. - Gttingen : Vandenhoeck &
>Ruprecht 1991-1997 (Symposien zur Buddhismusforschung ; 4) (Abhandlungen der
>Akademie der Wissenschaften in G ttingen : philologisch-historische
>Klasse ; ...)
>
>1 / ed. by Heinz Bechert. - 1991. - XV, 525 S. -  (Symposien zur
>Buddhismusforschung ; 4,1) (Abhandlungen der Akademie der Wissenschaften
>in Gttingen : philologisch-historische Klasse ; Folge 3, 189)
>ISBN 3-525-82476-9
>
>2 / ed. by Heinz Bechert. - 1992. - X, 530 S. -  (Symposien zur
>Buddhismusforschung ; 4,2) (Abhandlungen der Akademie der Wissenschaften
>in G ttingen : philologisch-historische Klasse ; Folge 3, 194)
>ISBN 3-525-82481-5
>
>3 / ed. by Heinz Bechert. - 1997. - VI, 171 S. -  (Symposien zur
>Buddhismusforschung ; 4,3) (Abhandlungen der Akademie der Wissenschaften
>in Gttingen : philologisch-historische Klasse ; Folge 3, 222)
>ISBN 3-525-82419-X
>
>Hope it helps
>Peter Wyzlic