Faxian
340 CE – 422 CE · aged 82
Chinese Buddhist monk (bhikkhu), pilgrim to India, and travelogue author during the Jin and Liu Song dynasties
- Born
- 340 CE · Xiangyuan County
- Died
- 422 CE · Nanjing
Life timeline
Their life from birth to death. On the timeline, world events of the time are shown faintly.
- 340 CEBornBorn in Xiangyuan County
- 422 CEDiedDied in Nanjing
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Meanwhile in the world
Major world events during their lifetime (340 CE – 422 CE).
- 395 CE – 1453Byzantine Empire
- 395 CE – 476 CEWestern Roman Empire
Biography
Faxian (337–c. 422 CE), formerly romanized as Fa-hien or Fa-hsien, was a Chinese Buddhist monk and translator who traveled on foot from the Later Qin state to classical India to acquire Buddhist scriptures. His birth surname was Gong. Starting his journey about age 60, he traveled west along the overland Silk Road, visiting Buddhist sites in Central, South, and Southeast Asia. The journey and return took from 399 to 412, with 10 years spent in India.
Faxian's account of his pilgrimage, the Foguoji or Record of the Buddhist Kingdoms, is a notable independent record of early Buddhism in India. He returned to China with a large number of Sanskrit texts, whose translations greatly influenced East Asian Buddhism and provide a terminus ante quem for many historical names, events, texts, and ideas therein.
Text from the Wikipedia article Faxian, CC BY-SA 4.0
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