Comparison of Buddhist Principles with Archaeological Execution

Abstract

Buddhism has been widely studied in many fields, including history, temporary development, source, textual study, oral communications and practices. Archaeology is one of the most significant sciences employed in Buddhist Studies. Even if archaeology and Buddhism come from different origins, archaeology plays a significant role as a tool used in exploring historic facts of Buddhism. A number of archaeologists have explored philosophy to support their study; however, it is obvious that Buddhist philosophy has never used in archaeological investigation or execution. Merely, Buddhist philosophies or principles are utilized to explain stories, doctrines or even Buddhist philosophies possibly recorded on artefacts. Based on the documentary research and the involved scholar group discussion, this paper discusses the possibility to apply Buddhist principles into the science of archaeology. In other words, it compares Theravada Buddhist principles with the archaeological process. The research methodology began with an intensive study of the archaeological texts in order to obtain proper comprehension of its nature. Thenceforth, the Buddhist texts were analyzed to determine the most suitable principles applied in the archaeological processes. The studied results indicates that an archaeology incorporates three important key terms: 1) ‘subject matter’ (a study of the past), 2) ‘techniques’ (the means of describing and explaining the past to discover, recover, preserve, describe and analyze the remains of the past) and 3) ‘theories’ (theories used to assess meanings of evidence), Buddhist principles alternatively applied as theories to study the ‘subject matter’ of the past as found in the archaeological process of the Mississippi Valley Archaeology Centre (MVAC) at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse.