The Sources of the Medieval Image of India, and the Effect of This Image on the Idea of the American Indian

FAIN: FT-12730-75

Thomas G. Hahn
University of Rochester (Rochester, NY 14627-0001)

To study the relations between a group of 8 Greek and Latin texts that form the basis of medieval understanding of India in the West. Through a collation and comparison of these works and recensions of them (all dating from the 4th to the 12th centuries) the study will indicate the precise sequence of developments that established these fictional Indians in the consciousness of the late Middle Ages as the foremost instance of non-Christian virtue, and the embodiment of the possibility of external happiness outside Christianity. The P.I. will also consider the relation of a Middle English translation of Alexander's Letter to Aristotle to its Latin sources.