E. J. Rapson

Edward James Rapson FBA (12 May 1861 – 3 October 1937) was a British numismatist, philologist and professor of Sanskrit at the University of Cambridge. He was a fellow of St. John's College. Rapson died following a sudden collapse at dinner at St. John's. Quotes The Cambridge History of India (1922) thumb|The one clear unity which India has possessed throughout history has been geographical. The great continent of Asia falls naturally into four parts or sub-continents. The east drains to the Pacific, and is mainly Buddhist. The north and west centre lie open in an arctic direction, and during the past century were united under Russian rule. The south-west, or Lower Asia, is the land of passage from Asia into Africa, and from the Indian ocean to the Atlantic. It is the homeland of Islam. In the middle south is the Indian sub-continent.The inhabitants of the United States describe their vast land as a sub-continent. As regards everything but mere area the expression is more appropriate to India. A single race and a single religion are overwhelmingly dominant in the United States, but in India a long history lives to-day in the most striking contrasts, presenting all manner of problems which it will take generations to solve.In the past there have been great empires in India, but it is a new thing that the entire region from the Hindu Kush to Ceylon, and from Seistān to the Irrawaddy should be united fix a single political system. The one clear unity which India has possessed throughout history has been geographical. In no other part of the world, unless perhaps in South America, are the physical features on a grander scale. Yet no where else are they more simply combined into a single natural region. Vol. I, ch. i, p. 1 Their oldest literature...supplies no certain indication that they still retained the recollection of their former home; and we may reasonably conclude, therefore, that the invasion which brought them into India took place at a date considerably earlier. Vol. I, ch. ii, p. 43 Quotes about Rapson To Rapson there never was any originality in ancient Indian history, which was also a collection of histories of many separate countries. It is against characters like Rapson that Indian scholars of ancient India wielded their pens. D. K. Chakrabarti, "Nationalism in the study of ancient Indian history", National Security, vol. 4, no. 1 (2021), pp. 29-50 External links Category:1861 births Category:1937 deaths Category:Academics from the United Kingdom Category:Philologists Category:University of Cambridge faculty Category:Indologists Category:University of Cambridge alumni Category:Fellows of the British Academy