The Chinese monk Xuanzang travels the Silk Road to India against imperial orders, studies at Nalanda, and returns with hundreds of texts and a record of the Western regions; his translations set the standard of Chinese Buddhist scholarship, and his journey later flowers into the Journey to the West.
The Event
- Date
- 629–645 (exact)
- Era
- Classical; Standard periodization of Buddhist history
- Location
- Chang'an to Nalanda; today Xi'an, China, to Bihar, India
- Traditions
- Buddhism
- Streams
- Mahayana
- Key figures
- Xuanzang
- Key texts
- Great Tang Records on the Western Regions, Heart Sutra (Xuanzang's translation)
Primary Sources
- Xuanzang, Da Tang Xiyu Ji
Secondary Sources
- Buswell and Lopez, The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism (Princeton, 2014)
- Harvey, An Introduction to Buddhism: Teachings, History and Practices (Cambridge, 2nd ed. 2013)
Provenance: HIST-0414; confidence 0.95; accessed 2026-10-27.
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- Nalanda at its height History Event
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