Narmadāparikramā - Circumambulation of the Narmadā River

In Narmadāparikramā. Circumambulation of the Narmadā River Jürgen Neuss offers for the first time a comprehensive study of the Narmadāparikramā, a singular Hindu pilgrimage, which comprises the complete circumambulation of the Central Indian river Narmadā. Following a brief general introduction, the first part of the book comprises a text-historical analysis of the Sanskrit texts which are traditionally regarded as the basis for this rite. The second part represents a synoptic translation of two modern pilgrims’ handbooks in Hindi, which link the mythological place names of the Sanskrit texts with actual geographical locations. Part three consists of synopses of available Sanskrit source texts, and the concluding part summarizes the many-fold findings and results of the study in thematically arranged maps.

Jürgen Neuss, Ph.D. (2007), studied Indology at Berlin and Allahabad. He worked at Free University Berlin from 2000-2010, until the closure of the Indological Department was finalized. He has published a number of articles on different indological subjects.

'Overall, however, the book as the first comprehensive study of the Narmadāparikramā opens up many important areas of research, and may be used profitably by any student of Māhātmya literature, an important but still understudied genre of literature, and HIndu pilgrimage at large.'
Just Boedeker, Berlin, Orientalistische Literaturzeitung, 110, 4-5 (2015)