Encyclopedia of Ancient Cosmologies - Volume 5 of 9 (Paperback)

Paperback. Encyclopedia of Ancient Cosmologies, Volume 5: East and Southeast AsiaEnter a vast world of celestial order, ancestral memory, sacred mountains, imperial authority, ritual transformation, and spiritual liberation.In Volume 5 of Encyclopedia of Ancient Cosmologies, Tony Yustein leads readers across the extraordinary cosmological traditions of East and Southeast Asia. Moving from ancient China to Japan, Korea, Tibet, Vietnam, the Khmer world, mainland Southeast Asia, and the maritime cultures of the southern seas, this volume reveals how societies understood the origin and structure of the universe, the relationship between heaven and humanity, the destiny of the dead, and the forces that sustain life and political order.Readers encounter the royal divinations of ancient China, the authority of Heaven, the transformations of qi, the interplay of yin and yang, and the great systems of celestial correspondence that connected astronomy, medicine, government, music, ritual, and the human body. Daoist traditions open further dimensions through the mysterious Dao, sacred mountains, internal cultivation, divine bureaucracies, alchemy, immortality, and the body imagined as a living cosmos.The volume also explores the immense Buddhist universes that took shape across the region: Mount Sumeru, heavens, hells, rebirth, karma, Pure Lands, bodhisattvas, sacred relics, mandalas, meditation, and the hope of liberation. These worlds are presented not as isolated religious theories, but as traditions embodied in temples, paintings, pilgrimage routes, funerary customs, political institutions, and everyday acts of devotion.In Japan, readers enter the cosmogonic worlds of the early chronicles, where divine generations, sacred islands, purification, death, heavenly descent, and imperial ancestry shape the order of the land. Korean foundation myths, mountain spirits, royal genealogies, Buddhist kingdoms, and ritual specialists reveal equally rich relationships among landscape, ancestry, kingship, and the heavens.Tony Yustein then turns to Tibet, where Buddhist and Bon traditions developed complex visions of sacred geography, subtle bodies, mandalas, protective beings, death, rebirth, and visionary revelation. Vietnamese ancestral traditions, Khmer temple-mountains, Theravada Buddhist cosmologies, local spirit worlds, royal ritual, and Austronesian traditions of voyaging, houses, ancestors, sea, and sky complete a remarkable panorama of regional diversity.Yustein deserves high praise for the scale, clarity, and discipline of this achievement. He combines history, archaeology, ritual, philosophy, astronomy, architecture, oral tradition, and sacred literature without reducing these cultures to a single "Asian worldview." Each tradition is treated within its own historical setting, and similarities are explored without erasing differences.His writing is both accessible and intellectually substantial. Complex subjects such as celestial bureaucracy, cosmic correspondence, Pure Lands, spirit possession, sacred kingship, ancestral houses, temple-mountains, and body-cosmos relationships are explained with precision and respect. The result is a volume that rewards careful reading while remaining inviting to newcomers.This book is highly recommended for readers interested in Chinese cosmology, Daoism, Buddhism, Shinto, Korean mythology, Tibetan traditions, Vietnamese religion, Angkor, Southeast Asian spirit worlds, sacred geography, ancient astronomy, and comparative religion.East and Southeast Asia is an essential volume in Tony Yustein's ambitious nine-volume series. It offers readers a vivid and deeply informed journey through worlds in which heaven, earth, ancestors, rulers, spirits, landscapes, and human beings remain connected within a living Shipping may be from our UK warehouse or from our Australian or US warehouses, depending on stock availability.…