Indian Studies Teaching Staff
Dr Vincenzo Vergiani
Contact Information
Email: vv234@cam.ac.uk
Current Position
University Lecturer in Sanskrit
Biographical Details
After an MA in psychology, I turned to South Asian studies, took a second MA in Sanskrit and later, a Ph.D. in Classical and Mediaeval Indian Studies from the University of Rome “La Sapienza”, where I was lecturer in Indology for a few years.
My main areas of research are the history of linguistic ideas and the philosophy of language in ancient India, and their place in the broader historical context of early Brahmanism. I am a member of an international team working on the critical edition of the Kāśikā Vṛtti (7th c. CE), the first complete commentary on the Aṣṭādhyāyī of Pāṇini, the first part of which was published in 2009. I am also preparing an annotated translation of the Sādhanasamuddeśa of Bhartṛhari with the commentary of Helārāja, from the third book of the Vākyapadīya.
In recent years I have developed an interest in Classical Tamil and its intellectual traditions. This led to the organization of an international workshop on “Bilingualism and Cross-cultural Fertilisation: Sanskrit and Tamil in Mediaeval India”, co-convened with Dr Whitney Cox (SOAS), which was held at Wolfson College, Cambridge in May, 2009 with the generous support of the British Academy (the proceedings are now in press).
In 2011 I was awarded an AHRC Standard Route research grant for the project "The intellectual and religious traditions of South Asia as seen through the Sanskrit manuscript collections of the University Library, Cambridge". The project began in November 2011 and will last three years.
