Preta Narratives in the Mahavastu
- Date of account
- Compiled over several centuries; approximately 2nd century BCE–4th century CE
- Location
- Northwestern South Asia and wider Buddhist textual networks
- Source
- model_recalled_reference
- Record updated
- 2026-10-10
Record summary
The Mahavastu contains Buddhist narrative material involving rebirth, hungry ghosts, karmic consequences and encounters with beings outside ordinary human society. These passages are relevant as late antique South Asian textual comparators for apparitional testimony, death pollution and the social interpretation of unusual encounters. The text is composite, preserved in Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit and transmitted through monastic literary culture. Individual stories should be identified from a translation or edition before comparison, because broad summaries can blur doctrinal narrative, miracle story and local folklore.
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