Nina Mirnig

Contact

Dr. Nina Mirnig

- Indian Studies
- Tel (+43-1) 51581-6411
- nina.mirnig@oeaw.ac.at
Curriculum Vitae

Nina Mirnig (born 1982) received her BA (2004), M.St. (2005) and D.Phil. (2010) in Oriental Studies/Sanskrit from Oxford University with a research focus on early Śaivism and tantric rituals during her graduate studies. Her research interests include the development and history of early Śaivism and its literary traditions (in particular early Śaiva tantras and manuals as well as the Sivadharma corpus), rituals and beliefs concerning death and afterlife in Hinduism, and the study of epigraphical material as a source for religio-political and cultural history, with special focus on Śaivism in Nepal during the Licchavi period.

Nina Mirnig joined the Institute for the Cultural and Intellectual History of Asia in June 2014 as a member of the FWF project Visions of Community. In this framework she co-organized the VISCOM conference "Tantric Communities in Context: Sacred Secrets and Public Rituals" (together with Vincent Eltschinger and Marion Rastelli) at the institute, 5-7 February 2015 and worked on her book manuscript "Liberating the Liberated. A History of the Development of Cremation and Ancestor Worship in the Early Śaiva Siddhānta", which deals with the earliest surviving Śaiva Tantric sources on death and memorial rituals.

Since July 2015, Nina Mirnig works on the FWF project "The Śivaliṅga Cult on the Eve of the Tantric Age: A Study and Critical Edition of the Śivadharmaśāstra Chapters 1-5 and 7-9".

Publications

Monographs

“Liberating the Liberated. A History of the Development of Cremation and Ancestor Worship in the Early Śaiva Siddhānta.” Doctoral Thesis, Oxford University, 2010. Book manuscript currently under preparation.

Edited Volumes

Natasja Bosma, Nina Mirnig, ed., 2013
Epigraphical Evidence for the Formation and Rise of Early Śaivism. (Special Issue of the Indo-Iranian Journal 56:3/4.) Leiden: Brill, 2013.

Nina Mirnig, Peter Daniel Szanto, Michael Williams, ed., 2013
Puṣpikā: Tracing Ancient India through Texts and Traditions. Contributions to Current Research in Indology. Oxford: Oxbow Books, 2013.

Articles

"Inscribing Merit, Obtaining Might: Early Śivaliṅga Foundation Inscriptions and Patterns of Religious Donations in Early Medieval Nepal" (forthcoming)
“Hungry Ghost or Divine Soul? Post-Mortem Initiation in Medieval Śaiva Tantric Death Rites,” in Ultimate Ambiguities. Investigating Death and Liminality. Eds. Peter Berger and Justin Kroesen. Berghahn Books. (2014, in press)
“Favoured by the Venerable Lord Paśupati. Tracing the Rise of a new Tutelary Deity in Epigraphic Expressions of Power in Early Medieval Nepal,” in the Indo-Iranian Journal, Volume 53, 3/4, Brill. (2013)
“Śaiva Siddhānta Śrāddha. Towards an Evaluation of its Performance in the Early Medieval Period,” in Puṣpikā. Tracing Ancient India Through Texts and Tradition. Contributions to Current Research in Indology. Oxbow Books, Oxford. (2013)

Cooperations

Hans T. Bakker, Peter C. Bisschop, Yuko Yokochi, eds., in cooperation with Nina Mirnig and Judit Toerzsoek (2014)
The Skandapurāṇa. Volume IIB. Adhyāyas 31-52. The Vāhana and Naraka Cycles. Critical Edition with and Introduction and annotated English Synopsis. Brill, 2014.