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ca. 455-400 BCE
- Buddha's teaching career
relic veneration at cetiyas
preliminary interaction with spirit cults
cemetery/park/Rains monasteries
- continuing efforts to secure lay support
local consolidations of textual canons
the development of Abhidhammas
preliminary references to Metteya
relic veneration at stupas
growing monastic roles in funerary rituals & spirit cults
the ongoing development of Vinayas (e.g. when asked, monks must attend weddings, funerals, stupa dedications, etc.)
increasingly urban Buddhist monasteries
- inter-regional consolidation of textual canons into proto-Agamas/Nikayas
Asokan missions & inscriptions (Sri Lanka, Nepal, Gandhara, et al)
early state-monastic relations at a high point
burgeoning ideas about merit transfer based on filial piety
established references to past Buddhas
- increasing glorification of the Buddha (aggrandized omniscience, etc.)
proto-Mahayana sentiments (merit transfer "to all beings", book cults, proto-Prajnaparamita, etc.)
burgeoning traffic along the Silk Road
first edition of the Milindapanha
- Nikayas written down in Sri Lanka
- first anthropomorphic sculptures of the Buddha
- China is collecting Buddhist texts of all sorts