Nalanda

Nalanda was a Buddhist mahavihara, a great monastery, in the ancient kingdom of Magadha, near modern Rajgir in Bihar, India, often called the world's first residential university. A commemorative seal names Kumaragupta I of the Gupta Empire, also recorded as Shakraditya, as its founder around 427 CE. It taught Buddhist philosophy alongside the Vedas, grammar, medicine, logic, mathematics, astronomy and alchemy, drawing monks and teachers from across Asia; sources describing it as home to over 1,500 faculty and 10,000 student monks are disputed by modern scholars as implausible for the site, with more conservative visitor accounts putting the community over 3,000. It was destroyed around 1200 CE by Muhammad Bakhtiyar Khalji, evidenced by a thick layer of ash across many excavated buildings, though some monks regathered and resumed teaching into the thirteenth century before the site was abandoned around 1400 CE.