“Jain Universal History” is a term coined by Western scholars for the Jain lsegendary history of the world. The world is believed by the Jains to be everlasting, with an uncountable number of progressive and regressive half-cycles of time in certain areas of the universe. In every half-cycle, so-called “illustrious men” (śalākāpuruṣas/mahāpuruṣas) are…