of that event. The four lions standing back to back on the abacus once supported a stone wheel, 83 centimetres in diameter, of which only fragments remain.
Ashokan pillar with single lion capital. Such pillars were erected by King Ashoka and Buddhist teachings were engraved on them, 3rd century B. C. E., Maurya dynasty (Ashoka). Polished Chunar sandstone, height: 12 m. Vaishali, Bihar.
It would be difficult to find in any country an example of ancient animal sculpture superior or even equal to this beautiful work of art, which successfully combines realistic modelling with idealistic dignity, and is finished in every detail with perfect accuracy. The bas-reliefs on the abacus are as good in their way as the noble lions in the round. The design, while obviously reminiscent of Assyrian and Persian prototypes, is modified by Indian sentiment, the bas-reliefs being purely Indian. The conjecture of Sir John Marshall (1876–1958), former Director-General of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), that the composition may be the work of an Asiatic Greek is not supported by the style of the relief figures. The ability of an Asiatic Greek to represent Indian animals so well may be doubted.
The only rival to the artistic supremacy of the Sarnath capital is the replica which once crowned the detached pillar at Sanchi engraved with a copy of the Sarnath edict denouncing schism. The Sanchi capital is decidedly inferior to that at Sarnath, but it is possible that both works may proceed from the hands of a single artist. A century or so later, when an inferior sculptor attempted to model similar lions on the pillars of the southern gateway at Sanchi, he failed utterly, and his failure supports the theory that the Sarnath capital must have been wrought by a foreigner. Certainly no later sculpture in India attained such high excellence.
The perfection of the Sanchi and Sarnath lions on the edict-pillars must have been the result of much progressive effort. The uninscribed pillar at Bakhira seems to be one of the earlier experiments of Ashoka’s artists. The clumsy proportions of the shaft contrast unfavourably with the graceful design of the Lauriya-Nandangarh column, which bears a copy of the Pillar Edicts, and may be dated in 242 or 241 B. C. E., while the seated lion on the summit is by no means equal to the animals on the edict-pillars of Sarnath and Sanchi erected between 242 and 232 B. C. E. I am disposed to think that the Bakhira column was set up soon after 257 B. C. E., the date of the earliest Rock Edicts. It must also be noted that at Rampurva there are two pillars only one of which is inscribed. In the Sahasram inscription it is clearly stated that edicts are to be inscribed on rocks, or on pillars wherever a stone pillar is standing, which suggests that some of these pillars may considerably antedate Ashoka’s reign, although their technique is obviously one with the inscriptions and caves, and they are clearly ‘Mauryan’.
The Early Period
Stupa III of Sanchi, 150–140 B. C. E., Sunga dynasty. Sandstone, stupa: diameter at the plinth: 15 m, height: 8.1 m. Sanchi, Madhya Pradesh.
Architecture
After the death of Ashoka the empire broke to pieces, but his descendants continued to rule the home provinces for about half a century, at the end of which they were superseded by the Sunga kings who governed parts of Northern India until the beginning of the first century B. C. E. However, the style of architecture, decoration, and sculpture which perhaps first assumed a permanent form under the patronage of Ashoka continued in use up to about the close of the first century of the Common era, forming a distinct and definite period in the history of Indian art.
Although Buddhism at this period, approximately extending from 273 B. C. E. to 10 °C. E., was by no means the only religion in India, it enjoyed a dominant position as the result of the great Buddhist emperor’s propaganda, and the monuments remaining, therefore, are almost all Buddhist, though few are as early as the reign of Ashoka. The huge mass of solid brick masonry known as the great stupa of Sanchi, later encased with stone, may belong to his reign, as well as several other similar structures, but most of the buildings that now survive are of a later date.
The ancient civil buildings having all perished utterly, except the tangle of superimposed foundations that is all that the spade lays bare at most of the early sites, the story of Indian architecture must therefore be reconstructed from the somewhat one-sided evidence of the temples and shrines, and the bas-reliefs that adorn them. The most characteristic early architectural compositions were stupas, with their appurtenant railings and gateways, monasteries, and churches, the ‘ifaziiya-halls’ of James Fergusson. The monasteries and churches include both rock-cut and structural examples. Isolated pillars also were frequently set up.
Stupas or ‘topes’, the dagabas of Sri Lanka, solid cupolas of brick or stone masonry, were constructed either for the safe custody of relics hidden in a pagaba, or chamber near the base, or to mark a spot associated with an event sacred in Buddhist or Jain legend. Until the early twentieth century, the stupa was universally believed to be peculiarly Buddhist, but it is now a matter of common knowledge that the ancient Jains built stupas identical in form and accessories with those of the rival religion. However, no specimen of a Jain stupa is standing, and our attention may be confined to the Buddhist series. The earliest stupas were of unburnt bricks like the Bharhut stupa. The great stupa at Sanchi was originally of this type, a casing of roughly trimmed masonry and a ramp forming an upper procession-path being added later.
As time went on, the originally hemispherical dome of this stupa as it appeared before restoration was raised on a high drum or tier of drums, and so by a series of gradual amplifications the ancient model was transformed first into a lofty tower after Kanishka’s stupa at Peshawar, described by Hiuen Tsiang, and ultimately into the Chinese pagoda.
The most ancient stupas were very plain. They were usually surrounded by a stone railing, sometimes square in plan, but more often circular, marking off a procession path for the use of worshippers and serving as a defence against evil spirits. The earliest examples of such railings, at Sanchi, are unadorned copies of wooden post-and-rail fences. The bars of the railing were usually lenticular in section, inserted in the posts as shown in the diagram. At Besnagar another form of ancient railing has been unearthed, consisting of oblong slabs held by grooved uprights.
Bharhut and Sanchi represent two sequent stages in the development of the stupa of the Early (post-Mauryan) Period. They and their appurtenances had become more ornate. Sculpture was freely applied to every member of the railing to the posts, rails, and coping. Late in the second century of the Common era at Amaravati the railing was transformed into a screen covered with stone pictures in comparatively low relief but with the richest effect. The openings giving access to the processionpath inside the railing were dignified by the creation of lofty gateways (torana) copied from wooden models, and covered with a profusion of sculpture. The best examples of such gateways are those at Sanchi.
The origin of the stupa lies in primitive burial ceremonies for they are primarily tombs like the ‘iron age’ cairns of the south and such tumuli as those excavated by Dr. Theodor Bloch near Nandangarh in the Champaran District. Originally mounds of earth, the earliest stupas existing are of unbaked brick, hemispherical in shape. Although their first object was the enshrinement of sacred relics, in later times they acquired a symbolical value and many cenotaphs were built, the dedication of miniature stupas of stone or clay being customary at the great shrines. This idea of the symbolic value of stupas and the merit of stupa-building, on the part of the faithful, apart from the relics they might or might not contain, is to be found at the root of the legendary accounts of Ashoka’s ten-thousand stupas. Fa Xian says that in monasteries it was customary to raise stupas to Mudgalaputra, Sariputra, and Ananda, as well as in honour of the Abhidharma, Vinaya, and Sutra, such stupas in fact being regarded as altars. The word chaitya is indeed often used where a stupa is intended, in the sense of a shrine or holy place. So Anathapindika builds Sariputra’s chaitya which was four stories high, decreasing in size, and which contained a relic vase, and was surmounted by a roof and many
