འཕགས་པ་སངས་རྒྱས་བདན་པ་ཞས་བྱ་བ་ཐག་པ་ཆན་པའ་མད intro.14

intro.14

Among these enumerations of past buddhas, the set of seven that figures in the present text is perhaps the most consistent, and may possibly be the earliest. Its classic presentation is in the various Pāli, Sanskrit, and Chinese recensions of the Mahā­vadāna­sūtra.⁵ Among early Indian artworks depicting the seven buddhas are a series of relief carvings on the outer circumambulatory railing at the Bharhut stūpa that represent them aniconically as the specific species of tree under which they are said to have attained enlightenment, accompanied by inscriptions in late second-century bce Brahmi script,⁶ and first century bce iconographic reliefs of them, accompanied by their trees and stūpas, on two architraves of the north gateway to the Sanchi stūpa.⁷ Other representations of the seven buddhas appear at some of the most important surviving Buddhist archeological sites of later centuries such as the Amarāvatī stūpa complex, the cave vihāra complexes of Ajanta, Ellora, and Kanheri, and as far to the northwest as the Swat Valley.⁸