Indian Art: A History of Indian Art from the Earliest Times up to the Third Century A.D. c11.150

c11.150

ORIGIN OF MAURYAN ART :—The question of the origin and the sources of inspiration behind the monuments of Mauryan art is of considerable importance. As is well known there is absence of specimens of monuments representing the several phases of pre-Mauryan art but there is enough evidence in literature to indicate that art in India had a long history even before the Mauryan period. For example, we have literary references to royal palaces built on a thousand pillars (*Sahassa-khambha pāsāda*), assembly halls (*Sabhā*, *Samthāgāra*), pillars (*Thambha*, *Sthūṇa*), towns (*Pura*) and cities (*Nagara*), gateways (*Gopura*, *Dvāra*) and city-walls (*Prākāra*), *Stūpas*, *Chaityas*, railings (*Vedikā*), caves (*Śailaguhā*), temples of gods (*Devagṛiha*, *Devāyatana*), images (*Pratimā*, *Rūpaka*) and to a number of subsidiary crafts such as wood-carving (*Kāṣṭha-karma*, *Takṣaṇa*), weaving, lapidary’s art (*Maṇikarma*, *Maṇiśilpa*), jeweller’s art (*Suvarṇa-śilpa*), etc.