Eastern Indian School of Mediaeval Sculpture c5.54

c5.54

Excavations have been so fruitful at Sarnath that it is quite possible to trace a history of its sculptural art from the Mauryan period up to the 10th century A. D. Specimens excavated prove that the earlier sculptures of Sarnath belong to the same class as the earlier sculptures of Eastern India and that the Sarnath style suffered the same degeneration as befell the plastic art of the latter region on the decline of the Maurya Empire. During the period which followed the Mathurā School of Sculpture succeeded in imposing its sway, at least partly, on Benares as is amply proved by the discovery of several sculptures, specially images, carved in the red or yellowish sandstone, the favourite material of the Mathurā sculptors, which were brought and set up at Benares, i.e., at Sarnath. This is not all. The researches of the Archæological Department have provided incontestable epigraphical proof of images having been carved at Mathurā and exported to other distant places for dedication. A Bodhisattva image of the Kushān period unearthed at Śrāvastī¹ bears an inscription stating that the image was carved by a sculptor of Mathurā named Śivamitra and installed at the Jētavana of Śrāvastī.