Indian Architecture (Buddhist and Hindu Periods) c14.21

c14.21

The age of the Gandharan buildings may be presumed from the character of the sculptures, the test applied being, the more Hellenistic the sculpture, the earlier the date. Some of the examples indicate by the spontaneity and confidence of their handling that they were not far removed from the first phase of the Alexandrian school of Greek sculpture, which was at its zenith in the second century B.C. Another class appertains more to the style of the statuary recovered from the site of Herculaneum, near Naples, and therefore related to the Graeco-Roman school of the first century B.C. But the bulk of the Gandharan sculpture was executed in the subsequent period, during the rule of the Indo-Scythians or Kushans (A.D. 20 to A.D. 225), in the first centuries of the Christian era, for it was at this time that Mahayana Buddhism received its greatest encouragement in northern India under the patronage of the Kushan king Kanishka (c. A.D. 123-153). Much of the work produced under this regime was of a somewhat mediocre kind, and can only be described as of a "commercial" character, prepared in large quantities by artizans of not very special artistic ability. It is not difficult to see that the increasing demand brought into being many studio-workshops, supervised by Asiatic Greeks and their descendants, assisted by a subordinate staff of indigenous craftsmen, whom they had trained to copy their style and technique.