Indian Architecture (Buddhist and Hindu Periods) c42.3

c42.3

Of the first of these developments, namely the "Early Phase," although it is known that a form of the building art existed at the historical centres of Thaton is Pegu the capital of a Mongolian tribe known as the Mons or Talaings, and at Prome the capital of another tribe, the Pyu, definite traces of the mode that then prevailed have disappeared. Partly on account of the destructive nature of the climate especially in the deltaic region, and partly owing to the continuance of devastating wars, the actual architectural remains of this period, which covered the earlier centuries of the first millennium, are so scanty as to be negligible. From the geographical position of these remains, however, and other evidences, it appears that a religio-cultural approach from Buddhist India, probably early in the Christian era, was made by sea. The land barriers between India and Burma at this period were of such a nature as to prevent ready intercourse, and accordingly the earliest historical material has been located in Lower Burma. Here, in the kingdom of the Pyus, with its seaport in the Gulf of Martaban, access to the country was obtained by means of the lower reaches of the Sitang river. The Pyu capital was at Srikshatra, near Prome, on the Irrawady, and was a city of considerable size and importance. It is described as being twenty-seven miles in circumference, with its walls and moat faced with glazed bricks, and that it contained over a hundred Buddhist monasteries richly furnished and endowed. There were twelve gates with pagodas at each corner, and mention is made of a great white image, one hundred feet high opposite the gate of the place.¹ Few traces, if any, of this city remain, yet, on the other hand several buildings have survived of a rather later date which may be regarded as a connecting link between the two periods, the Early and the Mediaeval, or, more precisely, a stage of transition leading up to the grand Classical Phase which followed.