Elements of Buddhist Iconography c4.35

c4.35

Although their history and significance can hardly yet be fully explained, some consideration of the symbolic forms representing the head and feet of the jewelled Tree of Life at Sāñcī and the Fiery Pillars at Amarāvatī is necessary. The triśūla, in Buddhism (Figs. 1, 4, 23, etc.), commonly understood to denote the jewel-trinity (ratna-traya) of Buddha, Dharma, and Saṅgha, is certainly not exclusively of Buddhist nor even wholly of Buddhist and Jaina (Fig. 17) significance; Buddhism, as usual, is adapting an older symbolism to its immediate purposes. Sénart (*La légende du* *Bouddha*, p. 484) already regarded the Buddhist *triśūla* as a Fire symbol; we could think of it as naturally representing either the three aspects of Agni Vaiśvānara, or the primordial Agni as the triunity of the Several Angels. This would not in any way conflict with the Śaiva association suggested by Marshall, *Mohenjodaro*, p. 55, cf. our Figs. 21, 22, and indicated also by the use of the symbol in connection with Śiva at a later time, e. g. on the Śaiva coins of Kadphises II and on the Śaiva seal from Sirkap, A.S.I., A.R., 1914-15, p. 51 and Pl. XXIV.²² That the form corresponds to that of Siva's trident in the later iconography is indeed evident enough. It has not been so much observed that if the symbol is doubled, so as to consist of two addorsed tridents connected by a common stem, there is obtained the usual form of the *vajra*, or if quadrupled that of the fourfold *vajra*. In our representations (Figs. 1, 4, 6, etc.), the *triśūla* forms the termination of a stem or trunk which we have been able to identify with the pillar (*skambha*) that supports-apart Heaven and Earth, and with the axle-tree (*akṣa*) of the Solar chariot, i. e. with the axis of the Universe.²³ Recalling now the kenning *akṣa-ja* = *vajra*, it is not implausible to assume that our *triśūla* may also be thought of as a "single *vajra*."