History of Indian and Eastern Architecture v1.c19.s17.4

v1.c19.s17.4

A digression may be made in conclusion with reference to the famous monastery referred to (p. 171), as spoken of from hearsay, both by Fah Hian and Hiuen Tsiang. Its situation has long been a puzzle. The second pilgrim says it was built by one of the Andhra kings as a monastery for Nâgârjuna.¹ It had lofty halls in five tiers, each with four courts and temples containing golden images of Buddha. But after a time the Brâhmans had ousted the Buddhists and, he adds, "the way of access to it was no longer known." The Tibetan works state that Nâgârjuna died at the great monastery of *d*Pal-gyi-ri, a translation of Srî-Sailam or Srî-Parvata, both names of a very old place of pilgrimage on a rocky hill overlooking a gorge of the Krishnâ river, and which is one of the twelve Jyotir-lingas or great Saiva shrines of the Hindûs. The place is difficult of access, but was visited by Colonel Colin Mackenzie in 1794,² and perhaps by four or five Europeans before 1886, when the editor made a hurried excursion to it. Mackenzie had mentioned the animals carved on the surrounding walls in a way that seemed to follow the arrangement described by Fah-Hian. Though beyond the limits of the Kosala kingdom, with which Hiuen Tsiang seemed to connect it, it was most probably within the early Andhra dominions.