The Beginnings of Buddhist Art and Other Essays in Indian and Central-Asian Archaeology c5.s5.8

c5.s5.8

The history of the ancient régime in Buddhist art prior to the Gandhârian revolution may, in fact, be summed up somewhat as follows. We have every reason to suppose that there was, first, from the fifth century onwards, local production at the four great centres of pilgrimage, and conveyance into the interior of India, of rude delineations copying the « sacred vestiges » actually still visible above ground in the sites of the miracles. It was these naturally unpeopled tableaux which, thanks to time and distance, ended by being regarded as systematic representations of the four principal episodes in the life of the Blessed One, and which, joined to some routine variations composed in accordance with the same formula, served, before as well as after Açoka (middle of the third century B. C.), for the decoration of religious foundations; finally, on the monuments of the second century (still before our era)