The Buddhist Art of Gandhara: The Story of the Early School, its Birth, Growth and Decline c10: Chapter 4. The Renaissance of Hellenistic Art under the Parthians and its Effect on Gandhāra Art

The Buddhist Art of Gandhāra: The Story of the Early School, its Birth, Growth and Decline c10

Language: English

Chapter 4. The Renaissance of Hellenistic Art under the Parthians and its Effect on Gandhāra Art

The Śakas and Parthians were alike in being philhellenes, admirers of Greek institutions and of Greek material culture. But the Śakas in the North-West had the misfortune of being cut off by the Parthian Empire from intercourse with the centres of living Hellenism in Western Asia, and in their isolation were unable to sustain the relatively high quality of the art which they had inherited from their Greek predecessors. The Parthians, on the other hand, not only had vast numbers of Asiatic Greeks within the borders of their own Empire, but were able to enjoy at least in times of peace both commercial and cultural contacts with the Graeco-Roman world. Thanks to this, Hellenistic art, as the Parthians knew it in the first century of our era, was still a living and progressive art, far superior to the lifeless and decadent kind of art then in vogue among the Śakas. Parthian art was in fact part and parcel of the Hellenistic art then prevailing in the West of Asia. Of this the Parthian remains at Taxila have furnished many proofs, including objects of stone, terracotta, metal, gold and silver jewellery, silver and bronze vessels, engraved gems and seals. Many of the smaller articles may have been imported from the West, but others were undoubtedly made on the spot. Of the former I shall content myself with giving three examples, figures 29, 30 and 31. The first of these is a head of Dionysus or Silenus in silver repoussé (fig. 29). The head of the god is bald on top and wreathed with a grape-vine. His ears are pointed. In his right hand he holds a two-handled wine-cup (kantharos). Behind his head passes the curved staff (thyrsos), with a bell suspended at its end. The relief once stood on a small stand, which was found separately. It closely resembles the handle of a kylix and was probably made for that purpose. The relief-work is very deep (1.35 in.) and the style and workmanship first-class. The kantharos is of a type which was in vogue about 300 B.C., and it is possible that the relief was an antique of that date. On the other hand, it may be a copy of earlier work. In favour of the former hypothesis is the fact that among the jewellery with which it was found was a gold and lapis-lazuli finger-ring of an earlier period, though not so early as 300 B.C.

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The next example, fig. 30, is a bronze statuette of the Egyptian child-god Harpocrates, offspring of Isis and Osiris. Cast solid, probably in a piece-mould, the child-god stands with heels almost together, wearing a long sleeveless tunic, which reaches to his ankles and leaves his left shoulder bare. His right forefinger is raised towards his lips—a gesture which the Greeks and Romans interpreted as enjoining silence upon his votaries, who were forbidden to speak of the mysteries revealed to them, but which seems rather to have been a natural gesture of childhood. In his left hand he held some object which has disappeared—possibly a lotus, symbol of resurrection, or a cornucopia, symbol of the fruitfulness of nature which he personified. His hair, which is waved from the centre, falls in a long tress on his right shoulder. On his head he wears the Egyptian crowns of the North and South. The statuette is a typical piece of Graeco-Roman bronze-work, which may well have come from Alexandria, where the cult of Harpocrates was centred, though such statuettes appear to have been made in many parts of the Graeco-Roman world. As a work of art, it is not on a high level. The statuette was unearthed beneath the floor of a room in Block E, Stratum II, of Sirkap. Just below it was found an earthenware pot containing a valuable hoard of jewellery and other objects.

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The third example (fig. 31) is the head of a female figurine of buff-coloured terracotta. She wears an open-work net, perhaps of gold or silver, over the front of her hair and a high bandeau behind, with a rosette above the left ear. The modelling is delicate and sensitive. It is referable to the first century A.D.

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The three samples given above may well have been, like many other small *objets d'art*, imports from the Near East. But that Taxila could boast of competent artists capable of executing equally good work is proved by a number of stucco sculptures found in the great Buddhist Apsidal Temple in Sirkap. This temple was erected on the remains of buildings overthrown by the earthquake of *circa* A.D. 30, and was destroyed some thirty years later by the invading Kushāns. It was built on an imposing scale in the new kind of diaper masonry which was introduced from Gandhāra for the first time after the earthquake as being more stable than the traditional rubble. That the main building would take several years to complete, and that the two stūpas in its courtyard would not be added until after its completion, may be taken for granted. The date of the main building must be about A.D. 40 and the stūpas a few years later.

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For the decoration of the stūpas the architects made use of small figural reliefs in stucco, numerous heads of which were found lying in the debris. Of the structures themselves from which they had fallen nothing unfortunately has survived, and we are left, therefore, to guess at the disposition and design of the decoration. One thing, however, is clear, namely, that the Buddhists of Taxila were as quick to make use of the newly revived Hellenistic art as the Buddhists of Gandhāra were. Some typical examples of these heads are illustrated in figs. 32-7. A few of them, like figs. 32 and 33, are plainly Hellenistic types, and modelled, moreover, by a sculptor of considerable ability and feeling for form. Others are inferior in style and execution and may be presumed to be the work of local craftsmen working under his supervision. At one time I took the view that figs. 32 and 33 might have been fashioned with the help of moulds imported from Western Asia. But closer study has shown me that this view is not really tenable. If the reader will look at the examples illustrated he will see that, while some of them, like figs. 33 and 37, were evidently intended to be seen full-face, others, like figs. 32, 35 and 36, were intended to be seen three-quarter face with one or the other cheek turned towards the wall to which the head was affixed. In the case of such three-quarter reliefs the sculptor was naturally prone to carelessness when fashioning the side of the face hidden from the spectator. Countless examples of this defect can be seen among the stucco reliefs at Jauliāñ and other fourth-fifth century sites, the carelessness being most marked in those of poorest quality. The same is true of the reliefs from the Apsidal Temple. Thus in figs. 35 and 36, which are inferior pieces of work, the distortions of the features on the unseen side of the face are very pronounced. On the other hand, in the Satyr's head, fig. 32, which is the work of a competent artist, the difference between the two sides is not so marked, but it is quite marked enough to leave us in no doubt that the sculptor must have done his modelling of this head in the position in which it was to remain against the face of the stūpa wall, and that he must have done it without the help of a mould; for had a mould been employed, we may be sure that both sides of the head would have shown the same amount of care and precision. For a highly elaborate and deeply undercut head of this kind, a piece-mould would, of course, have been needed, and there is no evidence that piece-moulds were used at Taxila for stucco reliefs of this kind, though they must have been used for the solid casting of objects in the round.

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We must conclude, then, that all these reliefs without exception were modelled by hand on the spot, the best of them by a sculptor familiar with Hellenistic ideals and methods, the rest by local craftsmen of varying ability. It may be recalled that the same thing had happened in the case of the famous pillars of Aśoka, erected nearly three centuries earlier. Two of them, at Sārnāth and Sāñchī, are magnificent specimens of Hellenistic sculpture, executed by a master of the art; the others, of different degrees of merit but all much inferior, are evidently the works of his local assistants. That skilled artists and craftsmen from Western Asia were being encouraged at this time to find work under Parthian patronage at Taxila is evidenced by the well-known story of St Thomas. According to this story, the apostle, who was a carpenter or builder by trade, was recruited in Syria by an Indian merchant named Habban to accompany him to India, to take service at the court of the Parthian king Gondophares, for whom he was acting as agent. Whatever the precise facts behind this story, it fully confirms the conclusion drawn from the monuments themselves that the Parthian conquest of the North-West and the consequent opening-up of communications with the Mediterranean coasts were followed by an influx not only of small *objets d'art* from Western Asia and Egypt but also of artists and skilled craftsmen seeking their fortunes under the patronage of the philhellene Parthians. We shall see presently that further evidence on this subject is provided by sculptures from the Peshāwar Valley.

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The Satyr head referred to above (fig. 32) has typical pointed ears, broad flat nose, moustache, beard and free-flowing locks. There is nothing mechanical or crude about the workmanship. There is an intensity of expression in the knitted brows and half-parted lips and a boldness in the treatment of the hair and beard that bespeak a thorough mastery over the material, coupled with a proper understanding of its limitations. The strong, almost portrait-like individuality that characterizes the countenance is typical of Greek art in its later phases; it is never found in early Indian art; nor is it a characteristic of the Gandhāra School.

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The next head (fig. 33) is also truly Hellenistic. It, too, is bearded, but the beard is treated in even simpler masses, and there is a quiet dignity and repose about the features that find their nearest parallel among cult statues of the Greek pantheon. Unfortunately, the upper part of the head is mutilated, but what remains is quite enough to show that the sculptor had an intimate knowledge of Hellenistic art and complete command of his material. In fig. 34, a female head with heavy wreath, the hair is parted from the centre and rolled back over the ears, with two rosettes on the left side. The right side of the forehead and part of the nose are damaged. The wreath and top-knot (which is here mutilated) were very fashionable at this period. The small, pretty features call to mind those of contemporary terracotta figurines.

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The remaining three heads are less successful. The bearded head (fig. 35) is very sketchily drawn, with deep-set eyes, overhanging brows and long, oval face. It was intended to be seen three-quarter face and its left side was carelessly modelled. The top of the head and ears are missing. In the following example (fig. 36)—a female head with highly arched brows and slightly smiling lips—it is the right side of the head which was turned away from the spectator and is hence carelessly modelled. In contrast with these two heads, the next one (fig. 37) was all but full-face and there is little difference in the modelling of the two sides. This head and figs. 34 and 36 illustrate, though not as clearly as some other terracotta and stucco heads from Taxila,¹ the form of indoor head-dress in vogue among the Parthian nobility, namely, a chaplet (of Hellenistic origin) with the long hair dressed as a top-knot inside it. Both of these features—the top-knot and the chaplet—seem to have been recognized as symbols of aristocratic birth and this no doubt explains why from this time onwards images of the Buddha were habitually provided with such a top-knot, under the name of uṣṇīṣa.²

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¹ E.g. Taxila, vol. III, pl. 138a, and pl. 148, 4, 7, 9.

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² E.g. figs. 61, 63, 66, 67 below.

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Besides these stucco figures in the Hellenistic style and somewhat feeble imitations by local craftsmen, there are a few heads of the Bodhisattva belonging to the same group from the Apsidal Temple. One of them (fig. 39) must have belonged to a statue of superhuman size. Cunningham records that, when clearing the nave of the Apsidal Temple in 1863 (C.S.R. v, p. 74), he found numerous pieces of burnt-clay statues of colossal size, which had stood against the walls of the nave. Large statues in such a position, where they were protected from the weather, would normally be made of clay, and would, of course, be converted into terra-cotta, if the building happened to be burnt down. On the other hand, statues intended for a more exposed position would be made of the more durable stucco. It is reasonable, therefore, to infer that the statue we are discussing probably stood in the shallow entrance porch to the temple, where it would not be entirely protected from the rain. That it was the work of one of the local craftsmen engaged on these sculptures and that it represents the Bodhisattva in princely attire can hardly be questioned. Thus it has the distinction of being the earliest known head of the princely type of Bodhisattva which was afterwards to become the standard type of Gandhāra.

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The small head of the Bodhisattva illustrated in fig. 38 wears a moustache, ear-pendants (right one missing) and elaborate turban. The turban is in three rolls, crossing in the middle of the forehead and finished with a fan-tail ornament above. The left side of the face is more roughly modelled than the right.

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The colossal head referred to above (fig. 39) was similar in appearance to the foregoing but on a larger scale. The modelling is rough and devoid of feeling. The moustache, which is missing, was affixed separately.

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It remains to add that the stucco of which all these figures were made is composed of lime mixed freely with small broken stone (bajri) and other foreign matter. It is coarser than the stucco used on the later monuments of the fourth and fifth centuries; nor is there any trace of the fine finishing coat which was used to embellish some of the later stuccos. At Taxila there is no evidence of stucco of any kind having been used for figural work before the Parthian period. I purposely use the word ‘figural’, because there is one small stūpa in Sirkap dating from pre-Parthian times which is decorated with a design of acanthus foliage worked out in a thick coat of stucco, This is the stūpa brought to light in Court a of Block E, and described and illustrated in Taxila, vol. I, p. 158 and vol. III, pls. 27 a and 120 A. From the level at which it stood, this stūpa would appear to have been contemporary with the small Śaka stūpas at the Dharmarājikā referable to the latter part of the first century B.C.; but in this case it is more than likely that the stucco decoration was added after the Parthian occupation of Taxila, but before the great earthquake of *circa* A.D. 30, when the stūpa was lifted bodily from its base and turned almost upside down before being buried in the ruins of the surrounding buildings.

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These illustrations will, I hope, suffice to show the high quality of the revived Hellenistic art which the Parthians introduced at Taxila and the influence which it exercised on the local Buddhist School. We have now to go westward across the Indus, and see what effect its impact had upon the Buddhist School of sculpture in Gandhāra.