The Buddhist Art of Gandhara: The Story of the Early School, its Birth, Growth and Decline c12.13

c12.13

Excluding their borders these two panels are less than 6 in. high and of exquisitely fine workmanship, with the quality of ivory miniatures rather than stone carvings. Their close affinity with the Partho-Greek reliefs described in the last chapter is evident in many features: in the formal, scenic character of the composition and the self-conscious poses of the individual figures; in the careful delineation of the facial features notwithstanding their minute scale; in the graceful draping of the robes and masterly precision in the modelling of their folds; and in the framing of the panels between pairs of rounded Corinthian pilasters. These and other details of style and technique make it clear beyond question that these two panels follow at no long interval in the track of the Partho-Greek reliefs, and this conclusion is confirmed by the relationship in which they stand to later members of the same group which we shall presently examine. On the other hand, there is a radical difference between these panels and their Partho-Greek predecessors. The latter, as we have seen, were little more than servile imitations of Hellenistic originals, with the actors sometimes dressed in local instead of Greek costume, sometimes carrying a lotus instead of a wine-cup in their hands, to give a Buddhist atmosphere to the scene. But the changes are superficial and do not affect their essentially Hellenistic character. Here, in these two panels, the sculptor still has the Greek outlook, is still inspired by Greek ideals, still employs the Greek technique and expresses himself in the Greek idiom. But he is now moving in a new atmosphere, the religious atmosphere of Buddhism, is deeply immersed in its sacred traditions and is putting all his skill and artistry into the narration of its legends. Reliefs of this character are manifestly too mature and complex to have been created overnight or by the genius of a single artist. They presuppose earlier efforts of a more empirical, less assured kind, and it may be hoped that examples of these may one day be turned up by the spade of the excavator. Meanwhile we must be content to recognize that, with these panels, we are now for the first time coming face to face with the real Graeco-Buddhist Art of Gandhāra—an art which was dependent for its life-blood as much on the traditions and inspiration of Buddhism as on those of the local Hellenism, and which could have been born nowhere else in Asia but on the soil of Gandhāra.