The Buddhist Art of Gandhara: The Story of the Early School, its Birth, Growth and Decline c17.20

c17.20

We may conclude this chapter with three more examples (figs. 147-9) selected from decorative pieces of architecture. Particularly attractive is the exquisitely carved Corinthian capital, fig. 147. In stylishness and perfection of technique this capital takes its place beside the finest of the cult statues such as figs. 137 and 138. A happy touch in its design is the little figure of a haloed Bodhisattva emerging from the centre of the acanthus leaves. Much has been written about this type of Gandhāra capital. From the fact that similar figures were introduced into Roman Corinthian capitals for the first time during the reign of Caracalla (A.D. 211-17) the late Vincent Smith inferred that the Gandhāra examples must be later than 217.¹ Vincent Smith’s chronology, however, is quite untenable, and there is in fact no justification for supposing that the idea was borrowed from Rome. If there was any copying at all, it is surely more likely to have been done by the West rather than the East since sprightly devas and yakshas emerging from leaves or flowers had long been a favourite device in the Early Indian School, as witness, for example, the well-known Tree of Life and Fortune on the south jamb of the Western Gateway of the Great Stūpa at Sāñchi which dates from the first century B.C. Obviously this near-at-hand source of Buddhist art was the one from which the idea would be most likely to find its way into the art of Gandhāra.