The Buddhist Art of Gandhara: The Story of the Early School, its Birth, Growth and Decline c18.3

c18.3

Such, in rough outline, is the story of the Early School of Buddhist art in Gandhāra, as revealed by my discoveries at Taxila. Now that we know the truth and can follow, step by step, the course of its evolution, we may wonder why earlier efforts at its reconstruction fell so wide of the mark. Still more may we wonder at the way in which even the highest authorities on the subject failed to distinguish between this Early School of Gandhāra art and the Later School which was flourishing between the latter part of the fourth century and towards the end of the fifth century of our era. For, although these two Schools had a common ancestry (although, indeed, one sprang phoenix-like from the ashes of the other), the differences between them are so glaring that they might well have been recognized long before Taxila yielded its clear and conclusive evidence. Let us consider what these differences were.