The Antiquities of Orissa v2.c16.s2.73

v2.c16.s2.73

Again, in a silver didrachma of Azelisas, brought by Mr. Arthur Grote from Peshawer, and described by me,³⁷ I find on reverse a female figure to the front standing on a lotus; the left hand rests on the waist, and the right over the stomach, holding something; on each side is a lotus-stalk rising as high as the waist and bearing an expanded flower, whereon stands an elephant with its trunk extended over the head of the central figure. This reverse is evidently founded on the type of the Azas' square coin with the trident reverse (*Ariana Antiqua*, plate VII, fig. 5, p. 327), which has a female figure standing amidst twining creepers, and it may unhesitatingly be said that the figures on the coins are intended to represent the same personage whom the Hindus designate Mahālakṣmī. As the goddess of fortune and good luck, her figure was most appropriate on coins issued in the neighbourhood of India, and for currency amongst a nation entertaining at the time strong Hindu notions. It would not be very presumptuous to suppose that Mahālaksmī at the time was not worshipped as a divinity for salvation, but as the regent of good fortune, and as such, the Buddhist laity had no objection to her, and, with the natural instinct of man in favour of everything that tends to his temporal welfare, admitted her existence even as they did that of Indra, the god of rain, and showed her some respect: or possibly they got up a Buddhist version of her story, as they did of many other Hindu legends, and received her as a goddess of their own, and the Bactro-Greek sovereigns got her from the Buddhists. Anyhow, seeing that the image of the goddess occurs as frequently among Buddhist, as among Hindu remains, it would be unwarrantable to found upon her presence any theory about the religious character of the cave in question.