Maurya and Shunga Art c5.11

c5.11

The same process seems to have been fully at work in the realm of art. Colonial Hellenistic art was slowly coming under the influence of Persian art, specially of Persian motifs, patterns and designs on the one hand, while Persian art itself began to feel the pressure of Ionian and Hellenistic influences onwards from the fifth century B. C.²² This pressure became active during and after the Achaemenid period, so that when the Mauryas came into intimate contact with the colonial Greeks of Western Asia, both Achaemenid and Hellenistic art-traditions had become heavily touched by each other.