Maurya and Shunga Art c5.16.3

c5.16.3

“Whereas no other structure of really early date in ancient India disclosed”, says Spooner, “an arrangement of pillars in square bays over the whole floor the hall at Kumrahar did show this otherwise unparalleled arrangement, and this was identical with the arrangement of the pillars in the Achaemenian Hall. The columns themselves moreover showed a technique in their polished surface which is not only known to have been un-Indian, and outside the line of Indian architectural development, but which again is identical with Persepolitan workmanship.” Apart from the question of the origin and morphology of the Asokan columns, it is not unlikely that the Maurya Pillared Hall owed its inspiration and general design to the Hall of Hundred columns erected by Darius. We have it on the authority of classical writers that Chandragupta’s palace at Pāṭaliputra consisted of halls whose gilded pillars were adorned with golden vines and silver birds; indeed fragments of golden vines have been discovered in the exacavations at Kumrahar. We know that the halls of the palaces of Ekbatana had gilded pillars constructed of cedar and cypress, and golden vines of the pillars invariably recall the vines hanging over the couch of Darius, a gift of the Lydian Pythias and perhaps of Ionian workmanship.