[Pramāṇa](https://indike.org/pramana/) › [Studies](https://indike.org/pramana/ins) › [Architecture and art](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art) › [Maurya and Shunga Art](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945) › c6 # Maurya and Shunga Art c6: III. Mauryan Columns Maurya and Śuṅga Art c6 - **Language:** English ## Contents - [c6.9](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6.9) — 4 parts ### III. Mauryan Columns ### [c6.2](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6.2) The highly polished, tall and well-proportioned columns with slightly tapering monolithic shafts and standing free in space, complete and independent by themselves, are admittedly the best representatives of the court art of the Mauryas. The columns that bear the edicts of Aśoka include those of Delhi-Mirat, Allahabad, Lauriya-Araraj, Lauriya-Nandangarh, Rampurva ( with lion capital ), Delhi-Topra, Sāṅkiśya, Sanchi and Sarnath ; the non-edict bearing columns known up till now include those of Rampurva ( with bull capital ), Basarh-Bakhira ( with single lion capital ) and Kosam ( capital not yet recovered ) ; the third category, that of columns bearing dedicatory inscriptions, includes atleast two well-known specimens, those of Rummindei and Nigali Sagar. Of these the capitals of Basarh-Bakhira and Lauriya-Nandangarh pillars are \*in situ\*; those of Rampurva ( both bull and lion-crowned ), Sāṅkiśya, Sarnath and Sanchi have been recovered in more or less damaged condition. The Lauriya-Nandangarh and Basarh-Bakhira pillars and one of the two Rampurva columns is crowned by a single lion seated on its haunches; the Sāṅkiśya pillar by a standing elephant; the second Rampurva column by a standing bull; and the Sarnath and Sanchi columns by four semi-lions united back to back. The Lauriya-Araraj column seems once to have been crowned by a Garuḍa capital,³⁷ while the fragment of a capital of Chunar sand-stone with Mauryan polish and probably of Mauryan date, recovered from a village called Salempur, Muzaffarpur district, shows that it consisted of four semi-bulls seated back to back on a plain square abacus, the animals themselves being super-imposed by a square block decorated with honey-suckle ornaments. It was more than once suggested that the Rummindei Pillar was once crowned by a horse,³⁸ but Prof. Barua thinks that the word ‘vigada’ means ‘young elephant’. ### [c6.3](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6.3) It has been suggested on an eighth century Sinhalese parallel that these crowning animals—elephant, horse (?), bull and lion—should be considered as guardians of the four cardinal points.³⁹ It is doubtful if this interpretation can with equal force be given to the Asokan animal capitals. Nor can it definitely be said they are all even exclusively Buddhist symbols. Except the horse, the three other animals as well as the Garuda that is assumed to have once crowned the Lauriya-Araraj pillar are symbols associated with early Brahmanical tradition and mythology, though the elephant, especially the white elephant, was considered particularly sacred in Buddha-legend as well ( cf. also the Dhauli elephant and the word ‘seto’ or the ‘white one’ at the end of the sixth Dhauli R. E. ; the phrase alluding to the white elephant below the thirteenth Girnar R. E. ; the word ‘gajatame’ or the ‘best of elephants’ and the drawing of an elephant on the north face of the Kalsi rock ). Moreover, a close study of the Rupnath and Sahasram Rock inscriptions and the seventh Pillar Edict suggests definitely that some of the pillars bearing his edicts must have been in existence before Asoka chose to have his rescripts on morality engraved on them ; they may even be pre-Asokan, and consequently may have nothing to do with Buddhism, while others were erected by Asoka himself and were his own Dharmastambhas. And lastly, it has been argued with some force that these pillars with animal capitals are but translations in stone of primitive animal standards.⁴⁰ ### [c6.4](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6.4) ⁴⁰ \[Note text not present on page\] ### [c6.5](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6.5) The internal evidence of the inscriptions themselves helps us to arrive at a rough chronological sequence of the columns. The Rummindei pillar was raised in the 20th year of the great monarch's reign while the Rampurva column with the lion capital in the 26th year, followed a year later by the Lauriya-Nandangarh column bearing the six pillar edicts dated in the 27th year. The Sarnath pillar could not have been raised before the 28th year; it bears edicts that do not find place in other columns. In any case, all scholars agree that this column belongs to the last years of Aśoka's reign. ### [c6.6](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6.6) We may add to this the stylistic evidence afforded by the columns and capitals themselves. So far as columns are concerned a definite starting point is furnished by the one at Basarh-Bakhira which is probably pre-Asokan Compared with the other columns of known Asokan dates the shaft of this column is heavy and of shorter proportions, and its workmanship crude and rough. The plain square abacus which is by itself an almost sure indication of an earlier date has no integral relation with the bell-capital below, and is moreover heavy in proportion. The crowning lion ‘recouchant’, though a free and independent figure, is not only rough and crude in execution, but has not yet evolved the form and appearance so as to make of itself an integrated whole together with the shaft, capital and the abacus. The next milestone is furnished by the elephant-crowned Sāṅkāśya column. The clumsy and heavy workmanship of the animal, its plump shape, and the sense of form seem to suggest a near parallel with the Dhauli elephant which has to be dated in the twelfth or thirteenth year of the reign of Aśoka. The filling up of the depth between the legs by rock-designs and the decorations of the abacus framed only at the lower border are both primitive and are presumably translated from wooden designs; the border decoration is particularly reminiscent of wood. But already the abacus has changed from square to round and has been given a form that keeps rhythmic balance between the animal above and the capital below. The bull-crowned Rampurva pillar seems to form a pair with the one just described so far as stylistic chronology is concerned or comes not very long after. The crowning bull though rendered with energy and evident naturalism indeed fails to keep harmony with the abacus and the capital, and the rosettas and honey-suckle decoration on the abacus itself is a little bit heavy and rough in execution. But it cannot be far out in date from either the lion-crowned Rampurva column or the similarly crowned Lauriya-Nandangarh column. In both instances the abacus which is artistically integrated and harmonised with the capital below is decorated with a row of pecking geese; but while the Rampurva lion is entirely contained within the abacus, the Nandangarh lion finds it difficult to fit itself into the round abacus; its rump and part of its hind legs project beyond the abacus in an unbalanced manner. The last stage in the evolution is marked by the Sarnath and Sanchi pillars, both crowned by four semi-lions joined back to back at the shoulders and carrying the Buddhist symbol of the wheel, instead of by a big single animal as had hitherto been the practice, and that without any crowning symbol. The Salempur column crowned by four semi-bulls joined back to back must also belong to this stage of evolution. ### [c6.7](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6.7) We shall try to see at a later stage to what extent this chronological sequence is upheld or not by a stylistic analysis of the animal sculptures themselves. ### [c6.8](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6.8) A clear idea of the whole and of component parts of a Maurya column is afforded by the one at Lauriya-Nandangarh which is a perfect specimen of the long series of such columns. All Maurya columns, no matter where they are set up, are chiselled out of grey Chunar sand stone and have a lustrous polish due to the application perhaps of silicious varnish on the stone. This uniform place of origin of the material probably suggests that there was at or near Chunar an art centre established and patronised directly by the Maurya court, an assumption supported by the additional fact that all the component parts of the columns including the crowning animal, abacus and the shaft tend increasingly to form one whole so far as art-form is concerned. At least this had been the problem the artists were confronted with and which they tried to solve with increasing success. The component parts that are easily known are (1) the shaft, always plain and smooth, circular in section and slightly tapering upwards, without any base whatsoever, and always and invariably chiselled out of one piece of stone; (2) the capital, having the shape and appearance of a gently arched bell formed of lotus-petals, the proportionate ratio of breadth and height being variable from capital to capital, and joined with the shaft by a copper-bolt of cylindrical shape bulging in the middle (cf. the Rampurva lion-capital column and the copper-bolt that used once to connect the capital with the shaft); (3) the abacus, square and plain in the earlier specimens and circular and decorated in the later ones, and of variable proportions; and (4) the crowning animal, seated or standing, always and invariably in the round, and always constituting a single piece with the abacus. The constituent elements may now be taken up one by one. ### [c6.9.1](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6.9.1) The surface of the shaft as of the other elements is cut and executed with remarkable precision and accuracy, and except in the case of the Basarh-Bakhira pillar which is heavy and massive, the shafts, to judge by the Lauriya-Nandangarh example as well as by the fragments of other columns, seem to have maintained a graceful and elegant proportion throughout. They are maintained in position by simply being buried in the earth and by plain slabs of stone or plain brickwork at the bottom. This gives them an appearance of stability, as if they stand by their own weight. The shaft is super-imposed by the bell-shaped capital. In some cases, as in the Rummindei column, the transition from the shaft to the capital is abrupt, while in other instances it is made easy and gradual by the introduction of intermediate mouldings of variable stages and designs. On the Basarh-Bakhira column there are three retreating mouldings decorated with rope-bead-reel designs. Similar mouldings are to be seen in the Lauriya-Nandangarh example as well; elsewhere the mouldings are plain. The surface of gently arched bell-shaped capital is decorated with highly stylised longitidunal lotus petals with sharp and thin ridges in the middle and wide and roundish border mouldings, the spaces between the ends of the petals being filled up with short mouldings. In the earliest Mauryan example, i. e. ### [c6.9.2](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6.9.2) in the Basarh-Bakhira specimen, the transition from the capital to the square abacus is marked by a cable-moulding of West-Asiatic twisted rope design which is repeated in later examples also, except in the lion-topped Rampurva and Sarnath examples. In other Mauryan examples the formal appearance of the capital is the same, but there is a progressive attempt towards a clearer and sharper definition of the middle ridge and of the border mouldings, and increasing stylisation; both are fully in evidence in the Sarnath specimen. The real aesthetic significance of the beautifully arched and elegantly ribbed floral bell of the Mauryan capital lies in its gentle curve, its chaste and rhythmic proportion and in its very effective contrast with the chaste and elegant, plain and smooth, tall and tapering shaft that it crowns. The capital like the abacus and the shaft also shows different stages of a process of artistic evolution, though the chronological sequence cannot be definitely established; but the steady growth of the feeling for form and more and more linear rhythm is unmistakable. The abacus is indeed the pedestal for the crowning animal; ### [c6.9.3](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6.9.3) in the change of its form from square to round, of its appearance from plain to decorated surface beginning with low and culminating in bold and high relief work in various motifs and designs, and in the attempt for increasing harmonisation of the abacus with the bell-shaped capital below and the crowning animal above, a discerning eye can clearly trace the stages of the progressive evolution of an architectonic form existing by itself. This becomes further evident when one compares the entire ensemble formed by the crowning animal, the abacus and the capital as we see it in various stages from the Basarh-Bakhira example through Sāṅkāśya and Rampurva to Sarnath. Beginning from disjointed and ununified parts of unequal proportions and a broken linear rhythm at Basarh-Bakhira it steadily marches towards integration of the component parts into one whole until it reaches its perfection at Sarnath where the parts are clear, distinct and well-defined, well-proportioned and singularly evenly balanced and yet forming one integrated whole and maintaining a linear rhythm through out, so much so that the crowning elements on the shaft contribute the most positive character that gives the Maurya columns the independent effect of complete monumental works. ### [c6.9.4](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6.9.4) From primitive animal standards to such monumental works it must have been a long journey, but royal will and state resources, individual taste and ideology of a benevolent autocrat and perhaps also foreign hand and inspiration so potently at work at the Mauryan court achieved the end of this long and arduous journey within a very short space of time. The total aesthetic effect of Mauryan columns has never been surpassed in later Indian art, and in the whole realm of independent monumental columns of the world Mauryan columns occupy a proud position by reason of their very free and significant artistic form in space, the rhythmic and balanced proportion of their constituent elements, the unitary and integrated effect of the whole, their chaste and elegant shaft and capital and no less by the conscious, proud and dignified attitude of the crowning ornaments. ### [c6.10](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6.10) There can be no doubt that the impetus came from outside. The very sudden use of stone and that at once for monumental art of large designs and huge proportions, the quick process of evolution from primitive to conscious, civilised and sophisticated from and appearance, from tribal to imperial outlook that is evident in the total effect of the columns, point unmistakably in that direction. It has been repeatedly suggested, not without reason, that this extraneous impetus and inspiration came from Iran of the Achaemenid emperors; some have even suggested that Mauryan columns are but Indian adaptations of the Achaemenian prototype. As repeatedly attempts have been made to deny the alleged extent of debt, again not without a certain amount of justice; but few have seriously doubted that West-Asiatic art forms and inspiration indirectly and in general and Achaemenian impetus and inspiration directly and in particular were at work at the root. Nor against the background of what we know of Mauryan relations with Hellenic East and Mauryan court ideology and tradition deeply tinged with Achaemenian ideas were such impetus and inspiration unlikely, especially when we take into account the extent of Achaemenian influence on Asokan epigraphs, his imperial ideal and policy and the conception of the Maurya Pillared Hall referred to above. But the differences that separate the Mauryan columns from the Achaemenian ones are also considerable and must not be lost sight of. ### [c6.11](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6.11) The stone columns of the Maurya Pillared Hall were evidently without capitals whereas the columns of the pillared halls of Persepolis are provided with more or less elaborate capitals. Achaemenian columns stand either on bell-shaped bases or on plain rectangular blocks or on plain circular mouldings while independent Mauryan columns have no base at all. The bell-form that is used as supporting base in Persian columns serves as capital in Mauryan ones and makes altogether a different aesthetic effect; moreover, in form, shape and appearance the Mauryan bell, which along with the Achaemenian may have originally been derived from stylised lotus design and which may have been a common art-motif in both Indian and Iranian art-heritage, is a long way off from the Achaemenian bell in which a ring of leaves and petals plays an important part in the decoration of the upper end of the motif and which has no bulge whatsoever in the middle that makes the Mauryan bell so gainly and conspicuous. The Achaemenian shaft is fluted in all cases "save in the facades of the necropolis at Persepolis and the single column that still remains of the palace of Cyrus in the upland valley of Powar. In the latter case the anamoly is to be explained by the fact that the building to which the support belonged dates from a time when Persian art had not constituted itself and was as yet groping to strike out a path of its own. On the contrary, the rock-cut tombs are coeval with the palaces of Darius and Xerxes and if in them the shaft is plain, it was because the vaults stood at a considerable height above ground. To have made them fluted therefore, would have still further reduced the column and divested it of a frank clear aspect when viewed at that distance. To obviate so untoward a contingency the Persian sculptor modified the forms as the Greeks often did in similar cases."\[41\] Mauryan columns are all plain and circular, but evidently they did not adopt the type from Achaemenian unfluted ones which had for ordinary purposes been discarded by the Achaemenians themselves. A funeral mound at Lauriya-Nandangarh yielded to the excavator's spade a plain and circular piece of a column carved out of śāla wood; such columns are in our literature known as 'sthuna', and the 'primitive' animal standards were evidently comprised of such sthuna columns.\[42\] It is not unlikely that the Mauryan shaft was derived from such wooden originals. Indeed, early Buddhist literature speaks often of wooden pillars standing independently by themselves on public thoroughfares. Prof. Barua thinks that "the idea of setting up pillars on public roads (samsaraṇasi) might have been suggested by 'indrakīla' (Pāli, indakhīla) which, according to the Pāli scholiast, was a city-gate pillar made of durable wood (sāradāru mayatthambha)...The art of fashioning them with ornamentation, the capital and the abacus must have been the prevalent art of constructing the pillars of a pillared verandah or hall of a royal court" ('Aśoka and his Inscriptions', I, chap. IX). The above assumption derives further support from the fact that Achaemenian shafts are indeed built of separate pieces or segments of stone and evidently presents the essential character of the work of a mason, while the Mauryan shaft is one piece which partakes of the character of the work of a wood-carver or carpenter. The Achaemenian capitals crowned with a cluster of stylised palm-leaves after old Egyptian manner, and formed either of two semi-bulls or unicorns or lions seated back to back, or of an upright or inverted cup, and the whole crowned with projecting double volutes, have nothing whatsoever in common with the Mauryan capitals which consist as we have seen of simply a bell formed of stylised lotus-petals. The crowning abacus and the round and independent animal motif of Mauryan columns are also altogether absent in Achaemenian examples. ### [c6.12](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6.12) The result achieved by this almost ‘thorough transformation’ is altogether different. The Achaemenian column intended invariably as part of larger architectural conception is composed of much too many component parts presenting harsh contrasts and looking complex and complicated, while the Mauryan column intended to produce the effect of an independent monument, at least in its latest and best specimens, is simpler, more harmonious in conception and execution, and gives the feeling of more stability, dignity and strength, born perhaps of other primitive and elemental origins. The indigenous and original contribution to the creation of this item of Mauryan art is therefore undeniable. Equally undeniable is also the fact that in their lustrous varnish, in their adoption and adaptation of the bell-shaped capital, in the higher plane of conception and driving idea and in the general monumental and dignified quality and appearance, the Mauryan columns seem to reveal the debt they owe to Achaemenian art, also to Hellenistic art so far as some of the crowning members of the columns and part of the general effect are concerned. The twisted rope design, the bead-reel-cable design etc. to mark the transitions, the acanthus leaf and palmette designs etc. to decorate the abacus may have however been derived from the older and common West-Asiatic art-heritage. ## Linked texts (2) - [Lauriya-Nandangarh](https://indike.org/pramana/inp.site.lauriya-nandangarh) - [Delhi-Meerut pillar](https://indike.org/pramana/inp.monument.delhi-meerut-pillar) --- Source: [https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.ray-1945.c6) · Pramāṇa