A History of Fine Art in India and Ceylon, from the Earliest Times to the Present Day c17.14

c17.14

M. Foucher, however, is, I think, right when he discerns in the Sānchī sculptures more subtle indications of Hellenistic influence in certain examples of bold fore-shortening, in clever presentations of the three-quarter face figure, and in the harmonious balancing of groups. It is, indeed, inconceivable that the Indian sculptors of Asoka's time should have failed to learn something from the Greek art which was so readily accessible to them. But whatever they borrowed they made their own so that their work as a whole is unmistakably Indian in character, and original in substance.