A History of Fine Art in India and Ceylon, from the Earliest Times to the Present Day c8.35

c8.35

Isolated pillars, or columns, usually associated with other buildings, and frequently surmounted by a human figure, animal sculpture, or sacred symbol, continued to be erected during many centuries by adherents of all the three leading Indian religions. The oldest are the monolithic pillars of Asoka, who set up at least thirty such monuments, of which many, more or less perfect, survive.¹ Ten of those known bear his inscriptions. The Lauriyā-Nandangarh monument, inscribed with the first six Pillar Edicts, and practically uninjured, is shown in Plate II. The shaft of polished sandstone, 32 feet 9½ inches in height, diminishes from a base diameter of 35½ inches to a diameter of only 22½ inches at the top—proportions which render it Plate II. Asoka inscribed Pillar at Lauriyā-Nandangarh.