Lectures on Ancient Indian Numismatics (Carmichael Lectures, 1921) c8.68

c8.68

Another symbol which is met with on the Kārshāpaṇas and later coins and to which I would invite your attention now is the sign which is supposed and wrongly supposed to represent the stūpa or chaitya. We have got at least two specimens of this symbol, on one of which a pea-cock and on the other a dog is represented as standing. If the symbol is taken to be one of a stūpa or chaitya, the presence of a pea-cock or dog on its summit is inexplicable. Cunningham was the first to suggest that it was a sign for Mount Meru,¹ and this idea was afterwards accepted by Pandit Bhagwanlal Indraji.² I have elsewhere expressed the view that the symbol need not be taken to stand specifically for Mount Meru but rather for a hill in general.¹ According to this view the pea-cock or dog on its top can very well be understood to stand for the different vehicles of the different hill deities represented. Now, a seal-impression of late Minoan style has been found at Knossos which has been ascribed to circa 1500 B. C. On it figures the mountain-mother standing on the peak of her hill and flanked by guardian lions.² The hill on which she stands is represented as consisting of rows of semicircular curves raised in tiers exactly as the so-called *stūpa* or *chaitya* symbol does. This clearly shows that the symbol cannot possibly denote a *stūpa* or *chaitya* but rather a hill, and that this representation of the hill can be traced even outside India and to the pre-historic period, certainly earlier than 1500 B. C. to which the Knossos seal has been assigned.