Indian Epigraphy c15.s2.t4: 4. Buddhist Nirvāṇa Era
Indian Epigraphy c15.s2.t4
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4. Buddhist Nirvāṇa Era
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⁴ See V. A. Smith, E. Hist. Ind., 1924, pp. 48 ff.; Ojha, Bhāratīya Prācīn Lipimālā, p. 164.
c15.s2.t4.2
The Cantonese dotted record suggests that the Buddhist Clergy had a record in which each past year after the Buddha’s death was represented by a dot and that the said event took place in 486 B.C.⁵ But that there was no genuine, continuous and universally accepted tradition on the subject is clear from the different epochs of the Buddha-nirvāṇa era prevalent in different parts of the Buddhist world. Thus, according to the Ceylonese tradition, now also accepted in Burma and Siam, the era starts from 544 B.C. while the Chinese tradition places it in 638 B.C.⁶ The Chinese traveller Fa-hien, who came to India in 399 A.D., speaks of 1497 years having passed after the Buddha’s death, thus placing the beginning of the era about 1097 B.C.¹
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⁵ Cf. JRAS, 1905, p. 51; Smith, E. Hist. Ind., 1924, p. 49.
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⁶ Cunningham, CII, Vol. I, p. 3; Prinsep, Antiquities, Vol. II (Useful Tables), p. 165.
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¹ Beal, *Si-yu-ki*, Vol. I, Intr., p. 75.
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On the basis of the Cantonese dotted record and considering certain other factors, scholars now generally assign the Buddha’s death to 483 B.C.² The Gaya inscription of the Buddha-nirvāṇa year 1813, Kārttika-badi 1, Wednesday, was believed by some scholars to suggest the epoch of the era in 638 B.C.³ But the date seems actually to be referable to the Ceylonese Buddha-nirvāṇa era of 544 B.C.⁴
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² See *Camb. Hist. Ind.*, Vol. I, p. 696.
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³ *Ind. Ant.*, Vol. X, p. 346; Bhandarkar’s List, No. 1459.
c15.s2.t4.9
⁴ Cf. *IHQ*, Vol. XXXIV, p. 27; above, p. 277.