Encyclopedia of India–China Cultural Contacts v2.c11.s4.t2: Architecture
Encyclopedia of India–China Cultural Contacts v2.c11.s4.t2
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- v2.c11.s4.t2.16 — 4 parts
Architecture
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Dunhuang Caves
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Dunhuang Caves (Dunhuang Shiku) is the Chinese Buddhist grottoes. It is a general name of the grotto groups in the area of Dunhuang, Gansu. The broad sense of Dunhuang Caves includes Dunhuang Mogao Caves, Western Thousand Buddha Caves, Anxi Yulin Caves, Eastern Thousand Buddha Caves and five temple grottoes in the north of Gansu Province; the narrow sense of Dunhuang Caves specifically means Mogao Caves. Mogao Caves is located in the cliff of the eastern side of Mingsha Mountain, 25 km southeast of present day Dunhuang City, Gansu Province. It was first built in the second Jianyuan year of the Former Qin Dynasty (366), and cut in succession from Northern Liang era Dynasty through to Yuan Dynasty. Now, there are 492 caves, about 2,400 coloured sculptures, and over 45,000 sq mt of murals. Of the grotto cluster in Dunhuang Caves, Mogao Caves were cut at the earliest with the largest size and the highest achievements.
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Dunhuang was an important town on the ancient Silk Road, and the hub of Sino-foreign cultural exchanges. India Buddhist art was introduced into Dunhuang along the Silk Road through the western regions, therefore, the early Buddhist art in the Dunhuang Caves were permeated with the influence of the western region and Indian art. The shape and structure of early caves in Dunhuang can be divided into two styles – the Chan caves and the central tower caves. The Chan caves evolved from Indian Vihara (monk's dormitory) Buddhist caves, and the central tower caves derived from Indian Chaitya (Buddha Hall) caves, introduced into Dunhuang after the formation of the Western Regions. The early coloured sculptures of Dunhuang were also influenced by Indian Gandhara art and Gupta art.
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The main image of a cross-legged Buddha in cave number 275 at Mogao caves of Dunhuang in Gansu, China.
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For example, on the front wall of the main room of the 275ᵗʰ cave of the Mogao Caves in the Liang era of the Northern Dynasties was sculptured a Maitreya statue up to a height of 3 mt, feet crossed. The crossing feet posture was relatively popular in the Gandhara area, and the modelling of Maitreya was full of Gandhara sculpture style. On the north wall of the 259ᵗʰ cave of the Mogao Caves in the Wei era of the Northern Dynasties exists a statue of Buddha; the clothes of the Buddha is thin and stick to the body, obviously embodying the features of Mathura style Buddha figure in *Gupta*, India. The early murals of Mogao Caves in Dunhuang were
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An image of Bodhisattva, a mural painting from the early period of the Tang Dynasty. The southern fresco belongs to cave number 57 at Dunhuang in Gansu Province.
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mixed with Indian and Persian styles. The Buddha portraits of Dunhuang murals are generally dressed in a coat in exposed right shoulder style or through shoulder style. One kind of the clothes lines are thick in texture, with a trace of Gandhara sculpture; another kind are thin and stick to the body, referred to as "Cao's clothes out of the water", is a typical feature of the Mathura Buddha portrait in *Gupta*, India. The Bodhisattva generally wears Indian-style three-jewel coronet or splendid suma-mala of the Western Regions, big Persian scarf on the shoulder, jade necklace on the breast, and presents a slender body that shows the three fold style common in Indian art. This dress is a mixture of Indian and Persian customs. Compared to the flying Apsaras in Qiuci murals, the flying Apsaras in Dunhuang Caves are soft in profile, dynamic and lively, with long ribbons dancing in the air, as if the whole wall was moving in the wind. In early Dunhuang murals, some appeared as multi-headed and multi-armed Hinduism Dharmapala images, such as the Mahesvara with three heads and six arms riding a black ox on the north mural of the main shrine of the rear wall in the 285ᵗʰ cave (the Western Wei Dynasty) of Mogao Caves, four-armed Skanda riding on a peacock, Ganesha holding a trident with the head of an elephant and the body of the man, and Vishnu with three heads and six arms in the mural on the south wall. In the Dunhuang murals is also a method of Indian traditional paintings from the Western Regions, i.e., the concave and convex method, namely to show the three dimensional effect of the characters' skin through colour shading. The concave and convex method in India murals is to shade the depth of the same colour; after introduced into Qiuci, it changed back into single-sided shading, double-sided shading, rendering, superimposed shading and other techniques. After being introduced in Dunhuang, it changed into multi-layered superimposed circle shading, from light to dark with clear-cut colour gradations. The concave and convex method in Dunhuang Caves was mainly popular in the murals of the Northern Dynasties, and gradually disappeared in the Sui and Tang Dynasties.
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*(Wang Yong)*
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Binglingsi Caves
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Binglingsi Caves (Binglingsi Shiku) Chinese Buddhist caves. It is located in Xiaojishi Mountain 35 km southwest of Yongjing County, Gansu Province, cut in succession from the Western Qin and Northern Wei Dynasties through to the Sui and Tang Dynasties. Now there are 196 cave shrines, 776 statues, and 912 sq mt of murals. The 169ᵗʰ cave of Bilingsi cut in the Western Qin period (385-430 CE) is the most important. In 1963, in the 6ᵗʰ shrine on the north wall of the 269ᵗʰ Binglingsi cave discovered an ink inscription of "Made on March 24ᵗʰ, the first Jianhong year (420) in Xuanxiao." This is the earliest known inscription in Chinese caves. The shrine statues in the caves can be divided into stone carving, stone modelled clay sculpture, and clay sculpture. Most of them are a Buddha with a bodhisattva or a Buddha with two bodhisattvas by the side. The modelling is profound and primitive, the face is squarely rounded, the nose is straight, and the lips are thick, with a heavy Indian style. The standing Buddha clay sculpture in the 7ᵗʰ shrine of the east wall wears a thin cassock stuck to the body in the through shoulder style; the single line intaglio draws out U-shaped cloth lines, that shows the profile of the whole body as if soaked with water, closely resembling the Mathura style Buddha portraits. even in the folds on the edge of the cassock and the gorgeous light on the neck, except that the eyes are wide open rather than half closed and downward looking, lack of that meditation expression on the face of the Gupta Buddha figures. In the 23ʳᵈ shrine on the south wall are five seated Buddha in meditation, the clothes lines in a single line intaglio for through shoulder cassock all spreading in a radial pattern from under the left shoulder, which is obviously affected by the imitation of the Gandhara style of Buddha figures in the western regions. In the caves are painted a preaching scene, Buddhas, bodhisattvas, flying Apsaras, providers, and other murals in the Western Qin, of which the character modelling, colour, composition are similar to that of early Qiuci caves. Around 420 AD, when the 169ᵗʰ Western Qin Cave built shrines and modelled statues in Binglingsi Caves, the Mathura style Buddha figure in Gupta, *India* approached the mature and prosperous stage, while in faraway ‘*Gansu of China*’, the Buddha figures resembled the Indian Gupta style statues, which naturally made people think of the specific means or intermediation by which the influence of Gupta-style Buddha statues spread so quickly, and in turn helps to infer that the Gupta-style Buddha statues with unclear chronology may have been mature in the latter half of the 4ᵗʰ century. The painted Buddha sculptures remained in the 275ᵗʰ, 254ᵗʰ, 251ˢᵗ, and 259ᵗʰ early caves of Dunhuang Caves from the middle or the latter half of the 5ᵗʰ century continued the modelling mode of the Western Qin caves in Binglingsi with the influence of Gandhara Buddha or Gupta-style Buddha figures.
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An image of the Buddha on the surface of Bingling monastery in Gansu, China.
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Yungang Caves
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Yungang Caves (Yungang Shiku) are Chinese Buddhist grottoes. It is located on the southern side of Wuzhou Mountain, 16 km west from Datong City, Shanxi Province, stretching 1 km from east to west. Now there are 53 caves, and more than 51,000 statues. Yungang Caves were cut mainly in the Northern Wei Dynasty (386 - 534 CE), continuing from the first Heping year under the reign of
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The colossal Buddha al fresco in cave number 20 at Yungang Grottoes.
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Emperor Wencheng in the Northern Wei Dynasty (460 CE) to the fifth Zhengguang year of Emperor Xiaoming in the Northern Wei Dynasty (524 CE), and construction or renovation had also been conducted in later generations after the Northern Wei Dynasty.
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The Northern Wei period when Tuoba family of the Xianbei nationality entered the central plains was the thriving period of Buddhist cave art in north China. Most of the emperors in the Northern Wei Dynasty worshipped the Buddhist doctrine. In 439 AD, Emperor Taiwu of the Northern Wei Dynasty exterminated ‘Beiliang’, “Liangzhou was flat, the people migrated to Jingyi, and Sramana and Buddhists all moved east, thus the preaching of Buddhism increased,” (‘*History of Wei Dynasty - Annals of Buddhism & Taoism*’). The monks who moved from Liangzhou to the capital, Pingcheng of the Northern Wei Dynasty (now Datong, Shanxi), included Sramana Shixian from Ji Bin. He once served as a monk official, and carved or modelled Buddha statues imitating the image of the King of the Northern Wei on imperial orders. From 460-465 CE, the Zen monk Tanyao from Liangzhou succeeded Shixian as Sramana official, and suggested Emperor Wencheng of the Northern Wei “to cut the stone walls in the mountain on the Xiwuzhou frontier of the capital, and to dig five caves and engrave a Buddha statue in each, of which the highest 70 ft, the second highest was 60 ft, with spectacular carved decoration, matchless in the world,” (‘*History of Wei Dynasty* - *Annals of Buddhism & Taoism*’). This is the first phase of the Five Tanyao Caves in Yungang (the 16ᵗʰ, 17ᵗʰ, 18ᵗʰ, 19ᵗʰ, and 20ᵗʰ caves). The modelling plane of the five caves is horseshoe shaped with a dome roof;
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generally mimicking the Indian oval shaped thatched cottage form. The big stone carving Buddha statues of the Five Tanyao Caves on one hand permeates the notion of “King is Buddha” in the Northern Wei Dynasty, emphasising the imperial dignity and personality characteristics of the imperial dignified manner from appearance, temperament, and decoration. On the other hand, the expression style of clothing lines in the modelling tradition of Gandhara Buddha statues or Gupta Mathura Buddha statues. The main statues of the Five Tanyao Caves are Buddhas of Three Periods, and the main Buddha is unusually tall. The standing statue of the main Buddha in the 18ᵗʰ cave is 15.5 mt tall, the sitting statue of the main Buddha in the 19ᵗʰ cave is 16.8 mt tall, and the sitting statue of the main Buddha in the 20ᵗʰ cave is 14 mt tall. These standing or sitting Buddha in the shrine-shaped cave are reminiscent of the big Buddha statues in Bamian or Qiuci. The modelling of the main Buddha statues have high rounded buns and plump faces, with two ears hanging to the shoulders, eyes seeing the distance, wide shoulder and thick chest, vigorous body profile, mostly in cassock with exposed right side. The clothing lines are neat and pattern-like, full of the features of the idealised image of the leader of the northern nationality in China.
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The main Buddha in the 20ᵗʰ cave has high nose, deep eyes, thin lips, moustache, and flame-pattern neck light and back light, all embodying the characteristics of Gandhara Buddha statues, especially the Kapicsa style. The wavy hair of the main Buddha in the 16ᵗʰ cave also belongs to the legacy of Gandhara Buddha statues. On the either side of the main Buddha stands the follower Buddha figures, the appearances of which are the same with the main Buddha, but the clothing lines of the through-shoulder cassock inherit the U shape wave portraying method of the Buddha statues in Western Qin Cave of Binglingsi. Especially on the standing Buddha on the eastern wall of the 18ᵗʰ cave, and the standing Buddha on the western side of the southern wall of the 19ᵗʰ cave, the translucent thin through-shoulder clothing sticks close to the body, the U shape curve of clothing lines hangs down from his bosom, and the right hand seems to be posturing Abhaya Mudrā, closely resembles the Mathura style of Buddha statues. The disciple relief on the eastern wall of the 18ᵗʰ cave with deep eyes and high nose resembles the modelling of the strong facial expression of ‘*Khata’s*’ plaster statue.
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In addition, in Yungang Caves, a lot of relieves depicting Bunsen stories and Buddha stories, the subject and the composition are similar with the relieves of the same kind in Gandhara area, and often the directions of the relief compositions of the same subject are opposite in the two places, therefore it is postulated that some of Yungang relieves may be the rubbings of Gandhara relieves.
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Cave number 6 at Yungang Grottoes depicting Śākyamuni, Mañjuśrī, and Vairocana.
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The main image of Buddha in cave number 5 at Yungang Grottoes.
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Most of the basic manpower that sculpted the statues in Yungang Caves are the Liangzhou craftsmen who were familiar with the art of the Western Regions. On the eve of cutting the Five Tanyao Caves (455 CE), five people, including a Sramana from the Lion Kingdom (now Sri Lanka) and ‘*Buddhanandi*’, took the third Buddha statue to the capital (now Pingcheng), and Shale (present day Shule) Sramana went to the capital to present the Buddha’s bowl and painting portraits. These monks from various states in the Western Regions might also have contributed to the “Pingcheng pattern” statues of Yungang Caves. In the second half of the Northern Wei Dynasty, the “Pingcheng pattern” of Yungang Caves changed again and again. There appeared the modelling of clothing with ample clothes, broad belt, slim and a clear appearance; the influence of Gandhara art and Gupta art becomes increasingly weak, and the tendency of sinicisation is becoming more and more significant.
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On both sides of the door of the 8ᵗʰ cave of Yungang Caves, cut in the early years under the reign of Emperor Xiaowen of the Northern Wei Dynasty, carved the figures of Mahesvara - the three-head eight-arm Hindu Dharmapala - and five-head six-arm Skanda with peculiar modelling and unique style.
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Qizil Caves
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**Kezier Caves** (Kezier Shiku) are Chinese Buddhist grottoes. It is located in about 60 km east of Baicheng County, Xinjiang and 7 km southeast of Kezier Town. Cut in the cliff of the north bank of the Muzart valley, it has 236 numbered caves, of which 81 are relatively intact in shape and murals, mostly built in the 4^th to 7^th century. The Kuqa, Baicheng, Xinhe County area of Xinjiang is the ancient Qiuci area. Buddhism was introduced in Qiuci, which made
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*A cave of a 1,000 Buddhas at Qizil*
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it the centre of the Buddhist culture on the north path of the Silk Road. Qiuci Grottoes include Kezier Caves, Kumtura Caves, Simsim Caves, Kizilgaha Caves, etc., of which Kezier Caves are the earliest cut caves in China, and contain the largest size of Buddhist grotto group in Xinxiang. Unfortunately, the original painted statues have been destroyed, and only several pieces remain which were newly discovered after 1970.
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The shape, structure and murals of Kezier Caves are clearly affected by Indian Gandhara art and Gupta art. The shape and structure of Kezier Caves have a kind of Gandhara style rectangular patio bucket roof. The bucket top architectural form is common in Central Asia and West Asia area. Today, this kind of patio can also be seen in the sitting room of residential houses in Karakax County, Khotan. The early murals in Kezier Caves in Qiuci took portraits of Buddha, bodhisattva and large scale Buddha stories as the main theme, which is very close in the theme content and number to Gandhara Buddha stories, and the portraits of Buddha, bodhisattva and the image of nature and of man also have many similarities with the 3^rd century Gandhara statues. The 76^th cave of Kezier is deeply affected by the Gandhara art; the Buddhist story
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*The fresco in cave number 38 in the Kezier grottoes, depicting Prince Xudana offering as charity his son and daughter. This picture on the surface is the story as portrayed in the Xudana Sūtra, preserved at the Berlin Museum in Germany.*
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in the mural ‘*The birth of the Buddha*’ is the same in the picture composition with and the Gandhara relief of the Buddhist story ‘*The birth of the Buddha*’ in the 3^rd century, in which Mahamaya standing under the Sala tree with his right hand holding the branch and legs crossing naturally. Another mural of a Buddhist story, ‘*The Witch Luring Buddha*’ in the cave portrays the image of a haggard Sakyamuni, which is surprisingly similar in the profiling of the Gandhara relief ‘*Ascetical Sakyamuni*’ of the 3^rd century. Gupta art in India in 6^th century also had a great influence on grotto art in Qiuci area. In the left wall of the rear room of the 69^th cave of Kezier, there is a portrait of a standing Buddha, the lines of the cassock drawing the outline of the profile of the Buddha, mirroring the thin clothes close to the body in the Mathura style of Buddha portrait in Gupta era. The Bhiksu portrait in the inner wall of the paved path of the 175^th cave of Kezier particularly emphasises the presentation of the human body, which presents a transparent effect, and this is just the most typical characteristics of Sarnath-styled Buddha portrait. On the front wall of the main room of the 83^rd cave is a dancing girl in the mural of the King Udayana story, exhibiting a graceful S-shaped three-fold posture, which mirrors the Indian dancers in the murals of the Ajanta Caves.
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(*Wang Yong*)
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Dayan Stupa
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**Dayan Stupa (Dayan Ta)** It is Chinese Buddhist pagoda, also known as Pagoda at Ci'en Temple. It located in Xi'an City, Shaanxi Province. The stupa was first built in the 3^rd year of Yonghui (652 CE) in the reign of Emperor Gaozong of Tang. At that time, Emperor Gaozong of Tang subsidised to build this tower in the west courtyard of the temple to preserve Indian sutras obtained from India by the master of Xuanzang of Ci’en Temple. The stupa is a representative of the pavilion-style brick tower in the Tang dynasty, originally with five floors. It collapsed in the Chang’an years of Empress Wu Zetian (701-704 CE), and was reconstructed for 10 floors. Later only seven floors were left with a total height of about 64 mt. The plane of the tower is square, pilasters in the wood-like structure are built by bricks on the surface of each floor, and the circular arch door openings are cut in the centre of the four faces of each floor. The arch doors in the four facets of the tower base all have bluestone semicircular lintels with decoration of line carved reliefs of the Buddhism theme. Yuchi Yiseng, Khotan painter (present day Khotan) in early Tang, once painted murals at the Ci’en Temple. The lines carved on the lintels of the tower base resemble “winding iron wires”, which may be associated with the western region style of Yuchi Yiseng.
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Dayan stupa and an image of Xuanzang at Xian in Shaanxi Province
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(Wang Yong)
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Ajanta Caves
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Ajanta Caves is an Indian Buddhism grotto. It is located in about 106 km distance from northwest of Aurangabad, which is a key city of Maharashtra in the Deccan Plateau in India. From about 2ⁿᵈ century BCE to 7ᵗʰ century CE, 29 grottoes were dug successively in a U-shaped river valley, hills and palisades in Ajanta. In the first half of the 7th century, Chinese Tang Buddhist Xuanzang has recorded in Volume 11 of ‘*Great Tang Records on the Western Regions*’ of Achala Temple in Maharashtra that “the temple is located in the valley, near the cliff and valley, very high,” and the temple is carved from stones around, and Sakyamuni has even conducted bodhisattva’s activity here. From the auspicious omen of result to efficacy of still quiescence, everything is covered. Each stone elephant stands in the north and south of the gate, and local people say that the elephant will roar, with earsplitting sound. The geographical environment, building structure and sculpture theme under the description of Xuanzang are consistent with Ajanta Caves. Each side of the 16th grotto gate of Ajanta Caves has a stone elephant, and the name of Achala is engraved on the inscription of the 26th grotto, so most scholars agree that Achala Temple is Ajanta Caves.
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Twenty nine Ajanta grottoes are Buddhism grottoes. It can be divided into two periods: the early period is Hinayana, including 8ᵗʰ, 9ᵗʰ, 10ᵗʰ, 12ᵗʰ and 13ᵗʰ grottoes, and they have been dug up in 2ⁿᵈ century BC to 2ⁿᵈ century CE. The late period is Mahayana, including all the grottoes left, and they have been dug up from 450-650 CE. The building structure of Ajanta Caves can be divided into ‘chaitya’ grotto (Buddha hall) and ‘vihara’ grotto (monk room). The 9ᵗʰ, 10ᵗʰ, 19ᵗʰ, 26ᵗʰ and 29ᵗʰ belong to ‘chaitya’ grotto, and the rest belong to ‘vihara’ grotto. The 19ᵗʰ grotto is the typical one in the late period of Ajanta, and its front and interior decoration and carvings are magnificent. The Nirvana of Buddha Statue with 7 mt long in the 26ᵗʰ grotto is the largest existing Buddha statue in India. Frescoes of Ajanta Caves are well-known in
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Cave number 19 at Ajanta, India
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the history of art in the world. Frescoes of Ajanta Caves in the early period are created about from the 1ˢᵗ century BCE to 200 CE, and are the world’s most ancient Buddhism painting relics, presenting an antique style, which can be represented by the 9th and 10th grottoes. Frescoes of Ajanta Caves in the late period are created around in 450-650 AD or later, with the style changing from classicism to mannerism and Baroque style, which can be represented by the 16ᵗʰ, 17ᵗʰ, 1ˢᵗ and 2ⁿᵈ grottoes. Themes of Ajanta frescoes cover Jataka, biography of Buddhas and separate the Buddha and Bodhisattva statue, where the master works include the fresco of the 16ᵗʰ grotto ‘*Nanda Becoming a Buddhist*’, the frescoes of the 17ᵗʰ grotto ‘*Xudana Biography*’, ‘*Indra and Goddess*’, ‘*Buddha Returning Home* and *Simhala Avadana*’, the fresco of the 2ⁿᵈ grotto ‘*Female Believer’s Sacrifice*’, the frescoes of the 1ˢᵗ grotto ‘*Bodhisattva Padmapani*’, ‘*Mahajanaka*’ and ‘*Subduing Demons*’. Painting techniques of Ajanta frescoes include animnonnata and nimnonnata. Nimnonnata is more used in the frescoes in the late period, and it is not only used in character, but also in animals, flowers, rocks, buildings, etc.
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The ancient gallery of Ajanta grottoes in India.
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Nimnonnata of Indian traditional paintings was also introduced in China via various regions in Central Asia, producing a certain impact on China’s Buddhism paintings. However, whether China’s Buddhism painting technique including ‘*Tianzhu Yifa*’ used in the grottoes of Kizil and Dunhuang Caves in the early period is directly influenced by Nimnonnata of Ajanta fresco still lacks related transmission carrier, historical documents and physical evidence. In the records of Achala Temple in Maharashtra in Xuanzang’s ‘*Great Tang Records on the Western Regions*’, there is a description about architecture and engraving, but no information about frescoes.
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(Wang Yong)
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Great Stupa of Kanishka
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Great Stupa of Kanishka or Vihara of Kanishka is the stupa in Gandhara area in the Kushan era. Its site is located in Shan-ji-ki-Dheri near the ancient capital of Gandhara (now Peshawar, Pakistan). The stupa was built about in the late 1ˢᵗ or early 2ⁿᵈ century under the order of Kanishka, the third king of Kushan Dynasty and the supervision of imperial craftsman Agesiles (he may be the descendant of Greeks or Eurasian). According to the description of Chinese Buddhist Faxian (in the Eastern Jin
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Base of the receptacle of the relics of Kaniṣka
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Dynasty) who went westward for seeking sutra, this stupa is “more than 40 zhang high, with jeweleries decorated. Everyone who has seen it will praise it magnificent and stately, and other stupa cannot compare with it,” (*Biography of Faxian*). According to the records of chapter five, “Traveling notes of Song Yun and Hui Sheng” of Yang Xuanzhi (in the Northern Wei Dynasty) ‘*Records of Qielan Temple in Luoyang*: in 520’, when Song Yun and Hui Sheng
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Great Stūpa of Kaniṣka
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reached Gandhara, they saw the Great Stupa of Kanishka in the southeast of Gandhara (Peshawar), with “400 chi high”, “iron column on the top, 300 chi high, being 13 floors, so 700 chi high.” “During Buddhist ceremony in the stupa, there are too many treasures to be counted. Under the sunlight, the stupa becomes bright, and under the blow of wind, the bell will sound. Among all stupas, it is the best.” Tang Buddhist Xuanzang has even recorded in ‘*Great Tang Records on the Western Regions*’ that “the stupa is more than 400 chi high, with five layers of base, 150 chi high. 25 layers are on the top.” In Song Yun era, the stupa was preserved well, but in Xuanzang era, it was destroyed several times, and now, only a few footstones are left.
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In 1908, a bronze Kaniska ‘*Sarira Box*’ was unearthed in the Great Stupa of Kanishka, with a sitting statue of Buddha, standing statues of Indra and Brahma cast on the box cover, a row of amoretto shouldering snakelike garland on the box body, and sitting statue of Buddha, and Persian sun-god and luna are carved on the garland, and Kushan king wearing the martial attire and thigh boot stands among them. In this stupa, a Kaniska gold coin was also unearthed. The front of the coin was the figure of Kanishka wearing martial attire of the leader of the nomadic people in Central Asia, holding the spear standing near the fire altar. The back of the coin was the standing Buddha statue with Greek style, and there was the inscription in Greek letter “Buddha” (Boddo).
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Sanchi Stupa
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Sanchi, also known traditionally as Kakanaya, Kakanava, Kakanadabota and Bota-Sriparvata, is a small city near Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh. It is famous for its repository of remarkable remains of Buddhist art and architecture dating back from 3ʳᵈ century BCE till 12ᵗʰ century CE, which covered the period starting from the Mauryan dynasty and extending up to Sunga, Satvahana, Kushan, Gupta dynasties and later kingdoms. The famous site consists of stupas, monasteries, temples, and a monolithic Asokan pillar crowned with four lion heads. It contains one of the best treasures of the ancient Indian sculptures. Lying neglected and unidentified for almost 600 years after it flourished for 1,500 years, it was rediscovered by a British officer General Taylor in 1818 and was restored by John Marshall of the Archaeological Survey of India between 1912-1919. Declared a UNESCO heritage site in 1989, the pride
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Southern gate of Sanchi Stūpa
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Sculpted column of the eastern gate of Sanchi Stūpa.
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of the place is a large Buddhist stupa (also called maha-stupa), which is considered to be the most exquisite among the earliest available stone as well as brick structures of India.
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It is said that Asoka, the Mauryan emperor, laid the foundation of a large Buddhist religious complex in Sanchi, probably because of its fascinating location in hills and connection with his Queen Devi, who was a daughter of the merchant of nearby Vidisha town. He built a maha-stupa (great stupa) here over the Buddha’s relics which were redistributed by him after their original division into eight portions. This maha-stupa was originally a low structure of brick with half the diameter of the present edifice, which was hemispherical in shape with raised terraces at the base. It was surrounded by a wooden railing and had a stone umbrella at the top.
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The core of the maha-stupa was enlarged to its present diameter of approximately 36 meters and the height to about 16 meters, during the period of Sungas and Andhra-Satvahanas in the 1st century BCE. It was decorated with balustrades, staircases and a harmika on the top and its wooden railing was replaced by stone ones.
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Satvahanas added to its four beautifully carved stone gateways or toranas. Each gateway is about 11 meters in height and consists of two upright pillars which support a superstructure of three architraves with volute ends. All of these are elaborately carved and depict various significant events connected with Lord Buddha’s life and Jataka stories. The southern gateway is believed to be the oldest of the four because it is placed at the entrance where the Asokan pillar and the staircase leading to the top is located. Its rich carvings illustrate the birth of Siddharth Gautam as well as his first sermon at Sarnath as Buddha. The northern gateway is crowned by a wheel of law and depicts various miracles of Buddhas as referred in the Jatakas. The eastern gateway has a depiction of stories connected with Siddharth Gautam’s journey towards enlightenment or Buddhahood. Sculpted on the western gateways are scenes from seven incarnations of Buddha.
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During the period of Kushanas and Guptas, the site of the maha-stupa was embellished with more temples, monasteries and sculptures. A large number of inscriptions in Brahmi describing small and large donations by people from local and faraway regions, have been found here, thereby indicating its importance.
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After the restoration of the site in 1919, it has gradually been well developed as a significant Buddhist tourist and pilgrimage spot and is well connected by road, train and air. An international Buddhist university is being planned to be established here to restore the glory of the place.
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(*Kamal Sheel*)