Republics in Ancient India, c. 1500 B.C.–500 B.C. c14.52

c14.52

This story is completely at variance with the statements of Fahsien and Hsüan Tsang, both of whom visited Rāmagāma many centuries after the time of Dutthagāmini, and found the relic *stūpa* intact, but no river. Fa-hsien, in the beginning of the 5th century A.D. saw a tank beside the *stūpa* in which, according to local tradition, lived a dragon (i.e. Nāga) who continually watched over the tower.³ In the middle of the 7th century, Hsüan Tsang saw the same *stūpa* and the same tank of clear water inhabited by dragons (Nāgas), who daily transformed themselves into men and paid their adoration to the *stūpa*.⁴ Both pilgrims mention Aśoka's attempt, abandoned on the expostulation of the Nāga king, to remove these relics to his own capital. In the Chinese accounts, the argument which the Nāga king gave to Aśoka is the same as that which he gave to dissuade the holy Sonuttara from removing the relics to Ceylon.⁵