Having accomplished this, they moved their capital down to Ayuthia, a little more than fifty miles from the sea; and three centuries afterwards Bangkok succeeded it, and is now the capital. It is by no means certain whether this migration downwards was caused by political events and increasing commerce, or from the country gradually becoming drier and more fit for human habitation. Judging from what happened in Bengal in historical times, I should fancy it was the latter.
In India we find civilized nations first established in the Punjab and on the watershed between the Sutlej and the Jumna. Between 2000 and 3000 years B.C. Oude seems to have become dry enough for human habitation, and Ayodhya[586] (from which the Siamese capital took its name) became the chief city. Between 1000 and 500 B.C. Janakpore on the north, and Rajagriha on the south, were the capital cities of Bengal; but both being situated on the hills, it was not till Asoka’s time (250 B.C.) that Patna on the Soane and Vaisali on the Gunduck, became capitals; and still another 1000 years elapsed before Gaur and Dacca became important, while Moorshedabad, Hooghly, and Calcutta, are cities of yesterday.[587] The same phenomenon seems to have occurred in Siam, and, what is of still more interest, as we shall presently see, in Cambodia.
358. Ruins of a Pagoda at Ayuthia.
As Ayuthia was for three centuries the flourishing capital of one of the great building races of the world, we should, of course, look for considerable magnificence having been displayed in its architecture. From the accounts of the early Portuguese and Dutch travellers who visited it in the days of its glory, it seems to have merited the title they bestowed upon it of the “Venice of the East,” and the remains justify their eulogiums. The buildings, however, seem to have been principally constructed of brick and wood; and as the city has now been practically deserted for more than a century, the wild fig-trees have everywhere inserted their roots into the masonry, and decay has progressed rapidly among the wooden erections. As described by recent visitors, nothing can be more wildly picturesque than this once splendid city, now overgrown with jungle; but such a stage of decay is, of all conditions, the least favourable to the researches of the antiquary.
The form which the older pagodas took at Ayuthia differs in many essential respects from those which we find either in India or in Burmah. The top or upper part has a rounded domical shape, which we can easily fancy to be derived from the tope, but the upright part looks more like the sikra of a Hindu temple than anything Buddhist. If we had a few earlier examples, perhaps we might trace the steps by which the one passed into the other; at present the gaps in the series are too great to be bridged over with anything approaching certainty. One link, however, seems to be supplied by the temples of Nakhon Wat in Cambodia, of which more hereafter.
359. Ruins of a Pagoda at Ayuthia. (From Mouhot.)