14. Tope at Sarnath, near Benares.
(From a Photograph.)
The best known, as well as the best preserved of the Bengal topes, is that at Sarnath, near Benares ([Woodcut No. 14]). It was carefully explored by General Cunningham in 1835-36, and found to be a stupa: viz., containing no relics, but erected to mark some spot sanctified by the presence of Buddha, or by some act of his during his long residence there. It is situated in the Deer Park, where he took up his residence with his five disciples when he first removed from Gaya on attaining Buddhahood, and commencing his mission as a teacher. What act it commemorates we shall probably never know, as there are several mounds in the neighbourhood, and the descriptions of the Chinese Pilgrims are not sufficiently precise to enable us now to discriminate between them.
The building consists of a stone basement, 93 ft. in diameter, and solidly built, the stones being clamped together with iron to the height of 43 ft. Above that it is in brickwork, rising to a height of 110 ft. above the surrounding ruins, and 128 ft. above the plain.[78] Externally the lower part is relieved by eight projecting faces, each 21 ft. 6 in. wide, and 15 ft. apart. In each is a small niche, intended apparently to contain a seated figure of Buddha, and below them, encircling the monument, is a band of sculptured ornament of the most exquisite beauty. The central part consists—as will be seen by the cut on the next page—of geometric patterns of great intricacy, but combined with singular skill; and, above and below, foliage equally well designed, and so much resembling that carved by Hindu artists on the earliest Mahomedan mosques at Ajmir and Delhi, as to make us feel sure they cannot be very distant in date.
The carvings round the niches and on the projections have been left so unfinished—in some instances only outlined—that it is impossible to guess what ultimate form it may have been intended to give them. The upper part of the tower seems never to have been finished at all, but from our knowledge of the Afghanistan topes we may surmise that it was intended to encircle it with a range of pilasters, and then some bold mouldings, before covering it with a hemispherical dome.
In his excavations, General Cunningham found, buried in the solid masonry, at the depth of 10½ ft. from the summit, a large stone on which was engraved the usual Buddhist formula, “Ye dharmma hetu,” &c., in characters belonging to the 7th century, from which he infers that the monument belongs to the 6th century. To me it appears so extremely improbable that men should carefully engrave such a formula on a stone, and then bury it ten or twelve feet in a mass of masonry which they must have hoped would endure for ever, that I cannot accept the conclusion. It seems to me much more probable that it may have belonged to some building which this one was designed to supersede, or to have been the pedestal of some statue which had been disused, but which from its age had become venerable, and was consequently utilised to sanctify this new erection. I am consequently much more inclined to adopt the tradition preserved by Captain Wilford,[79] to the effect that the Sarnath monument was erected by the sons of Mohi Pala, and destroyed (interrupted?) by the Mahomedans, in 1017, before its completion.[80] The form of the monument, the character of its sculptured ornaments, the unfinished condition in which it is left, and indeed the whole circumstances of the case, render this date so much the most probable that I feel inclined to adopt it almost without hesitation.
15. Panel on the Tope at Sarnath.
(From a Photograph.)