adopted, as shown in the above woodcut (No. [37]). The pillars being narrower, and the discs smaller, the principal sculpture was on the intermediate space: in this instance a king on his throne receives a messenger, while his army in front defends the walls; lower down the infantry, cavalry, and elephants sally forth in battle array, while one of the enemy sues for peace, which is probably the information being communicated to the king.
The inner rail, though lower, was even more richly ornamented than the great rail, generally with figures of dagobas—apparently twelve in each quadrant—most elaborately carved with scenes from the life of Buddha or from legends. One of these dagobas has already been given ([Woodcut No. 17]). Between these were pillars and slabs ornamented, either as shown in Woodcuts Nos. 38 and 39, or with either Buddhist designs or emblems, but all as rich, at least, as these; the whole making up a series of pictures of Buddhism, as it was understood in the 4th and 5th centuries, unsurpassed by anything now known to exist in India. The slab represented in Woodcut No. 38 (p. 101), though now much ruined, is interesting as showing the three great objects of Buddhist worship at once. At the top is the dagoba with its rail, but with the five-headed Naga in the place usually occupied by Buddha. In the central compartment is the chakra or wheel, now generally acknowledged to be the emblem of Dharma, the second member of the Buddhist Trinity; below that the tree, possibly representing Sanga or the congregation; and in front of all a throne, on which is placed what I believe to be a relic, wrapt up in a silken cloth.
39. Dagoba (from a Slab), Amravati.
This combination is repeated again and again in these sculptures, and may be almost designated as the shorter Buddhist catechism, or rather the confession of faith, Buddha, Dharma, Sanga. The last woodcut (No. 39) is also interesting, as showing, besides the three emblems, the form of pillars with its double animal capitals so common in structures of this and an earlier age.
The age of these rails does not seem doubtful.[131] The outer or great rail seems to have been commenced about A.D. 319, at the time when the tooth relic paid this place a visit on its way from Puri to Ceylon, and its erection may have occupied the whole of the rest of that century. The inner rail is more modern, and seems to have been begun about A.D. 400, and, with some other detached fragments, carry the history of the monument down, it may be, to 500. At the same time it is clear that an older monument existed on the spot. The fragments that exist of the central tope are certainly of an earlier age, and some of the slabs of the inner rail exhibit sculptures of a much earlier date on their backs. It seems as if they had belonged to some disused earlier building, and been re-worked when fitted to their new places.
When Hiouen Thsang visited this place in the year 639 it had already been deserted for more than a century, but he speaks of its magnificence and the beauty of its site in more glowing terms than he applies to almost any other monument in India. Among other expressions he uses one not easily understood at first sight, for he says, “It was ornamented with all the magnificence of the palaces of Bactria”[132] (Tahia). Now, however, that we know what the native art of India was from the sculptures at Bharhut and Sanchi, and as we also know nearly what the art of Bactria was from those recently dug up near Peshawur, especially at Jamalgiri, we see at once that it was by a marriage of these two arts that the Amravati school of sculpture was produced, but with a stronger classical influence than anything of its kind found elsewhere in India. It is now also tolerably evident that the existence of so splendid a Buddhist establishment so far south must have been due to the fact of the mouths of the Kistnah and Godavery being ports of departure from which the Buddhists of the north-west and west of India, in early times, conquered or colonised Pegu and Cambodia, and eventually the island of Java.
All this will be clearer as we proceed. Meanwhile it seems probable that with this, which is certainly the most splendid specimen of its class, we must conclude our history of Buddhist rails. No later example is known to exist; and the Gandhara topes, which generally seem to be of this age or later, have all their rails attached to their sides in the shape of a row of pilasters. If they had any figured illustrations, they must have been in the form of paintings on plaster on the panels between the pilasters. This, indeed, was probably the mode in which they were adorned, for it certainly was not with sculptures, but we cannot understand any Buddhist monument existing anywhere, without the jatakas or legends being portrayed on its walls in some shape or other.
At Sarnath all reminiscences of a rail had disappeared, and a new mode of ornamentation introduced, which bore no resemblance to anything found on the earlier topes.