guides, and we have now sufficient evidence to interpret these sculptures with reasonable confidence.
Besides the figures of Buddha, there are a great number of figures which have all got nimbuses or glories at the back of their heads. All have the tilaka on their foreheads, as Buddha has, and none have any kingly attributes, but all wear the same ornaments and amulets. These are recognised as representations of the Bodhisattwa or of Bodhisattwas. Until Gautama assumed Buddhahood, he was the Bodhisattwa of that age, and as such is represented with necklaces and ornaments. But the Mahâyâna school introduced many others into their iconography—mythical beings who are ultimately to be manifested as the Buddhas of future ages.[1]
A more important point than the mere presence of these conventional figures of Buddha or of saints in these monasteries, is their excessive reduplication; to consecrate one was evidently, as among the Jains, a work of religious merit.
In India, no building or cave is known with a date anterior to, say, a.d. 100, in which more than one such figure is represented. Even at Amarâvatî they do not occur on the great rail which was erected at latest about the beginning of the Christian Era (ante, p. 122) but appear first on the basement, which was constructed in the 2nd century; and they occur in such cases as Nos. 19 and 26 at Ajantâ, and are numerous in the later caves at Kanherî, Elûrâ, and Aurangâbâd, none of which seem to be earlier than a.d. 200, and most of them much later.
In the Gandhâra monasteries they exist literally in hundreds—on the base of the stûpas, on the walls, and in the cells. The latter is, indeed, the most remarkable peculiarity of any. Among the Jains, it is the practice to surround the courts of their temples with cells which are small shrines; and here we find also numerous small cells surrounding the courts of the stûpas all consecrated as shrines for images of Buddha and saints, the monastery being quite separate from the structures for worship. And further, here are even separate courts constructed for secondary stûpas and numerous additional image chapels. This wealth of imagery, however, is accounted for by the fact that the Mahâyâna or Greater Translation was much more prevalent in the north of India than in the peninsula, and was considerably in advance of the Hînayâna school of Central India in all complications of ritual observances.
The few inscriptions found on Gandhâra sculptures or on the same sites, are dated in an unnamed era, and range from 78 to 384. One is dated in the twenty-sixth year of King Guduphara
- ↑ Among these the chief are Maitreya—who is expected to appear first—Avalokitesvara or Padmapâni, Manjusrî, Samantabhadra, Vajrapâni, etc.
