them as Græco-Buddhistic sculptures.[1] Their resemblance to the Byzantine ivories, as of this casket to Byzantine goldsmiths' work, is probably due to their having been executed by Indian workmen from Greek designs or models. It will be interesting to observe that the peaked arches represented on the casket are identical in character with the peaked arches of the upper part of the piazza of St Mark's at Venice, which was built I believe in 1592, The bottom of the casket is ornamented with a beautiful conventional representation of the sacred lotus with eight petals, which are pointed like the arches of the eight niches above them.
The silver patera has been fully described and figured by me in vol. xi, New Series, of the Transactions of the Royal Society of Literature. It was also described and figured by Prinsep in vol. vii. of the Transactions of the Asiatic Society of Bengal; and is mentioned and badly figured in Sir Alexander Burnes' Cabool, 1843. Colonel Yule gives a woodcut of it in the second edition of his Marco Polo. Sir Alexander Burnes figures along with it a second silver dish of Persian work, representing Yezdigird I [a.d. 632], which is described by General Cunningham in vol. x. of the
- ↑ I have great pleasure in publishing the following extract from a letter written to me by Mr. William Simpson since the publication of the earlier copies of this Handbook—
"At p. 146, vol i. you give to Dr. Leitner the whole credit of being the first to declare the existence of Greek Art in the remains of the Indus region. I have a claim dating long before that of Leitner’ s, and mine is not exactly the first. I po t with this a copy of a paper I read in January last, to the Royal Institute of British Architects, in which you will see the details so far as my reading has gone. The reference to Elphinstone's History is vol. i. p. 107. Wilsons remarks on that you will find in the Ariana Antiqua, p. 31. Cunningham's small book only refers to Cashmere. I visited the Manikyala Tope in February 1860, and my judgment that it contained in its art an influence derived from Greek or classic sources was founded on the sketches I then made. Next year I sketched all the Cashmere remains, and the details on them confirmed the judgment I formed from the Manikyala monument, I have all my drawings here on which I based my opinions. It was ten years after that when Dr. Leitner came home with his interesting collection of 'Græco-Buddhistic' sculptures."
