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Much light, it may be shown, is thrown on the monuments under review by certain passages of this inscription.

The couplet, we quote below, is the most important part of the record :

(a) "Tau Dharmarājikām Sāmgam Dharmachakram punar

در

navam.

(b) "Krtavantau cha Navināmaṣṭa-Mahasthāna Saila Ganddha Kuțim."

Translation:-"They (Sthirapala and Vasantapāla) repaired the Dharmarajikā and the Dharmachakra (vihara ?) including the accessories, as well as the Gandhakuți, made of stone, belonging to the eight great places. "

We shall attempt now to examine these monuments and establish their identity, as far as we can, in the light of Hiuentsiang's travels, and epigraphic finds.

Dharmarajikā―Dr. Vogel tried to identify the present "Dhāmekh Stupa " with the "Dharmarājikā” of the inscription. But since the publication of Dr. Venis' true view that the word Dhamekh was derived from Dharmekṣa rather than from Dharmarājikā, Dr. Vogel has finally abandoned his identification. Archeologists have, however, ascertained that the Dhamekh Stupa belongs to the Gupta period and not to the Asokan period. The word Dharmarājikā again was used to denote the Asokan stupas generally. It has already been pointed out that the Jagat Singh Stupa was of the Aśokan age. It is inferable, therefore, that the word Dharmarajikā refers to the original structure of the Jagat Singh's Stupa. Moreover, we gather from the travels of Fahien that he saw a stupa where the Panchavaggiyas paid reverence to the Buddha and to the north of it was the famous site of "Turning the Wheel of the Law " Judging from this, I am inclined to believe that the Dharmarājika or the Jagat Singh was meant by that stupa by Fahien.

1 84,000 Dharmarājikās built by Aśoka Dharmaraja, as stated by Divyavadāna (Ed. Cowell and Neil, p. 379) quoted by Foucher, Ico. Boudhique, p. 554.

? The Pilgrimage of Fahien (translated by Laidlay) pp. 307-8,

Dharmohakra.-Its mention has been made in the Mahipāla inscription as Sangam Dharmachakram. Dr. Vogel took the word sangam to mean "complete". The late Dr. Venis seemed to have accepted his rendering evidently in the absence of a better one. This rendering, in my opinion, appears very doubtful and therefore deserves to be examined. We meet with an expression like Sanga Veda meaning Sadanga-Veda. Likewise, we may take the expression Sangam Dharmachakra to mean the present Dharmachakra together with its various accessories. The meaning of Dharmachakra remains now to be settled. From the fact that the Buddha at Sarnath turned "the Wheel of the Law" have originated in later times the Dharma-chakra symbol or the symbol of the Wheel, the Dharmachakramudra, and even the name Dharmachakravihār a denoting the monastery of Sarnath.1 In a seal, discovered in the course of excavation at Sarnath, is inscribed CH'S श्रीमूल | गन्धकु भगवतो । It may consequently lead us to the conclusion that the whole monastery used to be called Saddharmachakra and a chapel within its precincts was known as Mulagandhakuti (Main Shrine). From all this we may deduce that the present monastery, as a whole, together with its accessories, has been meant by the expression Sangam Dharmachakram. Mr. A. K. Maitra, of the Varendra Research Society, is of opinion that the Dharmachakra symbol, which formerly surmounted the lion capital of Asoka and of which the fragments are now being preserved in the Sarnath Museum, 3 is the exact object which is denoted by the foregoing expression in the Mahipala Inscription. The practice of adorning the lion capital of Asoka with the Dharmachakra symbol was not an uncommon feature in ancient days, and, as a matter of fact, we find the same thing on the Asoka pillar at Sanchi. Therefore nothing can be said with certainty as to the object which was repaired—either the whole monastery or

11n the inscription of Kumāradevi we find that Sarnath has been called Saddharma-chakra Vihara, vide the present writer's" History of Sarnath ", p. 112.

2 Hargreave's Annual Progress Report for 1915, p. 4.

8 Sir John Marshall's Annual Report, A. S., 1904-5, p. 36.

the Asoka pillar. It is not unlikely that the whole monastery was under repairs along with the repairs of the Dharma-rājikā inasmuch as the monastery, the Gandha-Kuti and the Dharmarājikā were all in a ruinous condition. The Pala brothers, it may rightly be supposed, undertook to repair all of them.

Aṣṭa-mahāsthāna-Faila Gandhakuti.-Drs. Hultzsch, Vogel and Venis have offered various interpretations to this expression: Of these, Dr. Venis' is the latest. The late learned doctor, after having shown the impossibility of expounding the compound as the Gandha-kuti erected of stone brought from eight great places, on the ground of Sanskrit grammar, has put forth the following careful interpretation: "Shrine is made of stone and in the shrine are, or to it belong, eight great places (positions)." According to the rules of Sanskrit grammar, this compound can be no other than the मध्यमपदलोपि समास. Then, of course, the component parts would be :--षष्ठ महास्थानस्था (or स्थितां ) शैलगन्धकुटी'. We shall consider now whether this interpretation suits the topography of Sarnath as well as tholds good on several other grounds. Remarks have been heard from scholars that the explanation hitherto advanced of the expression is far from being satisfactory. To work at the details, it appears that the word "Saila-Gandhakuți " here, no doubt, refers to the Main Shrine existing to-day, for architectural characteristics of the twelfth century A.D. are traceable in the ruins and the style of this building. The word Gandhakuti has, however been discussed elsewhere. Again, the previously mentioned earthen seal, bearing the legend श्रीसद्धम्मचक्रे मलगन्धकु Hal, furnishes us with the information that "in the Mula Gandhakuți which was situate in the Saddharmachakra Vihāra”, etc. The age of this epigraph is much anterior to that of the Mahipala Inscription. Thus, we find that the relation which the

1 J.A.S.B. (N.S,), Vol. II, No. 9, p. 447.

› Cf. faumage :Daśakumāra Charita.

Mr. Hargreaves, Superintendent, Archeological Survey, in a letter to me expressed the same view" Its explanation, I am afraid, must always remain doubtful."

Dharmachakra Vihara or the whole monastery bore to the Gandhakuti has been a matter of considerable antiquity. Round the chapel in which the Buddha dwelt an extensive monastery may have gradually come into being. That chapel used to be called "Gandhakuti " and the whole monastery passed by so many different names. Our attention may be turned again to Hiuen-tsiang's account just for the sake of comparison. We shall find there that he also saw the whole monastery and a high building made of stone.1 There was an image of Buddha therein represented in the Dharmachakramudrā. In the traveller's account one one thing appears to be specially striking and on which he seemed to have laid much stress, viz. "The Sanghārāma was divided into eight portions (sections)". I conjecture from this that these eight parts of the Sanghārāma in course of time developed into eight great places or sthānas or monasteries which constituted the whole establishment. And very probably this Sanghārāma having distinct divisions received the true designation of Aṣṭa mahāsthāna. Curiously enough it is to note that six distinct monasteries have already been exhumed by modern exploration. I was also informed by a Superintendent of the Indian Archælogical Department that probable sites of more vihāras still lay hidden on the east of the sanghaNo spadework has, for some reasons, been carried on in that direction. We may nevertheless arrive at these conclusive points that Asta mahāsthāna was the name given to the whole Sanghārama and Saila-gandhakuti was the name which signified an old stone building situated probably in the middle of the Sanghårāma and therefore called at one time Mūla, meaning "central" or "original", from the fact that the Buddha had set up his first residence there, and at another time "Saila " as it was chiefly built of stone.

rāma.

The Buddhist literature informs us that the room where the Buddha dwelt was usually made fragrant by burning some incense and thus it received the name of Gandhakuți. The word, again, in course of time, has been modified into Gandhola and came to be used in a similar sense in Tibetan books-" Pag-SamJon-Zang" by S. C. Das, c.I.E., p. 77.

Cf. Watter's version." This establishment, he says, was in eight divisions all enclosed within one wall." Watter's, Vol. II, p 50.

III.-Raja Indradyumna.

By J. N. Samaddar, B.A.

In one of my peregrinations I found an Oriya priest making some excavations on a small ridge in the village of Jaynagore near Lakhisarai in the Monghyr district. The presence of an Oriya priest at that place naturally excited my curiosity and on enquiry I came to know from him that he believed to have had received a mandate while asleep from the god Jagannatha to build a temple there and so he had come all the way from his native district, Puri, to carry out the command, which he proposed to do by begging.

On my return to the Dâk Bungalow, on further enquiry I came to know that there is a tradition in that part of the country that close to the top of the northern ridge in that village, one king named Indradyumna had his treasure which was sealed with a magic seal and that a number of fruitless attempts had been made in the past to discover this treasure. It was said that the Oriya priest had come there as Jagannatha had revealed to him the place of the treasure on condition that he would build a temple there, rivalling the temple at Puri. My curiosity being intensified, I went to the ridge the next day, and as fortunately the priest was then absent I was able to take a more minute observation of the excavation (?) which was going on and found that underneath the grass some pavement was indeed discernible and portions of the grass having been removed in some places, the pavement was clear.

Mr. V. A. Smith in his History referring to the Pāla kings observes that "According to tradition, the ruler of Magadha at the time of the Muhammadan conquest in A.D. 1197 was Indradyumna Pāla. Forts attributed to him are still pointed out in the Monghyr district." (History, p. 401.) The Archæological

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