PREFACE.

1. THE discoveries made by Lieutenant Maisey and myself, amongst the numerous Buddhist monuments that still exist around Bhilsa, in Central India, are described - imperfectly, I fear- by myself in the present work. To the Indian antiquary and historian, these discoveries will be, I am willing to think, of very high importance; while to the mere English reader they may not be uninteresting, as the massive mounds are surrounded by mysterious circles of stone pillars, recalling attention at every turn to the early earthworks, or barrows, and the Druidical colonnades of Britain.

In the Buddhistical worship of trees displayed in the Sánchi bas-reliefs, others, I hope, will see (as well as myself) the counterpart of the Druidical and adopted English reverence for the Oak. In the horse-shoe temples of Ajanta and Sánchi many will recognise the form of the inner colonnade at Stonehenge.* More, I suspect, will learn that there are Cromlechs in India as well as in Britain;t that the Brahmans, Buddhists, and Druids all believed in the transmigration of the soul; that the Celtic language * Plate II. figs. 1, 2, and 3. Plate II. figs. 4 and 5.

was undoubtedly derived from the Sanscrit ;* and that Buddha (or Wisdom), the Supreme Being worshipped by the Buddhists, is probably (most probably) the same as the great god Buddwás, considered by the Welsh as the dispenser of good. These coincidences are too numerous and too striking to be accidental. Indeed, the Eastern origin of the Druids was suspected by the younger Pliny,† who says, "Even to this day Britain celebrates the magic rites with so many similar ceremonies, that one might suppose they had been taken from the Persians." The same coincidence is even more distinctly stated by Dionysius Periegesis, who says that the women of the British Amnitæ celebrated the rites of Dionysos, v. 375 :As the Bistonians on Apsinthus banks Shout to the clamorous Eiraphiates, Or, as the Indians on dark-rolling Ganges Hold revels to Dionysos the noisy

So do the British women shout Evoë!

2. I have confined my observations

chiefly to

the religious belief taught by Sákya Muni, the last mortal Buddha, who died 543 B.C. There was, however, a more ancient Buddhism, which prevailed not only in India, but in all the countries

* The name of Druid may be taken as an example: Greek, dpūs; Sanskrit, ☎, dru; Welsh, derw; Erse, dair: a tree, or oak

tree.

† Pliny, Nat. Hist. xxx. 1,—“ Britannia hodie eam (magiam) attonite celebrat tantis ceremoniis, ut eam Persis dedisse videri possit."

populated by the Arian race. kuchanda, Kanaka, and

The belief in Kra

Kásyapa, the three mortal Buddhas who preceded Sakya Muni, was in India contemporaneous with the worship of the elements inculcated in the Védas. The difference between Vedantism and primitive Buddhism, was not very great; and the gradual evolution of the worship of concrete Nature (called Pradhún by the Brahmans, and Dharma or Prajná by the Buddhists), from the more ancient adoration of the simple elements, was but the natural consequence of the growth and progressive development of the human mind. In Europe the traces of this older Buddhism are found in the Caduceus, or wand of Hermes, which is only the symbol of Dharma, or deified nature, and in the Welsh Buddwás, and the Saxon Woden ;- but slightly altered forms of Buddha. The fourth day of the week, Wednesday, or Woden's-day, was named Dies Mercurii by the Romans, and is still called Buddhwár by the Hindus. Maia was the mother of the Greek Hermeias or Hermes; and Maya was the mother of the Indian Buddha. The connection between Hermes, Buddwás, Woden, and Buddha is evident; although it may be difficult, and perhaps nearly impossible, to make it apparent to the general reader.

Hermeias and his "golden wand," xovoóópanic, are mentioned by Homer; but Hesiod* is the first who * Theog. 938.

speaks of his mother "Maia, the Atlantis who bore to Zeus the illustrious Hermes, the herald of the immortals." In the Homeric poems, also, there is no trace of serpents entwining the wand in the manner represented in works of art. Even in the late Homeridian hymn the wand (which was Apollo's sheepstaff) is described as "a golden three-leaved innocuous rod." The epithet of three-leaved is peculiarly applicable to the three-pointed symbol of Dharma, so conspicuous an ornament on the Sánchi gateways of this volume.

In illustration of the ancient history of India, the bas-reliefs and inscriptions of the Bhilsa Topes are almost equal in importance to the more splendid discoveries made by the enterprising and energetic Layard in the mounds of the Euphrates. In the inscriptions found in the Sánchi and Sonári Topes we have the most complete and convincing proof of the authenticity of the history of Asoka, as related in the Mahawanso. In the Pali Annals of Ceylon, it is stated, that after the meeting of the Third Buddhist Synod, 241 B.C., Kásyapa was despatched to the Hemawanta country to convert the people to Buddhism. In the Sánchi and Sonári Topes were discovered two portions of the relics of Kásyapa, whom the inscriptions call the "Missionary to the whole Hemawanta."

The Sánchi bas-reliefs, which date in the early part of the first century of our era, are more original in

design and more varied in subject than any other examples of Eastern sculpture which I have seen in India. The subjects represented are religious processions, the worship of Topes and trees, and the adoration of the peculiar symbols of the Buddhist Triad. Besides these there are some spirited sieges of fortified cities, several stories from the life of Sákya Muni, and some little domestic scenes which I would rather attribute to the fancy of the artist than to their particular significance in Buddhistical story.

The plans and sections which accompany this work are all drawn from careful measurements on the same scale (of 40 feet to an inch), to preserve the relative proportions of the different Topes. The top of each drawing is the north, by which the relative positions of staircases, gateways, and other parts, may be determined at a glance. The plans of the different hills on which the several groups of Topes are situated, are all taken from my own surveys on the same scale of 400 feet to an inch. The eye can thus compare the disposition of one group with another. Lastly, the drawings of all the principal relic-boxes and caskets are one half the original size, sufficient (I have reason to think) for the correct delineation of the different shapes and various mouldings.

I am indebted to the kind liberality of Major H. M. Durand, of the Engineers, for the view of the Sánchi Tope, and for the drawings of the Sánchi bas-reliefs,