Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult

Magic Symbols
Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult
Magic Symbols

Arputharani Sengupta

Agam Kala Prakashan

Delhi
First Published 2019

© The Author

ISBN : 978-81-7320-144-8

History is a logical restoration of the past.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted,
The explanations of the historians change when the evidences change.
in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, otherwise, without the prior
permission of Author and Publisher. Romila Thapar

Published by:
Dr. Agam Prasad, M.A., Ph.D., Diploma in Museology
For Agam Kala Prakashan
34, Central Market, Ashok Vihar
Delhi - 110 052
Tel.: 91-11-27212194-95
Fax: 91-11-27212195
Email: agamkala101@gmail.com, agambook@yahoo.com
www.agamkala.com

Composed by:
Sushil Kumar
Delhi - 110 052
Mobile: 9891395309

Printed in India.
CONTENTS

List of Plates ix
Map xix
Foreword xxiii
Preface xxv
Introduction lxiii

Volume I
Chapter 1 Goddess of Infinite Variety 1
Chapter 2 Goddess of Fortune and Destiny 69
Chapter 3 Visions of Faith 125
Chapter 4 Ring of Eternity 187
Chapter 5 Ornaments of Splendor 245

Volume II
Chapter 6 Charms and Amulets 301
Chapter 7 Gems of Heaven 365
Chapter 8 Commodity and Fetishism 439

Plates 513
Appendix Analytical Study 569
Glossary 579
Bibliography 597
Index 607
List of Plates

Pl.1: a. Alexandrian sun god Horus-Harpocrates, Bronze, H. 12. 7 cm, Taxila, Sirkap, 1st century CE
National Museum of Pakistan
b. Isis-Venus, Ivory mirror handle, H. 24 cm, Villa of Indian Statuette, Pompeii, 1st century CE
Naples Museo Nationale
Pl.2: Hariti-Isis-Venus enthroned with a king and Harpocratic-Cupid, Schist, Sahri Bahlol, 2nd
century CE
Gandhara, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province, Peshawar Museum of Pakistan
Pl.3: Bedecked mother goddess Hariti wearing raindrop pearl earrings and crest jewel on laureate
head, Schist, 77 x 42 x 14 cm, Gandhara, 1st-2nd century CE, The British Museum a.
Leech-crescent-dangle earrings, 1st-2nd century CE, Taxila, Sirkap, National Museum of
India b. Hellenistic leech-crescent-goddess earring, Taxila, Sirkap, National Museum of
Pakistan c. Classical Greek akro gold earrings, 3rd century BCE
Pl.4: a. Gilded bodhisattva, Schist, H. 105 cm, Gandhara, 2nd century CE, San Francisco Asian
Art Museum (B60S597) b. Reliquary procession, Sandstone, Bharhut stupa, 2nd century
CE, Kolkata Indian Museum c. Gold-crystal reliquary, 7.6 x 2.1 cm, Taxila, Art Institute
of Chicago d. Gilded andnested schist reliquary, H.26 cm, Taxila, National Museum of
Pakistan e-f. Gold ruby ring and Huvishka gold and silver coins from Manikiala gold
reliquary nested in an iron box, The British Museum
pl.5: a. Didarganj yakshi, Limestone, 212 x 50 cm, 2nd Century CE, Patna Museum, India b.
Kushana copper earplugs laminated in gold, North India c. Terracotta figurine, Kausambi
d. 20th century pampadam gold ear ornament of the Nadars of Tamil Nadu, South India e.
Twisted wire spiral gold earring, Taxila f-g. Plaited gold earring and Terracotta earplugs,
Kausambi, North India
pl.6: a. Carved sandstone ring, Ø 5.9 cm, Gandhara, Metropolitan Museum of Art b. Sandstone
acanthus altar, 1st-2nd century CE, Patna Museum, Bihar, India c. Schist stupa relic casket
with beads, Gandhara d. Bodh Gaya Mahabodhi Vajrasana, Bihar in situ e. Goddess gold
plaque, Lauriya Nandangarh, Benares Bharat Kala Bhavan Museum f-g. Conch gold chain,
Flower Ø. 2 cm, Bodh Gaya Vajrasana relics including Kushana coins, 2nd century CE,
The British Museum
x Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
pl.7: Royal grave goods from Cheinchin Hill, Imphal, Government of Manipur, 1st-2nd century
CE a-b. Diademed skull wrapped in gold, gem stone beads. c. Gold handle of flywhisk.
g-h. Protective animal ewers for libation. g-h. Cylindrical and spherical relic caskets. i.
Embossed offering plate. j. Fragments of gold. k. Sacrificial ladles. l. Stamped quatrefoil
applique.
Pl.8: a. Kushana period Triratna gold pendent H.5.7 cm, bead L. 5.7 cm, Cleveland Museum of
Art b. Triratna stone mold, Kausambi c. Gold Triratna, Vellalur, Tamil Nadu d. Terracotta
Triratna beads, Stupa relic from Bhon Buldana, Maharashtra e-f. Copper and gold Triratna
amulets, Kausambi g. Triratna carnelian bead h. Auspicious Triratna emblem of the goddess
i. Triratna mudra on the sword of deified Greek prince, Bharhut sandstone parclose, Kolkata
Indian Museum
pl.9: a. Pair of Kronos Torsade-style twisted-knot gold earrings, 3.4 x 7.7 cm, 3.8 x.7.9 cm,
Metropolitan Museum of Art b. Kushana Twisted-knot earrings of Chanda yakshi, Bharhut
stupa c. Twisted-knot earring carved on sandstone parclose of Bharhut stupa, 1st-2nd
century CE, Kolkata Indian Museum d. Copper twisted-knot, palm leaf scroll, and vase
ear-plugs, Kausambi, 1st-2nd century CE
pl.10: a. Gold statuette of Venus, Taxila, Sirkap, H.5 cm, Ø of base 2 cm, Victoria and Albert
Museum b. Gold hairpin finial, H.5 cm, Taxila, British Museum c. Necklace of 37 Æ
bullae, Bulla H.1.7 cm, Bhir Mound, Taxila Museum d. Gold ring, Sirkap, Ø 2.2 cm,
Taxila Museum e. Filigree gold six-amulet cylinders, Sirkap f. Enthroned mother goddess
in embossed gilt Æ, Gandhara g. Enthroned mother goddess in gilt Æ Ø 9.2 cm, Gandhara
h. Goddess with worshiper in Greek chiton, Gilt Æ Ø 7.4 cm, Punjab, British Museum.
i. Goddess on copper bezel, Sirkap, Ø 2 cm, Taxila Museum j. Copper mirror with ivory
handle, Tlllya Tepe, 1st century CE
pl.11: a. Votive terracotta of goddess wearing hairpins, earrings, girdle and thigh band, Tamralipta
(Tamluk) Bengal, 1st century CE, Oxford University Ashmolean Museum b. Engraved
concentric circles on pulley type ear-plug, Jet black jasper, Kausambi, 1st century CE,
National Museum of India
pl.12: Gandhara gold earrings of the Kushana Period a. Tortoise eardrops, Los Angeles County
Museum of Art b. Gold hoop with granule pendant, San Francisco Asian Art Museum
c. Taxila womb-heart hoop, National Museum of India d. Taxila gold swan earplugs
Ø 3cm, Metropolitan Museum of Art e. Winged Cupid ear-clips, L. 7 cm, Tillya Tepe,
Kabul Museum f-h. Taxila Floral-top eardrop, Victoria and Albert Museum i. Parthian
floral vase on suspension ring, Gandhara, j. Parthian goddess-wineskin eardrop, Nineveh,
Metropolitan Museum of Art k. Conch shell reel ear-plug, Kausambi l. Iridescent glass disc
m. Terracotta crescent n. Terracotta sunburst, North India o. Kinnara terracotta earplug
Ø 2.3cm p. Polished ringstone Ø 5.9 cm, Metropolitan Museum of Art q. Griffin jeweler’s
stone mold, National Museum of India r. Ishtar sandstone disc Ø 6.5 cm, London Wallmore
Collection
List of Plates xi
Pl.13: a. Gold amphora-dolphin turquoise eardrop, Taxila, Bhir Mound, H. 4.4 cm, Victoria and
Albert Museum b. Amphora-Cupid temple eardrop, Taxila, Sirkap, H. 10.9 cm, National
Museum of Pakistan c. Leech-crescent-bud earring, Sirkap, 13 x.6.3 cm, Taxila Museum
d. Sphinx gold earring, 2.5 x.1.0 x 2.5 cm, Gandhara, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts,
Richmond e. Hellenistic winged griffon earring, 2nd century BCE-CE, Victoria and Albert
Museum f. Devi-scroll Hellenistic gold earring, 3.8 x .3.7 cm, Gandhara, Art Institute of
Chicago g. Winged Cupid gold earring, L. 7, 1st century CE, Tillya Tepe, Kabul Museum
pl.14: a. Antelope penannular gold bangle, 8.5 x 6.3 cm, Tillya Tepe b. Lion penannular gold
bangle, L. 18.4 cm, 1st century CE, Tillya Tepe, Kabul Museum c .Egyptian griffin vessel,
High Priest Petosiris’ tomb painting, c. 300 BCE d. Winged griffin gold wristlet, Oxus
Treasure, British Museum e. Penannular bracelet Æ, Taxila, National Museum of India
f. Gold bracelet with lion’s head terminals, Bhir Mound, Ø 11.8 cm, Taxila Museum g.
Hinged womb-heart gold armlet Ø 7.6, Taxila, Metropolitan Museum of Art h. Gate clasp
wristlet, Taxila, Sirkap, National Museum of India i. Gate clasp gold bracelet, H. 1.7, Ø.4
cm, 1st century CE, Sirkap, Taxila Museum j. Petrified bangle, Schist, Gandhara, British
Museum
pl.15: a. Goddess votive terracotta, Chandraketugarh, 1st century CE b. Hellenic anthropoid
earring, British Museum c. Gandhara gold pin L.6.3 cm, Art Institute of Chicago d. Taxila
gold pin, Sirkap, National Museum of India e. Anklet Æ, Sirkap, Ø 15.9 cm, Taxila Museum
pl.16: a. Garland of figurative beads decorate sandstone bull, Allahabad University Museum,
India b. Buddha seated inside tortoise lead amulet, Rasra, Balia in Bihar, 1st-2nd century
CE c-e. Zoomorphic stone beads from North India, Benares Bharat Kala Bhavan, 1st
century CE
pl.17: a. Isis-Venus leaning on cippus embossed gold brooch, H.6.3cm, National Museum of
Pakistan b. Fortuna gold plaque, Taxila, Sirkap, H. 7.8, Metropolitan Museum of Art c-d.
Nilgriris gold amulets e. Gold elephant amulet case, Vellalur hoard, Tamil Nadu, South
India 1st Century CE
pl.18: a. Winged Isis-Venus gold plaque, 5 x 2.6 cm, Tillya Tepe b. Isis-Venus and Harpocratic-
Cupid on cippus, 4.5 x 2.5 cm, Tillya Tepe c-d. Cupid on dolphin gold clasps, each 4.2
x 4.9 cm and 4.5 x 3 cm, Tillya Tepe grave goods, Afghanistan, 1st century CE, Kabul
Museum e. Dhampati loving couple gold plaque, Laurya Nandangarh, 1st century CE,
Benares Bharat Kala Bhavan
pl.19: a. Hariti pectoral in gold, garnet and pearl, Ø 4.5 cm, Gandhara, Victoria and Albert
Museum b. Gold and carnelian Hariti medallion, Ø 5cm, Gandhara, Cleveland Museum
of Art c-d Lotus engraved base of Hariti medallion, and Bimaran reliquary Ø 6.6 cm f.
Cabochon garnet encrusted Bimaran gold reliquary pyxis, H. 6.7, 1st century CE, The
British Museum f. Gandhara Tyche, Schist g. Gold Tyche pendant, Roman England, 1st -
2nd century CE
xii Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
pl.20: a-c Eight rows of braided gold belt 97.6 x 2 cm, and nine plaques of Great Ma Cybele, Ø
4 cm, Tillya Tepe, Kabul Museum d. Tapered plaques cast in relief with boxed prongs for
attachment, 4 x 1.2 cm, Tillya Tepe, 1st century CE, Kabul Museum
p.21: a-c Gandhara Orphic cup Æ, H.9.5 cm, Ø 12.8 cm, Art Institute of Chicago d. Gandhara
Ritual cup, 7.6 x 30.4 cm, Art Institute of Chicago e. Gandhara goblet Æ, H.13 cm, Ø
8.9 cm, Taxila Museum f. Elephant reliquary procession on silver plate, Oxus Treasure,
British Museum g. Jaulian silver reliquary, Taxila, British Museum h. Gold soles L.22.5
cm, Tillya Tepe Tomb IV i. Bronze portrait-ring, Taxila j. Exhumed prince, Tepe Tomb IV
k. Alchemical Caput Mortuum gold buttons, Tillya Tepe, 1st century CE, Kabul Museum
p.22: a. Mistress of animal tempieto ear pendant, 5.8 x 4.6 x 5 cm, 31.58 g., Tillya Tepe b. Gold
turquoise heart ear clips, L.7.2, Wt.13 g., Tillya Tepe, Kabul Museum c. Coptic Isis framed
in heart, Woolen tapestry, Egypt d. Jumka gold ear pendant, H. 6.3 cm, Sirkap, 1st century
CE, Taxila Museum e. Heart gold amulets burial goods, Tillya Tepe, 1st century CE f.
Floral disc ear pendant, L.8.2 cm, Ø 3.1 cm, Sirkap, Taxila Museum
pl.23: a. Goddess on sea dragon, Steatite libation plate, Ø 15.4 cm, Taxila, 1st century CE,
Metropolitan Museum of Art b. Nereid on Ketos, Æ lid of pyxis, Canosa Di Puglia, Italy,
1st century BCE-CE c. Two sided gold head, Ø 1.27, Gandhara, Art Institute of Chicago
d. Jeweled gold tiara, Gandhara, 3 x 2.5 cm, British Museum e. Goddess carnelian gem,
Gandhara, British Museum f. Bull and winged horse chalcedony, Bhir Mound, L. 2.5 cm,
Taxila Museum g. Silver standard, Taxila, Sirkap h. Bronz emblema of goddess, Ø 20.3
cm, Chausa, Patna Museum i-k. Crystal reliquary, Gandhara, The British Museum l. Heart
lobed floral brooch, Ø 5cm, Wt.19.98 g., Tillya Tepe m. Ma Cybele Æ gilt emblema, Ø
25cm, Aï Khanoum, Kabul Museum
pl.24: a. Mirror and cup in cult rituals, Limestone, Gandhara, 29.9 x 52.1 cm, British Museum
b. Copper mirror with silver handle, H.24 cm, Ø 14.5 cm, Tillya Tepe c. Silver cup, H.6.7
cm, D.11, Ø foot 5.1cm, Gandhara, Art Institute of Chicago d. Sacred Marriage, Schist, 24
x 52 x10 cm, Lahore Museum e. Heirogamy in Soul Saucer, Ø 9.8 cm, Peshawar Museum
f. Heirogamy libation plate, Ø 16.7 cm, National Museum of India, 1st-2nd century CE
pl.25: a. Gold folding tiara with five palmettes, 13 x 7.5 cm, fillet 45×2.3cm, Wt.214.14 g. Tillya
Tepe b-c. Gold crown detail d. Cinquefoil floral pendant, Ø3cm, L.5.7 cm, Tillya Tepe e.
Crescent hairpins, Ø.2.7, L.4.5 cm, Tillya Tepe, 1st century CE, Kabul Museum
pl.26: a. Gold crown, front and reverse, fillet 45 x 2.3 cm, palmette 13 x 7.5 cm, Tillya Tepe b.
Flared penannular bracelet cast in gold, L.23.1, Wt. 580 g., Tillya Tepe c. Womb-heart
amulet, L. 7 cm, Wt. 65g. (pair) d. Mistress of animal pendant earring, 12.5 x 6.5 cm, Tillya
Tepe e. Boat ear-pendant, 2.9 x 2.4 cm, Wt.32.5 g., Tillya Tepe f. Man holding dolphin
gold plaque, 3.1 x 2.9 cm, Costume of two female reconstructed from burials, Tillya Tepe,
1st century CE, Kabul Museum
pl.27: Variety of gold amulets, Tillya Tepe burial goods, 1st century CE, Kabul National Museum
of Afghanistan
List of Plates xiii
Pl.28: Variety of gold amulets, Tillya Tepe burial goods, 1st century CE, Kabul National Museum
of Afghanistan
Pl.29: Variety of gold amulets, Tillya Tepe burial goods, 1st century CE, Kabul National Museum
of Afghanistan
Pl.30: a. Gold and turquoise fishtail amulet, 0.8 x 0.6 x 0.2 cm b. Square-eye plaque, 2.3 × 2.0 cm
c, Turquoise stripe on gold plaque, 0.9 x 0.8 x 0.2 cm d. Gold disc with garnet and turquoise
heart petals, Ø 1cm e. Gold plaque with black paste inlay and two tubes for attachment, 2.0
x 1.7 cm f. Floral gold plaque, 1×1×2 cm, Tillya Tepe necropolis, 1st century CE, Kabul
National Museum of Afghanistan
Pl.31: a. Stack of silver pyxis and tiny gold boxes nested in a Gandharan gilded schist stupa
reliquary. It contained a white steatite box tied in gold ribbon, crystal jar, embossed gold
plaques, pendants, florets, lotus, rings, humanoid beads, stone beads, crystal rings and
womb amulets b. Gold sheet crescent linked to stencil cut tassel c. Gold disc linked to
floret, and four-pointed star threaded through a conical stem with loop d. Wheel with six
petals Ø 2 x 0.5 cm, Wheel with five cut-out hearts Ø 1.6 x 0.5 cm, Petals linked to a
crescent and vine leaf threaded with pearls, Wt. 4.72 g. e. Embossed floral hairpin, Ø 7.5,
L. 4.5 cm, Tillya Tepe, 1st century CE, Kabul National Museum of Afghanistan
pl.32: a. Princess Dushefri, daughter of Shantruq II, 32-38 CE, Hatra b. Santruq I,
King of Hatra, 2nd century CE, Iraq Mosul Museum c. Gold plaque of amorous
couple on lion, 6.5 x 7 x 0.8 cm d. Warrior gold clasp, 9 x 6.3 cm, Tillya Tepe, 1st
century CE, Kabul Museum e. Parthian eagle gold buckle with turquoise inlay,
W. 8.4 cm, Metropolitan Museum of Art f. Parthian polychrome gold eardrop
g. Celestial musician gold beads 2.3 x1.2 x 0.03 cm, Tillia Tepe, Kabul Museum
pl.33: a. Sandstone effigy of Kushana King Kanishka, Mat, North India, ca.100 CE, Mathura
Museum b. Gold sword hilt with round pommel, Gold scabbard with turquoise inlay
depicting animals and vine tendrils, L. 37.5 cm, Tomb IV, Tillya Tepe, 1st century CE,
Kabul Museum
pl.34: a. Goddess in sacred pavilion, Terracotta, 26.7 x 20 cm, Chandraketugarh, Bengal, 1st
century CE Metropolitan Museum of Art b. Hinged gate-clasp gold bracelet, H.1.7 cm, Ø
4.8 cm, Taxila, Sirkap, 1st century CE, National Museum of India
pl.35: a. Fish scale gold necklace, Taxila b. Gold fish girdle, Taxila c. Gold strap necklace
with interlocking W, Taxila d. Silver filigree necklace, Taxila e. Polychrome gold fringe
necklace, Taxila, Sirkap, 1st century CE, National Museum of India f. Disc clasp, Ø 3.3
cm, L. of hook 2.0 cm, Wt. 32.22 g. g. Box clasp, Tillya Tepe, L. 2.6 cm, W. 0.9 cm, Wt.
4.5g., 1st century CE h. Roman gold bullae bracelet i. Gold bullae, Tillya Tepe j. Bust
medallion, Ø 2.6 cm, gold disc Ø 1.6 cm, 1st century CE, Tillya Tepe, Kabul Museum
k. Fish fringe necklace, Taxila, Sirkap, National Museum of India l. Goddess terracotta
plaque, Chandraketugarh, Bengal
xiv Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
pl.36: a-c Necklace of hollow gold beads with surface ornamentation, Tillya Tepe, 1st century CE
d. Fringe necklace with polychrome gold pendents, L. 4.1, clasp L. 3.6, Wt. 112.23g., 1st
century CE, Tillya Tepe necropolis, Kabul National Museum of Afghanistan
pl.37: a. Gold sprig necklace, Taxila, Sirkap, 1st century CE, National Museum of India b. Horse
pendant cast in gold with turquoise inlay 8.6 x 4.6 cm, nose linked to heart and vine streamer
and addorsed horse protome with disc tassel, Tillya Tepe, Kabul Museum c. Dolphin fringe
necklace, Taxila, Sirkap, National Museum of India d. Roman strap necklace, Vellalur
hoard, Tamil Nadu e. Strap necklace made of 68 gold spacer beads, Taxila, Sirkap, National
Museum of India
pl.38: a. Gold bead necklace with vase pendant, Taxila, Sirkap, 1st century CE b. Gadrooned
bead necklace, Taxila, Sirkap, 1st century CE, National Museum of India c. Gold chain
with four double plaits and hook fastener, Taxila, Sirkap, National Museum of Pakistan d.
Gold ear pendant, H. 6.3 cm, Sirkap, Taxila Museum e. Cloissoné gold bead, Taxila, Sirkap,
Natonal Museum of India f. Five strand loop-in-loop necklace, L. 61.5 cm, st century CE,
Dalverzine-tepe, Uzbekistan g. Gold shoulder strap, Ø 1.7 cm, Tillya Tepe, Kabul National
Museum of Afghanistan
pl.39: a-b. Goddess and dwarf wearing Alexandrian body chain, Begram ivory hoard, 1st century
CE, National Museum of Afghanistan c. Merlon gold amulets, Tillya Tepe, 1st century CE
d. Gold merlon body chain, Taxila, Sirkap, 1st century CE, National Museum of India e.
Byzantine open work gold breast chain linked to two medallions on chest and back, L. 72
cm, Wt. 643.2g., found in Egypt with gold coins of emperor Maurice Tiberius (582-602
CE), British Museum
pl.40: a. Gold ring, Ø 1.3 cm, gem 2.0 x 1.7 cm, Tillya Tepe, 1st Century CE, Kabul Museum b.
Copper signet ring, Gandhara c. Gold signet ring, Vellalur, Tamil Nadu d. Gold dhampati
bezel, 2.5 x1.5 cm, Karur, Tamil Nadu e. Gold makara bazel, Vellalur, Tamil Nadu,
1st century CE f-g. Shell ring, Taxila, Sirkap h. Knotted copper ring, Kausambi, North
India i. Bull copper ring, 2.3cm, Taxila j. Lion intaglio on copper ring with Kharoshthi
inscription, Ø. 2.3cm, Taxila Museum k. Intaglio of mythological scene on bronze ring,
Gandhara, Metropolitan Museum of Art l. Gold box-setting on bezel of D-ring, Gandhara
m. Onyx ring, Taxila n.  Stone ring with Buddha bezel, 1.85 x 2 in, Gandhara, 1st-2nd
century CE
pl.41: a. Memorial terracotta, Harwan, Kashmir, circa 1st-5th century CE b. Kushana memorial
gold ring, Gandhara c. Roman imagines or mortuary portrait d. Jugate gold ring of Julia
Domna and Severus inscribed in Brahmi, Gandhara, 2nd-3rd century CE e. Kushana
bronze Capricorn ring f. Capricorn on Gemma Augustae cameo, 19 x 23cm, double-layered
Arabian onyx cut by Dioscurides or one of his disciples, early 1st century CE, Vienna
Kunsthistorisches Museum g. Vine gold ring, H. 4.2 cm, Ø 2.2 cm, National Museum of
India h. Vine leaf coin of Judea
pl.42: a. Gilded bodhisattva in metamorphic phyllite with micaceous sheen, probably deified
Antinous (111130  CE), 62 x 26 cm, Gandhara, 2nd century CE b. Elephant carrying
List of Plates xv
reliquary, Æ gilt plate, Oxus Treasure, British Museum c. Parthian winged griffin appliqué
in gold, 1st century CE
pl.43: a. Kushana king Heraios (1–30 CE) Æ Tetradrachm b. Hermaeus-style diademed bust of
Kujula Kadphises (30–80 CE) Æ Tetradrachm c. Vima Kadphises (r. ca. 110-20 CE), King
of Kings, Great Savior, British Museum d. Vima Kadphise dinar, Ardochsho, goddess of
plenty e. Kujula Kadphises imitating Augustus Caesar, British Museum f-g. Kanishka’s
father Wima Kadphises’ gold dinar (64-78 CE), Wt. 8., British Museum h. BOΔΔO gold
coin of Kanishka I (ca.78-115CE) Ø 2.1 cm, Wt.16.98 gm., British Museum i-j. Kanishka’s
Æ Tetradrachm, Wind god OΔΔO the ‘Great strider’ after Antinous’ Star named Aquila the
Eagle k-l. Huvishka (c. 150-191 CE) gold dinars, Osiris and Ardoxho holding cornucopia
on reverse, Ø 1.9cm, Wt. 7.85 g, 2nd century CE
pl.44: a. Shiva and Nandi type and four-armed Oisho Shiva (rev.), Nimbate Kanihka holds
trident, stands facing, sacrificing at alter (obv.) b. Crowned Hadrian aureus, Roman coin
hoard, Tamil Nadu c-d. Aureus of Emperor Trajan (d.117) and Ahin Posh gold reliquary,
7.3 x.3 cm, Jalalabad, Afghanistan, British Museum e. Aureus of ‘Caesar Tiberius son of
the Divine Augustus’ with Livia as Demeter inscribed ‘Great Pontifix’ (rev.), Wt.7.77g.
f-g. Terracotta bullae imitate Roman coins, Ter h. Byzantine coin amulet, Ajanta Caves,
Mahrashtra i. Amulet on mummy-board, Faiyum, Egypt, 50200 CE, J. Paul Getty Museum
j. Gold Roman bulla amulet, Vellur hoard, Tamil Nadu k. Gold bulla, Tillya Tepe burial
m. Inscribed gold medallion, Tillya Tepe Tomb IV, Ø 1.6, Wt.4.33g. n-o. Swastika, Womb-
heart amulets, Taxila, Sirkap, National Museum of India p. Tyche enthroned with king,
Gold amulet, Taxila, 3.6 x 4.4 cm, Victoria and Albert Museum
pl.45: a-b. Turquoise hand amulet in gold mount, H. 1.5 cm, Gold and green stone H..1.1 cm
c-d. Foot amulet cast in gold H.1.1 cm, Gold and lapis lazuli foot H..0.9 cm e-f. Gemstone
amulets in gold mount with suspension ring, Tillya Tepe, 1st century CE, National Museum
of Afghanistan
pl.46: a-j. Harappan beads in steatite, fired and natural, agate, carnelian, jasper, chert, chalcedony,
milky quartz, etched carnelian, limestone, stalagmite, marble, calcite, hornblende,
serpentine, deorite, lapis lazuli and jadeite c. Harappan carnelian bull amulet d. Micro
steatite beads e. Kalibhangan zebra beads f. S-shaped guilloche electrum brooch inset with
gold capped steatite facince beads, 6 x 3 cm k. Etched carnelian beads, Tillya Tepe. l-o.
Etched beads, Gandhara. p-q. Altered agate beads, Bengal, 1st-2nd century CE
pl.47: a- d Gold Torc or Hansuli, Taxila, Sirkap, 1st century CE, National Museum of India e.
Gold beads with turquoise inlay and granulation, Tillya Tepe, 1st century CE, National
Museum of Afghanistan f. Amber lion bead with transverse perforation and longitudinal
hole between paws, 2.6 x 2.2 x1 cm g. Paste fish with longitudinal hole mouth to tail, Tillya
Tepe h. Potstone elephant bead, 1.4 x 1.5 cm i. Golden brown lilac agate mango bead, 2.6
x 2.1 cm j. Alamndine garnet red bird bead, H. 1.2 cm, Taxila, Victoria and Albert Museum
pl.48: a-b. Gold buttons with turquoise Inlay, Tillya Tepe, Kabul Museum c. Gilt bronze oak
leaf, 12 x 12.6 cm, Begram, 1st century CE, Kabul Museum d. Twisted gold necklace
xvi Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
with cameo, Ø.21 cm, Cameo pectoral 4 x 3.5 x 0.7 cm, Tillya Tepe Tomb IV, Kabul
Museum e. Expandable bracelet with insets, Ø 6.7 cm, gold wire W. 0.2 cm. Tillya Tepe,
Kabul Museum f. Fluted gold phiale, Ø 23 cm, H. 4 cm, Tillya Tepe necropolis, National
Museum of Afghanistan
pl.49: a. Kushana divinity Adsho Atar, Carnelian seal, L.2.2 cm, Kanishka’s dynastic tamgha mark
right Triratna left, British Museum b. Carnelian seal ring with portrait of Kausumadasya,
L. 1.9 cm, Darunta stupa reliquary, Afghanistan, 1st century CE, British Museum c. Aion
chalcedony seal, 5 x 3.7cm, Junnar, India d-e. Bull, Winged griffin gem, Taxila f. Pegasus
gem, 1.6 x 1.7 cm, Victoria and Albert Museum g-o Gems from Tillya Tepe, 1st century
CE, Kabul Museum g. Bull, flat side of cabochon bored longitudinally 2.1 x 1.6 cm h-i
Griffin, chalcedony bored longitudinally 3.1 x 2.6 cm j. Portrait cameo, 4 x 3.5 cm k.
Turquoise bezel, 2.3 x 2 cm l. Hector cameo with gold tube for attachment, 1.8 x 1.3 x 0.6
cm, Wt. 2.6 g. m. Nike gem in silver setting, loop for attachment, Ø 1.0 cm n. Athena cast
in gold with four loops, 1.6 cm o.Athena gold bezel, 3 x 2.7 cm, 22.72 g. p. Gold lion bezel,
Vellalur hoard, Tamil Nadu, South India
pl.50: a. The Kiss of Aphrodite and Adonis, Piazza Armerina Roman mosaic, Sicily b. Cupid
observes Venus and Adonis embrace, Blue glass, Ø 2.7 cm, W. 4 mm, Gandhara, 1st
century CE, Art Institute of Chicago c. Inscribed slate double tablet seal, 7.2 x 7 x 0.5 cm,
Taxila, National Museum of Pakistan d. Kunal proto-historic Æ ornament e. Ancient bull
at trough cylinder seal, Susa f. Isis quenching thirst in afterlife in Book of the Dead, 18th
Dynasty Egypt g. Tree goddess and Pleiades steatite seal, Mohenjo-Daro h. Resurrection
through lustration, Book of the Dead, 18th Dynasty Egypt i. Incarnation seal depicting
tiger goddess in lustration ritual, Faience cylindrical seal, Kalibhangan j. Faience Swastika
stamp seal, Mohenjo-Daro k. Lapis lazuli beads l. Gold beads m. Micro gold bead necklace,
Lothal, Harappan, Proto-historic period
pl.51: a. Venus Roman bronze figurine, H. 5.6 cm, 1st century CE b. Animated ivory Julia Domna
effigy, 2nd-3rd century CE, Palazzo Massimo, Via Valeria, Tivoli c. Female torso, grey
sandstone, Harappa d. Male torsos, red sandstone, H. 8.5cm, Harappa e. Bronze figurine,
Mohenjo-Daro f. Bronze mirror, Mohenjo-Daro g. Two bangles made of thin electrum
sheet wrapped over a core, Ø 8 cm h. Bronze Dancing Girl, H. 10.8 cm i-j. Pressed faience,
shell bangles in female burials k-l. Bronze and terracotta bangles, Mohenjo-Daro, Proto-
historic period
pl.52: a. Electrum headbands b. Emblazoned gold diadem, National Museum of India c. Resist
dyed trilobite design on steatite bead d. Iconic bust of the Priest King in admired for his
trefoil robe, solar armband and fillet, from Proto-historic period, Mohenjo-Daro where the
Great Stupa looming on the skyline is aligned to the Great Bath f. Chanhudaro bronze box
cart chariot, Boston Museum of Fine Arts
pl.53: a. Gemstone bead necklace, Harappa, National Museum of India b. Geometric shell inlay
produced by compass, Mohenjo-Daro c-d. Harappan Gilgamesh steatite seals e. Gold and
stone beads from silver vase buried in Mohenjo-Daro f. Two-sided swastika and bull at
List of Plates xvii
tough seal g. Seal of horned goddess seated above paired rabbits, Mohenjo-Daro h. Pair of
crystal rabbits from Han burial, China i. Three monkeys yellow-brown glazed faience bead,
H.1.6 in Ø1.4 in, Mohenjo-Daro, National Museum of Pakistan j. Blue faience monkey,
New Kingdom Egypt k. Master of animal on bifacial plano convex terracotta tablet,
Harappa l-m Inscribed Indus Valley steatite seals, Proto-historic Period n. Tutankhamun’s
chair back depicting Neb, Seat of Gold, New Kingdom Egypt o. Proto-historic rhinoceros
steatite button seal, Mohenjo-Daro, Proto-historic Period
pl.54: a. Womb-heart well, reconstructed at Mohenjo-daro Museum b. Gold womb-heart electrum
brooch, 5.7 x 2.8 cm, Harappa, National Museum of India c. Rhino intaglio gem d. Faience
bangle e. Heart stone amulets f. Ribbed gold cone g. Amulets in faience, Mohenjo-Daro h.
Harappan guilloche S-brooch inset with steatite beads i. Electrum D-terminals and spacer
rods, Mohenjo-Daro j. Turquoise in electrum cylinder k. Fragment of gold bead necklace
with D-terminal l. Bead deposit in burial m. Gold pen with nib n. Agate bead deposits o.
Harappan fertility gold discs p. Conical gold caps, 3 x 3.2 x 3 cm s. Teardrop carnelian
pendant t. Beads from male burial, Mohenjo-Daro, Proto-historic, Period
pl.55: a. Silver amphora containing jewelry and beads, some wrapped in cloth, Mohenjo-Daro
b. Proto-historic gold capped steatite bead necklace c. Cast gold beads d. Bead necklace,
light-green jadite L. 2 cm, Ø 1 cm, soldered gold disc beads L. 4.4 cm, Ø 1 cm, with
pendants of agate-jasper and cylindrical steatite bead capped with gold e. Gold disc-bead
necklace f. Shell bangles from burial g. Turquoise bead, gold disc and cylinder necklace
h. Multi-strand choker with spacers and D-terminals i. Terracotta bead. j. Carnelian and
copper girdle with semi-circular D-terminals, Mohenjo-Daro k. Four strand bead necklace
l-m. Harappan terracotta figurines of fertility goddess
pl.56: a-b. Green serpentine grooved cylinder, basalt entasis disc from female burial, Mohenjo-
Daro, Proto-historic Period c-d. Six-segment circle glyph, Cartographer’s Wheel carved in
shell, Mohenjo-Daro e. Ancient pawns in faience, crystal and semi precious stones, Egypt
f-g. Roulette amulets in stone and ribbed shell i. Geometric sphere in shell j. Indus Valley
gold disc k. Lapis lazuli spool earplug, Mohenjo-Daro l. Engraved spool, Kausambi m.
Senet played by Queen Nefertari (ca.1300-1250 BCE), Luxor. Senet board (Inset), 27.5 x
8.5 x 5 cm, ebony, ivory and faience, circa 1600 BCE, Cairo Museum
Maps xix

a. Routes linking the Mediterranean with South Asia and Far East during the Roman Empire
b. Mapping jewelry from the Buddha zone
xx Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols Maps xxi

The Roman Empire

South at its greatest extent

South Asia during early historic period Harappan Site Map

PREFACE

Art is always a vision; an attempt to express visibly what a particular age, a particular society, and
a particular person has viewed as the true nature and essence of reality. And this includes both the
essence of man and his relations to significant aspects of the world.
— Bruno Bettelheim

During the early Christian period numerous relics in distinctive reliquary caskets were preserved
deep inside the rounded stupa monuments. The reliquary cult linked to paradigm shift in the
funerary practices across Central Asia and Han China altered the entire face of South Asia.
Habitually antique reliquaries are worshiped as the purported relic of the Buddha. The legend of
a historic Buddha gained momentum and veracity only after the decipherment of ancient Brahmi
script during nineteenth century archaeology. Rebirth stories called Jatakam in Pali literature and
Mahayana sutras are the source to interpret the first-time sculptured images that once adorned
the stupa monuments. Actually the ‘Life Cycle’ at the core of the Mystery Religion tracks magic
rituals associated with death, mystical conception of the soul and rebirth followed by endless life
surrounded by immense light called ‘enlightenment’. The innovative halo indicates the seductive
bio-luminance that makes ‘Awakened’ humans glow with magical light. For the first time the
illumined immortals collectively identified as Buddha and bodhisattva dominate the centrally
planned stupa complexes across a vast region. In the community worship of the deified dead
the individuality is downplayed as generic Buddha. Inscribed reliquaries, and occasional portrait
cameos in sculpture or on the bezel of signet ring reveals the identity of a person. Customarily
carved libation plates and homage tablets depicting religious symbols are offered in the stupa
shrines. At present the well planned funerary complexes in the Indian subcontinent are important
pilgrimage centers. The major archaeological sites packed with the stupa monuments of the
Kushana period (1st-3rd century CE) are packaged as the landscape where life events of the
legendary Buddha (560-483 BCE) took place. However, marvelous sculptures from the stupa sites
confirm that primordial confidence in the goddess is fundamental to the new funerary cult. The
goddess as wish fulfilling ‘Tree of Wisdom’ called Kalpavriksha and Salabhanjika confirms faith
in splendid afterlife. Furthermore, the goddess image in Greco-Roman style is the main source
xxvi Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
for various types of jewel that confirm the confidence of the faithful through signs and symbols.
The goddess clarifies the astonishing nature of the Buddhist relics fundamental to resurrection.
Yet, in the fervent Buddha centric interpretations the supreme importance of the goddess is totally
ignored.
The funerary cult centers intended for obscure rituals, now identified as monastery, has
yielded numerous unmatched votive objects including engraved gems and precious pieces of
jewelry. Especially the nested reliquary caskets contain variety of beads, coins, jewels, inscribed
gems and scrolls, embossed charms in gold foil and other offerings along with ash, earth and bits of
human bone. The exclusive crystal reliquary, and the occasionally gilded stupa shaped casket lathe
turned in schist is characteristic of Gandhara now part of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Intriguingly
caskets in gold, silver and bronze resemble eastern Mediterranean metalwork. At the same time
a type of spherical reliquary in stone with divided compartments, found also in Ai-Khanoum,
has strange affinity to the wooden containers still used by the Yoruba diviners of Nigeria in West
Africa. Frankly, function is the key to form. The reliquary cult burgeoned in proportion to the
faith in resurrection expressed by anagrammatic Amitabha, of immense radiance (a-mita-abha)
and everlasting life (a-mita-ayus).
Foremost is the role and reception of the goddess in the rebirth process of enlightened
immortals shrouded in mystery. To believers Maya is mother of Buddha. Maya is literally magic
or illusion – soon after giving birth she ascends heaven. Surrounded by handmaids, Maya Devi in
the sala grove gives rebirth holding a branch that identifies her as the Tree of Life. Etymologically
Maya is linked to Maia the Roman goddess of magic and childbirth. Just like the branch of sala
tree, situla identifies Isis among Maya’s female assistants. Among them the sheaf of wheat brands
Demeter, usually in the company of Persephone and Hecate, the Greek goddess of magic who
escorts the dead and helps childbirth. A bevy of divine maidens labeled in Brahmi stand on the
remarkable sandstone parclose of Bharhut stupa in Central India. Maha Maya coexists with the
newly installed Hindu goddess Gajalakshmi recognized by lustrating elephants. Time and again,
from Oxus to Amaravati, the royal elephants that glorify the goddess carry the numinous essence
of immortals in reliquary processions.
The goddesses modeled after priestess-courtesans wear fabulous pieces of jewelry
incorporating various religious symbols. Series of lotus medallions carved on the stupa enclosure
at Sanchi, Bharhut and Amaravati is integrated in multiple ways in all the other Buddhist relics
to convey rebirth assured by Maha Maya Lakshmi known as Padma the lotus. Pushkalavati, the
Lotus City named after the goddess was the capital of ancient Gandhara. Vaishali in the Bihar
state of India and Lumbini in Nepal believed to be the birth place of Buddha, are also renowned
cult centers that exalt the prosperous goddess known for her beauty. Similar to Srichakra or the
Wheel of Fortune on the Retribution stele, homage tablets carved with the footprint of the goddess
called Sripada and Bhudpada invoke the benevolence of the goddess. The scaffolding of meaning
through symbols such as Srichakra, Triratna and Srivatsa is typical of logocentricism peculiar to
early Buddhist art that treats words and language as fundamental expression of existential reality,
which by design appears as visual reality. The goddess of immortality holds goblet of wine or
stands on the womb like pot of ambrosia (Amrita) while the idiosyncratic girdle (Manimekala)
Preface xxvii
proclaims her as the endless wave that encircles the entire world. Thus the logos represented as an
original, irreducible object is created specifically for a special purpose. In western scientific and
philosophical terms the design of logos is the perfect representation of the Platonic Ideal Form
enormously trendy in the unprecedented Neo-Platonic Greco-Buddhist cult.
The first-time votives and Hellenistic images of cult and devotion across the Indian
subcontinent and in the North West Frontier Provinces had close links with Macedonian Greek
tradition of Alexandria connected to Parthia by way of historic caravan trails through Palmyra.
The resulting cross-cultural knowledge transfer and globalization presented the need for the
implementation of successful cultural models learnt from Roman, Egyptian, Asiatic and Persian
Imperial cults. It spread across the eastern Mediterranean, Black Sea and Caspian Sea and Central
Asia and expanded into the new territories world-wide reaching up to China and South Asia. The
successful expansion of Persian cult of Mithras was a counter movement that crisscrossed the Silk
Road to thrive in the Roman Empire. In the Kushana Empire the gold dinars of Huvishka (circa
152-192) representing Mithras, Serapis and Hercules is a measure of cross-cultural influences
in the Buddhist cult that subsumes the unique identity of Mithras. The international mergers and
alliances is indicated by the plethora of Greco-Roman design, vine scroll, winged griffin, amphora,
heart and Swastika. Cupid on dolphin, Venus and Ma Cybele are mystifying elements in Buddhist
art and artifacts. The sudden process of self-organization in isolated stupa complexes as remote as
the Swat Valley in Pakistan or Amaravati in Andhra Pradesh seem to be spontaneous geomancy of
the grave. The synchronized social behavior indicates that this strange coordinated movement was
accelerated simultaneously by a tremendous external force. In the swarm behavior the individual
in the scheme is but one among many swept together in huge wave similar to the murmuration of
the starlings. The secret of this complex system in nature applied to the community worship of
deified individuals advocates effective control of the cult by an influential mediator within the
system. Presumably a college of erudite high priests now identified as ‘monk’ held the central
command of the outside world in the incredibly remote recesses.
BRINK OF DEATH
The dynastic cult of Kushana priest-kings known as the ‘Fire Protector’ introduced royal mortuary
shrines called Devakula equivalent to Roman Augusteum at Mat in Mathura. Cult centers in Begram
and Taxila in Gandhara have yielded variety of votives largely transported from Alexandria in
Egypt. Afghan Rabatak Inscription in the Kabul Museum proclaims: The King of Kings, Kanishka
the Kushana, son of god (Devaputra), the supreme ruler of India and Kabul introduced Aryan
language and ushered the Cultural Revolution in South Asia. Several links suggest that the Greco-
Buddhist reliquary cult was an extension of the Imperial Cult of Rome derived from Macedonian
Egypt and Syria. A bilingual gold Kushana stater depicts bearded Kanishka I (c.78-115 CE) in
Central Asian costume offer sacrifice at a Nebatean type of fire altar. Togated Kushana king
inscribed BOΔΔO on reverse stands like a luminous Christian saint. A jeweled gold amulet case
and the famous BOΔΔO gold coin were found along with the aurei of Emperor Trajan (d.117) and
Empress Sabina (c.128–137) in the ruins of Ahin Posh stupa near Jalalabad in Afghanistan (3.73).
Votive coins emulate the Greek ‘Charon’s obol’ paid for ferrying the departed to the next world.
xxviii Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols Preface xxix

The obols or the ‘token coins’ in Buddhist reliquary cult is an ancient mortuary custom chiefly
among Greeks, Romans and Celts. Hence signs and symbols on the Indo-Greek coins and the
votive punch-marked coins, at times found together in buried hoards, are noteworthy.
Significantly, cult centers deliberately positioned by the natural water bodies, rivers and
manmade tanks have been radically navigated across the seas as part of elaborate funerary rituals.
Stupa clusters in the recesses of South Asia stretch across Gandhara, North India, Bihar, Bengal,
Odisha and Andhra on the east coast and Maharashtra seeping into Karnataka on the west coast. From
the Himalayan belt in Nepal and Tibet the mortuary cult percolated into Manipur, Burma, Thailand
and Sri Lanka. In tangent to early first-century royal burials in Tillya Tepe in north Afghanistan
is the global network devoted to the dead in remote Bactria-Margiana region of Turkmenistan
connected to several clusters in Pakistan collectively known as the Indus Valley Civilization. The
interconnected necropolises or the ‘city of the dead’ misidentified as the forgotten Bronze Age
remains was unexpectedly discovered by 19th and 20th century archaeology. Thus the so-called
prehistoric material culture divorced from the early historic Greco-Buddhist reliquary cult leaves
an incomprehensible emptiness of more than two thousand years according to some estimation.
Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro in the Indus Valley and Nindowari in Baluchistan connected to the
Red Sea have yielded unique types of relics, some of which are similar to antique Buddhist relics
in Gandhara.
1. Alignment of the Great Stupa and the Great Bath, Aerial view of Mohenjo-Daro, 1st century CE
Lacking valid and reliable method to classify the motivation of the mysterious culture at the
dawn of civilization, Sir John Marshall’s (1876-1958) archaeology in the Indus Valley failed to
Despite its reckless extravagance the ruins of early Buddhist cult shares unity of vision and
acknowledge the ground breaking significance of the huge Buddhist monument that dominated
the distinctive ‘spirit of place’ so that it can be described as the ‘fountainhead and beginning’ or
the manmade citadel of Mohenjo-Daro (fig.1). Later Sir Mortimer Wheeler (1890–1976) sought
the source and origin of an outstanding culture in the Indian subcontinent. However, without the
to reconsider the rationale behind the Roman type of brickwork in the Harappan sites having
crucial timeline of events constructing India’s past is an astonishing adventure. To begin with all
rectilinear arrangement similar to Roman city plan taken from Etruscan necropolis. Amazingly the
we have are the outcome of events attributed to alleged motivations of individuals determined
same type of layout and orientation singles out Buddhist stupa complexes as well. Befuddled by
solely by literary resources in which mytholgoy and legend are interwoven in a convincing pattern.
its unique pictographic script the Indus Valley field was swept aside into unconvincing prehistoric
In patriotic archaeology chronological disorder is endemic. Buddha (563-483 BCE) emerges from
pocket despite the discoveries in Buddhist material culture that inexplicably overlap. The fortified
a vast void after the supposedly Bronze Age Harappan culture named after the eponymous Indus
cult centers dedicated to obscure funerary rituals are located in inaccessible barren places; Gonur
Valley site divided into three periods between 2500 and 1900 BCE. Buddha is followed by the
Depe in Turkmenistan is planned exactly like the first-century Tillya Tepe burial site in Afghanistan.
inscribed edicts attributed to Mauryan Emperor Ashoka (321-185 BCE) followed by the Sungas
Similarly, the so called Bronze Age Tepe Fullol and Greco-Buddhist archaeological site in Hedda
(185-75 BCE) mentioned in a chance dedicatory inscription on Bharhut monument in Central India
coexist in Afghanistan, while the ‘Bronze Age’ Nindowari and Indus Valley sites in Pakistan and in
– all of which coalesce and culminate in early historic Greco-Kushana period (1st-3rd century
the adjoining Indian region coexist uninterrupted with the major Buddhist reliquary sites. All these
CE). Until now ‘life-and-achievement’ style of narrative has not explained the ‘life-and-time’ of
mortuary sites without exception atrophied into neglected relic dumps leaving absolutely no trace
the people who actually lived the way of life surrounding the huge funerary monuments. Without
of the living. The factor explaining the abrupt dereliction of the briefly escalating necropolises is
enquiring into the contributing factors for the intensely networked global culture and the sudden
not so much the change in the natural environment but the drastic shift in the mortuary practices.
spurt of exotic Greco-Roman material culture in the land beyond the then known world, many
As known archaeologically, this is due to certain socio-religious and political climate. Yet, the
players have maneuvered the history of South Asia. One of them is German archaeologist Anton
outstanding aspects of religious syncretism incorporating various elements from the Oriental and
Fuhrer (1853–1930) credited with discovering the birthplace of Buddha at Lumbini in Nepal. The
Greek mystery religions persist in the renaissance of ancestor worship in an exceptionally rich and
physical world of the Buddha in the subcontinent is opaque – archaeological remains of the early
spectacularly diverse civilization in India, the Heart of Asia.
inhabitants of the period are nil. The new reliquary cult datable to early Christian era glorifies
Hellenized Buddha whose claim to antiquity literally makes him contemporary to Pythagoras
xxx Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
(572-490 BCE). The enigma of Greco-Buddhist funerary cult inseparable from art and literature,
which found its voice in Aramaic derived Kharoshti and Brahmi scripts invented most likely in the
beginning of the new era. Once the early historic Pali-Brahmi script was deciphered in 1837 by
James Prinsep, the celebrated jatakam stories and the legendary puranas have seamlessly filled the
impossible gap between the sixth-century BCE and the fledgling funerary cult of the early Christian
era. In his 1880 preface to The Cave Temples of India Fergusson points out that the discovery of
hitherto unread Buddhist documents made the ‘mythical and hazy history of Buddha and early
Buddhism intelligible based on recognized facts’. Nevertheless, the now established ‘facts’ are
based on hurriedly assimilated premature assumptions made during early colonial archaeology.
Among the early Buddhists and the Christians the worship of consecrated individuals and
the venerated relics deserve to be considered as a singular event in popular superstition. in the
history of the human psyche the reliquaries offer a microscopic view on how collective belief in
ressurection and afterlife can affect human behavior. The new cult of the dead standardized as
Life Cycle of Buddha produced huge corpus of Indo-Greek ex-votos, funerary art and architecture
in South Asia during the Kushana period synchronal to the Roman Empire. The Kushana known
as Yüehchih or the Moon Tribe to the Chinese were steppe warriors. Others knew them as Saka
or Greco-Scythians who ranged from the Black Sea to the border of China trading in horses as
far as Egypt. Inhumation was widespread in Central Asia where burials wrapped in figured silk
was common. In Parthia and northern Afghanistan archaeologists have found Kushana period
terracotta sarcophagi and ossuaries containing bones and full burials in clay jars. Urn burials in
neatly stratified layers were also found in the northeastern region of Manipur and on the east coast
of South India. The most astounding treasure was discovered in six wooden coffins buried in the
brick vaults of Tillya Tepe necropolis in northern Afghanistan. The richly furnished coffins of a
prince and five royal women were loaded with huge number of gold ornaments and talismans.
Greco-Cypriot fringe necklace, brilliant jewels, bangles and signet rings, gold beads and plaques
embossed with various symbols are similar to some of those found in the buried hoards in Taxila
in Pakistan. Cremation was more common. It gave rise to the stupa mausolea enshrining human
relics in concealed chamber called garbhadahtu. Superb Greco-Roman furnishing of the reliquary
stupa attests to the belief in the immortal soul. Stupa, as noted by Kuwayama, is in the style of
Roman mausoleums of the early Roman Empire. Mausoleum of Augustus Caesar (d.14 CE) built
in 28 BCE on Campus Martius in Rome and the circular monument of his protégé the Ptolemaic
princess Cleopatra Selene II (d.6 CE) built by King Juba II of Mauritania in Algiers are part of a
wave that irresistibly reached the shores of South Asia. Astonishing portrait of Cleopatra Selene
engraved on the inscribed ‘Kusumadasya’ carnelian seal ring comes from a ruined Darunta stupa
in Afghanistan (3.64). It was found along with other noteworthy relics including the signet ring of
Juba II. The nested reliquary casket in schist is sectioned exactly like the rounded wooden box now
used by the shamans of the Yoruba people in Nigeria.
The sheer complexity of the veneration of the dead completely altered the virgin landscape
of South Asia – the implication of the reliquary cult is not easy to fathom or even to come to
grip with. Innovative iconography and unique types of reliquaries deposited in Buddhist funerary
monuments focus on the needs of the time when preoccupation with immortality and afterlife
Preface xxxi
was intense. The new spiritual inclinations in South Asia reveals how the new society reinvents
and totally transforms what has been done before elsewhere while still retaining the preexisting
values. Silk treasured like gold connected the Mediterranean with the Innermost Asia channeling
transmission of knowledge across the world of ideas and beliefs. Silk trade had direct impact on
the bewildering Buddhist cult subject to geomancy of the grave. The reciprocal influence of the
stupa complexes is actually intricate unified vision manifested by unique Provincial Roman styles.
Spiritual aspiration has always been a part of art history but in this particular instance the Hero
Cult is impacted by deified Alexander the Great (356–323 BCE) whose conquests unified several
nations and brought about cultural synthesis. At the same time the vast geographical extent of the
Roman world was responsible for this mono-directional cultural movement spearheading the all
pervasive cult of the dead. Deified immortals in the Buddhist cult represented as Apollo, Hercules
and even Perseus, Endymion and Adonis is the result of Hellenistic syncretism. Evidently this
ephemeral cult was forever deflated when Roman wealth and paganism that caused this outlandish
episode in the very first place declined in the west.
BEYOND DEATH
Form and function of religious works of art backed by substantial Mystery deals with intentionally
‘obscured’ and ‘enigmatic’ content. Buddhist Mystery begins with the account of Immaculate
Conception and miraculous rebirth of Buddha. It parallels the mystifying genesis of Persian
Mithras known as a Roman deity. According to one account Mithras’ mother is Anahita, the
goddess of fertilizing waters with links to Buddhism and Iranian Zoroastrianism. Simultaneously,
Hariti holding cornucopia in Buddhist stupa complexes represents Demeter, the Greek goddess of
the underworld. Cornucopia as symbol of prosperity classifies Roman Fortuna and Greek Tyche
called Ardoxho (Ardochsho) by the Kushana kings. Fortuna dedicated to the Roman Emperors in
the Augusteum at Ostia. The port city of Ostia on the mouth of Tibur was a flourishing center of
Mithraism. It was also the transit point for runaways and freed slaves, army deserters and citizens
who set out to seek paradise on earth in the mysterious east beyond the boundary of the Roman
Empire. The ubiquitous acanthus sprouting columns and piers framing the Buddhist frieze actually
replicate the Imperial memorials in the Augusteum. Graffiti dated to early Christian era identify
the first Roman cohorts stationed in the Augusteum as the ‘Fire Protector’ (vigil ignis), the official
‘Fire Keeper’. The exceptional gold jugate ring of Septimius Severus and Julia Domna inscribed
in Brahmi from a reliquary in Gandhara is linked to the dedications to the Imperial family in the
Augusteum dated to 207 CE. Inexplicably the Kushana kings too called the ‘Fire Protector’ are
typically shown sacrificing at the fire altar. Further, the gold dinars of Huvishka (126-164 CE)
exalting Roma, Fortuna, Mithras, Apollo, Hercules, Hermes and even Serapis raise questions about
their religious identity and political affiliations. Whether the Kushana kings known to possess
supernatural power were in fact powerful shamans dedicated to the Imperial Roman cult is worth
considering. It is known that Mithradetus VI of Pontus, who invented antidote to poison and defied
death like Shiva even after drinking poison, was always accompanied by Scythian shamans, right
up to his final apocryphal end.
A double flute player and a man holding libation dish (patera) derived from Persian and
Greco-Roman tradition appears in the black and white floor mosaic on the vestibule of a shrine in
xxxii Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
2. Mithraic type animal combat, Steatite seal, Mohenjo-Daro, Protohistoric Period, Private collection
3. Cosmic bull of Mithras, Mosaic, Barrack of the Vigiles or Augusteum, Ostia, 1st-2nd century CE
(Photo Robert Ehrlick)
4. Mithraeum of Felicissimus, Orientation Grade 7th Degree, Mosaic, Ostia, 1st-2nd century CE
5. Mithraeum of Felicissimus, Orientation Grade 4th Degree, Mosaic, Ostia, 1st-2nd century CE
the Barracks of the Vigiles at Ostia. The ceremonial pose with the bull sacrifice to the left of the
pronaos similar to the Kushana coin of Vima Kadphises is comparable to the hieratic form of a man
aiming a spade at a bull on a seal from Gandhara engraved in Greco-Roman style. Strangely the
accompanying hieroglyphic text is peculiar to the Indus Valley seal (figs. 2,3). The transcultural
style grudgingly discloses its derivation from the iconic Tauroctony in which Mithras and the
cosmic bull are united by the dagger signifying shaft of light. It has been noted that iconography
of Mithras as the bull-slayer actually has cosmological significance because of the solar deity’s
ability to shift the equinox from the constellation of Taurus to Aries. The spear like propeller in
fact shifts the cosmic sphere of enlightenment as the spring equinox moves out of Taurus the
Bull. Mithraic initiation ceremonies are consistent with the astronomical map of the constellations
Taurus, Canis Minor, Hydra, Corvus, and Scorpio. The zodiac encircles Tauroctony flanked by the
sun and the cersent moon; the dog supposedly representing Canis Minor is cohort of Hecate and
Mithras. Notably, Mitra in Sanskrit meaning friend or friendship is the name of a god praised in
the Rig Veda.
Animals such as deer, horse, elephant, lion, winged griffin, goat, Capricorn called Makara,
dragon, snake, paired fish, and monkey are part of Buddhist mythology. Even pigs sacrificed to
the earth goddess Demeter play important role in early Buddhist art. Although deer is most widely
recognized in Buddhist iconography, the rider-less horse or horse of Helios ascending heaven are
well-known. Animal totems and animal personifications are part of lessons learnt from nature for
our own advantage. In Greco-Roman culture the dog escorting the dead represents either Anubis the
Egyptian god or Hecate the moon goddess of magic and afterlife. Buddha appears to idolize a dog
regally seated on chair in a vertical frieze in the Lahore Museum (G. 108). The dog accompanying
Buddha seated in the celestial cave mansion known as Indrasala is equally unusual. Inexplicably
Greco-Roman Buddha in Indrasala and Roman Mithras worshiped in the underground cave shrines
called Mithraeum flourished simultaneously. Faith in the liberator-savior and the hierarchy of
adepts in Mithraism is similar to Christianity. The litany to the sun-god describes both Mithras and
Christ variously as the Way, the Truth, the Light, the Life, the Word, the Son of God, and the Good
Shepherd. It is worth noting that enlightened Buddha prototypical of Christ stands for the Eightfold
Preface xxxiii
Path. The eighth step indicating ultimate glory is culmination of seven levels of initiation with
equivalent signs, which is part of the secret rites in Mithraism known as ‘Ascending by degrees’
(Gradibus ascendimus). In the seventh degree Mithras crown is a Phrygian cap equivalent to the
halo of enlightenment. Other Mithraic implements and symbols in the step includes patera for
libation, the command stick and the sickle of Saturn worshiped as the father (Latin. Pater) (fig.4).
Just like the handshake of Mithras and Sol, admission into the cult was completed with a handshake
with the Pater. The ultimate goal is to attain the celebrated cup of immortality in the eighth step.
In the sidereal religion those initiates ‘united by the handshake’ referred to as syndexioi receive
the cup denoting perpetual life. Concurrently the crucial trophy in the hands of the Buddha effigy
outlandishly identified as the begging bowl is actually the cup of life.
Buddha conceived in the image of the indomitable sun god is equivalent to Persian ‘Yazeta’
meaning a holy being worthy of worship and honor. The noble Eightfold Path in Buddhism is
equitable view, aspiration, speech, action, livelihood, effort, mindfulness and concentration. The
symbols of eightfold path to reach the status of timeless adoration appear on the floor mosaic
of Felicissimus Mithraeum at Ostia. The fourth stage of initiation depicts spade and Egyptian
systrum along with Buddhist Vajra or the lightning bolt of zeus (fig.5). In the Pali canon Vajrapani
representing the ‘right action’ is the ‘wielder of the thunderbolt’ that strikes at insolence and pride.
As a Yaksha or nature spirit Vajrapani has peculiar affinity to Hercules the psychopomp. Details
are important in Buddhist jewelry design — in wide variety of Buddhist talismans Hercules Knot,
teardrop shaped spade, diamond, heart, trilobe clover and comma shaped wing are momentous
motifs. Although Mithras is known as Roman deity, Indo-Iranian Mithraism with strong roots in
Phrygia coexists with early Buddhism – Phrygia and Anatolia now Turkey is where east meets
west. The pivotal role of the ‘Jerusalem Corridor’ in the expansion of the mystery cults is revealed
by a small Palestinian Tauroctony libation plate recently found in central Gaza Strip. Its form
is identical to the offering plates habitually deposited in the stupa shrines in Gandhara. This
unsuspected conduit has left indelible mark on the Buddhist jewelry design. Comparative religions
in terms of material culture and its importance to the history of first-time culture in South Asia
are discussed in the following chapters. Greek is the common denominator for the expansion of
the cult of Mithras, Christ and Buddha during the early Roman Empire. Greek uppercase letter T
pronounced ‘tao’ denoting Hecate the goddess of the crossroads is similar to anagrammatic Greek
word Ichthys (I-ch-th-y-s) or ‘fish’ acronym for ‘Jesus Christ God's Son, Savior’. The Tao ‘T’
sign on the libation plates of Taxila is one of the ways in which Greco-Buddhist cult concedes the
importance of the goddesses of the underworld (3.98). Together with Demeter the dark moon of
magic worshiped as Hecate (Kali) takes protective custody of the departed. Derivative Taoism in
ancient eastern philosophy points the way to the rhythm of nature, peaceful meditation and ‘the
supernatural spherical pills’ that avoids death and prolongs life.
ASTROLOGICAL RELIGION
Consensus in the interstellar world was believed to produce equilibrium and harmony in human
life stretched to infinity. Thus, endless time and eternal life revolved around the planets Sun-Surya
and Moon-Chanda, Saturn-Shani and Mercury-Budh. Among the constellation of stars Capricorn-
Makara followed by solar Ram and Taurus are foremost. Similar to Hinduism, Greco-Buddhist
xxxiv Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
6. Parinirvana memorial Frieze, Schist, Loriyan Tangai, 2nd-3rd century CE
Kolkata: Indian Museum (5147) (photo Alexander Caddy 1896)
reliquary cult is an idolatry astrological religion that unified varied people. Strabo (c.63 BCE–
24 CE) called India ‘universal reservoir’ where the growing population seeking the abode of the
blessed was very mixed. Similar to the Elysian Fields of perfect happiness pristine South Asia
surrounded by immense ocean and mountains emerged as the Sukhavati of the Mahayana sect.
It was understood that the dead were conveyed by the gods across the vast ocean to the New
Elysium at the ends of the earth. In early Buddhist art psychopomps such as Dionysus, Hercules
and Mercury on the votive coins served a pivotal role. More importantly, the astral goddesses
central to rebirth exerted immense power over the destiny of man. Buddha, bodhisattva and other
immortals depicted in Greco-Roman style were conceived as the ‘dwelling place’ of the revered
soul. Strategy to stage religious experience as ritual performance was codified by suggestive
postures, mudra or gestures, signs and symbols.
It is claimed that Buddha did not believe in the soul or the gods. Yet, Mahayana Buddhism
demonstrates that soul is human nature – death and rebirth are closely connected. Nirvana of the
Buddha, or his death in common speech, is glorified as Parinirvana. Nirvana or heavenly bliss in the
Sukhavati is based on the idea of Persian Paradise and Greek Elysium. The attainment of nirvana
is equated with the achievement of enlightenment, the point at which the human body becomes a
blaze of light. It is best communicated by the halo of deified immortals. Thanatos in ancient Greek
religion is personified god of peaceful Death. He is the son of Nyx, the goddess of night, and the
brother of Hypnos, the god of sleep. The frieze called ‘Parinirvana of Buddha’ describes death,
Preface xxxv
body and soul when the time allotted to the humans by the Fates had expired. Each ‘Parinirvana’
memorial stele is unique but the manner in which the dead person is laid out in identical. A
mysterious unsolved heavy sack hanging from a tripod in front of the bier is also a constant feature.
Parinirvana or the Great Sleep from Loriyan Tangai is a masterpiece of compression and style. A
richly furnished Egyptian type of sloping bed and the head on pillow according to Greco-Roman
tradition represents critical choices made in the prothesis or the ‘laying out’ of the corpse (fig.6).
Among the distraught men keeping wake is nude Vajrapani the ‘Lord of Thunder’ modeled after
bearded Zeus and Taranis the Celtic thunder god. In other reliefs the psychopomp among the
group of mourners resembles Hercules or Hermes, the messenger of gods. Here Vajrapani makes
Phrygian karana mudra, a form of Christian benediction that originally served to ward off evil in
Anatolian culture. The tree goddess to left and a crowned goddess holding palm leaf to right might
simultaneously represent Isis-Venus, beloved of resurrected Osiris-Adonis, and Myrrha who gave
birth to Adonis as myrrh tree. Teardrop of Myrrha is fragrant myrrh essential for embalming in
Greco-Syrian tradition. Another Parinirvana relief depicts the tree goddess close to the bier weep
into a face cloth called Fumian used in Central Asian burials (V&A, IM.247-1927). As a rule
Buddhist frieze in Imperial Roman style includes Alexandrian garland bearers on the edge. Here
the border of flying celestials and a row of sea-monsters carrying winged and wingless riders
signify the Buddhist Paradise known as Paramita. The Lotus Sutra and a large number of other
texts describe the Pure Land as the Land of Supreme Bliss, or the Western Paradise of Amitabha
Buddha. Paramita figuratively means ‘gone to the other shore’. The ideal transport to the other
world depicted as a sea-monster called Ketos has clear parallel in Classical Greek and Roman
sepulchral art. Often propitious goddess riding the sea dragon escorts the soul on the stone libation
plates to be found in the stupa shrines in Gandhara (3.100, 101).
MARVELS OF THE DEEP
Obviously, in the strategies of representation any formulation that departs from what is commonly
accepted as Buddhist tradition helps us to interpret the absolutely new reliquary art. This approach
consistently extends the meaning of diverse forms of talismans and jewelry from various stupa
complexes. Offering plates carved in schist replicating embossed gold are typically from Taxila
but peculiar to Gandhara in general. The goddess riding the sea dragon as sign of salvation is
a recurrent theme in the libation plates. A comparable sea horse called hippocampus and
ichthyocentaur transports a nude man across the seas in a medallion carved on a Greek pyxis
form Gandhara. The mantle pinned to his right shoulder confirms him as an influential Roman.
The hybrid sea deity from Greek mythology takes the form of a horse with the serpentine tail of
fish named Bythos from (Sea-Depths) and Aphros (Sea-Foam). The domical lid of this enigmatic
cylindrical casket is festooned with leafy decoration alternating with seated Dhyani-Buddha. The
lid seamlessly blends with a row of dart-like leaves and herringbone pattern on the curved rim.
Snakes carved on the pitched neck of the lid signify healing in Mithraic cult (fig.7). The snake as
‘genius locus’ is literally the protective spirit of a place. In Buddhist reliefs the snake also signifies
fortune and regeneration, even in the ritual cup held by Buddha as in some versions. The extremely
rare relic casket shaped like the ‘cista mystica’ is peculiar to Dionysian cult. The form actually
resembles the Temple of Vesta built in Tivoli in early first-century BCE. The Corinthian pilasters
xxxvi Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
on the drum of hemispherical stupa monuments
in Gandhara suggest transmission of the circular
peripteral Temple of Vesta in Rome, which can
be seen on a rare Severus-Domna gold coin
(fig.8). Swags and acanthus decoration on the
dome of several stupa monuments are derivative
of architectural ornamentation on the Temple of
Vesta. Worship and sacrifice offered to deified
kings and queens in its celebrated fire altar is a
familiar ritual observed in the stupa reliefs as
well. Historically Vesta offering libation on the
bronze AS of Caligula (12–41 CE) is the Biblical
Tribute Money that all citizens were required
to offer at Imperial shrines. It was understood
as the perpetual obligation to the sovereign and
ancestors (fig.9). Accordingly, Caligula before
being killed had collected and brought back the
mortal remains of his mother and his brothers and
deposited their relics in the circular tomb of his
grandfather Augustus Caesar in Rome. Similarly
a single stupa serving as memorial for several is
witnessed by numerous dedicatory inscriptions on
the parclose at Sanchi and Bharhut. Devotion to
more than one person is found even in a reliquary
casket.
Classicism is well established in the small
libation plates habitually deposited in the stupa
shrines. Oddly called cosmetic palette or toilet
tray, the offering plates as the residence of the
departed soul are usually framed in lotus petals
with a shallow semicircular depression to hold
liquid offering. The offering plates carved in stone
avoid direct reference to any individual. Instead
Hellenistic relief in the lunette offers an idealized
vision of salvation, such as Isis-Venus riding a
sea dragon. More importantly, the breadth of
Greco-Roman associations made by the offering
7. Relic casket, Schist, H. c. 26 cm, Gandhara, 1st–2nd century CE (Online Eclectic Museum)
8. Temple of Vesta in Rome, Gold, Aureus of Septimius Severus and Julia Domna (193-196 CE)
9. Libation of goddess Vesta, Bronze As of Caligula (37–41 CE), Inscribed Vesta, S[enatus] C[onsulto]
Preface xxxvii
plates provide a reasonable framework to interpret what
the images spoke to the contemporaries in the context of
death and how people viewed rebirth. The shallow plate
called patera was used for libation or for offering drink in
religious rituals. The commemorative plates demonstrate
that care and nurturing of the dead did not end with the
funeral and formal period of mourning, but was sustained
by dedicated priests residing in the stupa site identified
as monasteries.
Art-historical references in the bas-reliefs carved in
the arched alcove separated from the offering holder are
of considerable variety and interest. A togate figure with
topknot rather like Vesta or a priest offering libation at the
four quarters deviates from the usual format. The praying
figure with upraised open arms simultaneously identifies
the figure as Oran or Oranté, the departed soul, which is
an extraordinary example of art imitating life (fig.10).
The symbol of soul at peace in paradise common in early
Sumerian and Egyptian art gained collective connotation
as the praying Oran in early Christian art. The Oran
holds lotus embossed offering plate peculiar to current
Buddhist cult. As the lotus at the center radiates to the
four corners of the earth, the offering plate conceived
as the Lotus of Rebirth is edged with lotus petals. The
offering plates also provide a close glimpse of skilled
gold workers widely engaged as sculptor-jeweler in the
Buddhist reliquary cult.
It is needless to say that concurrent to the early
Christian Catacombs of Rome, geomancy of the grave
played critical role in the choice of the funerary sites
in the extreme east, practically beyond the then known
world. Death and funerary practices are of particular
interest to archaeologists and art historians, mainly
because funerary remains are often the best-preserved.
In tangent to Gandhara two other cult centers located on
the Oxus and Indus River complement each other. Till
now identified as ‘Bronze Age Cultures’ the importance
10. Praying Oran libation plate, Grey Schist, Ø 11 cm, Swat Valley, 1st-2nd century CE
11. Square offering plate, black marble, c.11.4 cm, BMAC, Turkmenistan, Protohistoric period
12. Elephant Seal, Steatite, BMAC, Turkmenistan, Protohistoric period
Archaeology Victor Sarianidi (Photo Kenneth Garrett)
xxxviii Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols Preface xxxix

of Indus Valley Civilization and the closely related Bactria Margiana Archaeological Complex
(BMAC) have remained isolated and incomprehensible. One of the rare unifying factors is a Taxila
type of offering plate from BMAC type site at Gonur. But instead of the usual circular libation
plates of Gandhara, the square tray in metamorphic limestone depicts typical Buddhist floral
motif and bull’s head with crescent horns inside alternate circles. At the centre of nine auspicious
circles is the circular offering plate, which is the seat of the soul implicit in the engraved seal or
coin tokens (fig.11). Archaeologists have long puzzled over the origin of the exceptional artifacts
linked to the strange hieroglyphics of the Indus Valley culture. It was equally mystifying to Victor
Sarianidi and his team to recover from the ‘palace citadel’ of Gonur an elephant seal inscribed in
the pictographic script of the Indus Valley (fig.12). 13. Deer-hoof seal, Terracotta cone, Jandial Greek Temple, Taxila, 1st century CE
14. Deer-hoof eternity knot, Copperplate, Mohenjo-Daro, Protohistoric Period
BMAC and Mohenjo-Daro co-exist in the presumed Bronze Age. But the distance between 15. Auspicious Buddhist Knot of Eternity
Mohenjo-Daro and Taxila in the Indus Valley is not in terms of space but in time, for the conventional
dating divides them by more than fifteen hundred years of limbo. Despite the Great Stupa towering to the land of the living. In all likelihood the matching endless-knot on the copperplates and the
in both the sites the ambiguous void between the isolated Bronze Age and the burgeoning Greco- conical terracotta seal served the same necromantic function. The identical ‘deer-hoof’ endless-
Buddhist cult in the first century CE has never been bridged. The problem lies in the strange knot etched on about one hundred and forty copperplates from Mohenjo-Daro have personalized
steatite seals and the as yet un-deciphered pictographic glyphs exclusive to the Indus Valley. In dedication on reverse (fig.14). The pictorial text on each tablet exhibits rich syntactic module
each of these locations hugely influential religious leaders with remarkable organizational skill of words corresponding to usual speech. And together with its ability to incorporate different
clearly spearheaded the coordinated cult movements. So far no one has considered the possibility substance suggests a linguistic writing system rather than a nonlinguistic symbol system designed
that at one significant moment in time and under tremendously critical circumstances, diverse specifically for secret rites. In Hindu practice efficacy of ‘yantra’ engraved on the copper plates is
ethnic groups from different places gathered together in the out-of-the-way easternmost locations due to the magical ‘mantra’ uttered over such mystic diagrams.
to practice mortuary cult rituals. This seems to clarify manifold related funerary sites generating
The amazing endless-knot and the accompanying inscriptions are actually etched on both
diverse types of grave goods in the BMAC, Indus Valley and Greco-Buddhist archaeological
sides of the square copperplates. Leaving aside the source of copper ore and the technology of ore
sites. First of all, despite the cohesive faith in afterlife, divergent votives adjunct to different
smelting, the earliest etching in the Indus Valley and the partitioned copper seals from BMAC are
ethinicity segregate these necropolises. Next, the idiosyncratic funerary goods in isolated pockets
astounding in the suddenly sprung Bronze Age cultures with no recorded history. Etching used by
in fact classify people according to their race and geographical origin since migration has been
goldsmiths and other metal-workers to decorate metal items such as armor, cups and plates has
the primary force of the demographic trend in the settlement of related societies. Even now this
been known in Europe at least since the Middle Ages. It may go back to antiquity in Egypt that
peculiar cultural disposition defines the different States in India. Statewide the settlement pattern
produced large quantities of electrum, an alloy of gold and silver, copper, and bronze alloys so
cover whole societies, or groups defined by criteria such as original nationality, religion, and more
similar to the transient knowledge of metallurgy noticed in Mohenjo-Daro. Resist dyed carnelian
importantly ethnicity or race identified by caste. In this regard even early historic Buddhist cult
beads in the Indus Valley treated in acid bath called mordant too spans thousands of years of
taken for granted due to its readily accessible realistic representation is quite diverse slylistically.
experience in Egypt. Symbolic hare and the one horned rhinoceros on etched copperplates devoted
In the present study interrelated burial goods from various sites differentiated as Bronze Age to the departed in Mohenjo-Daro were evidently as significant as the endless-knot (4.80). Copper
and early historic Kushana period often have surprising convergences that demonstrate shared belief etching in the abruptly materialized ‘Bronze Age’ culture in South Asia is frankly astonishing. In
in life after death. A terracotta conical seal carved with a curious endless-knot on the circular base traditional pure etching a metal plate, usually copper or zinc, is covered with a waxy ground that
was found in the mound on which a Greek temple once stood in Jandial (fig.13). It is located about is resistant to acid. The artist then scratches off the ground with a pointed etching needle so that
half a mile from the north gate of Sirkap stupa cluster, a satellite of Taxila necropolis. The knot of lines exposing the bare metal appears in the finished piece. The plate is then dipped in a bath of
eternity shaped like figure 8 is a labyrinth called antelope or ‘deer-hoof’ drawn by Chokwe shaman acid, technically called the mordant. The acid dissolves part of the exposed metal or ‘bites’ into
of Angola. The Jandial endless-knot identical to the Chokwe ‘deer-hoof’ is unexpectedly replicated the metal, leaving behind lines sunken in the plate. The surrounding protected waxy ground is then
on several copperplates in the adjacent Mohenjo-Daro. The ‘deer-hoof’ endless-knot was known cleaned off the plate. The etched line on the plate used in printing is inked all over and then the ink
also to the Egyptians. In the freehand Sona sand drawing of Angola the eternal knot in funerary wiped off the surface, leaving only the ink in the etched lines.
rituals gives ceremonial safe passage to the departed. Chokwe shaman at the end obliterates half of
Buddhist memorials on large boulders and on the rocky slopes are dispersed at random on
the interlaced endless maze right down the middle to block the spirit from retracing its way back
the Karakoram Highway along the Indus Valley. The desolate rock art depict stupa enshrining
xl Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
enlightened immortal, mountain goat with curved horns and the simplest shield-knot labyrinth.
Interlacement is a notable trait in Celtic and West Asian art extensively practiced now in Islamic
art. The purpose of the eternal knot in the Indus Valley culminates in the interlaced endless-knot
among the eight auspicious signs worshiped on the Buddhist altar (fig.15). Its hidden inspiration
continues in the ephemeral threshold kolam encircling the ‘Perfect Ten’ dots ‘put’ by Hindu
housewives in South India as part of daily ritual to attract prosperity and protection. The cognitive
skill and synchronicity of the deer-hoof endless-knot persisting in shamanic funerary ceremony in
Angola and the threshold kolam of Tamil Nadu is just another example of meaningful coincidences
one observes in early Buddhist culture. Astonishing symmetrical synchronicity is consistent in
the first-time ever Greco-Buddhist reliquary cult; it is the intuitive ‘acausal connecting principle’
linking mind and matter. Birch bark manuscript in Kharoshti script derivative of Aramaic alphabet is
noteworthy during the Kushana period. Simultaneously, linear Brahmi adapted from contemporary
Hellenized Semitic script of Palmyra is the first in a list of scripts mentioned in the Lalitavistara
Sutra. Copy of the Kabul MS written on birch bark now in the Vienna Western Himalaya Archive
(SNO5 1000, 7081) written in innovative Indus script has not only given unexpected direction
to scholarship on Indus Valley culture but has brought Kushana and Indus Valley cultures closer
together (8.31). The claims that as-yet undeciphered Indus hieroglyphics is affiliated to Brahmi
is the most disputed point from early colonial archaeology onwards to the present. In addition the
obscure hieroglyphics has close affinity to the alphabets of Celts and Etruscan whose involvement
is well documented by early Buddhist archaeology.
I am drawn to the Buddhist cult regarding what we do not know about its partiality to astronomy.
Venus represented as a flower with five petals is an important sign of Paramita. The virtual floral
tributes on Buddhist reliefs is also a popular ex-voto embossed or cut out in sheet gold. The first-
century votive flowers with five petals shaped like a heart signify Venus as the goddess of love
(2.29). Star gazing is an important way to understand Paramita translated as perfection, perfect
realization, or reaching the beyond. The ‘pentagram’ of Venus is a highly noticeable rhythm in the
motion of Venus around the sun as viewed from an earth-centered perspective. The ‘Five Petal of
Venus’ is scientifically discussed in earth.org by Guy Ottewell in ASTRONOMY ESSENTIALS
(June 13, 2016). The celestial dance of Venus to the accompaniment of the Music of the Spheres
represents the all embracing love of Isis-Venus on the other shore. Venus embracing Adonis
embossed on a gold plaque from Taxila conveys divine love in afterlife (2.39). An array of style
creates hieratic forms of loving couple called Dhampati or Mithuna to serve esoteric function in the
Buddhist mortuary cult. Intransience of otherworldly pleasures repeatedly portrayed in Mahayana
Buddhist art neutralize the philosophic rejection of the impermanent world. Number of sculptured
relief on the stupa monuments located in the ‘Buddhist monastery’ gives the first glimpse of
sacred marriage or hierogamy. Female votaries in the all male bastion are occasionally identified
as courtesan-dancers in inscribed votives. The highly valued real life prostitutes are known from
the contemporary accounts in literature. The tradition of Devadasi and sacred prostitution begins
with highly skilled courtesans called ganika (Gk. hieroduli) dedicated to the cult of the dead in the
stupa complexes. The voluptuous divine female merges with the savior goddesses linked to rituals
connected to post-mortem healing shrouded in mystery. Although practice of necromancy is still
whispered about, awaking the dead from the eternal slumber is not common knowledge.
Preface xli
The complex network dedicated to the service of the dead wasted away at the decline of
Kushana dynasty synchronal to the fall of the Roman Empire. The countless Buddhist memorials
spread across a vast expanse was impossible to upkeep and when the source of endowment dried
up, memory failed. And in the natural course of time the inscrutable Greco-Buddhist funerary cult
that thrived for over two hundred years dwindle to nothing. However, investiture of priests and
priestesses called ‘Devadasi’ instituted for the successive worship of a deity of one’s choice follow
the same astrological path that classify several Hindu festivals. The accompanying rituals are often
connected to codified funerary ceremonies that automatically turned community responsibility
into a family duty, which at the same time manifests as public celebration of various festivals. Thus
the astrological calendar tracking religious events throughout the year keeps the heterogeneous
Hindu community together.
The same astrological principle linked to the seasonal changes joined the motley groups
of people in the exceptionally coordinated Greco-Buddhist funerary cult. Religious rituals were
focused on the consecrated effigies installed for worship. Buddhist art known for a consistant
statement of belief in multiple styles follow the ritual ‘Cycle of Life’ culminating in the
enlightenment of countless human beings. Buddha is a brand that now thrives in its ‘encapsulated
myth’ — its attractiveness is in the suspension of disbelief. It was poet Coleridge who suggested
in 1817 that if a writer could infuse a ‘human interest and a semblance of truth’ into a fantastic
tale, the reader would suspend judgment concerning the implausibility of the narrative. At the
core is the existential conundrum of Siddhartha transforming into the enlightened Buddha fighting
the forces of darkness called Mara meaning death. Far too many rely on the classic formula of
a beginning, middle and an end — the oft repeated story of Immaculate Conception in a palace
and the supernatural rebirth in Nepal’s Lumbini sala grove in the literal approach overlooks the
transliteration of metaphysical religious experience. It proves prejudicial to the recovery of the
Mystery Religion communicated through the Buddhist relics, metaphors and parables, signs and
symbols. There is always a story within a story. Life cycle of a Buddha actually begins at death
with mystical conception of soul called the ‘Descend of the Lord’ in the Bharhut inscription. It is
followed by rebirth and heavenly illumination at the union with the divine female.
The wing of a portable altar depicts a dead man being mourned in the lowest panel. The register
above describes in chronological order rebirth of soul conveyed by a full grown child by the side
of the revered tree goddess. The eternal abode is identified by the branch of ‘Sala’ tree (fig.16). The
word Sala of Germanic origin in Spanish and Italian means ‘House of Eternity’ from home, main
living room or pavilion; the same as in Buddhist and Sanskritic convention elsewhere. A range of
key themes in descriptive Buddhist reliefs are rather similar to Roman Asiatic sarcophagi such as the
Four Seasons (Horae) sarcophagus in Rome Musei Capitolini (MC1185). A commemorative stele
following the convention of vertical composition depicts the heavenly abode with ‘Flower of Life’
latticework at the very top. First a man on horseback rides through a doorway on the base – above
the gateway to afterlife is acanthus of rejuvenation bound with protective Hercules knot. Usually a
rider-less horse indicates the Great Departure linked to Parinirvana. In the following sequence the
man is united with the divine female on the balcony right above the doorway lit by flaming torch
on the porch. The culmination of deification is denoted by the loving couple in an arched alcove at
xlii Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
the highest point (fig.17). The atmospheric details on the stupa slab
overcome primitive fear of the unknown, evil spirits and immense
darkness encountered at death. Knitting together signs and symbols
embedded in the iconographic details, the frieze distinguishes human
and divine, place, performance, posture and conviction in afterlife.
The creative god Vishnu sleeping on the endless ocean of time
with Lakshmi seated at his feet represents the imminent awakening
and the ultimate union of divine lovers. The icon of Anantasayana of
Vishnu strangely reminiscent of Parinirvana combines the sacred and
the profane to indicate ‘Superior Consciousness’. Among the planets
and the luminaries Gajalkshmi worshiped as Purnima corresponds to
the moon goddess Selene as well as Venus the eternal star. Parinirvana
seem to have successfully reinvented the myth of the moon goddess
Selene kiss and embrace each night Endymion sleeping in his cave
tomb in Mount Latmus in Asia Minor. The legendary love of the
shepherd prince Endymion and Selene is gathered from ancient
stories about the indigenous Karian moon-god men. In the exclusively
Greek tradition augmented by art, literature and witness accounts,
Endymion and Selene were united each night in his cave tomb. Thus
Zeus granted Selene to bestow everlasting youth and immortality to
Endymion. A plaster cast of Endymion and Selene from the Begram
hoard of the Kushana was among several votives brought from
Alexandria (fig.18). The myth of Endymion and Selene embossed
on a bronze plaque from Kholapur is a somewhat amended version.
The famous antiquarian theme of Endymion and Selene embossed
on a silver pendant from Afghanistan is copied from Julius Caesar’s
posthumous denarius issued in 44 BCE. Instead of moon goddess
Selene, Hecate on a moonless night alights on sleeping Endymion
as a winged female with bird’s feet on another plaster plaque from
Begram now in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. The necromantic
subject of Hecate overlaps with the owl’s ability to see in the dark,
which amplifies her role as the goddess of transition and magic on
moonless nights. Thematically linked Ganymede and Zeus plaster
plaque from Begram Room 13 combines mourning and praise for the
deceased. The Hellenistic bas-reliefs on the plaster plaques similar
to the libation plates of Gandhra incorporate Greco-Roman myths.
More importantly, the votive plaster plaques from Begram similar to
16. Altar of Immortality, Phyllitic brown schist, H. 8.7 cm, Gandhara, 1st-2nd -3rd century CE
New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of Eilenberg (1987.142.53)
17. Entry to afterlife, Schist, Gandhara, 2nd-3rd century CE, Private collection
Preface xliii
18. Selene and Endymion, Plaster, H.14cm, Ø17cm, Begram Room 13, 1st century CE
Kabul: National Museum of Afghanistan (B39.102.103) (Paris Musée Guimet on loan)
19. The Golden Fleece, Sandstone, Bharhut stupa, 1st-2nd century CE
Kolkata: Indian Museum
the offering plates of Taxila evocative of funerary sculpture on Roman Asiatic sarcophagi recollect
lost Greek works in painting and embossed gold.
The myth of Endymion celebrated in Greek literature engaged painters in works of art such
as red-figure terracotta krater now in the Texas Dallas Museum of Art. Labels identify only
the figures of Atlas, Gaia, Aphrodite and Selene in two or possibly three scenes connected to
Endymion. To the right of Endymion are Athena and a Hesperid standing before a serpent entwined
tree connecting both the upper and lower panels, probably designed to represent simultaneously
the story of Jason. The lower panel depicts Hercules in his quest for the golden apples of the
Hesperides. The figures from left to right are Hermes, Hercules, Atlas enthroned as a king and Gaia
the earth goddess. On upper panel Endymion with Golden Fleece lures the moon goddess crowned
with crescent moon and aureole riding a four-horse drawn chariot. To her left stand Aphrodite
and Peitho, the goddesses of love and seduction. Unexpectedly, ivory reliquary fragments from
Chandraketugarh in Bengal depict Aphrodite and Peitho accompany Selene riding a chariot drawn
by four deer consecrated to the moon goddess (2.103,104). By inference the painted Greek vase
succeeds to identify the nameless Yakshi in similar compositions in Buddhist art. Symbolic reliefs
repeatedly disclose eternal values, yet, the legend of Jason and his Golden Fleece denoting astral
glory and transfiguration is another surprise on the copingstone of Bharhut stupa in Central India
(fig.19). The ground-breaking allegory carved next to the silent graves depicts a man holding
the Golden Fleece hung from a miraculous creeper surrounding emblematic jewelry. The Golden
Fleece signifies a different kind of successful sea voyage known as Argonautica accomplished
after overcoming many obstacles. Perhaps the relief of Jason and the Golden Fleece suggests an
alternative Greek myth in which Endymion lures with shining Golden Fleece the moon-goddess
Selene-Ma (Purnima) from the sky. Assuming that the same figure represents both Jason and
Endymion, the frieze is almost certainly a funerary vignette in the manner of Egyptian Book of the
Dead to guarantee everlasting life.
xliv Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols Preface xlv

Sanchi and Bharhut stupa reliefs confirm that complementary funerary rituals were performed
in the supplementary rock-cut monuments such as vaulted chapel called chaitya griha (chita–pyre,
griha–abode) and vihara meaning ‘secluded dwelling’. Loving couple in one form or the other
appear on all the early Buddhist monuments. The technological wonder of innovative Buddhist
cave architecture in India is stylistically similar to preexisting Anatolian rock-cut tombs in Turkey,
the homeland of Endymion. The myth of Endymion explains the unfathomable Parinirvana that
occupies the left side wall of Ajatna Cave 26 in Aurangabad, Maharashtra. The icon comes alive
in the Spring Equinox on the occasion of May full moon called Visakhi or Buddha Purnima. The
chaitya with Asiatic arched facade is designed as vaulted pillared hall with rock-cut reliquary stupa
in the apsidal altar. The chaitya plan derivative of ancient funerary chapels in Italy is prototypical
of the Christian basilica. And the rock-cut vihara planned like a Roman villa has, instead of atrium
open to the sky, a painted skylight on the ceiling of a square pillared hall. The propitious lotus
ceiling in concentric circles within a square is virtual sky inside the manmade cave that progresses
towards the awakened Buddha seated in the rear cell similar to the Ka or double of the dead
installed in the underground Egyptian tombs. The ceiling painting in Ajanta Cave 17 depicts six
celestials holding the nimbus veil skydive in a fantastic six lobed formation within a circle. The
axially planned pillared hall has small lateral cubicles with built in bed very similar to those in
Pompeii’s numerous houses of disrepute. This dark ritual space inside the imaginary residence of
monks does not explain the lavish trompe-l'œil paintings and the equally unconventional jewelry
hoards from the main stupa complexes. Exceptional female ornaments from Taxila in part explain
its function complementary to the ever present luscious females and loving couple represented in
Buddhist votives and architectural sculpture.
Secret Eleusinian religious rites of ancient Greece include the mysteries of Endymion and
Selene, Isis and Osiris and Venus and Adonis. Revitalization involved initiation and communion
with the goddess involving fertility rituals conducted by consecrated priests and priestesses who
held mediatorial office between the deity and man. Bacchanalian fertility rituals in honor of Adonis’
stay with Persephone in Hades is also part of Eleusinian mystery glimpsed on an unusual sandstone
votive pillar from Gandhara (3.70a-c). The identities of voluptuous women and their context in 20. Bacchanalian assembly, Schist, Gandhara, 2nd century CE
Buddhist art and culture open another chapter. Men and women in Buddhist art surrendering to Tokyo: National Museum of Japan
the influence of wine and amorous dalliance is still a long way from being resolved (fig.20). stupa
stair raisers from Buner in Gandhara consistently depict musicians and celebrants drinking wine of embossed spacers is wedged into a high waist-band. The girdle slung low on the hip is strung
among Roman freed slaves participating in melodramatic cult rituals (3.3). The Bacchanalian scene with three rows of Phoenician beads. The circular front piece or buckle is embossed with seated
arranged in horizontal registers apparently invoke Dionysus, known as Saturn in other places and image of the goddess. As the goddess-priestess fondles her emblematic earring in a significant
worshiped as Osiris from whom several other deities emerge. As protector of the dead the deity manner she displays variety of embossed and beaded bracelets wrapped around her arms. Her
guarantees a happy hereafter. heavy anklets too are strung with several rows of tinkling beads. She also wears strap slippers
The counterpart is the attractive divine female called Yakshi believed to be a nature spirit. ornamented with beads and embossed gold flower. The hierarchical scale of her turbaned but
Meticulously detailed pieces of jewelry decorate the Yakshi from the toe to the crown of her barefoot female companions magnifies the importance of the delightful embodiment of the moon
elaborate coiffure. The Phoenician type of votive terracotta from Chandraketugarh in Bengal goddess towering at the center. Beaded aprons and thigh-bands are unique type of ornaments in
depicts the goddess in her shrine receiving a basket filled with gold ornaments (fig. 21a). The the terracotta and ivory plaques from Tamluk and Chandaketgarh in Bengal (fig. 21b). Display
impression made from a mold delicately carved like ivory depicts broad fringe necklace and of various pieces of jewelry incorporating signs and symbols of the goddess is unique in Bharhut
distinctive hairpins called Panchuda. The long four-strand bead necklace strung through a couple stupa. The sculptured sandstone railing depicting various types of jewelry design articulated in
xlvi Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
detail by skilled sculptor-jeweler is important source of early
Buddhist jewelry. In addition to the captivating adornment of
the goddesses, the enormous number of artifacts in bewildering
variety, often one of a kind from buried hoards, is a huge challenge
for systematic classification. In order to understand their religious
meaning it is important to tackle the nature of the goddess against
the backdrop of the stupa complexes. The manner in which votives
and ornaments from the funerary monuments glorify the goddess
or her handmaids called ‘devadasi’ is addressed in the first two
chapters. At the same time it is imperative to gauge the true nature
of the reliquary cult by logically placing various visual evidences
in its historical and cultural context.
Once upon a time devotees from everywhere, including
Julius Caesar (d.44 CE) and Strabo (d.24 CE) thronged the famous
temple of the moon goddess Ma at Comana in present day Turkey.
Footprint of Ma worshiped as Nishan meaning mark or target in
both Aramaic and Sanskrit was a Greco-Armenian innovation in
Cappadocia. Sripada is auspicious footprints of goddess Lakshmi;
Hindus invite Purnima the full moon by placing her footprint on
the threshold pointing inwards. Sripada renowned as Budhpada
was popular votive in the Greco-Buddhist mystery cult (6.106).
Inevitably, rituals connected to the departed performed in India
and Southeast Asian countries occur on each moonless night and
on the full moon days. Now May’s Flower Moon in the month of
Vaisakhi celebrates death, rebirth and enlightenment of Buddha.
The full moon in May celebrated as Vaisakha Purnima or Buddha
Purnima ushers spring, a time of increasing fertility when the water
element dominates spring’s lunar cycle. Purnima the full moon
worshiped as Gajalakshmi, Srima Devata and Chanda Yakshi is
first labeled on Bharhut stupa enclosure. Significantly, prakrit
Brahmi and Kharoshti peculiar to Gandhara are found together
in inscriptions on the sandstone parclose of Bharhut stupa the
astounding Bharhut sculptures with clear traits of Mathura style
confirm its importance in the overall expansion of the Buddhist
reliquary cult during the early Christian era.
Hindu rituals connected to the dead follows the passage of
the moon culminating in the autumn full moon of Kartik in the
21a. Yakshi, Terracotta H. 66 cm, Chandraketugarh, 1st-2nd century CE
Private Collection, Renzo Freschi Oriental Art
21b. Devadasi, Terracotta, Chandraketugarh, 1st-2nd century CE
Oxford : Ashmolean Museum (EA 1999.47)
Preface xlvii
Hindu calendar (October/November). Married Hindu women in North India fast from sunrise to
moonrise for the safety and longevity of their husbands on Karwa chauth, the fourth day of Harvest
Blood Moon called Kartik Purnima. Karva means clay pot while chauth means fourth. The rituals
on this day conclude only after the moon is witnessed through a moonlike screen. As we move into
the unknown the crutch of myths reinforces inherent faith in immortality. According to popular
legend the display of glittering gold and dazzling light to the accompaniment of death defying
legends and songs on the day of Dhanteras, the thirteenth lunar day in the Hindu month of Kartik,
keeps away the god of death named Yama. Most importantly Lakshmi worshiped on Dhanteras
was manifested by the gods and demons churning the ocean of milk for the elixir of immortality.
On that formidable dark night a pot of ambrosia was brought forth by Lakshmi and Dhanavantri,
the physician of the gods and an incarnation of Vishnu. Gajalakshmi first appears on the pot of
immortality on the sculptured railing of Bharhut stupa (1.12). Mahayana meaning the Great Boat
might actually denote the great goddess in the Buddhist cult. Gajalakshmi lustrated by paired
elephant is Maha Vihara Devi in Sri Lanka, where votive copperplates depict the goddess ride
the ceremonial 'Mayurpankhi' boat with peacock prow. The goddess guiding the lofty stern like
Isis later adopts swan figurehead of Venus. Several metallic crescent moon votives among the
Buddhist relics suggest that the crescent boat in the night sky is a sign of salvation.
The earliest religious expression in South Asia displaying symbiotic relationship between
the goddess and various animals that mutually reinforce the power of nature. Fragments of ivory
reliquary caskets from Chandraketugarh in Bengal depict celestial maidens similar to Venus and
Peitho accompany the moon goddess in a chariot drawn by four deer sacred to Selene-Artemis.
Customarily paired deer flank Srichakra or the wheel of fortune on the seat of Buddha to acknowledge
the healing power of moon light reflecting the many aspects of nature – earth, water, wind and
sun. The superb classic style of paired deer on an unusual Indus Valley seal displays consummate
skill and knowledge of gem engraving (6.79). The roaring tiger subdued by the Mistress of Animal
recurring in the Indus Valley steatite seals is the foundation of goddess mythology (7.12a-c). An
astonishing libation plate from a Buddhist funerary chapel in Afghanistan is comparable to the
goddess seals in the Indus Valley culture. The goddess on lion holding aloft a sword resembles
the Punic lunar goddess Tanit of Carthage adapted from the warrior goddess Ishtar Atargatis. The
goddess familiar in Hindu Shakti cult appears earliest on the golden offering plate carved in stone
to counterfeit embossed gold. The goddess riding lion called Simhavahini appears beneath vine
arbor loaded with bunches of grapes (fig.22). Simhavahini representing various moon goddesses
also appears on engraved gems, coin tokens and a rare mold from Taxila used for embossing
sheet metal (5.29-32). Religious syncretism in early Buddhist art is conveyed by the Simhavahini
derivative of Mesopotamian Ishtar worshiped as the shining morning and evening ‘Star’(Tara).
In Buddhist talismans the goddess is signified by six or eight pointed star. Yet, Ishtar can easily
merge with the Anatolian goddess Ma Cybele riding a lion embossed on a ceremonial gold belt
from a Tillya Tepe burial (5.28). At the same time the goddess riding the lion represents Parthian
goddess Nana. Nana or Nanaia as protector of the Kushana throne is mentioned earliest in a
rock inscription written in Tocharian Greek discovered in 1993 at Rabatak near Surkh Khotal in
Afghanistan. The first lines of the Kushana Rabatak inscription describes Kanishka’s kingship:
xlviii Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
22. Nana-Ma Cybele, Phyllitic Schist, Ø 13.3 cm, Afghanistan, 1st-2nd century CE, BARAKAT
23. BOΔΔO Coin of Kanishka I (c.78-115CE), Gold Stater, Wt.16.98 gm, Ø 2.1 cm, 1st century CE
Afghanistan: Ahim Posh Stupa 2. London: The British Museum
‘The righteous savior, the just ruler worthy of divine worship, obtained investiture from Nana and
the gods and inaugurated the first year to gratify the gods’. On a Sasanian silver basin from Amu
Darya the four armed Nana-Nanaia seated on lion lifts up the sun and the moon while holding the
scepter and the elixir bowl in her lower hands. The part gilt silver plate from the delta oasis of
Khwarezm is now in the British Museum (2.106).
The planets had profound effect on the religions and philosophies in antiquity. It is fairly
complicated to estimate the impact of astrological religion upon the Buddhist mortuary cult
articulated mostly through visual art. BOΔΔO in Tocharian Greek inscribed on the gold dinar of
Kanishka I is recognized as luminous Buddha. But BOΔΔO might denote planet Mercury called
in Sanskrit Budha and revered as Saumya, the son of the Moon god (Mao). Kushana king of the
‘moon race’ offers sacrifice at the fire altar of Osiris worshiped as the night sun and depicted as
crescent moon. The bearded Kanishka the ‘Great Kushana King of Kings, Son of God’ wears
a sword strapped to his belt, ample trousers and tunic. His short cape is pinned to his chest in
Roman manner and he holds a lance as sign of regal office. The BOΔΔO coin of Kanishka
was found in the exceptional Ahan Posh gold reliquary from Stupa 2. The embodiment of
incandescence labeled BOΔΔO on reverse might represent the transformed togate king Kanishka
with by splayed legs (fig.23). Consistent with Palmyraean portraits BOΔΔO holds folded end of
cloth in the form of Egyptian sign ‘Sa’ to convey abhaya or protection. The erudite artist / priest
who invented the twofold golden aureole is obviously the custodian of Hellenistic tradition. The
‘brilliant light radiating from every pore on his body’ fits the epithet ‘Tejaprabha of the Blazing
Lights’ usually reserved for Buddha ascended to heaven in the likeness of Helios. However,
BOΔΔO denoting Hermes or Mercury is ‘Budha’ in local Prakrit self promoted by Kanishka
as ‘Aryan’ language in his Rabatak Inscription. Budhawar or Wednesday devoted to ‘Budha’ is
named after the Anglo-Saxon divinity Woden, and Woden’s day in Latin is the ‘Day of Mercury’
(Dies Mercurii). Consequently the double aura of plasma surrounding the personified Mercury
Preface xlix
is the astronomical corona that surrounds the planets. Invoked as ‘Bhagavata budhe’ (Bhagavata
– Lord / God) Mercury is Greek god Hermes in Alchemy and Hermetic Philosophy. Maia, also
known as Maya is the mother of Hermes (Budha), the guide of the departed soul.
The deep seated desire for postmortem healing and immortality is inherent to Buddhist
reliquary cult. It is connected to obscure magical rites that survive in Hindu rituals conducted
on the Full Moon and the no moon days dedicated to ancestor worship. On moonless nights
and on the fifth day of the new moon Hecate (Kali) traverses the land of the dead. The magical
earth hugging Harvest Blood Moon appearing closest to Autumn equinox (Sept.-Oct.) prompts a
fortnight of ancestor worship in India when the dead receive water and rice mixed with sesame
seed sacred to Saturn, the embodiment of all ancestors. Worship of Maha Maya Lakshmi as
Purnima on Autumn full moon concludes the annual ancestor rites when lamp lit boats are
set afloat to steer the departed spirits back to heaven. Myth, language and gender are vital
ingredients to understand the mysterious Buddhist cult. A gold plate inscribed in Kharoshti
deposited by Prince of the Odi in a Gandhara reliquary refers to the protectors of the dead.
Among the chief deities mentioned in the scroll are Hariti and Indradeva: “Honored with whole
retinue of..…… devanam Indrab and the deva gods (Latin. Divus-god), the four great kings, the
twenty eight yaksa captains and Hariti with her retinue, in short all deliverers from perdition
(apaya) of the great niraya (hell).” The king of Devas, the shining celestials, is Lord Indra
identical to Varun like Saturn identified with Bel or Baal of Syria. Demeter-Hariti identified by
cornucopia in addition holds harpa in a Petra mosaic, which confirms her identity as the consort
of Saturn. Denticulate sickle called harpa is an agricultural tool emblematic of Saturn, the lord
of agriculture. Harpa of Saturn represents fertility of the earth, cyclic time and regeneration
associated with Isis as well.
THE AGE OF SATURN
The Age of Saturn named after Greek god Kronos (Chronos) was remembered with nostalgia as
an age of bliss. The cataclysmic life on Earth under the Sun and the Saturnian system brought
about the impetus for the rise of civilizations and a golden age of exploration demonstrated so
well by the sudden Buddhist cutting edge technology at the source of a mysterious civilization.
Leverage of planets is the common denominator in the Greco-Buddhist art and culture in which
Saturn called Mahakala rides a huge black elephant called Kala, homonym meaning black as well
as time. As god of agriculture, liberation and ultimate shield Saturn holds the denticulate Harpa
called Ankusa the elephant goad, which is an iron-sickle widely circulated in Greek and Roman
coins (fig.24, 3.31). Hindu customs offer window to vanished antiquity. Vishwakarma, also riding
an elephant, is the divine architect of the universe, and the maternal grandfather of Saturn (Shani).
Vishwakarma is worshiped on Kanya Sankranti when Kanya (Virgo) transits to Tula (Libra) on
the Blood Moon nearest to September equinox. At this auspicious Punya Kal spirit of ancestors
is pacified by Pitru Dosh Nivaran. The sacrament marks the end of estrangement between Surya
and his son Mahakala glorified on the doorway to garbhagriha or the womb chamber of Hindu
temples. Sun, Moon, Earth, Venus, Mercury (Budha) and other co-regents of Saturn personified
in Buddhist art are vital to the illumination of immortal BOΔΔO. The Circle and the Pythagorean
l Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
Semicircle in Buddhist sculpture and the libation
plates convey rebirth in chronomatic Kalachakra.
Makara representing or Capricorn ruled by Saturn is a
vital sign on the Makara Torana gateway to reliquary
stupa and temples. The ceremonial gateway called
Makara Torana celebrates the renewed life force of
the sun in Uttarayana, the six-month long ascent in
the northern hemisphere commencing at the winter
solstice. Annual celebration of Makara Sankranti by
Hindus on the day of Janus in mid January helps to
understand obscure motifs in ancient Buddhist cult
that introduced several pseudoscientific systems of
divination in visual art. Migration of chthonic makara
dates back to ancient Babylon where the sign of the
water god Ea was known as the ‘Antelope of the
Seas’. Capricorn as logo and birth sign of Augustus
Caesar is familiar in Roman coins and gems.
Puranas reveal that on Makara Sankranti Sun visits
the house of his son Saturn, the lord of Capricorn
or Makar Rashi. Despite inherent conflict between
Sun and Saturn, Sun comes to his son’s house for
a month. Makara Sankranti at the core of Buddhist
funerary cult underlines the father son relationship
in which the son carries forward the survival of the
family and self identity. Thus, strategic alliance of
past cultures secured the future while the planetary
deities governing all aspects of ancestor worship was
consolidated by the Greco-Buddhist mortuary cult.
On the whole the jeweler-engravers who are
also skilled sculptors and ivory carvers serve as
important interpreters of cult and rituals. It is best
demonstraded by the jeweled garden of bliss carved
on the Southern Torana gateway of the Great Stupa
at Sanchi (fig.25). Votive coins and stupa reliefs
incorporate appropriate signifiers of various deities in
the funerary cult. Coin tokens inscribed ‘Demetrious’
in Greek meaning ‘Beloved of Demeter’ surrenders
the dead to the endless seasons of the earth and
24. Mahakala and Harpa, Indo-Greek coin of Manander, Bronze, 2.4×2.4 cm, 11.41 gm, 1st century CE
25. Jeweled Arcadia, Sandstone, Southern gateway external left side, Sanchi Stupa I, 1st century CE
Preface li
guarantees a happy hereafter. Hermes the swift messenger of the gods
is signified by caduceus. The Inner Companion or the guide of souls
together with the goddess of the netherworld protects and liberates
the dead. On several Indo-Greek coins the head of African elephant
wearing apotropaic bell on obverse represents Saturn, the supreme
ruler of the universe and consort of Demeter. A bilingual Menander
coin inscribed in Geek and Karoshti has the same elephant head
adorned with a bell. Although it is customary to place such ‘Indo-
Greek’ coins from Gandhara to pre-Christian era, the club of Hercules
on reverse inscribed in Kharoshti dates the commemorative token to
early historic Kushana period. Several votive coins devoted to the
astral deities such as Saturn and Mercury and Hercules represent the
psychopomps in symbolic form. The elephant mascotis of Saturn,
the lord of endless time, appears as a joyous vehicle of the luminous
soul and descends on the milky white full moon to impregnate
Maya Devi. A Satavahana votive bronze corroborates the passage of
the immortal soul to the sky world: A sky bound man clings to the
elephant carrying two female companions corresponding to Saturn’s
consort Demeter and daughter Isis, interchangeable both protectors
of the underworld. Personified Saturn seated on the elephant holds
the harpa called ‘ankusa’ pointed directly at the elephant’s head. The
homonym Kala meaning black as well as time describes the dark blue
Saturn oscillating ponderously in the outer space.
A unique offering plate from Afghanistan at the crossroads of
the ancient world depicts goddesses of the underworld hold the harpa
and escort Mahakala Saturn revered as the ancestral god-king. This
unique circular emblem carved in ‘Sunga’ style is one of the rare
instances of the flexibile iconography of Saturn in the regional styles
(fig.26). Saturn’s harpa amulet and tattoo adorning the Buddhist
goddess draws attention to its meaning in the new funerary cult. On the
parclose of Bharhut stupa Saturn wearing royal twisted-knot earring
carries a Greco-Syrian pyxis and holds the harpa touching the head of
the elephant leading a reliquary procession. dwarf caryatids support
Mahakala and two others in hierarchical scale beneath inverted lotus
lunette on the threshold to rebirth and eternity (fig.27). The elephant
transport is common to Indradev, Shani and his maternal grandfather
Vishwakarma, the divine architect of the universe. Parallel to this
tradition is Saturn worshiped as father in Roman ancestor worship
26. Underworld goddesses, Schist, Ø c.11 cm, Gandhara, 1st-2nd century CE, Private collection
27. Reliquary procession, Red sandstone, Bharhut Stupa, Central India, 1st-2nd century CE
Kolkata: Indian Museum
lii Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols Preface liii

since Æneas his grandson is the founding father of Rome. Annual worship of Vishwakarma takes
place on the day of the Blood Moon nearest to September equinox; sun’s position marks Kanya
Sankranti when Kanya (Virgo) transits to Tula (Libra) in the lunar calendar. Saturn, the estranged son
of Surya, is important in the funerary cult since Pitru Dosh Nivaran is performed to pacify manes or
spirit of ancestors at this auspicious Punya Kal. If history is the past with an eye on the present this
ritual certainly goes back to the very beginning of time.
From colossal stupa to smallest reliquary casket, amulets and sculptured relief, Buddhist
culture exploits the infinite possibilities of the circle and the sphere of the planets. The proliferation
of medallions, votive plates and pendants in the Buddhist cult is unparalleled in Indian culture.
The ‘Music of the Spheres’ in harmony with Saturn hugely important to the Kushana Golden Age
began even before the foundation of Rome. Egyptian astrological order established the planetary
week worldwide and assigned each day to a particular deity. Plutarch’s description of Saturn
worship has perplexed many: ‘Saturn’s feet planted in oil worshiped with perpetual lamp’ – is the
custom in India on each Saturday dedicated to Saturn. Birth of Saturn called Shani is mystical.
Vishwakarma’s daughter Sanjana married to Surya became dusky Sandhya due to Sun’s intense
heat. Distressed she left after installing her clone Chhaya or shadow as substitute cohort of the
Sun. In time Shani was born to Chhaya and Surya. Jealous Sanjana-Sandhya banished Chhaya and
gave birth to the twins Yama and Yamuna. Mistaken as the god of death, Yama called Dharmaraja
supports truth and righteousness favorable for afterlife. Thus the oldest funerary monument
in Taxila called Dahrmarajika Stupa glorifies favorable karmic balance sheet received at the
appointed time of death. Saturn or Shani is also lord of truth and retribution and like his brother
Yama allows no concessions. Saturn governs ‘karma; and ‘dharma’ and as the ultimate Guru helps
to elevate man high on the karmic ladder. Greco-Buddhist reliquary cult practiced by multiracial
and multinational population was influenced by the powerful sacerdotal authority of the Saturn
28. Kulu Vase, Engraved tin bronze, H. 15.2 cm, Gondla, North Himachal Pradesh, 1st century CE
temple in the Roman Forum that simultaneously served as the state treasury. Consequently Roman, London: British Museum (OA 1880-22) Major Hay discovery in 1857
North African and Kushana coins personify deified king as elephant or depict the king riding 29. Womb of lotus goddess, Limestone, Amaravat Stupa, Andhra Pradesh, 2nd century CE
the elephant reminiscent of heroic Alexander, which established the iconography of Mahakala
in Buddhist art. The gargoyle like face of Saturn called Kirtimukha is the ancient most deity
the Gemini called Diascuri (fig.28). The iconic globular reliquary pot is the womb (Garba) of the
worshiped in the Ujjain Mahakala temple. Kirtimukha embossed on a silver buckle from a stupa
primordial earth goddess worshiped as Aditi meaning ‘she who has no limits’. The pot with lotus lid
reliquary eventually became the customary feature on Hindu temple torana doorway leading to the
is a type of stupa reliquary peculiar to Amaravati stupa. The pot with splayed leg called uttanapad
womb chamber called garbhagriha (5.53). Thus living culture in South Asia is window to vanished
is suggestive of fertility. The personified goddess is known as Lajja Gauri due to her shameful
antiquity that controlled obscure mortuary cults in the distant past.
posture (fig.29). Her counterpart in Greek myth is Baubo, whose unexpected indecent exposure
A bronze funerary urn called the Kulu Vase comes from a vaulted chamber in a Buddhist infused humor into the dreadful circumstances of Demeter’s daughter Persephone adducted to
reliquary site in the Himalayan region. Engraving on the urn depicts Saturn seated under a parasol the underworld. In the poetics of ancient satire Baubo linked to Demeter laughs at death knowing
and ride an elephant surrounded by tiny wheels. According to iconographic convention Mahakala that renewed life and prosperity awaits on the other side. Aditi personified as fertile womb and
touches the elephant’s head with harpa. Alchemists call Saturn the ‘Primeval Sun’ and the ‘Best lotus of rebirth is invoked in obscure Tantric rituals. The erotic figure strangely corresponds to
Sun’ that bestows radiant halo as sign of eternal luminosity. As the ‘Son of the Sun’ (Sk. Suryaputra) Celtic Sheela-na-Gig carved on medieval churches, castles and other buildings in Ireland and
Saturn leads the procession in which female musicians play flute and bow-harp and carry the royal Great Britain.
whisk. On the other side of the urn the scroll depicts a prince and his charioteer on a quadriga,
The domical stupa like the pyramid is a symbol – it signifies rebirth and spiritual solace
which is well-established iconography of the invincible sun god and Roman Emperors. Here the
stretching in time without end. The stupa and ancillary manmade caves were integral part of
four-horse chariot is followed by a female whisk bearer and twin equestrian escorts representing
liv Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
esoteric cult rituals. Lotus of rebirth incorporated
in reliquary design is essential nature of immortal
sun. Spherical or hemispherical reliquary with
fitted lid is lathe turned and carved in schist and
occasionally gilded (fig.30a). Saturn with nine
known moons and extensive ring system seem to
have inspired multiple parasols on the reliquary
stupa with several molded rings on the base. It
also alludes to protective planets that serve as
ladder to heaven and assist the soul at rebirth
(fig.30b). Nested reliquaries deposited inside the
stupa monument contain ritual offerings and body
relics called sarira dhatu. Greco-Syrian cylindrical
pyxis in gold or bronze is equally popular. Huge
investment in precious reliquaries to ‘Awaken’ the
departed played no part in the celebrated Buddhist
attitude of renunciation, unless it is intended to
denote conscious departure from life in order to
seek Nirvana. Revered relics were purposely buried
deep inside the countless stupa mausoleums. Only
in Dharmarajika complex unsecured relics have
been found in the G5-6 double-cell shrines referred
to by a donor as Bodhisatvagrahami, meaning ‘the
abode of the illumined being’. It was here that the
remarkable ABRAXAS offering tray in schist and
the silver scroll inscription of the year 136 of Azes
with some other relics were found. Stacked relics,
frequently inscribed, were usually deposited within
the miniature reliquary stupa and placed in the
funerary shrines adjoining the monumental stupa
in the complex. In some instances reliquary stupa
fashioned in stone is gilded, thus making up in
splendor what was lacking in size or material.
TRANSCULTURAL WORLD VISION
Death is a constant theme in Greco-Buddhist art
composed of many overlapping stories about ascent
and desent from Tushita heaven. Cremation ash
deposited in small votive chaitya was often placed
30a. Nested stupa reliquary, Schist, Gold, Gandhara, 1st-2nd century CE
30b. Stupa reliquary, Schist, H. 21.9 cm, Ø 11.8 cm, Sonala Pind Stupa 15, Manikiala, 1st-2nd century CE
London: British Museum (OA 1887.7-17.34) Gift of Sir Alexander Cunningham
Preface lv
31. Triratna-Acanthus memorial stele, Schist, Gandhara, Jamalgarhi, 2nd-3rd century CE
North Carolina: Ackland Museum of Art
32. Venerating the dead in stupa shrine, Swat Valley, Gandhara, 2nd century CE
close to a large stupa monument for the everlasting merit of the deceased. It is well-known that
judged at death by their deeds (karma) the good were transported to Sukavati (Elysian Fields)
and those who had done evil went to the terrifying hell called Niraya (Tartarus). Hariti offered
protection against the unimaginable creatures that populated the underworld. The goddess is vital
to the new cult in the new world. The coded language of Mahayana sect displays the full swing
of Hellenistic syncretism in which animals, plants and objects serve as auspicious signs of the
goddess. Triratna standard composed of adorsed fish on lotus supporting the sun disc is one of the
most important rebus of the goddess. Triratna jewel or triple gem is a Buddhist fetish; the abstract
sign is identified by twentieth century archaeology as Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. On the
contrary, Triratna altar on a stupa slab flanked by the memorial column with rejuvenating acanthus
capital is designed to reassure, glorify and put to rest the restless departed spirit (fig.31). While
the astonishing monumental ‘Asoka’ pillars offer access to afterlife the architectural expedient
of low Corinthian pilasters on sculptured relief and on the drum of the reliquary stupa proclaim
that human life is eternal. The acanthus is typical of Roman architecture. The transnational pillar
device framing the funerary reliefs is the ‘Door of Hades’ where funerary rituals were performed
at the fire altar in the Roman Augusteum (fig.32).
Unprecedented Buddhist art is iconic, repetitive, religious and ritualistic. Triratna amulet
embossed in gold and in engraved gemstone beads indicates that ‘enlightenment’ of body and soul
was not unlike the Egyptian belief in ‘eternal life’ that gripped all Egyptians and non-Egyptians
alike at the advent of Christianity. In the well organized rebus system of communication the
signs and symbols are much older than the first-time Greco-Buddhist material culture. Therefore
in investigative archaeology we are faced with the principles governing epistemology and
morphology – a scientific method by which one may arrive at correct and reliable inference. Thus,
the appreciation of expensive gems and jewelry in the context of interrelated Buddhist art is mainly
in terms of technological and persuasive art historical consideration of costume, style, and purpose
in terms of comparative religions of the period. Embossed gold brooch from Taxila and Tillya
lvi Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
Tepe depicts partially draped Venus leaning on the memorial cippus. Venus in harmony with the
departed soul is queen and consort of Roman kings, particularly in the Julian dynasty that claimed
direct descent from Aeneas, the founder of Rome paired with Venus. Embossed gold plaque of
partially draped Venus standing in hand on hip posture was buried with the princess buried in
Tillya Tepe Tomb VI. The winged goddess wearing bangles and arm rings is Punic goddess Tanit
worshiped across the Mediterranean as Venus Celeste. She confirms her pact with the dead by
leaning on the funerary cippus or the memorial pillar (2.34). The intriguing dot on her forehead is
noticeable on both Venus and Cupid in Cypriot floor mosaics. The pilgrims to the temple dedicated
to Aphrodite and her son Eros (Eryx/Cupid) at Kouklia (Palaepaphos or Old Paphos) in Cyprus
cavorted with prostitute-priestesses as part of their worship. The Venus plaque from Tillya Tepe
Tomb II depicts infant Harpocratic-Eros on top of a cippus leaning forward to touch the left breast
of winged Venus standing between two cippi. The goddess wears a crown and Alexandrian cross
chain (2.35). Claudio-Julian dynasty that claimed descent from Venus was recognized by signs of
the goddess. Hence gold plaques of Venus and drop earrings composed of amphora, cupid and
dolphin from Taxila and Tillya Tepe, in addition have direct links to the Imperial cult seem to
have in Rome. the Greco-Buddhist reliquary cult captivated those who aspired for royal eminent
commemorations (2.36).
South Asian civilization begins with Buddhist culture in which men wear Greco-Roman tunic
or chiton and the enveloping pallium (Gk. himation). Like the long trailing part of the saree called
the palla draped over bare left shoulder, the pallium covers the left shoulder and under the right
arm (Latin. palla, Hindi. pallu). Tunic is an undergarment for the gracefully wrapped toga of the
wealthy, which is allowed by law only to Roman citizens. Thus the funerary effigy of the togate
Buddha represents a wealthy Roman. Considering the well-known story of the ascetic Buddha it
can be disorienting. the ‘Presentation of the Bride to Siddhartha’ (fig.33) in the British Museum
is from the ruins of Takht-i-Bahi meaning the ‘Good Hub’ in the Swat Valley. It stands out in
Buddhism: Art and Faith by W. Zwalf (1985); the caption was taken from Sir John Marshall’s
The Buddhist Art of Gandhara (1960). Theoretically Siddhartha denoting ‘he who has found the
meaning of existence’ is the youthful Buddha. In the funerary frieze Greco-Roman Siddhartha
standing between two women is a mature bearded man wearing simple tunic beneath the mandatory
pallium draped over his left shoulder. The women with bosom bound firmly under the high waist-
belt of the stola claim gender equity. A woman with her hand slung in the pallium like a scholar
seems to defend the virtues of her mantle. Here it is far too easy for Dan Brown to locate Mary
Magdalene standing next to Christ. Or it could be Apostle Thomas in Gandhara, a look alike of
Christ employed to build a palace for Gondophares, who according to the Apocrypha converted
the king and several married women to celibacy and Christian faith. Among the three men in the
group wearing one-shoulder tunic two men hold ceremonial vessel on either end of the panel. The
off-shoulder rough woolen costume hitched well above the knees exposing bare feet is in fact
Roman slave garment, the voluminous fold held by belt serving as purse. The uneven grouping of
rank and gender seem to fit the earliest barefoot solders of Christ described as ‘they carry neither
purse, scrip, nor shoes’ (Luke10, vs.3-4). While no self-respecting Roman would walk barefoot in
public, the realistic portrayal by itself is an offshoot of Greco-Roman theater that greatly influenced
Preface lvii
33. Goddess on Gateway to Heaven, Schist, 13.7 X 34.3 X 4.8 cm, Takht-i-Bahi, 1st century CE
London: British Museum (OA 1900.4-14.13)
Roman art. Closer scrutiny reveals the diadem of wreaths that as a rule distinguish goddesses, here
it might identify Venus, Selene-Artemis and Hecate accompanying a resurrected man. In funerary
art the freed men officiating as priests in the cult of Hecate hold libation vessel on either end,
while a bearded slave in the middle holds a Pinecone, which is a sacred sign of the ‘Third Eye’
and enlightenment. Apart from being a significant aspect of Dionysian cult, pinecone in sacred
geometry generates the circadian rhythm of sleep. It is comparable to the radial sunflower pattern
that dominates lotus medallions in sculptured relief. ‘Presentation of the Bride to Siddhartha’
demonstrates how knowledge shifts the identity in Buddhist art originally conceived with dense
layers of data. Multiple contexts placed at different viewpoints and the complex circumstances
under which the sculptured monuments came into being in South Asia is even more important to
understand the nature of the mysterious cult of the dead.
DIVING INTO THE DAWN
Tritions, Nereids and Ichthyocentaurs among other mythological deities adapted from Greco-
Roman sources have left indelible mark on Buddhist funerary art. Plinth of the oceanic goddess
is usually supported by dwarf and animal hybrids such as the sea dragon, Makara-dolphin,
hypocompus and Ichytho-elephant with fish tail. When the innovative funerary cult declined and
suddenly vanished, extraordinary signs accompanying the awesome journey of the departed called
Buddha faded away. The refrain that Buddha disappeared from the land of his origin actually
means that after third century CE Buddhist reliquary cult vanished when it lost its relevance in the
subcontinent. Misplaced Buddhist material culture was naturally bewildering when it was recovered
by modern archaeology after a lapse of two millennia. I began by investigating the irresistible
logic of the facts. First, archaeological evidence of numerous persons represented in nonspecific
Buddha image and glorification of individuals in singular reliquaries, inscribed or otherwise, is
proof that the community based Buddhist reliquary cult does not relate to one particular individual.
lviii Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols Preface lix

Archaeology of cult of the dead is consistent during

the Kushana period while material proof for the
fervent Indian origin theory of the legendary
Buddha is nil. Looking beyond existing boundaries,
I searched for the basic nature of belief and the
motivation behind the innovative reliquary cult by
taking stock of specific knowledge applied in works
of art. The vine meanders in Nebatean and Greco-
Egyptian style frame an unusual frieze on the north
gateway of the Great Stupa at Sanchi. It depicts men
wearing laced Roman boots perform rituals in front
of a reliquary stupa. Winged human spirits hover
above the funerary monument expressing religious
belief among Celts, Greeks and Egyptians (fig.34).
The cross-cultural references seem to coincide with
Trajan’s successful second campaign (105–106 CE)
when Decebalus the valiant enemy king of Dacia 36. Deified man in the Osirian, Schist, Gandhara, 1st-2nd- century CE
evaded capture by suicide. When the Dacian capital Tokyo, Toshima: Ancient Orient Museum of Japan (Pvt.)
north of the Danube in western Romania became a 37. Hormizd I memorial medallion, Gold dinar, Kushano-Sasanian king, Afghanistan, c. 272 CE
new province, Decebalus might have received the London: British Museum
hero’s veneration in the reliquary stupa located far
from Roman domination. Two men in the group Syria and Hellenized North African kingdoms. Consequent to Roman conquests the autonomous
blow on Celtic carnyces and the conical caps of two Parthians and Saka-Scythians who traded in the horses of Farghana from Egypt to China exerted
others identify Druids. Several wear Greek type of great influence in the cohesive forces that created the Kushana kingdom in South Asia. their
fillet fluttering in the wind. The high priest holding impact on the Greco-Buddhist cult is linked to the kingdom of the landlocked Celtic Galatia in
offerings stands at extreme right. The solemn Roman Asia located between Phrygia and Armenia Minor. In the invasion highway Galatian Celtic
sacrament is performed under a sun, moon and star Princess Adobogiona the Elder was saved from poisoning by King Mithridates VI of Pontus (120-
spangled banner at left held by a man wearing the cape 63 BCE) who took her as his mistress after 86 BCE. Their son the Pontic Prince Mithridates I of the
of Mithras the Persian sun god. Racial diversity and Bosporus, sometimes known as Mithridates of Pergamon, was of Celtic, Persian and Macedonian
social hierarchy in the group arranged in horizontal Greek ancestry tracing back to Darius and Alexander the Great. Educated in Pergamon the prince
rows indicates that the departed king whom they of Anatolia was a leading citizen of the city and a tetrarch over the Trocmi Celtic tribe, one of
apotheosize once held the reign of nations known for the three ancient tribes of Galatia in central Asia Minor. Caesar made him king of the Bosporan
pomp and pageant. Kingdom in 46 BCE but after Caesar’s death in 44 BCE he abdicated and later died. It is highly
probable that the Pontic kings who had family relations with Seleucids and Ptolemaic kings very
Commencing from Alexander the Great the
likely instituted Egyptian type of royal titulary in their dynastic cult. The royal cult extended
chronology of those who spearheaded the movement
into Ariathids Dynasty known for its priest-kings of the Asian kingdom of Pergamon, Phrygia
towards Greco-Buddhist reliquary cult are the Greco-
and Cappadocia. Archelaus (r.55-36 BCE) the priest-king of Cappadocia was a Greek nobleman,
Persian rulers and Greeks of all hue in Eurasia with
possibly of Macedonian descent. He succeeded his father Archelaus (d.55 BCE), the high priest
close connection to Macedonian Egypt, Anatolia,
and temple ruler of Comana, the cult center of the moon goddess Ma. He probably married one
of the daughters of Mithridates VI of Pontus, whom he once served as the much preferred high-
34. Celts at Gateway to Heaven, Sandstone, North Torana of Sanchi Stupa I (in situ), 1st century CE ranking general. Pompey raised the temple ruler of Comana as high priest of Bellona the Roman
35. Man with deer and lion, Steatite amulet, H. 6.4cm, BMAC, Turkmenistan, Protohistoric period
lx Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
goddess of war. However, the power of moon goddess Ma at Comana dominated religious fervor
and devotees from far and wide thronged her temple situated by a river in a pleasant valley. Tiberius
awarded rule of the Roman client Kingdom of Armenia to Archelaus’ step-son Artaxias III and the
Roman client Kingdom of Cilicia to Archelaus’ son Archelaus II, both of which adjoined Parthia,
which expanded into erstwhile Bactria and the currently rising Gandhara. In early first century
when the group of Greco-Roman Celts arrived at the stupa monument at Sanchi in Central India,
Anatolia, the present day Turkey, was the fulcrum of power and influence in the expansion of the
earliest dynastic cult to South Asia. Greco-Scythian Kushana known as Saka in India were part of
this culture. Hence the innovative stupa mound has to be seen in the context of the rich Thracian-
Scythian burials in the circular mounds called Kurgan found in Kazakhstan and in Central Asian
steppe reaching as far as Russia and China.
A rare amulet from BMAC inscribed in the Indus script depicts a man wearing an armor suit
that appears to be more like the Roman gladiator’s leggings rather than the established pattern of
Roman military equipment (fig.35). The man holding some kind of device is accompanied by lion
and deer commonly seen together in early Buddhist art. Further, the Egyptian type of amulet shaped
like the backbone of Osiris called Djet column inscribed like the seals of Mohenjo-Daro suggests
multiple interpretations concerning its origin. In typical Hellenistic syncretism Osiris is in fact
well represented in the offering plates and in Kushana bronzes, coins and glyptics. On a libation
plate from Gandhara a man holding trident wears Roman boots, tunic (chiton) and cape (chlamys),
and deified as Osiris he is accompanied by partially draped goddesses of the underworld. Possibly
Isis and Nephthys are intended as protection against chthonic forces (fig.36). Similar to Osirian
iconography Hormizd-Ardashir, better known by his dynastic name of Hormizd I, holds a trident
on his Kushana-Sasanian commemorative medallion issued in Afghanistan 272 CE (fig.37). The
memorial token inscribed in Tocharian Greek incorporates the customary triratna right and the fire
altar left. The crescent moon-trident standard above the fire altar signifies Osiris while the trident-
trisul affirms safety accorded by oceanic god Neptune. Several inscribed votives in Gandhara
invoking ‘Shiva-rakshita’ might have resulted from this strange Osiris-Neptune fusion. The third
shahanshah of the Sasanian Empire from May 270 to June 271 was the youngest son of Shapur I
(240–270/72) and the governor of Armenia. In a votive coin the ‘king of kings’ wears Roman
armor and royal torque typical of the Kushana period but his Greek diadem with fluttering ribbons
presages Sasanian iconography.
The fundamental unity of vision in the Buddhist cult is noteworthy despite diversity in
material and disparate styles of special guilds operating in different locations. What is even more
remarkable is that multidisciplinary craftspersons display mastery over diverse mediums. Thus
the jeweler engraver is also the sculptor who is equally at ease with stone, ivory, glass, gold
and terracotta. Unfamiliar funerary customs connected to afterlife is conveyed by sanctified
necromantic signs and symbols synchronized with stonework intimately connected to engraved
gemstone, embossed gold and patterned silk. The main commodity in international trade was silk
produced in the Central Asia of Han China closely connected to the Kushana-Satavahana-Parthian
confederation. Silk trade with Romans brought immense wealth that funded the extremely costly
Buddhist reliquary cult. The countless captivating domical monuments embellished in variety of
Preface lxi
ways exist in clusters along the Silk Road leading right in to South Asia. The contribution of the
caravan leaders of Syria and the wealthy Tocharian merchants brought unexpected innovations
in the funerary cult across Central and South Asia. As a result the study of burial silk subsequent
to Buddhist Art and Culture: Symbols & Significance (2014) resulted in The Silk Road Fabrics:
The Stein Collection in the National Museum of India (2017). Symbols are fundamental to design;
Buddhist reliefs and jewels incorporate motifs from Central Asian patterned silk woven with rich
symbolic meaning. A basic understanding of the language of symbols is needed to appreciate the
meaning as well as its function in mortuary art. It began with Art of Terracotta: Cult and Cultural
Synthesis in India (2004) in which I earnestly began to understand the cult objects taken from the
outer fringe. It culminated in Indus Valley Seals Navigate Sundarbans Tiger (2016). It compares
the tiger cult in folklore and the oral epic in native animistic religion and investigates how the royal
Bengal tiger well represented in Dionysian cult first appears in the inhospitable Indus Valley and
BMAC. And after leaving indelible mark on the enigmatic seals the tiger crosses over to the Caspian
Lakes and reaches Piazza Armerina in Sicily and Roman Britain. In this context Buddhist reliquary
cult tries to fathom the supernatural biological entities and the historical reality of the Indus Valley
seals in Gandhara. Significantly, Buddhist Jewls in Mortuary Cult reveals how the complex thread
of interconnections linking East and West helped to shape new civilizations along the way. In the
process, the repossession of the key to the mystery religion meant patient reassembling of the
complex combination lock inside out.
The Cult of the Goddess published in 2015 is the proceedings of a symposium held in 2005. It
was preceded by the edited volume of the proceedings of a seminar on God & King: Devaraja Cult
in South and Southeast Asia (2004). It resulted in the comparative study of early Buddhist art and
literature describing the life of royal courtesans in Manimekalai. Dancer with Magic Bowl (2005).
The second century Tamil epics Cilappatikaram and Manimekalai describe contemporary culture
while the titles identify the power of the anklet and the girdle incarnate in the goddess central
to Greco-Buddhist narrative. Analogous to Isis-Venus, goddess Manimekala identified by anklet
and girdle exerts immense power over the sea. Alchemy of curative amulets, gems and jewelry
harnessing the power of the divine female are fundamental to afterlife. The first two chapters are
dedicated to the jewelry and amulets designed as insignia of various goddesses that dominate the
reliquary cult. Art historical consideration of comparative cultures and religions is a thread that
binds signs and symbols, and form and function in jewelry design. Together with the alchemy
of ornaments adorning the deified effigies of the dead, jewelry of the period exudes confidence
and conviction in its power. Jewelry of undeniable brilliance fashioned in Greco-Roman style are
from Taxila, the land between the Indus and the Jhelum. Mithuna or loving couple in Buddhist art
suggest sacred marriage or hierogamy. Hierogamy in Taxila and bridal burials in Mohenjo-Daro and
Tillya Tepe have left behind mystifying hoards of jewelry. Beautiful female musicians and dancers
depicted on the reliquary monuments are linked to the courtesan and Tantric consort culture, which
seem to unfold the significance of the buried treasure. Apparently attractive courtesan dancers
decked like the goddess doubled as consecrated priestesses in ritual. They flourished as Devadasi
or ‘servant of god’ in Hindu temple culture until recent times.
lxii Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
Emergence of Buddhist reliquary cult in South Asia is a defining moment in history when the
Greco-Tocharian-Kushana kingdom bordering Parthia absorbed influences from the expanding
Roman world. Apotheosis is the central theme; at the same time range of different subjects
suggesting virtues and values offer comfort in the form of happy afterlife. Another group consists
of allegories and metaphors directly related to death and resurrection. Yet, the choice of image
often reveals that the pursuit of knowledge is finally dictated by anecdotes from Greek and
Egyptian myths. In this context it is quite appropriate to term early Buddhist art Greco-Roman.
The epic profusion of luxurious ornaments in the Buddhist reliquary cult is closely related to
diverse art works in which classicism is well established. Technology and art-historical references
in the votive objects are of considerable variety and interest. Interrelated by signs and symbols
incorporated in various artifacts actually speak for themselves. Grippingly the art objects choose
to reveal about the development of a culture and the life of the society. And only by asking ‘why in
this form’ and ‘why in such a place’ can one arrive at its context in terms of function, technological
innovation and iconographic significance.
The sociobiology of choosing afterlife is reflected by investments made for the purpose. A
peculiarity is that from the colossal stupa to the smallest reliquary chest, amulets and sculptured
relief, Buddhist culture exploits infinite possibilities of the circle. The proliferation of symbolic
shapes have important bearing on the evocative pieces of jewelry from the reliquary sites.
Regardless of diversity in style the unifying vision points to a central authority endowed with
immense power, wisdom and knowledge. In addition to the embellishment of the monuments,
emotional response generated by cognition and semiotics of symbols is linked to overall intent.
Replicas of captivating ornaments carved on the divine female and deified dead called bodhisattva
considerably expand the scope of Buddhist jewelry design. With intimate knowledge of cult and
its requirements the sculptor-jeweler articulate the monuments and the effigies with counterfeit
jewelry pieces that replicate exquisite looped gold chains, granulated and embossed beads and
gold ornaments inset with gems and paste. Multidisciplinary skill of the sculptor-jeweler is derived
from centuries of progression. The new will to form in contextual artworks housed in the museums
worldwide yield perfect examples of precious jewelry. The eclectic sharing of new finds among
the professionals has also considerably widened the scope of museum collections. A wide variety
of undocumented artifacts are now among the looted Afghan and BMAC antiquities brought into
the antiquarian market, which demonstrate the wider coverage offered by the auction portals. The
thematically considered ornaments, amulets and votives gathered together from all the available
sources are verified by morphology and style and are considered carefully in terms of cognitive,
religious, social and historic concerns.
Arputharani Sengupta
Kolkata
INTRODUCTION
He who controls the past controls the future….
He who controls the present controls the past….
— George Orwell
Ancient cemeteries and memorial complexes are the happy hunting grounds for hidden treasures.
The earliest ornaments and precious artifacts along with human relics come from the peculiar
reliquary caskets deposited in the unprecedented reliquary stupa monuments and in its surroundings.
Indeed, almost all the Buddhist jewels that can be classified under different materials and design
are closely related to the oldest funerary sites in the Indian subcontinent. The amazingly portentous
early record of ‘Buddhist Gold Jewelry’ reported by Marshall in the Archaeological Survey of India
Annual Report (1902-3) is from Tordher and Charsadda in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of
Pakistan, Hadda and Bimaran in Afghanistan, Priprava in Nepal, and Bhattiprolu in the Guntur
district of Andhra Pradesh in India. Those excavated in Charsadda are two gold rings and two gold
cylinders attached to a circular disc. Notably, a bluish garnet en cabochon set on one of the gold
cylinders is backed by flimsy silver disc. Among seventy bronze earrings from the site, the simplest
type is in plain copper wire. Some of them with silver coating are threaded through small beads of
crystal, silver, or faience described as vitreous paste native to Egypt. Seventeen cylindrical amber
beads, a transparent glass bead with blue and white striations and a variety of beads made of bone,
ivory, agate, cornelian, lapis lazuli and faience are among more than a thousand beads from the
stupa sites in Charsadda.
In the 1902-3 ASI Report, Marshall records thirteen relics salvaged from a mound in
Tordher village located close to the Indus River; about 76 km north-west of Islamabad. It
includes a cylindrical copper charm covered with a thin lamina of gold and a small casket
containing a calcined bone identified as the third phalanx of the second toe of a human foot. The
ornamental gilded cylinder usually worn around the neck contained a waxy substance believed
to be congealed blood. The hoard contained a remarkable pair of vase pendants with Eros riding
a winged sea-lion with a tassel of pearls and bells suspended from four chains, each bobble
ornamented with a tiny pyramid of five fine granules. The step-pyramidal base of the vase
lxiv Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
is also ornamented by a cluster of graded gold balls. The vase dangler is hooked through an
ornamental cylinder and ring to a gold ear top composed of a central flower inside a square flat
gold wire frame ornamented at the four-corners by a tiny flower amplified by granules. The
polychrome temple ear-pendant enhanced by now displaced gems still has at every conceivable
traces of blue-green paste inlay in the wings of Eros and the ear of the sea monster. Apart from
this remarkable piece of jewelry in the Taxila style (1.85), the Tordher hoard deposited in the
Lahore Museum includes an intricate earring with typical field granules ornamented by series of
domical gold bullae arranged like smooth breasts. It also has two fanciful heart-shaped cloisons
soldered to each side. A domical gold medallion backed by a gold plate and surrounded by
concentric rings packed with an organic hard paste is a unique stupa pendant suspended from a
gold chain. Ornamented with filigree and edged with wire beading, it has a projecting umbrella
(chatra) crowned by red cabochon garnet called carbuncle backed by silver foil. The suspension
ring with a pearl on either side is also inlaid with garnet en cabochon. Pliny’s observations on
Greco-Roman gem inlay techniques are entirely validated by the silver foil placed in the cloison
gem setting. The coins of Kanishka and Huvishka found in the Tordher hoard suggest probable
date of the jewels.
The marvelous but mystifying Buddhist material culture can be most conveniently treated
in one of two ways. It can be painstakingly divided as one cuts coconut from its shell, taking the
pieces as they come. Or it can be sliced like wood along the grain. The two methods don’t match
at all: in the nut shell method the dates and names never come in the natural order. Sternly attached
to the local geography, it displays a particular belief based on a stylistic tendency. But the wood
grain is organic and flows true like a continuous river. The commentator who desires to move
onward with the life of an epoch, is thus required to run back and forth not only among its truly
vast geographical extent and events along the way, but has to continually shift between contextual
dates. It behaves like a branch bending under the weight of the tree goddess in Greco-Buddhist
mystery cult.
Mere chronological order, indeed, is almost as arbitrary as alphabetical order. To deal
first with the ‘Bronze Age’ Indus Valley Culture and then take the extremely huge jump to the
Buddhist culture booming in the early Christian era, and then instantly leap back six centuries
to the ghostly genesis of Buddha reconstructed from the new illusive literary sources, leaves
an impossible gap between A—B—C. In the sequence of the centennial book it would be like
forging as real a chain as the ‘Pepin, Pericles, Peter the Great’ of a biographical dictionary. The
inconceivable breaks in cultural chronology might satisfy that school of scholars who hold that
each period exists in a solitary pocket indifferent to the honest network of the newly formed
international fusion seeping into each other. Buddha, the Apollo type of ‘eternal being’ derived
from the Imperial Cult of Rome linked to the far-flung commonwealth comes by way of eastern
Mediterranean. The Hellenistic world absolutely advanced to enter pristine South Asia. It might
satisfy a school of thought that holds that every image, monument or object created pertains
only to a solitary Buddha. This outlook is markedly unconcerned about the true intent and
purpose. That attitude cultivates indifference to the transnational partnerships and the plurality
of thousands of dissimilar persons commemorated in the burgeoning memorials. To question
Introduction lxv
present premises involves a number of difficulties that plague any argument opposed to recently
enforced Buddhist interpretatios and philosophic creeds culled from diverse literary sources.
Yet, the moment we differentiate the original intent of the Greco-Roman artistic tradition, we
must then differentiate by the set of guidelines and moral sentiments of that bygone age. Men
are never isolated individuals; predictably the collective attitudes of the age influenced the
personality of the artist. The artist too as a solitary individual does not exist; his attitude to his
age makes up his characteristics, which in turn informs his art as an expression of a new society.
Above all, a mere sympathy for the autonomous individuality of a new Buddha does not negate
the omnipresent quest for immortality. The burden of the universal tendency to bank on afterlife
is too overwhelming to be ignored.
To take up this informed but entangled task and deal with the great Greco-Kushana culture
spanning Central Asia and South Asia, not only by dates and names, but rather by schools and
streams of thought sympathetic to the deification of the dead is overwhelming. It also has to deal
with the wide-ranging expressions of ancestor worship in the parallel movements left in the limbo
of Bronze Age label in pockets of no-man-land. Therefore, gathering together all the precious gems
and jewels from the early historic funerary complexes wasn’t just about itself, but about its context
and about the historical information in all the related art objects that have migrated from diverse
places. In the orchestrated view the uppermost level is about the arts. Then a second part deals
with its mythological content. So the tripartite structure also includes the language of symbols
and morphology of form. Therefore the experience turned out for me to be a fascinating journey,
staring from that dark womb of the reliquary chamber and ascending into the conical cloak of
invincible circle of light, a kind of progression towards analogous history. Following the migratory
process is a daunting task for which I feel I am not fully prepared, the only satisfaction being, that
no one could deal with this complex undertaking appropriately. The main drawback might be the
inevitable inclination to make the spiritual landscape too large for the figure. But the very temper
of the age was such that utilitarianism and aesthetics entwined homogenously with consumer
expectations and attitude or faith. I can only assure, I shall not make religion more important than
it was to Buddha, or beliefs more sacred than they were to those in the Greco-Kushana kingdom.
Everything here is driven by research on how the visual arts take you to another emerging world
contemporary to the Roman Empire.
EXPANDING NETWORK
The ever expanding network committed to the intuitive dream of rebirth and rejuvenation is notable
in early Buddhist culture. Transfigured body surrounded by aureole traverse the sky in Roman
quadriga, it is the earliest evidence of cross-cultural exchange in both Bharhut and Bodh Gaya.
Simultaneously the moon goddess in Bengal drawn by deer matching the solar quadriga or the two-
horse biga is engulfed by overlapping currents in the funerary rite. Varied groups from the eastern
Mediterranean first made the groundwork in the frontier regions of the Indian subcontinent and
in the barren valleys where the Himalayas meets the foothills of Hindu Kush. At its zenith during
the first three centuries of the Christian era a vibrant body of relics and reliquaries were deposited
in Gandhara for supernatural purpose. The abandoned funerary mounds are known as Depe, Tepe
lxvi Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
and Stupa synonymous to Thupa, Chaitya, Vihara, Dagaba and Seya. Reliquary stupa differentiate
cremation custom in Greco-Buddhist culture with inhumation typical of Sarmatian-Scythian
burials in the kurgan mounds. Kurgan in the region of Altai Mountains of eastern Kazakhstan
coexist with perplexing necropolises in the Bactrian region around the Oxus River (Amu Darya)
and around Lake Urmia in the Solduz Valley northwest of Afghanistan and Iran. For our purpose
belief in afterlife is observed from archaeological evidence in Gonur and Indus Valley sites, which
mysteriously bridge Greco-Buddhist material culture in South Asia. Art historical evidence from
Gandhara and Tillya Tepe necropolis match the burial goods found in Thracian Bosporus annexed
by the Romans in 63 BCE. A double grave discovered in a kurgan mound in Caucasus was that of
a male and an elderly priestess photographed in situ by Leonid Yablonsky for the A. Kh. Margulan
Institute of Archaeology at Almaty. A gold reliquary casket and a mirror accompanied the priestess
surrounded by rich and varied grave goods. One of the large number of gold discs scattered around
was placed on her forehead. A pierced oval gem on her chest engraved in antique Aramaic script
is similar to Brahmi (0.1). The gem framed in dots translates as the pearly medallion on the actual
silk face covers in Central Asian burials. The prime item in the dazzling group of Buddhist relics
has string of pearls that frame two embossed medallions of goddess Hariti in gold. The main
attraction of Hariti medallian in the polychrome style of Gandhara is the rim of cutout shape for
gem inlay (2.58,59).
The cameo head of Hercules (Gk. Herakles) in turquoise and onyx cameo head of Hercules’
lover Omphale wearing the lion skin cape of Hercules articulate Greek culture in Gandhara. At the
core of these two rare gems is the legend of Herculean Mithridates VI of Pontus (136–63 BCE) and
his inseparable warrior queen Hypsicratea compared to Omphale. The turquoise gem is reminiscent
of the lion’s skull pulled over the head like a helmet in the portrait bust of Mithridates VI in Louvre.
Whereas, the onyx head of Omphale from Pakistan represents Herakles’ lover wearing his lion
skin cape; glorifies Hypsicratea who disguised as a man bravely accompanied Mithridates to the
battlegrounds, including the dreadful Mithridatic Wars against the Roman Republic (0.2,3). Similar
to Omphale, the Caucasian Hypsicratea is noted to have fought with axe, lance, sword, and bow
and arrow. To the Greeks Omphale etymologically connected to the world-navel stone at Delphi
called the Omphalos is analogous to the stupa or the linga. The onyx gem of Omphale-Hypsicratea
indicates the growing importance of the cult of immortal Mithridates VI. Chiefly, Mithridates from
Old Persian Miθradāta, meaning ‘gift of Mithra’ seem to have sparked the cult of Mithras among
the Romans. In his Caspian Kingdom Mithradates the Great was worshiped as Eupator Dionysius.
Of Persian and Greek ancestry, he was protector of Greek cities on the Black Sea and in Asia,
and by virtue the protector of Greece and Greek way of life. In Pliny’s account Mithridates could
speak the languages of all the twenty-two nations he governed (NH. VII, 24). His several children
from numerous wives and concubines are identified as Greek, Macedonian, Celtic, Caucasian and
Syrian. Mithridates VI also had family relationship with Egyptian Macedonian Greek Pharaohs
Ptolemy XII Auletes and his brother Ptolemy of Cyprus.
Against this background there is a widening interest to learn the circumstances of Greco-
Buddhist funerary cult that introduced culturally conditioned metaphors, signs and symbols
to exemplify faith in after life. Votive amulets, talismans and jewels akin to ancient Egyptians
Introduction lxvii
gather hidden powers in nature to overcome the finality of
death. The cultivated relationship with alchemy and things
beyond worldly experience promotes creativity in art. First
of all, motivation to live beyond the grave is the key. The
moon goddess among other divinities offers active resistance
to death. Enlightenment empowering ‘Awakening’ to
perpetual life is in fact the science of the future. Gandhara
at the crossroads of cultures was linked to the temple-state
of Comana in Cappadocia. The reigning Cappadocian Greek
nobleman Archelaus, who claimed to be a son of Mithridates
VI, was high priest of the Syrian moon goddess Ma (Enyo) in
the deep valley of River Sarus (Seihoun), where Julius Caesar
and Strabo participated in the sacred rites (Strabo 17.1.11).
Several bronze votive coins from Taxila depict Ma holding
the radiant star. The moon goddess stands between an arched
hill crowned by the crescent and the mystical tetrad important
in the secret worship of the Pythagoreans (0.4a). Crescent
moon on imbricate-hill on several tokens also appears along
with Triratna, Srivatsa, Swastika and Tree of Life linked to
the moon goddess now worshiped as Lakshmi and Purnima
(0.4b). The sign is redesigned as crescent on three rings
inset with red gems on a pair of temple ear pendant from
Afghanistan. A tassel of flatted bells linked to matching
gem encrusted teardrops is typical of Sarmatian ornaments
known for colorful inlay. Three flattened gold bells familiar
in Palmyra and Armenia dangle from a classic Phoenician
horizontal bar hinge (0.4c). Similar dolphin on trilobe eardrop
pendant from Taxila has pearl suspended from three loop-
on-loop gold chain instead of the typical flattened bell tassel
(1.89). The triple-ring on the Sarmatian eardrops is usually
replaced by turquoise or gold amphora in Taxila ear pendants,
confirming trilobe sign of water identical to amphora of wine
signify immortality. Hellenistic elements such as Harpocratic-
Eros mounted on the sea monster ketoi, pearl and dolphin
framing amphora signify Isis-Venus, mistress of the ocean.
0.1 Phoenician amulet, Carnelian, Sarmatian kurgan burial in situ, Caucasus, 1st century CE
Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology, NAS, Armenia (Photo Leonid Yablonsky)
0.2 Head of Herakles wearing lion skin cape, Turquoise cameo, Gandhara, 1st century CE
Columbia: Museum of Art and Archaeology, University of Missouri
0.3 Head of Omphale wearing lion skin cape, Onyx cameo, Akra, Pakistan, 1st century CE
London: British Museum (1893.0502.1)
lxviii Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
0.4a,b Votive tokens of the moon goddess, Copper alloy, Taxila, 1st-2nd century CE
0.4c Temple ear pendant, Gold, Carnelian, Gandhara, 1st-2nd century CE
Taxila jewelry use fine granulation, gold filigree, and inlaid turquoise, carnelian or cabochon
garnet to fashion polychrome ornaments. Skill of fashioning loop-on-loop chain, gold disc tassel in
fringe necklace and eardrops, and leach earring ornamented with granulation and filigree display
age old Greco-Cypriot-Egyptian craftsmanship.
Footprint of moon goddess Ma of Comana on a votive stele has Greek dedication (0.5). The
sudden proliferation of footprints called Budhpada or Sripada on homage tablets dedicated in
stupa shrines seem to flow from the sacred city or Hieropolis of Cappadocia. The Buddhist votive
footprint is enhanced by auspicious signs such as lotus, Swastika, Srivatsa, wheel and Trirtna. The
symbols glorify the moon goddess first invoked as Chanda Yakshi, Srima Devata and Gajalakshmi
on Bharhut stupa railing. Even now footprint of Purnima the full moon invokes SriLakshmi in
Hindu rituals. Budhpada carved on a rock in the Swat Valley is about half a mile south of Tirath
village (0.6). It was discovered by Major Deane following Huan Tsang’s trail. The Chinese pilgrim
reports Tirath footmark at Udyana about 30 li from Apalala spring north of River Subhavastu.
Aramaic derived Kharoshti dedication states— ‘Illuminate the path of revered Saka’ (Bhodassa
Sakamunisa padani) — which is a communal prayer devoted to the departed. It is translated by
Bhuler in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland (1898:460). The
Introduction lxix
0.5 Funerary stele with Greek dedication to Ma, Marble, Comana, Turkey, 1st century BCE-CE
Warsaw: National Museum of Poland
0.6 Footprint stele with Kharoshti dedication, Tirath, Swat Valley, Pakistan, 1st century CE
revered footprint of Purnima resorting to the myth of Selene and Endymion is meaningful in
the ethnically mixed Greco-Scythian Kushana kingdom. Votive terracotta from Bengal depicts
the moon goddess displaying pudenda adorned with impressive jewels. The Phoenician type of
goddess-priestesses called Yakshi meaning ‘Nature Spirit’ is prototypical of devadasi, literally the
deity’s slave. Thousands of temple slaves or ‘hieroduli’ were engaged in sacred prostitution at the
temple-city of Cappadocia. Even in Strabo’s time a number of them serving Ma of Comana and
variety of nature-goddesses was upwards of six thousand. Among them, to judge by the names
common on local tomb-stones, were many Persians. Large estates set apart to defray their expenses
accumulated royal revenue. Emperor Caracalla made Comana a Roman colony and the temple-city
received honors from the Roman emperors until Christianity was accepted as state religion.
ANTIDOTE TO DEATH
Only anthropological archaeology and historic context can generate a true dialogue. The Kushana
kings known as the ‘moon tribe’ maintained perpetual flame in the altar. Kanishka known for his
magical abilities is similar to Mithridates VI who surrounded himself with Agari, a group of Scythian
shamans. Exceptional animals, a horse, a bull and a stag allegedly protected his sleep. Related animal
escorts in stupa sculpture, votive beads and plaques are common. Mithridates’ quest for immortality
includes self induced immunity to poisons. He also found a ‘complete antidote’ during the seven years
lxx Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
he spent in wilderness after the assassination of his father in 120 BCE. In Pliny’s version the famous
remedy contained fifty-four ingredients in a flask matured for at least two months. Imperial Roman
physicians claimed to possess the formula, which they touted as Mithradatium. Bodhisattvas in fact
carry a flask of ‘Antidote to Death’. The equivalent ‘Cup of Ambrosia’ mistaken as the begging bowl
in the hand of the aristocratic Buddha misinterprets religious aspirations of the period. Votive objects
found in Gandhra are meaningless unless compared with Greco-Scythian culture on the whole. For
instance the ‘Horn of Plenty’ amulets in Buddhist culture was used in ‘brotherhood drinking ritual’
embossed in a gold plaque from the Kul Oba kurgan near Kerch (6.121-123). A goddess or priestess
holds the mirror and offers the ‘horn of ambrosia’ to an immortal on a gold plaque from a kurgan in
Dnieper. Such embossed gold plaques and mirror are common New Age votives found in Ter and
Tamralipta (Tamluk); Tillya Tepe, Taxia and Mohenjo-Daro in Gandhara.
Greco-Scythian and Sarmatian mounted warriors roamed the wild Eurasian steppes, stretching
from the Black Sea and the Bosporus to the borders of China and Russia. Phoenician and Celtic
influences is discernible among Sarmatians meaning water. The Sarmatian network flowed from
the Greek colony Pantikapaion, the modern Kerch on eastern Crimea at Cimmerian Bosporus.
The treasures brimming in their burial mounds called kurgan far exceeds the capacity of the so
called nomad society as claimed to be. Rather the prestige goods in the burials reveals strong
social differentiation characteristic of splendid Bosporan Kingdom annexed by Mithridates VI of
Pontus (120-63 BCE), the king of Armenia Minor in northern Anatolia, now Turkey. The Greco-
Kushana period in South Asia is inevitably linked to the hereditary cultural traits of Egypt and all
other nations conquered by Alexander the Great. During the late classical period the Bosporan
Kingdom was vital for the diffusion of Greek and non-Greek ethnic traits. A broad survey of
kurgan and reliquary stupa reveals shared spiritual coordinates. Allegoric Greek themes on the
offering plates of Taxila are comparable to the ‘Judgment of Paris’ on an ivory plaque found in
a sarcophagus from a Kul Oba kurgan. Similarly, the synoptic Great Departure and Parinirvana
theme is combined in a chased gold buckle from a kurgan. It depicts grief stricken rider-less horse
in the funerary ritual being performed under a tree in trans-national style (0.7). The openwork gold
buckle of a Sarmatian-Scythian noble now in the Leningrad State Hermitage Museum is part of
the collection of Peter the Great assembled in 1716. supposedly from Siberia, several such gold
artifacts probably came from looted kurgans in Central Asia and in the Volga and the Black Sea
regions.
Altai kurgans near the village of Berel in Kazakhstan were first excavated by Russians in
the 19th century. In 1998 a team led by Zainolla S. Samashev, director of the Margulan Institute
of Archaeology, began work on the circular kurgans on a natural terrace above the Bukhtarma
River. It led to a systematic exploration of the four long lines of kurgans in which at least 70 were
prominent Scythian tombs (0.8). Two of the largest among the 24 Berel kurgans investigated so
far, Kurgan 11 was the tomb of a man in his 30s who met a violent death. Similar to the internment
of a prince in Tillya Tepe Tomb IV, he was accompanied by bridal burial of a woman, and 13
horses in formal regalia before they were sacrificed in a separate section of the pit. The man’s lofty
social status is reaffirmed by the embroidered leather saddles, and the gold plaques ornamenting
the bridle. Fasteners decorated with naturalistic animals and mythical winged griffin with head of
Introduction lxxi
0.7 Great Departure buckle, Gold, 15.2 x 12.1 cm, Bosporos Kurgan, Saka Era
Leningrad: The State Hermitage Museum (Си.1727-1162)
a bird and the body of a tiger or lion show Persian-Egyptian influence. The griffin guarding the
tomb is sign of Isis-Nemesis in Roman monuments. The Greco-Buddhist sculptor gathers motifs
from diverse sources and skillfully converts metal craft into stone reliefs. Thus, early Buddhist
sculpture, particularly from Gandhara, Mathura, Sanchi and Bharhut stupa, is important source for
jewelry design.
The royal mausoleum of Cleopatra Selene and Juba II of Mauretania in Algiers is prototypical
of the Buddhist stupa. Rather similar to Sarmatian-Scythian kurgan tomb construction, it is a fusion
of Egyptian pyramid with circular Greek temple called tholos (0.9). The drum of the mausoleum
with doorway and attached columns is characteristic of Greco-Roman style in Gandhara. The
Great Stupa of Manikyala raised on a terrace echo the peripteral Temple of Vesta at Tivoli. The
reliquary casket from Manikyala stupa was discovered by General Ventura in 1830. The bronze
Greek pyxis held nested gold and silver cylindrical boxes containing Kushana coins and human
remains (0.10). Various types of votive objects include embossed gold plaque, floral tribute cut
out in gold foil, beads in rock crystal, pearl and semi precious stones. The stupa is a reliquary
monument in which the sacred relic of the departed is concealed in a chamber at the center (0.11).
The main focus was the reliquary, architectural sculpture and funerary art are of strategic interest.
Apart from the reliquary pots in terracotta and stone, caskets shaped like stupa were made in gold,
silver, rock crystal, bronze and gilded schist. Relics and reliquaries in embossed gold or silver
occasionally have stone setting. Buddhist reliquaries usually contain votive coins, beads, amulets
and finger rings. The reliquary cult introduced for the first time hairpins with emblematic crest,
figured pectorals, turban jewels and variety of finger rings.
The relic caskets wheel turned and shaped in schist replicate the stupa monument in Gandhara.
Four pillars with lion capital on the four corners of a square platform support a stupa casket in James
and Marilynn Alsdorf Collection. Sculptured frieze illustrate that this type of stupa shrines under the
sky were the venerated eternal abode of the departed. None of the stupa monuments have survived
lxxii Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
intact. A reliquary stupa in Victoria and Albert
Museum is one of the most complete models
of the monumental stupa. It is in three parts: a
square base and a dome surmounted by tiered
umbrellas (chattra) called a ‘tree’, which is
raised within a square railing (harmika) above
stepped enclosure (vedika) with crenellation.
A small gold casket deposited in the square
base held bone fragments and stone beads
(IS.299B-1951). Like several other reliquary
stupa the base is articulated by Corinthian
pilasters supporting the cornice carved with
necromantic acanthus leaves. Lotus of new
dawn embellishes the dome and the base of the
umbrella. Flanked by worshipers on the four
sides of the base, Buddha seated in Samadi
is ‘Awakened’ under the tree of life. Eternal
sleep codified as Parinirvana is immediately
above on the lattice casement surmounted by
trefoil dormer enclosing an image in heaven
(0.12).
Thus the stupa is a House of Eternity,
complete with window and doorway where
the double of the dead appears seated or
standing to receive the offerings. The fifth
century Consecration Sutra explains: The case
of a dead person is like that of one who has
broken the Law in the world of the living; in
his heart he thinks longingly of his family, and
looks to them for forceful assistance to escape
from his peril. Acquiring merit on behalf of
the deceased is like bestowing provision on
travelers: it always has good result. Compelled
by geneties, reliquary caskets from different
stupa mounds belong to various persons
characterized by their ethnicity. Kharoshti
inscription on a stupa casket in schist
0.8 Kurgan tomb, Kazakhstan. A. Kh Margulan Institute of Archaeology (Drawing V. Efimov)
0.9 Royal Mausoleum of Cleopatra Selene and Juba II of Mauretania, 6 CE, Tipaza, Algiers
0.10 Nested reliquary of Manikyala stupa, Bronze, Gold, H.22.9, Ø 9cm, 1st century CE
London: British Museum (OA 1848.6-2 1-4 & 5) Discovered by General Ventura in 1830
Introduction lxxiii
(Ø 9.2 cm) from a stupa at Bajaur in Gandhara states:
“Ramaka, son of Mahasrava, inhabitant of the village of
Kamti, from whom the relics of the elder (Sakyamuni)
are reverently deposited. Hereby all those who are
worthy to be honored are honored.” The Idravarman
Casket (Ø 5.4 cm) now in the Metropolitan Museum
of Art is also from Bajaur in Peshawar (Purushapura)
Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan (The Lotus
Transcendent, Cat.no.38). The seven line inscription in
Kharoshti mentions another Ramaka the Roman from
the royal house of Avaca: “In the sixty-third year of
the late great king Aya (Elder), on the sixteenth day of
the month of Kartia (Kartika), at an auspicious time,
Prince Indravarma, son of the king of Apraca (Avaca),
established these bodily relics in a secure, deep,
previously un-established place. His collective brahma-
merit with his mother Rukunaka, daughter of Aji and
wife of king Apraca; with maternal uncle Ramaka,
with maternal uncle’s wife Dasaka, with his sisters
Vasavadata, Mahaveda and Nika and wife Utara. In
honor of father Visnuvarma, the king of Avaca’s brother
the Commander Vaga is also honored. Vijayamitra,
king of Avaca and Mother’s sister Biadhata is honored.
These bodily relics having been brought in procession
from the Muraka Cave Stupa, were established in a
secure (?), safe, deep (?), depository in the year twenty
five.”
Apart from the style of dedication, the embedded
message on the Indravarman Casket reveals that
Brahma-merit equals Eternal Happiness. caves are
connected to reliquary and funerary rituals performed
in the stupa monument at intersecting time and
place. We learn that bodily relics were brought in a
procession from the Muraka Cave stupa to be deposited
in the womb of a stupa mausoleum. Another source of
information is Sri-Nalanda, 95 kilometres southeast of
Patna in Bihar. Nalanda Mahavihara identified as a
university by historians, was one among five Devakula
0.11 Conjectural view of reliquary stupa chamber, Masonry, Ambaran, India, 1st-2nd century CE
0.12 Reliquary Stupa, Schist, Base: 55 x 27 cm, Depth: 27 cm, Takht-i-Bahi, Ghandara, 1st century CE
London: Victoria and Albert Museum (IS.299-1951)
lxxiv Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
0.13 Seal of Sri-Nalanda, Terracotta, Pala period, 9th-10th century CE
Inscription: Sri-Nalanda maha-vihara’s noble assembly of bhikṣu
014 Amoghabhuti Kuninda drachms, Silver, Wt. 2.14g. Ø 1.9 cm, 1st century CE
Kharoshti Inscription: Great King Amoghabhuti of the Kunindas
of Gupta and Pala dynasties established at five places in eastern India, which includes Vikramshila
and Somapura. Imperial cult at Sri-Nalanda under the patronage of the Gupta Empire in the 5th
and 6th centuries was operated by a network of state-sponsored erudite priests. A copper plate at
Nalanda lists endowment of Balaputradeva, the Shailendra King Srivijayan of Suvarnadvipa, the
present Indonesia. It requests Devapala to grant the revenue of five villages for the upkeep of his
funerary establishment. Nalanda was a vast complex of stupa mausoleums with planned quarters
connected to its upkeep, including a college for instructions in esoteric rituals and other related
subjects. At its peak, the Adholoka School attracted scholars and students from Tibet, China, Korea,
and Central Asia. As customary elsewhere, small terracotta votives venerate the dead at Nalanda.
These are about two inches wide circular or pear-shaped plaques stamped from moulds that serve
as a substitute for embossed gold plaques. The fired clay seals usually inscribed in Brähmi derived
characters depict a Buddha in Nirvana seated in dhyanamudra with stupa mounds by his side
or in the backdrop. The circular seal of Sri-Nalanda inscribed ‘Śri-Nalanda-Mahavihariya-Arya-
Bhikṣusamghasya’ depicts Srichakra flanked by deer enface. In early Buddhist art the deer and
Srichakra emblem of the goddess usually denotes the seat of the ‘Awakened’, or the enlightened
Buddha (0.13).
Metaphorically Buddha’s ‘Discourse in the Deer Park at Sarnath’ is conveyed by the deer
logo. The writings of the pilgrim monk Hiuen Tsang (Xuanzang) who came from China in the
7th century provide information on Sri-Nalanda. Hiuen Tsang traveling in India from 630 to 643
CE received the title Mokshadeva at Nalanda. He records that Nalanda Chaitya Vihara with eight
halls and 300 apartments surrounded by great pools of water for daily ablation was maintained by
revenues from 200 villages. He noted that Chaitya-vandana at twilight was performed preferably
at the central hall, which concluded daily rituals with the reading of prescribed text, chanting
of hymns and mantra. A brick wall with richly adorned towers and pointed turrets surrounded
Nalanda Sangharama, the great college with eight halls opened through a gate. Shilabhadra, the
Introduction lxxv
revered head of Sri-Nalanda at the time taught Yogachara to
Hiuen Tsang, which Asaṅga Bodhisattva originally received
from Tuṣita Heaven. Primordial wisdom gained by yoga
was then transmitted to China and Tibet. We learn from the
biographer Hwui-Li that at the behest of the Gupta king
Harsha the chancellor of Nalanda sent Hiuen Tsang along with
few monks to learn the alternate faith in Odisha. According
to Hiranand Sastri in Nalanda and its Epigraphic Material
(1942) Sthaviras of Odisha disdained Nalanda’s confidence
in Mahayana’s lotus goddess Sri Lakshmi called the ‘sky-
flower’, and recommended Kapalika faith in various fierce
goddesses.
ETHICS OF IMMORTALITY
Terracotta seals and coin tokens were dedicated to the departed.
The beautifully crafted Indo-Greek ‘Amoghabhuti’ coins in
silver and copper is from Kuninda (Administrator) region of
Himachal Pradesh. Similar to the punch-marked coins these are
typically found in buried hoards together with other inscribed
coins. Kuninda (Gk. Kylindrine) is identified by Ptolemy as
a territory surrounded by river Ganges, Yamuna, and Sutlej
(Geography 7.1.42). Amoga(m) in Tamil means increasing
good, abundance and beauty; Bhuti is goddess Sri Lakshmi.
Mahabharata identifies Amoghabhuti as the source of wealth
and wellbeing. A vast number of Amoghabhuti silver coins
represent Lakshmi crowned by Srivatsa holding lotus flower
by the side of a deer and hill-crescent emblem. On reverse is
hill-crescent above flowing water surrounded by various signs
of the goddess, such as Triratna, Swastika and fenced sacred
tree (0.14). The Indo-Greek silver coin of the Kushana period
adopts the Roman coinage standards of drachms. The Aramaic
derived Brahmi legend on reverse reads from left to right. It
parallel’s Kharoshti script on obverse: Rajnah Kunindasya
Amoghabhutisya maharajasya translates as ‘Rajya-Lakhsmi of
the Royal Administrator’.
The goat headed Tantric goddess Vrishanana first
encountered in Buddhist art is one of the sixty-four Yoginis
0.15 Juno Caprotina, Polychrome terracotta aedicula, Etruscan-Roman, 1st century BCE-CE
0.16 Indravarman reliquary with ibex finial, Silver, 1st century CE
Otsu: Shumei Culture Foundation, Japan
Los Angeles County Museum of Art (on loan / TR 10109.18a,b)
lxxvi Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
in medieval India. The ancient Etruscan goat goddess
derivative of Roman goddess Juno Caprotina is signified by
cornucopia and fig (0.15). The Kushana period fertility goat
goddess enshrined in an aedicula copulates with a man on a
first century ivory shaped like the arched winnow (cula) from
Chandraketugarh in Bengal. The exquisitely carved ivory
plaques equivalent to embossed gold are expensive Buddhist
relics mostly from the Begram hoard of the Kushana. Ancient
ivory from Bengal edited by Enamul Haque is published as
‘Erotic Plaques from Chandraketugarh in the Collection of
Indian Museum’ in the Journal of Bengal Art Series (vol. 11
& 12, 2006-2007: 19-38). Coincidentally a naturalistic goat
standard from Mohenjo-Daro is one among several figurative
finials that served sacerdotal function in both Indus Valley
and Greco-Buddhist sites (1.117-118). The Way of the Soul is
the Lunar Way of death and rebirth. The cow horns represent
the moon governing earth and water; the lunar goddess shape
shifts into animals during the fruitful thirteen lunar-months of
each year. The lunar deer horn is the Tree of Life; the ram
horns indicate that the earth goddess is pregnant. Caprid or
goat form of the goddess fashioned in gold was a popular
talisman in the early burials in the Bactrian region north of
Afghanistan. Goat horn is Cornucopia, the cornucopia held by
goddess Hariti signifies fertility of the earth in Greco-Buddhist
art. The horn of plenty was gifted by Zeus as token of his own
survival from his devouring father Saturn. In Greek tradition
youthful Pan transformed into an amphibian goat to escape a
deadly enemy of gods called Typhon. On Taxila libation plates
Typhon is represented as a sea dragon under the control of the
goddess.
Funerary cults across Central and South Asia embrace
metamorphosis to evade death. A mountain goat called ibex
with curved horn balanced on the conical lid of inscribed
silver casket is one of the most original Tropaion of the Greco-
Roman world. The unusual Buddhist reliquary casket now in
Japan’s Shumei Culture Foundation in Otsu, is presumably
0.17 Mountain goat, Gold, 5.1 x 1.9 x 3.6 cm, Tillya Tepe Tomb IV, 1st century CE
Kabul: National Museum of Afghanistan (MK 04.40.399)
0.18 Wild goat pendant, Gold, 5×2.80 cm, Crete, circa 1700-1550 BCE-1st century CE
London: British Museum (1876.0513.1)
0.19 Deer, Two-sided Gold, H. 3.5, L. 4.9, D. 1.15 cm, Zhalauli, Kegen district, 1st century CE
Almaty: Central State Museum of the Republic of Kazakhstan (KP 22030/10)
Introduction lxxvii
from Bajaur in Kapisa (Kapisi/Begram), the historic Kafiristan region of Nuristan Province in
Afghanistan (0.16). The eclectic mortuary container from Transoxania region is typically Greco-
Parthian. The ibex stands on the tapering lid conceived as astral Pure Land (Sadamattas) on the
slope of Mount Meru. The carinated cup with horizontal flutings is similar to the silver goblets
on small stem found in great numbers in Taxila and Kapisa. The ceremonial goblets are widely
represented in Gandhara sculpture. When Los Angeles County Museum of Art had the early fist-
century silver reliquary on loan from Japan, Richard Saloman at the University of Washington
studied the inscription and published his results in the Journal of the American Oriental Society
(Vol 116, No 3, 1996: 1418-452). The reliquary casket known as ‘Apracaraja Indravarman’s Silver
Reliquary’ has six Kharoshti inscriptions in north Indian Prakrit. The Gandhari script written from
right to left in pointille style mentions names of persons and the cost of silver by weight. We learn
from inscription no. II that the likely co-owners of the reliquary are Indravarman identified as the
Avaca (Apraca) king of Bajaur and king Khara(y)osta. Kharahostes or Kharaosta known from
numismatics and inscription on the famous Mathura sandstone Lion Capital now in the British
Museum indicates close links between Mathura and the North West Frontier Province (NWFP)
called Gandhara.
The source of this type of ibex or wild goat (Ovis orientalia) is evidenced by a bronze incense-
burner from Arabia Felix. The bowl with a splayed foot and a spiked temple wall that shields the
burning incense is cast in lost-wax process (H.23.9 cm, Ø 13.5 cm). An ibex stands on the exterior
of the temple wall below star and crescent moon originally highlighted with now missing inlay.
With a floral motif on the right hindquarter and a star on its right shoulder the ibex presumably
personified a deified person so that the cult object served as an altar. The incense-burner datable
to first century CE now in the British Museum (1960,1212.1) is from a mortuary shrine. The
ibex with its head for heights conquers the mountains to evade deadly predators. An auspicious
ibex talisman cast in gold was placed on the left side of the head of a prince buried in Tillya Tepe
Tomb IV (0.17). The majestic mountain goat with regal horns competes for attention with partially
nude Aphrodite from Tillya Tepe Tomb VI. The winged goddess embossed in sheet gold leans
nonchalantly on a memorial pillar (2.34). The prince was accompanied by a horse and bridal burial
of five princesses covered with huge number of gold ornaments dated to early first century CE.
Costumes of the prince and the princesses were richly embroidered in gold thread, gold beads
and variety of bullae, some of which are inset with turquoise and gem. Among them the appliqué
shaped like the head of caprid is remarkable (Plate 27-e). The Syrian type of embroidery using gold
appliqué is well-known in Kushana and Palmyraean costumes represented in funerary sculpture.
Realistically modeled ibex or wild goat cast in gold, silver or bronze and dedicated to the dead
might derive from the custom of ram sacrifice to Zeus for divine favors. Or it might originate
from the dying vegetation god Tamuz resurrected and worshiped in the form of a goat in ancient
Mesopotamia. A Cretan wild goat pendant with a loop and three gold disc tassels is exactly like
the ornaments from Tillya Tepe. Crete certainly appears to be an important link and a source of
influence (0.18). The ibex with long curved horns made of sheet gold is closer to Kushana age in
style than to the presumed Minoan period (1700-1550 BCE).
lxxviii Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
0.20a Ibex crowded on ‘Megamata’ wing, Gold, Kurgan in Altai Mountains, 1st century CE
Almaty: Central State Museum of the Republic of Kazakhstan
0.20b Heart and wing amulet jewel, Gold, Turquoise, Tillya Tepe, 1st century CE
Kabul: National Museum of Afghanistan
0.20c Magatama comma amulet, Gold, Taxila, 1st-2ndcentury CE
Taxila Museum of Archaeology, Pakistan
Introduction lxxix
Wheeled animal votives in terracotta and bronze modeled in naturalistic Intercultural Style
is common to both Kushana and Indus Valley cultures. The ram siginifies Agni, the fire god
persanified as the sun in Egypt. Terracotta ram from Chanhudaro with a hole poked in its belly
suggests that it might have been a processional standard attached to a stick illustrated occasionally
on seals. Fibula in the form of recumbent deer is popular votive from Scythian kurgan graves.
The deer motif is also found in the oldest tattooed human skin preserved in the Altai Mountains
of Siberia. A gold and turquoise plaque of standing argali from Kazakhstan is currently dated
to 8th–7th century BCE. The dating is contested since the argali plaques from the Kazakhstan
kurgans in the style of Tilly Tepe gold ornaments actually appear to be part of the funerary cult
of the early Christian era. Another gold plaque in the peculiar Scythian animal style represents a
recumbent deer with horns scrolling like flowing water, which signifies its ability to survive by
sniffing out water even in arid deserts. The ‘comma’ on its flanks is an abstract ‘wing’ shape, which
is noteworthy in votive tokens and jewelry pieces from Gandhara (0.19). Thus the gold deer plaque
from Kazakhstan is stylistically linked to Buddhist reliquary cult in a weird and wonderful way.
Several recumbent caprid or goat-antelope with curved horns sit in rows on a gold teardrop
shaped like a comma fashioned some 2000 years ago. The spectacular votive object is from a
kurgan in the Altai Mountains of eastern Kazakhstan, near the borders with Russia and China.
The goats shaped in embossed gold sheet are practically knitted together by closely packed gold
granules placed drop by drop by melting gold wire. Cross-cultural affinities is observed in the
consummate artistry of field granulation common in Buddhist jewelry. The hollow comma shape
recurring on the flanks of the votive goats signify their flight in the luminous sky filled with minute
gold granules (0.20a). The magatama in Japan is a ‘comma’ shaped amulet in stone known from
ancient times. The Osaka Sangyo University team discovered unusual magatama configuration
in the galaxy through the Low Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (LRIS). The wing shape as a
significant sign in the burial goods seem to be a magatama vision of ultraviolet radiation that
ionizes hydrogen atoms, which apparently holds important clues about the Milky-Way. How the
ancients perceived this heavenly comma formation about 11.6 billion light-years from the earth
is a mystery. The radial solar sign on the flank of sacred animals correspond to the comma-wing
sign often incorporated in Buddhist artifacts. A jewel from Tillya Tepe encloses the heart in the
center lifted on the paired wings of comma outlined by gold granules (0.20b). The turquoise
comma rather like a curved teardrop is widespread in Taxila and Tillya Tepe necropolis (0.20c).
Stunning fringe necklaces and other jeweled pieces from Tillya Tepe burials and buried hoards
from Sirkap incorporate the ‘comma’ shape in extraordinary ways. In addition to granulation the
chased gold ornaments with decorative gold granules have knobs on the rim produced by the
early use of ‘doming punch’. This style of enhancement in Gandhara is shared by Phoenician and
Roman goldsmiths (0.21a). Sheet gold ornaments in Tillya Tepe and Taxila combines filigree and
granulation. The ‘beaded wire’ technology exploits small gold spheres or granules arranged in a
linear pattern on hammered gold discs. The concentric beaded and decorative wire make attractive
ear pendants (0.21b). The vaguely classical genre of beaded wire filigree bordering the petals on a
group of rosette discs from Tillya Tepe Tomb II is a decorative feature generally favored in Greco-
Roman jewelry (1.109).
lxxx Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols Introduction lxxxi

Gold plaques are popular Buddhist votives similar to those found in the Scythian kurgans.
Before embossing, the design is first outlined with a tracer on the reverse surface of sheet metal.
The plate is then embedded face down in a pliable block made of lac and bees wax and the
portions to be raised are hammered down. Next the plate is removed and re-embedded with the
face uppermost. The hammering is continued, this time forcing the background of the design into
the yielding support. By a series of hammering and re-embedding, followed finally by chasing,
the sheet metal in relief attains its final form. There are three essential types of tools—for tracing,
for bossing, and for chasing—as well as a specialized tool, a snarling iron or spring bar, which is
used to reach the otherwise inaccessible areas. In addition, hammered and embossed sheet metal
could be shaped into on ornament, a figurine or given any type of shape such as a cup or a vase, in
which case the metal is joined together by scrimping the edges together. The technique of joining
metal to make three dimensional shapes was advanced to such an extent as to produce unusual and
attractive hollow figurines of various deities in gold (2.71). The jeweler-sculptors imitate beaded
frame and reproduce luxurious granulation even on the stone parclose of Bharhut stupa. Likewise,
the ivory carvers seem to have prepared the mold for making the exquisite votive terracotta plaques
of Bengal. The ivory carvers of ‘Vidisha’ reputed to have carved the gateways of Sanchi stupa
have likely links with the Nebataean settlers in Pompeii where the beautifully ornamented ivory
statuette of Sanchi Salabhanjika played a vital role in cult and ritual (2.78). 0.21a Flying bird talisman, Gold, Gaza, Jerusalem Corridor, Roman period
Characteristically, the female gold ornaments from Gaza correspond to Buddhist material Israel Museum (IDAM)
0.21b Beaded wire disc pendants, Gold, Gandhara, 1st century CE
culture. In this regard, the Cypriot-Phoenician link is important to understand the numerous
votive terracotta from Chandraketugarh and Tamluk cult centers in Bengal. The terracotta plaques
demonstrate that the sculptor-jeweler meticulously counterfeited variety of ornaments applying temples of its local sun god, shrine of a hero (Heroeion) and the Great Marneion sacred to Zeus
Phoenician techniques. This includes embossed flower edged with granules, huge earrings hanging incorporating fertility god Dagon symbolized by eagle and fish. By the imperial decree of Rome
from pierced ears, multiple bracelets, anklets, gadrooned amulet beads, pectorals, armbands, it was one among the eight shrines destroyed in May 402 – the others were devoted to Aphrodite,
thighbands, wreaths and imposing headdress that include symbolic hair pins. Additionally, fringed Demeter, Persephone (Kore), Tyche (Tychaion) and Hecate the moon goddess of magic, witchcraft
collar necklace, cross chain, girdle and thigh band are arranged to display exposed breasts and and necromancy familiar as Maia-Isis in Greco-Buddhist cult. Famously, former Greek slaves in
pudenda. To the right the relatively small scaled male devotee receives from the divine female the Rome assigned to be priests in the sacred groves of Hecate had wide following. Various unfamiliar
ring of eternity. The emblematic ornaments of the goddess are placed at her feet or in the offering deities and Roman freed slaves performing rituals in the company of goddess-priestess, or dancing
stand held by a female acolyte demonstrate rituals transcribed in time and space. Alternatively, the with toga clad elite are widespread in the Buddhist art of Gandhara (3.3). Fertility goddess well
richly adorned wealthy courtesan-priestess impersonating the goddess holds the insignia of office. known in Canaanite and Buddhist culture might be connected to the local Isis-Venus cult that
In some plaques the independent women wear jeweled footwear. The ceremonial pavilion itself seemed to have plunged Pompeii into turbulent eroticism involving largest number of prostitutes.
replicates embossed and chased gold shrine enriched with granulation (0.22). The glorified courtesan seemed to have served as a model for the tree goddess called Salabhanjka
Gaza at the centre of frankincense trade during the Persian period (539-332 BCE) tactically found in Pompeii (Plate 1).
linked Asia and Africa during the Hellenistic period. Gaza in the Roman period in the conglomeration Assimilation of foreign gods is the secret of ‘Interpretatio Romana’. It set the stage for
of Asia Minor, Syria and Palestine was captured by Pompey in 64 BCE, and as a Roman military extraordinary amalgamation of race and blend of cultures, which created a new and absolutely
colony was a hotbed of prostitution. Consequently the favorite glass bangles and hoop earrings of original civilization in the Indian subcontinent. Here, the Cananite Dagon merges with Zeus,
Gaza correlate with those found in various early Buddhist sites. Number of Gaza coins of Hadrian supreme among the Olympian gods. Zeus as eagle being fed by Ganymede the beautiful lover
(129-130 CE) found in the subcontinent underlines the synchronicity of Greco-Buddhist cult linked boy is an exceptional stucco plaque from Begram in afghanistan. The Greek myth played out in
to Hadrian’s cult of Antinous installed in Antinoöpolis flourishing in Egypt, Syria, Turkey and the life of Emperor Hadrian; his beloved Antinous, a Bithynian Greek youth worshiped widely
Greek colonies in Asia Minor. Illustrious schools of philosophy and rhetoric too drew worldwide as psychopomp was a typical bodhisattva associated with the golden eagle and lotus. From the
attention to Gaza during second and third century CE. Idolatrous Gaza staunchly protected the very beginning animal personifications and symbolic language is hard to interpret in the mortuary
lxxxii Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols Introduction lxxxiii

cult. The trend of ethnographic narrative coming from

the contemporary transcultural social construction
naturally expanded the pantheon in Central Asia
and Buddhist South Asia. A group of unusual
altarpieces from Sanghao in Gandhara discovered
in late nineteenth century depict a divine female in
Parthian costume wearing floral crown. She leans
back to embrace an eagle. Her wrapper is girdled by
a twisted piece of cloth, its loose end slung gracefully
around her shoulder. In other examples the Greco-
Roman pallium around her tunic is draped like saree.
In a posture similar to the tree goddess she reaches
up to hold a snaky girdle or fillet held in the beak
of the eagle. Their mystifying union in the fertility
cult is reminiscent of Leda and the Swan (0.23). Also,
the eagle signifying the youthful sun god of Egypt 0.24 Eagle cockade of bodhisattva, Schist, Ø 11.4cm, Sanghao, Gandhara, 1st-2nd century CE
successfully assimilates the deified dead as Horus. London: British Library (no. 10031132) Photo H. H. Cole 1883
0.25 Eagle and goat medallion, Bronze gilt, Daulatabad, North Afghanistan, ca. 1st century CE
While examining the icons photographed in 1883
by H. H. Cole, Soper and others readily shift their
focus from the goddess in the forefront to the eagle Dagon, Zeus and Horus influenced human psyche so deeply that the theme of redeeming eagle
in the background so that the iconography identified cohabiting with the goddess remained constant even in far-flung regions. Among wide variety of
as ‘Garuda Slaying Snake’ directly brands the female votives dedicated to the dead a gilded bronze medallion embossed with theriomorphic eagle is an
‘Nagini’. Sensing that “There is . . . something more astonishing find from Daulatabad in north Afghanistan. As the deified man stands in imposing
than a simple opposition of the solar-angelic and Egyptian frontal pose, his eagle profile turned to his right. The eagle man with erect phallus is
lunar-titanic powers of light and darkness” at play, directly linked to the indomitable wild goat. He firmly grasps pair of horned caprid in both hands
Ananda Coomaraswamy in Transformation of Nature to signify perpetual fertility and security. The inscribed monogram on the exergues of the votive
in Art rightly interprets this unusual iconography token is very similar to abbreviated Greek signs on Greco-Kushana coins (0.25). The goat radically
as “consummation most to be desired’ and ‘a signifies Tamuz, consort of Sumerian goddess Ishtar. The symmetrical composition of Zeus-Horus
transportation” (1934: 39–41). type of deity holding goats by the horn suggests a composite religion drawing from antiquity. The
winged eagle with the body of a muscular man wearing Egyptian type belted kilt is cast in relief
In Roman Egypt a man with the falcon’s head of
on a bronze axe from the same site in Afghanistan. He wears a solar boss on his beaded neckband.
Horus represents the immortal king. Jeweler-sculptors
The naturalistic intercultural style typical of Hellenistic syncretism in Roman Imperial cult is
of the contempory Buddhist period originate icons of
characteristic of the ancient diasporas in the Age of Globalization.
worship and at the same time display extraordinary
capacity to conceive them in logographic language FIRSTIME CRAFTSMANSHIP
typical of Egypt. A detached disc from the turban of a Staying with this tomb group, a small recumbent lion in amber from Tillya Tepe Tomb V is among
bodhisattva is part of the goddess and eagle group from handful of animal gems recovered from ancient funerary sites (Plate 47-f). Buried treasures
Sanghao. By fusing the goddess and the transfigured from Taxila and Tillya Tepe reveal astounding range of beautiful goldwork that take advantage
eagle the fragment of cockade acknowledges their of turquoise blue. Turquoise inlay take three noteworthy shapes — heart, teardrop and curved
shared identity (0.24). Indications are that myths of teardrop-wing that looks like one half of Chinese yin and yang symbol. The teardrop-wing shape
0.22 Goddess-priestess in pavilion, Terracotta, Chandraketughar, Bengal, 1st century CE
is more attuned to eastern Han temperament whereas the heart is an ancient necromantic symbol
0.23 Goddess and eagle god Dagon, Schist, H. 35-40 cm, Sanghao, Gandhara, 2nd-3rd century CE derived from Egypt. The first century true heart shaped in gold and turquoise from Tillya Tepe
lxxxiv Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
is more comfortable with the current notion of romantic
love traced back to later medieval Europe (6.15a-c).
The original Afghani turquoise heart amulets match the
heart-shaped garnets often seen in some later Hellenistic
jewelry, mainly from the most easterly Mediterranean.
Hence a common source or origin seems likely from
this direction. The ‘Mistress of Animal’ in an audicula
stands out in a magnificent pair of temple pendants from
Tillya Tepe Tomb VI. The richly attired goddess has
heart shaped wings inset with turquoise. The ornamental
pediment has owl flanking a rose with four heart shaped
petals inset with turquoise (4.47). Bright blue turquoise is
common in the Tillia Tepe gold work but extremely rare
in Hellenistic and Roman jewelry. We might assume that
the stones that provide this fine blue color came from the
Iranian mines near Mashhad in Khorasan province, but
there is turquoise also in Afghanistan.
Gold ornaments from Taxila and Tillya Tepe are
noted for superb chasing, engraving and gem encrustation.
The polychrome style often exploits soldering, molding,
filigree with twisted wires and inlay of colored paste and
stones. The earliest instance of micro grain field work
consists of small gold globules soldered on sheet gold
surface. Grains arranged in lines are a simple form of
granulation, most typically surrounding stone settings.
This type of ‘beaded wire’ technique produces linear
patterns consisting of small spheres or spool shapes. This
Phoenician technique first appeared in the Mediterranean
world around the 7th century BCE and became a staple
decoration technique in Roman and Greco-Sarmation
gold work in the later periods. Examples of beaded wire
filigree in a vaguely classical Greek or Hellenistic genre
is most pronounced on the borders of the petals on a group
of rosette discs from Tomb II. Large-diameter beaded
wire appears on a pair of penannular hoop earrings from
Tomb VI that has a stylized standing figure with hands on
hip; the back of the hoop flares out towards the terminal.
But more complex granulation work appears on a rare
0.26 Bird soul, Bronze, Gonur site (BMAC), Protohistoric period
0.27 Eagle pendant seal, Bronze, Early historic Bactrian burial, circa 1st century CE
0.28 Eagle and Cross, Steatite tablet, Harappa, Protohistoric period (Parpola. H-166)
Introduction lxxxv
set of Triratna gold beads replicated in Bharhut stupa sandstone reliefs. The rosette and acanthus
decoration is outlined in very narrow beaded wire of a gauge that is seen in some rare classical and
early Hellenistic jewelry. The most uncommon is the excellent filigree ribbon and the fine network
of granulation on a center bead of a type found in Celtie graves (1.46).
The gold wirework is prominent in Taxila and Tillia Tepe jewelry. The wire-making technique
evolved during the first century CE is a strip-twist process of wire making known as a Z-twist in
textile technology. Gold wire used in making the popular loop-in-loop chain involved cutting a thin
strip of gold from sheet gold, twisting it into a cordlike length, and then rolling this between two
flat surfaces. The resulting wire would have a seam line or lines that spiral along its length. The
direction of the spiral with Z-twist point to a normal right-handed goldsmith usual to the majority
of Greek and Roman gold wire work. Apparently, contemporary Chinese gold wires chose to have
a higher proportion of S-twist. The loop-in-loop chain from Tillya Tepe Tomb I made from gold
wire with the S-twist is worth noting the merger of different guilds employed to furnish the tombs
(MK 04.40.304). The clasp of this necklace has a hinge-type fastening device with a gold nail-like
peg holding it closed. The cylindrical form is closer to Chinese or Southeast Asian clasps than
Mediterranean ones. The four gold medallions with a male bust from Tomb III (MK04.40.423) are
linked to the adjoining plain gold discs by wires with Z-seams. Both seam directions can be seen
on the loop-in-loop chains on at least one of the two ‘Mistress of Animals’ pendants from Tomb VI.
This suggests that at least two makers were involved in the making of this pendant. This lack of
consistency might be due to the division of labor that often employed apprentices for this kind of
job. A magnificent pair of pendants from Tomb II depicting the ‘Master of Animals’ controlling
dragons is in a wonderful oriental style. It has gold wire with seams that run longitudinally along
the length (4.48). This type is occasionally encountered in Parthian jewelry. Probably the greatest
use of gold wire is found in the girdle of the prince buried in Tomb IV (5.28). The almost one meter
long gold girdle has nine medallions of Nana or Demeter seated on lion linked by eight bands of
gold ‘straps’. the belt is made of loop-in-loop chain joined along the side in a technique termed
‘interlinking’ seen in knitting. Although connection with classical goldwork is not always present,
the style of embossing and the manner of plaiting the strap and the buckling device at each end
matches ancient Greek method.
By its very nature art is inextricable from culture, which is inseparable from the zeitgeist or
the ‘spirit of the age’. Similar to terracotta votive tanks found in ancient most archaeological sites
in South Asia, bird-soul perch on the rim of a beaker fashioned in electrum from Gonur (4.92).
Electrum is a delicate combination of gold and silver common in Egypt, Anatolia, Mohenjo-Daro,
and Bolochistan Kulli sites. The bird shape cut from sheet gold is riveted use stud technique that was
usual during Roman period when soldering had not come into wide use. Unlike the expensive bird-
cup, the archetypal bird on a bronze seal from BMAC is more than a stamping device produced in
the most economical way. The bird connected to the spirit world spreads its wings without the fear of
fracture in the medallion with a ring for attachment (0.26). Dexterity displayed by the compartmented
bronze seals is found even in the Indus Valley. Craftsmen working in metal have greater freedom
than their counterparts carving stone, ivory or wood. Molten metal takes any form and when cooled
supports its own weight, allowing negative space to open up and expand freely, which is most
lxxxvi Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols Introduction lxxxvii

suitable for decorative ornaments in metal. A compartmented stamp seal from north Afghanistan
integrates Vesica Pisces in the chest of the two-headed eagle originating in ancient Turkey (0.27).
The eagle grasps Chinese type of dragon curiously like the prince grasping the winged dragons in a
gold temple-pendant earring from Tillya Tepe Tomb II. Funerary art is guided by its responsibility
to the overall intent. The renowned ‘Two-headed Eagle Stupa’ in Taxila has two-headed eagle on the
pediment of a series of blind niche on the platform to provide axis to the two worlds.
A two-sided square seal from Harappa engraved with an eagle on one side and a cross on the
other side notched like a crenellated battlement. The solar bird at the center of the four ceremonial
pathways is at the meeting point of the two worlds where mortuary rite is performed (0.28).
Several compartmented bronze seals of BMAC incorporate stepped pinnacles or crenellations
to indicate the temple of the sun god often depicted as an eagle, its unusual two heads looking
0.29 Torana goddess, Middle architrave of northern gateway of stupa (rear side), Sanchi, 1st century CE
towards east and west. The horizontal band of the ‘Sun at its Zenith’ motif is a relentless pattern on
the copingstone of Bharhut railing and on the architraves spanning the Sanchi tornana gateways.
Further, the soaring eagle on the seal shown above a circle at the center of the cardinal gateways in which opulent jewelry played significant role. In Gandhara small gold plaques and ornaments
suggests a commonality of style and purpose throughout Buddhist South Asia. The closest example in repoussé range from Alexandrian Hellenism to Scythian-Sarmatian animal style. Many of the
is the Heliodorus Pillar monument at Besnagar that was once crowned by an eagle. Below the now technical processes in use today are essentially the same as those employed in ancient times. All
absent eagle capital the shaft faceted into eight and sixteen sides is carved with swags of twisted decorative metalwork attributed to Syrian, Etruscan, and Greek goldsmiths was wrought by the
rope and floral festoons with bunches of fruit such as mango, apple and pear suspended from eight hammer and the punch. The refined workmanship in twenty-four carat gold sheet is primarily by
brackets. The memorial pillar typical of early historic period is located just five miles from Sanchi means of embossing, which is the art of producing relief from the reverse side. A thin, pliable sheet
stupa in Central India. Prakrit Brahmi inscription glorifies: of metal pressed into molds or between dies is comparatively easy method of embossing known
Divine Lord (Devadeva) Heliodorus riding an eagle (Garuda), Bhagavan / Bhagavata, from antiquity. Jewelry refer to ornaments closely connected with the art of crafting them. Jewelry
divine son of Dion of Taxila sent by the great Greek King (Yona Maharaja) Antialcidas from reliquary stupa complexes use composite method, which is primarily a sheet gold technology
(Amtalikitasa) as ambassador / savior to Kasiputra (son of Benares) Bhagabhadra, in the to create a single object shaped mainly by hammering. The technique produced integral settings
fourteenth year of his reign. for inlays. The lavish ‘polychrome style’ combined colored gemstone, glass and paste inlays that
simulate enameling. Buddhist relics used embossed relief, frequently combining granulation and
The religious guideline on the east face declares the prevailing faith in heaven as a reward for filigree decoration. The stylistic details were produced by differences in contraction.
righteous conduct:
Among the three important features the foremost is the completely new style of jewelry made
Three immortal steps when practiced lead to heaven (paralokika): for religious purpose. The aesthetic appeal of new types of ornaments and technique was greatly
Self-restraint, Charity, Consciousness. influenced by Sarmatian-Scythians, Ossetians and Aryan Alans of Iranian-Parthia flourished
– Archaeological Survey of India, Annual Report (1908-1909) assimilated quickly into pockets of Celtic migrants in both east and west of their homelands. This
cultural synthesis during classical antiquity had great impact on the Greco-Kushana culture. The
The goddess of transition and gateways is Dvaravati equal to Hekate worshiped as the Lotus
combination of acanthus, lion and winged griffin signifying the goddess are notable in new jewelry
Gem invoked as “Om Padma Mani Om”. The goddess holding food tray and water vessel at the
design. Head pieces, such as gold wreaths and emblematic hairpins from Buddhist reliquaries are
torana-gateway welcomes the departed to enhanced eternal life. Water pot with handle called Situla
typically Greek. It features new symbols such as acanthus, vase, fig leaf, vine, heart and conch
(Kamandal) is a celebrated sign of the sicamore tree goddess Isis. According to Egyptian tradition
shell. Hercules knot called reef-knot is a very important charm integrated into girdles and bangles.
the deceased along with his wife and young son pay homage to the welcoming goddess next to the
Cupid and dolphin, star-like golden flowers, fish, Swastika, sun and crescent moon increased in
tomb under the Tree of Life. Human soul hovering above the grave is personified as winged birds
popularity. Hellenistic jewelry design include hoop earring with suspended vase pendant, and
(0.29). The celestial musicians occupy the realm of the sun god personified as eagle.
bangles with winged griffin, and human or animal head protome. Bangles are worn in pairs or in
About two thousand years ago age old crafts suddenly emerged fully developed Indian in the matched sets by both sexes. Bracelets are either open or featured gate-clasps or animal terminals.
subcontinent. In the east-west economic and cultural exchanges enormous flow of wealth from Torque and choker are often worn along with long gold chain distinguished by elaborate pectoral.
the Roman Empire (27 BCE-180 CE) supported the extremely expensive Buddhist reliquary cult Bead necklaces and girdles with beaded apron strung through spacers are novel types. Faience
lxxxviii Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
typical of Egypt and polychrome glass beads and bangles
are derived from eastern Mediterranean where glass was
used to make ‘gems’ since it was cheaper and easier to
work with. Signet rings and pectorals set with Greco-
Roman cameo might indicate social status or a person’s
religious affiliation. In the art historical context gems from
ancient Buddhist sites shed realistic light on the sources of
religious belief. The engraved gems depict winged Victory
(Athena–Isis–Nemesis), Osiris and Hercules. Gilgamesh
motif unexpectedly appears in number of steatile seals in
Mohenjo-Daro. In a restricted sense it is natural to speak
of engraved steatite seal as a gemstone and even a jewel.
COMMODITY FETISHISM
Trancultural characteristics of the Bosporus seeped into
Buddhist cult images. In particular Pantikapaion at Kerch
in the Crimean peninsula of Ukraine was an important
ancient Greek city built on Mount Mithridat. A gold
burial mask from Pantikapaion necropolis on the western
side of the Bosporus is curiously related to Hellenistic
syncretism in early Greco-Buddhist ‘Sunga’ style (0.30).
In the age of cultist colonialism, tomb construction and
burial rituals is dictated by ethnicity. Thus, new Buddhist
art in the crossroads of cultures cannot be isolated from
the historical relevance of the Greek world. On Sanchi
stupa gateway a man in sculptured niche is represented
exactly like the double of the dead called Ka that receive
offerings at the doorway in Egyptian tomb. In the House
of Eternity pleasurable view of paradise unfolds behind
the immortal now called the ‘door keeper’ (Dwarapala)
(0.31).
Bharhut stupa parclose shares maturity, style and
iconographic development equal to Sanchi and Mathura
schools. Despite its isolation as ‘Sunga Period’ before the
Common Era the profusion of ornaments and symbols
reproduced in multiple ways communicates the newest
ideas as a coherent whole. Above all, jewelry design
oversteps its marginal position within art history and
0.30 Burial mask, Gold, Pantikapaion necropolis, Kerch, Crimea, Ukraine, 2nd-3rd century CE
Saint Petersburg: Hermitage Museum, Russia
0.31 Funerary effigy, Sandstone, Great Stupa I, Sanchi, Central India, 1st century CE
Introduction lxxxix
carries rich cultural assets. Compelling evidence suggests that codified system of symbols was
available to all the sculptor-jewelers in the new Buddhist reliquary cult. The polished sandstone
parclose of Bharhut stupa is covered with meticulous reproduction of multi-stringed bead necklace,
spiral wristlet and unique pair of twisted-knot earrings displayed at the center of a broad necklace
made of embossed plaques decorated with rows of gold granules. Bharhut jewelry models actually
fashioned in gold are extremely rare archaeological finds. Among them a pair of royal twisted-
knot earring and a set of Triratna and bead pendant are exceptional (1.42, 46). The extremely fine
field granulation and filigree outlined in gold pearls display the high proficiency of countless
generations of goldsmiths.
In comparison a young man in Anatolian style is draped in palla decorated with ornamental
Phrygian tassel. The Antinous type pillar statue articulated in the inimitable Greco-Roman style is
adorned with broad neckband embossed with the aegis of Hariti holding cornucopia. In addition
the multi strand loop-in-loop gold necklace has an elaborate pectoral composed of celestials
holding an octagonal bead pendant. His adornment includes coronet, trilobe armband, and chains
slung with several amulets across his covered left shoulder (0.32). The sumptuous cult statues from
Gandhara are unabashed about obsession with permanence. Similar to funerary portraits of Palmyra,
jewelry represented on votive sculpture draws a parallel with the originals that are now lost. The
alchemist-jeweler-sculptor in Gandhara reincarnates golden images in schist, and drawing from
the antique animates the inanimate through magic symbols. The same type of emblematic jewelry
adorning numerous bodhisattva effigies is calculated to counterfeit originals in gold. Following
ancient traditions Buddhist monks consecrate religious icons by performing a ceremony called
‘Awakening’ or ‘Opening of Light’, which is synonymous to Egyptian ‘Opening of Eye’ ritual in
which Eye-Mirror-Ankh-Life have interrelated meaning. Above all, innovative Buddhist art and
architecture mirroring a new optimism in afterlife is iconic, repetitive and symbolic.
Necromantic signs incorporated in jewelry design act as magical device in the strange world of
the dead. Reproduction of jewelry on the stone railings of Bharhut stupa is far more numerous than
anywhere else. Importance of an object is indicated by context, choice of material and breadth of
iconographic treatment. Exquisitely carved ivory valued as white gold is from the funerary vaults
of the Kushana kings in ancient Kapisa. In the Begram hoard a dwarf derived from Egyptian god
Bes wears Alexandrian cross-chain (Plate 39-b). The dwarf closely connected to religious rituals
support the western gateway of the Great Stupa at Sanchi. The dwarf acolyte of the goddess on the
torana gateway to the next world is adorned with wide range of ornaments. Life size cult statue of
a dwarf caryatid from Pitalkhora Cave 3 near the Ajanta caves wears unusual spiral earrings and
a necklace of gadrooned beads with Triratna aegis of the goddess embossed with the visage of the
sun (0.33). On the hand of the bejeweled Pitalkhora dwarf the jeweler-sculptor has signed in Prakrit
Brahmi: Kanhadasena hiramakarna kata – made by Kannadasa the goldsmith. As germinator of a
unique culture, the erudite and multidisciplinary sculptor undeniably holds a distinguished position
in Buddhist reliquary cult. Ornaments carved in sculpture are based on cultural conviction on its
efficacy. The purpose of the votive figure is to bring together idea and image and convey religious
faith through signs and symbols determined by agreed upon knowledge. The design itself is resolved
xc Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols
0.32 Deified Immortal, Gilded polished marble, Gandhara, 2nd century CE
0.33 Yaksha, Sandstone, 103 x 60 x 37 cm, Pitalkhora, 1st-2nd century CE
New Delhi: National Museum of India (67.195)
0.34 Greek prince, Red sandstone, Bharhut Stupa, Central India, 1st-2nd century CE
Kolkata: Indian Museum
through originality, unity and consistency, by which the rebus containing the visual-verbal message
could be easily understood.
Once formulated, the Egyptian type of rebus designed for religious purpose was repeated
methodically in variety of Buddhist art across a wide geographical area. Notably Triratna and
Srivatsa displayed in multiple ways is essential for protection and postmortem healing. The
necromantic logo is naturally converted into emblematic jewelry. The sacred protective signs are
adapted admirably to architectural ornamentation and sculptured frieze. The first-time symbolic
communication in medallions and semicircles typical of Pythagoreans is part of the synchronicity
in the unprecedented reliquary cult.
At Kausambi a small collection of terracotta Triratna earrings was discovered by Alexander
Cunningham. A Yavana prince with African features holds a scabbard stamped with protective
Triratna sign. He stands on a memorial pillar in Bharhut stupa, his sword hangs from a long flat
strap. The loose ends of his Greek diadem flutter in the wind as he stands at the lotus threshold
Introduction xci
to immortality (0.34). The prince wears low-heeled slipper
shoe fastened to his calf by a cord with tassels. He holds fig
and fig leaf, his tunic with pomegranate tie ends is similar
to the gold fastenings in Tillya Tepe tomb VI. Pomegranate
signifying eternal life in Egypt and Canaan is widely used
in Gandhara sculpture. A votive terracotta rattle from Taxila
is shaped like a pomegranate as well. Similarly, a fig leaf in
gilded bronze found in Begram hoard is a fertility symbold
suspended from the girdle of the goddess to cover the
pudenda (4.51).
Sheet gold technology is most common in votive
offerings. Among symbolic shapes cut out in sheet gold the
wheel with five spokes has radiating heart (0.35). The five
pointed star from Tillya Tepe burials indicate transformation
of the heart of the ‘praying soul’ in ancient Egypt. Buddhist
art irresistibly draws on prodigious memory transcending
geographic boundaries so that imagination becomes
collective and culture, trans-continental. Foremost is wheel
with six spokes called Hagal Rune representing Saturn. The
occult sign also identifies Isis-Nemesis and Celtic thunder
god Taranis. The flower with six petals in the shape of Vesica
Pisces is the Flower of Life whereas each petal is a rebus that
denotes the Vessel of Fish (). The Flower of Life motif recurs
on pained funerary pottery and on the stone enclosure of the
reliquary stupa. The Hagal Rune dominates the hieroglyphic
text on the Indus Valley tablet seals, which corresponds to
the offering trays of Gandhara. Matching Mahakala elephant
in the Buddhist cult, the one horned rhinoceros on a steatite
seal begins with the Hagal Rune inscription (0.36). It
magically transforms into almond shaped fecund fish sign
of rebirth all pervasive in Buddhist and Indus Valley culture.
Significantly, glyptic art is basic for the preparation of molds
used to cast coins, and emboss sheet metal or shape clay
fired for durablity equal to gold.
The goddess fundamental to Buddhist reliquary cult
is denoted by various symbols. Swastika and wheel linked
to Sri Lakshmi is integrated in multiple ways as a signal to
enter the next world. The reliquary stupa built on the Circle
0.35 Flower of Life appliqué, Gold, Tillya Tepe necropolis, Afghanistan, 1st century CE
0.36 Unicorn-Rhino at offering plate, Steatite seal, Mohenjo-Daro (H-88a), Protohistoric period
xcii Buddhist Jewels in Mortuary Cult: Magic Symbols Introduction xciii

0.37 Swastika offering tray, Schist, D.11.24 cm, Sirkap, 1st-2nd century CE
Taxila: Taxila Archaeological Museum (193/1932-33)
0.38 Swastika meander seal, Steatite, Harappa, Protohistoric period (Parpola H-165 A)
0.39 Srivatsa-Triratna acrotia, Sandstone, North Torana of Stupa I, Sanchi, Central India, 1st century CE
0.40 Srivatsa-Gajalakshmi stele, Sandstone, Tamil Nadu, Pallava Period, 6th century CE
dead called ‘enlightenment’ was a substantial source of income. Thus the stupa complexes emerged
as centers of wealth and power. The underlying religious, magical and sociological meaning related
to the relics certainly includes practical matters such as material cost and substantial fee paid to
craftsmen. More importantly, who strategized and coordinated the global movement and more
critically, who financed the manufacture of unique relics and for what purpose, and ultimately what
meaning these convey is the key. Precious reliquary caskets, art works and jewelry played an extremely
important role in the funerary cult aimed to influence human destiny. The splendid vision of hereafter
expressed by sensual women, however, exists outside the credo of renunciation of worldly pleasures.
Independent of Buddhist texts, visual culture conveys information on cult and ritual, art and craft,
material and technique, form and function. Validation using inductive reasoning and interpretations
based on empirical inquiry is practical. Pragmatic approach to art as the product of a particular time
deals with new thematic concerns, which call for morphological and art historical interpretations.
While doing so it places Greco-Buddhist reliquary cult in a unique historical circumstance. The
investigative method as a process casts doubts on existing premises and asks questions. Evidences
changes frame; frame changes the attitude. Understanding context and motivation lead to answers
that increase our capacity to understand and interpret new evidences in new light.

of Time called Kalachakra mandala is quartered by the gateway at cardinal directions. It generates
the ‘right turning’ ritual following the sun wheel that produces the Swastika plan of the stupa.
The left-turning Swastika denoting sunset is called gammadion because it is made of four capital
Gammas from Greek alphabet. Swastika votive seals from Mohenjo-Daro and the Swastika gold
badge and libation plate from Taxila question the cognitive foundation on which such exceptional
sacred objects were produced (0.37,0.38). Triratna composed of adorsed fish on lotus supporting
the solar sphere is supreme logocentric innovation. Deliberately abstracted in multiple ways, the
fusion of Triratna-Srivatsa acrotia on the north gateway of the Great Stupa at Sanchi is a shield
designed like Egyptian altar dedicated to Isis-Hathor (0.39). Srivatsa simplified as opposed-S
pattern dominates the gate-clasp bracelets fashioned in sheet gold in Taxila. in a rare Pallava relief
the sacred srivatsa sign on lotus placed between two tall lamps is lustrated by elephants. Thus from
inception srivatsa is emblematic of the enduring goddess Gajalakshmi at the focus of the Mystery
Religion (0.40).
During the first three centuries nameless jeweler-sculptors were engaged to glorify numerous
goddesses, divine humans and the immortals. The execution of sophisticated design is marked
by accuracy tested by efficacy and serviceability. Outlay on an artifact also depends on choice of
style, material, form, function and technology. From the potter to the jeweler-sculptor the image
makers dedicated themselves for a common purpose. Greco-Buddhist reliquary cult required large
network of multinational experts to organize and orchestrate the absolutely new but inexplicably
interrelated funerary cult. Change in funerary customs indicates major social and cultural changes.
Fundamental changes in mortuary art were advantageous. It is reasonable to infer that therapeutic
aspect in mortuary Buddhism was a powerful stimulus. Postmortem healing and reincarnation of the
CHAPTER 1

Goddess of Infinite Variety

The idea is a sign of things,

And the image is sign of the idea,
Sign of a sign.
— Umberto Eco. The Name of the Rose

The archaeology of ancestors combines Tomb Cult and Hero Cult. The repetitious iconic toga clad
Buddha is occasionally mustached like the bare-chest bodhisattva. The obligation to identify the
individuals in Buddhist tomb markers rarely arises. Numerous types of offerings were made to the
dead, which served as a form of ‘return gift’ to the everlasting good of the living. The customary
‘Dhanam’ is equivalent to ‘ex-dono’ in Latin or ‘ex-voto’ in Greek, which is an offering in fulfillment
of a vow. Thus the current practice of religious ‘gift’ is quite different from ‘Dhanam’ for mortuary
purpose. The probable explanation for the avant-garde movement in the Greco-Buddhist reliquary
cult is spiritual upheaval in the Mediterranean region on the cusp of the Christian era. Rebirth or
resurrection culminated in deification articulated through the living images, which is familiar in
Mithraism and Imperial cult of Rome. The luminous beauty of the incarnate being is the unifying
thread in the unprecedented Buddhist cult in South Asia. The astonishing short-lived cult follows
the predictable notion of New Elysium. Aesthetic and socio-religious concerns centered on the
union with Divinity (Monad) is based on the belief in the Oneness (Henosis) of all earthly mortals.
The goal was to reunite with the Source of Light designated as Wisdom or Sophia often prsonified
as a goddess. To attain enlightenment the physical garments had to be shed. A combination of
ascetic practices and prescribed rituals helped to free the soul from the confines of the body and the
illusion of matter. It also offered defense against demonic powers lurking in some of the realms.
But education was equally necessary to comprehend philosophy and metaphysical teachings.
Therefore, Pythagorean neo-Platonic Buddhist discipline resembled a school of meditation or
contemplation as a way to theurgy or divine-working. The process was open to all.