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Hāritī and the chronology of the Kuṣāṇas

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 December 2009

A. D. H. Bivae
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Extract

The view has more than once been mooted amongst archaeologists, though dissenting voices have frequently made themselves heard, that the art of the ‘Graeco-Buddhist’ School of Gandhāra is contemporary with the zenith of the Kuṣāṇa dynasty under the rulers Kaniṣka, Huviṣka, and perhaps Vāsudeva. A further analysis is naturally required to convert this proposition into terms of absolute chronology. Yet the basic thesis is one that would find justification in an argument developed by Ibn Khaldūn in his masterpiece of historical theory, the Muqaddima:

‘The monuments of a dynasty are its buildings and large (edifices). They are proportionate to the original power of the dynasty. They can materialize only when there are many workers, and united action and co-operation. When a dynasty is large and far-flung, with many provinces and subjects, workers are very plentiful, and can be brought together from all sides and regions. Thus even the largest monument can materialize’.

Type
Articles and Notes and Communications
Information
Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , Volume 33 , Issue 1 , February 1970 , pp. 10 - 21
Copyright
Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies 1970

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References

1 e.g. Rowland, B., The art and architecture of India, London, 1953, 78Google Scholar.

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4 Pace d'Ancona, Mirella Levi, ‘Is the Kaniṣka reliquary a work of Mathurā ?’, Art Bulletin, xxxi, 1949, 321–3Google Scholar. He may well be right in noticing signs of Mathurā influence.

5 That it is late is averred by SirMarshall, John, ‘Greeks and Sakas in India’, JRAS, 1947, 30Google Scholar. However, Rowland, B., ‘Revised chronology of Gandhāra sculpture’, Art Bulletin, XVIII, 1936, 391Google Scholar, maintains that it was ‘not decadent but archaic’.

6 Objections to the identification of the Kaniska of the casket with Kaniṣka I are listed by Majumdar, N. G., A guide to the sculptures in the Indian Museum. Part II. The Graeco-Buddhist School of Gandhāra, Delhi, 1937, p. 13Google Scholar, n. 3.

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8 On the hypothesis that the Ārā inscription of year 41 (Konow, S., Corpus inscriptionum indicarum II, 1, p. 162Google Scholar) belongs to a second Kaniṣka, and that the reign of the first came to an end in year 23. The pedestal from Dalpat-ki-Khirki Mohalla, Mathurā, taken by Mirashi, V. V., Epigraphia Indica, xxvi, 7, 1942Google Scholar, [pub.] 1951, 293, as of year 54, is here ascribed to year 14, with Lüders, H., Mathurā inscriptions, Göttingen, 1961, 116Google Scholar, and Sahni, D. R., Epigraphia Indica, xix, 1927, 96Google Scholar.

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12 The question of whether the Buddha figure appeared first in Gandhāra or at Mathurā is of course not at issue here.

13 Catalogue of Indian coins in the British Museum: Greek and Scythic kings of Bactria and India, repr., Chicago, 1966, p. 130, no. 15.

14 CII, II, 1, p. 134 (= Shakur, M. A., A hand book to the inscriptions gallery in the Peshawar Museum, Peshawar, 1946, p. 28Google Scholar, no. 27).

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20 This opinion was long maintained by SirMarshall, John, e.g. ‘Greeks and Sakas in India’, JRAS, 1947, 17Google Scholar, and in his Taxila is taken as axiomatic. It has, however, been criticized in other quarters.

21 For example the terra-cotta plaque of a seated Buddha from Damkot, near Chakdarra, with floral scrollwork and heraldic leogryphs (Dani, A. H., Gandhara art of Pakistan, Peshawar, 1968, p1. XVIII)Google Scholar. Cf. the well-known panels with floral scrolls and leogryph from Cave V of the 53-metre Buddha at Bāmiyān, Rowland, B., Ancient art from Afghanistan, New York, 1966, nos. 81, 82Google Scholar. Both have affinities with the British Museum silver bowl, Dalton, O. M., The treasure of the Oxus, third ed., London, 1964, p. 53Google Scholar, no. 201, and pi. xxix, no doubt rightly ascribed to the later fourth or early fifth century A.D.

22 Tarn, W. W., The Greeks in Bactria and India, second ed., Cambridge, 1951, 494Google Scholar. For its attribution to Menander, see the present writer's note in BSOAS, xxvi, 3, 1963, p. 501Google Scholar, n. 1.

23 A.D. 78 is, of course, the starting-point of the Saka Era under the Western Satraps, but there is still no clear evidence for its use in the north-west.

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25 van Wijk, W. E., ‘On dates in the Kaniṣka Era’, Ada Orientalia, v, 1927, 168–70Google Scholar. This result was of course accepted by SirMarshall, John, Taxila, i, 71Google Scholar, whose dynastic, but not artistic, chronology is followed here almost in its entirety.

26 ‘The Kaniṣka dating from Surkh Kotal’, BSOAS, xxvi, 3, 1963, 489–502Google Scholar.

27 Thus seven coins of Vāsudeva were reported from the excavations of Jamālgārhi, cf. Cunningham, A., Archaeological Survey of India [Reports], v, 1875, 194Google Scholar, with the possible implication that the site was abandoned in this reign. At Sanghao, coins of Kaniṣka were found in the ‘superstructure’, which was thus presumably standing in that emperor's reign. The sculptures were, however, in the ‘basement’, and thus possibly (but not necessarily) earlier (Smith, V. A., JASB, LVIII, Pt. i, No. 3, 1889, 147)Google Scholar.

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31 Since the Takht-i Bāhī inscription of year 103 (CII, II, 1, pp. 57 ff.) is best related to the Vikrama Bra of 57 B.C., and thus preserves the king's synchronism with the Apostle Thomas.

32 The single Gandhāra panel reported by SirMarshall, John, ‘Greeks and Sakas in India’, JRAS, 1947, pi. viiGoogle Scholar, fig. 12, lay close to the surface, and was isolated, thereby suggesting that it was not in situ, but a stray brought in the past from a near-by monastery site.

33 CII, ii, 1, p. 106.

34 ibid., p. 117.

35 ibid., p. 171.

36 ibid., p. 124.

37 e.g., the Kula Dherī (Chārsadda) casket of the year 303 (Majumdar, N. G., ‘Inscriptions on two relic caskets from Charsadda’, Epigraphia Indica, xxiv, 1, 1937, 9)Google Scholar; the Jamālgārhī inscription of the year 359. Their conversions, on the hypothesis developed here, are: Kula Dherī, 303—155 = A.D. 148; Jamālgārhī, 359—155 = A.D. 204. The second figure seems late; it was not upon a statue, but on a stone, Peshawar Museum, No. 23.

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43 CII, II, 1, p. 125, where earlier references are listed. It is also accepted by Dobbins, K. Walton, ‘A note on the Hāritī image from Skārah Ḍherī, year 399’, East and West, NS, XVII, 3–4, 1967, 268–72Google Scholar, who gives excellent illustrations.

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54 Hirth, F., China and the Roman Orient, Leipzig, 1885, 175Google Scholar, quoting the Hou Han shu.

55 The formidable bulk of Galen's surviving writings, 20 volumes in the standard edition, has been an embarrassment to those seeking a complete evaluation of his evidence on this point, scattered as it is amongst discussions of other matters. A useful selection is that of Haeser, H., Historisch-pathologische Untersuchungen, Dresden and Leipzig, 1839, I, 69–75Google Scholar. It may suffice to quote from De methodo medendi, v, 12 (= vol. x of the standard edition):

κατ⋯ τ⋯ν μ⋯γαν το⋯τον λοιμ⋯ν, ⋯ν εἴη ποτ⋯ πα⋯σεσθαι, τρ⋯τον εἰσβ⋯λλοντα. τ⋯τε νεαν⋯σκος τις

⋯νναταῖος ⋯ζ⋯νθησεν ἔλκεσιν ⋯λον τ⋯ σ⋯μα, καθ⋯περ κα⋯ οἱ ἄλλοι σϰεδ⋯ν ἄπαντες οἱ σωθ⋯ντες. ⋯ν

το⋯τῳ δ⋯ κα⋯ ὑπ⋯βηττε βραϰ⋯α. τῇ δ' ὑστερα⋯ᾳ λουσ⋯μενος αὐτ⋯κα μ⋯ν ἔβηζε σφοδρ⋯τερον,

⋯νην⋯ϰθη δ' αὐτῷ μετ⋯ τ⋯ς βηϰ⋯ς, ἤν ⋯νομ⋯ζουσιν ⋯φελκ⋯δα

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