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No. 18.]
TWO INSCRIPTIONS ON BUDDHIST IMAGES.
181
The statue to which the inscription belongs is shown on the accompanying Plate. It is called a Bôdbisattva. Unfortunately the head is broken, and it is impossible to say whether it wore some sort of a diadem, as the so-called 'Bodhisattva' figures in the contemporaneous art of Gandhåra. There are, however, no necklace or other ornaments of the body, and the feet are naked. The left hand rests on the hip, and the broken right hand probably was uplifted in the Act of granting protection (abhaya-mudra). The right shoulder is bare, and between the feet stands some indistinct round object, which I am unable to explain. The girdle around the waist is the only mark of difference between this state and the ordinary type of a Buddha image. The term Bodbisattva is likewise applied to the Mathura image to which the second inscription belongs, and which was a seated figare. Unfortunately it is broken, and not much can be said in regard to its general appearance.
From Dr. Vogel's account it appears that the recently excavated Sarnath image is very similar to that from Sråvasti. He also suggests that all these three images were made at Mathura. The Srêvasti image is 11 feet 8 inches high. Its material is the red sandstone from the quarries near Fathpur-Sikri.
TEXT. 1 [Maharajasya devaputrasya Kanishkasya (or Huvishkasya) sam . . .
. .di] 10 etaye purvaye bhikshusya Pushya[vu). 2 [ddhis]ya! Saddhy[e]viharisya bhikshusya Balasya trepitakasya dânam
B[o]dhisatvo chhatram d&p das-cha Savastiye Bhagavato chamkame 3 Kosambakuţiye acharyyârâm Sarvastivadinam parigahe.
TRANSLATION. (In the ...th year of the Mahar&ja, the Dêvaputra Kanishka (or Huvishka P), in the . ..th month of . . . . . ., on the] 19th [day], on the date specified above, a Bôdhisattva, an umbrella and a stick, the gift of the monk Bala, who knows the Tripitaka, a companion (saddhy[e]vihárin) of the monk Pushya[vřiddhi], (have been set up) at Sråvasti, at the place where the Lord (i.e. Buddha) used to walk, in the Kosambakuti, as the property of the teachers of the school of Sarvástivadins.
B. - MATHURA IMAGE INSCRIPTION OF THE YEAR 33 OF HUVISHKA.
This inscription is on the broken pedestal of a seated Buddha image from the Chaubârå mound near Mathura. It is now in the Lucknow Provincial Museum. It measures 3 feet by 2 inches. The size of the letters varies between and 14 inches. The end of the second line is damaged and cannot be restored completely.
The writing is of a later type than the Set-Mahet image inscription. The ya in the compound letter sya is expressed by the cursive form in deva putrasya, Huvishkasya and trepitakasya (1.1), and by the full form of the letter in bhikshusya Balasya (1.1), while an intermediate form, with a loop attached to the left-hand side of the central line, is found in maharajasya (1.1). The old form of sha with a small apper cross-bar occurs only once, in bhikshusya (1. l), if the impression can be trusted. The later sa with a loop in the left-hand lower corner is found in maharajasya, devaputrasya, sarh (1. 1), as has been pointed out already by Prof. Lüders (loc. cit. p. 40). The language is the ordinary mixed dialect of Sanskrit and Präkfit employed in the
See above, p. 180, note 1. * So with Sarnath No. III. a, lines 2 and 6. The surface of the stone above ddhy is damaged.
The one is added in small letters at the top of the line.
