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Novembee, 1906.]
ANTIQUARIAN NOTES IN BURMA AND CEYLON.
295
His trausliteration into modern Burmese character is :
38သတိပုတ္သဘောက ကာယ
With this reading Mr. Louis Finot, who has been kind enough to give the subject his close attention, is dissatisfied ; bat I will not here enter on the discussion which has now lasted some months, regarding the inscription, character by character. Suffice it to repeat that all European criticism can only be of a tentative nature till the Government of India in the Archeological Department is able to provide scholars with facsimiles of Burmese inscriptions of different epochs for comparison.
Aksharas will be observed close to the heads of the different Buddha figures, on the right side of each. These are probably the initials of their names - Ti for Tissa, or Tishya; Ka for Kakusandha, Kassapa, or another; and so on.
B. - Ceylon.
Slabs from Amarduati at Anuradhapura. In the museum at Anuradhapura, Ceylon, lie three marble sculptures; two having groups of figures, while the third is the lower portion of a flattened octagonal pillar bearing an inscription. All three appear to have been brought to Ceylon from the Amaravati Stapa, in India. A the first glance I identified them as Aniaravati marbles, and subsequent investigation has confirmed me in this opinion. By permission of Mr. Still of the Archeological Department I brought with me to England a small chip from the rongh unsculptured back of one of the slabs (fig. 4 of the Plate), and submitted it, together with a fragment picked up by myself in 1877 during the excavations at Amaravati, for examination at the Geological Museum in Jermyn Street and the Imperial Institute Laboratories in South Kensington. The question pat in each case was whether the Anuradhapura chip was a piece of Ceylon marble, or was of similar formation to the material of which the Amaravati chip was composed.
Dr. Flett of the Geological Museum was kind enough to make a very careful analysis of the stones, and he sent me his written opinion thereon, in the following terms:
“The two specimens of crystalline limestone which you left with me..... are so exactly similar ...... in microscopic section that there can be little doubt that they are from the same locality. Some minor differences may be noted, but none of any importance, and as these schistose limestones are rarely exactly the same, even in the same quarry, these differences may be disregarded. The rocks are both of a somewhat peculiar character; they consist of the same mineral and in very much the same proportions, and their structures are identical."
In answer to my question whether he thought it possible for these two stones to have come from different countries, or whether their similarity must be held conclusively to prove that both came from the Palnad formations, which supplied the material for the Anarâvati sculptures, Dr. Flett replied:
"I may say that I should certainly consider it a remarkable coincidence if two crystallized limestones, similar in foliation and in the nature and proportions of accessory ingredients, should occur in two places so widely separated. If the rocks were of a more common type this would not be extraordinary, but this limestone is a rock with well-marked characters, such as are not at all likely to be repeated."
Dr. Evans of the Imperial Institute entirely concurred in this view, pointing out that the marble of Ceylon is very coarselycrystalline, and of quite a different structure and formation to the compact laminated limestone of the Palnkd.
