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MONUMENTS & SCULPTURE A.D. 300 TO 600
[PART III
Another important Jaina monument which flourished in the fifth century but eventually disappeared is known from the Paharpur copper-plate inscription of the (Gupta) year 159A.D. 479. This extensive Jaina monastic establishment was situated at Vata-Gohali and was presided over by the Nirgrantha preceptor (śramaṇācārya) Guhanandin, belonging to the Pañcastupa-nikaya of Käsi or Navyāvakasika. The vihara was subsequently enlarged and occupied by the great temple and monastic complex of the Buddhists. However, the excavations at the site have revealed that even as the monastery was enlarged, it retained the original Jaina plan conforming to the typical sarvatobhadra type. This plan is typically Jaina is evolution. During its heyday the vihara of Vata-Gohali was an active centre of Jaina religious pursuits, and when Hiuen Tsang visited the Pundravardhana region he saw some one hundred Deva temples where sectaries of different schools congregated. Amongst them the naked Nirgranthas were most numerous.
REMAINS OF RAJGIR
Located at Rajgir are the twin rock-cut Sonbhandar caves,' involving a different mode of workmanship than used in the structural edifices. These caves eastern and western (plates 51 and 52)-have been assigned to the third or fourth century A.D. Cunningham had identified the western cave with the famed Saptaparni cave where the first Buddhist Council was held. Subsequently, when the other cave was discovered, Beglar suggested that the two caves belonged to Buddha and his disciple Ananda. These suggestions should be
1 Dikshit, op. cit., pp. 59 ff.
* Pañca-stüpänvaya, mentioned in the sixth and thirteenth lines of the inscription, was founded by Arhadbalaya Acarya of Pundravardhana, according to the Śrutavatara cf. Chhotelal Jain in Anekanta, Aug., 1966, p. 239; cf. also S.B. Deo, History of Jaina Monachism, Poona, 1956, p. 558, for the anvayas.
J. Fergusson, History of Indian and Eastern Architecture, London, 1906, II, p. 28; Mukherji, op. cit., p. 149. This type of plan may have evolved out of the Jaina samavasaranas. For samavasaranas and their antiquity, see U.P. Shah, Studies in Jaina Art, Banaras, 1955, pp. 123 ff. Similar plan occurs later at Osia and Sadri in Rajasthan and at the ChausathYogini temple at Khajuraho. K. Fischer, Caves and Temples of the Jainas, Aliganj, Etah, 1957, p. 5.
S. Beal, Buddhist Records of the Western World, London, 1906, II, p. 195.
Kuraishi and Ghosh, op. cit., p. 26, plate VII A; M.H. Kuraishi, List of Ancient Monuments Protected under Act VII of 1904 in the Province of Bihar and Orissa, Archaeological Survey of India, New Imperial Series, LI, Calcutta, 1931, pp. 120 f., figs. 80-81.
• Archaeological Survey of India Reports, III, Calcutta, 1873, pp. 140 ff; earlier he had identified it with Pippala cave (ibid., I, Simla, 1871), p. 24.
Kuraishi, op. cit., 1931, p. 121.
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