________________
CANONS & SYMBOLISM
[PART EX
is actually called fild-pato. It is expressly stated in the last line that this tablet was meant for worship of (offering to) Arhats (Arahata-päjäye).
Hemacandra refers to ball-pattas, with figures of asta-mangalas in Jaina shrines. These are certainly the ayaga-patas since each of the ayaga-patas discovered hitherto at Kańkäll-tilä (except the tablets of ascetic Kapha and Aryavati, above, plate 19) has, as its central prominent motif, one of the aşta-mangala symbols. Thus, we have dyaga-pata with svastika, tri-ratna, stúpa, dharma-cakra, sthäpanācārya (or Indra-yaşti as identified by V.S. Agrawala), etc. Some of the tablets have figures of all the eight auspicious symbols on them, for example, the ayaga-pata which is the gift of Sihanädika, the ayagapaja of the wife of Bhadranandi and the ayaga-pata of an unknown donor from Mathură. The list of eight auspicious symbols of the age was somewhat different from the lists now current with the Svetämbara and the Digambara sects.
The practice of installing objects of worship on platform under caityatrees continues to this day in India, and we find loose broken or intact images and stones placed on such platforms under trees in villages and towns. An interesting evidence of about first century B.C. is obtained in a relief-panel from Mathura which has the representation of a Siva-linga under a tree, both enclosed in a railing."
In the Aupapatika-sütra description of the caitya of Parnabhadra (a wellknown ancient Yakşa), there is no mention of a structural shrine, and here possibly the tree itself with silä-patta is the Yakşa-ayatana as in the case of Suciloma-Jataka (Samyutta-Nikaya, 11, 5) where a tankite mañco is stated to be the Yakkha's haunt (bhavana). It seems that the carving of a figure (of the Yaksa or any deity) on the sila-patta or of installing a sculpture of a deity
1 V.S. Agrawala, Catalogue of the Mathura Museum', Journal of the U.P. Historical Society, XXIII, parts 1-2, pp. 69 ff. For a fuller description of the passage from the Aupapātika. süira, see Shah, op. cit., 1955, pp. 67 ff.
* See the remarks of U.P. Shah in 'Varddhamana-Vidya-Pata', Journal of the Indian Society of Oriental Art, IX, 1941. Hemacandra, in his Trişaşti, I, 3,422 ff., describing a samavasarana says: The arches were adorned with flags and white umbrellas and eight auspicious symbols below looked like those on offering slabs (bali-pottas)."
Smith, op. cit., plates IX, VII; above, plate 3. For a fuller description of and discussion on dydga-patas, see Shah, op. cit., 1955, pp. 77-84, figs. 7, 10, 11, 13, 14, 14A, 14B, etc.
Shah, op. cit., 1955, fig. 67.
482
