Gautam the Siddhartha attained Buddhattva ( enlightenment) under the papal tree at Gaya. The enlightened now calm and serene and probably propelled by the divine reached Mrigdava ( the modern Sarnath is refered to as ‘Mrigdava’ in one of the Jataka stories) where bodies of 500 odd Pratyeka Buddha or rishis had fallen after they attained nirvana ( and so the place is also called Isipatan or Rishipattan in Buddhist texts). Fa-Hien’s chronicle is very concise. "Rather more," He says, "than ten li to the north-east of the city, he found the vihara in the park of the ‘Rishi’s Deer-wild.’ In this park there formerly resided the Pratyeka Buddha, with whom the deer were regularly in the habit of stopping for the night. When The world-honored one was about to attain to perfect Wisdom, the divas sang in the sky ‘The son of king Suddhodana, having quitted his family and studied the Path (of Wisdom) will now in seven days become Buddha. The Pratyeka Buddha heard their words, and immediately attained to Nirvana; and hence this place was named ‘The Park of the Rishi’s Deer-wild.’
What was the place called when the Buddha arrieved here is not known? Why did Buddha come here to preach straight from Bodhgaya is also not sure? From Bodhgaya to Mrigdava is a long journey which passes through various cities, towns and villages, still the Buddha came directly to Mrigdava, Why? Was it a famous place already? Or Buddha came here perforce not finding right persons to hear him. These are some of the questions which cannot be answered convincingly. Such queries haunt my mind but finding myself not well equipped to attempt their answer I take this episode as ordained by divine. However, Buddha the teacher found five recluses (i.e. Kaundinya, Bashpa, Bhadrika, Mahanaman and Ashvajit), dissatisfied with their masters, meditating here. He gave a sermon to them and convincing them into his fold set the wheel of law into motion. The dharmachakra was now moving on a modest pace, as these five mendicants stuck to him.
It is highly unlikely that during his journey from Bodhgaya to Mrigdava, which must have taken considerable time, Gautam Siddhartha did not talk to anybody about his new found wisdom. Or rather he discussed it with his co-travellers but finding no takers proceeded further in search of takers of his ideas and reached Mrigdava, where the five recluses readily accepted him and his ideology. Thus, Gautam became Buddha only after he could develop a followership. It sure takes fan-followership to become famous, irrespective of amount of talent or qualities one might possess.
Anyway, this all falls in the realm of may be and may not be, and is certainly not the focus of this present writing. Buddha preached at a place in a mrigdava, and the Mrigdava became famous. Asoka the great, built a stupa and also erected a carved pillar, undoubtedly the best of the lot, to commemorate the event. Viharas developed and the size of the stupa and the numbers of viharas gradually increased. The stupa increased in size due to several repairs and amendments. Repairs to stupa may suggest some vandalism, if not religious animosity. As the monastic centre survived through endowments from state as well as from donations by business magnets, with the passage of time fresh viharas were erected over the debris of other earlier ones. Large scale building activities were encountered in the Kushana period. Temples, monasteries and chaityas embellished with images (a new introduction) were constructed, which again in due time were razed to make room for later constructions in Gupta period. This later period saw an introduction of a new pro-Indian phase of realism in plastic art and some of the best images were made in this period. The Dhamek Stupa was given a new structure over an old foundation of Mauryan times. Thus, from the time of Buddha the Mrigdava flourished as a great centre of Buddhist worship and practice down to the times of Govind Chandra of Gahadval dynasty as the last evidenced monastery is that ordered by his wife the queen Kumardevi.
Something drastic seems to have happened at Mrigdava around 12th century AD that virtually eradicated Buddhism from Mrigdava. This event was so complete that the place could not be re-established and was allowed to slip into oblivion for centuries. Except Dharmarajika, Dhamek and Chuakhandi (the last name is medieaval) nothing remained above ground. Its association with Buddhism was completely lost, until 1794 AD when Jagat Singh, Dewan of Raja Chet Singh, ordered for querrying of bricks and stones from a place near Benaras called Sarnath, where a great heap of brick was readily available.
The great heap of bricks was the Dharmarajika stupa of Mrigdava, which was completely dismantled and carted to Benaras. The work was stopped only when some pieces of bones along with ashes, and some gold leaves, pearls and other objects were found in a casket of green marble. Thanks to one Mr. Jonathan Duncan, a resident of Benaras, that this finding was report to learned world in 1798 AD and association of something Buddhist with Sarnath was established. For almost five centuries the name Mrigdava and anything Buddhist was forgotten from the human memory. The place was instead known as Sarnath, a derived form of Saranganath – a form of Shiva holding a deer, who was the presiding deity of a temple there.
Ever since 1794 AD antiquarian attention was focussed at Sarnath. In 1835-36, Alexander Cunningham, a Major then, spent 18 months and Rs. 517 on excavating the site with sole intention to retrieve the relic casket. The borings and burrowing at Dhamek and Chaukhandi did not reveal anything but the make-up of the stupas. The other digs, however, yielded a monastery, a temple and a chamber full of statues. Later in 1851 Major Kittoe, Archaeological Enquirer to the Government, started excavation at this place and brought to light a monastery to the south-east of Jagat Singh’s stupa (as the Dharmarajika was known and referred), a rectangular structure to the west of Dhamek which he preferred to call ‘Hospital’ and rows of votive and donative stupas to north and east of Dhamek. Though no chronological information could be derieved from these findings yet the topography and contours of the Mrigdava were changed considerably. Major Kittoe, following Hwen tsang’s description believed in three stupas in Mrigdava – Jagat Singh’s stupa and Dhamek were already there and the third he identified a short distance north of Jagat Singh’s stupa, which he could not probe.
Major Kittoe’s fatal illness prevented him from reporting his excavation properly and most of the details were lost, some informal communications survive. His work was further continued in 1853 by Mr. A. Thomas followed by Dr. F. Hall and Mr. Buttler. In 1865 Mr. C. Horne and in 1877 Mr. Rivett Carnao also did their antiquarian hunt. In all these attempts some more structural remains were added to the personality of the site. Since these efforts, except those by Kittoe, lacked planning and academic purpose, proved little beyond the haphazard digs.
Finally in 1903-04 Mr. F. O. Oertel of the Public Works Department started detailed excavation. He cleared the area where Kittoe had identified his third stupa and could expose a very elaborate temple built of lavishly carved burnt bricks belonging to the last phase of occupation and the Asokan Pillar and lion capital to the west of it and a large number of images of Buddhist affiliation.
Remains at Sarnath attest only to the century of Asoka, where as the Mrigdava and Buddha association is more than two hundred years older. Not much reliance can be placed on the findings and more importantly, neither on the procedure of findings. As the minor antiquities and potsherds were not considered important, only few complete earthen wares and some objects which caught the fancy of the diggers were preserved. Therefore, the dates pronounced more than hundred years ago may be improved upon. Aktha which is only a stone’s throw away was expected to add some pointers in this context. Excavation here yielded evidences of a small rural settlement, which the excavator readily identified it as “one such rural settlement which right from the earliest times till its desertion, evidenced strong hermitage bias in terms of intensive ritual performances and simplicity of the associated articles suggesting rishis or learned pilgrims were halting and residing en route, while travelling to various places in the uttarapatha, northern India – concept inherent in Risipattan”. The evidences cited in favour of this hypothesis are – presence of post holes and rammed floors only and ‘no evidence’ of lumps with reed impression and mud plaster. As if the hermitage is very different from simple hutment or the application of mud plaster or mud wrapped walls were proscribed for hermitage. Further, for the presence of reed-impressed lumps some evidence of fire is also required. Unless and until a plan is available or some other very convincing evidence is produced declaration or even suggestion of “strong hermitage bias” seems rather unwarranted and born of wishful subjective thinking.
The fact that in post 12th century scenario, when the place was not only completely destroyed but even the memory of it was so completely erased from the human mind that the names such as mrigdava and Risipattan were preserved only in the literature, instead the place was known by the name Sarnath. Here it is important to remember that one Jain text of 17th century refers to this place as ‘Dharmeksha’ and identifies it as associated with Shreyansnath, one of the tirthankar. But this too appears to be a later extrapolation by one of the jain sadhu. (it shows some reference to the name of Dhamek (which appears to be a corrupted form of Dharmeksha), which Cunningham so fervently tried to find but could not derive at this form)
As the earliest reference to Mrigdava is found in one of the Jatak stories – Nigrodha Mriga Jatak. It appears possible that this Jatak and other stories regarding the fall/demise of 500 rishis at the time of Gautam becoming Buddha are projections of an aura created at a later date. The story of ‘rishi patan’ reminds something of the kind “sau padhha to ek pratapgarhha” or an allegoric mention to the acquired divine knowledge of Buddha that with his rise to prominence five hundred rishis (of Brahmanical faith) faded into oblivion. Further, the place where Buddha delivered his first sermon came to be known as ‘mrigdava’ and the monastery ‘Mulagandha Kuti’ is a figuratively correct nomenclature. As the deer searches for the source of the scent of kasturi and runs hither-thither and lastly rests satisfied, similarly the Buddha, on attaining the ultimate knowledge hidden inside him moved from place to place and finally arrived at Sarnath and rested here.
Excavations at Sarnath continued intermittently till 1932. Each passing year of excavation added some new features to the ancient monastic settlement at Sarnath, there by changing the landscape. A large number of remains movable as well as immovable were laid bare. Large proportion of the movable remains found their ways to various quarters of the world and some unfortunate ones got watery grave (in the pier of Duncan’s bridge on Varuna) or were crushed to make concrete or refashioned into other building material (at Queen’s College). Some fortunate ones which had survived the vagaries of time and were probably in good shape found their way back to Sarnath (museum) or other museums or collections.
The immovable property at Sarnath, with sole exception of Dharmarajika Stupa which was vandalised by Jagat Singh, most survive till date. However, with modifications some induced deliberately and some due to ignorance of the executioner. Many of the structural remains have been done away with and some have been re buried to create a better movement plan for the visitor. Still a comparison of what was excavated and what we have today will reveal that drastic changes have been made in structures and many of the structures have now become almost modern with the use of modern building material. It may be a big question as to whither we are moving in the field of conservation? To what extent conservation should be permissible and at what cost? Are we going to hand over the next generation a fake in place of ancient monument? We are not sure what was the original shape of Dhamek let aside the dharmarajika? Which is no more today, no research is undertaken before initiating a conservation project. No detailed reports of conservation problems and remedial measures suggested are preserved or made public, with the result that a lay tourist is befooled.
From all the remains I would like to stress upon some – dhamek and few other structures – to show the tell-tale marks of the passage of a century. I would also like to suggest the original shape of the Dhamek stupa.
The scene predating the Jagat Singh episode (1794 AD) can but only be conjectured with Dharmarajika and Dhamek both standing tall, but the landscape changed immediately after. Dharmarajika was dismantelled and carted away while the sturdier Dhamek was left bruised. Whatsoever damage Jagat Singh affected to the landscape of Sarnath, he must, however, be credited with the revival of Sarnath as a Buddhist centre by highlighting its presence. It was initially the destruction that attracted the attention of scholarly world towards Sarnath. First to come Sarnath were the Jainas, who erected a temple very near to the Dhamek in 1824 AD.
Jaina scholars and saints referred to a text belonging to 16th century which mentioned the place as Dharmeksha, of which the much rolled form is Dhamek. Interestingly, Major Cunningham in 1835 began his search for the root or the original name for Dhamek but even as General in 1862 he could not find this Jain source which is refered by Oertel in 1905 AD. (Could it be said that the Jain source was a creation of period between 1835/1862 and 1905.) Whatever the case may be, Sarnath landscape had a Jain presence by 1824 AD, which was enlarged to almost double in size by 1862 AD.
Series of excavations which began with Major Cunningham and continued intermittently upto 1928 AD brought to light many remains at the site. Some of these lost their existence due to negligence, some were removed deliberately for approaching the remains of earlier period, still others were reburied or done away with to lay movement path to make the site tourist friendly. Thus, the landscape at Sarnath changed drastically since 1794. Large scale documentation done by Cunningham and later by Oertel and Marshall and others speaks volumes about this shifting landscape.
Now, if the documentation of 1905 AD, specially the drawings and photographs, is taken as a bench mark for the study of this shift, it may be seen that structures that had withstood the two onslaughts of human destruction coupled with vagaries of nature for almost 1200 years found the last century the most difficult for survival. Plans and elevation drawings attest to this fact. The drawing of the west face of Dhamek is sufficient to illustrate the marks of last century, when it was cared for by the government. There are eight projected niches around the drum of the stupa separated by recesses. Seven of the projecting niches are capped with simple tapering cone, but the one on the west is special as it shows a shoulder above the straight sided drum and is capped by gently curved dome topped by two receding stepped boxes, on top of which is a socket for holding flagstaff. The shape alone was not different, the decoration that it bore were also different than that of the drum.
The significance of the western projection has been a topic of debate among scholars and researchers. Cunningham and Oertel the two serious excavators have deliberated on it at great length forwarding their own views for dedicating the stupa for one or the other form of Buddha. The two justifications, although very logical failed to satiate my hunger for the architectural queries. Dhamek attracted me not only for its dimensions and shape but also for its architectural peculiarities, keeping the time frame for its construction in mind. The projections on regular interval remind of the up-shikara or anga shikharas that developed in the temple architecture.
