Page:History of Indian and Eastern Architecture Vol 1.djvu/115

 CHAP. III. JAGGAYYAPETA, ETC. inscriptions of considerable palaeographic interest, the alphabet of which can hardly be placed later than 200 B.C. 1 At Gudivada, 20 miles north-west from Masulipatam, there was a "dibba" containing the remains of a stupa, which was also demolished by the local engineers, it is said about 1860, and so little was left of it that its dimensions cannot now be ascertained. Four relic caskets are said to have been found, though we can learn nothing about their age ; but considerable numbers of Andhra coins, mostly of lead, are turned up about the site belonging, probably, to the first three centuries of our era. 2 The stupa at Jaggayyapeta or Betavolu, 30 miles north- west from Amaravati, had been plundered of its rail, and of much of the marble casing of its basement, the dome had been destroyed, and relic casket dug out before it was surveyed in 1882. The basement was 31^- ft. in diameter, and portions of the facing remained, chiefly on the south side where the slabs on the projection for the support of the five stelae bore archaeic sculptures. The procession-path had been about 5 ft. wide, surrounded by a rail or wall, of which every fragment had disappeared. 8 At Ghantayala, 13 miles west from Masulipatam, a mound was surveyed by Mr. Rea in 1892, and was found to contain the remains of a stupa with a diameter at the ground level of about in ft. contained by a circular brick wall 18 ft. thick, forming the drum of the stupa. Inside this was a curious reticulation of walls, between which the spaces were packed with black earth : a circular wall of 56 ft. outside diameter was connected by sixteen radiating partitions with the outer wall ; and inside this was a square of 26 ft, in the middle of which was a column of brick 10 ft. square, joined to the preceding by four partitions from the middle of its sides, which ran right through the whole interior, while the sides of the outer square were continued to the inner circle.* In the centre of the column was a well, varying in width from 9 in. to 2 ft, 6 in. square, in which was a relic casket, but without anything to indicate its age. On each of the four faces of the base were projections, as at Jaggayyapeta, about 17 ft. in length by 5 1 ft. broad and 4^ ft. high. Sculptured slabs were 1 ' Epigraphia Indica,' vol. ii. , preface, pp.ix.-xiii. , and pp. 323-329; Rea's' South Indian Buddhist Antiquities,' pp. 7-16 ; and conf. Fleet 'Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society,' 1903, pp. 996. 2 Sewell, ' Topographical Lists of Antiquarian Remains, 'p. 52 ; Rea, op. <r;V.pp. 18-23. 3 ' The Buddhist Stupas of Amaravati and Jaggayyapeta,' pp. 107-113, and plates 53-55. 4 Rea, ' South Indian Buddhist Antiquities,' plate 14 ; a less complex arrangement of interior partitions was found by Dr Fiihrer in the Kankali-Tila at Mathura. Foucher, ' L'Art Greco- Bouddhique,' torn. i. p. 95 ; and V. Smith, 'Jain Stupa,' plates I and 3.