Ajanta: History and Development: The End of the Golden Age Volume 1

435 Pages·2005·1.845 MB·English

by  Walter Spink

AJANTA
THE END OF THE GOLDEN AGE
HANDBOOK OF ORIENTAL STUDIES
HANDBUCH DER ORIENTALISTIK
SECTION TWO
INDIA
INDIEN
edited by
J. BRONKHORST
VOLUME 18/1
AJANTA: HISTORY AND DEVELOPMENT
THE END OF THE GOLDEN AGE
AJANTA: HISTORY AND
DEVELOPMENT
VOLUME ONE
THE END OF THE GOLDEN AGE
BY
WALTER M. SPINK
BRILL
LEIDEN•BOSTON
2005
Cover illustration: Ajanta Cave 1, façade view to left. Initiated 466, abandoned late 477.
Published with courtesy of the Michigan Asian Art Archives.
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A C.I.P. record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.
Appendix One (The Daáakum§racarita of DaÖ·in, 4th edition, 1966) is published
with permission of Motilal Banarsidass, Delhi/Varanasi/Patna.
ISSN 0169-9377
ISBN 90 04 14832 9
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For H
Who made it all possible

CONTENTS
To the Reader .......................................................................... xi
Introduction and a few Conventions ........................................ 1
A THE END OF THE GOLDEN AGE
Chapter 1 Ajanta in a Historical and Political Context ...... 7
This summary of my views was originally published in MTDC’s
magazine Maharashtra Pathik (Sept. 1990), with the understanding that
it would be used for the present purpose. It may be of particular
interest because it was followed in later issues by the comments
and/or criticisms of my colleagues. Concerned particularly with issues
of history and epigraphy, these essays reveal clearly the bones of our
contention. The various essays will be found in a later volume
(Arguments about Ajanta).
Chapter 2 A Query and A Response .................................. 22
This chapter is introduced by a probing letter by Dr. Heinrich von
Stietencron, questioning the validity of the “short chronology” for
Ajanta. Entitled “Questions addressed to Walter Spink”, it was
published at the request of Dr. Hans Bakker, in his recent volume,
The Vakataka Heritage: Indian Culture at the Crossroads, Groningen, 2004,
consisting of scholarly papers presented at a recent conference with
that same title. This short letter is followed by a rather long response
by the present author discussing the character of the site, as well as
patronage, chronology, and other matters.
Chapter 3 How the Monks Lived: Shrines and Cells at
Ajanta .................................................................... 66
The Vakataka viharas at Ajanta were originally planned as mere
dormitories for the monks, a usage that would hardly justify the
splendors of their present decoration. This must be explained by
their transformation, starting a half decade after the inauguration of
the site’s Vakataka phase, into shrines, in which not only the monks,
but the Buddha himself was resident. The donation of the Buddha
images in the shrines, and the creation of their richly meaningful
decorative contexts, now became an obsession with Ajanta’s courtly
patrons, eager not only for religious merit but for worldly praise.
However, the delights which such elite donors sponsored should not
totally distract us from considering how the monks lived within the
viii contents
caves—how they slept, where they hung their clothes, and how they
kept their humble toiletries. What can a survey of the few hundred cells
at Ajanta and related sites tell us about matters of privacy, security,
and convenience?
Chapter 4 In Defense of Dandin: The Historicity of the
Visrutacarita .......................................................... 119
Herein, I directly “bite the bullet” by presenting a detailed analysis of
the historical evidence in Dandin’s Dasakumaracarita, which I insist
provides a remarkably trustworthy account of the specific events
attendant upon the Vakataka fall. Admittedly, however, its convincing
historicity goes against everything that we might otherwise expect.
Perhaps because the “perfect world” which is mirrored at Ajanta fell
apart so dramatically, the situation was unforgettably engraved in
Dandin’s familial memory.
Chapter 5 A Revised Vakataka Chronology ........................ 163
To support my views, I present a Vakataka chronology somewhat
different from the conventional one. In fact, such a revision is
necessary if my analysis of the historical situation is to be valid.
Chapter 6 Dandin’s Visrutacarita and the Future of
Harisena’s Imperium ............................................ 169
An analysis of Dandin’s story of Prince Visruta, presented as a narrative,
aimed at revealing the protagonist’s motivations regarding his ultimate
goal of taking over the power of the collapsing Vakataka house, and
of establishing his own new dynasty on that ancient base. The reader
will find justification for the arguments in Chapters 4 and 5.
Chapter 7 Family Relationships bearing upon Ajanta’s
Short Chronology .................................................. 179
Very shortly after the great emperor Harisena’s death, his minister
Varahadeva (donor of Ajanta Cave 16) took Harisena’s grandchildren
for safety to the court of their uncle (Harisena’s “second son”) at
Mahismati, which was still resisting the assaults of the insurrectionist
feudatories. Since Dandin, in the Dasakumaracarita, tells us that the
granddaughter was “about thirteen years” old at the time, we can
estimate that Harisena was roughly fifty years old when he died,
probably at the hands of the Asmakas, in about 477; by the same
token, the emperor would have been in his early thirties when Ajanta
was started shortly after his accession.
Chapter 8 “The Persian Embassy” ........................................ 181
This innocent scene—in fact a Buddhist Jataka tale in praise of
kingship—was the single even if unwilling source of the early but
persistent misdating (by two centuries!) of Ajanta’s great later phase.
This chapter briefly considers how the confusion arose.
contents ix
B THE SHOCK WAVE AND THE SITE
Chapter 9 Ajanta Cave 1: Its Origins and its Aftermath ... 184
Cave 1 is not only the most splendid vihara at the site—indeed, in
the whole of India—but the course of its development must be
understood if we are going understand what happened to the site as a
whole. Its tragic abandonment foretells both the precipitous decline of
the site and the destruction of the Vakataka empire itself. The fact
that it was never dedicated bears directly upon the circumstances of
the Harisena’s death and the site’s consequent collapse.
Chapter 10 Ajanta’s Latter Days: A Review ........................ 200
In 478, the troubled year after Harisena’s death, first the “Vakataka”
patrons, and then the Asmakas, gave up their longstanding patronage
at the site, as a consequence of Harisena’s death. But their reaction
to this dire event and to the problems caused by Harisena’s successor
was quite different, as a study of their caves proves.
Chapter 11 Understanding the Site’s Collapse: The
“Vakataka” Caves” ............................................ 220
This chapter concentrates upon the earlier months of 478, after the
emperor Harisena’s death, during which the Asmakas rejected the
Vakataka overlord, and put “Vakataka” patronage at the site in such
sudden jeopardy, that these established patrons had to precipitously
leave.
Chapter 12 Understanding the Site’s Collapse: The Asmaka
Caves .................................................................... 272
The difference between the situation of the “Vakataka” patrons and
those patrons under Asmaka “protection” illuminates the history of the
difficult year, 478, at the end of which the Asmaka patrons also were
forced to leave the site.
Chapter 13 Caves Abandoned at the Time of Harisena’s
Death .................................................................... 315
These are the caves that were so incomplete when Harisena died that
the patrons gave up on any attempt to get their shrine Buddhas
finished. Because they were never dedicated, they contain no intrusions,
even though there was much space available for such votive imagery.
Chapter 14 Related Caves of the Vakatakas or their
Feudatories .......................................................... 325
This is a survey of important related monuments (Aurangabad, Bagh,
Banoti, Dharasiva, Ghatotkacha, Kanheri, Lonad in most of which
patronage is severely affected or suddenly curtailed in the troubled
year (478) after Harisena’s death. Only Bagh, already completed by
that time, is not thus affected.
x contents
Chapter 15 The Need for Study in Situ (Esp.
Caves 17–20; 29) ................................................ 366
This chapter, with particular attention to the caves of the local king,
Upendragupta, attempts to show how an on-the-spot analysis
contributes to an understanding of the various aspects of work at the
site. It also explores a few of the telling relationships involving this
special group of royal caves (17–20; 29); since work upon them ended
in about 471, due to the defeat of Upendragupta by the Asmakas,
they have had only cursory mention in the previous chapters of this
volume, which focus on the events surrounding Harisena’s death.
Appendix I Visrutacarita of Dandin’s Da≤akumàracarita
(Trans. Kale) ........................................................ 393
The reader should certainly have ready access to the relevant portion
of this important text. The present author sees its eighth ucchvasa—
the account of Prince Visruta—as having a startling and unexpected
historicity. Even though it is richly fleshed out with compelling even if
cautionary excursions into descriptions of the dangers of wine, women,
and song, the bones of the story describe the events connected with
the Vakataka collapse with such surprising precision that its author,
Dandin, must have had first-hand knowledge of the unforgettable
events described.
Appendix II Inscriptions (16, 17, 26, Ghatotkacha) ............ 412
These are the four long inscriptions of the major Vakataka patrons.
The two inscriptions of the Prime Minister Varahadeva in Ajanta
Cave 16 and the Ghatotkacha vihara and the Ajanta Cave 17
inscription of the local king, Upendragupta, have been translated by
V. V. Mirashi. (See Mirashi 1963) The Cave 26 inscription of the
monk Buddhabhadra, translated by Chhabra, is to be found in the
fourth volume (text) of G. Yazdani’s Ajanta (Yazdani, 1955) For a
critical edition of these four records, see Volume II, Appendix:
Inscriptions of Ajanta, by Richard S. Cohen, who provides a new
reading and critical edition of all other inscriptions at the site, both
Hinayana and Vakataka.