Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
Occasional Papers, 1
Harry Falk
Lumbini
1998
Cover picture:
Nativity of the Buddha, 9th century,
stone sculpture, h. 84 cm.
Courtesy of the National Museum,
Kathmandu
Copyright by
Lumbini International Research Institute,
Lumbini
Printed at: Mass Printing Press, Kathmandu
Contents
Preface iii
Abbreviations 24
Preface
Christoph Clippers
Lumbini, 1998
1
1. No other place than Lumbini has ever claimed to be the site of the
Buddha's birth. Bareau2 recently drew attention to inconsistencies in the
source texts, and on the basis of them cast doubt upon Lumbini's legitimacy.
He reasonably mused that a pregnant woman would not wish to leave home
to bear her child without some motivation (77). Since there was no particular
.t-
reason for Maya to do any travelling, Siddhartha could not have been born
in Lumbini but only in Kapilavastu, the royal family'S seat. Since no text
mentions the capital city of the Sakyas as the birthplace of the Buddha, the
tradition of the texts should be rejected as an artful but ahistorical legend.
Had Bareau delved into Indian customs, he would certainly have
been more cautious: "In many parts of India a woman prefers to go back to
'The Gennan version of this article was originally published in Acta Orientalia 52
(1991): 70-90. The English translation was done by Philip Pierce. All citations of foreign-
language works have been rendered into English.
lef. Herbert Hiirtel, "Archaeological Research on Ancient Buddhist Sites," in H.
Bechert, ed., The Dating of the Historical Buddha-Die Datierung des historischen Buddha,
Symposien zur Buddhismusforschung, IV 1 = AAWG no. 189 (Gottingen: 1991),61-89,
esp.7Off,
..
2Andre Bareau, "Lumbint et la naissance du futur Buddha," BEFEO 76 (1987): 69-81.
Harry Falk 2
her old home for the birth of her first child," wrote Stevenson from Gujarat
at the beginning of the century. "3
The arguments Bareau advances to explain why tradition has linked
Lumbinlof all places to this far-reaching event are most speculative. From
the Asokan inscription he reads, following Bloch, 4 that the king once had a
stone wall (silavigat;iabhlca) constructed. This wall, Bareau assumes,
supposedly marked the site of a fonner temple dedicated to a ya~iI)l who
was able to assure births free of complications. This ya~iI)l is said to have
had a statue representing her in the salabhafijika pose (78). There was, of
course, no child at the side of this female being. But since the Buddha was
never portrayed at the time in human fonn, such an absence proved no
obstacle for believers of later periods to transfer thither the birth of
Siddhartha (79).
The first premise of this hypothesis is already unacceptable. Up to
now we still have not the least idea whether sila-vigat;ia-bhlca or sila-
vigat;iabhl ca (= ca) is the proper reading, and what the expression
vigat;iabhl(?cajca) in the inscription at hand means. It is in any case certain
that in purely linguistic tenns it has nothing to do with bhitti 'wall,.5 The
stilpas and other buildings in LumbinI, ~s is the custom in this part of the
country, are all constructed of brick. To be sure, a so-called "cyclopean"
stone wall has been preserved around the old town of Rajagrha, but only for
an edifice serving a technical military function-on top of a rocky summit.
A change of construction material would make no sense in the Tarai. Thus
the most one may infer from Asoka's inscription is that, alongside the
massive (i.e. not rubble) stone columns (silathabhe), he had a massive (sila)
vigat;iabhl(Ca) erected. No matter how one analyzes silavigat;iabht(ca)
linguistically, there is nothing to support the notion of a massive wall. But
3[Margaret] Sinclair Stevenson, The Rites of the Twice-Born (London: 1920; Delhi:
1971), 1.
4Jules Bloch, Les inscriptions dAsoka (Paris: 1950), 157. Bloch refers in note 3,
however, to phonetic difficulties.
sp. Thieme, "Lexikalische und grammatische Bemerkungen zu den Asoka-Inschriften,"
in Kl. Bruhn and A. Wezler, eds., Studien zum Jainismus und Buddhismus: Gedenkschrift
fur L. Alsdorf, Alt- und Neu-Indische Studien no. 23 (Wiesbaden: 1981), 297.
The Discovery of LumbinI 3
without a wall the already flimsy reason for a ya~il,1i temple falls by the
wayside, and without a ya~il,1i there is no cause to replace one female being
by another.
3. Bareau has gone to great lengths to show that authoritative Buddhist texts,
in expatiating upon the birthplace of the Buddha, are highly contradictory in
the details, as if the authors had never personally been to the scene of the
event. The place is called a "village" (gama) by Asoka; according to the
Suttanipata 683, the birth village (gama) of the Buddha is located in the
country (janapada) belonging to Lumbini; in the Nidanakatha, Lumbini is
only a forest (vana, Ja I 52: 15). Chinese translations speak in terms of a
"garden" or a "park" (71). The tree under which the Buddha was born is
called in the sources either lumba (Mvu I 99:6) or pippala (Lalitavistara, ed.
Lefman, p. 79), Siila (la I 52: 16; Mvu 11 18:9), plak$a (Mvu 11 19: 17) or
else, in travel guides, asoka (78). There is therefore every justification for
Bareau's warning not to exaggerate the authority of the written sources in
their details.
If we seek statements that offer a balanced account of the site as it
actually was, we are forced to resort to the travel reports of foreigners,
namely those written by Chinese and Tibetans.
The Tarai is an unhealthy region; one can travel in it with some
degree of safety only from November on. The Chinese had as much trouble
finding their way forward in the first millennium as archaeologists have had
at the end of the second. It is thus understandable why foreigners, unaware
of the conditions there, should have succumbed to the temptation to visit
Lumbini, whereas Indians, even the Buddhist authors of the early part of the
first millennium, 'Preferred to pass up the trip to the Tarai.
It is not likely that the Moslems had to come in order for Lumbini
to disappear from the map of frequently visited pilgrimage sites. By the
middle of the last century, in any case, the place could no longer be located
by British interested in it. The search for Lumbini necessarily began where
foreigners had described their route.
Harry Falk 4
Here the queen having entered the pool to bathe, came out on
the north side, and after walking twenty paces, raised her
hands and grasped the branch of a tree. Then, facing the east,
she brought forth the Heir Apparent. On reaching the ground,
the Heir Apparent walked seven steps, and two dragop.-kings
washed his body. At the place of the washing, a well was
afterwards made; and also from the above-mentioned bathing-
pool, the priests of to-day are accustomed to get their
drinking water.
i
6The Travels of Fa-hsien (399-414 A. D.), or Record of the Buddhistic Kingdoms,
retranslated by H. A. Giles (Cambridge: 1923; Varanasi: 1972), 36-38.
7Thomas Watters. On Yuan Chwang's Travels in 1ndia (A.D. 629-645),2 vols. (London:
1904/05; Delhi: 1961).
The Discovery of Lumbini 5
which the Buddha had been born into the world. On the east
of this was an Asoka tope, at the place where two dragons
washed the newly born prince with hot and cold water. To
the east of this were two clear springs with topes where two
dragons emerged on the birth of the P'usa and produced two
springs. South of these was a tope where Indra received the
newborn infant P'usa. Next to it were four topes to the four
Devarajas who had taken charge of the baby Buddha after his
birth. Near these topes was a stone pillar set up by Asoka
with the figure of a horse on the top. Afterwards the pillar
had been broken in the middle, and laid on the ground (that
is, half of it), by a thunderbolt from a malicious dragon. Near
this pillar was a small stream flowing south-east, and called
by the people the Oil River. (14f.)
The relevant portions of a travel guide, "probably ... not more than a few
centuries old" (276), written in Tibetan and in part compiled from reports of
the above Chinese travellers, was published by Wadde1l8 in 1896. This
guidebook, which mentions several of the old sites under relatively modem
names, shows that even after the Islamic conquests pilgrims from the north
continued to' seek the way to Lumbini.
5. By the beginning of the 19th century, at a time when ever more was
being learned in Europe about the teaching of the Buddha, the place in the
Tarai had fallen into oblivion. On the basis of non-Indian sources, Schmidt9
had settled upon the notion in 1824 that the Buddha was brought forth in
"Magada," in the city of "Radschagricha."
8L. A. Waddell, "A Tibetan Guide-book to the Lost Sites of the Buddha's Birth and
Death," JASB 65 (1896): 275-279.
9Isaac Jacob Schmidt, Forschungen im Gebiete der (. .. ) Bildungsgeschichte der Vi5lker
Mittel-Asiens, vorzuglich der Mongolen und Tibeter (St. Petersburg: 1824), 171.
Harry Fa1k 6
l~rian Houghton Hodgson, "Sketch of Buddhism, Derived from the Bauddha Scriptures
of NipaJ.," Transactions of the RAS 2 (1830): 222-257.
llNote 1, pages 103f., signed "Kl." in the article by H. Wilson, "Notice sur trois
ouvrages bouddhiques rer;us du Nepal," lA 7 (1831): 97-138.
12H. H. Wilson, "Abstract of the Contents of the Dul-va, or first Portion of the Kith-
gyur, from the Analysis of Mr. Alexander Csoma de Koros, lASB 1 (1832): 1-8.
131. H. Klaproth, Foe Koue Ki ou Relation des royaumes bouddhiques: Voyage dans la
Tartarie, dans l'Afghanistan et dans ['Inde, execute a la fin du IVe siecIe par Chy Fa
Hian, ... (paris: 1836).
The Discovery of LurnbinI 7
14H. H. Wilson, "Account of the Foe Kue Ki; or Travels of Fa Hian in India," JRAS 5
(1839): 123.
IsE. Bumouf, Introduction ill'histoire du Buddhisme Indien (Paris: 1844), 143, n. 2.
16Christian Lassen, Indische Alterthumskunde, vol. 1 (Bonn: 1847), 138, n. 1; vol. 2
(Bonn: 1852), 904, n. 1; vol. 3 (Berlin/London: 1858), 20lf.
17Stanislas Julien, Memoires sur les contrees occidentales, traduits du Sanscrit en
Chinois, en l'an 648 par Hiouen-Thsang, vol. 2 (Paris: 1858), 356.
18Volume 1 (paris: 1857), fold-out.
Harry Falk 8
19Alexander Cunningham, The Ancient Geography of India, vol. 1, The Buddhist Period
(London: 1871), cited according to the 1963 Varanasi reprint.
2A. C. L. Carlleyle, Tours in the Central Doab and Gorakhpur, Archreological Survey
of India, Report 12 (Calcutta: 1879; reprint Varanasi: 1970).
21Preface to Carlleyle's Report, iv.
22 A. Fiihrer, The Monumental Antiquities and Inscriptions, in the North- Western
Provinces and Oudh, Archreological Survey of India (Allahabad: 1981; reprint Varanasi:
1969).
The Discovery of LumbinI 9
23This already occurs, though without "and the inhabitants," in A. Fiihrer, The Sharqi
Architecture of Jaunpur, ASI N.S. 1 (Calcutta: 1889),69.
24 A number of important features of this discovery are related in L. A. Waddell, "The
Discovery of the Birthplace of the Buddha," JRAS 1897: 644-65l.
25G. Biihler, "The Asoka Pillar in the Terai," The Academy 47 (1895): 360; WZKM 9
(1895): 175-177; "The Asoka Edicts of Paderia and Nigliva," EI5 (1898/99): 1-6.
Harry Falk 10
managed "to look up the Asoka pillar." Fiihrer's report to Biihler told of
stilpa fragments near the pillar; it also mentioned, however, the missing
characters in the last line of the inscription. Biihler repeated Fiihrer's
statements that these characters were hidden under ground level and that the
Nepalese had kept him from excavating. 26 Now, there is not the slightest
trace of a stilpa at Nigrui Sagar, nor were the final characters hidden
underground, having long before been broken off with a piece of the pillar.
All told, this can only mean that Fiihrer himself never saw the pillar there
before his reports on Nigliva to Biihler. Somebody else must have obtained
the rubbing at his bidding.
Waddell, for his part, only learned from the press what is in fact
written on the pillar, namely that King Asoka visited the stUpa of the
Buddha KOI)agamana in the twentieth year of his reign. The doctor
immediately made a connection between the pillar and the reports of the
Chinese pilgrims, who were shown the birthplace of this same Buddha some
seven kilometres south-east of Kapilavastu. 27 From Hsiian Tsang one knew
that an Asokan pillar 8 could be expected to be found there. Waddell equated
the site of the newly found pillar with the birthplace of KOI)agamana and
wrote of this to Fiihrer. But again he received no reply.
Fiihrer had published his report 29 in 1895, and in it, as in his letters
to Biihler, had listed an entire complex of ruins at Nig~ill Sagar. He repeated
his descriptions at greater length in 1897.30 He, too, on the basis of the
records of the Chinese, associated the inscription on the pillar with the stUpa
of the Buddha KOl).agamana. He claimed to have found this stUpa right next
to the pillar and described it in great detail. In 1901 Vincent Smith learned
why no one besides Fiihrer had been able to find the least bit of evidence
for the stUpa: Fiihrer had simply borrowed the description of his fictive
stUpa, in some parts word for word, from Cunningham's work dealing with
the Bhilsa Topes. 31
Nevertheless, the pillar that sparked Fiihrer's report did exist. From
this report Waddell surmised that the archaeologist had at no time realized
the value of the pillar for localizing Kapilavastu. In the spring of 1896
Waddell attempted by means of an article in the Journal of the Asiatic
Society of Bengal to interest others in the field to keep on looking. This
article was at first, however, not even accepted for print. Therefore he
rewrote it for a newspaper readership and saw it appear in June in The
Englishman in Calcutta. 32 The Asiatic Society thereupon backed down and
printed his original memorandum in the fall of the same year. 33
Waddell now took up the search for the birthplace of the Buddha on
his own. He requested the government in Calcutta to approach the Nepalese
for permission to enter their country. All sides were forthcoming. In August
of 1896 the state government of Bengal promised him to bear the costs of
an expedition, and the Nepalese were willing to let him in the country. Still.
the state government had to give their final consent and find a replacement
for the doctor for the planned six weeks. The consent was secured, but not
the replacement. And thus, on 5 February 1897, Waddell was informed that
Archaeological Surveyor Dr. Fiihrer would be leading the expedition in place
of him.
Later (650) Waddell noted somewhat bitterly: ''using the machinery
which I had set in motion, he proceeded to the spots which I had indicated,
and there found the ruined monuments of Kapilavastu city and the Lumbini
grove."
And that was not all. In all his reports and letters, Fiihrer forgot to
mention to whom and to what circumstances he owed his charge. He also
managed, after the fact, to link his name with drawing the connection
between Nigllva, the Chinese travellers and Lumbini.34
7. Even though Waddell cannot be deprived of his share of the credit for
having spurred on the search for Kapilavastu and Lumbini, he nevertheless
erred in two decisive respects: having identified the birthplace of the Buddha
KOI)agamana south of Kapilavastu with the site of the Asokan pillar's
discovery, he thought the old capital could be found in relation to Nigall
Sagar, "about 6 or 8 miles to the northwest of this pillar"; and: "The
Lumbini garden should lie a little to the north."35 In The Englishman he
wrote: "The Lumbini or Lumbuna grove will be found three or four miles
to the north of the village of Nigliva."36 Now, both Chinese pilgrims agree
that LumbinI is located "fifty li [= 13 km] to the east of the city" (Fa-hsien,
38) or, beginning 30 li south of the city, "80 or 90 li north-east" from that
34Biihler in particular took Fiihrer's portrayal of himself at face value, having carried on
an active correspondence with him. Cf. G. Biihler, "Uber eine kiirzlich gefundene Asoka-
Inschrift aus dem nepalesischen Terai," Anzeiger der Kaiserl. Akad. der WisscnschC{ftcn,
Vienna 34 (1897): 1-7; esp. p. 2: "In March of 1895, however, Dr. Fiihrer ... brought a
document to light in the village of Nigliva .... "; p. 3: "Dr. Fiihrer supplemented these
results with a comparison of Hiuen-Tsiang's memoires. He found that according to the
itinerary given in them ... Kapilavastu ought to be located very near to Nigliva."
J5"A Tibetan Guide-book" (n. 8), 276.
J6The original is not available to me. I cite from the reproduction in Wadc\ell,
"Birthplace" (n. 24), 647.
The Discovery of Lumbini 13
point (Hsiian Tsang 11, 14)-in other words, not too far east of Kapilavastu.
Moreover, the inscription in Nigliva does not state that the pillar had ever
stood at the birthplace of the Buddha KOI)agamana. The equation, therefore,
was somewhat too hasty, if understandable.
With Waddell prohibited from leaving Calcutta, the Archaeological
Survey sent Dr. Fiihrer to Nepal. Fuhrer intended to search between Nigliva
and Bhagvanpur, in the same false direction that Waddell had proposed. 37 It
was agreed with the Nepalese authorities that Nigliva would be the meeting
place and starting point. 38 When Fuhrer entered the country, however, he
was informed that he would find General Kha<,iga Shamsher in the vicinity
of Pa<,ieriya. Fiihrer later described this meeting on 1 December 1896 in
terms suggesting that the place had been selected "by a lucky chance," and
intimating that he had discovered "a slightly mutilated pillar" "close to the
General's camp, near the debris of four stupas."39 "On digging away the
accumulated debris, it proved to be an Asoka monolith"-Ua" monolith, be
it noted, and not "the" monolith being sought.
This historical moment is portrayed somewhat differently by Smith. 40
One Mr. Duncan Ricketts, estate manager, had also come to Rummindei
with the Nepalese, it seems. This Ricketts watched the Nepalese put spade
to earth at the pillar and was a witness when "the inscription was being
unearthed. Dr. Fuhrer arrived a little later."41 This means that neither the
37Fiihrer, Birth-Place (n. 30), 22: "the capital of the Silkyas is situated just five miles
to the north-west of ... Nigillf Sagar." To the north-west is located the larger Bhagvanpur,
which Waddell had in mind. Later Fiihrer entered an identically named spot onto his map
south of Lumbini.
38Fiihrer, Antiquities (n. 22), v.
39Fiihrer, Antiquities, 27.
40Vincent A. Smith, "The Birthplace of Gautama Buddha," JRAS (1897): 617f.
4JThese Nepalese also turn up in Biihler, Anzeiger (n. 34), 4: "He [Dr. Fiihrer] thus
immediately searched out the pillar of Bhagvanpur and found it on 1 December, some 13
English miles from Nigllva near the Nepalese village of Paderia, 2 English miles north of
the Nepalese district town of Bhagvanpur. Upon his arrival he found only a small fragment
visible, nine feet high, and it was covered with numerous inscriptions by pilgrims, including
one from the year 800 A.D. As luck would have it, the Nepalese governor of Palpa, General
Kha<;lga Shamsher Jang Ral)a Baha:dur, had an encampment right nearby. At the request of
Dr. Fiihrer, he had the pillar completely uncovered."
Harry Falk 14
Nepalese officials nor the onlooking estate manager had any trouble finding
a second pillar in the wider surroundings of Nigliva, even if confusing
directions had been supplied to them.
The reason for this is obvious: the pillar was by no means unknown,
as Fuhrer would have it later. Smith, who had been a magistrate around
1880, had already back then heard of the pillar, and had had rubbings of the
inscriptions sent to him. But since at that time Asoka's text lay buried
underground, he secured only fairly modem graffiti and attached no
significance to the pillar. 42
The pillar was not completely uncovered by the Nepalese-only down
to just below the inscription. 43 Dr. Fiihrer had rubbings made and reported
on his expedition in the same month's issue of Pioneer (Allahabad) and in
a telegram of the London TimeS of 28 December 1897. When Waddell (see
n. 24) remonstrated against Fiihrer's claim to the discovery, the latter
attempted to save face. Waddell's reply allowed only the argument of the
false directions to stand and went about further unmasking the German. 45
The massive falsifications in the latter's reports finally led in 1898 to the
Archaeological Survey's breaking all ties with Fiihrer,46 and withdrawing his
42Smith, "Birthplace" (n. 40), 617, n. 2. Cf. Fiihrer, Birth-Place (n. 30), 617, n. 2; and
T. W. Rhys Davids's article "LumbinI" in ERE 8 (1915): 196f.
43Biihler, Anzeiger (n. 34), 4, following Fiihrer's information, reports that the pillar was
"completely" uncovered and was 25 feet tall. During the later digging by Mukherji (see n.
31), though, several layers of apparently undisturbed bricks around the pillar came to light.
Mukherji himself "could not go down to the foundation" (34). The height by his guess is
"21' or so."
44 A "Correspondent," "The Birthplace of Buddha," reproduced the words of "Dr. Fahrer,"
to the effect that, in the first place, an orig,inal search had been carried out "ten miles to the
north-west of Mauza Nigliva," and that then "by a lucky chance" Fiihrer came across
Kha<,iga Shamsher at Pa<,ieriya, where "the archaeologist's attention was at once caught" by
this pillar fragment he had accidently chanced upon.
45A. Fiihrer and L. A. Waddell, "Who Found Buddha's Birthplace?" JRAS (1898): 199-
203.
46See R. Pischel, "Die Echtheit der Buddhareliquien," Beilage zur Allgemeinen Zeitung
(Munich), 27 Jan. 1902,26-28. Pischel (27a) refers to a report (Annual Progress Report of
the Arclu;eological Survey Circle United Provinces of Agra and Oudh) of 1897/1898,
published in Naini Tal in 1899.
The Discovery of Lumbini 15
8. In Vienna Biihler received once more a copy of the inscription, the text
of which he published on more than one occasion, at first in the Anzeiger. 51
Since in the course of hundreds of years a pile of debris had formed around
where Asoka had had the pillar erected, the inscription had become buried,
and so was in a fine state of preservation. The text allows no doubt as to the
identity of any character. It reads:
If one excepts two terms, the content of this inscription is fully clear. The
text consists of three sentences, whose relation one to another was correctly
47The National Union Catalogue appends the note that only four copies reached Europe.
48A. A. Fiihrer-Basel (a talk on 6 Nov. 1901), "Die Geburtsstatte Buddhas Sakyamunis
im Nepalesischen Tarai," lahresberichte des Frankfurter Vereins flir Geographie ulld
Statistik (1901/2-1902/3): 92-94.
49See A. Barth, "Decouvertes recentes de M. le Dr. Fiihrer au -Nepal," Journal des
Savants (1897): 65-76, CRAIBL 25 (1897): 258; RHR 37 (1898), 163; Barth was later
greatly disappointed at the revelations surrounding Fiihrer: see RHR 41 (1900): 177f. =
Oeuvres 11, 31lf.; D. R. Bhandarkar in John Cumming, ed., Revealing India's Past (London:
1939),205; H. Hiirtel 1991 (see n. 1),69; John Irwin. "'Asoka' Pillars: A Reassessment of
the Evidence-II: Structure." The Burlington Magazine 116 (1974). 721, n. 42: "The NigaH
Sagar pillar-fragments were discovered by Dr. A. Fiihrer."
SOSee Pischel, "Echtheit" (n. 46), 27a; Perceval Landon, Nepal, vo!. 1 (London: 1928),
3ff., where Fiihrer's version is given almost verbatim; L. F. Rushbrook Williams, A
Handbook for Travellers in India (... ), 22nd ed. (London: 1975), 68l.
51See n. 34; id., "The Asoka Edicts of Paderia ancI Nigliva," El5 (1898/99): 1-6.
Harry Falk 16
The marvelous tree, which the excellent queen grasped when the
Buddha came to life, is called hsii-ko (asoka). King Asoka made, out
of lapis lazuli, a statue of the queen in the act of grasping [the tree]
and giving birth to the prince. When the old tree had no more
offshoots, all the srama1J,a took the old trunk and planted it; and over
and over again it continued itself till the present time. The branches
of the tree are as of old, and they still shelter the stone statue.
56See John Irwin, "The Uit Bhairo at Benares (Varal}asi): Another Pre-Asokan
Monument?" ZDMG 133 (1983), 326ff.
57Babu Krishna Rijal, Archaeological Activities in Lumbini 1976-77 (Kathmandu: n.d.),
11 ("reprint from Ancient Nepal 30/39 (1975/77)").
Harry Falk 18
The claim has been made that this Maya actually goes back to the
Mauryan period,58 but the portrayal of the new-born child alone would argue
against this. A relief of the future Buddha from the time of Asoka would be
without parallel.
If the sculpture of rummindel is identical with the Maya of the
Chinese, then we may presume that the pilgrim had been misled, as far as
its age is concerned, by his local guides.
The second controversial word in Asoka's text is less problematic. In
his declaration of waiver, the king made Lumbinl ubalika, i.e. Skt. *udbalika
'exempt from imposts'. The word lived on in South India, where it is
documented in land transfers down to the thirteenth century, in the form
uf!lbali or vUf!lbali.59 In addition, however, the king made the place
athabhagiya. In one of two possibilities, this term was taken to mean
a$tabhagika, which in turn admitted two interpretations. The most common
opinion is that the villagers from then on had only to pay an eighth (a$ta as
an ordinal number) of their income as tribute instead of the normal sixth. 60
That Asoka is thereby made to appear as ignominiously money-minded61
seems not to have disturbed anyone down to the recent present. Smith, on
the other hand, would have the village be the recipient of eight portions
(a$ta as a cardinal number) of land. 62 The second interpretation equates the
word with Skt. arthabhagika, suggesting that the villagers were to obtain a
share of the king's income.
As so often, the right answer had long been on the table unnoticed.
Pischel63 showed in 1903 that in land transfers in South India-that is, in the
very texts that still preserve the only traces of ubalika-eight rights were
frequently accorded in addition to the customary user rights, and were
generally subsumed under the term a$tabhogateja(s)sviimya. For the most
part, they include all rights to discovered treasure (nidhi), unclaimed
collateral (nik$epa), water (jala) and stones (pii$iina). Pischel noted that the
number of rights has symbolic value, as "the numbers 2, 4, 16, 20 occur
particularly often, so that the number four seems to have been favoured"
(734). Given these insights, it is incomprehensible how Pischel could have
so misunderstood the text in question, for he directly proceeds to interpret
athabhiigiya as "eight parcels" (733), translating: "[he] granted it [= the
village] an eighth (of the crown land)" (734).
In 1931 Venkatasubbiah64 again showed, without knowledge of
Pischel's article, the connection between Asoka's athabhiigiya and
a$tabhogateja(s)sviimya. These eight rights enjoy a far older tradition than
Pischel or Venkatasubbiah could advert to, their oldest piece of evidence
dating to 1236. I have found the earliest traces in Sircar,65 in documents of
Sailas (Madhya Pradesh) from the eighth century (314: 27+33) and on
copperplates of the Palas of Bengal that can be dated to the ninth century
(84: 41f.).
If one glances through the sources that are available in Sircar alone,66
they are seen to range from approximately 800 A.D. to 1528; the
development can be followed, therefore, over a period of seven hundred
years. A comparison demonstrates changes in content; the number of these
63R. Pischel, "Die Inschrift von Pa<;ieriya," SitzungsbeTichte der Konigl. Preussischen
Akademie der Wissenschaften (Berlin) 35 (1903): 724-734.
64 A. Venkatasubbiah, "Athabhagiye," lA 60 (1931), 168-170; 204-207.
65Dines Chandra Sircar, Select Inscriptions, vol. 2 (Delhi: 1983).
66Texts of the Plllas around 950 A.D. p. 98:52-54, Sircar thereon on p. 94; Rajasthan
946 A.D. p. 252: lO-13, 253:24, and also p. 250; Varanasi lO42 A.D. p. 343:37; lO92 A.D.
p. 277:23; 1125 A.D. p. 285:17; V.P. 1129 A.D. p. 290:15; Dharwar 1182 A.D. p. 756:63f.;
Jaunpur 1196 A.D. p. 302:22; Hoysala 1192 A.D. p. 547:42f., and also p. 541; Orissa 1456
A.D. p. 201:6lf.; Kanchipuram 1528 A.D. p. 599:84f.
Harry Falk 20
9. Let us return from the text one pilgrim left behind to the site of his
pilgrimage. More than two thousand years separate the erecting of the
Asokan pillar and the date when his inscription could be published outside
of India.
After Lumbini was rediscovered, increasing numbers of scholars have
made their way to it. One impressive report on the outward appearance of
the site ninety years ago is provided by Levi,68 who journeyed with Dr.
Fiihrer on the back of an elephant, first to what they supposed to be
Kapilavastu, and from there thirty kilometres east to Lumbini. There he
found a "fakir, as filthy as he was ignorant" (76), who had built himself a
chapel up on the temple grounds. This fakir lived together with a child who
served him, and every day he worshipped Asoka's pillar with prayers,
flowers and libations of water. In the main, however, he watched over the
above-mentioned statue of rummindef, whom he called riipaf!ldeVl.
According to Levi, the ascetic himself did not really care about her but
simply performed the rites in front of the statue when the local population
came to worship her. Levi does not appear to have personally seen the
figure.
In 1897 W. Hoey and Waiter Lupton were also on location,69 and the
two were the first persons to make a concerted effort to obtain a look inside
the temple: "The Brahman in charge was very unwilling to permit the image
to be seen, but some persuasion and rupees overcame his scruples." Both
visitors immediately realized that in RTIpam Devi they had Maya before
them, even though at the time the statue was still headless.
In 1899 P. C. Mukherji carried out excavations in the Tarai,
including in Lumbini. By then the babajI had died, so that the archaeologists
could dig on the rising undisturbed, something the holy man would have
hindered during his earthly sojourn. Mukherji first found the upper part with
the representation of the head in the temple hall, and he replaced it on the
statue in the interior (36).
Mukherji, too, told of the local people who venerated the shrine even
after the demise of the Brahmin custodian. The Paharis of the surrounding
villages expected that the goddess would fulfill their wishes and brought her
all sorts of vegetarian dishes as offerings, as well as goats and domestic
fowl, which were slaughtered in front of the temple.
Even though its role had radically changed during an intervening
period, the site of the Buddha's birth nevertheless had been visited down
through the centuries. The name of the rising had been kept alive among the
farmers and hunters of the surrounding region, even if the origins of its
veneration had apparently little by little fallen into oblivion from the tenth
century onwards. 70 The mother Maya necessarily came to be the focus of
worship, and in the end was brought blood sacrifices as a Hindu DevL 71 At
least one sadhu took advantage of the sanctity of the place and made a
living for himself as a custodian of the cult figure.
7Debala Mitra, Buddhist Monuments (Calcutta: 1971),60: "To judge from the available
antiquities, the Buddhist establishment of Lumbirn maintained its existence till at least the
tenth century A.D."
71Buddha figures were also Hinduized without a passing thought. Among the cases that
Alexander E. Caddy notes ("Asoka Inscriptions in India," PASB (1895), 160.), one at
Nruanda is particularly striking: a statue of the Buddha that came to be worshipped as
RukminI. This recalls J. S. Speyer's ("Lumbinl," WZKM 11 (1897): 22-24) derivation of the
place-name Pali lumbinl < Asoka-Magadhl lU1!lminl < Skt. rukmi/:ti.
Table of Abbreviations