MAy 3, 1872.]
ANCIENT REMAINS IN THE KRISHNA DISTRICT.
who employed this means of sepulture to have been, in physical configuration, much on the same scale as the present natives of the country, and gives no support to the local tradition, which is, that they are the remains of an extinct race of Pigmies who, being threatened with a storm of fire from heaven, built these stone structures and retired into them
when the anticipated danger arrived, but were over whelmed, buried, and burnt alive in the surround ing conflagration. The position in which the bones are found show, however, also, that the corpse was first burnt, and the bones collected and heaped in the stone cells.
It is said that many years ago a ryot dug up in. this field of tombs a large bell-metal wheel, but he kept his discovery a secret, and had the wheel broken up. There are persons still living who say they have seen pieces of it. This must have been a Buddhist relic. The kist-vaens are of all sizes from about three
feet square to twenty feet square. One of the larg est may be seen immediately behind the District Munsiff's Court. The converging slab is an enorm ous mass about a foot thick.
These evidently appear to be the remains of the Scythian or Turanian race who first conquered the aborigines and settled in India, and must therefore be of very great antiquity. We do not know of any race of a subsequent period in this part of India, who employed both cremation and interment in their mode of disposing of the dead. To the westward of Amravati on the Krishna, celebrated for its Buddhist remains, and near an unexplored mound known as kuchi dibba, there are a great number of rude circles of stone which have been noticed by Mr. Fergusson in his Tree and Ser pent-worship. A still greater number of these re mains are found at a distance of four or five miles
to the south-east, where they cover the roots of the hills. They range apparently from twenty-four to thirty-two feet in diameter, and when dug into, have always yielded cinerary urns, burnt bones, and other indications of being burning places. On the left bank of the Krishna also in the Nandi gāma Taluqa these monuments are to be found in great numbers, extending for many miles in all directions, as noticed in a review of Mr. Fergusson's work in the Edinburgh Review.” IV.
Buddhist
remains.—The most celebrated
Buddhist remains in this district are the antique marble sculptures of Amrāvati, recently brought to the notice of the public, and illustrated by Mr. James Fergusson in his Tree and Serpent Worship. Amrāvati is situated on the right bank of the river
Krishna, about twenty miles above Bejwadá. These sculptures were first discovered by Captain C. Mackenzie in 1797. Some years previous to Captain Mackenzie's visit, the Wasereddi Rāja of
151
Chintapalli, attracted by the sanctity of the temple dedicated to Shiva under the title of Amarashwaras
wāmi, determined to build a town here and a resi dence for himself.
He had recourse for stone to the
walls of Dharanekota, the ruins of an ancient city, about half a mile to the westward of Amråvati. He
also opened several mounds adjoining the spot, and among them the one known as Dipavali-dinna or the Hill of Lights, when the remains of an an cient Buddhist dagoba were found. Large quanti ties of the stone he removed and employed in build ing new temples and palaces, and many of the fine marble sculptures perished, being burnt for lime. The Rāja discovered in his excavations a small relic-casket of stone with a lid—on opening which a crystal was found containing a small pearl, some gold leaf, and other things of no value. This was sent to the Madras Museum.
Captain (afterwards Colonel) Mackenzie, Surveyor General, first saw Amravati in 1797. He visited the spot again in 1816, and had eighty drawings made of the sculptures. He selected a number of the stones which were forwarded to Calcutta in
1819. Subsequently a number were brought to Masulipatam, with the view, it is said, of erecting
some building, and they lay there for more than eighteen years before they were given to Mr. Alexander, Master Attendant. Some were removed to the temple of Shivagańgå. Sir Walter Elliot resumed the excavations at Am
ravati in 1840, and discovered a portion of the monu ment not before touched. These slabs had, however,
all been probably removed in the twelfth or thirteenth centuries from their original positions, Mr. Fergusson surmises, and built into a little chapel, of which they formed the walls. Sir Walter Elliot sent a large number of the sculptures to Madras, where they lay till they were sent home to England in 1856. In London they were put out
of the way into a coach-house attached to Fife house, where they were at last discovered by Mr. Fergusson, who was able to appretiate their value. Besides the sculptures sent to England, there were others deposited in the Central Museum, Madras. Some are to be found in the Bejwadā Museum, and a few are in the possession of Captain Maiden, Master Attendant, Masulipatam.t Such inscriptions as have been found at Amravati are in Pali, the form of letters being those of the Gupta alphabet, as used immediately before or after 318, A.D. Colonel Mackenzie collected a considerable num
ber of coins about Dharanekota, some of these were Roman and others of the Baktrian Kadphises type affording additional evidence as to the fact that the place was of some importance about the Christian era. Some were gold coins. Small lead coins are still to be found there in great numbers, and may
- We omit Mr. Boswell's outline
- Vol. CXXX. (Oct. 1869,) p. 501,–Ed.
of Mr. Fergusson's restoration of the Amaravati tope, which follows here in the original report.—ED.
