Buddhist Art and Culture in Karnataka - India

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........There is now another book on the same subject by Dr. M.S. Krishna Murthy but with a distinct difference based, largely and comprehensively on the archaeological Buddhist remains in the entire Karnataka. Especially, it includes his own substantial contribution: the discovery of a new Buddhist site with a brick chaityalaya and parts of a vihara nearby, in Rajaghatta (Bengaluru district), dated to c. 4th-5th c. CE, its critical description and analytical discussion of its significance, intelligent and meaningful reconstruction. besides Similarly, in Talakadu, near Mysuru, which also he excavated, found new Buddhist remains for the first time implying the prevalence of Buddhism in the area.......

In the narration the author has described very meticulously and vividly in detail every Buddhist remains or relics of Buddhist significance in all the sites.....

The book is profusely illustrated with photographs of quality of almost all the Buddhist remains.

In fine, the book in many respects distinguished enriching our knowledge about Buddhism in Karnataka with a new proof of material evidences and therefore most welcome in the domain of Buddhist literature.

M. S. Krishna Murthy, born in Mysuru (1945), obtained B.A. Degree in Indology and Sanskrit (1965), M.A. Degree in Indology (1967), Diploma in Epigraphy (1975) and Ph.D. (1976) all from the University of Mysore. After his M.A., he joined the PG Department of Ancient History and Archaeology of the University of Mysore and worked in various capacities as Research Fellow, Antiquity Assistant, Lecturer, Reader/Chairman and Professor/Chairman. He was awarded Emeritus Fellowship by the UGC (2009-11).

Dr. Krishna Murthy, during his service and after has served as Member, Central Advisory Board of Archaeology (CABA), Honorary visiting Professor at the National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS), Bengaluru, Member of the Peer Committee of the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC), etc.

Dr. Krishna Murthy has directed archaeological excavations conducted at Talakadu (six seasons), Rajaghatta (two seasons), Annigeri and Krishnapura, besides actively participating in excavations conducted by the Department at various other places.

Including the present work, Dr. Krishna Murthy has authored seven books (some as co-author), about one hundred and fifty research papers. He has attended many International, National and State level Seminars, Conferences, Symposiums, Workshops, etc., and delivered lectures at Universities, National and State level academic bodies. He has successfully guided ten students for Ph.D. degree.

Ever since the time I discovered and excavated the ancient Buddhist chaitya/vihara complex at Raja-ghatta in 2001, it was my desire to rewrite the history of Buddhism in Karnataka. As there was a general opinion that early Buddhism never anchored in southern Karnataka, the discovery of a flourishing Buddhist settlement of the early period near Bengaluru brought the hope that southern Karnataka also hosted the Buddhists as cordially as it hosted the Jains. The efforts of Emperor Aśoka to spread Buddhism in Mahisa-mandala through his missionary Thera Mahadeva paid rich dividend. Many Buddhist settlements sprang up in different places of Karnataka. Discovery of Buddhist settlements throughout the length and breadth of Karnataka, in the recent past, has led us to conclude that Buddhism was quite a popular religion in this state during the first millennium of the Current era.

In this work I have been able to analyse several known and newly discovered sites connected with Buddhism, examine many new antiquities, and also review the research done earlier. Two Buddhist sites in Karnataka that are researched well are Sannati and Raja-ghatta. Archaeological excavations conducted there have yielded valuable information regarding two flourishing Buddhist settlements. Sannati was excavated by the ASI and Raja-ghatta was excavated by the University of Mysore, Mysuru, under the Direction of the present author. Sannati is situated at the northern end of the present state of Karnataka and Raja-ghatta is situated in the south central part of Karnataka. While Sannati has yielded vast stone sculptural material of a highly vandalised stupa, Raja-ghatta yielded information about a destroyed chaitya cum vihara complex built entirely in brick and other soft media. In this way the information we get from these two sites are complementary to each other to present the varied forms of Buddhist architectural art. Thus these two sites of the Buddhists are exceptionally helpful to understand the diverse facets of the Buddhist culture of south India in general and Karnataka in particular. Therefore, in this work, special attention is given to the study and analyses of the material found at these two sites.

The results of the present study show the prevalence of Buddhism as a potential religion in the early centuries of the Current era in Karnataka. With the advent of the Badami Chalukyas, the Vedic religion rose to prominence and Buddhism lost its importance only to exist in certain important towns of Karnataka, on a low profile. Therefore, it is not possible to give a continuous and coherent account of the growth and spread of Buddhism in Karnataka, as the material at our disposal is meagre. Not much of esoteric factors of Buddhism that prevailed in Karnataka are also known for certain. The scanty tangible materials at our disposal help only to draw bare outlines of the cultural life of the Buddhists. Therefore it is necessary to explore the Buddhist literary sources to have a clear picture of the socio-religious fabric of the Buddhist society of Karnataka.

No Buddhist literary work written in any language in Karnataka has come to light so far. Therefore the Buddhist literature in general produced through the different centuries in the pan-Indian context is taken to present a connected and coherent account of the Buddhist social milieu of Karnataka. The basic structure of the Buddhist religio-cultural fabric, as is known, was almost identical throughout India. The reason being that the entire life style of the Buddhist, religious as well as social, was centred on the Vinaya Pitaka, their sacred religious text. In Karnataka one gets tangible proofs for the presence of all the major sects of Buddhism like Hinayana, Mahayana and Vajrayana, objects of Buddhist culture like the Stupa, the Chaitya, the Vihara, and various types of Buddhist sculptures of different media, Buddhist epigraphs and other objects. These diverse factors of Buddhist culture are no different from their parallels found elsewhere in India. Under these circumstances one can easily accept that an efflorescent Buddhist culture based on the Vinaya Pitaka, no different in its content to that existing in other parts of India, prevailed in Karnataka also. Therefore based on the Buddhist literature, a brief account of the salient features of the Buddhist life is given in a separate chapter.

At the end a glossary of non-english terms used in this book is provided for the use of the readers who are not very familiar with Sanskrit, Pali and Kannada languages.

In the preparation of this work I have been greatly benefitted by the help of various institutions, and also by suggestions and opinions of many esteemed scholars. It is my duty to express my deep sense of gratitude to all of them.

First and foremost I thank the U.G.C. for awarding me the Emeritus Fellowship to materialize my long-cherished dream to delve deep to explore the potentials of Buddhism in Karnataka.

Discovery of a flourishing Buddhist settlement at Sannati in Kalburgi district of Karnataka in 1956 by Kapatarala Krishna Rao is a landmark in the progress of Buddhist research in Karnataka. Buddhist relics at Sannati substantiated that Karnataka accommodated Buddhism as liberally as the the neighbouring states of Maharashtra, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh. First to reconstruct an account of Buddhism in Karnataka, based on the Kannada inscriptions, was Dr. M. Chidananda Murthy, an eminent scholar, in his book: Kannada Sasanagaļa Samskritika Adhyayana (1966). This was followed by the work of Dr. Taltaje Vasanta Kumar in Kannada entitled Karnațakadalli Bauddha Samskṛti (1988). This work gives a general account of Buddhist culture in Karnataka based on epigraphs and literature. Thereafter, there were some papers now and then published especially on the Buddhist art occasionally discovered here and there. Another noteworthy work is Buddhism in Karnataka by R.C. Hiremath, Professor in Kannada Language and literature and the former Vice-Chancellor of Karnatak University, Dharwad, based on the Kannada literature through the ages (1994). In this, the emphasis is more on the impact of Buddhism on Kannada literature and the derivation of the Kannada script from the earliest Buddhist inscriptions in Karnataka.

Realising the importance and the magnitude of the Buddhist site with a Maha stupa in utter ruins in the Western Krishna Valley at Sannati, the Archaeological Survey of India, excavated the site on a large scale and soon published a report on the findings of the excavation. This report deals, exclusively and exhaustively, with the Buddhist relics exposed abundantly in the excavations identifying some Jataka stories in some sculptural panels, deciphering numerous inscriptions and reconstructing the Mahastupa to the extent posssible, from this and a few other sites in the neighbourhood and the excavated finds, all of 1" c. BCE-2nd c. CE.

There is now another book on the same subject by Dr. M.S. Krishna Murthy, former Professor and U.G.C. Emeritus Fellow, University of Mysore, but with a distinct difference based, largely and comprehensively, on the archaeological Buddhist remains in the entire Karnataka. Especially, it includes his own substantial contribution: the discovery of a new Buddhist site with a brick chaityalaya and parts of a vihara nearby, in Rajaghatta (Bengaluru district), dated to c. 4th 5th c.CE, excavated by him; its critical description and analytical discussion of its significance, besides the discovery of numerous earthen votives stupas, each containing a clay tablet with an imprint of popular Buddhist mantra: yë dhamma hētu ppabhava...samaņah', besides intelligent and meaningful reconstruction. Similarly, in Talakadu near Mysuru, which also he excavated, found a few Buddhist remains for the first time implying the prevalence of Buddhism in the area. These discoveries are very important. For, historians know that thera Mahadeva sent by Aśoka Maurya, the Magadhan emperor, had spread Buddhism in this part of Karnataka then known as Mahişa Mandala, by preaching the religious tenets resulting in the conversion of several thousands of people to Buddhism.