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RICHARDS. COHENINDIA, BUDDHIST ART INSometime around the fifth century B.C.E., the histori-
cal Buddha S ́akyamuni encouraged his disciples to
spread his teachings in all directions. Although Bud-
dhism was thus established as a missionary religion,
the earliest remaining artworks devoted to the Bud-
dhist tradition date from the mid-third century B.C.E.
After that time, however, Buddhist arts and teachings
flourished together, propagating outward from their
Indian home to the farthest points of Asia, until the
advent of Muslim hegemony, when Buddhism virtu-
ally ceased on the Indian subcontinent. Today India is
mainly of historical interest to scholars and art histo-
rians of Buddhism; to Buddhists, however, India is
home to the most important PILGRIMAGEsites. India is
the land where Buddha S ́akyamuni lived, taught, and
died, as well as where the familiar and beloved arts and
literature of Buddhism first developed. Indeed, much
of the history of India’s culture is only known through
the accounts of travelers and pilgrims and through the
arts and literature they brought home with them. Par-
ticularly important are the many Buddhist pilgrims
from China—especially FAXIAN(ca. 337–418) in the
late fourth century C.E. and XUANZANG(ca. 600–664)
in the seventh century—and the countless merchants
and monks who traveled along the SILKROADand to
Southeast Asia.
The materials used for Buddhist arts in India range
from precious metals to the cliffs that edge the Dec-
can plateau. Artworks made of more ephemeral ma-
terials, such as clay or wood, have not survived but
were probably made in abundance starting in the sec-
ond century B.C.E. The most prominent medium is
stone relief sculpture, sometimes carved nearly in the
round, along with the context of the sculptures—
monumental reliquary mounds (STUPAs) and archi-
tecture in brick or stone. Although today most Indian
Buddhist sculptures are found in museums, they once
were part of stupa railings, were arrayed in niches on
the exterior walls of temples, or were placed on altars
with other images. Free-standing sculptures were also
important; bronze-casting achieved a high degree of
perfection in south India and in Kashmir, where they
inlaid the bronze with silver. Mural painting in dry-
fresco was established early in India, culminating in
the preserved works at AJANTAin the fifth century C.E.,
but influencing later mural painting throughout Bud-
dhist Asia. Manuscript illuminations and sacred writ-
ings on palm leaves were specialties in Pala northeast
India, providing models for the vast corpus of Hi-INDIA, BUDDHISTART IN