sculptural reliefs also show thatch-domed structures with
arched entrances, which shelter small stupas or relic contain-
ers as if for worship. These “vernacular” wooden or wattle-
and-daub caitya shrines are sometimes depicted built on large
platforms with a long central flight of steps and corner pillars
marking the compound as if equivalent to the large ritual stu-
pas built in this region, as that at Saidu Sharif. Clusters of
votive stupas, as at Bha ̄ja ̄ and Kan:her ̄ı, sometimes have in-
scriptions assigning each to a particular deceased member of
the monastic community.
Relic shrines and Buddhist retreats. As Buddhism
spread to the northwest and south in the first centuries BCE,
relic shrines became a significant component of monastic
and ritual compounds. In Gandha ̄ra in the northwest, these
could be simple shed-shelters placed in association with large
ritual stupas, or they could take the form of relic stupas with
enclosed chambers giving access to relic caskets. In South
India, carved reliefs also sometimes depict circular thatch-
domed shelters that frame reliquary urns. The cult of relics—
of the Buddha and of his monastic followers—gave a major
impetus to the process of conversion and the spread of Bud-
dhism in both regions.
One first-century BCE relief from an early Buddhist
stupa site in Karnataka, Kanganhalli, uniquely depicts a
stepped embankment with pilgrims, much like the steps of
the gha ̄t (tank) excavated at the important Buddhist center
of Na ̄ga ̄rjunakon:d:a. Four sacred structures shown lined up
at the top consist of a solid stupa, a stupa set on a circular
platform that has a visible reliquary shrine within, a sacred
tree shrine, and what seems to be a large stepped altar.
Other fragmentary reliefs from Kanganhalli represent
the model for all Buddhist compounds, the viha ̄ra and
“sweet-smelling” huts of the Jetavana garden into which the
Buddha and his followers took retreat. More detailed than
similar narrative depictions from Barhut, these reliefs from
Kanganhalli show simple gates and compound walls, an ox-
cart bringing coins to be spread out in payment, simple ascet-
ics’ huts (presumably the gandhakut: ̄ı and kosambakut ̄ı hut
for monks from Kosamb ̄ı), a tree shrine, an altar marked
with footprints, a “walking path” for the Buddha, and a large
tapering multistoried central assembly hall (viha ̄ra).
Landscape, statehood, and pilgrimage. The siting of
Buddhist compounds was of utmost importance. Located
along trade and pilgrimage routes from an early period, Bud-
dhist establishments served merchants and coreligionists as
way stations in the wilderness, retreats in proximity to urban
centers, and markers at sites (tirthas) sacred to other groups.
If the Jetavana garden was one model, the miracle at S ́ra ̄vast ̄ı
where the Buddha manifest himself in a multitude of forms
provided a rationale. Stupas, monasteries, caitya halls, and
relic shrines all formed part of a natural landscape mapped
by pilgrims, merchants, monks, and nuns. The stupas on
Sa ̄ñc ̄ı hill; caitya halls and monasteries in Ajanta ̄’s horseshoe
gorge; retreats carved into the Western Ghat mountains; the
manmade embankment (gha ̄t), tanks, and shrines laid out
along a river at Na ̄ga ̄rjunakon:d:a; monasteries marching up
the valleys through Swat; all intentionally partake of nature
and integrate themselves within a landscape. That we are
largely unable to reconstruct initial principles of Buddhist
planning should not detract us from understanding that the
result was intended to be what one scholar has described as
a mesocosm—a sacred landscape in the living world.
A pilgrimage and political complex such as that at Bami-
yan, Afghanistan—as famous for its frescoes as for the two
giant Buddha statues destroyed in 2001 by the Taliban—can
well exemplify the extent to which a Buddhist compound
could incorporate and model the world. Long before the ex-
plicit rendering of buildings as cosmic maps (man:d:alas), as
in Tibet, was common, Buddhist sites in South Asia less for-
mally “centered” nature to bring the universe alive. At Bami-
yan, a long cliff with mountains looming behind is honey-
combed with pilgrim’s caves. Two gigantic standing Buddha
statues were carved into the cliff some distance apart by the
seventh century CE; a third reclining image of the Buddha’s
maha ̄parinirva ̄n:a was also recorded by pilgrim accounts. The
cliff’s facade was a single canvas, dwarfed by the landscape
of the valley, but to visit these images in ritual order accord-
ing to one scholar was to retrace the spiritual career of the
historical Buddha S ́a ̄kyamuni. Bamiyan’s valley became the
“compound” within which ambulation and pilgrimage oc-
curred, as by extension did the kingdom of Bamiyan and the
human-occupied Jambudv ̄ıpa continent cited so frequently
in early Buddhist inscriptions and texts. Also in this valley
in front of these images, according to the seventh-century CE
Chinese visitor Xuanzang, the king performed a state ritual
(the Pañcava ̄rs:ika) in which he gives up his wealth and
“body” and then has them restored. By doing so each year
he guaranteed the well-being of the assembled community.
BUDDHIST TEMPLES. Bodh Gaya ̄, the site in Eastern India
at which the historical Buddha is said to have achieved en-
lightenment, reflects successive changes in Buddhist belief
and practice. Under the present bodhi tree rests a stone altar
set up in the time of A ́soka Maurya to mark the place of the
Buddha’s enlightenment. The tree and altar are surrounded
by a modern railing mimicking the form of an ancient tree
shrine, but railing pieces from the S ́unga period (second to
first centuries BCE) remain nearby. Such open enclosures set
around objects of worship (trees, pillars, images of nature
spirits, stupas) represent pre-Buddhist practices that were ab-
sorbed into the iconography of popular Buddhism. Set next
to the tree shrine is a large and restored brick temple of the
seventh century CE, pyramidal in shape, its surface orna-
mented to suggest a multi-terraced palatial structure not un-
like the viha ̄ra represented in the Kanganhalli relief. A large
image of the Buddha is enshrined within the present struc-
ture for worship. A relief on a second- to third-century CE
terra-cotta plaque from Kumra ̄ha ̄r demonstrates that an ear-
lier shrine in much the same form was already there by that
period. Though such a Buddhist temple structure was based
exclusively on Indian palatial forms, its conceptualization al-
ready suggests a model for the later pagoda temples thatTEMPLE: BUDDHIST TEMPLE COMPOUNDS IN SOUTH ASIA 9043