knowledged, even in the absence of general agreement about
its interpretation. It may be regarded as a stupa elevated upon
a sequence of terraces, as in such later structures as the
twelfth-century Dhammayazika at Pagan (where the terraces
bear reliefs depicting Buddhist birth stories) and the Kum-
bum in Gyantse, Tibet (where niches on the terraces hold
images of deities in the Vajraya ̄na pantheon). Its Indian ante-
cedents are obscure. In complexity, quality of workmanship,
and expressiveness, Borobudur surpasses these later buildings
and perhaps all other Buddhist monuments.
The original 160 relief panels encircling the lowest
quadrangular story were covered with stone blocks, appar-
ently before the monument reached its ultimate shape, as a
result of a need to prevent subsidence. These reliefs depict
scenes of cause and effect, such as appropriate punishments
for evil deeds. Above are four stories generally referred to as
galleries. Each of these can be circumambulated by a visitor
entering from one of the four axial stairs, and each contains
a major series of narrative reliefs on the inner wall, with re-
liefs of lesser importance on the outer wall. The height of the
outer wall prevents views out to the landscape. In the first
gallery, the primary 120 panels depict the life of the Buddha
through his enlightenment; directly below, the reliefs depict
Buddhist tales, both ja ̄takas and avada ̄nas. On the second
and third galleries, the primary reliefs depict the Gan:d:avyu ̄ha
Su ̄tra, specifically the visits of the pilgrim Sudhana to “good
friends,” who provide instruction in Maha ̄ya ̄na Buddhist
doctrine according to Avatam:saka tenets, and Sudhana’s ar-
rival at the Tower of Maitreya, characterized in the text as
a fantastic architectural structure that provides a visualization
of the nature of the dharmadha ̄tu, the “truth realm” or phe-
nomenal world as perceived by buddhas. The reliefs of the
fourth and topmost gallery are devoted to the Samantabha-
dra vows, a text describing miraculous visions and commit-
ting the pilgrim to the bodhisattva path, and to the vow to
remain in the world, aiding suffering creatures until all be-
ings can enter nirva ̄n:a together. Overlooking each of these
four galleries are life-sized buddha images in niches (in all,
368 images); these are differentiated according to direction
on the first three galleries; over the fourth gallery, all the bud-
dhas execute a teaching gesture.
After the fourth gallery, the visitor enters a “plateau,”
above which rise three concentric terraces, which hold a total
of seventy-two (thirty-two, twenty-four, and sixteen) perfo-
rated stupas with diamond-shaped and square openings,
through which is visible a life-sized sculpture of the Buddha
performing the teaching gesture known as dharmacakra
mudra ̄. Crowning the monument is a much larger central
stupa, which is solid. From these terraces the visitor has a
view over the landscape.
The reliefs of the covered base and the four galleries
present a straightforward pilgrimage along the bodhisattva
path of Maha ̄ya ̄na Buddhism. The significance of the upper
terraces, on the other hand, is less clear. Older interpretations
draw conclusions from points of connection with Buddhist
cosmology, seeing in the half-hidden buddhas of the perfo-
rated stupas a move toward the invisibility of the topmost
“formless realm” of the Buddhist cosmos. One recent inter-
pretation argues that the upper terraces represent an ideal
world, contrasting with and paralleling the real world of the
galleries, and that the perforated stupas convey higher
meditational experience in two ways. The openings in the
stupas are actually the shapes of the breaths of the meditator,
who is paying visits on the terraces to the planets and stars,
the moon, and the sun. Secondly, if the stupas were gilded
and reflected each other and the visitor, they would have
conveyed the nature of the dharmadha ̄tu, in which enlight-
ened ones perceive phenomena as resembling a hall of mir-
rors. It may be that originally Borobudur was to be crowned
with a sanctuary that would have stood for the Tower of
Maitreya as illustrated in the third-gallery reliefs. A change
of plan resulted in the terraces with perforated stupas, unique
in the Buddhist world, but paralleling chakras (“circles,” psy-
chic centers within the human trunk) of lotuses with thirty-
two, twenty-four, and sixteen petals, like those found in the
Tantric texts that were soon to dominate Indian monastic
centers.
THE NAGAYON. The Nagayon, a relatively small temple con-
structed in the late eleventh century, is one of the oldest
buildings in the ancient capital of Pagan, Burma. Construct-
ed of brick and stucco, it reflects older traditions of northern
India and Bangladesh, and its spire takes the form of the
́sikhara of the northern Indian Hindu shrine. There are three
interior spaces: a hall, an ambulatory, and a sanctuary. Ten
niches in the hall hold sculptures depicting important events
in the life of the Buddha. On the inner and outer walls of
the ambulatory, which encircles the sanctuary, beside murals
(originally) illustrating the Buddha’s life and birth stories, are
sixty niches with sculptures. Twenty-eight of these niches
hold a sequence of images of buddhas, representing the his-
torical Buddha Gautama and his twenty-seven predecessors
in the distant past. In a panel below each buddha of the past
appears a small-scale figure who represents the contemporary
incarnation of Gautama hearing a prediction regarding fu-
ture buddhahood. For instance, the Buddha Dipankara in-
formed the hermit Sumedha that he would become a buddha
after innumerable eons. From the darkened ambulatory, the
visitor enters the sanctuary, in height nearly double that of
the ambulatory; it has small clerestory windows through
which, under the right conditions, light falls upon the head
of the tall standing central Buddha image, with magical
effect.
A passage found in Sanskrit avada ̄na texts describes a
miracle of the Buddha: the Buddha smiles, rays of light
emerge from his eyeteeth, ascend to the higher heavens and
descend to the earth, and then return to the Buddha’s
mouth. This passage is found also in an inscription of the
reigning Burmese king, Kyanzittha (1084–1111). The Bud-
dha smiled because he was about to predict to his disciple
A ̄nanda the reign of Kyanzittha himself. Therefore the visitor
to the Nagayon, having pondered the giving of predictionsTEMPLE: BUDDHIST TEMPLE COMPOUNDS IN SOUTHEAST ASIA 9053