THE REGIONAL KINGDOMS OF EARLY MEDIEVAL INDIAconceived by the Chola ruler in the same spirit as that which moved
contemporary Cambodian rulers who ordered the construction of the
famous Barays (tanks) of Angkor, which are considered to be a special
indication of royal merit.
In the late thirteenth century Pagan (Burma) was once more exposed to
a strong current of direct Indian influence emanating from Bengal, at that
time conquered by Islamic rulers. Nalanda had been destroyed by the end
of the twelfth century and large groups of monks in search of a new home
flocked to Pagan and also to the Buddhist centres of Tibet. The beautiful
paintings in the temples of Minnanthu in the eastern part of the city of
Pagan may have been due to them.
Islamic conquest of northern India cut off the holy places of Buddhism.
A millennium of intensive contacts between India and Buddhist Southeast
Asia had come to an end. But there was another factor which must be
mentioned in this context. In 1190 Chapata, a Buddhist monk from Pagan,
returned to that city after having spent ten years in Sri Lanka. In Burma he
led a branch of the Theravada school of Buddhism, established on the strict
rules of the Mahavihara monastery of Sri Lanka. This led to a schism in
the Burmese Buddhist order which had been established at Pagan by Shin
Arahan about 150 years earlier. Shin Arahan was a follower of the South
Indian school of Buddhism, which had its centre at Kanchipuram.
Chapata’s reform prevailed and by the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries
Burma, Thailand and Cambodia had adopted Theravada Buddhism of the
Sri Lanka school. In Cambodia this shift from Mahayana to Theravada
Buddhism seems to have been part of a socio-cultural revolution. Under the
last great king of Angkor, Jayavarman VII (1181–1218), royal Mahayana
Buddhism had become associated in the eyes of the people with the
enormous burden which the king imposed upon them in order to build the
huge Buddhist temples of Angkor Thom (e.g. the gigantic Bayon).
Even in Indonesia, however, where Tantrist Buddhism with an
admixture of Shaivism prevailed at the courts of rulers all the way from
Sumatra down to Bali, direct Indian influence rapidly receded in the
thirteenth century. This was only partly due to the intervention of Islam in
India, its other cause being an upsurge of Javanese art which confined the
influence of Indian art to the statues of deified kings erected after the death
of the ruler. The outer walls of the temples were covered with Javanese
reliefs which evince a great similarity to the Javanese shadow play (wayang
kulit). The Chandi Jago (thirteenth century) and the temples of Panantaran
(fourteenth century) show this new Javanese style very well. It has
remained the dominant style of Bali art up to the present time. A similar
trend towards the assertion of indigenous styles can also be found in the
Theravada Buddhist countries. The content of the scenes depicted is still
derived from Hindu mythology or Buddhist legends, but the presentation
clearly incorporates the respective national style.