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Serindia : vol.1 |
i6 ACROSS SWAT AND DM [Chap. I
is possible to fix with fair accuracy the position of the sacred spots further down by the river, where Buddha's miraculous footprints and the impress left by his drying clothes received pious worship.12
Also when Hsüan-tsang passes on southwards, identifications of the sacred sites he describes become possible owing to the rapid archaeological survey I was able to effect in i 898, while with the Bunér Field Force. Thus I have shown that the Mahayana convent, two hundred li to the south of the Swat capital, where Buddha in a former birth had delivered himself up to a king, his enemy, in order that the reward offered for his person might benefit a poor Brahman, is still marked by the ruins of Pinj-katai near Sunigram in Bunér." With this point determined and guided by the Hsi yii-chi's precise bearings and distances, it became possible for me also to trace the remains of the Masûra-sarigharama or ` Convent of the lentils', and of the Stüpa which marked the spot where Buddha in a previous existence had ransomed the dove, at Gumbatai near Tursak and at Girarai respectively' Both sites have already been referred to, the first being mentioned also by Sung Yün and the second by Fa-hsien.15 To this group of Bunér sites a fourth may be added, if the tempting identification proposed by M. Foucher of the Hi-lo mountain with Mount I1am, the most conspicuous peak in the range separating the Swat Valley from Buner, is accepted.'s The description which Hsüan-tsang gives of the mountain, the bearing to the south of Manglaur which he indicates, and the name itself would well agree with the suggested location. But there remains the fact that the versions so far known of the Hsi yü-chi's text put the distance at four hundred li, while M. Foucher must conjecturally emend it to one hundred. So a decision must be left until the time when it will be possible to pay a visit to Mount I1am and to verify the presence, or otherwise, of the square stones mentioned by the pilgrim, ' resembling couches and looking as if made by the hand of man, which touch each other and continue from the sides of the mountain down into the valley'. The superstitious respect in which the peak is held to-day might well be a reflex of the legends to which Hsüan-tsang alludes, about mysterious voices and musical strains heard on the mountain where Buddha ' once gave up his life for the hearing of a half-stanza of doctrine '.17
From the Stûpa, marking the spot where Buddha had redeemed the pigeon, a journey of two hundred li north-westwards brought the pilgrim to a group of sacred sites in a valley which he calls Shan-ni-lo-shih.'s The distance and bearing taken from Girarai justify Colonel Deane in his identification of this with the Adinzai Valley which debouches at Chakdara from the north." Remains of Buddhist shrines can be traced at several points along the lower part of this valley,
Hsüan-
tsang's account of Bunér sites.
years. And so once every twelve years the countryhas the " white water " infliction.
M. Foucher has rightly pointed out that the folklore notion underlying the legend of Apalala is the same as in the Kashmir legend of the Naga Suiravas; see his article on Les bas-reliefs du Sttipa de Srkri, J.A., 1903, ii. p. 185 ; also my note on Rnjat. i. 263-5. M. Foucher has also justly called attention to the identity of the expression white water' with the Turki term ak-su applied in Chinese Turkestan to the summer floods from the mountains ; cf. Ruins of Kholan, i. pp. 185, 426 ; Ancient Khotan, i. pp. 94, 445. It is curious that Albérûni (ii. p. 182, as quoted by Watters) records a tradition from Swat about the water of a certain valley becoming white on certain days of the year. The Nâga Su§ravas, too, is supposed after his banishment to reside in a ' lake of dazzling whiteness resembling a sea of milk which he created for himself on a far-off mountain' ; see my Râjal. i. 267, with note.
12 Cf. above, p. 8.
" See Archaeological lour with the Bunér Field Force, pp. 34 sqq., 61-2 (also Ind. Ant., xxviii. pp. 14, 58).
14 Cf. ibidem, pp. 16 sqq., 61-2 (Ind. Ant., xxviii. pp. 21, 25, 59 sq.). It may be noted that the designation Blasûra is not certain since the text of the Hsi yü-chi shows ulIo yü
Ilk for the form Mo-shu a presupposed by
an explanatory gloss. Sung Yün's text shows the second character as - hsiu.
15 See above, pp. 9, 13.
is Cf. Foucher, Giographie ancienne du Gandhdra, p. 48, note 3.
" Cf. Watters, Yuan Chwang, i. p. 231 ; Julien, Mimoires, i. pp. 135 sq.
18 See Julien, Mimoires, i. pp. 137 sq. ; Watters, Yuan Chwang, i. pp. 235 sq.
'S See Deane, Notes on Udyâna, JR.A.S., 1896, p. 657.
Buddhist sites in Adinzai Valley.
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