ARCHAEOLOGY AND COINS
[Illustration: Fig. 73. Group of Chamba Temples.]
~Hindu and Buddhist Remains.~--The scholar who ended his study of Indian
history with the close of the first millennium of the Christian era
would expect to find a fruitful field for the study of ancient monuments
of the Hindu faith in the plains of the Panjáb. He would look for a
great temple of the Sun God at Multán, and at places like Lahore and
Kángra, Thanesar and Pihowa, for shrines rich with graven work outside
and with treasures of gold and precious stones within. But he would look
in vain. The Muhammadan invaders of the five centuries which elapsed
between Mahmúd of Ghazní and the Moghal Bábar were above all things
idol-breakers, and their path was marked by the destruction and
spoliation of temples. Even those invaders who remained as conquerors
deemed it a pious work to build their mosques with the stones of ruined
fanes. The transformation, as in the case of the great Kuwwat ul Islám
mosque beside the Kutb Minár, did not always involve the complete
obliteration of idolatrous emblems. Kángra was not too remote to be
reached by invading armies, and the visitor to Nurpur on the road from
Pathánkot to Dharmsála can realize how magnificent some of the old Hindu
buildings were, and how utterly they were destroyed. The smaller
buildings to be found in the remoter parts of the hills escaped, and
there are characteristic groups of stone temples at Chamba and still
older shrines dating from the eighth century at Barmaur and Chitrádí in
the same state. The ruins of the great temple of the Sun, built by
Lálitáditya in the same period, at Mártand[7] near Islámábád in the
Kashmír State are very striking. The smaller, but far better preserved,
temple at Payer is probably of much later date. Round the pool of Katás,
one of Siva's eyes, a great place of Hindu pilgrimage in the Salt
Range, there is little or nothing of antiquarian value, but there are
interesting remains at Malot in the same neighbourhood. It is possible
that when the mounds that mark the sites of ancient villages come to be
excavated valuable relics of the Hindu period will be brought to light.
The forces of nature or the violence of man have wiped out all traces of
the numerous Buddhist monasteries which the Chinese pilgrims found in
the Panjáb. Inscriptions of Asoka? graven on rocks survive at
Sháhbázgarhí and Mansehra in the North-West Frontier Province. Two
pillars with inscriptions of the Missionary Emperor stand at Delhi. They
were brought from Topra near the Jamna in Ambála and from Meerut by
Firoz Sháh. The traveller by train from Jhelam to Ráwalpindí can see to
the west of the line at Mankiála a great _stúpa_ raised to celebrate the
self-sacrifice of the Bodhisattva who gave his life to feed a starving
tigress. There is a ruined _stúpa_ at Suí Vihár in the Baháwalpur State.
The Chinese pilgrims described the largest of Indian _stúpas_ built by
Kanishka near Pesháwar to enshrine precious relics of Gautama Buddha and
a great monastery beside it. Recent excavations have proved the truth
of the conjecture that the two mounds at Sháhjí kí dherí covered the
remains of these buildings, and the six-sided crystal reliquary
containing three small fragments of bone has after long centuries been
disinterred and is now in the great pagoda at Rangoon. In the Lahore
museum there is a rich collection of the sculptures recovered from the
Pesháwar Valley, the ancient Gandhára. They exhibit strong traces of
Greek influence. The best age of Gandhára sculpture was probably over
before the reign of Kanishka. The site of the famous town of Táxila is
now a protected area, and excavation there may yield a rich reward.
[Illustration: Fig. 74. Payer Temple.]
[Illustration: Fig. 75. Reliquary.]
[Illustration: Fig. 76. Colonnade in Kuwwat ul Islám Mosque.]
~Muhammadan Architecture.~--The Muhammadan architecture of North-Western
India may be divided into three periods:
(_a_) The Pathán 1191-1320
(_b_) The Tughlak 1320-1556
(_c_) The Moghal 1556-1753
[Illustration: Fig. 77. Kutb Minár.]
In the Pathán period the royal builders drew their inspiration from
Ghazní, but their work was also much affected by Hindu influences for
two reasons. They used the materials of Hindu temples in constructing
their mosques and they employed masons imbued with the traditions of
Hindu art. The best specimens of this period are to be found in the
group of buildings in Old Delhi or _Kila' Rai Pithora_, close to
Mahraulí and eleven miles to the south of the present city. These
buildings are the magnificent _Kuwwat ul Islám_ (Might of Islam) Mosque
(1191-1225), with its splendid tower, the _Kutb Minár_ (1200-1220), from
which the _mu'azzin_ called the faithful to prayer, the tomb of the
Emperor Altamsh (1238), and the great gateway built in 1310 by Alá ud
dín Khaljí. In the second period, named after the house that occupied
the imperial throne when it began, all traces of Hindu influence have
vanished, and the buildings display the austere and massive grandeur
suited to the faith of the desert prophet unalloyed by foreign elements.
This style in its beginning is best seen in the cyclopean ruins of
Tughlakábád and the tomb of the Emperor Tughlak Sháh, and in some
mosques in and near Delhi. Its latest phase is represented by Sher
Sháh's mosque in the Old Fort or _Purána Kila'_. To some the simple
grandeur of this style will appeal more strongly than the splendid, but
at times almost effeminate, beauty of the third period. Noted examples
of Moghal architecture in the Panjáb are to be found in Sháhjahári's red
fort palace and _Jama' Masjid_ at New Delhi or Sháhjahánábád,
Humáyun's tomb on the road from Delhi to Mahraulí, the fort palace, the
Bádsháhí and Wazír Khán's mosques, at Lahore, and Jahángír's mausoleum
at Sháhdara. A very late building in this style is the tomb of Nawáb
Safdar Jang (1753) near Delhi. A further account of some of the most
famous Muhammadan buildings will be found in the paragraphs devoted to
the chief cities of the province. The architecture of the British period
scarcely deserves notice.
[Illustration: Fig. 78. Tomb of Emperor Tughlak Sháh.]
[Illustration: Fig. 79. Jama Masjid, Delhi.]
[Illustration: Fig. 80. Tomb of Emperor Humáyun.]
[Illustration: Fig. 81. Bádsháhí Mosque, Lahore.]
~Coins.~--Among the most interesting of the archaeological remains are the
coins which are found in great abundance on the frontier and all over
the Panjáb. These take us back through the centuries to times before
the invasion of India by Alexander, and for the obscure period
intervening between the Greek occupation of the Frontier and the
Muhammadan conquest, they are our main source of history. The most
ancient of the Indian monetary issues are the so-called punch-marked
coins, some of which were undoubtedly in existence before the Greek
invasion. Alexander himself left no permanent traces of his progress
through the Panjáb and Sindh, but about the year 200 B.C., Greeks from
Bactria, an outlying province of the Seleukidan Empire, once more
appeared on the Indian Frontier, which they effectively occupied for
more than a century. They struck the well-known Graeco-Bactrian coins;
the most famous of the Indo-Greek princes were Apollodotos and Menander.
Towards the close of this dynasty, parts of Sindh and Afghánistán were
conquered by Sáka Scythians from Central Asia. They struck what are
termed the Indo-Scythian and Indo-Parthian coins bearing names in
legible Greek legends--Manes, Azes, Azilises, Gondophares, Abdagases.
Both Greeks and Sákas were overthrown by the Kusháns. The extensive gold
and copper Kushán currency, with inscriptions in the Greek script,
contains the names of Kadphises, Kanishka, Huvishka, and others. In
addition to the coins of these foreign dynasties, there are the purely
Indian currencies, e.g. the coins of Táxila, and those bearing the names
of such tribes as the Odumbaras, Kunindas, and Yaudheyas. The White Huns
overthrew the Kushán Empire in the fifth century. After their own fall
in the sixth century, there are more and more debased types of coinage
such as the ubiquitous _Gadhiya paisa_, a degraded Sassanian type. In
the ninth century we again meet with coins bearing distinct names, the
"bull and horseman" currency of the Hindu kings of Kábul. We have now
reached the beginning of the Muhammadan rule in India. Muhammad bin
Sám was the founder of the first Pathán dynasty of Delhi, and was
succeeded by a long line of Sultáns. The Pathán and Moghal coins bear
Arabic and Persian legends. There were mints at Lahore, Multán,
Háfizábád, Kalanaur, Deraját, Pesháwar, Srínagar and Jammu. An issue of
coins peculiar to the Panjáb is that of the Sikhs. Their coin legends,
partly Persian, partly Panjábí, are written in the Persian and Gurmúkhí
scripts. Amongst Sikh mints were Amritsar, Lahore, Multán, Dera,
Anandgarh, Jhang, and Kashmír.
[Illustration: Fig. 82. Coins.
1. Silver punch-marked coin. 2. Drachma of Sophytes (Panjáb Satrap about
time of Alexander). 3. Hemidrachma of Azes. 4. Copper coin of Táxila. 5.
Silver Kuninda coin. 6. Stater of Wema Kadphises. 7. Stater of Kanishka.
8. Later Kushán stater. 9. White Hun silver piece. 10. Gadhiya _paisa_.
11. Silver coin of Spalapatí Deva, Hindu King of Kábul.]
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 7: See page 166.]