Sravasti

Sravasti was one of the Buddhist places visited by Xuan Zang in 636 AD.

Visit by Xuanzang in 636 AD

Alexander Cunningham writes that

The ancient territory of Ayodliya, or Oudh, was divided by the Sarju or Ghagra river into two great provinces ; that to the north being called TJltara Kosala, and that to the south Banaodha. Each was again

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[p.408]: subdivided into two districts. In Banaodha these are called Pachham-rdt and Purab-rdt, or the western and eastern districts ; and in Uttara Kosala they are Gauda (vulgarly Gondu) to the south of the Eapti, and Kosala to the north of the Eapti, or Rdwati, as it is univer- sally called in Oudh. Some of these names are found in the Puranas. Thus, in the Yayu Purana, Lava the son of Eama is said to have reigned in Uttara Eosala; but in the Matsya Linga and Kurma Puranas, Srdvasti is stated to be in Gauda. These apparent discrepancies are satisfactorily explaiued when we learn that Gauda is only a subdivision of Uttara Kosala, and that the ruins of Sravasti have actually been discovered in the district of Gauda, which is the Gonda of the maps. The extent of Gauda is proved by the old name of Balrampur on the Eapti, which was formerly Ra7n- garli-Gauda. I presume, therefore, that both the Gauda Brahnans and the Gauda Tac/as must originally have belonged to this district, and not to the medi- asval city of Gauda in Bengal. Brahmans of this name are still numerous iu Ajudhya and Jahangirabad on the right bank of the Ghagra river, in Gonda, Pa- khapur, and Jaisni of the Gonda or Gauda district on the left bank, and in many parts of the neighbouring province of Gorakhpur. Ajiidltya, therefore, was the capital of Banaodha, or Oudh to the south of the Gha- gra, while Srdvasti was the capital of Uttara Kosala, or Oudh to the north of the Ghagra.

The position of the famous city of Srdvasti, one of the most celebrated places in the annals of Buddhism, has long puzzled our best scholars. This was owing partly to the contradictory statements of the" Chinese pilgrims themselves, and partly to the want of a good

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map of the province of Oudli. In my account of Vi- sdkJia or Ajudhya, I have compared the bearings and distances recorded by Fa-Hian and Hwen Thsang with those preserved in the Buddhist annals of Cey- lon, and I have shown conclusively that Fa-Hian' s distance from Sankisa and his bearing from Shachi or Sdket are both erroneous. We know from Hwen Thsang and the Buddhist books of Ceylon that Srd- vasti was to the north of Sdket or Ajudhya^ or in other words that it was in the district of Gauda or TJttara Kosala, which is confirmed by the statements of no less than four of the Brahmanical Pur^nas. And as Fa-Hian also says that Shewei or Sewet was in Kosala, there can be no doubt whatever that Sravasti must be looked for within a few days' journey to the north- ward of Sdket or Ayodliya. According to Fa-Hian the distance was 8 yojanas, or 56 miles, which is in- creased by Hwen Thsang to 500 U, or 83 miles.* But as the latter pilgrim reduced the Indian yojana to Chinese measure at the rate of 40 li per yojana^ ve may correct his distance by the nearest round number of 350 li^ or 58 miles, to bring it into accordance with the other. Now, as this is the exact distance from Ajudhya of the great ruined city on the south bank of the Eapti, called Sdhet-Mdhet, in which I discovered a colossal statue of Buddha with an inscription con- taining the name of Sravasti itself, I have no hesita- tion in correcting Hwen Thsang' s distance from 500 li to 350 li, as proposed above.

The ruined city of Sahet-Mahet is situated between Akaona and Balrampur, at 5 miles from the former and 12 miles from the latter, and at ijiearly equal dis-

• Beal'a ' Fali-Hian,' p. xx. 73 ; Julien's ' Hiouen Tlisang,' ii. 292.

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tances from Bahraich and Gonda.* In shape it is an almost semicircular crescent, with its diameter of one mile and a third in length curved inwards and facing the north-east, along the old bank of the Eapti river. The -western front, which runs due north and south, for three-quarters of a mile, is the only straight por- tion of the enclosure. The ramparts vary consider- ably in height ; those to the west being from 35 to 40 feet in height, whUe those on the south and east are not more than 25 or 30 feet. The highest point is the great north-west bastion, which is 50 feet above the fields. The north-east face, or shorter curve of the crescent, was defended by the Eapti, which still flows down its old bed during the annual floods. The land ramparts on the longer curve of the crescent must once have been defended by a ditch, the remains of which yet exist as a swamp, nearly half a mile in length, at the south-west corner. Everywhere the ramparts are covered with fragments of brick, of the large size peculiar to very ancient cities ; and though I was unable to trace any remains of walls except in one place, yet the very presence of the bricks is quite sufficient to show that the earthen ramparts must once have been crowned by briclv parapets and battlements. The portion of the parapet wall, which I discovered still standing in the middle of the river face, was 10 feet thick. The whole cii'cuit of the old earthen ram- parts, according to my survey, is 17,300 feet, or up- wards of 3^ miles. Now this is the exact size of 20 /i, or 3|- miles, which Ilwen Thsang gives to the palace alone ; but, as the city was then deserted and in ruins, he must have mistaken the city itself for the palace.

• See Map No. XI. for its position.

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It is certain at least that the suburbs outside the walls must have been very limited indeed, as the place is almost entirely surrounded with the remains of large religious buildings, which would have left but little room for any private dwellings. I am therefore quite satisfied that the city has been mistaken for the palace ; and this mistake is sufiicient to show how utterly ruined this once famous city must have been at so distant a period as the seventh century, when the place was visited by Hwen Thsang. As Fa-Hian describes the population as already very inconsider- able in A.D. 400, while the Ceylonese annals speak of K/iiradhdra^ king of SawaWiipura between a.d. 275 and 302, the great decline of Sr^vasti must have taken place during the fourth century, and we may perhaps not be far wrong in connecting it with the fall of the Gupta dynasty in a.d. 319.

Srdvasti is said to have been built by Eaja Sravasta* the son of Yuvandswa of the Solar race, and the tenth in descent from Surya himself. Its foundation there- fore reaches to the fabulous ages of Indian history, long anterior to Eama. During this early period it most probably formed part of the kingdom of Ayo- dhya, as the Yayu Purana assigns it to Lava, the son of Eama. When Sravasti next appears in historj^, in the time of Buddha, it was the capital of King Pra- senajit, the son of Maha Kosala. The king became a convert to the new faith, and during the rest of his life he was the firm friend and protector of Buddha. But his son Virudhaka hated the race of the Sakyas, and his invasion of their country and subsequent mas- sacre of 500 Sakya maidens, who had been selected for

• "Wilson, ' Vishnu Purana,' book iv. p. 2 ; Hall's edit., vol. iv. p. 263.

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his harem, brought forth the famous prediction of Bud- dha, that within seven days the king would be con- sumed by fire. As the story has been preserved by Buddhists, the prediction was of course fulfilled, and upwards of eleven centuries afterwards, the tank in which the king had sought to avoid the flames was pointed out to the credulous Hwen Thsang.*

We hear nothing more of Sravasti until one cen- tury after Kanishka, or five centuries after Buddha, when, according to Hwen Thsang, Yikramaditya, king of Sravasti, became a persecutor of Buddhists, and the famous Manorhita, author of the Yibhasha Sastra, being worsted in argument by the Brahmans, put himself to death. During the reign of his successor, whose name is not given, the Brahmans were overcome by FasitbainJIiu, the eminent disciple of Manorldta. The probable date of these two kings may be set down as ranging from a.d. 79 to 120. Por the next two cen- turies Sravasti would seem to have been under the rule of its own kings, as we find KJuradhura and his nephew mentioned as Eajas between a.d. 275 and 319. t But there can be little doubt that during the whole of this time Sravasti was only a dependency of the powerful Gupta dynasty of Magadha, as the neigh- bouring city of Sakcta is specially said to have be- longed to them. "Princes of the Gupta race," says the Vayu Purana, "will possess all those countries; the banks of the Ganges to Prayaga, and Saketa, and Magadha." % From this time Sravasti gradually de-

• Julien's ' Hiouen Tlisang,' ii. 306.

t Tumour, ia Jourii. Asiat. Soc. Bengal, vi. 865. X Quoted in Wilson's ' >'is]mu Purana,' p. 479, note ; and Hall's edition, iv. 218. --- [p.413]:

elined. In a.d. 400 it contained only 200 families; in A.D. 632 it was completely deserted ; and at the present day the whole area of the city, excepting only a few clearances near the gateways, is a mass of almost impenetrable jangal.

There is a difference in the name of the city, which Fa-Hian gives as She-wei., while Hwen Thsang writes it, as correctly as is possible in Chinese syllables, 8he- lo-fa-si-ti or Srdvasti. But this diiference is more ap- parent than real, as there can be little doubt that Shewei is only a slight alteration of the abbreviated Pali form of Sewet, for SdwatlM, which is found in ■most of the Ceylonese books. Similarly the modern name of SMef is evidently only a variation of the Pali Sdwet. The other name of Mdhet I am unable to ex- plain ; but it is perhaps only the usual rhyming addi- tion of which the Hindus are so fond^ as in ulta-pulfa, or " topsy-turvy," which many people say is the true meaning of Sdhet-mdhet, in allusion to the utter ruin of the whole place. But some say that the name was originally Set-met, and as this form seems to be a cor- ruption of Seioet, it is probable that Sahd-Mahet is only a lengthened pronunciation of Set-met. One man alone, a Muhammadan in charge of the tomb of Pir Barana close to the ruined city, affirmed that the true name was Sdvitri, which is so close to the correct Pali form of Sdioatthi as to leave but little doubt that it preserves the original name of the place.

Hwen Thsang assigns to the kingdom of Srdvasti a circuit of 4000 li, or 667 miles, which is about double the actual size of the territory lying between the Ghagra river and the foot of the mountains ; but as he assigns the same dimensions to the territory of Nep^l,

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it is probable that in his time the two western districts of Malbhum and Khachi, in the hills to the north, may at that time have belonged to Sravasti. The territory of Sravasti would thus have comprised all the country lying between the Himalaya mountains and the Ghagra river, from the Karnali river on the west to the mountain of Dhaolagiri and Faizabad on the east. The circuit of this tract is about 600 miles, or very nearly the same as the estimated measurement of Hwen Thsang.