NO. 6 YAKSAS COOMARASWAMY 23 



Another and later instance may be cited in the Mdlavikagnimitra, 

 V. I, where a bhitti-handho, or hhittivcdikahandha is built round an 

 asoka-tree. 



Elaborate structures built round the Bodhi tree are represented in 

 numerous reliefs from Bharhut, SancT, Mathura, and AmaravatI, 

 and there is no reason to suppose that structures of this kind were 

 made for the first time after the Yakkha hhavanam (for such it was) 

 at Uruvela became the Bodhi tree of Gautama. 



Yaksa caityas, etc., are constantly described as places of resort, and 

 suitable halting or resting places for travellers ; Buddhist and Jaina 

 saints and monks are frequently introduced as resting or residing at 

 the haunt of such and such a Yaksa, or in such and such a Yakkha 

 ceiya (Punnabhadda ceiya, ut supra; the Buddha, in many of the 

 Yakkha Suttas of the Samyutta Nikaya). Amongst other caityas or 

 groves mentioned in Buddhist literature, the following may be cited 

 as having been in all probability sacred to the cult of a local divinity: 

 (i) the Capala caitya given to the Buddha by the Vajjians (Lic- 

 chavis) of Vaisall (Watters, On Yuan Chwang, II, 78) (2) the 

 Supatittha cetiya in the Yatthivana or Staffwood, where Buddha 

 stayed on his first visit ; it is stated, indeed, that this was the ancient 

 place of abode of Supatittha, the god of a banyan tree (Watters, ibid., 

 II, 147), (3) the grove of sal-trees belonging to the Mallas, where the 

 Parinibbana took place. Here the couch {uttarasisakain) on which 

 the Buddha lay must have been a dais or altar originally intended for 

 the reception of offerings. In some reliefs, tree spirits are seen in 

 each of the two trees. (4) The Vajjian (Vaisali, Licchavi) 

 caityas referred to by the Buddha {Mahaparinihhana Suttanta, and 

 Angnttara Nikaya, VII, 19) when he repeats the conditions of future 

 welfare for the Vajjians, exhorting them not to allow the " proper 

 offerings and rites as formerly given and performed at the Vajjian 

 cetiyas to fall into desuetude." Buddhaghosa (Sumahgala Vildsinl) 

 regards these as having been Yakkha cetiya, and it can hardly be 

 doubted that this was so in most or all cases. With reference to the 

 Saradanda cetiya at Vaisall, where the Buddha was staying on the 

 occasion of stating the conditions of Vajjian welfare, he says that 

 " this was a vihdra erected on the site of a former shrine of the 

 Yakkha Saradanda." 



In the same way Gujarat! commentators of Jaina texts interpret, 

 no doubt correctly, the ceiyas referred to, as Jakkha shrines. But the 

 Dijipalasa ceiya N. E. of the Vaniyagama suburb of Vaisall may be 

 separately mentioned. Here, in the Uvdsaga Dasdo^ § 2f., we find 



' Hoernle, UvdsagadasSo, II, p. 2. 



