Archeological Survey Report. cul 
the foundation, immediately below the stone-work, but without 
yielding any result. : 
242. Thus ended my opening of the great tower after 14 
months’ labour, and at a cost of more than Rs. 500. When I began 
the work I was not aware that many of the most hallowed of the 
Buddhist monuments were only memorial stupas, raised over spots 
rendered famous by various acts of Buddha, such as we know from 
Hwen Thsang’s account was the great tower near Benares, which 
was erected by Asoka near the spot where Buddha had begun to 
“turn the wheel of the Jaw,’ thatis, to preach his new doctrine. 
The “tower of the Deer Park near Benares”’ is likewise enumerated 
by another Chinese author as one of the “eight divine towers” 
erected on sites where Buddha had accomplished “ many important 
acts of his terrestrial career,” the particular act which he had accom- 
plished at Benares being his preaching. This tower was seen by 
Fa-Hian in the beginning of the 5th century, who notices that 
Buddha, when he began to “turn the wheel of the law,’ sat down 
looking towards the west. Now on the western face of the great 
tower there is a small plain tablet, which, as I have said before, could 
only have been intended for some very short inscription, such as the 
name either of the tower itself, or of the event which it was intended 
to commemorate. But whatever it may have been intended for, its 
position was no doubt significant, and as at Buddha Gaya, where 
Sakya had been seated facing the east, his statue was placed in the 
same position, so at Benares, where, when he began to preach, he had 
been seated facing the west, I conclude that the western face of the 
monument erected to commemorate that event would have been the 
principal side, and that any inscription would certainly have been 
placed on that side. 
243. It now only remains to notice the name by which this great 
tower is known amongst the people of the neighbouring villages. This 
name is Dhamek, of which no one knows the meaning. It is 
evidently some compound of Dharmma, and bearing in mind that on 
this spot Buddha first began to “ turn the wheel of the law,” I would 
suggest that Dhamek is only an abbreviation af the Sanskrit Dharm- 
mopadesaka, or “ Preacher of Dharmma,” which is indeed the common 
term now in use to designate any religious teacher. The term is 
also used in the simpler form of Dharima desaka, which in familiar 
