1854.] Excavations at Sarn&th. 471 



the lower walls (distinguished by neutral tint), the general line of 

 the original bank sloped from east to west and that the later 

 monastery was erected on the slope of the shelving bank forming 

 the westward face of the Kherali or natural mound, to the extreme 

 eastward of which is situated the celebrated. Tope, which dates from 

 a far earlier period.* 



The outline profile therefore of that portion of the accumulations, 

 which served to fill in the higher but unequal line of the broken 

 walls now exposed, formed, by subsequent deposits, a mere con- 

 tinuation to the westward of that face of the original bank, taking 

 however a more gradual slope than the sides of the clean earth 

 mound appear to have done. 



In brief summary of the nature of the materials removed during 

 the progress of the excavations, I may note unmixed earthen soil 



* Major Cunningham in reply to my enquiries regarding his extensive Sarnath 

 researches of older days, sends me the following items of information : 



' When I got your letter I could not lay my hands upon my Sarnath papers, and 

 when I did find them, there did not appear to be any thing that would be of use 

 to you. I opened the great Tope in January, 1835 : and made numerous excava- 

 tions all round it. I cleared out the remains of the Tops, in which Jagat Singh, 

 the Dewan of Cheit Singh, had found the relics — and I drove a shaft down the 

 centre of the large brick Tope called Chokaudi. I found about one hundred 

 statues and bas reliefs, of which all that were worth preserving were presented by 

 me to the Asiatic Society of Bengal. 



* Connected with Sarnath there are two great facts which should be brought pro- 

 minently forward. The first is the size of the building, which Wilford has stated 

 to be 50 feet high, and which Wilson and others have repeated — whereas it is 

 110 feet high above the ruins, and about 130 feet above the plain, I measured it 

 with a theodolite, 109 feet 10 inches, and afterwards with an iron chain, when I had 

 finished the scaffolding, 110 feet. 



' The other point regarding Sarnath is its age, and here again Wilford has misled 

 every one. The inscription which he published was found by Jayat Singh, and 

 removed to the tank at Jagatganj, where Kittoe afterwards found it. This inscrip- 

 tion is on the pedestal of a statue and bears reference only to the erection and 

 dedication of the statue in the tenth century, and has no connexion whatever with 

 any of the Topes. The great Tope, to judge by the alphabetical characters of the 

 inscribed slab which I found inside it must date as early as A. D. 600—700 — and 

 I feel certain that it is the very lofty Tope seen by II wan Thsang in A. D. 640 

 in the Deer Park. As Sdrang is a Deer, perhaps Sarnath may be only a contrac- 

 tion of Saranganath.' 



