358 INDIAN ARCHAEOLOGICAL SURVEY. 



magnificent Buddhist monument in all India — the Amravati Tope.* 

 Here Mr. Sewell set to work in 1877, and during the summer and 

 autumn of that year, unearthed a large number of marbles which he 

 closely described in his report.f 



In 1879 Mr. Sewell went home on sick leave, and the following 

 year the Duke of Buckingham, Governor of Madras, paid a visit to the 

 spot and directed the district collector to complete the excavation of 

 the tope, at a cost not exceeding R,s. 1.000. But, as Lord 

 Hartington pointedly remarked in a despatch on the subject, the 

 collector's special qualifications as an archseologist were unknown, 

 the promised services of a Public "Works officer to help him 

 were not vouchsafed, and the general result was to convert the site 

 of the tope into a large pit about 75 yards in diameter, to 

 disarrange the stones and debris, and so destroy the chance of 

 getting any idea of its size or structural arrangements. J 

 Dr. Burgess is of opinion, however, that this once splendid 

 monument had been destroyed perhaps more than once before, and 

 that many of the beautiful slabs must have been used even within 

 the last 65 years to burn into lime, or to repair miserable Svami 

 temples, and similar buildings. There are indications also of a 

 great flood having first destroyed, or at least greatly injured, the 

 stupa, possibly drowned many of its priests and worshippers and 

 led to its falling into rapid decay, after which it was reconstructed 

 after some rough manner. 



On Mr. Adam's sudden death, Mr. (now Sir) M. E. Grant Duff 

 became Governor, and in November 1881, the superintendence of 

 the Madras Archaeological Survey was also entrusted to Dr. Burgess. 

 His first season was devoted to the survey of the remains round 

 Bejwada, the Amaravati and Jaggayyapeta stupas, the Jaugada and 

 Dhauli inscriptions of Asoka, and a visit to the Khandagiri and 

 TTdayagiri caves, taking facsimiles of all the inscriptions. 



The season of 1S82-83, besides the official work and direction of 

 tlic Bombay Survey, was largely devoted, along with Mr. A. Rea, to the 



* Colonel Mackenzie and liis assistants made careful drawings and plans in 1816 of 

 this great monument, and Sir Walter Elliot excavated a large number of sculptures, 

 now at the British Museum. The Stupa and its known sculptures were described fully 

 in the second part of Fergusson's Tree and Serpent Worship. 



| lieport on the Amaravati Tope, and Excavations en its Site in 1877, by Robert 

 Sewell, Printed by order of the Secretary of State for India in Council, 1880. 



J Burgess's Notes on the Amaravati Stupa. Printed by order of Government, 

 Madras: E. Kcv>. LS82. 



