74 



THE STATURE OF GOT AM A. BUDDHA, 

 BY J AMES D' ALWIS, M. R. Ai"S* 



There is no statement in any part of the Buddhist 

 Canon regarding the stature of Buddha, or the ordinary- 

 stature of man in his age. Nor, so far as my investigations 

 have extended, have I found any allusion to them in any 

 of the Commentaries to the Canon. Dimensions, however, 

 are recorded of habitations, furniture, clothes, &c, designed 

 for the priesthood; and they are generally expressed by 

 the terms " sugata vidatthi." At the place, where it is 

 first mentioned (vide Vinaya Pitaka, lib. 1, chap. 4) 

 Buddhaghosa defines the measure thus: — 



Sugata vidatthi nama idani majjhimassa purisassa tisso vidat- 

 thiyo vaddhalu hatthena diyaddho hattho hoti — i. e. '* Sugata 

 vidatthi, is three spans of a middle-size person of this (age), and 

 one and a half cubits by a carpenter's cubit.' 



Upon the above authority, and on the supposition, I 

 believe, that by sugata, "Buddha's" was meant, the cal- 

 culation of his height is in this wise. Taking Buddha's 

 span to have been the length of " three spans of an ordinary 

 person," and giving nine inches to the ordinary span, the 

 sugata span is put down at (three by nine, equal to) twenty- 

 seven inches. Two spans being generally considered to be 

 a cubit, or the length of the lower-half of a man's arm ; and 

 four times that length being the average height of a well- 

 proportioned man — Buddha's stature is said to have been 

 (twenty-seven x two x four, equal to two-hundred and 

 sixteen inches, or) eighteen feet. 



It is not easy to ascertain with precision if Buddhaghosa 

 in his gloss meantj by sugata vidatthi, "Gotama Buddha's 



