History of Indian and Eastern ArchitectureFergusson, James
History
History of Indian and Eastern Architecture
Fergusson, James
Architecture -- India; Architecture, Asian
On digging into this monument, General Ventura found three separate
deposits of relics, deposited at apparently equal distances of 25 ft.
from the surface of the finished monument and from each other, and each
apparently increasing in value or importance as it descended. The first
was at the base of a solid cubical mass of squared masonry, and
contained, _inter alia_, some Sassanian coins and one of Yasoverma (A.D.
720), and one of Abdullah ben Hassim, struck at Merv A.H. 66, or A.D.
685.[106] The second, at a depth of 50 ft., contained no coins. The
principal deposit, at a depth of 75 ft., was on the exact level of the
procession-path outside. It consisted of a copper vessel, in which was a
relic casket in brass, represented in the annexed woodcut (No. 24),
containing a smaller vessel of gold, filled with a brown liquid, and
with an inscription on the lid which has not yet been fully deciphered,
but around it were one gold and six copper coins of the Kanishka type.
[Illustration: 23. Elevation and Section of Portion of Basement of Tope
at Manikyala.]
[Illustration: 24. Relic Casket, Manikyala.]
If this were all, it would be easy to assert that the original smaller
tope, as shown in the section (Woodcut No. 22), was erected by Kanishka,
or in his age, and that the square block on its summit was the original
tee, and that in the 8th century an envelope 25 ft. in thickness, but
following the original form, was added to it, and with the extended
procession-path it assumed its present form, which is very much lower
than we would otherwise expect from its age.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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