Miscellaneous Communications -- The Traditional Date of Kanishka
By Fleet, J.F.
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland
1906, pp. 979-992
p. 979
The tradition of Gandhara and Kashmir, as
reported by Hiuen Tsiang (A.D. 630-644), placed
Kanishka 400 years after the death of Buddha; as
follows:--
According to the Si-yu-ki, under Gandhara, Buddha
on a certain occasion said to Ananda (Julien,
Memoires, 1. 106): -- `In the 400 years which will
follow my nirvana, there will `be a king who will
make himself illustrious in the world `under the name
of Kanishka.' And immediately after this we are told
(ibid., 107) that:-- `In the 400th year after `the
nirvana of the Tathagata, king Kanishka ascended `the
throne, and extended his power over the whole of
`Jambudvipa.'(1)
And the same work tells us, under Kashmir
(Julien, Memoires, 1. 172), that:-- 'In the 400th
year after the nirvana `of the Tathagata, Kanishka,
king of Gandhara, ascended the `throne at the time
fixed by heaven. The influence of his `laws made
itself felt far and wide; and foreign peoples
------------------------------
1. Beal, Records, 1. 99: --"400 years after my
departure from the world. "there will be a king
who shall rule it called kanishka..... this king
"ascended the throne 400 rears after the nirvana,
and governed the whole of "Jambudvipa."
Watters, On Yuang Chwang, 1. 203:--, "400 years
after my decease a sovereign "will reign, by name
Kanishka......Exactly 400 years after the death of
"the Buddha kanishka became sovereign of all
Jambudvipa."
The Life does not present a passage answering to
this one.
p. 980
`came to make submission to him."(1) This passage
goes on to give an account of the "Council" convened
by Kanishka and the honourable Parsva, which it may,
or may not, be understood to place in the 400th year.
Whether we should accept this tradition about
Kanishka, is a question regarding which there may be,
no doubt, a justifiable difference of opinion. But,
either the tradition must be accepted and applied as
it stands, or else it must be definitely rejected. It
is not permissible to accept it, but to misapply it
by distorting it so as to make it say or mean
something which it does not really assert. Yet that
has been done, in the manner explained further on,
with a view to making it place Kanishka in the last
quarter of the first century A.D.; or, to be more
explicit, in order to set up, on one side, the view
that he founded the so- called Saka era commencing in
A.D,. 78, and, on another side, the view,-- without
determining exactly his initial year,-- that his
known dates, ranging from the year 3 onwards, were
recorded on a system of "omitted hundreds" in the
fifth century, commencing in A.D. 89, of the
Seleucidan era which began in B.C. 312: that is, the
year 3 mentioned in connexion with Kanishka may or
may not mean the third year of his reign, but it does
at any rate mean the year 403, = A.D. 91-92; the year
18 means 418, = A.D. 106-107; and so on.(2)
-----------------------------
1. Beal, Records, 1. 151:-" In the 400th year after
the nirvana of Tathagata, "Kanishka, king of
Canddhara, having succeeded to the kingdom, his
kingly " renown reached far, and he brought the
most remote within his jurisdiction.
Watters, 0n Yuan Chwang, 1. 270:--" Our pilgrim
next proceeds to relate "the circumstances
connected with the great Council summoned by
Kanishka. " This king of Gandhara, Yuan-chuang
tells us, in the 400th year after the "decease of
Buddha was a great and powerful sovereign whose
sway extended to " many peoples."
For the corresponding passage in the Life, see
Julien, 95; Beal, 71.
2. By the application of " omitted hundreds '' in
another direction, Mr. Vincent Smith arrired at
the result that the year 5 for Kanishka means the
year 3205, = A.D. 129-30, of a certain reckoning,
belonging to Kashmir, which has its initial point
in B.C. 3076. But, after referring to a certain
passage in Alberuni's India, which shews that the
use of "omitted hundreds" did exist in certain
parts at a certain time, and after quoting a
remark by General Sir Alexander Cunningham that
(see Num. Chron., 1892.42) " the omission of the
hundreds...... was a common practice in India in
reckoning the Sapt Rishi
p. 981
As regards this last view, we shall be happy to
give full consideration to that or any other such
arrangement, when anyone can adduce, against the
dates which we have for Kanishka ranging from the
year 3 to the year 18, or against those which we have
for Vasudeva ranging from the year 80 to the year 98,
a date connected with the name Kanishka,-- a date
which is not based on a speculation, a theory, or an
inference, but is distinctly given and so connected
either in an inscription or on a coin,-- in a year
ranging from (say) 91 to 100, or a similar date
connected with the name Vasudeva in a year ranging
from 1 to (say) 10. Meanwhile, I can only say that,
as far as I can work the matter out, the idea that
the Hindus had any system of "omitted hundreds" for
stating dates before the eighth or ninth century in
Kashmir and the tenth certury in some of the northern
parts of India more or less near to Kashmir, is pure
imagination. And I invite attention to a very sound
remark made by a judicious writer in this Journal,
1875. 382; in respect of this theory of "omitted
hundreds," or as it might also be called "suppressed
centuries," Professor Dowson there said:-"It supposes
that the number of the "century was suppressed, as we
now suppress it in saying '' `75 for 1875. But we
never adopt this practice in dating " documents,(1)
and it is obvious that it would entirely defeat
------------------------------
kal, or Era of the Seven Rishis," Mr. Smith has
proceeded to say (this Journal, 1903. 17):--" No
such mode or practice ever existed. The actual
practice was "and is very different, and requires
the omission of both thousands and hundreds. " The
year 3899 is actually written as 99, and might
conceivably be written as " 899, with the omission
of the thousands, but it could not possibly be
written " as 3`99, omitting the hundreds only.
This observation is fatal to the theories " which
seek to explain the Kusana dates"--[i.e. the dates
of the series of the records which mention
kanishka, etc.]--"4 to 98, as meaning 404 to 498 "
of the Seleucidan era, 204 to 298 of the Saka era,
and so forth. There is no " evidence that the year
98 ever meant either 298 or 498 although it might
"mean 3298 or 2498, or any other figure in
thousands and hundreds ending "with 98."
On that I will only remark that, while a certain
freedom of argument may be permissible in writing
about matters of ancient history, it really is
going too far, to credit Sir A. Cunningham with
such nonsense as is imputed to him by suggesting
that, if he had omitted the hundreds of any such
number as 3899, he would have given any remainder
except 99.
1. Meaning, of course, documents in any way of a
formal nature.
p. 982
" the object of putting a date upon a monument
intended "to endure for a long period." However, we
are not now concerned with the matter of "omitted
hundreds;" I apply myself here to another question.
We have quoted, above, the tradition of Gandhara
and Kashmir about Kanishka. We have next to note that
the tradition of Kashmir and India placed a king
Asoka 100 years after the death of Buddha.(1) This
date is asserted in the Asokavadana (page 883 above,
and note I). It is also reported by Hiuen Tsiang,(2)
and by I-tsing (A.D. 671-695).(3)
As regards the Asokavadana, there is no doubt
that, by the Asoka to whom it assigns that date,
there was meant Asoka the Maurya, the promulgator of
the famous rock and pillar edicts, the grandson of
Chandragupta. The work omits, indeed, to mention
Chandragupta (see note 1 on
---------------------
1. It may be useful to remark here that the name
Asoka is not at all unique. Without making any
detailed search, and without taking count of
double- barrelled names such as those of
Asokavarna, an alleged king, perhaps = Asoka the
Maurya (Divyavadana,140), Asokavarman, an alleged
ancestor of the Pallava king (H.SII, 2. 355), and
Asokavalla, a ruler of the Sapadalaksha country in
the twelfth century A.D. (EI, 5. appendix, Nos.
575-577). We have the following instances of the
occurrence of the name Asoka pure and simple:--
(1) The Maurya king Asoka-Dharmasoka; as is well
known, in the Vishnu and Bhagavata Puranas he is
called Asokavardhana.
(2) The Saisunaga king Asoka-Kalasoka, regarding
whom see fully further on.
(3) Asoka, younger brother of king
Devanampiya-Tissa of Ceylon, a contemporary of
Asoka the Maurya; commentary on the Mahavamsa,
Turnour, 95; Wijesinha, 61.
(4) Asoka, a prehistoric king, apparently at
Baranasi; Dipavamsa, 3. 37.
(5) Asoka, the personal attendant of the Buddha
Vipasyin; Digha-Nikaya, Part 2, p. 6, and
Nidanakatha, 41.
(6) Asoka, a Brahman, in the time of the Buddha
Kasyapa; Mahavamsa, Turnour, 162; Wijesinha, 104.
(7) Asoka, maternal uncle of an alleged king
Mahapranada; Divyavadana, 59.
2. Julien Memoires, 1. 170, 414, 422; 2. 140: Beal,
Records, 1. 150; 2. 85, 90, 246: Watters, 0n Yuan
Chwang, 1. 267; 2. 88 (at 2. 92, 234, this detail
has been omitted). See also in the Life, Julien,
137, 198; Beal, 101, 144.
The first of the passages in the Si-yu-ki is found
in the account of Kashmir. The last of those
passages, and the second of the two in the Life,
are found in the accounts of Ceylon: but the
statement is so opposed to the Ceylonese has been
omitted). See also in the Life, Julien, 137, 198;
Beal, 101, 144. tradition, both in this detail and
in representing Mahendra as the younger brother
instead of the son of Asoka, that It is
practically impossible that Hiuen Tsiang can have
heard it there, even if he actually went there, as
to which there is a doubt; in this detail, at any
rate, he must have worked into his account of
Ceylon information obtained in India.
3. Takakusu, Records of the Buddhist Religion, 14.
p. 983
page 884 above). But it expressly mentions its Asoka
as a son of Vindusara (ibid.), who is well known from
other sources as a son of Chandragupta and as the
father of Asoka; and it styles him " the Maurya"
(page 889).
As regards the statements reported by Hiuen
Tsiang,-- it is possible that two passages (the
second of the four in the Si-yu-ki, and its
counterpart, the first of the two in the Life) which
mention A-shu-ka instead of A-yu (on which detail see
page 669 above, note 2) refer to someone else. But
there is practically no doubt that all the other
statements reported by Hiuen Tsiang were intended to
refer to Asoka the Maurya. This is made clear, as
regards the last of the passages in both the Si-yu-ki
and the Life indicated in note 3 on page 982 above,
by the concomitant mention of Mahendra therein, and,
as regards the bulk of his writings, by a comparison
of various details recited in them with the stories
about acts attributed to Asoka the Maurya in the
Asokavadana.
As regards I-tsing, the point is not so certain.
He says (loc. cit., note 4 on page 982 above) that on
a certain occasion Buddha said to king Bimbisara:--
"More than "100 years after my attainment of nirvana,
there will arise "a king named Asoka, who will rule
over t:he whole of "Jambudvipa. At that time, my
teaching handed down by "several Bhikshus will be
split into eighteen schools." It is understood, and
probably quite correctly, that in another statement
in the same work (73), in which he said:--" The
"image of king Asoka has its garment in this way,"
I-tsing has referred to Asoka the Maurya. But it is
difficult to take the reference to the eighteen
schools in the same way. At any rate, I cannot trace
any other statement of that kind in connexion with
Asoka the Maurya; whereas the Mahavamsa (Turnour, 21;
Wijesinha, 15), though perhaps it does not place the
establishment of any of these schools in actually the
time of Asoka the Saisunaga (whom we shall mention
more fully further on), refers to them in the course
of passing from that king to his ten sons who
succeeded him, and allots the foundation of all the
eighteen schools to some
p. 984
undefined times in "the second century, " i.e.,
between the years 100 and 201, after the death of
Buddha, fourteen years at least before the earliest
date of Asoka the Maurya.
Now, in all matters of the most ancient Indian
chronology, the great "sheet-anchor" is, and has been
ever since 1793, the date of Chandragupta, the
grandfather of Asoka the Maurya, as determined by the
information furnished by the Greek writers. In recent
years, indeed, there has been a tendency to believe
that we have something still more definite in the
reference to certain foreign kings in the thirteenth
rock-edict of Asoka. But, as may be shewn on some
other occasion, there is nothing in that, beyond
proof that that edict, framed not earlier than the
ninth year after the abhisheka or anointment of Asoka
to the sovereignty, and most probably in the
thirteenth year, was framed not before B.C. 272; and
that does not help us much, because the abhisheka of
Asoka might, so far as that goes, be put back to even
as early a year as B.C. 284. In all that we have as
yet been able to determine about Asoka there is
nothing that enables us to improve upon what we could
already determine about Chandragupta. From the Greek
writers, we know that Chandragupta, became king of
Northern India at some time between B.C. 326 and 312.
Within those limits, different writers have selected
different years; B.C. 325, 321, 316, 315, and 312.
The latest selection is, I suppose, that made by Mr.
Vincent Smith in his Early History of India, 173;
namely, B.C. 321. And, having regard to the extent to
which ancient history must always be more or less a
matter of compromise, and giving the consideration
which is due (whether we accept or reject his
results) to the earnestness with which Mr. Smith
works and writes, I would not lightly seek to replace
that selection by another; especially for the sake of
only one year. But Mr. Smith's chronological details
are even inter se wrong and irreconcilable. The most
reliable tradition, adopted by Mr. Smith himself for
other ends, gives an interval of 56 years from the
commencement of the reign of Chandra- gupta to the
abhisheka of Asoka; yet, on the same page,
p. 985
Mr. Smith has adopted only 52 years; placing the
abhisheka of Asoka in B.C. 269. And further, he has
placed only three years earlier, in B.C. 272, that
which he has termed the "accession "--- (in reality,
the usurpation)-- of Asoka; regardless of the fact
that the same tradition makes that interval one of
four years.(1) A chronology which includes such
inconsistencies and errors as these in some of its
radical details cannot in any way be accepted as
final. And therefore, for my own results, and on
grounds which I will fully justify hereafter, I do
not hesitate to lay out a different scheme, as the
most convenient and satisfactory one that we are
likely to arrive at. I take B.C. 320 as the initial
year of Chandragupta. The initial date, then, of
Asoka, as determined by his abhisheka, which is
placed by tradition 56 years after the initial date
of Chandragupta, and is cited
------------------------------
1. This is easily arrived at, by deduction, from the
Dipavamsa, 6.1, 20, 21. It is expressly stated by
the commentary on that work, the Mahavamsa, in the
statement about Asoka (Turnour, 21 f.) that:--
Vematike bhatare so hantva ekunakam satam
sakale Janbudipasmim ekarajjam apapuni //
Jina-nibbanato pachchha pure tass abhisekato
attharasm vassa-satam dvayam evam vijaniyam //
Patva chatuhi vassehi ekarajja-mahayaso
pure Pataliputtasmim attanam abhisechayi //
"Having slain (his) brothers, born of various
mothers, to the number of a hundred less by one,
he attained sole sovereignty in the whole of
Jambudipa. After the death of the Conqueror
(Buddha), (and) before the anointment of him
(Asoka,) (there were) 218 years; thus is it to be
understood. Having reached (a point of time
marked) by four years, he, possessed of the great
glory of sole sovereignty, caused himself to be
anointed at the town Pataliputta."
In the last verse, Turnour translated "in the
fourth year of his accession to his sole
sovereignty;" and this was reproduced by
Wijesinha(16). I infer that that is what misled
Mr. Vincent Smith.
Again, Buddhaghosha makes all equally clear
statement. After telling us that Asoka slew all
his brothers with the exception of Tissa who was
born from the same mother with himself, he says
(see Vinayapitaka, ed. Oldenberg, 3. 299): -
Ghatento chattari vassani anabhisitto = va rajjam
karetva chatunnam vassanam achchayena Tathagatassa
parinbbanato dvinnam vassa-satanam upari
attharasame vasse sakala-Jambudipe
ekarajj-abhisekam papuni.
"While slaying (them), he reigned for four years,
without, indeed, being anoicted; and then, at the
end of (those) four years, in the 218th year after
the death of the Tathagata (Buddha), he attained
anointment to the sole sovereignty in the whole of
Jambudipa."
So, also, in another place Buddhaghosha says (loc.
cit., 321)-- Chandagutto cha chatuvisati Bindusaro
atthavisam tass = avasane Asoko rajjam papuni
tassa pure abhiseka chattari.
"And Chandagutta (reigned) for twenty-four
(years); (and) Bindusara for twenty-eight. At his
denth, or at the end of that (period), Asoka
obtained the sovereignty; before his anointment
(took place, there passed) four (years.)"
p. 986
prominently as the starting-point in all the dated
records of Asoka himself, is B.C. 264. And the death
of Buddha, placed by the same tradition 218 years
before the abhisheka of Asoka, occurred in B.C. 482.
The preceding digression has been necessaryin
order to arrive at two working dates; namely, B.C.
264 for the initial date, marked by his abhisheka, of
Asoka, and B.C. 482 for the death of Buddha. We can
now proceed to consider how the tradition about
Kanishka has been misapplied.
The tradition of Kashmir and India gives us 100
years from the death of Buddha to Asoka. The
tradition of Gandhara and Kashmir gives us 400 years
from the death of Buddha to Kanishka. Hardly anything
could be plainer than the point that that statements
were intended to carry us from the death of Buddha to
certain homogeneous dates in the careers of Asoka and
Kanishka, and in fact to their initial dates.
Consequently, the initial date of Asoka, marked by
his abhisheka, being 100 years after the death of
Buddha, the initial date of Kanishka was 300 years
after the initial date of Asoka. Instead of that,
however, the artificial understanding has been
adopted that these statements, combined, place the
initial date of Kanishka 300 years after the final
date, the "death''-- (for which, because the two
events were not coincident, it is better to
substitute here the "end of the reign")-- of
Asoka.(1) Asoka reigned
------------------------------
1. It is sufficient, I think, to cite only two
instances in illustration of this:-
(1) In commenting on the statement recorded by
Hiuen Tsiang in his accound of Kashmir, which
places Kanishka in the 400th year after the death
of Buddha, Mr. Beal said (Records, 1. 151, note
97): --"That is, 300 years after Asoka (B.C.
263-224), or about A.D. 75." It is only from B.C.
224, the final date of Asoka, that 300 years take
us to " about A.D. 75; " to be exact, to A.D. 77.
Compare Beal, ibid., 56, note 200; there, however,
perhaps on the whole seeking rather to place
Kanishka between A.D. 10 and 40, he counted the
300 years from B.C. 263.
(2) Professor Kern has adopted, from Lassen and
other writers, B.C. 259 as approximately right for
the initial date of Asoka (Manual of Indian
Buddhism, 112). He has understood that Asoka "died
after a reign of 37 years" (114). He has cited
"the three centuries which elapsed between the
death of Asoka and the reign of Kaniska" (118).
And, adopting the view that the Saka era of A.D.
78 dates from Kanishka, he has taken A.D. 100 as
the approximate date of the "Council" held under
his patronage (121). Here we have, Asoka reigned
B.C. 259-222; and 300 years from B.C. 222 take us
to A.D.79.
p. 987
for 37 years;(1) that is, from B.C. 264 to 228.
Counting 300 years from B.C. 228 as the end of the
reign of Asoka, we of course reach A.D. 73. And,
taking this as only an approximate result, of course
we at once arrive at A.D. 78, or any desiderated date
thereabouts, for the initial date of Kanishka;
Q.E.D., according to the postulates! But this result
ignores the point that the traditional period of 400
years from the death of Buddha to the initial date of
Kanishka is, by this process itself, deliberately and
unauthorizedly increased from a period of 100 + 300 =
400 years into one of 100 + 37 + 300 = 437 years. In
other words, the traditional statement of 400 years
from the death of Buddha to the initial date of
Kanishka is quietly wiped out; and there is
substituted for it a purely imaginative assertion,
not really found anywhere, of an interval of 300
years from the end of Asoka to the beginning of
Kanishka.
Now, if the basis of the matter were sound,-- if
there was really an interval of 100 years from the
death of Buddha to the initial point, the abhisheka,
of Asoka the Maurya, -- then the real result would be
that, with B.C. 264 as the date of the abhisheka
Asoka as determined from B.C. 320 as the initial date
of Chandragupta, we should have, not A.D. 73, but
A.D. 37 for the initial date of Kanishka, and we
should have B.C. 364 as one amongst various more or
less fictitious dates for the death of Buddha. And
this latter result, also, has been propounded,
practically.(2)
But tradition does not, in reality lead to any
such results as B.C. 364 for the death of Buddha and
A.D. 37 for the initial date of Kanishka. The whole
matter has been simply
------------------------------
1. Dipavamsa, 5. 101: Mahavamsa, Turnour, 122;
Wijesinha, 78. The point that these 37 years were
counted from the abhisheka, not from the time,
four years before that, when he usurped the
sovereignty, must be handled on some other
occasion.
2. I say "practically" because, though that has been
the process, the exact year put forward has not
been B.C. 364. Instead of working with B.C. 264
for the abhisheka of Asoka, the years selected
have been B.C. 268 and 270; and so, by adding
sometimes 100 years, sometimes 118 years, the
years arrived at in this way for the death of
Buddha have been B.C. 368, 370, 380, and 388; see,
e.g. views cited (some of them quite possibly
subsequently abandoned) by Max Muller in SBE, 10.
introd.,44 ff.
p. 988
based upon a mistake, which is removed at once when
we turn to the Ceylonese tradition.
The Ceylonese tradition has not been found to
mention Kanishka. But it places the abhisheka of
Asoka the Maurya 218 years after the death of Buddha
;(1)in which respect it is corroborated by that
record of Asoka himself, found at Sahasram, Rupnath,
and Bairat in Northern India, and at Siddapura,
BrahMagiri, and Jatinga-Ramesvara in Mysore, which
was framed and is dated 256 years after the death of
Buddha and 38 years after the abhisheka of Asoka.(2)
And it mentions a predecessor, called (see page 894
above) sometimes Kalasoka, sometimes simply Asoka,
the Saisunaga, with the statement (Dipavamsa, 4. 44,
47) that it was when he had been reigning for 10
years and half a month, and when Buddha had been dead
100 years, that there arose the heresy of Vesali
which led to the second "Council."(3)
Thus, then, the tradition of Kashmir and India,
found in the Asokavadana and in the writings of Hiuen
Tsiang, simply confuses in respect of his date,--in
which it presents 100 years instead of 90 either by
making a statement in round numbers or by pure
mistake,(4)- Asoka-Dharmasoka
------------------------------
1.See Dipavamsa, 6. 1, and, for Buddhaghosha and the
Mahavamsa, the note on page 985 above.
2.This latter detail is proved whether the word
adhatiya, adhatiya, does or does not actually mean
'thirty-eight.' I regret that I have not yet been
able to pursue that topic further. But in all
these matters there are important side- issues
which must he considered; and they delay progress
even when other affairs do not intervene.
3. The Mahavamsa introduces the account of this
heresy, etc., by saying (Turnour, 15):
Atite dasame vasse Kalasokassa rajino
Sambuddha-parinibbana evam vassa-satam ahu
Tada Vesaliya bhikkhu aneka Vajjiputtaka, etc.
"When the tenth year of king Kalasoka had elapsed,
then it was a century of years after the death of
Buddha. Then many Bhikkhus of Vesali, sons of the
Vajji people, etc."
4. The first is the case according to the information
given by the Dipavamsa, and the Mahavanisa. Both
of them place the commencement of the reign of
Kalasoka 90 years after the death of Buddha.
The second is the case if the statement was based
on information similar to that put forward by
Buddhaghosha. The details of reigns given by him
(loc. cit., 321) place the commencement of the
reign of Kalasoka 100 years (instead of 90) after
the death of Buddha. The sum, however, of all the
reigns up to the initial date of Asoka, given in
the same place, shews a mistake of ten years; it
amounts to 228 years, instead of the 218 which he
has elsewhere (see note on page 985
p. 989
the Maurya, who reigned at Pataliputra, with Asoka
Kalasoka the Saisunaga, who had previously reigned at
the same place. It misplaces Asoka the Maurya by
referring him to a time 128 or 118 years, as we may
like to take it, before his real initial date. As
regards Kanishka, the plain and only safe course is,
not to combine the two statements about 100 and 400
years, and then to count 300 years from a point which
is determined either by a mere statement in round
numbers or by a mistake, but to take the 400 years
themselves, and count them from the point from which
the tradition itself counted them; namely, from the
death of Buddha. And that gives us B.C. 82 as the
initial date of Kanishka indicated by this tradition.
In respect of this tradition about an interval of
400 years from the death of Buddha to the initial
date of Kanishka, we must not ignore the point that,
while the first of Hiuen Tsiang's statements, in the
Si-yu-ki, comes from Gandhara, from that same
territory we have another statement, by Sung-yun
(A.D. 518), which places Kanishka only 300 years
after the death of Buddha (Beal, Records, 1.
introd,103). But that is undeniably wrong. Is it, by
any chance, a result, though Sung-yun does not seem
to m ention Asoka, of some similar erroneous
combination, made in early times, of the 100 years
for Asoka and the 400 years for Kanishka? Or was it
in some way evolved from a tradition reported by
Fa-hian (Beal, Records, 1. introd., 30), not indeed
from Gandhara but from a neighbouring territory, that
a certain image of Maitreya was set up rather more
than 300 years after the death of Buddha?
On the other hand, quite on a line with the
statement about the 400 years is another traditional
statement, reported by Hiuen Tsiang in his story
about Panini under his account
--------------------
above) explicitly stated. And a comparison with
the Mahavamsa (Turnour, 15; Wijesinha, 11) shews
that the mistake-- (whether made by Buddhaghosha
or by copyists, we can hardly say)--lies in
assigning eighteen instead of eight years to kings
Anuruddha and Munda in the time between Ajatasatru
and Kalasoka.
The statements in the Asokavadana and in the
traditions reported by Hiuen Tsiang and I-tsing
may give 100 years on the authority of that
mistake, just as well as in the shape of an even
century for ninety years.
p. 990
of Salatura,(1) which has been held(2) to placee 500
years after the death of Buddha, not simply an
alleged contemporary of Kanishka (which would be
conceivably quite possible), but also Kanishka
himself. We are told that, 500 years after the death
of Buddha, a great Arhat from Kashmir arrived at
Salatura, and saw a Brahman teacher chastising a
young pupil. He explained to the teacher that the boy
was Panini, reborn. And he told to the teacher the
story of 500 bats, which, in a subsequent birth, had
as the result of their merits become the 500 wise men
whom "in these latter times" (Julien), "lately"
(Beal), "in recent times" (Watters), king Kanishka
and the reverend Parsva had convoked in the
"Council," held in Kashmir, at which there was drawn
up the Vibhasha-Sastra. The great Arhat asserted that
he himself had been one of the 500 bats. And, having
narrated all this, he proved his divine power by
instantly disappearing.
Having been one of the 500 bats, this great Arhat
was necessarily also one of the 500 members of the
"Council" of Kanishka. And the story certainly places
the great Arhat, at the time when he was telling it,
in the 500th year after the death of Buddha. But the
plain indication that he was a somewhat miraculous
being entitles us to at any rate credit him with a
certain amount of longevity, even to the occasional
Buddhist extent (see, e.g., page 912 above) of 120
years. Anyhow, the story distinctly does not place
the "Council" itself in the 500th year after the
death of Buddha; it places it "in these latter
times," "in recent times." And even if we should
admit, though it seems hardly probable, that the
"Council" was held in the very first year of the
reign of Kanishka, which was in reality the 424th
year but must be taken as the 400th year in round
numbers according to tradition, still, an occurrence
placed in even the 400th year of any particular
reckoning surely
----------------------------
1. Julien, Memoires, 1. 127 ff.; Beal, Records, 1. 116
f.; Watters, On Yuan Chwang, 1. 222.
2. E.g., to quote what is probably the latest
instance, by Watters, On Yuan Chwang, 1. 224.
p. 991
belongs, from the point of view of the 500th year, to
"latter times" or "recent times" as compared with the
opening years of the reckoning.
Tradition placed the initial date of Kanishka 400
years after the death of Buddha. It is open to anyone
to accept that tradition, or to reject it. But anyone
who, accepting any traditional statements at all of
the series to which this one belongs, rejects this
one, is bound to shew for his rejection of it some
better reason than simply that it does not happen to
suit his general views and theories. And anyone who
accepts it must apply it as it stands, without
distorting it so as to make it say or mean something
which it does not really assert.
I accept the tradition, and apply it exactly as
it stands. Taken in that way, and applied to B.C. 482
for the death of Buddha as determined by
considerations into which the question of the date of
Kanishka does not enter in any way whatsoever, the
400 years bring us to B.C. 82. That is, taken as a
statement of 400 in round numbers for 424,(1)-- which
is about all that we are usually entitled to expect
from the ancient Hindus, except in the few cases in
which they were able to cite the lengths of
individual reigns and to present definete totals,
sometimes right sometimes wrong, by adding up such
details, -- it carries us practically to the truth,
which certainly is that Kanishka founded the socalled
Malava or Vikrama era commencing in B.C. 58
I Shall deal separately with some other points
which have to be considered in connexion with this
matter. I will close this note by inviting attention
to some observations which have apparently not
received the recognition to which they are entitled;
namely, the remarks made by Professor Kielhorn in the
Indian Antiquary, 26, 1897. 153, on the terminology
presented in certain dates. He has there
------------------------------
1. If Mr. Beal has rightly reported the Avadanasataka
as Placing Asoka 200 years after Buddha (Records,
1. 151, note 97), then we certainly have there
such a round statement, of 200 for 218 years. In
the assertion about 100 years from Buddha to
Asoka, we may have another such statement, or we
may not; see page 988 above, and note 4.
p. 992
shewn that the wording of the dates of the dated
records which mention Kanishka, Huvishka, and
Vasudeva, is radically opposed to the wording of Saka
dates. On the other hand, it is identical with the
wording of dates in the so-called Malava or Vikrama
era.