Пипрахва: Будданың туған жерінен қазба жұмыстары және реликвиялар тарихы

Piprahwa is a village near Siddharthnagar city in Siddharthnagar district of the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. Kalanamak rice, a scented and spicy variety of rice is grown in this area. It lies in the heart of the historical Buddha's homeland and is 9 miles from the world heritage site of Lumbini that is believed to be the place of Gautama Buddha's birth. Piprahwa is best known for its archaeological site and excavations that suggest that it was the burial place of the portion of the Buddha's ashes that were given to his own Shakya clan. A large stupa and the ruins of several monasteries as well as a museum are located within the site. Ancient residential complexes and shrines were uncovered at the adjacent mound of Ganwaria.

The history of the Piprahwa stupa begins with the passing of the Buddha. The Mahaparinirvana Sutra tells us that an argument arose following his cremation around 480BCE. ‘The Sakyas of Kapilavatthu came to know that at Kusinara the Blessed One had passed away. And they sent a message to the Mallas of Kusinara, saying: "The Blessed One was the greatest of our clan. We are worthy to receive a portion of the relics. We will erect a stupa over them and hold a festival in their honor." The Mallas replied 'The Blessed One has passed away in our township. We shall not part with any portion of the relics'. The Brahman, Dona, then intervened to remind them about the Buddha’s teachings and suggested that they avoid 'strife, war and bloodshed' and split the relics between the eight kingdoms demanding a portion so that "far and wide Stupas may rise". The Buddha’s own Sakya clan received a share as did seven other kingdoms. They deposited them in eight stupas with two further stupas being built over the ashes of the cremation pyre and over the vessel in which the bones and ashes had been gathered. In the centuries after the Sakyas built their stupa, all signs of Buddhism disappeared from the Buddha’s homeland. A Brahmin Hindu revival saw the decline of Buddhism which migrated to Thailand, Sri Lanka, China, Cambodia etc. Statues were destroyed or decapitated during a succession of invasions by Persians, Arabs, Mongols, Mughals and assorted Hunas or Huns.

For over 2000 years the stupa built by the Sakyas remained intact and covered with vegetation outside the village of Piprahwa on the Indian side of the border with Nepal. It even survived fifty years of stupa archaeology by the many Indophiles to be found in the British civil service. For all their efforts, they failed to find any reliquaries that claimed to hold the Buddha's relics. In 1897 a particularly large kot or earthen mound caught the attention of William Claxton Peppé, a British colonial engineer and landowner who had been inspired by the recent discovery of the Lumbini pillar that marked the birthplace of the Buddha. The Indian Famine of 1896 97 had decimated the region leaving the tenant farmers on his estate in need of work. Peppé led a team excavating what Indologist Vincent Smith advised him was an unusually early example of an ancient Buddhist stupa ‘probably dating from the era of Asoka the Great.’ Having cleared away scrub and jungle, they set to work building a deep trench through the mound. After digging through 18 feet of solid brickwork, they came to a large stone coffer which contained five small vases containing bone fragments, gold ornaments and intricately fashioned jewelry. These reliquaries together held the largest group of precious offerings ever recorded in a single deposit: around 1,800 gemstones and semi precious stones (many shaped and drilled), rock crystal, pearls, shell, coral, embossed sheet gold and silver, granulated gold, as well as bone and ash assumed to be of great sanctity