Amaravati
About the city
There is now over 300 talks on-line and this will be expanding please visit here www.abmuk.org. The media room at Amaravati has a large collection of tapes, Audio CD's, MP3-CD's and DVD's, in English, Thai and a small selection in Sinhala. The Archive Library at Amaravati has over 3000 tapes (the public does not have access to this), and we are in the process of digitizing some of these tapes. Some MP3-CD's are available from dhamma threads. Over the coming months DVD's will be available from Dhamma Threads with archive material on it. More talks on line can be found at the dhammatalks website. All talks are for non-commercial use and may only be distributed in there entirety.Lord Buddha preached at Dharanikota/Dhanyakatakam and conducted Kalachakra ceremony, which takes the antiquity of Amaravati back to 500 BCE.Taranatha, the Buddhist monk writes: "On the full moon of the month Caitra in the year following his enlightenment, at the great stupa of Dhanyakataka, Buddha emanated the mandala of "The Glorious Lunar Mansions" (Kalachakra). This shows that Dhanyakatakam (Amaravati) was a very important place in 5th century BCE. The recorded history of Amaravati and nearby Dharanikota is from 2nd century BCE. It was the capital of andhra Satavahanas who ruled from 2nd century BCE to 3rd century CE. After the decline of Satavahanas, Ikshvakus and later Pallava kings ruled Krishna river valley. Subsequently, Eastern Chalukyas and Telugu Cholas held sway over the region. Kota kings were in control of Amaravati during the medieval times. Kota kings were subdued by Kakatiyas in 11th century CE and Amaravati became part of the unified Telugu empire.
History
The Amaravati Stupa was first built in the third century BC. by a missionary monk, Mahadeva, sent by Asoka to preach Buddhism in this part of the country. Initially it was a modest stupa enclosed by a granite reiling. A fragment of a polished pillar bearing an Asoken edict discovered here confirms its erection during the reign of Asoka. In the following two or three centuries, the granite rail was replaced by the limestone one and the gateways were also renovated. A large number of inscribed sculptured fragments of this period include a limestone stele of second century B.C. depicting scenes of Vaisali, Sravasti and Kusinagara with appropriate labels. The Satavahanas who ruled andhra, after Asoka, for a long period of over 450 years though not Buddhisits, were sympathetic towards the Buddhist cause. During the reign of the later Satavahana Kings, who made the nearby Dhanyakataka their royal seat, the Amaravati stupa was enlarged in A.D. second century and also surrounded by a new highly ornamental railing, carved with beautiful reliefs and elegant designs.Of the three inscriptions of the later Satavahana period, the erliest one refers to the gift of the Wheel of Law (Dharma-Chakra) at the western gate of the Maha-Chaitya during the reign of Vaishthiputra Palumavi (AD. 130-A..159). The second one refers to the replacement or renovation of a part of the railing during the reign of Siri Sivamaka Sada, generally identified with Siva-Sri (AD. 159-AD. 166). The third inscription belongs to the period of Gautamiputra Yajna Satakarni (AD. 166-AD.196), the last important King of the Satavahana dynasty. Yajna Satakarni was the patron and friend of Acharya Nagarjuna, the famous Buddhist saint and scholar. Taranatha, the Tibetan historian , says that the erection of the sculptured rail at Amaravati was organized by Nagarjuna. According to an inscription, renovation of the railing was supervised by a monk, named Buddharakshita. Apparently, this was at the instance of Acharya Nagarjuna. The donors included, a nun, who was Buddharakshita's disciple, Lakkhita, a monk from Pataliputra; three Tamil pilgrims; the people of Dhanyakataka; and a family from Ghantasala in andhra. Hiuen-Tsang who vivisted Dhanyakataka(Amaravati) in AD. 639 says, "The convents (sangharamas) are numerous, but are mostly deserted and ruined; of those preserved there are about 20with 1000 or so priests. They all study the law of the Great Vehicle." The Amaravati Maha-Chaitya appears to have continued to be a living shrine for a long time. An eleventh century inscription records that a Pallava, Simhavarman worshipped the stupa. Inscriptions in the nearby Amresvara temple of the Kota chief, who ruled in 12th century-13th century from Dharnikota (Dhanyakataka) also refer to some donations to the Maha-Chaitya. One of these inscriptions dated to AD. 1182 describes the Maha-Chaitya as a very lofty stupa, finely decorated with sculptures. Lastly, Dharmakirti, a pilgrim from Sri Lanka, visited Amaravati and carried out some repairs to the shrine in AD. 1344. An inscription to this effect has been found at Gadaladeniya, near Kandy in Sri Lanka. Thus the mighty stupa survived almost intact, with its towering dome, till about the fourteenth century. After this, however, Amaravati Shrine was completely neglected and lost sight of.
The existence of the Amaravati Stupa came to light in 1797 when Collin Mackenzie visited Amaravati and found some men quarrying the remains of the stupa for materials for a new township being built by the Raja of Chintapalli, Raja Vasu Reddi Nayudu, who had shifted his residence a year earlier from Chintapalli to Amaravati. What Mackenzie saw was a "great low mound crowned by a smaller one, some ninety feet in diameter and twenty feet high, and cased with bricks and slabs of stone." Mackenzie thought that the monument was a "mysterious structure" but he had no clear idea of its importance. Hence he did not interfere. Consequently, many priceless sculptures were used in the Amaresvara temple, the Sivaganga tank and other buildings then being constructed while some were burnt for lime. Such vandalism continued for over 20 years till Mackenzie revisited the site in 1818 with a band of assistants and prepared drawings of the site and the stupa. He also recovered a few sculptured pieces. After Mackenzie, manu attempts were made to excavate the site. These were by Sir Walter Smith (1845), by Robert Sewell (1877), by James Burgess (1881) and thrice by Alexander Rea (1888-1889, 1905-1906, and 1908-1909). Inspite of considerable spoilt for over hundred years, the potentiality of the Amaravati ruins was not exhausted. No wonder, the excavations undertaken during the year 1958-1959, by K. subramanyam and K.Krishna Murthy of the Archaeological Survery of zindia, yielded a large number of inscribed architectural pieces, sculptures pieces, and other significant antiquities.