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Apracaraja Indravarman's Silver Reliquary
An Inscribed Silver Buddhist Reliquary or Apracaraja Indravarman's Silver Reliquary 〔The item belongs to the Shumei Culture Foundation in Otsu, Japan and was loaned to Los Angeles County Museum of Art, when it was studied by Richard Saloman of the University of Washington, USA, who examined and studied the inscriptions and published his results in Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol 116, No 3, 1996, pp 1418-452.〕 has been found, presumably from Bajaur area of ancient Kapisa.〔IMPORTANT: Kapisa formed the heart of ancient Kamboja. In fact, scholars assert that Kapisa is simply an alternative name for the Kamboja. See main article: Kapisa Province〕 Believed to have been fabricated originally at Taxila, the silver reliquary consists of two parts—the base and the cover—both being fluted,〔Fluting is an Iranian motif (Richard Saloman).〕 and the cover being topped by a figure of long horned Ibex. It has been dated to around the eighth or ninth decades of the 1st century BCE and bears six inscriptions written in ''pointillē'' style, in Kharoshthi script and Gandhari/north-western Prakrit. In form, the silver vessel is wholly atypical of Buddhist reliquaries and is said to have been originally a wine goblet, similar to others found in Gandhara and Kapisa regions. The vessel was later reused by Apraca king Indravarman as a Reliquary to enshrine Buddhist relics in a stüpa raised by Indravarman. The inscriptions on the silver reliquary provide important new information not only about the history of the kings of Apraca dynasty themselves but also about their relationships with other rulers of the eastern region of Bactria and its crown jewels, Gandhara and Avacapura i.e. western Pakistan, around the beginning of Christian era.
The inscriptions on the silver reliquary have been investigated by Richard Saloman of University of Washington, in an article published in ''Journal of American Oriental Society.
==Form and function of the Reliquary==
The lower part of the reliquary with fluted surface, carination and small stem and foot is extremely similar to the "drinking goblets" that have been found in good numbers mainly in Gandhara (Taxila) and Kapisa (Kapisi). The lower part of the reliquary resembles the ceremonial drinking cups depicted in ancient Gandharan art and culture relief. Gandharan art of Bacchanalian or Dionysiac drinking scenes are the motifs which represent assimilation of local folk traditions of remote river valleys of the Kafiristan where viticulture and wine festivals are known to have been widely practiced. Similar customs are also well documented in recent times in the region of Nuristan (pre-Islamic Kafiristan) which area had formed integral parts of ancient Kapisa. Bajaur, the presumed provenance of the silver reliquary, was part of the ancient Kapisa. In this very region of Kafiristan or ancient Kapisa, the heirloom silver wine cups 〔Called ''ürei'' in Waigali.〕 with features very similar to those of old Gandhara and Kapisa goblets are still found and before the Islamization of Kafiristan, these silver wine cups were important ritual objects and symbols of social status.〔Dolke, Pokaler og Magiske Soer i Nuristan / Silver, Gold and Iron: Concerning Katara Urei, and Magic lake of Nuristan, KUML, 1974, pp 253-255, Schuyler Jones〕 Martha Carter associates the well attested wine festival tradition of the valleys of Hindukush with Dionysiac scenes in Gandharan art in general and heirloom silver cups of the modern Nuristanis with Gandharan goblets in particular which is quite persuasive.〔〔Dionysiac Festivals and Gandharan Imagery, Res Orienttales 4, pp 51-59, Martha Carter〕〔It is worthy of note here that the warlike, highly independent and militarily dominating Siyah-posh clans like Kam/Kamoj/Kamtoj of Kafiristan/Nuristan the modern representatives of the ancient Kambojas of Kapisa territory (See: Mountstuart Elphinstone, "An account of the kingdom of Caubol", fn p 619; Journal of Royal Asiatic Society, 1843, p 140; Journal of Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1874, p 260 fn; Die altpersischen Keilinschriften: Im Grundtexte mit Uebersetzung, Grammatik und Glossar, 1881, p 86, Friedrich Spiegel; Political History of Ancient India, 1996, p 133, fn, Dr H. C. Raychaudhury, Dr B. N. Banerjee; The Achaemenids and India, 1974, p 13, Dr S Chattopadhyaya; Vishnu Purana, p 374, fn, H. H. Wilson; The Geographical Dictionary of Ancient andMedieval India, Numdo Lal Dey).〕
According to Dr Richard Saloman, ''"if the association is even approximately correct, it may explain what the new silver reliquary originally may have been. It was undoubtedly a ceremonial silver drinking cup of Indo-Iranian king Kharaosta and later of his successor prince Indravarman who converted it into a sacred reliquary for the bones of Buddha"''.〔 The Nuristani customs represents the survival in remote region of a local (Bajaur) tradition of ritual wine drinking which, in Buddhist world of Gandhara, may have been assimilated to and rationalized by the cosmological realm of the 'Sadamattas', who dwell on the slope of Mt Meru.〔"Dionysiac Festivals and Gandharan Imagery." Res Orientals 4 ("Banquets d'Orient"), 1992, p 57, Martha Carter.〕 The figure of Ibex topping the cover of the reliquary definitely implies Trans-Pamirian (Central Asian) influence and establishes a proof of ''early migration'' of people (Kambojas) from the Transoxian region (''i.e. the Parama Kamboja of Central Asia or Scythian region'') into the Kabul valley. The Ibex motif is quintessentially characteristic of Iranian and Central Asian (''Scythian'') art and culture. It reflects the arrival and assimilation, by whatever geographic route or routes, of this ancient Central Asian/Iranian motif into the Gandharan world in Pre-Christian times. And lastly, the fluting in the surfaces of the silver reliquary is also an Iranian motif. Thus the Ibex motif combined with wine drinking culture of the goblet itself amply illustrates the influx of regional and extra-regional cultural elements into the eclectic art and culture of Gandhara of the Indo-Iranian/Indo-Scythian period which is indeed reflected in the silver reliquary of prince Indravarman.
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