Further Evidence for the Interpretation of the‘Indian Scene’ in the Pre-Islamic Paintings atAfrasiab (Samarkand)Matteo ComparetiVenice

The Sogdian paintings at Afrasiabwere discovered accidentally morethan forty years ago during roadconstruction near Samarkand.However, only in 1975 was the firstbook concerning them published(Al’baum 1975). Archaeologicalexcavations continued at theAfrasiab site for some time,leading to the discovery of otherfragments of schematic paintingsbetween 1978 and 1985(Akhunbabaev 1987). Since 1989French archaeologists have beenexcavating at the ancient site incollaboration with Russian and,after the collapse of the SovietUnion, Uzbek colleagues, butwithout a specific connection tothe paintings themselves.

The room where the paintingswere discovered came to be calledthe ‘Hall of the Ambassadors,’since its western wall, facing theentrance, depicts several repre-sentatives of non-Sogdian landsbearing gifts. While from the startthere has been general agreementon the identification of thatimagery, the interpretation ofwhat exactly the ritual is that thescene depicts and some of itsdetails have been a matter ofdebate. This article is a con-tribution to that discussion.

General Interpretation

At the end of the 1980s Chiara SilviAntonini offered persuasiveevidence to identify the scene ofthe western wall in the so-called‘Hall of the Ambassadors’ as arepresentation of the Iranian NewYear Festival (Nawruz) inconjunction with the coronation ofthe local king, Varkhuman (SilviAntonini 1989). In this author’s

opinion, Silvi Antonini’s idearemains the key for a correctinterpretation of the entire cycleof the paintings at Afrasiab. Whilea detailed study by Markus Modea few years later disputed herinterpretation (Mode 1993), thegreat specialist of Sogdian studies,the late Boris Marshak, not onlyaccepted it but also added otherimportant elements to the generalinterpretation of the whole cycleand, especially, of the southernwall paintings (Marshak 1994).Soviet scholars continued to studythe Afrasiab paintings, althoughtheir interesting results did notbecome widely known because oftheir publication in Russian in rarejournals or books (e.g., Maitdinova1984; Akhunbabaev 1990; Motov1999).

In recent years other authorssuch as Etsuko Kageyama, FrantzGrenet, Sergei Iatsenko, andSimone Cristoforetti together withthe present writer reopened theproblem of the interpretation ofthe Afrasiab paintings consideringsingle scenes or details(Kageyama 2002; Grenet 2003;Yatsenko 2004; Grenet 2005;Grenet 2006; Compareti andCristoforetti 2005). Finally, aconference was organized by thepresent writer in March 2005 inVenice in order to collect in onevolume the most recent results ofthe investigations by thosescholars who had already studiedthe paintings together with a newtranslation of the Sogdianinscriptions at Afrasiab by VladimirLivshits (Compareti and de laVaissière 2006).

The inscriptions are extremelyimportant in order to attempt achronology for the paintings.

Fragmentary inscriptions on thewestern wall mention the name ofa sovereign, Varkhuman, whocorresponds to the local kingrecognized as governor ofSamarkand and Sogdiana by theChinese Emperor Gaozong (649-683) in the period between 650-655 (Chavannes 1903, 135).1 In658 Gaozong even sent an envoyto the court of Varkhuman for anofficial investiture (Anazawa andManome 1976, 21ff., cited byKageyama 2002, 320). However,according to Islamic sources,when Sa‘id ibn Othman conqueredSamarkand in 676 he did not findany king there. So it is possible tosuppose that Varkhuman was nolonger regent of Samarkand at thetime of the Arab conquest (Frye,1954, 40; Smirnova 1970, 275;Fedorov 2006, 222-223). All of theevidence suggests that theAfrasiab paintings were executedaround this period.

Other literary sources (Chinese,Persian and even Sogdian) couldbe useful for the comprehensionand chronology of the muralpaintings. They have already beenextensively considered in a recentstudy by Frantz Grenet, who alsodemonstrated that the spatialorganization of the Afrasiabpaintings corresponds to anestablished scheme well known inSasanian Persia (Grenet 2005,124-130) and in India too whereit possibly originated (de laVaissière 2006, 148).2 Inparticular, as already noted byMode (Mode 1993), a passage ofthe Tangshu (History of the TangDynasty, composed between 1043and 1060) referring to 7th-centurycentral Sogdiana mentions a royalpavilion where representations of

32

Persians and Byzantines appearedon the western wall, Chinese onthe northern wall, and the Turksand Indians on the eastern one(Chavannes, 1903, 145).3 As willbe shown in the present paper aswell, this is exactly the partitionof the walls at Afrasiab, the onlyexception being the western one.

At present it is almostunanimously accepted that thescenes depicted in the ‘Hall of theAmbassadors’ are part of a uniquecycle. The western wall most likelyrepresents the initial stage of theSogdian Nawruz celebrated in 7th-century Samarkand. According tothe mobile Sogdian (and, moregenerally, Iranian) calendar,during the 7th century Nawruz fellin summer (Compareti andCristoforetti 2005).4 Thefragmentary paintings enable usto recognize foreign delegatesshown during the presentation ofsome gifts to an upper centralfigure that is irretrievably lost [Fig.1]. The presentation of gifts (or,better, tributes) on the occasionof Nawruz is a very ancient Iraniancustom, and, according to theinterpretation by RomanGhirshman and other scholarswhich was accepted by SilviAntonini, it can be clearlyobserved among the very ancientreliefs of the Apadana at

Persepolis (Silvi Antonini 1989,125-126).

It seems correct to consider theNew Year Festival as a goodoccasion to celebrate thecoronation of a king amongancient Iranians. The hypothesisis supported by some literarysources on ancient Persian habits,transmitted, however, onlythrough Muslim authors (Ibid.,118-126). So, the lost figure in theupper part of the western wall wasmost likely that of a king, possiblyVarkhuman himself. It is notexcluded that he was probablyrepresented together with his wifeaccording to a scheme muchappreciated on 6th-centuryfunerary monuments belonging topowerful Sogdians settled in Chinaand recently excavated in the areaof Xi’an (China).5 On thosemonuments the couple isrepresented under a canopy bothin realistic and paradisiacal scenes(Marshak 2001), but it is notexcluded that the two royal figurescould have been positioned at acertain distance from each other.In this case, a possible alternativeexplanation is Mode’s hypothesisthat the two rows of tributes-bearers were proceeding towardstwo different sovereigns(Varkhuman and the TurkishKhaghan) (Mode 2006). Also of

interest is Sergei Iatsenko’s veryinteresting observation about thenecklace and the reconstructedtorque in the hands of the envoyfrom Chaghanyan on the westernwall. The envoy can be recognizedin the lower left part of the scenesince he is wearing a robeembellished with so-calledsenmurv-like creatures.Considering that all the otherforeign envoys are bringingtributes to be presented to thefigure that was depicted in theupper part of the scene, then mostlikely the torque was intended fora man and the necklace for awoman. On the western wall theycan only be the Samarkand royalcouple (Yatsenko 2004). In thisway, as will be discussed moreextensively below, the King andQueen of Samarkand could havecounterbalanced the Chineseemperor and empress on thenorthern wall.

Boris Marshak has identified thescene on the southern wall as thefinal stage of the Nawruz festival,when the Sogdian sovereigncelebrated a funerary ritual inhonour of his ancestors in a templewhich — according to the Tangshu— was built on the eastern fringesof the town (Marshak 1994, 11-15).6 While the paintings are veryfragmentary, the shape of an

Fig. 1. Western wall, Afrasiab (after F. Ory and Grenet reconstruction).

Fig. 2. Southern wall, Afrasiab (after F. Ory and Grenet reconstruction).

33

enormous horse ridden by aperson who was depicted largerthan the other people around himcan be discerned among thepaintings of the southern wall [Fig.2]. It is highly probable that thisperson was king Varkhumanmoving in the direction of thetemple of his ancestors. Therepresentation of this buildingsurvived only partially in the leftpart of the scene depicted on thesouthern wall, almost on thecorner with the eastern wall (thedirection of the royal paradeaccording to the Chinese sources).Two people wearing ritualZoroastrian masks (padam) in themiddle of the procession could beconsidered in charge of thesacrifice for the royal ancestors.In fact, they accompany aharnessed horse not mounted andfour geese probably destined to besacrificed in honour of Iraniangods (Grenet 2005, 125).

Chinese subjects appear on thenorthern wall exactly as reportedin the Tangshu [Fig. 3]. It is anextremely complicated represen-tation which is divided in twoparts, both of them connectedwith astronomical-astrologicalmatters. It is beyond the aim ofthe present article to discuss indetail all the elements which ledto its general interpretation(Compareti and Cristoforetti 2005;Compareti 2006; Comparetiforthcoming; Compareti andCristoforetti forthcoming). Here itwill be enough to say that the twoparts of the scene constitute anexact parallel with the western andthe southern walls. In fact, mostlikely, on the northern wall thereis a representation of the ChineseNew Year Festival. Some Chinesepoems report the custom of very

ancient times when the emperorwas expected to perform a ritualhunt in a special part of theimperial park and kill evil animalssuch as felines. After the hunt,members of the Chinesearistocracy went at a pond in thesame park to listen to musiciansand singers on boats shaped likebirds’ heads, while some peoplehad to dive in the water in searchof animals such as fishes, turtlesand ducks. This is exactly what canbe discerned in the hunting andaquatic scenes in the left part ofthe northern wall. Also theappearance of a dragon isrecorded in Chinese poems incoincidence with a festivitypossibly to be identified with theNew Year Festival and, in fact, acomposite winged monster can bediscerned below the boat in theaquatic scene (Comparetiforthcoming). A person leadingtwo horses in the water is probablyperforming a Chinese ritual whichhas not yet been identified. As willbe observed below, the presenceof this last element is quiteimportant for the comprehensionof the whole cycle.

There is something more to beadded as regards the aquaticscene. One lady on the boat isrepresented larger than theothers, because she is possibly theChinese empress. She is feedingthe fishes just below the boat and,in fact, her left hand is opened asif to drop something into the water.Such an attitude calls to mind atypical Chinese festivity, theDuanwu Festival, still performedtoday around the summer solsticeto remember a poet whocommitted suicide in ancienttimes, during the Warring Statesperiod (453-221 BCE). Every year

on thato c c a s i o np e o p l efeed fishesin order top r e v e n ta q u a t i ca n i m a l sf r o meating the

body of the poet and race in riversand lakes on dragon-shaped boatssearching, ideally, for his corpse.Other people dive in the water tolook for his body which, needlessto say, was never recovered. It isquite clear that the second part ofthe ancient Chinese New YearFestival, as reported in poems,and the Duanwu Festival verymuch resemble each other.

As is well-known, in Gregoriancalendrical terms, the ChineseNew Year Festival falls in January-February, while the Duanwu fallsaround mid-June. The latter dateconstitutes an exact parallel withthe Sogdian Nawruz which, duringthe 7th century, was celebrated insummer. The artists in charge ofthe execution of the paintings atAfrasiab confused the twofestivities because of theirsimilarities. Possibly the artistseven confused them deliberatelyin order to have a calendricalcoincidence between a localSogdian festivity and an importantChinese one (namely, theDuanwujie) which could balancethe Chinese New Year celebration.

The Eastern Wall

At this point we turn our attentionto the eastern wall [Fig. 4, facingpage]. Many scholars agree thatthis scene represents India mainlyon the basis of the passage in theTangshu, even though there is noTurk representative depicted here.Unfortunately, once more, theChinese source is not specificabout the subject of the scene,and the fragmentary state of thepainting makes an identificationextremely difficult.

The surviving fragments areconcentrated just in the lower part

Fig. 3. Northern wall, Afrasiab (after F. Ory and Grenet reconstruction).

34

of the wall. Starting from the leftpart, one can observe two sittingpeople facing each other in atypical attitude of teacher andstudent. Between them is a roundobject which was probablyintended to be an armilla used forastronomical purposes. In a recentpaper, Frantz Grenet arguedconvincingly that this imagerepresents the transmission ofastrology from the Greeks to theIndians according to aniconography rooted in Classical art(Grenet 2003). Next to them is arider on a horse but so far there isno satisfactory explanation for itsmeaning. After the entrance, onthe right portion of the wall, asecond enigmatic scene can bediscerned: a person wearing along robe is carrying a child whiletwo big birds spread their wings.The background is aquatic. Grenetproposed to identify this scenewith a representation of Krishnaand his foster-mother, Yashoda,just before the attack of the crane-demon Putana (Grenet 2005,128). Above them, fragments ofan image of a horse and the legsof a person could be intended asanother episode of Krishna’syouth, when he fought the horse-demon Keshin (Ibid.; Grenet2006, 45) [Fig. 5]. On the rightpart of the painting, thebackground is still aquatic butinfant-archers and a man grabbingthe tail of a bull together with a

kneeling person appear amongfishes, turtles, water-birds andflowers. Grenet identified theinfant-archers as a multiplerepresentation of Kama, theIndian god of love who wasreproduced according to aniconography borrowed fromClassical art. His presence couldbe justified because of the ‘allusionto Krishna’s romances with thecowgirls’ (Ibid.). However, asGrenet himself noted, MarkusMode had already observed thatthose archers should be betteridentified with pygmies fightingcranes exactly as described(although differently represented)in Roman sources (Mode 1993,98; Grenet 2006, 46-47). Mode’sintepretation would fit better giventhe fact that a source in Classicalart was proposed for the firstscene on the left. Moreover, thedemon-crane Putana is one, whilein the painting there are parts ofat least three birds. Unless thereare new discoveries, theinterpretation of this scene willremain open.

The long-haired man grabbingthe tail of a buffalo in the watermay recall an enigmatic sceneengraved on a panel of a 6th-century funerary bed from Chinawhich possibly belonged to aSogdian [Fig. 6].7 It is possible torecognize an archer shooting abird while sitting on an ox amongwaves, a scene which has not yetbeen identified. However, theIndian (or, better, Vishnuite)context of the panels of thisfunerary bed, recently pointed outby Penelope Riboud (Riboud 2004,46, fig. 24), may mean that itprovides a good comparison withthe detail in the Afrasiab paintingeven if rendered differently. Otherelements such as the pygmy

archers shooting cranes couldbe part of the same schemebut, unfortunately, thefragmentary state of theeastern wall does not allowone to discern more.

Among the different scenes onthe eastern wall, thefragments of ‘teacher and

student’ with armilla and theinferior parts of the horse close tothe legs of a person areproportionately larger than theother figures in the samecomposition. Possibly, this fact isnot to be neglected, especially ininterpreting the scene identifiedby Grenet as Krishna fightingKeshin, since on the other wallslarger characters have veryimportant roles.

In his mostrecent paperdevoted to theinterpretation ofthe Indian scenesat Afrasiab,Grenet produceda 5th-centuryGupta relief fromM a n d o rrepresentat ingKrishna fightingagainst Keshin(Grenet 2006, fig.2), although two

other specimens of Indiansculpture — one from a privatecollection and the other fromMathura — provide good parallelswhich support his arguments(Harle 1985, figs. 7-8). Lastly, ablack wax inscribed seal (possiblyKushano-Sasanian) kept in theAshmolean Museum deserves tobe considered [Fig. 7, next page].The figure, which appearstogether with a Bactrianinscription, could be interpeted asHeracles fighting the monstruoushorse of Diomedes or Krishnafighting Keshin according to a

Fig. 4. Eastern wall, Afrasiab (after F. Ory and Grenet reconstruction).

Fig. 5. Eastern wall, Afrasiab, detail(after Al’baum 1975, fig. 26, detail).

Fig. 6. Panel of theVahid Kooros Col-lection funerary bed(after Riboud 2004,fig. 25).

35

common iconography which waspossibly rooted in Classical art(Ibid.).8 The interpretation is againcomplicated, typical for objects ofCentral Asian provenance in whichGreek, Iranian and Indianelements co-exist, exactly as inthe painting at Afrasiab underexamination.

In any case, in our opinion, it isnot so important to figure out theexact interpretation for the detailof the man with the horse. Thevery presence of this animalrepresents an interesting element.A reasonable hypothesis can beoffered to explain its inclusion inthe cycle of paintings at Afrasiabwhere, as already observed, afunerary sacrifice in the presenceof royal characters is depicted onthe southern wall as a continuationof the Nawruz on the western wall.On the northern wall the Chineseemperor and empress too areperforming local rituals connectedwith calendrical matters whichcorrespond quite precisely to theSogdian events. In both thescenes of Sogdian and Chineserituals the presence of the horseseems to be very important,although on the northern wall theexplanation is not yet fully clear.Persian literary sources of theIslamic period explicitly indicate aconnection between the horse andwater (Cristoforetti 2006).Moreover, in the painting on thenorthern wall, two horses areswimming, since the connectionwith the aquatic element shouldhave been extremely important forthe Chinese too (Riboud 2003;Mao forthcoming). So, if the

hypothesis of the Indian characterof the eastern wall is correct andif that fragmentary paintingactually represents the lower partsof a man with a horse, then oneshould expect to find also therethe depiction of an Indian festivityor celebration connected withroyalty when a kind of horsesacrifice occurred. Such a ritual isreported in Indian literary sourcesexplicitly and is described as themost important royal sacrifice thatonly important sovereigns couldhave afforded to celebrate sinceVedic period: the ashvamedha(Dumont 1927).9

The aim of the horse sacrifice,or ashvamedha, in ancient Indiawas the recognition of a king asan universal sovereign. It was alsoa magical ritual with very ancientsolar reminiscences celebrated inorder to ensure fecundity to thekingdom. In fact, the king wasexpected to accomplish it at theend of his reign, when it wasalmost time for the succession ofthe designated new king (Ibid.,x). The preparation for theashvamedha took normally oneyear but, sometimes, even two.The sacrificial animal — which waschosen because of his color, speedand other characteristics (Albrightand Dumont 1934, 110-111) —had to be ritually immersed in apond and later was set freetogether with one hundredcastrated horses and obliged tomove in a northeastern direction.The land crossed by the horse wasconsidered to be under that king’sdominion. Thus this was a warningto the neighboring kingdoms.Young nobles, and among themthe designated successor, had tofollow the horse in order to allowit to pass wherever it wanted andprevent it from coupling with anymare for one entire year. At thetime of its return to the startingpoint, a three-day celebration tookplace during which encomiasticsinging, music and offerings hadto be performed at court. On thesecond day the sacrificial horsewas attached to the royal war-chariot and led by the king himself

to a sacred pond. When hereturned, the queen andconcubines had to embellish themane and the tail of the animalwhile praying. Then the horse waschoked in the northern part of thearea designated for the sacrifice,and the queen had to lie next toits corpse while the king and hiscompanions performed anenigmas-competition. Only at thispoint, the dead horse, togetherwith other sacrificial animals,could be quartered in the presenceof priests, nobles and commonpeople.

Ritual celebrations and othersacrifices in honor of Indiandivinities such as Agni and Somawere performed as well. Inparticular, the ritual liquid Somawas solemnly offered on the thirdday of the ashvamedha, and, later,all the objects touched by it hadto be thrown in the water(Dumont, 1927, 227). On thefourth day a purification bathoccurred for all the participants inthe ashvamedha, together withthe sacrifice of twenty-one sterilecows. Although we do not knowexactly the representation of thatIndian ritual by the Sogdians (norby the Indians themselves), atleast this part of the ashvamedhacelebration resembles very muchthe Duanwujie.

The ashvamedha took placearound February-March (but alsoin spring or summer; see Ibid., 9-10) and had very clear calendricalconnections: the wandering of thehorse around and outside thekingdom had the symbolic valueof the annual movement of the sunwhich conferred to the king thelegitimacy to govern on the landduring the period of the year.Furthermore, of considerableinterest is the fact that, accordingto some Indian literary sources,among the characteristics of thedesignated sacrificial horse was aspot on its body or a tuft of hairon the forehead with a particularshape representing the Pleiadesconstellation. There is an exactparallel between such acharacteristic of the horse of the

Fig. 7. Kushano-Sasanian inscribedblack wax seal, Ashmolean Museum(after Harle, 1985, fig. 1).

36

ashvamedha and a similar spot ortuft required for sacrificial horsesin ancient Mesopotamia. Possiblythis was due to the association ofa certain period of the year, whenthe Pleiades were particularlyvisible in the sky, with phenomenasuch as inundations by largerivers. In this way, the Pleiadescould have been seen as a link tothe ferti l ization of the land(Albright and Dumont 1934, 124-127). So here is another linkbetween horse and water inconnection with calendricalmatters. As is well-known, manyelements coming from Meso-potamian culture were acceptedin Central Asia such as, forexample, the presence of thegoddess called by Kushans andSogdians Nana who, in the Iranianmilieu, should be possiblyidentified with Anahita and,consequently, with Venus (Tanabe1995; Grenet and Marshak 1998).Astral symbols seem to haveplayed a very important role inancient Sogdiana too, and for thisreason the artists at Afrasiab wereprobably attracted by theirpresence also in other culturalspheres. Specimens of Sogdian artobjects produced both in themotherland and in the coloniesalong the so-called ‘Silk Road’present quite often images of ahorse or a pegasus with a pole onits head embellished on its topwith a half moon containing a staror a flower (Compareti 2003, 34).Since much of the horserepresented on the eastern wallat Afrasiab disappeared, anyattempt to find such astralsymbols is completely useless.However, as now seems likely, thehorse was associated with theaquatic element and had astralrelationships almost in everyancient culture; for this reason itcould have been chosen to berepresented on the walls atAfrasiab.

Other details of the eastern wallcould be considered to have aprecise parallel with elements inthe other three painted scenes atAfrasiab. Just as in the scenes

representing Sogdiana and China,where the sovereign was depictedtogether with his queen, for thecelebration of the ashvamedha thepresence of the royal couple wasrequired. The character of theIndian sacrifice concerned thelegitimacy of a king, and atAfrasiab the representation ofsuch a concept can be observedon two opposite walls: the eastern(or Indian) one and the western(or Sogdian) one where theNawruz is celebrated in con-junction with the coronation ofVarkhuman. Finally, all the sceneson the four walls present clearconnections with astrological-astronomical matters which couldbe considered reciprocally(although not exactly) balanced:when a king decided to performthe ashvamedha, this had tohappen around February-March, aperiod of the year quite close tothe celebration of the Chinese NewYear Festival (January-February).The Sogdian artists and theirpatrons were certainly aware ofthe astronomical-astrologicalcommon notions of ancient‘Westerners’ such as Indians,Greeks and Mesopotamians, butthey had to find also commonfeatures with China that, in thosedays, still followed a differentsystem and only later — mostlikely through the Sogdians —would have adopted ‘western’features such as the division of theweek into seven days, each onelinked to a planetary deity(Chavannes and Pelliot 1913, 158-177). For this reason they cleverlyopted for representations on thenorthern wall of the Chinese NewYear Festival, which fell

approximately during theashvamedha, and the Duanwu,which fell around the SogdianNawruz.

It is not possible to find an exactcontemporary parallel for thepainting of the eastern wall since,unfortunately, the few elementsreferring to the ashvamedha inIndian art are limited to therepresentation of the sacrificialhorse itself — for example, in atleast one sculpture and coins ofthe Gupta period (Huntington1985, 187-188; Lindquist 2003).Nevertheless, hints of a horsesacrifice exist in Indian art,although they date to a periodmuch later than the Afrasiabpaintings. These are the reliefcarvings of the great platform ofthe early 16th century HazaraRama temple at Hampi (ancientVijayanagara) (Dellapiccola andVerghese, 1998).10 Almost fortyyears ago, the great indologistHermann Goetz had alreadyrecognized among these reliefssome images of foreignersrepresented in processional rowstogether with animals such aselephants and horses (Goetz1967, 195-196, fig. 11). Inparticular, one relief is extremelyinteresting because of the pose ofone foreigner (possibly a Persian?)holding the bridle of a recalcitranthorse with one hand while theother seems to be beating theanimal with a kind of dagger [Fig.8]. Why would a person of possiblyIranian appearance have beenrepresented in this way? Could hispose be considered the final partof a horse sacrifice? In the pre-Islamic Iranian sphere there was

Fig. 8. Relief carving, Hazara Rama temple, Hampi (after Goetz1967, fig. 11).

37

an important funerary horsesacrifice, the chakharom, which isjust alluded to, for example, on aSogdian ossuary from Shahr-iSabz (Uzbekistan) by the solepresence of a harnessed horse(Grenet 1993, 61, n. 44).11

However, if the people in the reliefat Hampi are Iranians then theyshould be considered in allprobabil ity Muslims and notMazdeans. What is needed is anexample from Indian art dated toa much earlier period.

As noted above, in Indian artthere are very few specimenswhich can be identified asrepresentations of theashvamedha, and they are all dateto the Gupta period. Nevertheless,an interesting horn cylinder sealfrom the Greco-Bactrian site ofTakht-i Sangin [Fig. 9] which has

been recentlyattributed toIndia (Bernard,1994, 112-113) presents a scenevery similar to the relief of Hampiand, possibly, to the recon-struction of that detail of theAfrasiab painting reconsideredhere. It is not easy to give an exactinterpetation to the scene carvedon the seal, which was termed byClaude Rapin ‘an Indian myth’(Rapin 1996, 50, fig. 29b; Rapin1995, 275-281); however,what is really important toconsider here is the pose ofthe person standing in frontof the horse, which atAfrasiab as well might havefollowed an establishediconographic formula. It isnot possible to be too specificabout the pose of the manwith the horse on the hornseal since the scene isdepicted too sketchily and itcould represent just a riderwith his steed or even aprocession. Processions of

people and animals can beobserved already in very ancientPersian art (for example, atPersepolis12), and it is well knownthat the Achaemenids extendedtheir control on some parts ofnorthwestern India, where theyinfluenced local cultures. However,the processions of Persepolis donot look exactly like the scene onthe Indian horn seal, where theman seems to stand in front of theanimal without walking and hisright hand seems to grab the hiltof the sword while with the left,possibly, he holds the bridle.

Since the temple at Takht-iSangin is much older than anyother specimen of Indian artalready considered in the presentstudy, then it seems to be likelythat a pure Indian iconography isinvolved at Afrasiab. In any case,independently from the origin ofthe iconography, it is clear that theIranians were aware of it. In fact,it is possible to observe verysimilar scenes in a problematic 7th-century (?) textile fragmentacquired on the antiquarianmarket embellished with ninehorses on three parallel lines withpeople wearing caftans holding inone hand the bridles and with theother one a weapon or a stick. Theposition of those men indicates aclearly hostile attitude towards thehorses; for this reason the sceneof the textile could be intended asa representation of a sacrifice(Kitzinger 1946, fig. 46; Trilling1982, pl. 17) [Fig. 10]. As thepresent writer has already noted,

notwithstanding the long period oftime which separates the creationof the textile and the relief atHampi, they resemble aston-ishingly each other (Compareti2005, 37-40). The same could besaid for the earlier horn seal fromTakht-i Sangin. That fragmentaryPersian textile offers a good, ifenigmatic, parallel to thespecimens in Indian art. If ancientIranians knew the Indianiconography for the horse sacrificeand had even adopted it, then itcould be considered likely that itis exactly something similar thatthe Sogdians copied for therepresentation of India on theeastern wall at Afrasiab. Thehypothesis is hardly demon-strable, but at least it can offer apossible alternative identificationto the battle between Krishna andKeshin. In any case, the depictionof Indian subjects at Afrasiabaccording to that iconographycould be simply explained becausethe context there was obviouslyIranian.

An Indian King in the Paintingsat Afrasiab?

We might, finally, propose areconstruction for the upper partof the eastern wall which wascompletely lost: probably also inthis scene there was a kingtogether with his spouse; it is notunlikely that the royal couple hadlarger dimensions exactly as onthe other walls. As in the case ofVarkhuman and Gaozong on the

other walls, could this Indianking be identified? It wouldseem that Harsha (606-647)is the most probablecandidate, since he was avery powerful sovereign ofnorthern India in that period.True, the Chinese pilgrimXuanzang, who visited Indiain the first half of the 7th

century and was a respectedguest at Harsha’s court,recorded important Buddhistfestivities celebrated in thatkingdom but gave no hintsabout the ashvamedha (Beal

Fig. 9. Indianhorn cylinderseal, Takht-iSangin (afterRapin 1996,fig. 29b).

Fig. 10. 7th century fragmentary textile,Egypt? (after Trilling 1982, pl. 17).

38

1884 [1983], 206-224). Xuanzangwas a devoted follower of theDharma, which could explain hisscant interest in his memoir inreligious customs extraneous toBuddhism. However, thisexplanation would not explain whyIndian sources too, such as theHarshacharita, are silent about theashvamedha during Harsha’sreign, even though animalsacrifices should have existed in7th-century India (Kane 1918,236).

In the second part of the 7th

century, Adityasena, one of thelast representatives of the GuptaDynasty (or Later Gupta) inMagadha performed theashvamedha (Auboyer 1965, 387;Asher 1983), a fact that definitelycreated great sensation andwhose echoes, possibly, reachedother regions outside India. Forthis reason he could have beenconsidered an appropriatecandidate to appear together withVarkhuman and the ChineseEmperor Gaozong at Afrasiab.

This last hypothesis — althoughhighly evocative — is hardlydemonstrable. Despite the effortsof some students of Sogdian artto reconstruct the otherfragmentary parts of the samepainting with reference India,proof of the proposed iden-tifications is still lacking (cf. Mode2002).

About the Author

Matteo Compareti graduatedfrom The University of Venice ‘Ca’Foscari’ in oriental languages andliteratures and in 2005 defendedhis PhD in Iranian studies at TheUniversity of Naples ‘L’Orientale.’He is a specialist in art history ofSogdiana, especially pre-IslamicSamarkand, although his interestsinclude also Sasanian Persia. Atpresent his research focusesmainly on the iconography ofMazdean divinities.

References

Akhunbabaev 1987Khasan G. Akhunbabaev.“Domashnie khramy rannesredne-vekovogo Samarkanda.” In:Gorodskaia kul’tura Baktrii-Tokharistana i Sogda, Tashkent,1987: 10-21.

Akhunbabaev 1990Khasan G. Akhunbabaev.Sotsial ’no-planigraficheskaiastruktura kvartala znati naAfrasiabe i problema izucheniiarannesrednevekovogo Samar-kanda. Samarkand, 1990.

Al’baum 1975Lazar I. Al’baum. Zhivopis’Afrasiaba. Tashkent, 1975.

Albright and Dumont 1934William F. Albright and Paul-ÉmileDumont, “A Parallel between Indicand Babylonian Sacrificial Ritual.”Journal of the Royal AsiaticSociety, 54/ 2 (1934): 107-128.

Anazawa and Manome 1976W. Anazawa and J. Manome.“Korean Envoys Depicted in theMural Painting from AncientSamarkand.” Chosen Gakuho, 80(1976): 1-36 (in Japanese).

Asher 1983Frederick M. Asher. “Historical andPolitical Allegory in Gupta Art.” In:Bardwell Smith, ed. Essays onGupta Culture. Delhi; Varanasi;Patna, 1983: 53-66.

Auboyer 1965 (1961)Jeannine Auboyer. L’India fino aiGupta. Milano, 1965 (original title:La vie quotidienne dans l’Indeancienne (environ IIe s. avant J.-C.-VIIe s.). Paris, 1961; in Englishas: Daily Life in Ancient India, fromApproximately 200 B.C. to 700A.D. New York, 1965).

Beal 1884 (1983)Samuel Beal, tr. Si-Yu-Ki. BuddhistRecords of the Western World.Chinese Accounts of India.Translated from the Chinese ofHiuen Tsiang AD 629. London:Trubner, 1884 (Reprint New Delhi,1983).

Belenitskii 1961Aleksandr M. Belenitskii. “Rabotypendzhikentskogo otriada v 1961g.” Arkheologicheskie raboty vTadzhikistane, IX (1961): 53-75.

Bernard 1994Paul Bernard. “Le temple de Takht-i Sangin en Bactriane: temple dufeu ou pas?” Studia Iranica, 23(1994): 81-121.

Chandra 1983Lokesh Chandra, “HellenisticEchoes in the Legend of Krishna.”In: Joachim Deppert, ed. Indiaand the West. Proceedings of aSeminar Dedicated to the Memoryof Hermann Goetz. New Delhi:Manohar, 1983: 149-154.

Chavannes 1903Edouard Chavannes. Documentssur les Tou-Kiue (Turks) Occi-dentaux. Paris, 1903.

Chavannes and Pelliot 1913Edouard Chavannes and PaulPelliot. “Un traité manichéenretrouvé en Chine.” JournalAsiatique, 11 sér., t. 1 (1913): 99-199; 261-394.

Compareti 2003Matteo Compareti. “Notesull’iconografia del pegaso e delcavallo bardato nell’arte iranica.”In: Matteo Compareti and G.Scarcia, eds. Il falcone di Bistam.Intorno all’iranica Fenice/Samand:un progetto di sintesi per il volodel Pegaso iranico tra Ponto,Alessandretta e Insulindia.Venezia, 2003: 27-37.

Compareti 2004Matteo Compareti. “Remarks onthe Sogdian Religious Iconographyin 7th Century Samarkand.” 2004:http://www.eurasianhistory.com/data/articles/a02/422.html.

Compareti 2005Matteo Compareti. I Popoli Iranicie la navigazione nell’OceanoIndiano. Venezia, 2005.

Compareti 2006Matteo Compareti, “A Reading ofThe Royal Hunt at Afrasyab Basedon Chinese Sources.” In:

39

Compareti and de la Vaissière2006, pp. 173-184.

Compareti forthcomingMatteo Compareti. “On theMeaning of the Dragon in thePaintings at Afrasyab (AncientSamarkand).” Eurasian Studies, 6(2006): 64-76 (in press).

Compareti and Cristoforetti 2005Matteo Compareti and SimoneCristoforetti. “Proposal for a NewInterpretation of the Northern Wallof the ‘Hall of the Ambassadors’at Afrasyab.” In: Central Asia fromthe Achaemenids to the Timurids:Archaeology, History, Ethnology,Culture. Materials of an Interna-tional Scientific ConferenceDedicated to the Centenary ofAleksandr Markovich Belenitsky,ed. Valerii P. Nikonorov, St.Petersburg, 2005: 215-220.

Compareti and CristoforettiforthcomingMatteo Compareti and SimoneCristoforetti. “New Elements onthe Chinese Scene in the ‘Hall ofthe Ambassadors’ at Afrasyabalong with a Reconsideration of‘Zoroastrian’ Calendar.” StudiaIranica, forthcoming.

Compareti and de la Vaissière2006Matteo Compareti and Étienne dela Vaissière, eds. Royal Nauruz inSamarkand. Proceedings of theConference held in Venice on thePre-Islamic Paintings at Afrasyab.Rivista degli Studi Orientali, N.S.,LXXVIII, Suppl. n. 1. Pisa; Roma:Accademia editoriale, 2006.

Cristoforetti 2006Simone Cristoforetti, “Afrasyabtoponimo e Afrasyab eponimo:considerazioni sulla riemergenteplausibilità di una lectio facilior.”In: Compareti and de la Vaissière2006, pp. 163-171.

Dallapiccola and Verghese 1998Anna L. Dallapiccola, AnilaVerghese, Sculpture at Vija-yanagara: Iconography and Style.New Delhi: Manohar, 1998.

de la Vaissière 2006Étienne de la Vaissière. “Les Turcs,rois du monde à Samarcande.” In:Compareti and de la Vaissière2006: 147-162.

Dumont 1927Paul-Émile Dumont, L’Asvamedha.Description du sacrifice solenneldu cheval dans le culte védiqued’après les textes du Yajurvedablanc. Paris: P. Geuthner, 1927.

Fedorov 2006Michael Fedorov. “Returning to theSogdian Incense-Burner of theLate VII-Early VIII c. AD: A Por-trait of Ikhshid Varkhuman?”Iranica Antiqua, 41 (2006): 221-231.

Fowden 2004Garth Fowden, “The Six Kings atQusayr ‘Amra.” In: La Persia eBisanzio. Roma, 2004: 275-290.

Frye 1954Richard N. Frye, ed. and tr. TheHistory of Bukhara. Translatedfrom a Persian Abridgement of theArabic Original by Narshakhî.Cambridge, Mass.: MediaevalAcademy of America, 1954.

Goetz 1967Hermann Goetz. “Frühe Dar-stellungen von Moslems in derHindu-Kunst.” Oriens, 18-19(1967): 193-199.

Goossens 1993Roger Goossens. “Un texte grecrelatif à l’ashvamedha.” JournalAsiatique, t. 217 (1930): 280-285.

Grenet 1993Frantz Grenet. “Trois nouveauxdocuments d’iconographiereligieuse sogdienne.” StudiaIranica, 22/1 (1993): 49-67.

Grenet 2003Frantz Grenet. “L’Inde desastrologues sur une peinturesogdienne du VIIe siècle.” In:Carlo Cereti, Mauro Maggi, and E.Provasi, eds. Religious Themesand Texts in Pre-Islamic Iran andCentral Asia. Studies in Honour ofProfessor Gherardo Gnoli on the

Occasion of His 65th Birthday.Wiesbaden, 2003: 123-129.

Grenet 2004Frantz Grenet. “Maracanda/Samarkand, une métropole pré-mongole. Sources écrites etarchéologie.” Annales. Histoire,sciences sociales, 5-6 (2004):1043-1067.

Grenet 2005Frantz Grenet. “The Self-Image ofthe Sogdians.” In: Étienne de laVaissière and Éric Trombert, eds.Les Sogdiens en Chine. EFEO,Etudes thématiques 17. Paris(2005): 123-140.

Grenet 2006Frantz Grenet. “What was theAfrasyab Painting About?” In:Compareti and de la Vaissière2006, pp. 43-58.

Grenet and Marshak 1998Frantz Grenet and Boris I.Marshak. “Le mythe de Nana dansl’art de la Sogdiane.” ArtsAsiatiques, 53 (1998): 5-18.

Harle 1985James C. Harle. “HeraklesSubduing the Horse(s) ofDiomedes and Krishna Slaying theDemon-Horse Keshin: a CommonIconographic Formula.” In: JanineSchotsmans and Maurizio Taddei,eds. South Asian Archaeology1983: Papers from the SeventhInternational Conference of theAssociation of South AsianArchaeologists in Western Europe,Held in the Musées Royaux d’Artet d’Histoire, Brussels. Naples:Instituto universitario orientale,1985: 641-652.

Huntington 1985Susan L. Huntington, The Art ofAncient India. Buddhist, Hindu,Jain, with contributions by John C.Huntington. New York; Tokyo:Weatherhill, 1985.

Kageyama 2002Etsuko Kageyama. “A Chinese Wayof Depicting Foreign DelegatesDiscerned in the Paintings ofAfrasiab.” In: Iran, questions etconnaissances. Vol. I: La période

40

ancienne, ed. Ph. Huyse. Paris,2002: 313-327.

Kane 1918P. V. Kane, ed. The Harshacaritaof Ba’abhatta (Text ofUchchhvasas I-VIII). Bombay,1918.

Kitzinger 1946Ernst Kitzinger. “The Horse andLion Tapestry at Dumbarton Oaks:A Study in Coptic and SassanianTextile Design.” Dumbarton OaksPapers, 3 (1946): 1-72.

Lindquist 2003S. E. Lindquist. “EnigmaticNumismatics. Kings, Horses, andthe Ashvamedha Coin-Type.”South Asian Studies, 19 (2003):105-112.

Maitdinova 1984Guzel M. Maitdinova. “Kinterpretatsii zhivopisi AfrasiabaVII v. n. e. (stsena v lodke).”Izvestiia Otdeleniia obshchest-vennykh nauk AN TadzhikskoiSSR, 2, Dushanbe, 1984: 20-27.

Malville 2000John McKim Malville, “The CosmicGeometries of Vijayanagara.” In:John McKim Malville and Lalit M.Gujral, eds. Ancient Cities, SacredSkies: Cosmic Geometries andCity Planning in Ancient India. NewDelhi: Indira Gandhi NationalCentre for the Arts; Aryan BooksInternational, 2000: 100-118.

Mao forthcomingMao Min. “The Scene of theBathing Horses at the «Hall of theAmbassadors» in Afrasyab(Samarkand): Its IconographyInfluence from China and ItsCultural Link with the NawruzFestival.” Paper Presented to theSecond Conference on TurfanStudies, Turfan, August 25th-30th

2005, forthcoming.

Marshak 1994Boris I. Marshak. “Le programmeiconographique des peintures dela ‘Salle des ambassadeurs’ àAfrasiab (Samarkand).” ArtsAsiatiques, 49 (1994): 5-20.

Marshak 2001Boris I. Marshak. “La thématiquesogdienne dans l’art de la Chinede la seconde moitié du VIe siècle.”Comptes Rendus de l’Académiedes Inscriptions et Belles Lettres,2001, No. 1: 227-264.

Marshak 2006Boris I. Marshak, “ Remarks on theMurals of the Ambassadors Hall.”In: Compareti and de la Vaissière2006, pp. 75-85.

Mode 1993Markus Mode. Sogdien und dieHerrscher der Welt. Türken,Sasaniden und Chinesen inHistoriengemälden des 7.Jahrhunderts n. Chr. aus Alt-Samarqand. Frankfurt/Main etc.:Peter Lang, 1993 (= EuropäischeHochschulschriften. Reihe XXVIII,Kunstgeschichte. Bd. 162).

Mode 2002Markus Mode. “Court Art ofSogdian Samarqand in the 7thcentury AD: Some remarks to anold problem.” 2002: http://www.orientarch.uni-halle.de/ca/afras/index.htm, accessedJanuary 15, 2007.

Mode 2006Markus Mode. “Reading theAfrasiab Murals: Some Commentson Reconstructions and Details.”In: Compareti and de la Vaissière2006, pp. 113-128.

Motov 1999Iurii A. Motov, “Izobrazheniemisterii prazdnika Mikhragan vnastennykh rospisiakh afrasiab-skogo dvortsa.” In: Istoriia iarkheologiia Semirech’ia. Sbornikstatei i publikatsii. Almaty, 1999:57-81.

Rapin 1995Claude Rapin. “Hinduism in theIndo-Greek Area. Notes on SomeIndian Finds from Bactria and TwoTemples in Taxila.” In: AntonioInvernizzi, ed. In the Land of theGryphons. Papers onCentral AsianArchaeology in Antiquity.Monografie di Mesopotamia, 5.Firenze: Le lettere, 1995: 275-291.

Rapin 1996Claude Rapin. Indian Art fromAfghanistan. The Legend ofSakuntala and the Indian Treasureof Eucratides at Ai Khanum. NewDelhi: Manohar, 1996.

Riboud 2003Penelope Riboud. “Le cheval sanscavalier dans l’art funérairesogdien en Chine: à la recherchedes sources d’un thèmecomposite.” Arts Asiatiques, 58(2003): 148-161.

Riboud 2004Penelope Riboud. “Description dumonument”, and “Quelquesremarques sur l’iconographiereligieuse du monument.” In:Catherine Delacour and PenelopeRiboud, eds. Lit de pierre, sommeilbarbare. Présentation, aprèsrestauration et remontage, d’unebanquette funéraire ayantappartenu à un aristocrate d’AsieCentrale venu s’établir en Chineau VIe siècle. Paris, 2004: 15-31and 43-47.

Schiltz 1994Véronique Schiltz. Gli Sciti. VIIIsecolo a.C.-I secolo d.C., Parigi,1994.

Silvi Antonini 1989Chiara Silvi Antonini. “ThePaintings in the Palace of Afrasiab(Samarkand).” Rivista degli StudiOrientali, 43 (1989): 109-144.

Sinor 1990Denis Sinor. “The Establishmentand Dissolution of the TürkEmpire.” In: Denis Sinor, ed. TheCambridge History of Early InnerAsia. Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press, 1990: 285-316.

Stein 1983Burton Stein. “Mahanavami:Medieval and Modern Kingly Ritualin South India.” In: BardwellSmith, ed. Essays on GuptaCulture. Delhi; Varanasi; Patna,1983: 67-92.

Smirnova 1970Ol’ga I. Smirnova. Ocherki iz istoriiSogda. Moskva: “Nauka,” 1970.

41

Tanabe 1995Katsumi Tanabe. “Nana on Lion.East and West in Sogdian Art.”Orient, 30-31 (1995): 309-334.

Trilling 1982James Tril l ing. The RomanHeritage. Textiles from Egypt andthe Eastern Mediterranean 300 to600 A.D. Washington D.C., 1982.

Yatsenko 2004Sergey A. Yatsenko. “The Costumeof Foreign Embassies andInhabitants of Samarkand on WallPainting of the 7th c. in the ‘Hall ofAmbassadors’ from Afrasiab as aHistorical Source.” Transoxiana, 8(June 2004): http://www.transoxiana.org/0108/yatsenko-afrasiab_costume.html.

Notes

1. In 630, during the reign ofTaizong (630-649), the Chinesedefeated the Eastern Turk Empirein Mongolia and used Turkishcontingents in order to subjugatethe Western Turk Empire in theTarim Basin and Transoxiana. Thistask was completed during thereign of Gaozong between 657-659 (Sinor 1990, p. 310). Turkguards can be observedeverywhere in the paintings of thewestern wall at Afrasiab: they canbe recognized by their hairstyleand other facial traits such as theabsence of a beard. In fact,Chinese literary sources describethem as having long hair andplaits. They do not carry gifts inthe paintings, and for this reasonthey have been considered to beguards in service in the territoryof their former empire after thesubmission to the Tang.2. A possible similar scheme is,mutatis mutandis, in the famousearly 8th century Omayyadpainting at Qusayr ‘Amra (Jordan)(Fowden 2004).3. The king of that Sogdian region(identified with Kushanya) wentinto that pavilion to pray; so itwould not be incorrect to identify

the building as a temple too. Thisdoes not seem to have been thecase in Afrasiab where the ‘Hall ofthe Ambassadors’ has beenidentified as the private space ofa prominent person, possiblyVarkhuman himself (Marshak2006, p. 75).4. Chinese sources also report thetime of year when the SogdianNawruz was celebrated(Compareti and Cristoforettiforthcoming). Grenet noted thatone of the Turk guards wrappedhis robe around his hips, probablysince the season was too warm(Grenet 2004, pl. B).5. Recently Mikhail Fedorovsuggested that Varkhuman is theperson dressed like a warrior inthe left corner of the southernwall, who is, however, depicted onthe same scale as the other peoplearound him (Fedorov 2006). For adifferent interpretation of thatdetail, see Compareti 2004.6. It is not clear if this part of thecelebration should follow orprecede the Nauwruz (Comparetiand Cristoforetti forthcoming).7. Unfortunately, the funerarymonument was not excavatedaccording to scientific criteria, andit is now part of a private collection(the Vahid Kooros Collection,Houston).8. The same figure of Krishnapresents some traits borrowedfrom Hellenistic culture (Chandra1983).9. Also classical authors wereaware of the ashvamedha. In hisbook on Apollonius of Tyana,Philostratus (1st century CE) givesa description of an Indian horsesacrifice which could be onlyinterpreted as the ashvamedha(Vit. Apoll. Ty., 2, 19, 15, cited inGoossens 1930).10. This is in all probability arepresentation of the Mahan-avami, a nine-days festival whichcomprised also horse sacrificesexactly as in the ashvamedha tobe held in March-April orSeptember-October: (Stein 1983,75-88). It is worth remembering

that the city of Hampi presents anurban plan which denotes acomplex system of astralrelationships (Malville 2000).11. Other harnessed horsespossibly ready for sacrifice can beobserved in at least one paintingat Panjikent and on a 6th-centurySogdian funerary bed from China(Belenitskii 1961, p. 72, fig. 15;Marshak 1994, pp. 11-15).12. The motif was wide-spreadamong many ancient culturesconnected with ancient Persiafrom very ancient times to theIslamization of Iran and CentralAsia. Processions of this kind canbe observed, in fact, at Pazyryk(3rd century BCE; see Schiltz 1994,p. 284, fig. 215) but also in someunpublished fragmentaryterracottas from 10th-11th centuryDvin (Armenia), directly observedby this writer in the State Museumof Armenian History.

42