23. Distribution of alms

 

All the Cakya's and other beings in the splendid great city called Kapila ate and drunk, amused themselves, lived pleasantly, gave gifts and performed meritorious work. (72: 17)

 

The sculptor or rather the one who ordered the design, has clearly suggested the more edifying part of the S~akya's life, the giving of alms, for the picture, as nothing else is represented on this relief. On the right a building, a dwelling house of two storeys with closed in niches below, windows with trellis-work above, an oblique sloping roof with top-ornaments and above the entrance a balcony with projecting roof. On the rest of the relief against a background of trees, we see a picturesque group: the Cakya's recognisable by their rich garments, who are distributing valuables and food from trays held by their servants, to a crowd of poor of all ages and sexes depicted in all sorts of attitudes. The sculptor has succeeded in giving a natural and animated scene, by here not dividing the givers and receivers on each side as on so many of the reliefs, but showing them in a mingled group.