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Mike Cohen
This one is almost full, so I made a new one! For now, this one will be for doll photos, and the other for human/other photos. Please follow me on there for more photos!
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I think that AI image generation is similar in many ways to photography. The camera itself handles all the fine details, but the photographer is in charge of curating the types of images that will be created.
Ultimately, it is all about maximizing the probability that something good will be created.
This is very similar to AI image generation, in terms of the skills involved and what the human does vs. what the machine does.
You can't compare AI image generation to the process of actually making these images from scratch with 3D software or paint/pencils, where the human controls every detail.
However, I think the process really is very similar to that of photography, as I made the case for above. I think that DALL-E 3 is by far the most powerful AI image generation tool currently available.
- Josh
Minneapolis, MN
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I did a shoot with these guys early last summer when they came through town, and we wanted to try again when they were here most recently. Unfortunately, our conflicting schedules didn't allow much shooting time, as well as it being my least favorite time of day (late morning). Ty and I were both also frustrated with having to wake up before 2pm to do the shoot haha.
accounting on board. You are allowed to use this image on your website. If you do, please link back to my site as the source: creditscoregeek.com/
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The Ajanta Caves (Ajiṇṭhā leni; Marathi: अजिंठा लेणी) in Aurangabad district of Maharashtra, India are about 30 rock-cut Buddhist cave monuments which date from the 2nd century BCE to about 480 or 650 CE. The caves include paintings and sculptures described by the government Archaeological Survey of India as "the finest surviving examples of Indian art, particularly painting", which are masterpieces of Buddhist religious art, with figures of the Buddha and depictions of the Jataka tales. The caves were built in two phases starting around the 2nd century BCE, with the second group of caves built around 400–650 CE according to older accounts, or all in a brief period of 460 to 480 according to the recent proposals of Walter M. Spink. The site is a protected monument in the care of the Archaeological Survey of India, and since 1983, the Ajanta Caves have been a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The caves are located in the Indian state of Maharashtra, near Jalgaon and just outside the village of Ajinṭhā 20°31′56″N 75°44′44″E), about 59 kilometres from Jalgaon railway station on the Delhi – Mumbai line and Howrah-Nagpur-Mumbai line of the Central Railway zone, and 104 kilometres from the city of Aurangabad. They are 100 kilometres from the Ellora Caves, which contain Hindu and Jain temples as well as Buddhist caves, the last dating from a period similar to Ajanta. The Ajanta caves are cut into the side of a cliff that is on the south side of a U-shaped gorge on the small river Waghur, and although they are now along and above a modern pathway running across the cliff they were originally reached by individual stairs or ladders from the side of the river 35 to 110 feet below.
The area was previously heavily forested, and after the site ceased to be used the caves were covered by jungle until accidentally rediscovered in 1819 by a British officer on a hunting party. They are Buddhist monastic buildings, apparently representing a number of distinct "monasteries" or colleges. The caves are numbered 1 to 28 according to their place along the path, beginning at the entrance. Several are unfinished and some barely begun and others are small shrines, included in the traditional numbering as e.g. "9A"; "Cave 15A" was still hidden under rubble when the numbering was done. Further round the gorge are a number of waterfalls, which when the river is high are audible from outside the caves.
The caves form the largest corpus of early Indian wall-painting; other survivals from the area of modern India are very few, though they are related to 5th-century paintings at Sigiriya in Sri Lanka. The elaborate architectural carving in many caves is also very rare, and the style of the many figure sculptures is highly local, found only at a few nearby contemporary sites, although the Ajanta tradition can be related to the later Hindu Ellora Caves and other sites.
HISTORY
Like the other ancient Buddhist monasteries, Ajanta had a large emphasis on teaching, and was divided into several different caves for living, education and worship, under a central direction. Monks were probably assigned to specific caves for living. The layout reflects this organizational structure, with most of the caves only connected through the exterior. The 7th-century travelling Chinese scholar Xuanzang informs us that Dignaga, a celebrated Buddhist philosopher and controversialist, author of well-known books on logic, lived at Ajanta in the 5th century. In its prime the settlement would have accommodated several hundred teachers and pupils. Many monks who had finished their first training may have returned to Ajanta during the monsoon season from an itinerant lifestyle.
The caves are generally agreed to have been made in two distinct periods, separated by several centuries.
CAVES OF THE FIRST (SATAVAHANA) PERIOD
The earliest group of caves consists of caves 9, 10, 12, 13 and 15A. According to Walter Spink, they were made during the period 100 BCE to 100 CE, probably under the patronage of the Satavahana dynasty (230 BCE – c. 220 CE) who ruled the region. Other datings prefer the period 300 BCE to 100 BCE, though the grouping of the earlier caves is generally agreed. More early caves may have vanished through later excavations. Of these, caves 9 and 10 are stupa halls of chaitya-griha form, and caves 12, 13, and 15A are vihāras (see the architecture section below for descriptions of these types). The first phase is still often called the Hinayāna phase, as it originated when, using traditional terminology, the Hinayāna or Lesser Vehicle tradition of Buddhism was dominant, when the Buddha was revered symbolically. However the use of the term Hinayana for this period of Buddhism is now deprecated by historians; equally the caves of the second period are now mostly dated too early to be properly called Mahayana, and do not yet show the full expanded cast of supernatural beings characteristic of that phase of Buddhist art. The first Satavahana period caves lacked figurative sculpture, emphasizing the stupa instead, and in the caves of the second period the overwhelming majority of images represent the Buddha alone, or narrative scenes of his lives.
Spink believes that some time after the Satavahana period caves were made the site was abandoned for a considerable period until the mid-5th century, probably because the region had turned mainly Hindu
CAVES OF THE LATER OR VAKATAKA PERIOD
The second phase began in the 5th century. For a long time it was thought that the later caves were made over a long period from the 4th to the 7th centuries CE, but in recent decades a series of studies by the leading expert on the caves, Walter M. Spink, have argued that most of the work took place over the very brief period from 460 to 480 CE, during the reign of Emperor Harishena of the Vakataka dynasty. This view has been criticized by some scholars, but is now broadly accepted by most authors of general books on Indian art, for example Huntington and Harle.
The second phase is still often called the Mahāyāna or Greater Vehicle phase, but scholars now tend to avoid this nomenclature because of the problems that have surfaced regarding our understanding of Mahāyāna.
Some 20 cave temples were simultaneously created, for the most part viharas with a sanctuary at the back. The most elaborate caves were produced in this period, which included some "modernization" of earlier caves. Spink claims that it is possible to establish dating for this period with a very high level of precision; a fuller account of his chronology is given below. Although debate continues, Spink's ideas are increasingly widely accepted, at least in their broad conclusions. The Archaeological Survey of India website still presents the traditional dating: "The second phase of paintings started around 5th – 6th centuries A.D. and continued for the next two centuries". Caves of the second period are 1–8, 11, 14–29, some possibly extensions of earlier caves. Caves 19, 26, and 29 are chaitya-grihas, the rest viharas.
According to Spink, the Ajanta Caves appear to have been abandoned by wealthy patrons shortly after the fall of Harishena, in about 480 CE. They were then gradually abandoned and forgotten. During the intervening centuries, the jungle grew back and the caves were hidden, unvisited and undisturbed, although the local population were aware of at least some of them.
REDISCOVERY
On 28 April 1819, a British officer for the Madras Presidency, John Smith, of the 28th Cavalry, while hunting tiger, accidentally discovered the entrance to Cave No. 10 deep within the tangled undergrowth. There were local people already using the caves for prayers with a small fire, when he arrived. Exploring that first cave, long since a home to nothing more than birds and bats and a lair for other larger animals, Captain Smith vandalized the wall by scratching his name and the date, April 1819. Since he stood on a five-foot high pile of rubble collected over the years, the inscription is well above the eye-level gaze of an adult today. A paper on the caves by William Erskine was read to the Bombay Literary Society in 1822. Within a few decades, the caves became famous for their exotic setting, impressive architecture, and above all their exceptional, all but unique paintings. A number of large projects to copy the paintings were made in the century after rediscovery, covered below. In 1848 the Royal Asiatic Society established the "Bombay Cave Temple Commission" to clear, tidy and record the most important rock-cut sites in the Bombay Presidency, with John Wilson, as president. In 1861 this became the nucleus of the new Archaeological Survey of India. Until the Nizam of Hyderabad built the modern path between the caves, among other efforts to make the site easy to visit, a trip to Ajanta was a considerable adventure, and contemporary accounts dwell with relish on the dangers from falls off narrow ledges, animals and the Bhil people, who were armed with bows and arrows and had a fearsome reputation.
Today, fairly easily combined with Ellora in a single trip, the caves are the most popular tourist destination in Mahrashtra, and are often crowded at holiday times, increasing the threat to the caves, especially the paintings. In 2012, the Maharashtra Tourism Development Corporation announced plans to add to the ASI visitor centre at the entrance complete replicas of caves 1, 2, 16 & 17 to reduce crowding in the originals, and enable visitors to receive a better visual idea of the paintings, which are dimly-lit and hard to read in the caves. Figures for the year to March 2010 showed a total of 390,000 visitors to the site, divided into 362,000 domestic and 27,000 foreign. The trends over the previous few years show a considerable growth in domestic visitors, but a decline in foreign ones; the year to 2010 was the first in which foreign visitors to Ellora exceeded those to Ajanta.
PAINTINGS
Mural paintings survive from both the earlier and later groups of caves. Several fragments of murals preserved from the earlier caves (Caves 9 and 11) are effectively unique survivals of court-led painting in India from this period, and "show that by Sātavāhana times, if not earlier, the Indian painter had mastered an easy and fluent naturalistic style, dealing with large groups of people in a manner comparable to the reliefs of the Sāñcī toraņa crossbars".
Four of the later caves have large and relatively well-preserved mural paintings which "have come to represent Indian mural painting to the non-specialist", and fall into two stylistic groups, with the most famous in Caves 16 and 17, and apparently later paintings in Caves 1 and 2. The latter group were thought to be a century or more later than the others, but the revised chronology proposed by Spink would place them much closer to the earlier group, perhaps contemporary with it in a more progressive style, or one reflecting a team from a different region. The paintings are in "dry fresco", painted on top of a dry plaster surface rather than into wet plaster.
All the paintings appear to be the work of painters at least as used to decorating palaces as temples, and show a familiarity with and interest in details of the life of a wealthy court. We know from literary sources that painting was widely practised and appreciated in the courts of the Gupta period. Unlike much Indian painting, compositions are not laid out in horizontal compartments like a frieze, but show large scenes spreading in all directions from a single figure or group at the centre. The ceilings are also painted with sophisticated and elaborate decorative motifs, many derived from sculpture. The paintings in cave 1, which according to Spink was commissioned by Harisena himself, concentrate on those Jataka tales which show previous lives of the Buddha as a king, rather than as an animal or human commoner, and so show settings from contemporary palace life.
In general the later caves seem to have been painted on finished areas as excavating work continued elsewhere in the cave, as shown in caves 2 and 16 in particular. According to Spink's account of the chronology of the caves, the abandonment of work in 478 after a brief busy period accounts for the absence of painting in caves such as 4 and 17, the later being plastered in preparation for paintings that were never done.
COPIES
The paintings have deteriorated significantly since they were rediscovered, and a number of 19th-century copies and drawings are important for a complete understanding of the works. However, the earliest projects to copy the paintings were plagued by bad fortune. In 1846, Major Robert Gill, an Army officer from Madras presidency and a painter, was appointed by the Royal Asiatic Society to replicate the frescoes on the cave walls to exhibit these paintings in England. Gill worked on his painting at the site from 1844 to 1863 (though he continued to be based there until his death in 1875, writing books and photographing) and made 27 copies of large sections of murals, but all but four were destroyed in a fire at the Crystal Palace in London in 1866, where they were on display.
Another attempt was made in 1872 when the Bombay Presidency commissioned John Griffiths, then principal of the Bombay School of Art, to work with his students to make new copies, again for shipping to England. They worked on this for thirteen years and some 300 canvases were produced, many of which were displayed at the Imperial Institute on Exhibition Road in London, one of the forerunners of the Victoria and Albert Museum. But in 1885 another fire destroyed over a hundred paintings that were in storage. The V&A still has 166 paintings surviving from both sets, though none have been on permanent display since 1955. The largest are some 3 × 6 metres. A conservation project was undertaken on about half of them in 2006, also involving the University of Northumbria. Griffith and his students had unfortunately painted many of the paintings with "cheap varnish" in order to make them easier to see, which has added to the deterioration of the originals, as has, according to Spink and others, recent cleaning by the ASI.
A further set of copies were made between 1909 and 1911 by Christiana Herringham (Lady Herringham) and a group of students from the Calcutta School of Art that included the future Indian Modernist painter Nandalal Bose. The copies were published in full colour as the first publication of London's fledgling India Society. More than the earlier copies, these aimed to fill in holes and damage to recreate the original condition rather than record the state of the paintings as she was seeing them. According to one writer, unlike the paintings created by her predecessors Griffiths and Gill, whose copies were influenced by British Victorian styles of painting, those of the Herringham expedition preferred an 'Indian Renascence' aesthetic of the type pioneered by Abanindranath Tagore.
Early photographic surveys were made by Robert Gill, who learnt to use a camera from about 1856, and whose photos, including some using stereoscopy, were used in books by him and Fergusson (many are available online from the British Library), then Victor Goloubew in 1911 and E.L. Vassey, who took the photos in the four volume study of the caves by Ghulam Yazdani (published 1930–1955).
ARCHITECTURE
The monasteries mostly consist of vihara halls for prayer and living, which are typically rectangular with small square dormitory cells cut into the walls, and by the second period a shrine or sanctuary at the rear centred on a large statue of the Buddha, also carved from the living rock. This change reflects the movement from Hinayana to Mahāyāna Buddhism. The other type of main hall is the narrower and higher chaitya hall with a stupa as the focus at the far end, and a narrow aisle around the walls, behind a range of pillars placed close together. Other plainer rooms were for sleeping and other activities. Some of the caves have elaborate carved entrances, some with large windows over the door to admit light. There is often a colonnaded porch or verandah, with another space inside the doors running the width of the cave.
The central square space of the interior of the viharas is defined by square columns forming a more or less square open area. Outside this are long rectangular aisles on each side, forming a kind of cloister. Along the side and rear walls are a number of small cells entered by a narrow doorway; these are roughly square, and have small niches on their back walls. Originally they had wooden doors. The centre of the rear wall has a larger shrine-room behind, containing a large Buddha statue. The viharas of the earlier period are much simpler, and lack shrines. Spink in fact places the change to a design with a shrine to the middle of the second period, with many caves being adapted to add a shrine in mid-excavation, or after the original phase.
The plan of Cave 1 shows one of the largest viharas, but is fairly typical of the later group. Many others, such as Cave 16, lack the vestibule to the shrine, which leads straight off the main hall. Cave 6 is two viharas, one above the other, connected by internal stairs, with sanctuaries on both levels.
The four completed chaitya halls are caves 9 and 10 from the early period, and caves 19 and 26 from the later period of construction. All follow the typical form found elsewhere, with high ceilings and a central "nave" leading to the stupa, which is near the back, but allows walking behind it, as walking around stupas was (and remains) a common element of Buddhist worship (pradakshina). The later two have high ribbed roofs, which reflect timber forms, and the earlier two are thought to have used actual timber ribs, which have now perished. The two later halls have a rather unusual arrangement (also found in Cave 10 at Ellora) where the stupa is fronted by a large relief sculpture of the Buddha, standing in Cave 19 and seated in Cave 26. Cave 29 is a late and very incomplete chaitya hall.
The form of columns in the work of the first period is very plain and un-embellished, with both chaitya halls using simple octagonal columns, which were painted with figures. In the second period columns were far more varied and inventive, often changing profile over their height, and with elaborate carved capitals, often spreading wide. Many columns are carved over all their surface, some fluted and others carved with decoration all over, as in cave 1.
The flood basalt rock of the cliff, part of the Deccan Traps formed by successive volcanic eruptions at the end of the Cretaceous, is layered horizontally, and somewhat variable in quality, so the excavators had to amend their plans in places, and in places there have been collapses in the intervening centuries, as with the lost portico to cave 1. Excavation began by cutting a narrow tunnel at roof level, which was expanded downwards and outwards; the half-built vihara cave 24 shows the method. Spink believes that for the first caves of the second period the excavators had to relearn skills and techniques that had been lost in the centuries since the first period, which were then transmitted to be used at later rock-cut sites in the region, such as Ellora, and the Elephanta, Bagh, Badami and Aurangabad Caves.
The caves from the first period seem to have been paid for by a number of different patrons, with several inscriptions recording the donation of particular portions of a single cave, but according to Spink the later caves were each commissioned as a complete unit by a single patron from the local rulers or their court elites. After the death of Harisena smaller donors got their chance to add small "shrinelets" between the caves or add statues to existing caves, and some two hundred of these "intrusive" additions were made in sculpture, with a further number of intrusive paintings, up to three hundred in cave 10 alone.
A grand gateway to the site, at the apex of the gorge's horsehoe between caves 15 and 16, was approached from the river, and is decorated with elephants on either side and a nāga, or protective snake deity.
ICONOGRAPHY OF THE CAVES
In the pre-Christian era, the Buddha was represented symbolically, in the form of the stupa. Thus, halls were made with stupas to venerate the Buddha. In later periods the images of the Buddha started to be made in coins, relic caskets, relief or loose sculptural forms, etc. However, it took a while for the human representation of the Buddha to appear in Buddhist art. One of the earliest evidences of the Buddha's human representations are found at Buddhist archaeological sites, such as Goli, Nagarjunakonda, and Amaravati. The monasteries of those sites were built in less durable media, such as wood, brick, and stone. As far as the genre of rock-cut architecture is concerned it took many centuries for the Buddha image to be depicted. Nobody knows for sure at which rock-cut cave site the first image of the Buddha was depicted. Current research indicates that Buddha images in a portable form, made of wood or stone, were introduced, for the first time, at Kanheri, to be followed soon at Ajanta Cave 8 (Dhavalikar, Jadhav, Spink, Singh). While the Kanheri example dates to 4th or 5th century CE, the Ajanta example has been dated to c. 462–478 CE (Spink). None of the rock-cut monasteries prior to these dates, and other than these examples, show any Buddha image although hundreds of rock-cut caves were made throughout India during the first few centuries CE. And, in those caves, it is the stupa that is the object of veneration, not the image. Images of the Buddha are not found in Buddhist sailagrhas (rock-cut complexes) until the times of the Kanheri (4th–5th century CE) and Ajanta examples (c. 462–478 CE).
The caves of the second period, now all dated to the 5th century, were typically described as "Mahayana", but do not show the features associated with later Mahayana Buddhism. Although the beginnings of Mahāyāna teachings go back to the 1st century there is little art and archaeological evidence to suggest that it became a mainstream cult for several centuries. In Mahayana it is not Gautama Buddha but the Bodhisattva who is important, including "deity" Bodhisattva like Manjushri and Tara, as well as aspects of the Buddha such as Aksobhya, and Amitabha. Except for a few Bodhisattva, these are not depicted at Ajanta, where the Buddha remains the dominant figure. Even the Bodhisattva images of Ajanta are never central objects of worship, but are always shown as attendants of the Buddha in the shrine. If a Bodhisattva is shown in isolation, as in the Astabhaya scenes, these were done in the very last years of activities at Ajanta, and are mostly 'intrusive' in nature, meaning that they were not planned by the original patrons, and were added by new donors after the original patrons had suddenly abandoned the region in the wake of Emperor Harisena's death.
The contrast between iconic and aniconic representations, that is, the stupa on one hand and the image of the Buddha on the other, is now being seen as a construct of the modern scholar rather than a reality of the past. The second phase of Ajanta shows that the stupa and image coincided together. If the entire corpus of the art of Ajanta including sculpture, iconography, architecture, epigraphy, and painting are analysed afresh it will become clear that there was no duality between the symbolic and human forms of the Buddha, as far as the 5th-century phase of Ajanta is concerned. That is why most current scholars tend to avoid the terms 'Hinayana' and 'Mahayana' in the context of Ajanta. They now prefer to call the second phase by the ruling dynasty, as the Vākāţaka phase.
CAVES
CAVE 1
Cave 1 was built on the eastern end of the horse-shoe shaped scarp, and is now the first cave the visitor encounters. This would when first made have been a less prominent position, right at the end of the row. According to Spink, it is one of the latest caves to have been excavated, when the best sites had been taken, and was never fully inaugurated for worship by the dedication of the Buddha image in the central shrine. This is shown by the absence of sooty deposits from butter lamps on the base of the shrine image, and the lack of damage to the paintings that would have been happened if the garland-hooks around the shrine had been in use for any period of time. Although there is no epigraphic evidence, Spink believes that the Vākāţaka Emperor Harishena was the benefactor of the work, and this is reflected in the emphasis on imagery of royalty in the cave, with those Jakata tales being selected that tell of those previous lives of the Buddha in which he was royal.
The cliff has a more steep slope here than at other caves, so to achieve a tall grand facade it was necessary to cut far back into the slope, giving a large courtyard in front of the facade. There was originally a columned portico in front of the present facade, which can be seen "half-intact in the 1880s" in pictures of the site, but this fell down completely and the remains, despite containing fine carving, were carelessly thrown down the slope into the river, from where they have been lost, presumably carried away in monsoon torrents.
This cave has one of the most elaborate carved façades, with relief sculptures on entablature and ridges, and most surfaces embellished with decorative carving. There are scenes carved from the life of the Buddha as well as a number of decorative motifs. A two pillared portico, visible in the 19th-century photographs, has since perished. The cave has a front-court with cells fronted by pillared vestibules on either side. These have a high plinth level. The cave has a porch with simple cells on both ends. The absence of pillared vestibules on the ends suggest that the porch was not excavated in the latest phase of Ajanta when pillared vestibules had become a necessity and norm. Most areas of the porch were once covered with murals, of which many fragments remain, especially on the ceiling. There are three doorways: a central doorway and two side doorways. Two square windows were carved between the doorways to brighten the interiors.
Each wall of the hall inside is nearly 12 m long and 6.1 m high. Twelve pillars make a square colonnade inside supporting the ceiling, and creating spacious aisles along the walls. There is a shrine carved on the rear wall to house an impressive seated image of the Buddha, his hands being in the dharmachakrapravartana mudra. There are four cells on each of the left, rear, and the right walls, though due to rock fault there are none at the ends of the rear aisle. The walls are covered with paintings in a fair state of preservation, though the full scheme was never completed. The scenes depicted are mostly didactic, devotional, and ornamental, with scenes from the Jataka stories of the Buddha's former existences as a bodhisattva), the life of the Gautama Buddha, and those of his veneration. The two most famous individual painted images at Ajanta are the two over-life size figures of the protective bodhisattvas Padmapani and Vajrapani on either side of the entrance to the Buddha shrine on the wall of the rear aisle (see illustrations above). According to Spink, the original dating of the paintings to about 625 arose largely or entirely because James Fegusson, a 19th-century architectural historian, had decided that a scene showing an ambassador being received, with figures in Persian dress, represented a recorded embassy to Persia (from a Hindu monarch at that) around that date.
CAVE 2
Cave 2, adjacent to Cave 1, is known for the paintings that have been preserved on its walls, ceilings, and pillars. It looks similar to Cave 1 and is in a better state of preservation.
Cave 2 has a porch quite different from Cave one. Even the façade carvings seem to be different. The cave is supported by robust pillars, ornamented with designs. The front porch consists of cells supported by pillared vestibules on both ends. The cells on the previously "wasted areas" were needed to meet the greater housing requirements in later years. Porch-end cells became a trend in all later Vakataka excavations. The simple single cells on porch-ends were converted into CPVs or were planned to provide more room, symmetry, and beauty.
The paintings on the ceilings and walls of this porch have been widely published. They depict the Jataka tales that are stories of the Buddha's life in former existences as Bodhisattva. Just as the stories illustrated in cave 1 emphasize kingship, those in cave 2 show many "noble and powerful" women in prominent roles, leading to suggestions that the patron was an unknown woman. The porch's rear wall has a doorway in the center, which allows entrance to the hall. On either side of the door is a square-shaped window to brighten the interior.
The hall has four colonnades which are supporting the ceiling and surrounding a square in the center of the hall. Each arm or colonnade of the square is parallel to the respective walls of the hall, making an aisle in between. The colonnades have rock-beams above and below them. The capitals are carved and painted with various decorative themes that include ornamental, human, animal, vegetative, and semi-divine forms.
Paintings appear on almost every surface of the cave except for the floor. At various places the art work has become eroded due to decay and human interference. Therefore, many areas of the painted walls, ceilings, and pillars are fragmentary. The painted narratives of the Jataka tales are depicted only on the walls, which demanded the special attention of the devotee. They are didactic in nature, meant to inform the community about the Buddha's teachings and life through successive rebirths. Their placement on the walls required the devotee to walk through the aisles and 'read' the narratives depicted in various episodes. The narrative episodes are depicted one after another although not in a linear order. Their identification has been a core area of research since the site's rediscovery in 1819. Dieter Schlingloff's identifications have updated our knowledge on the subject.
CAVE 4
The Archeological Survey of India board outside the caves gives the following detail about cave 4: "This is the largest monastery planned on a grandiose scale but was never finished. An inscription on the pedestal of the buddha's image mentions that it was a gift from a person named Mathura and paleographically belongs to 6th century A.D. It consists of a verandah, a hypostylar hall, sanctum with an antechamber and a series of unfinished cells. The rear wall of the verandah contains the panel of Litany of Avalokiteśvara".
The sanctuary houses a colossal image of the Buddha in preaching pose flanked by bodhisattvas and celestial nymphs hovering above.
CAVES 9-10
Caves 9 and 10 are the two chaitya halls from the first period of construction, though both were also undergoing an uncompleted reworking at the end of the second period. Cave 10 was perhaps originally of the 1st century BCE, and cave 9 about a hundred years later. The small "shrinelets" called caves 9A to 9D and 10A also date from the second period, and were commissioned by individuals.
The paintings in cave 10 include some surviving from the early period, many from an incomplete programme of modernization in the second period, and a very large number of smaller late intrusive images, nearly all Buddhas and many with donor inscriptions from individuals. These mostly avoided over-painting the "official" programme and after the best positions were used up are tucked away in less prominent positions not yet painted; the total of these (including those now lost) was probably over 300, and the hands of many different artists are visible.
OTHER CAVES
Cave 3 is merely a start of an excavation; according to Spink it was begun right at the end of the final period of work and soon abandoned. Caves 5 and 6 are viharas, the latter on two floors, that were late works of which only the lower floor of cave 6 was ever finished. The upper floor of cave 6 has many private votive sculptures, and a shrine Buddha, but is otherwise unfinished. Cave 7 has a grand facade with two porticos but, perhaps because of faults in the rock, which posed problems in many caves, was never taken very deep into the cliff, and consists only of the two porticos and a shrine room with antechamber, with no central hall. Some cells were fitted in.
Cave 8 was long thought to date to the first period of construction, but Spink sees it as perhaps the earliest cave from the second period, its shrine an "afterthought". The statue may have been loose rather than carved from the living rock, as it has now vanished. The cave was painted, but only traces remain.
SPINK´S DETAILED CHRONOLOGY
Walter M. Spink has over recent decades developed a very precise and circumstantial chronology for the second period of work on the site, which unlike earlier scholars, he places entirely in the 5th century. This is based on evidence such as the inscriptions and artistic style, combined with the many uncompleted elements of the caves. He believes the earlier group of caves, which like other scholars he dates only approximately, to the period "between 100 BCE – 100 CE", were at some later point completely abandoned and remained so "for over three centuries", as the local population had turned mainly Hindu. This changed with the accession of the Emperor Harishena of the Vakataka Dynasty, who reigned from 460 to his death in 477. Harisena extended the Central Indian Vakataka Empire to include a stretch of the east coast of India; the Gupta Empire ruled northern India at the same period, and the Pallava dynasty much of the south.
According to Spink, Harisena encouraged a group of associates, including his prime minister Varahadeva and Upendragupta, the sub-king in whose territory Ajanta was, to dig out new caves, which were individually commissioned, some containing inscriptions recording the donation. This activity began in 462 but was mostly suspended in 468 because of threats from the neighbouring Asmaka kings. Work continued on only caves 1, Harisena's own commission, and 17–20, commissioned by Upendragupta. In 472 the situation was such that work was suspended completely, in a period that Spink calls "the Hiatus", which lasted until about 475, by which time the Asmakas had replaced Upendragupta as the local rulers.
Work was then resumed, but again disrupted by Harisena's death in 477, soon after which major excavation ceased, except at cave 26, which the Asmakas were sponsoring themselves. The Asmakas launched a revolt against Harisena's son, which brought about the end of the Vakataka Dynasty. In the years 478–480 major excavation by important patrons was replaced by a rash of "intrusions" – statues added to existing caves, and small shrines dotted about where there was space between them. These were commissioned by less powerful individuals, some monks, who had not previously been able to make additions to the large excavations of the rulers and courtiers. They were added to the facades, the return sides of the entrances, and to walls inside the caves. According to Spink, "After 480, not a single image was ever made again at the site", and as Hinduism again dominated the region, the site was again abandoned, this time for over a millennium.
Spink does not use "circa" in his dates, but says that "one should allow a margin of error of one year or perhaps even two in all cases".
IMPACT ON MODERN INDIAN PAINTINGS
The Ajanta paintings, or more likely the general style they come from, influenced painting in Tibet and Sri Lanka.
The rediscovery of ancient Indian paintings at Ajanta provided Indian artists examples from ancient India to follow. Nandlal Bose experimented with techniques to follow the ancient style which allowed him to develop his unique style. Abanindranath Tagore also used the Ajanta paintings for inspiration.
WIKIPEDIA
Since this account has arrived to the free limit of 200 pictures, I'm starting a new flickr account.
Here is the link: www.flickr.com/photos/76064931@N06/
Thanks all so much <3
account on board. You are allowed to use this image on your website. If you do, please link back to my site as the source: creditscoregeek.com/
Example: Photo by CreditScoreGeek.com
Thank you!
Mike Cohen
I can't say i'm thrilled at Flickr's account changes, but you always used to have to pay to get the best out of it, and they've obviously realised that model is better than the advertising-funded one they have now.
Both of my accounts are over the 1,000 photo cap, so my choice is to leave, edit both collections or pay up. I like it here - this was my first social media site and whilst my activity is much diminished from what it used to be, I value the connections I've made here. And editing my accounts below the 1,000 mark? Well this account is growing at a rate beyond what i thought would ever be possible when I started it back in 2005. And my other account has over 11,000 pictures in it. They aren't going anywhere.
So I've paid up, and I'm staying.
This picture was taken at my recent burlesque evening, and was my 'after performance' look. Perfect for an Oxford Street hotel on a Thursday evening.
Persistent URL: www.floridamemory.com/items/show/42036
Local call number: RC20914
Title: Southern Bell Telephone's mechanized accounting office - Orlando
Date: July 1959
Physical descrip: 1 photoprint - b&w - 8 x 10 in.
Series Title: Reference Collection
Repository: State Library and Archives of Florida, 500 S. Bronough St., Tallahassee, FL 32399-0250 USA. Contact: 850.245.6700. Archives@dos.myflorida.com
There's no accounting or apologizing for taste! To me, Crimewave and Joe's Apartment are two off-beat gems and true cult classics of the highest order. That said, I appreciate I'm . . well, let's say I'm in the minority with that opinion! Ok, so neither is likely to be added to the Criterion Collection anytime soon, but I'd argue if you start from the right frame of mind, Crimewave and Joe's Apartment are delightful fun.
What's it about
Crimewave is the movie Sam Raimi made right after the success of the original Evil Dead. While that film was his spin on horror, Crimewave was to be his ode to slapstick comedy.
Joe's Apartment reminds us of the bygones days when New York City was renown as an uncaring cesspool of crime and blight and Jerry O'Connell was famous enough to headline a movie. Oh, and cockroaches could sing and dance insanely catchy numbers while counting the days until humanity falls and they can finally take their place as the dominate lifeform on earth. Think of like a raunchy, disease-ridden Chimpmonks without the music management. Really the opening number lays it all out pretty well: www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFkMkcQwog4
Why it's great
Crimewave: = The Three Stooges + Blood Simple. Seriously, it was written by the Coen brothers! It was directed by Sam Raimi! It co-stars Bruce Campbell! We're talking the folks behind Evil Dead II, Spider-Man, The Big Lebowski, Raising Arizona, etc, etc, etc; how could it not be completely awesome?!
Well, it is (to me). Trick is that the tone (silly slapstick with a dark edge and a VERY vaudevillian flair) has to be something you're in the mood for, and the lead character is an irritatingly nebbish, naive, and clueless clod with a good heart . . . who pretty much stays that through the whole film as part of the grand meta-joke on those types of characters. Don't like him and sort of want to strangle him half the time? THAT'S THE POINT! Still, that's an understandably tough sell for many.
Joe's Apartment has a similar problem. Joe (O'Connell) isn't much a protagonist, never growing much beyond the "gee, shucks" Midwest-schtick as a newly-arrived Iowan in NYC. His only friends: the talking (singing, dancing) cockroaches who share Joe's dilapidated apartment with him and try to "help" Joe with his career and lovelife . . . usually to Joe's detriment.
Also a plus: both films are loaded with great character actors and personalities: Brion James! Paul L. Smith! Louise Lasser! Billy West! Robert Vaughn! Don Ho! David Huddleston!
All Nite Picture Marathon
To expand the fun, add in the Coen Bros classic (but slightly less seen these days) Raisin Arizona for more crazy slapstick fun and Nicholas Cage action.
Premier Christy Clark visited BENCH, a visionary automated accounting firm, to speak about Budget 2016, British Columbia’s fourth consecutive balanced budget.
Formal opening of the renovated Port Arthur Public Utilities Office.
Visitors examine new accounting equipment while touring the renovated building.
Accession 1993-01 #292
For more information about Thunder Bay's history, visit www.thunderbay.ca/archives
And counting.....
I realised I have not posted shots of the wedding before, or I don't think I have. Today is our forth wedding anniversary, and thankfully, we are still very happy.
And here is my account of the day:
We woke at dawn to find the chaos from the barbeque all around. Seagulls had feasted long on discarded flavour of ribs and the suchlike. Quite where to start. So, bin bags were filled, washing up done and all other tasks that needed to be done.
There was just time for a shower; Julie went in as a calm woman, the same I had known for the past two years, but came out ‘with a panic head on.’
One of the jobs that needed to be done was going to the tailor to change the top hat. Somehow the wrong size one had been put in the box, and the hat sat on top of my head in a very humorous way, but not at all becoming. Julie also had to go and have her nails done; a first for her, and she had been growing them for weeks, making typing ever more difficult. Dropping her off in the centre of town, I headed to the main car park nearest the tailor.
Hughes is an old fashioned shop; full of suits, but served with manners from days gone by. The door would be opened, and all the other such things that are vanishing from the modern world. With minimum fuss a replacement hat was found, this one a perfect fit, and I was on my way back home.
I got a call from the planner asking about ice, and a mild form of panic formed in my head; and upon Julie’s return we checked with Jen and realised there was going to be no ice to keep the drinks cold. So, against all our plans we found ourselves having to go to Tesco’s on a Saturday morning, mixing it with families and the confused to get bags of ice. We filled the trolley with bags, checking that we could use the express checkout and have 10 items or less.
The cashier looked at us strange after looking at our purchases, ‘do you have some kind of ice fetish,’ she asked. ‘Wedding; drink; no ice; panic!’ I replied. She seemed happy at this. She had been passing the time of day with an old friend as we waited to pay, and as the minutes dragged by I could see the minute hand on a clock in my hand sweep round like the blade of a fan. We then had to get to the other side of town, mixing it with traffic heading to the port as the tunnel was still closed. Thankfully, we did not get held up, and we arrived at the barn as the planner did and at least it was open.
As we stood there, the florist arrived, dropping off the table arrangements before heading to Julie’s Dads to deposit the bouquet and buttonholes. The caterer was there, already preparing our wedding breakfast, and seeing everything come together was reassuring, but also creating an even greater sense of panic as we realised it was now less than three hours to the beginning of the ceremony, and we had to get home, then Julie to her Dad’s, my best man arrive, get ready.
Aaaaarrrgggghhhhh.
Thankfully there is a back way into Dover and right to our street, and so we were back home and only mildly worried within a few minutes. Julie had all her stuff in a bag, and so grabbed that and headed up to her dad’s, leaving me to shower and get ready, and wait for Mike, Julie’s brother and my best man, to arrive.
Unbeknown to me; Mike had decided to walk up from his house, and therefore be fashionably late and causing the panic level to rise still further. Causing me more worry was the discovery that there were no cufflinks in with the suits and shirts. My fault for not checking, for sure, but this meant I had to call Tony, Julie’s father to see if he had any; no dice. The only thing to do was to call Hughes and ask them; apparently the cufflinks were in the inside pocket of the jacket; I failed to see that there were two inside pockets and so checked just the one.
Another panic over, Mike arrived and it really started to come together. Thankfully the suits fitted, and somehow I had managed not to cut myself shaving, and it was time to head out to the pub down the road for some Dutch courage and to wait for the limo to take me to the barn. Whilst walking down I received a call from the limo driver, he was coming into town from a different direction and the directions to the pub did not work. I say I received a call, I had a voice mail asking me to ring him back and guide him to the Five Cups.
I did not have his mobile number; the only thing to do was to call Julie, and she call him back as she had the number. I really did not want to worry her right at that moment, but I had no other choice.
So, with that sorted there was just time to have a pint of Australia’s finest amber nectar before the Mercedes pulled up outside.
Our arrival at the barn was seen by no one, and walking into the barn itself we met just the photographer who was checking light levels and other such things. He set up a few shots of Mike and I outside, and it was during this that the registrar arrived; as did the first guests.
I have to admit that seeing that there was no one at all in the barn was a shock, but with 30 minutes to go before kick off I thought it a little early to worry too much. I had a short chat with the registrar, just confirming details I had given before, and then I was all ready to be wed.
More and more people started to arrive; I went round and thanked them for coming; then as two o’clock approached Julie arrived and I waited, back turned, for her appearance in the barn.
To be honest I was nervous, more than I thought I was going to be. The ceremony went by quite quickly; I slipped up on one part forgetting what I was supposed to say. It was a civil ceremony, nothing religious, no readings to be done, but instead there were passages about love and commitment; it was all rather wonderful, and I will try to post about that when I get home(I am writing this in Tuscany right now, more about that another time).
And after many nice words it was time to put the ring on her finger and for me to kiss Julie; and we were declared husband and wife. Everyone applauded, and we walked up the aisle outside to the marquee were we could meet each of our friends and welcome them as a married couple.
Second through was Julie’s father, but he could not stop and speak as he was choking back the tears. I gave him a look and went over and hugged him; he sobbed some more and patted me on the back.
Then it was time for the photos; with my Mother and Julie’s Nan sitting on chairs we arranged ourselves in ever bigger groups, as Colin snapped away. We then moved down to the Georgian townhouse that also stands there to take up places on the steps leading to the main door for some more pictures. The late afternoon sun beat down on us; the birds sang in the trees and all was right with the world.
We went back into the marquee where elderflower pressé was being served in champagne flutes. Seeing so many friends around was a real joy, and Jools and I circulated talking to as many friends as we could.
Then it was time to eat; we were seated at four round tables; Julie and I next to each other with each family next to us. This meant I was next to Mother dearest, but this was ok. We had steak, salmon, buttered potatoes, with salads of various kinds; followed by a choice of three desserts. The hobbits amongst the guest had two or even all three.
Then there were the speeches; Mike did not really know me, so there were not the usual embarrassing stories about the groom. I spoke only really to thank both Julie’s Father and my Mother for helping towards the cost, and to thank everyone for coming and making it such a joyful occasion.
Then the free bar opened.
We both mingled more; we watched the sun go down and the trees change colour. The DJ arrived and I said to play the usual cheese that gets played at weddings as I don’t think anyone would have liked Blister in The Sun, Wave of Mutilation or Train in Vain instead of Lambada, The Birdie Song or Agadoo.
The evening guests arrived from seven, and some of the older people began to leave. From that point on events get a little sketchy. One thing I do remember is that on of my friends of the matchdoctor site was there, and I forgot all about her until Julie mentioned her. How terrible I felt, all I could do was to blame the day and my mind being all messed up. But once I went over to say ‘hello’ to her, it was so good to meet someone for the first time that I felt had been friends for many years.
I think it would be fair to say I had had enough, but there were those who had much, much more. Glasses were dropped; people did fall around on the ground and I am sure people felt very silly in the morning.
It was left to Julie and I to get people into taxis and order plenty more, before it was time for us to climb into one of our own to get us back to the flat, and crash out for just three hours before it was time to get up, this time to get to the airport for the flight to Italy.
You can save your Flickr account (and money!) if you switch from Yahoo.de to Yahoo.com using www.flickr.com/account/transfer/ ! More info here
Ancient accounts, which differ to some degree, describe the structure as being built around several stone columns (or towers of blocks) forming the interior of the structure, which stood on a fifteen-meter-high (fifty-foot) white marble pedestal near the Mandraki harbor entrance. Other sources place the Colossus on a breakwater in the harbor. The statue itself was 30 meters (100 feet) tall. Iron beams were embedded in the brick towers, and bronze plates attached to the bars formed the visible skin of the sculpture. Much of the iron and bronze was reforged from the various weapons Demetrius's army left behind, and the abandoned second siege tower was used for scaffolding around the lower levels during construction. Upper portions were built with the use of a large earthen ramp. During the building the builders would pile mounds of dirt on the sides of the colossus. To an observer it may have looked like a volcano-like sculpture. Upon completion all of the dirt was moved and the colossus was left to stand alone. After twelve years, in 280 BC, the statue was completed.
Link: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
historia.abril.com.br/2006/infohistoria/info_ocolossodero...
Now for the most painful work-in-progress, my accounting class. It has been a struggle all semester and the most work I've ever had to put into a class. From a grade standpoint it has been a rollercoaster! There were time where I thought there was no way I could have a good grade at the end, but the end is here and I"m done! I'll need to do it again next semester in Accounting 2 but it will get done and I can HAVE a good grade!
Our Oakland Pedalfest Whymcycle accounting.. brought 48 Whymcycles, with 65 seats, 131 wheels on them total..bikes. trikes, quads.. hand pumping blisters.. countless smiles and riders on the dozen to ride, and tons of great conversations. Thanks, Christy Cantrell and Elliot Naess..and Jerri Michelle Lee Wagner for holding down the fort.
The tally:a 4 seat, a 3 seat,and a 2 seat double steered tandems, 4 'bents, 2 super tall, 2 tall, Express, BFG, 3 bounce Whyms, dbl. whym, trailer, rotary, 2 mini-quads, pedicab, Vitruvian Wheel, Schooner tadpole trike, 2 Burley FWD 'bents, 4 micro hand cycles, Yamaha bike, rowing bike,3MX tadpole, 2 stand up handcycles, Sociable trike , 2 former electrics, 4 ha' pennies, 2 hi wheel safeties, one ordinary, swing bike, 2 pedal electric generators, Strong arms for 2 loadings, 2 unloadings. Good times.
I moved to flickr from Textamerica. I don't like the atmosphere there anymore. It's all T and A, forgive the pun.
Glad to see they treat all their users well, even when they want to leave because of the bad atmosphere. Very smart.
AND my camera is still broken. Scheduled to arrive at canon on april 4th.
To celebrate my self portrait #100 and to make this day even more special
I gave myself a gift:
Upgraded to pro account ! :)
The distress in Lancashire: Distributing Bread at the Crooked Lane Depot, Preston.
The following description of the distress in Preston was written by Edwin Waugh. The full account entitled "HOME-LIFE OF THE LANCASHIRE FACTORY FOLK DURING THE COTTON FAMINE" can be accessed Here
AMONG THE PRESTON OPERATIVES.
Proud Preston, or Priest-town, on the banks of the beautiful Ribble, is a place of many quaint customs, and of great historic fame. Its character for pride is said to come from the fact of its having been, in the old time, a favourite residence of the local nobles and gentry, and of many penniless folk with long pedigrees. It was here that Richard Arkwright shaved chins at a halfpenny each, in the meantime working out his bold and ingenious schemes, with patient faith in their ultimate success. It was here, too, that the teetotal movement first began, with Anderson for its rhyme-smith. Preston has had its full share of the changeful fortunes of England, and, like our motherland, it has risen strongly out of them all. War's mad havoc has swept over it in many a troubled period of our history. Plague, pestilence, and famine have afflicted it sorely; and it has suffered from trade riots, "plug-drawings," panics, and strikes of most disastrous kinds. Proud Preston—the town of the Stanleys and the Hoghtons, and of "many a crest that is famous in story"—the town where silly King Jamie disported himself a little, with his knights and nobles, during the time of his ruinous visit to Hoghton Tower,—Proud Preston has seen many a black day. But, from the time when Roman sentinels kept watch and ward in their old camp at Walton, down by the Ribble side, it has never seen so much wealth and so much bitter poverty together as now. The streets do not show this poverty; but it is there. Looking from Avenham Walks, that glorious landscape smiles in all the splendour of a rich spring-tide. In those walks the nursemaids and children, and dainty folk, are wandering as usual airing their curls in the fresh breeze; and only now and then a workless operative trails by with chastened look. The wail of sorrow is not heard in Preston market-place; but destitution may be found almost anywhere there just now, cowering in squalid corners, within a few yards of plenty—as I have seen it many a time this week. The courts and alleys behind even some of the main streets swarm with people who have hardly a whole nail left to scratch themselves with.
Before attempting to tell something of what I saw whilst wandering amongst the poor operatives of Preston, I will say at once, that I do not intend to meddle with statistics. They have been carefully gathered, and often given elsewhere, and there is no need for me to repeat them. But, apart from these, the theme is endless, and full of painful interest. I hear on all hands that there is hardly any town in Lancashire suffering so much as Preston. The reason why the stroke has fallen so heavily here, lies in the nature of the trade. In the first place, Preston is almost purely a cotton town. There are two or three flax mills, and two or three ironworks, of no great extent; but, upon the whole, there is hardly any variety of employment there to lighten the disaster which has befallen its one absorbing occupation. There is comparatively little weaving in Preston; it is a town mostly engaged in spinning. The cotton used there is nearly all what is called "Middling American," the very kind which is now most scarce and dear. The yarns of Preston are known by the name of "Blackburn Counts." They range from 28's up to 60's, and they enter largely into the manufacture of goods for the India market. These things partly explain why Preston is more deeply overshadowed by the particular gloom of the times than many other places in Lancashire. About half-past nine on Tuesday morning last, I set out with an old acquaintance to call upon a certain member of the Relief Committee, in George's Ward. He is the manager of a cotton mill in that quarter, and he is well known and much respected among the working people. When we entered the mill-yard, all was quiet there, and the factory was still and silent. But through the office window we could see the man we wanted. He was accompanied by one of the proprietors of the mill, turning over the relief books of the ward. I soon found that he had a strong sense of humour, as well as a heart welling over with tenderness. He pointed to some of the cases in his books. The first was that of an old man, an overlooker of a cotton mill. His family was thirteen in number; three of the children were under ten years of age; seven of the rest were factory operatives; but the whole family had been out of work for several months. When in full employment the joint earnings of the family amounted to 80s. a week; but, after struggling on in the hope of better times, and exhausting the savings of past labour, they had been brought down to the receipt of charity at last, and for sixteen weeks gone by the whole thirteen had been living upon 6s. a week from the relief fund. They had no other resource. I went to see them at their own house afterwards, and it certainly was a pattern of cleanliness, with the little household gods there still. Seeing that house, a stranger would never dream that the family was living on an average income of less than sixpence a head per week. But I know how hard some decent folk will struggle with the bitterest poverty before they will give in to it. The old man came in whilst I was there. He sat down in one corner, quietly tinkering away at something he had in his hands. His old corduroy trousers were well patched, and just new washed. He had very little to say to us, except that "He could like to get summat to do; for he wur tired o' walkin' abeawt." Another case was that of a poor widow woman, with five young children. This family had been driven from house to house, by increasing necessity, till they had sunk at last into a dingy little hovel, up a dark court, in one of the poorest parts of the town, where they huddled together about a fireless grate to keep one another warm. They had nothing left of the wreck of their home but two rickety chairs, and a little deal table reared against the wall, because one of the legs was gone. In this miserable hole—which I saw afterwards—her husband died of sheer starvation, as was declared by the jury on the inquest. The dark, damp hovel where they had crept to was scarcely four yards square; and the poor woman pointed to one corner of the floor, saying, "He dee'd i' that nook." He died there, with nothing to lie upon but the ground, and nothing to cover him, in that fireless hovel. His wife and children crept about him, there, to watch him die; and to keep him as warm as they could. When the relief committee first found this family out, the entire clothing of the family of seven persons weighed eight pounds, and sold for fivepence, as rags. I saw the family afterwards, at their poor place; and will say more about them hereafter. He told me of many other cases of a similar kind. But, after agreeing to a time when we should visit them personally, we set out together to see the "Stone Yard," where there are many factory hands at work under the Board of Guardians.
The "Stone Yard" is close by the Preston and Lancaster Canal. Here there are from one hundred and seventy to one hundred and eighty, principally young men, employed in breaking, weighing, and wheeling stone, for road mending. The stones are of a hard kind of blue boulder, gathered from the land between Kendal and Lancaster. The "Labour Master" told me that there were thousands of tons of these boulders upon the land between Kendal and Lancaster. A great deal of them are brought from a place called "Tewhitt Field," about seven mile on "t' other side o' Lancaster." At the "Stone Yard" it is all piece-work, and the men can come and go when they like. As one of the Guardians told me, "They can oather sit an' break 'em, or kneel an' break 'em, or lie deawn to it, iv they'n a mind." The men can choose whether they will fill three tons of the broken stone, and wheel it to the central heap, for a shilling, or break one ton for a shilling. The persons employed here are mostly "lads an' leet-timber't chaps." The stronger men are sent to work upon Preston Moor. There are great varieties of health and strength amongst them. "Beside," as the Labour Master said, "yo'd hardly believe what a difference there it i'th wark o' two men wortchin' at the same heap, sometimes. There's a great deal i'th breaker, neaw; some on 'em's more artful nor others. They finden out that they can break 'em as fast again at after they'n getten to th' wick i'th inside. I have known an' odd un or two, here, that could break four ton a day,—an' many that couldn't break one,—but then, yo' know, th' men can only do accordin' to their ability. There is these differences, and there always will be." As we stood talking together, one of my friends said that he wished "Radical Jack" had been there. The latter gentleman is one of the guardians of the poor, and superintendent of the "Stone Yard." The men are naturally jealous of misrepresentation; and, the other day, as "Radical Jack" was describing the working of the yard to a gentleman who had come to look at the scene, some of the men overheard his words, and, misconceiving their meaning, gathered around the superintendent, clamorously protesting against what he had been saying. "He's lying!" said one. "Look at these honds!" cried another; "Wi'n they ever be fit to go to th' factory wi' again?"
Others turned up the soles of their battered shoon, to show their cut and stockingless feet. They were pacified at last; but, after the superintendent had gone away, some of the men said much and more, and "if ever he towd ony moor lies abeawt 'em, they'd fling him into th' cut." The "Labour Master" told me there was a large wood shed for the men to shelter in when rain came on. As we were conversing, one of my friends exclaimed, "He's here now!" "Who's here?" "Radical Jack." The superintendent was coming down the road. He told me some interesting things, which I will return to on another occasion. But our time was up. We had other places to see. As we came away, three old Irishwomen leaned against the wall at the corner of the yard, watching the men at work inside. One of them was saying, "Thim guardians is the awfullest set o' min in the world! A man had better be transpoorted than come under 'em. An' thin, they'll try you, an' try you, as if you was goin' to be hanged." The poor old soul had evidently only a narrow view of the necessities and difficulties which beset the labours of the Board of Guardians at a time like this. On our way back to town one of my friends told me that he "had met a sexton the day before, and had asked him how trade was with him. The sexton replied that it was "Varra bad—nowt doin', hardly." "Well, how's that?" asked the other. "Well, thae sees," answered the sexton, "Poverty seldom dees. There's far more kilt wi' o'er-heytin' an' o'er-drinkin' nor there is wi' bein' pinched."
Christmas and the Distress
Christmas which is just upon us, will necessarily be a cold one for the operatives, the resources of the past are not forthcoming; money is terribly scare, and many a one, who, in former years, have been jubilant at this season, will now have to be content with less than a ‘tithe’ of that cheer which is indissolubly associated with the good old-fashioned carnival of Christmas. Preparations are being made in many quarters for giving treats to the distressed operatives; the ordinary paupers will receive their Christmas dinner, in accordance with custom, and all those in receipt of relief from the charitable committee will, if they get nothing else, have eightpence each to fall back upon from the Mansion House fund. The kitchen in Crooked-lane appears to be as busy a place as ever. The following boilers of soup – each containing 175 gallons, have been made during the week :- Saturday, 4 boilers of meat and 1 and a half of sweet soup, Monday, 4 meat and 1 sweet, Tuesday, 5 meat and 1 sweet, Wednesday, 4 meat 4 scouse, Thursday 6 meat, yesterday 6 meat and half a boiler of sweet meat. The meat soup contained upwards of 4,850lbs beef, mutton, &c., of first-rate quality. During the week, 23,853 loaves of bread have been given out weighing 42 tons 12 cwt; 35,741 quarts of soup, and 9,057 quarts of scouse have been served at the Walker-street and the Crooked-lane establishments. The whole expense of the week, including bedding and clothing will exceed £3,000.
The following presents have been received during the week, for which the committee begs to offer its thanks.
A parcel of clothing from Mrs Foster, Whitehaven.
A parcel of grey flannel from Mrs Tollemache, Portland-terrace, Richmond, Surrey.
A crate of hats from L. Frayne, Bromsgrove.
Two bales and one hamper of clothing from E. Hallett and friends.
A bale of clothing from E.H. Sangley, Chudleign, Devon.
A large bale of clothing from C.S. Bromsgrove.
Three bales of clothing from H. Bell and Sons, Mickelgate, York.
A large bale of clothing from Lady Park, ‘very valuable’.
A truss of clothing from the Ladies Committee, Leeds.
Fifty sacks of rice chaff from W. Williams, Birkenhead.
A bale of clothing from friends at Castle Bromwick, per the Misses Kempson.
Ten bales of clothing from J. W. M’Clure, Manchester.
A sack of flour, one barrel of beef, twenty small barrels of herring, a barrel of fish, J.W. M’Clure, Manchester.
A bag of rice, a barrel of flour from Mr Baxter, Liverpool.
Two hundred plum puddings from the Lord Mayor’s Committee, London.
A quarter of the famous bull ‘Skyrocket’ weighing 419 lbs from Lord Feversham.
A parcel of clothing from Mr Burnett, Liverpool, per Mr Livesey, Preston.
Two carcasses of venison, used in the soup from Cartechy Castle, Scotland.
A box of clothing, tea, sugar &c., from Mrs Reyner, Waterloo.
A parcel of quilting, worsted, &c., from Mrs Jacson, Barton Lodge.
A sack of clothing from H. Rose Clark, Etwall, Derby.
A bale of clothing from George Earle, Hull.
One hamper of clothing from Thomas Cooper, Ulverstone.
3 boxes of clothing from Rossall College
87 lbs of venison from Messrs. Boulours, Marylebone.
A 2nd parcel clothing from United Sunday Scholars of Longsutton, per Rev. J. Nuller.
A case of caps and hats and a parcel of clothing from Penrim.
Preston Chronicle Dec 20th, 1862
Item 62473, Engineering Department Photographic Negatives (Record Series 2613-07), Seattle Municipal Archives.
Had another crack at taking a half decent pic of the moon and am pleased to say I more or less got it.
As with the last time, to illustrate my method so others can follow and avoid the mistakes I made or point out where my thinking may be wrong, I'll give an account of how I went about taking the shot.
First off, the moon was near full but waning (getting smaller with the darkness extending from the right). To be more correct its phase was waning gibbous. It was a superbly clear night and warm enough so I wasn't freezing like last time I took a serious shot of the moon.
Of course I used a tripod and decent ball head, which were all locked tight and steady. I noticed however that my setup still suffered with some wobble so took extra steps to check that both before I went to take the shot and out in the field.
I took off the battery grip and ended up taking the neck strap off too. The battery grip had too much play in it (I used a cheap Chinese equivalent instead of usual Canon one though believe they'd behave more or less the same since I have the Canon grips for my 40D and 350D and they wobble a bit too). Even the remote shutter release I was careful to hold above, allowing the cord to bend and so eliminating any interference from cord pull/movement at time of button press. This made a surprising difference to shot stability as did removing the weighty and unwieldy strap.
The lens collar on my 400mm prime lens (f/5.6) had been loose from the last time so I fitted some plastic packing material (like white cloth but more spongy) and cut it to size to get a really tight grip. All these measures to minimise vibration etc as necessary when using slow shutter speeds combined with long focal length. Hand holding it's advised to use at least equivalent shutter speed to focal length (so 1/400th second) but ideally one and a half times the focal length so 1/600th second as movement is exaggerated with the considerably smaller angle of view of a telephoto lens. Anything in the distance will be off even more than with something wider, like a standard lens or wide angle. Even mounting your camera on a good quality tripod won't necessarily eliminate all vibration and this is of course more important for night time photography when you're shooting the moon at relatively slow shutter speeds like 1/60th second or whatnot.
So, it being summer and warmer and the night more inviting, I took off - by foot - to the downsland nearby and set up the tripod in the shadow of a hawthorn since the moonlight was very intense and lit up the landscape quite dramatically on this ultra clear night and I wanted to really shade myself from any extraneous light coming in from the side like streetlights etc. There was still plenty of light pollution from the nearby town of some 40,000 residents but I'd done my best to get away from it (being car-less, lazy and a little scared of the dark or rather, what nutter with a hammer might be out there since people are the only real monsters left in the world).
Reviewing the pictures, and after manually adjusting exposure, they still looked quite soft. I should say at this point that along with the 400mm f/5.6 lens I used I also had attached a teleconverter with a 2x magnification (a Kenko Pro 300 Mk1 in this case). This doubles not only focal length but also halves, then halves again, the amount of light coming in so reducing the maximum aperture from f/5.6 to f/11, which is very slow and possibly just outside a normal lens' sweetspot of use, that is in this case from f/5.6 to probably f/9 or f/10 max so no picture taken would really take full advantage of the main glass and strength of the 400mm lens. Though, using the teleconverter and having double the reach is the trade off and worth it! Diffraction is also a point in fact with high (or small) apertures but that's another (and more academic) matter.
So, back to the pictures I'd taken and their general softness. I wasn't best pleased since I'd really worked hard to eliminate any variables I could think of that might be the cause of any possible wobble or shake. Using mirror up or live view on the camera's rear monitor should have helped too so what was wrong, I wondered.
I'd been careful to set the focus point manually as is necessary using the teleconverter (which with a relatively slow f/5.6 lens is unavoidable since you lose AF as another trade off). This was through the lens (TTL) using the viewfinder. This meant I was viewing the moon with my naked eye with dioptric correction to correct short sightedness but with the low viewfinder magnification of the Canon 5DM2 likely not helping much either. What looked sharp wasn't quite as sharp as it could've been as I discovered.
Focusing at infinity is not an option when taking pictures of the moon since most often, the focal point has gone shooting past the subject. As all lenses define infinity differently it really pays to experiment and not just crank the lens focal ring all the way over. You shouldn't just trust blindly that as the moon is a fair way off (some 380,000 km depending on orbit) you'd need to use infinity as the focal point since even subtle differences in how you've turned the focus ring can make a huge difference in how sharp the captured image will be as we'll see.
Despite having dioptric adjustment for short or long-sightedness on the camera's viewfinder and choosing carefully a point where maximum focus looked optimum I had actually misfocused. And this, as I found out, was the cause of not only the current 'soft' shots but also my previous attempt of capturing a nice bright and sharp image of the moon.
So, what did ya do Mr Joe? Well, I used the live view monitor on the back of the camera to make much finer adjustment when I remembered that I could digitally magnify the image by up to 10 times. This was a real revelation to seeing just how sensitive the focus ring was and how precisely - down to the millimeter - it was necessary to fine tune, since I was just out of focus. It really was a case of being fractionally out and the live view monitor really helped enormously (way beyond what I could see through the viewfinder).
Previously I'd been tracking the moon with the live view monitor on since it's amazing just how fast the moon is moving relative to the Earth. At the point I was shooting the moon it was in its ascension, moving up and to the right of frame and it didn't take long at all to see it move out of shot necessitating re-composition and fiddling with the tripod again.
Actually, I tried to take some video footage of the moon moving since it was amazing to watch on the live view monitor, zoomed in digitally 10 times closer as I was, watching all those tiny craters whizz by. Beautiful! You almost had the feeling of looking down on another planet and seeing people going about their business. Um, no. That would just be me getting carried away. It was sweet nonetheless! And sadly something I failed to capture since despite choosing manual settings for video capture, the camera chose to override them and auto over-exposed horrendously, giving me little more than a glowing white blob.
So, what did I learn? Well, that perhaps you don't need such a high shutter speed as I proposed last time since though the moon is moving fast any shutter speed that is a good fraction of a second will be enough to capture it without blur. I went down to 1/40th of a second and that seemed all right. This meant I could select lower ISOs and hopefully capture less noise. I even tried higher apertures and different exposures overall, favouring shooting towards the right, meaning towards capturing a brighter more exposed image rather than what you might initially think by way of attempting to capture more shadow (and thus crater) detail.
So, did I succeed? In most respects, yes, since I learned some more though again my shots were far from matching much of the quality of shots you typically see on the internet. Against our favour perhaps, if you live in a city, is light pollution and if you're not loaded you'll not be able to afford the very greatest of telephoto lenses (500mm f/4 etc) that allow far more light in so I reckon I did all right within the confines of those factors under my control.
As an interesting asides (well for me), was Jupiter was visible (this was likely my Planet X of before rather than Mars). I took some shots but they're naff really since though the normally visible (rising from the east) large white blob clearly had coloured bands you had to go down to the pixel level (and I mean 4 or 5 pixels) to make it out. At least I knew a little more on how Gallilleo felt, perhaps. Hmm... Maybe not. He must have had some seriously good equipment back then to make out what he did.
Post processing was done with Capture One 4.5.3 (last update I could get). Files shot RAW and JPEG (interestingly the in-camera processed JPEGs on examination were extremely soft to be worthless, even the well focused ones). I found that adding saturation as well as very small changes to the usual brightness, contrast and exposure yielded far more impressive detail than using sharpening tools ever could alone. Also, the levels and curves tools seemed to be worth exploring - I'm no Photoshopper so this is maybe another thing I need to try out.
Thank you and goodnight.
Addendum: Just been reading a little about the moon from Kim Long's "The moon book: fascinating facts about the magnificent, mysterious moon" (online version) and it explains the moon's orbit around the earth is actually elliptical so within the lunar cycle, the moon will be at a distance farthest from the earth (apogee) as well as closest (perigee). The moon will appear some 10% larger when it's closer and gain a small amount of additional reflectivity from the sun in this position, so having improved visibility for viewers of different latitudes (North/South) and longitudes (East/West) at certain points of the year. So you can get a closer shot every now and then, then! Interesting...
The lunar perigee has hit the news and is imminent - June 23rd 2013. Better info:
www.timeanddate.com/astronomy/moon/super-full-moon.html
www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/astronomy.html?obj=moon&am...
www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/moonset-moonrise-photograp...
What the the so called super-moon effect means in reality:
www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/06/20/supermoon_bi...
blog.chron.com/sciguy/2013/06/why-the-super-moon-isnt-tha...
London, UK
Moonrise 9:09pm
Moon sets 4:53am
Moon distance to Earth 221, 997 miles with 99.5% illumination (if it's not cloudy of course, which it's gonna be tomorrow night)
FAKE ACCOUNT IN FACEBOOK :)
هذي وحده مسويه اكاونت بالفيسبوك ومتقمصه شخصيتي وفلكري وصوري وكل شي حتى اسلوبي فا اهيا مسكينه مريضه
ماعندها حياة ولا هدف فا قالت اخذ حياة ناس ثانيه عندها هدف وعندها هوايه جاهزه يعني من غير لا تعب نفسها
فا لوسمحتو الي يشوفها بالفيسبوك هذي مو انا
راح احط لكم لنكها
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Her Name Sara" h "
& Me Have No H In Sara :)
Report Her Pls ..
Thank u
My FB Is here
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I saw Holy Trinity come up on the Heritage Weekend website, so I thought a nice Sunday afternoon out, a drive, an ice cream, and visit a new church.
But turns out that Holy Trinity is the Victorian church the other end of the High Street, and I came to the much older one, which happened to be open, but also explains the rest of the account below......
The passing of HM the Queen changed plans somewhat, but I didn't know that.
Sittingbourne is not a pretty town. It has a main road driven through the middle of it, and the area around the church, not pretty either. Four Ne'er-do-wells were drinking and smoking in the churchyard, and in time would attract the attention of two PCOs.
The blurb talked about visiting the crypt and so on, so I was looking forward to the visit. And upon entering, I was pretty much the only one looking round, in the south aisle a coffee shop had been set up.
A woman came up to me and asked:
"Are you SFM?", which I assume to be Swale FM, the local radio station.
I told her I wasn't. But then I did have my new Tron t shirt on, and and looked like a nerd. The actual nerd came out from behind the organ carrying leads and mics. He was SFM.
I introduced the woman to the guy and got on with my shots.
A voice behind me asked:
"Are you SFM?"
Again, I said I wasn't, but there was a guy around who was.
It seems a service was being broadcast, and they were setting up equipment, and in time members of the choir arrived and people carrying instruments. Either that or it was the mafia.
By then I had my shots, and so we made to leave, as yet more people came into the church, while outside people waited for the service to start.
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SITTINGBORNE.
THE next parish westward from Murston is Sittingborne, antiently written Sedingbourne, in Saxon, sœdingburna, i. e. the hamlet by the bourne, or small stream.
THE PARISH and town of Sittingborne is situated about forty miles from London, the high road from thence to Dover leading through it. The parish, though rather above the level of the marshes, which bound the northern side of it, from which the ground rises to the town, is still a damp situation, and both from the air and water is not accounted a healthy one, though much more so than several of the neighbouring parishes equally northward, than which it has a more chearful and populous aspect; from the town the ground still keeps rising southward till it joins Tunstall, in the road to which about a quarter of a mile from the town is a good modern house called Glovers, which lately belonged to Thomas Bannister, esq. who resided in it, and died in 1791, and his widow, Mrs. Bannister, now owns it; eastward from which, at about the same distance, are the estates of Chilston and Fulston, and Hysted Forstall, with Golden-wood at the boundary of the parish, part of which is within it, adjoining to Bapchild and Rodmersham. The parish, which is but small, contains little more than eight hundred acres of land, consisting of arable, pasture, orchards, hop ground, and woods. In the upper and western parts it is much inclined to chalk and thin land, but the rest of it is in general a fertile loam, especially about the town, which was formerly surrounded by orchards of apples and cherries, but many of them have been destroyed to make room for plantations of hops, which, however, are not so numerous as formerly, and several of those which remain are kept up only as nurseries for young plantations of fruit trees, to which they must soon in their turn give place. Northward from the town the grounds are entirely pasture and orchards, lying on a descent to the town of Milton and the creek, both about half a mile distant from it; on the latter is a key called Crown key, of great use to this part of the country for the exporting of corn and wood, and relanding the several commodities from London and elsewhere. At a small distance north-west from the town is Bayford-court.
It appears by a survey made in the 8th year of queen Elizabeth, that there was then in this parish houses inhabited eighty-eight; lacking inhabitants five; keys two, Crown key and Holdredge key; ships and boats three, two of one ton, and one of twenty-four tons.
THE town of Sittingborne is built on each side of the high road at the fortieth mile-stone from London, and stands on a descent towards the east. It is a wide, long street unpaved, the houses of which are mostly modern, being well built of brick, and sashed, the whole having a chearful aspect. The principal support of it has always been from the inns, and houses of reception in it for travellers, of which there are several.
The inhabitants boast much of John Northwood, esq. of Northwood, having entertained king Henry V. on his triumphant return from France, at the Red Lion inn, in this town; and though the entertainment was plentiful, and befitting the royalty of his guest, yet such was the difference of the times, that the whole expence of it amounted to no more than 9s. 9d. wine being then sold at two-pence a pint, and other articles in proportion. The principal inn now in it, called the Rose, is perhaps the most superb of any throughout the kingdom, and the entertainment afforded in it equally so, though the traveller probably will not find his reckoning near so moderate as that of John Northwood before-mentioned. About the middle of the opposite side of the town there is a good family seat, which was once the residence of the Tomlyn's, and then for many years of the Lushingtons, several of whom lie buried in this church, of whom a further mention has already been made under Rodmersham manor, which they possessed. At length Thomas Godfrey Lushington left it to reside at Canterbury, and his second son the Rev. James-Stephen Lushington, becoming possessed of it afterwards, sold it to Mr. John May, who resided in it for some time. Since which it has been converted into an inn. At this house, whilst in the possession of the Lushingtons, king George the 1st. and 11d. constantly lodged, whenever they travelled through this town, both in their way to, and return from visiting their German dominions.
The church and vicarage stand almost at the east end of the town, near which there rises a clear spring of water in the high road, which flows from thence northward into Milton creek.
Queen Elizabeth, by her charter, in her 16th year, incorporated the town of Sittingborne, by the name of a guardian and free tenants thereof; and granted to it a market weekly on a Wednesday, and two fairs yearly, the one at Whitsuntide, and the other at Michaelmas, with many other privileges: which charter was used for several years, and until the queen was pleased, through further favor to grant to it another more ample charter, in her 41st year, by which she incorporated this place, by the name of a mayor and jurats, and regranted the market and fairs, with the addition of a great number of privileges, and among others, of returning two members to parliament.
This charter does not appear ever to have been used, or the privileges in it exercised. The market, after having been used for several years, was dropped, and only the two yearly fairs have been kept up, which are still held on Whit-Monday and the two following days, for linen and toys, and on October 10, and the four following days, for linen, woollen, cloaths, hardward, &c. and on the second day of it, for the hiring of servants, both in the town, and in a field, called the Butts, at the back of it.
Lewis Theobald, the poet, made famous by Mr. Pope, in his Dunciad, was born at Sittingborne, his father being an attorney at this place.
SOME FEW of our antiquarians have been inclined to six the Roman station, called, in the second iter of Antonine, Durolevum, at or near Sittingborne; among which are Mr. Talbot, Dr. Horsley, Baxter, and Dr. Stukeley in his comment upon his favorite Richard of Cirencester; (fn. 1) but they have but little to offer in support of their conjecture, except the distances made use of in one or two copies, which are so different in many of them, that there is no trusting to any one in particular; consequently each alters them as it suits his own hypothesis best. The reader will find more of this subject under the description of both Lenham and Newington.
In the year 893, the Danes having fitted out a great number of ships, with an intention of ravaging the coasts of this kingdom, divided them into two fleets; with one of which they failed up the river Limene, or Rother, and with the other, under the command of Hastings, their captain, they entered the mouth of the river Thames, and landed at the neighbouring town of Milton. Near Milton they built a castle, at a place called Kemsley-down, about a quarter of a mile north-east from where the church of Milton now stands, which being overgrown with bushes, acquired the name of Castle rough. King Alfred, on receiving intelligence of these depredations, marched his forces towards Kent, and in order to flop their incursions, some time afterwards built on the opposite or eastern side of the creek, about a mile from the Danish intrenchments, a fortification, part of the ditches of which, and a small part of the stone-work, is still to be seen at Bayford-castle, in this parish.
Gerarde, the herbalist, found on the high road near this place,
Tragoriganum Dodonæi, goats marjorum of Dodo- næus.
Ruta muraria sive salvia vitæ, wall rue, or rue maidenhair; upon the walls of the church-yard here.
Colutea minima five coronilla, the smallest bastard sena; on the chalky barren grounds near Sittingborne, (fn. 2) and lately likewise by Mr. Jacob.
Hieracium maximum chondrillæ folio asperum; observed by Mr. John Sherard, very plentisully in the road from this place to Rochester.
Lychnis saponaria dicta, common sopewort; by him on the same road.
Tithymalus Hybernicus, Irish Spurge; between this place and Faversham.
Erysimum sophia dictum; found by Mr. Jacob, on the road sides near Sittingborne, and on the Standard Key.
Oenanthe cicutæ facie Lobellii, hemlock dropwort, found by him in the water lane between Sittingborne and Milton. (fn. 3)
THE MANOR OF MILTON is paramount over this parish, subordinate to which is
THE MANOR OF GOODNESTON, perhaps so called from its having been the property of Goodwyne, earl of Kent, who might have secured himself here at Bayford castle, in the year 1052, when having taken up arms against king Edward the Consessor, he raised an army, and ravaged the king's possessions, and among them the town of Milton, which he burnt to the ground.
On his death it most probably came to his son king Harold, and after the battle of Hastings into the hands of the crown, whence it seems to have been granted to the eminent family of Leyborne, of Leyborne, in this county. William, son of Roger de Leyborne, died possessed of it in the 3d year of king Edward II.
His grand-daughter Juliana, daughter of Thomas de Leyborne, who died in his life-time, became her grandfather's heir, and succeeded in this manor, to which she entitled her several husbands successively, all of whom she survived, and died S. P. in the 41st year of king Edward III. when no one being found, who could make claim to any of her estates, this manor, among the rest of them, escheated to the crown.
After which this manor of Goodneston, as it was then called, seems to have been granted by the crown to Robert de Nottingham, who resided at a seat adjoining to this manor, called
BAYFORD-CASTLE, where his ancestors had resided for several generations. Robert de Nottingham lived here in the reign of king Edward I. and dates several of his deeds apud castellum suum de Bayford, apud Goodneston. Robert de Nottingham, his successor, who became possessed of the manor of Goodneston as beforementioned, was sheriff in the 48th year of king Edward III. and kept his shrievalty at Bayford, bearing for his arms, Paly, wavy of two pieces, gules and argent, in which year he died, and was found by the inquisition to die possessed of lands at Sharsted, Pedding in Tenham, Newland, La Hirst, Higham in Milsted, Bixle, now called Bix, in Tong, and lastly, Goodneston, with Bayford, in Sittingborne; all which descended to his only son John Nottingham, who died without issue male, leaving Eleanor his daughter his sole heir, who marrying Simon Cheney, of Crall, in Sussex, second son of Sir Richard Cheney, of Shurland, he became, in her right, entitled to it. His grandson Humphry Cheney alienated both Goodneston and Bayford, at the latter end of king Henry VI.'s reign, to Mr. Richard Lovelace, of Queenhyth, in London.
His son Launcelot Lovelace was of Bayford, and purchased the manor of Hever in Kingsdown, near Farningham, under which a more ample account of him and his descendants may be seen. His second son William, heir to his eldest brother Sir Richard, who died S. P. at length became possessed of Goodneston, with Bayford, at which he resided, and dying anno 17 king Henry VII. left two sons, John and William Lovelace, esqrs. who possessed this manor and seat between them; the former of whom resided at Bayford, where he died in the 2d year of Edward VI. holding the moiety of this manor in capite, by knight's service, and leaving seven sons, of whom Thomas Lovelace, esq. his eldest son, inherited his interest in this manor and seat. He procured his lands to be disgavelled, by the act passed anno 2 and 3 Edward VI. and afterwards in the 10th year of queen Elizabeth, together with his cousin William Lovelace, by a joint conveyance, alienated Goodneston, with Bayford, to Mr. Ralph Finch, of Kingsdown, in this neighbourhood, whose son Mr. Thomas Finch, of that place, passed it away by sale to Sir William Garrard, who had been lord mayor in 1555, whose ancestors had been of this parish for several generations before, and perhaps were seated at Fulston in it, as many of them lie buried, in the chancel belonging to that seat, in this church. (fn. 4)
He died in 1571, and was buried in St. Magnus's church, in London, bearing for his arms, Argent, on a fess sable, a lion passant of the field; which arms, borne by his ancestors, are carved on the roof of the cloysters at Canterbury. After which it descended down to his grandson Sir John Garrard, or Gerrard, as this family now began to spell their name, who was of Whethamsted, in Hertfordshire, and was created a baronet in 1621. He was succeeded in it by his eldest son of the same name (at which time Bayford was become no more than a farm-house, being called Bayford-court farm). He died in 1700, leaving an only daughter and heir Mary, who carried the manor of Goodneston, with Bayford, among the rest of her inheritance, in marriage to Montague Drake, esq. of Shardeloes, in Agmondesham, in Buckinghamshire, who bore for his arms, Argent, a wivern, with wings displayed, and tail moved, gules. In whose descendants it continued down to William Drake, esq. M. P. for the borough of Agmondesham, as his ancestors had been, some few intermissions only excepted, ever since its being restored to its privilege of sending members to parliament, as a borough, anno 21 James I. He died possessed of this estate in 1796, and his heirs are at this time possessed of it.
A court baron is held for the manor of Goodneston, with Bayford.
CHILTON is a manor situated in the south-east part of this parish, which was formerly accounted a manor, and had owners of that furname, who held the manor of Chilton in Ash, near Sandwich, both which William de Chilton held at his death in the 31st year of king Edward I. one of whose descendants, in the beginning of king Edward III.'s reign, passed it away to Corbie, whose descendant Robert Corbie, of Boughton Malherb, died possessed of this manor of Chilton, alias Childeston, in the 39th year of that reign. (fn. 5) After which it passed by a female heir of this name in like manner as Boughton Malherb, to the family of Wotton, and from them again to the Stanhopes, (fn. 6) in which it continued till Philip, earl of Chesterfield, about the year 1725, alienated it to Richard Harvey, esq. of Dane-court, whose grandson, the Rev. Richard Harvey, died possessed of it in 1772, leaving his widow surviving, since which it has been sold to Balduck, and by him again to Mr. George Morrison, who now owns it, and resides in it.
FULSTON, called antiently Fogylston, was a large mansion, situated at a small distance southward from Chilton last-described, which, from the burials of the Garrards in the chancel belonging to this estate in Sittingborne church, seems to have been the early residence of that family in this parish. However that be, in the reign of Henry VIII. it was become the estate and residence of John Cromer, esq. the third son of Sir James Cromer, of Tunstall, who died in 1539, and was buried in this church, leaving his three daughters his coheirs; and in one of the windows of this church were the arms of John Cromer, esq. of Fulston, and his two wives, Guldeford and Grove, and their several quarterings.
Probably, by his will, or by a former entail, on his dying without male issue, this seat descended to his nephew Sir James Cromer, of Tunstall, whose grandson, of the same name, dying without male issue in 1613, Christian, one of his daughters and coheirs carried it in marriage to John Hales, esq. eldest son of Sir Edward Hales, of Tenterden, knight and baronet, as has been already more fully mentioned before under Tunstall, and in his descendants it has continued down to Sir Edward Hales, bart. of St. Stephen's, near Canterbury, the present owner of it. The greatest part of this mansion has been pulled down within memory, and a neat farm-house has been erected on the ruins of it.
Charities.
JOHN ALLEN, of Sittingborne, by his will in 1615, gave 40s. per annum for repairing the alms-houses in Crown-key-lane, and firing for the poor in them, to be paid out of Glovers, now Mrs. Bannister's.
ROBERT HODSOLE, by will in 1684, gave 10s. per annum to the poor, payable every Christmas-day yearly, out of Mrs. Rondeau's land.
JOHN GRANT, by will in 1689, gave 20s. per annum, to be paid in corn and bread on January 1, out of Mrs. Trott's farm.
FIVE SEAMS of boiling peas are yearly paid from the parsonage, to be distributed to the poor on every Christmas-day yearly.
KATHERINE DICKS, by her will, left the sum of 25l. to be put out on land security, the interest of it to be said out for ever in six two-penny loaves, to be given to six poor widows &c. who attend divine service, beginning every year on the first Sunday after Christmas-day, of the annual produce of 1l.
The poor annually relieved are about forty; casually eight hundred and fifty.
SITTINGBORNE is within the ECCLESIASTICAL JU RISDICTION of the diocese of Canterbury, and deany of Sittingborne
The church, which is dedicated to St. Michael, is a large, handsome building, of three isles and two chancels, and two cross ones; at the west end is a tower beacon steeple, in which is a clock, a set of chimes, and six bells.
On the stone font, which is an octagon, are the arms of archbishop Arundel, a shield, having on it a cross story; and another with the emblems of Christ's crucifixion on it.
On the 17th of July, 1762, the wind being exceeding high, a fire broke out on the roof of this church, occasioned by the plumbers, who were repairing the leads, having left their fire burning during their absence at dinner, which consumed the whole of it, except the bare walls and the tower. Next year a brief passed for rebuilding of it, which with the contribution of the inhabitants, and a gift of fifty pounds from archbishop Secker, they were enabled to set about.
This was stopped for some little time by the owners of the three chancels, belonging to the Bayford, Chilton, and Fulston estates, refusing to contribute to the rebuilding of them, and they were at length rebuilt at the same cost with the rest of the church; and the whole of it was afterwards completed and fitted up in a very handsome manner. By the fire the monuments against the walls were destroyed, and most of the gravestones broken by the falling of the timbers. The latter, in the rebuilding of the church, have, the greatest part of them, been most absurdly removed from the graves over which they lay, to other parts of the church, and some even from the church-yard, as it suited to make the pavement complete; so that there is now hardly a guess to be made, where the bodies lie, that the inscriptions commemorate, but the gravestones of the Lushingtons, I believe, were none of them removed. In the south cross chancel belonging to the estate of Fulston, is a monument for Thos. Bannister, gent. obt. 1750, arms, Argent, a cross story, sable. The brass plate, on which the inscription was, for John Crowmer, of Fulston, and his two wives, in this chancel, being loose, there was found on the under side of it one in Latin, for Robert Rokele, esq. once dwelling with the most revered lady, the lady Joane de Bohun, countess of Hereford, Essex, and Northton, who died in 1421, an instance of œconomy which has been discovered at times in other churches.
The south-east chancel belonged to the Chilton estate; there are many gravestones of the family of Lushington in it. Dr. Lushington's monument was entirely destroyed at the time of the fire. In the upper part of this chancel is a vault, belonging to the Chilton estate, in which is only one coffin, of Mr. Harvey, who died in 1751, and a great quantity of bonespiled up at one end of it.
The archdeacon's court, in which he holds his visitation, is at the upper end of this chancel.
The coats of arms in the windows of the church, which were many, were entirely destroyed, and they have been since entirely resitted with modern glass.
The middle chancel is the archbishop's, and belongs to the parsonage; in which there is a memorial for Mathew, son of Sir John, and grandson of archbishop Parker, who died in 1645. The north chancel is made use of now as a vestry. The north cross chancel belongs to the Bayford estate. In the north wall of it there is the effigies of a woman, lying at length, in the hollow of the wall, with an arch, carved and ornamented, over her, and midway between the arch and figure, a flat table stone of Bethersden marble: the whole of it seems very antient.
In this church there was, before the reformation, a chantry, called Busherb's chantry.
The church of Sittingborne belonged to the Benedictine nunnery of Clerkenwell, to which it was appropriated before the 8th year of king Richard II. and it remained part of the revenues of it till its dissolution, in the 31st year of king Henry VIII.'s reign.
¶This church thus coming into the king's hands, seems to have remained part of the revenues of the crown till queen Elizabeth, in her 3d year, granted the parsonage of it, with the advowson of the vicarage, the former being then valued at 13l. 6s. 8d. to archbishop Parker. Since which they have continued parcel of the possessions of the archbishopric, and remain so at this time.
The parsonage has been from time to time leased out on a benesicial lease, at the yearly rent of 13l. 6s. 8d. In 1643 John Olebury, gent. was lessee; in later times, Cockin Sole, esq. of Bobbing, whose son John Cockin Sole, esq. died possessed of it in 1790, since which this lease has been sold under the directions of his will.
In the 8th year of king Richard II. this parsonage was valued at 23l. 6s. 8d.
In 1578, on a survey of the diocese of Canterbury, it was returned, that this parsonage was impropriate to the queen's majesty; the vicarage also in her gift; dwelling-houses eighty; communicants three hundred; the tenths twenty shillings.
The vicarage is valued in the king's books at ten pounds, the yearly tenths being one pound. In 1640, it was valued at fifty-six pounds. Communicants three hundred and eighty.
The vicarage is situated not far from the north side of the church-yard, adjoining to which is the only piece of glebe land belonging to it.
Gautama Buddha, also known as Siddhārtha Gautama, Shakyamuni, or simply the Buddha, was a sage on whose teachings Buddhism was founded. He is believed to have lived and taught mostly in northeastern India sometime between the sixth and fourth centuries BCE.
The word Buddha means "awakened one" or "the enlightened one". "Buddha" is also used as a title for the first awakened being in a Yuga era. In most Buddhist traditions, Siddhartha Gautama is regarded as the Supreme Buddha (Pali sammāsambuddha, Sanskrit samyaksaṃbuddha) of the present age. Gautama taught a Middle Way between sensual indulgence and the severe asceticism found in the śramaṇa movement common in his region. He later taught throughout regions of eastern India such as Magadha and Kosala.
Gautama is the primary figure in Buddhism and accounts of his life, discourses, and monastic rules are believed by Buddhists to have been summarized after his death and memorized by his followers. Various collections of teachings attributed to him were passed down by oral tradition and first committed to writing about 400 years later.
CONTENTS
HISTORICAL SIDDHARTA GAUTAMA
Scholars are hesitant to make unqualified claims about the historical facts of the Buddha's life. Most accept that he lived, taught and founded a monastic order during the Mahajanapada era during the reign of Bimbisara, the ruler of the Magadha empire, and died during the early years of the reign of Ajasattu, who was the successor of Bimbisara, thus making him a younger contemporary of Mahavira, the Jain tirthankara. Apart from the Vedic Brahmins, the Buddha's lifetime coincided with the flourishing of other influential śramaṇa schools of thoughts like Ājīvika, Cārvāka, Jainism, and Ajñana. It was also the age of influential thinkers like Mahavira, Pūraṇa Kassapa , Makkhali Gosāla, Ajita Kesakambalī, Pakudha Kaccāyana, and Sañjaya Belaṭṭhaputta, whose viewpoints the Buddha most certainly must have been acquainted with and influenced by. Indeed, Sariputta and Moggallāna, two of the foremost disciples of the Buddha, were formerly the foremost disciples of Sañjaya Belaṭṭhaputta, the skeptic. There is also evidence to suggest that the two masters, Alara Kalama and Uddaka Ramaputta, were indeed historical figures and they most probably taught Buddha two different forms of meditative techniques. While the general sequence of "birth, maturity, renunciation, search, awakening and liberation, teaching, death" is widely accepted, there is less consensus on the veracity of many details contained in traditional biographies.
The times of Gautama's birth and death are uncertain. Most historians in the early 20th century dated his lifetime as circa 563 BCE to 483 BCE. More recently his death is dated later, between 411 and 400 BCE, while at a symposium on this question held in 1988, the majority of those who presented definite opinions gave dates within 20 years either side of 400 BCE for the Buddha's death. These alternative chronologies, however, have not yet been accepted by all historians.
The evidence of the early texts suggests that Siddhārtha Gautama was born into the Shakya clan, a community that was on the periphery, both geographically and culturally, of the northeastern Indian subcontinent in the 5th century BCE. It was either a small republic, in which case his father was an elected chieftain, or an oligarchy, in which case his father was an oligarch. According to the Buddhist tradition, Gautama was born in Lumbini, nowadays in modern-day Nepal, and raised in the Shakya capital of Kapilavastu, which may have been in either present day Tilaurakot, Nepal or Piprahwa, India. He obtained his enlightenment in Bodh Gaya, gave his first sermon in Sarnath, and died in Kushinagar.
No written records about Gautama have been found from his lifetime or some centuries thereafter. One Edict of Asoka, who reigned from circa 269 BCE to 232 BCE, commemorates the Emperor's pilgrimage to the Buddha's birthplace in Lumbini. Another one of his edicts mentions several Dhamma texts, establishing the existence of a written Buddhist tradition at least by the time of the Maurya era and which may be the precursors of the Pāli Canon. The oldest surviving Buddhist manuscripts are the Gandhāran Buddhist texts, reported to have been found in or around Haḍḍa near Jalalabad in eastern Afghanistan and now preserved in the British Library. They are written in the Gāndhārī language using the Kharosthi script on twenty-seven birch bark manuscripts and date from the first century BCE to the third century CE.
TRADITIONAL BIOGRAPHIES
BIOGRAPHICAL SOURCES
The sources for the life of Siddhārtha Gautama are a variety of different, and sometimes conflicting, traditional biographies. These include the Buddhacarita, Lalitavistara Sūtra, Mahāvastu, and the Nidānakathā. Of these, the Buddhacarita is the earliest full biography, an epic poem written by the poet Aśvaghoṣa, and dating around the beginning of the 2nd century CE. The Lalitavistara Sūtra is the next oldest biography, a Mahāyāna/Sarvāstivāda biography dating to the 3rd century CE. The Mahāvastu from the Mahāsāṃghika Lokottaravāda tradition is another major biography, composed incrementally until perhaps the 4th century CE. The Dharmaguptaka biography of the Buddha is the most exhaustive, and is entitled the Abhiniṣkramaṇa Sūtra, and various Chinese translations of this date between the 3rd and 6th century CE. The Nidānakathā is from the Theravada tradition in Sri Lanka and was composed in the 5th century by Buddhaghoṣa.
From canonical sources, the Jataka tales, the Mahapadana Sutta (DN 14), and the Achariyabhuta Sutta (MN 123) which include selective accounts that may be older, but are not full biographies. The Jātakas retell previous lives of Gautama as a bodhisattva, and the first collection of these can be dated among the earliest Buddhist texts. The Mahāpadāna Sutta and Achariyabhuta Sutta both recount miraculous events surrounding Gautama's birth, such as the bodhisattva's descent from the Tuṣita Heaven into his mother's womb.
NATURE OF TRADITIONAL DEPICTIONS
In the earliest Buddhists texts, the nikāyas and āgamas, the Buddha is not depicted as possessing omniscience (sabbaññu) nor is he depicted as being an eternal transcendent (lokottara) being. According to Bhikkhu Analayo, ideas of the Buddha's omniscience (along with an increasing tendency to deify him and his biography) are found only later, in the Mahayana sutras and later Pali commentaries or texts such as the Mahāvastu. In the Sandaka Sutta, the Buddha's disciple Ananda outlines an argument against the claims of teachers who say they are all knowing while in the Tevijjavacchagotta Sutta the Buddha himself states that he has never made a claim to being omniscient, instead he claimed to have the "higher knowledges" (abhijñā). The earliest biographical material from the Pali Nikayas focuses on the Buddha's life as a śramaṇa, his search for enlightenment under various teachers such as Alara Kalama and his forty five year career as a teacher.
Traditional biographies of Gautama generally include numerous miracles, omens, and supernatural events. The character of the Buddha in these traditional biographies is often that of a fully transcendent (Skt. lokottara) and perfected being who is unencumbered by the mundane world. In the Mahāvastu, over the course of many lives, Gautama is said to have developed supra-mundane abilities including: a painless birth conceived without intercourse; no need for sleep, food, medicine, or bathing, although engaging in such "in conformity with the world"; omniscience, and the ability to "suppress karma". Nevertheless, some of the more ordinary details of his life have been gathered from these traditional sources. In modern times there has been an attempt to form a secular understanding of Siddhārtha Gautama's life by omitting the traditional supernatural elements of his early biographies.
Andrew Skilton writes that the Buddha was never historically regarded by Buddhist traditions as being merely human:
It is important to stress that, despite modern Theravada teachings to the contrary (often a sop to skeptical Western pupils), he was never seen as being merely human. For instance, he is often described as having the thirty-two major and eighty minor marks or signs of a mahāpuruṣa, "superman"; the Buddha himself denied that he was either a man or a god; and in the Mahāparinibbāna Sutta he states that he could live for an aeon were he asked to do so.The ancient Indians were generally unconcerned with chronologies, being more focused on philosophy. Buddhist texts reflect this tendency, providing a clearer picture of what Gautama may have taught than of the dates of the events in his life. These texts contain descriptions of the culture and daily life of ancient India which can be corroborated from the Jain scriptures, and make the Buddha's time the earliest period in Indian history for which significant accounts exist. British author Karen Armstrong writes that although there is very little information that can be considered historically sound, we can be reasonably confident that Siddhārtha Gautama did exist as a historical figure. Michael Carrithers goes a bit further by stating that the most general outline of "birth, maturity, renunciation, search, awakening and liberation, teaching, death" must be true.
BIOGRAPHY
CONCEPTION AND BIRTH
The Buddhist tradition regards Lumbini, in present-day Nepal to be the birthplace of the Buddha. He grew up in Kapilavastu. The exact site of ancient Kapilavastu is unknown. It may have been either Piprahwa, Uttar Pradesh, present-day India, or Tilaurakot, present-day Nepal. Both places belonged to the Sakya territory, and are located only 15 miles apart from each other.
Gautama was born as a Kshatriya, the son of Śuddhodana, "an elected chief of the Shakya clan", whose capital was Kapilavastu, and who were later annexed by the growing Kingdom of Kosala during the Buddha's lifetime. Gautama was the family name. His mother, Maya (Māyādevī), Suddhodana's wife, was a Koliyan princess. Legend has it that, on the night Siddhartha was conceived, Queen Maya dreamt that a white elephant with six white tusks entered her right side, and ten months later Siddhartha was born. As was the Shakya tradition, when his mother Queen Maya became pregnant, she left Kapilvastu for her father's kingdom to give birth. However, her son is said to have been born on the way, at Lumbini, in a garden beneath a sal tree.
The day of the Buddha's birth is widely celebrated in Theravada countries as Vesak. Buddha's Birthday is called Buddha Purnima in Nepal and India as he is believed to have been born on a full moon day. Various sources hold that the Buddha's mother died at his birth, a few days or seven days later. The infant was given the name Siddhartha (Pāli: Siddhattha), meaning "he who achieves his aim". During the birth celebrations, the hermit seer Asita journeyed from his mountain abode and announced that the child would either become a great king (chakravartin) or a great sadhu. By traditional account, this occurred after Siddhartha placed his feet in Asita's hair and Asita examined the birthmarks. Suddhodana held a naming ceremony on the fifth day, and invited eight Brahmin scholars to read the future. All gave a dual prediction that the baby would either become a great king or a great holy man. Kondañña, the youngest, and later to be the first arhat other than the Buddha, was reputed to be the only one who unequivocally predicted that Siddhartha would become a Buddha.
While later tradition and legend characterized Śuddhodana as a hereditary monarch, the descendant of the Suryavansha (Solar dynasty) of Ikṣvāku (Pāli: Okkāka), many scholars think that Śuddhodana was the elected chief of a tribal confederacy.
Early texts suggest that Gautama was not familiar with the dominant religious teachings of his time until he left on his religious quest, which is said to have been motivated by existential concern for the human condition. The state of the Shakya clan was not a monarchy, and seems to have been structured either as an oligarchy, or as a form of republic. The more egalitarian gana-sangha form of government, as a political alternative to the strongly hierarchical kingdoms, may have influenced the development of the śramanic Jain and Buddhist sanghas, where monarchies tended toward Vedic Brahmanism.
EARLY LIFE AND MARRIAGE
Siddhartha was brought up by his mother's younger sister, Maha Pajapati. By tradition, he is said to have been destined by birth to the life of a prince, and had three palaces (for seasonal occupation) built for him. Although more recent scholarship doubts this status, his father, said to be King Śuddhodana, wishing for his son to be a great king, is said to have shielded him from religious teachings and from knowledge of human suffering.
When he reached the age of 16, his father reputedly arranged his marriage to a cousin of the same age named Yaśodharā (Pāli: Yasodharā). According to the traditional account, she gave birth to a son, named Rāhula. Siddhartha is said to have spent 29 years as a prince in Kapilavastu. Although his father ensured that Siddhartha was provided with everything he could want or need, Buddhist scriptures say that the future Buddha felt that material wealth was not life's ultimate goal.
RENUNCIATION AND ASCETIC LIFE
At the age of 29, the popular biography continues, Siddhartha left his palace to meet his subjects. Despite his father's efforts to hide from him the sick, aged and suffering, Siddhartha was said to have seen an old man. When his charioteer Channa explained to him that all people grew old, the prince went on further trips beyond the palace. On these he encountered a diseased man, a decaying corpse, and an ascetic. These depressed him, and he initially strove to overcome aging, sickness, and death by living the life of an ascetic.
Accompanied by Channa and riding his horse Kanthaka, Gautama quit his palace for the life of a mendicant. It's said that, "the horse's hooves were muffled by the gods" to prevent guards from knowing of his departure.
Gautama initially went to Rajagaha and began his ascetic life by begging for alms in the street. After King Bimbisara's men recognised Siddhartha and the king learned of his quest, Bimbisara offered Siddhartha the throne. Siddhartha rejected the offer, but promised to visit his kingdom of Magadha first, upon attaining enlightenment.
He left Rajagaha and practised under two hermit teachers of yogic meditation. After mastering the teachings of Alara Kalama (Skr. Ārāḍa Kālāma), he was asked by Kalama to succeed him. However, Gautama felt unsatisfied by the practice, and moved on to become a student of yoga with Udaka Ramaputta (Skr. Udraka Rāmaputra). With him he achieved high levels of meditative consciousness, and was again asked to succeed his teacher. But, once more, he was not satisfied, and again moved on.
Siddhartha and a group of five companions led by Kaundinya are then said to have set out to take their austerities even further. They tried to find enlightenment through deprivation of worldly goods, including food, practising self-mortification. After nearly starving himself to death by restricting his food intake to around a leaf or nut per day, he collapsed in a river while bathing and almost drowned. Siddhartha was rescued by a village girl named Sujata and she gave him some payasam (a pudding made from milk and jaggery) after which Siddhartha got back some energy. Siddhartha began to reconsider his path. Then, he remembered a moment in childhood in which he had been watching his father start the season's ploughing. He attained a concentrated and focused state that was blissful and refreshing, the jhāna.
AWAKENING
According to the early Buddhist texts, after realizing that meditative dhyana was the right path to awakening, but that extreme asceticism didn't work, Gautama discovered what Buddhists call the Middle Way - a path of moderation away from the extremes of self-indulgence and self-mortification, or the Noble Eightfold Path, as was identified and described by the Buddha in his first discourse, the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta. In a famous incident, after becoming starved and weakened, he is said to have accepted milk and rice pudding from a village girl named Sujata. Such was his emaciated appearance that she wrongly believed him to be a spirit that had granted her a wish.
Following this incident, Gautama was famously seated under a pipal tree - now known as the Bodhi tree - in Bodh Gaya, India, when he vowed never to arise until he had found the truth. Kaundinya and four other companions, believing that he had abandoned his search and become undisciplined, left. After a reputed 49 days of meditation, at the age of 35, he is said to have attained Enlightenment. According to some traditions, this occurred in approximately the fifth lunar month, while, according to others, it was in the twelfth month. From that time, Gautama was known to his followers as the Buddha or "Awakened One" ("Buddha" is also sometimes translated as "The Enlightened One").
According to Buddhism, at the time of his awakening he realized complete insight into the cause of suffering, and the steps necessary to eliminate it. These discoveries became known as the "Four Noble Truths", which are at the heart of Buddhist teaching. Through mastery of these truths, a state of supreme liberation, or Nirvana, is believed to be possible for any being. The Buddha described Nirvāna as the perfect peace of a mind that's free from ignorance, greed, hatred and other afflictive states, or "defilements" (kilesas). Nirvana is also regarded as the "end of the world", in that no personal identity or boundaries of the mind remain. In such a state, a being is said to possess the Ten Characteristics, belonging to every Buddha.
According to a story in the Āyācana Sutta (Samyutta Nikaya VI.1) - a scripture found in the Pāli and other canons - immediately after his awakening, the Buddha debated whether or not he should teach the Dharma to others. He was concerned that humans were so overpowered by ignorance, greed and hatred that they could never recognise the path, which is subtle, deep and hard to grasp. However, in the story, Brahmā Sahampati convinced him, arguing that at least some will understand it. The Buddha relented, and agreed to teach.
FORMATION OF THE SANGHA
After his awakening, the Buddha met Taphussa and Bhallika — two merchant brothers from the city of Balkh in what is currently Afghanistan - who became his first lay disciples. It is said that each was given hairs from his head, which are now claimed to be enshrined as relics in the Shwe Dagon Temple in Rangoon, Burma. The Buddha intended to visit Asita, and his former teachers, Alara Kalama and Udaka Ramaputta, to explain his findings, but they had already died.
He then travelled to the Deer Park near Varanasi (Benares) in northern India, where he set in motion what Buddhists call the Wheel of Dharma by delivering his first sermon to the five companions with whom he had sought enlightenment. Together with him, they formed the first saṅgha: the company of Buddhist monks.
All five become arahants, and within the first two months, with the conversion of Yasa and fifty four of his friends, the number of such arahants is said to have grown to 60. The conversion of three brothers named Kassapa followed, with their reputed 200, 300 and 500 disciples, respectively. This swelled the sangha to more than 1,000.
TRAVELS AND TEACHING
For the remaining 45 years of his life, the Buddha is said to have traveled in the Gangetic Plain, in what is now Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and southern Nepal, teaching a diverse range of people: from nobles to servants, murderers such as Angulimala, and cannibals such as Alavaka. Although the Buddha's language remains unknown, it's likely that he taught in one or more of a variety of closely related Middle Indo-Aryan dialects, of which Pali may be a standardization.
The sangha traveled through the subcontinent, expounding the dharma. This continued throughout the year, except during the four months of the Vāsanā rainy season when ascetics of all religions rarely traveled. One reason was that it was more difficult to do so without causing harm to animal life. At this time of year, the sangha would retreat to monasteries, public parks or forests, where people would come to them.
The first vassana was spent at Varanasi when the sangha was formed. After this, the Buddha kept a promise to travel to Rajagaha, capital of Magadha, to visit King Bimbisara. During this visit, Sariputta and Maudgalyayana were converted by Assaji, one of the first five disciples, after which they were to become the Buddha's two foremost followers. The Buddha spent the next three seasons at Veluvana Bamboo Grove monastery in Rajagaha, capital of Magadha.
Upon hearing of his son's awakening, Suddhodana sent, over a period, ten delegations to ask him to return to Kapilavastu. On the first nine occasions, the delegates failed to deliver the message, and instead joined the sangha to become arahants. The tenth delegation, led by Kaludayi, a childhood friend of Gautama's (who also became an arahant), however, delivered the message.
Now two years after his awakening, the Buddha agreed to return, and made a two-month journey by foot to Kapilavastu, teaching the dharma as he went. At his return, the royal palace prepared a midday meal, but the sangha was making an alms round in Kapilavastu. Hearing this, Suddhodana approached his son, the Buddha, saying:
"Ours is the warrior lineage of Mahamassata, and not a single warrior has gone seeking alms."
The Buddha is said to have replied:
"That is not the custom of your royal lineage. But it is the custom of my Buddha lineage. Several thousands of Buddhas have gone by seeking alms."
Buddhist texts say that Suddhodana invited the sangha into the palace for the meal, followed by a dharma talk. After this he is said to have become a sotapanna. During the visit, many members of the royal family joined the sangha. The Buddha's cousins Ananda and Anuruddha became two of his five chief disciples. At the age of seven, his son Rahula also joined, and became one of his ten chief disciples. His half-brother Nanda also joined and became an arahant.
Of the Buddha's disciples, Sariputta, Maudgalyayana, Mahakasyapa, Ananda and Anuruddha are believed to have been the five closest to him. His ten foremost disciples were reputedly completed by the quintet of Upali, Subhoti, Rahula, Mahakaccana and Punna.
In the fifth vassana, the Buddha was staying at Mahavana near Vesali when he heard news of the impending death of his father. He is said to have gone to Suddhodana and taught the dharma, after which his father became an arahant.The king's death and cremation was to inspire the creation of an order of nuns. Buddhist texts record that the Buddha was reluctant to ordain women. His foster mother Maha Pajapati, for example, approached him, asking to join the sangha, but he refused. Maha Pajapati, however, was so intent on the path of awakening that she led a group of royal Sakyan and Koliyan ladies, which followed the sangha on a long journey to Rajagaha. In time, after Ananda championed their cause, the Buddha is said to have reconsidered and, five years after the formation of the sangha, agreed to the ordination of women as nuns. He reasoned that males and females had an equal capacity for awakening. But he gave women additional rules (Vinaya) to follow.
MAHAPARINIRVANA
According to the Mahaparinibbana Sutta of the Pali canon, at the age of 80, the Buddha announced that he would soon reach Parinirvana, or the final deathless state, and abandon his earthly body. After this, the Buddha ate his last meal, which he had received as an offering from a blacksmith named Cunda. Falling violently ill, Buddha instructed his attendant Ānanda to convince Cunda that the meal eaten at his place had nothing to do with his passing and that his meal would be a source of the greatest merit as it provided the last meal for a Buddha. Mettanando and Von Hinüber argue that the Buddha died of mesenteric infarction, a symptom of old age, rather than food poisoning. The precise contents of the Buddha's final meal are not clear, due to variant scriptural traditions and ambiguity over the translation of certain significant terms; the Theravada tradition generally believes that the Buddha was offered some kind of pork, while the Mahayana tradition believes that the Buddha consumed some sort of truffle or other mushroom. These may reflect the different traditional views on Buddhist vegetarianism and the precepts for monks and nuns.
Waley suggests that Theravadin's would take suukaramaddava (the contents of the Buddha's last meal), which can translate as pig-soft, to mean soft flesh of a pig. However, he also states that pig-soft could mean "pig's soft-food", that is, after Neumann, a soft food favoured by pigs, assumed to be a truffle. He argues (also after Neumann) that as Pali Buddhism was developed in an area remote to the Buddha's death, the existence of other plants with suukara- (pig) as part of their names and that "(p)lant names tend to be local and dialectical" could easily indicate that suukaramaddava was a type of plant whose local name was unknown to those in the Pali regions. Specifically, local writers knew more about their flora than Theravadin commentator Buddhaghosa who lived hundreds of years and kilometres remote in time and space from the events described. Unaware of an alternate meaning and with no Theravadin prohibition against eating animal flesh, Theravadins would not have questioned the Buddha eating meat and interpreted the term accordingly.
Ananda protested the Buddha's decision to enter Parinirvana in the abandoned jungles of Kuśināra (present-day Kushinagar, India) of the Malla kingdom. The Buddha, however, is said to have reminded Ananda how Kushinara was a land once ruled by a righteous wheel-turning king that resounded with joy:
44. Kusavati, Ananda, resounded unceasingly day and night with ten sounds - the trumpeting of elephants, the neighing of horses, the rattling of chariots, the beating of drums and tabours, music and song, cheers, the clapping of hands, and cries of "Eat, drink, and be merry!"
The Buddha then asked all the attendant Bhikkhus to clarify any doubts or questions they had. They had none. According to Buddhist scriptures, he then finally entered Parinirvana. The Buddha's final words are reported to have been: "All composite things (Saṅkhāra) are perishable. Strive for your own liberation with diligence" (Pali: 'vayadhammā saṅkhārā appamādena sampādethā'). His body was cremated and the relics were placed in monuments or stupas, some of which are believed to have survived until the present. For example, The Temple of the Tooth or "Dalada Maligawa" in Sri Lanka is the place where what some believe to be the relic of the right tooth of Buddha is kept at present.
According to the Pāli historical chronicles of Sri Lanka, the Dīpavaṃsa and Mahāvaṃsa, the coronation of Emperor Aśoka (Pāli: Asoka) is 218 years after the death of the Buddha. According to two textual records in Chinese (十八部論 and 部執異論), the coronation of Emperor Aśoka is 116 years after the death of the Buddha. Therefore, the time of Buddha's passing is either 486 BCE according to Theravāda record or 383 BCE according to Mahayana record. However, the actual date traditionally accepted as the date of the Buddha's death in Theravāda countries is 544 or 545 BCE, because the reign of Emperor Aśoka was traditionally reckoned to be about 60 years earlier than current estimates. In Burmese Buddhist tradition, the date of the Buddha's death is 13 May 544 BCE. whereas in Thai tradition it is 11 March 545 BCE.
At his death, the Buddha is famously believed to have told his disciples to follow no leader. Mahakasyapa was chosen by the sangha to be the chairman of the First Buddhist Council, with the two chief disciples Maudgalyayana and Sariputta having died before the Buddha.
While in the Buddha's days he was addressed by the very respected titles Buddha, Shākyamuni, Shākyasimha, Bhante and Bho, he was known after his parinirvana as Arihant, Bhagavā/Bhagavat/Bhagwān, Mahāvira, Jina/Jinendra, Sāstr, Sugata, and most popularly in scriptures as Tathāgata.
BUDDHA AND VEDAS
Buddha's teachings deny the authority of the Vedas and consequently [at least atheistic] Buddhism is generally viewed as a nāstika school (heterodox, literally "It is not so") from the perspective of orthodox Hinduism.
RELICS
After his death, Buddha's cremation relics were divided amongst 8 royal families and his disciples; centuries later they would be enshrined by King Ashoka into 84,000 stupas. Many supernatural legends surround the history of alleged relics as they accompanied the spread of Buddhism and gave legitimacy to rulers.
PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS
An extensive and colorful physical description of the Buddha has been laid down in scriptures. A kshatriya by birth, he had military training in his upbringing, and by Shakyan tradition was required to pass tests to demonstrate his worthiness as a warrior in order to marry. He had a strong enough body to be noticed by one of the kings and was asked to join his army as a general. He is also believed by Buddhists to have "the 32 Signs of the Great Man".
The Brahmin Sonadanda described him as "handsome, good-looking, and pleasing to the eye, with a most beautiful complexion. He has a godlike form and countenance, he is by no means unattractive." (D, I:115)
"It is wonderful, truly marvellous, how serene is the good Gotama's appearance, how clear and radiant his complexion, just as the golden jujube in autumn is clear and radiant, just as a palm-tree fruit just loosened from the stalk is clear and radiant, just as an adornment of red gold wrought in a crucible by a skilled goldsmith, deftly beaten and laid on a yellow-cloth shines, blazes and glitters, even so, the good Gotama's senses are calmed, his complexion is clear and radiant." (A, I:181)
A disciple named Vakkali, who later became an arahant, was so obsessed by the Buddha's physical presence that the Buddha is said to have felt impelled to tell him to desist, and to have reminded him that he should know the Buddha through the Dhamma and not through physical appearances.
Although there are no extant representations of the Buddha in human form until around the 1st century CE (see Buddhist art), descriptions of the physical characteristics of fully enlightened buddhas are attributed to the Buddha in the Digha Nikaya's Lakkhaṇa Sutta (D, I:142). In addition, the Buddha's physical appearance is described by Yasodhara to their son Rahula upon the Buddha's first post-Enlightenment return to his former princely palace in the non-canonical Pali devotional hymn, Narasīha Gāthā ("The Lion of Men").
Among the 32 main characteristics it is mentioned that Buddha has blue eyes.
NINE VIRTUES
Recollection of nine virtues attributed to the Buddha is a common Buddhist meditation and devotional practice called Buddhānusmṛti. The nine virtues are also among the 40 Buddhist meditation subjects. The nine virtues of the Buddha appear throughout the Tipitaka, and include:
- Buddho – Awakened
- Sammasambuddho – Perfectly self-awakened
- Vijja-carana-sampano – Endowed with higher knowledge and ideal conduct.
- Sugato – Well-gone or Well-spoken.
- Lokavidu – Wise in the knowledge of the many worlds.
- Anuttaro Purisa-damma-sarathi – Unexcelled trainer of untrained people.
- Satthadeva-Manussanam – Teacher of gods and humans.
- Bhagavathi – The Blessed one
- Araham – Worthy of homage. An Arahant is "one with taints destroyed, who has lived the holy life, done what had to be done, laid down the burden, reached the true goal, destroyed the fetters of being, and is completely liberated through final knowledge."
TEACHINGS
TRACING THE OLDEST TEACHINGS
Information of the oldest teachings may be obtained by analysis of the oldest texts. One method to obtain information on the oldest core of Buddhism is to compare the oldest extant versions of the Theravadin Pali Canon and other texts. The reliability of these sources, and the possibility to draw out a core of oldest teachings, is a matter of dispute. According to Vetter, inconsistencies remain, and other methods must be applied to resolve those inconsistencies.
According to Schmithausen, three positions held by scholars of Buddhism can be distinguished:
"Stress on the fundamental homogeneity and substantial authenticity of at least a considerable part of the Nikayic materials;"
"Scepticism with regard to the possibility of retrieving the doctrine of earliest Buddhism;"
"Cautious optimism in this respect."
DHYANA AND INSIGHT
A core problem in the study of early Buddhism is the relation between dhyana and insight. Schmithausen, in his often-cited article On some Aspects of Descriptions or Theories of 'Liberating Insight' and 'Enlightenment' in Early Buddhism notes that the mention of the four noble truths as constituting "liberating insight", which is attained after mastering the Rupa Jhanas, is a later addition to texts such as Majjhima Nikaya 36
CORE TEACHINGS
According to Tilmann Vetter, the core of earliest Buddhism is the practice of dhyāna. Bronkhorst agrees that dhyana was a Buddhist invention, whereas Norman notes that "the Buddha's way to release [...] was by means of meditative practices." Discriminating insight into transiency as a separate path to liberation was a later development.
According to the Mahāsaccakasutta, from the fourth jhana the Buddha gained bodhi. Yet, it is not clear what he was awakened to. "Liberating insight" is a later addition to this text, and reflects a later development and understanding in early Buddhism. The mentioning of the four truths as constituting "liberating insight" introduces a logical problem, since the four truths depict a linear path of practice, the knowledge of which is in itself not depicted as being liberating:
[T]hey do not teach that one is released by knowing the four noble truths, but by practicing the fourth noble truth, the eightfold path, which culminates in right samadhi.
Although "Nibbāna" (Sanskrit: Nirvāna) is the common term for the desired goal of this practice, many other terms can be found throughout the Nikayas, which are not specified.
According to Vetter, the description of the Buddhist path may initially have been as simple as the term "the middle way". In time, this short description was elaborated, resulting in the description of the eightfold path.
According to both Bronkhorst and Anderson, the four truths became a substitution for prajna, or "liberating insight", in the suttas in those texts where "liberating insight" was preceded by the four jhanas. According to Bronkhorst, the four truths may not have been formulated in earliest Buddhism, and did not serve in earliest Buddhism as a description of "liberating insight". Gotama's teachings may have been personal, "adjusted to the need of each person."
The three marks of existence may reflect Upanishadic or other influences. K.R. Norman supposes that these terms were already in use at the Buddha's time, and were familiar to his listeners.
The Brahma-vihara was in origin probably a brahmanic term; but its usage may have been common to the Sramana traditions.
LATER DEVELOPMENTS
In time, "liberating insight" became an essential feature of the Buddhist tradition. The following teachings, which are commonly seen as essential to Buddhism, are later formulations which form part of the explanatory framework of this "liberating insight":
- The Four Noble Truths: that suffering is an ingrained part of existence; that the origin of suffering is craving for sensuality, acquisition of identity, and fear of annihilation; that suffering can be ended; and that following the Noble Eightfold Path is the means to accomplish this;
- The Noble Eightfold Path: right view, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration;
- Dependent origination: the mind creates suffering as a natural product of a complex process.
OTHER RELIGIONS
Some Hindus regard Gautama as the 9th avatar of Vishnu. The Buddha is also regarded as a prophet by the Ahmadiyya Muslims and a Manifestation of God in the Bahá'í Faith. Some early Chinese Taoist-Buddhists thought the Buddha to be a reincarnation of Lao Tzu.
The Christian Saint Josaphat is based on the Buddha. The name comes from the Sanskrit Bodhisattva via Arabic Būdhasaf and Georgian Iodasaph. The only story in which St. Josaphat appears, Barlaam and Josaphat, is based on the life of the Buddha. Josaphat was included in earlier editions of the Roman Martyrology (feast day 27 November) — though not in the Roman Missal — and in the Eastern Orthodox Church liturgical calendar (26 August).
Disciples of the Cao Đài religion worship the Buddha as a major religious teacher. His image can be found in both their Holy See and on the home altar. He is revealed during communication with Divine Beings as son of their Supreme Being (God the Father) together with other major religious teachers and founders like Jesus, Laozi, and Confucius.
In the ancient Gnostic sect of Manichaeism the Buddha is listed among the prophets who preached the word of God before Mani.
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After reading Simon's account of Eye and there being three Suffolks. I realise there are different Suffolks (and Norfolks) for me too. Although I lived in the area for the first 25 years of my life, and again for another half dozen upon leaving the RAF, I never really explored the area where I lived.
I know the main roads well, and the towns on or near them, as on signposts if little else. I may notice the occasional interesting building, like the school at Somerleyton, or the barn at Herringfleet, and even see there was a church or two (Herringfleet again or Haddiscoe). But my knowledge only went as far as I could see; so along the A146, the A143, the A12, the A149 and a handful of B roads and other unclassified roads I may have travelled down, and years later be able to point out every twist and turn, but for the towns and villages, I knew little.
Even large town like Beccles and Bungay I would go to, visit friends or call in at a shop, but in Bungay fail to notice that there are three churches side by side in the centre, or that Beccles church had a separate tower.
Thanks to the group her on Flickr, GWUK, I became aware that Norfolk and Suffolk were homes to a variety and number of churches that I was unaware of, and in parishes I knew I could not place on a map.
So it is, when I go up to visit Mum in Lowestoft, I try to call in at least one new church, just to see what it was like and learn about the history of the area, and in this I am endebited to Simon K for his wonderful East Anglian Churches website and his delightful prose regarding his visits, and in which is smuggles in the points of interest that can be seen.
I am learning myself, slowly, and can now see things that are rare or uncommon, but not really be able to write well or with authority about them.
St Mary here, became the first church I visited anywhere, where there was already a church snapper in attendance. I have been to churches where, because it is a cathedral or in a town or city centre centre, there might be other people walking around and snapping. But in a small rural church, seeing another snapper with a tripod, this was a first.
And he was deaf. As I wandered around calling out if I was in his shots, I was ignored. Meaning I thought him rude, he could just not hear me.
He took his time, and I rushed around, in fact I had little time as I had to be n Gorleston at just gone two, and so with one eye on the time I rushed round getting shots, waiting for my fellow snapper, and so missing loads of detail.
Before this day I had not heard of Horham, and maybe would struggle to find it on a map if I looked.
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The first time I ever approached this village, it was across the fields from poor, battered Denham; typical agricultural high Suffolk, wide spaces with the hedgerows gone, fields of barley and rape. Just short of Horham, I crossed a long concrete expanse which stretched away from the road at an angle. This was, I realised, the former runway of the large WWII American airbase, all that remains of one of the biggest. It was the home of 95th Bomb Group; from here, the cities of Germany were bombed, and St Mary is one of several Suffolk churches that have become shrines to the memory of the former American presence here. Apart from that, you'd never know today.
I remember Horham with affection, because when I started exploring the county's churches in the 1990s, this was one of the first places I visited. North Suffolk seemed fairly exotic and foreign to me then, and I did not even know that Horham is pronounced, for an obvious reason, Horrum, rather than to rhyme with quorum. Having since found myself in just about all the backwaters and byways of East Anglia, it was a pleasure to come back and find that this is still a pretty and remote place, just as I had thought it then.
On the first entry for this church, I suggested that anyone interested in exploring the graveyard should beware of Horham's famous beehives, which stand among the graves. On this day in early June the graveyard was a riot of waist high wildflowers, and at first I couldn't spot them. I wandered out to the south-east corner. The weatherbeaten hives were still there, crumbling quietly. I didn't see any bees, and the only local honey sold at the shop across the road came from far off Cockfield.
Despite being some way off the pulse of medieval industrial Suffolk, this is a typically fine tower of the period, immediately on the eve of the protestant Reformation. The Jernegans were patrons, which may explain the extent to which no expense was spared. Simon Cotton has uncovered a large number of bequests: a 1489 bequest to "new" tower "when begun"; a 1496 bequest to the tower; in 1499, 10s bequeathed to the making of the new steeple; further bequests to the tower in 1503, 1504, 1510 and 1512. There was a bell bequest in 1514, which may link up with the earliest of the current bells, of which more in a moment.
A blocked Norman north doorway reveals the true age of the nave walls. The chancel is all Victorian, but the rest reveals evidence of 14th century rebuilding. The white rendering of the nave gives it an air of being a cottage with a tower and chancel built on. Rather lovely, in fact. Most curiously, it has been heightened without the introduction of a clerestory. Because of this, my eyes took some time on this sunny day to adjust to the interior. It is small, and rather charming; thoroughly Victorianised, but with a strong sense of continuity, of the Horhamers of the past.
The porch is placed towards the middle of the south wall, and you step into the middle of the nave to face the font set in a floor of pamment stones. No two village church interiors are identical, of course, but Horham is rather more idiosyncratic than most. There was a lot of money spent here in the 1630s - was this a particularly Laudian parish, one wonders? From this date, or more precisely November 29th 1631, came the screen, for this is inscribed on it. It has been reset, and behind it is a contemporary pulpit, not as elaborate as some Stuart pulpits, but in this small church it is quietly beautiful. A19th century replacement screen sits to the east.
A great curiosity is the tray which slides out underneath the seat of the 4th bench from the front on the south side. The guide says it is for candles; Mortlock thought that perhaps it was for the churchwardens' clay pipe. Although candles seem an unlikely option given their prohibition at the time for liturgical uses, we must remember that tapers were used for lighting (hence the prickholes in the bench ends) and were therefore a necessity.
However, it seems unlikely that the churchwarden would need to keep them under his seat (and if he did, why do no other churches have this tray?) and so perhaps Mortlock is right. There is a small hole in it, as if for cleaning, perhaps of ashes.
Horham is famous with bellringers, because it has the oldest ring of eight bells in the whole world. An 18th century graffito on the chancel arch reminds the ringers what is due to the Sexton for keeping them in order. A wooden roundel on the north wall depicts the Annunciation, and St Dunstan, the patron Saint of bellfounders. It remembers the American donations which paid for the restoration of the bells.
Another American touch is the straw eagle set in a glass case, two flags in its mouth, which is simple and moving. The 95th Bomb Group memorial is across the road from the church, in the shape of a plane tail. It stands on a pedestal marked with the runway layout, like that at Knettishall. I stood by it in the quiet sunshine, thinking about the terrible accident on the airfield here during the war, when two planes collided on the ground, resulting in more than thirty deaths. And I remembered reading about the armaments being transported here on the now-vanished Middy, the Mid-Suffolk Light Railway, which had a station here.
Hard to imagine all that now, in this peaceful place