Civilizations of Central Asia and the Himalayas; The...

TREASURES

OF

WORLD ART©

Handsome young Etruscan

The Etruscans, who flourished in central Italy some 2,800 years ago, are one of history's

enigmas. Where they came from has never been satisfactorily explained nor has their

writing been deciphered. What is certain is that they were gifted sculptors whose works

in bronze, ivory and terracotta have shown us the nature of the civilization they created

before it was absorbed into the Roman world. This bronze head of a young Etruscan

(4th century B.C.) has qualities that recall Greek sculptures of the same period.

Museo Nazionale di Villa Giula, Rome Photo (' Unesco - Editions Rencontre

28JÂNV1869

CourierFEBRUARY 1969

22ND YEAR

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2

THE GREAT CIVILIZATION OF THE KUSHANS

By Bobojan Gafurov

PORTRAIT GALLERY OF 2.000 YEARS AGO

Masterpieces of Kushan sculpture

COINAGE OF THE KUSHAN RULERS

UNKNOWN TREASURES OF HIMALAYAN ART

By Madanjeet Singh

THE WHEEL OF EXISTENCE

Art rich in mystic symbolism

FOUR PAGES IN FULL COLOUR

Himalayan Art

THE VIVACITY OF PHILIPPINE FOLK BALLET

THE DANCE OF RETRIBUTION

WHEN THE EARTH SHOOK IN KHORASSAN

By Rex Keating

FROM THE UNESCO NEWSROOM

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

TREASURES OF WORLD ART

Young Etruscan (Italy)

Cover photo

Recent archaeological discoveries are

throwing new light on one of the great

civilizations of Antiquity which stood

on a par with ancient Rome, China and

Parthia. Cover photo shows head of

a Kushan prince unearthed just over ä

a year ago in Soviet Uzbekistan. For Athe story of the Kushans see page 4.

Photo Lev Miroshnikov - Unesco

THE GREAT

CIVILIZATION

OF THE KUSHANSThe Kushan Empire of Central Asia ranked with

Rome, China and Parthia in the first centuries of

our era. It is now emerging from the shrouds of

mystery to take its rightful place in world history.

by Bobojan Gafurov

I

4

WO thousand years agocentral Asia, northern India, West

Pakistan, Afghanistan and eastern Iranformed a single vast state whichstretched all the way from the shoresof the Aral Sea to the Indian Ocean.

This empire, which had given itselfthe name of Kushan, ranked with the

other great empires of the time Rome,Parthia and China and formed one

of the most important links in thepolitical system of the ancient world.

The empire of the Kushans was thesetting for a number of crucial eventsin the history of Asian civilization. Itnot only stands as a symbol of the poli¬tical unity of many peoples and racesof the East but also represents a new

stage in the cultural development ofAsia and the world as a whole.

The great period of Gandharaart coincides with the reign ofthe Kushan Dynasty. From India,Buddhism spread rapidly throughoutthe Kushan Empire and from there be¬gan its penetration and conversion ofChina. Kushan artists enriched Bud¬

dhist sculpture by the most importantinnovation of the period: the rendering

BOBOJAN GAFUROV, of the U.S.S.R. Acad¬emy of Sciences. Is director of the Acad¬emy's Institute of Oriental Studies. He ischairman of the Soviet committee collaborat¬

ing in the current Unesco protect, "Studieson the Civilizations of the Peoples of Centra/Asia', in which Afghanistan, India, Iran andPakistan are also participating. A specialistin the history of the Kushan civilization. Acad¬emician Gafurov is of Tajik nationality andis a deputy in the Supreme Soviet of theU.S.S.R.

The Kushan Empire occupiesa unique place in thehistory of the ancientworld, and recentarchaeological discoverieshave produced newevidence to show that

several distinctly differentart schools flourished in

different parts of the vastkingdom that stretchedfrom the Aral Sea to the

Indian Ocean. Kushan art

first developed in ancientBactria. Left, head ofwarrior found at a Bactrian

site on the north of the

Hindu Kush range. Right,fresco unearthed at

Pendjikent, near Samarkand(Uzbekistan), painted in thestyle that characterized theregion of Sogdiana at theend of the Kushan period.

of the Buddha in human form. The

Kushans not only sponsored great in¬tellectual and artistic achievements in

their dominions but were also in close

contact with the leading cultural cen¬tres of the ancient world, and control¬

led the important overland routes bet¬ween China and Rome.

At the beginning of the Christian erathe powerful Kushan Empire borderedon China in the east and Parthia in

the west and linked the previouslydisunited centres of the ancient world

into a single whole. For several cen¬turies, all the countries of the ancientworld from the British Isles to the

shores of the Pacific Ocean were under

either Roman, Parthian, Chinese or

Kushan rule, and these four great em¬pires were themselves interlinked bya complex system of close ties andcommunication.

The first trans-continental tradingand diplomatic route known as theGreat Silk Route ran from China to the

Mediterranean across the Parthian and

Kushan dominions. More than a

thousand years before Vasco daGama, ships were sailing regularlyover the Indian Ocean and the Red

Sea between Egypt, conquered byRome, and the ports of western Indiawhich served the Kushan empire.

At the same time the important landroute over the steppes was apparentlyopened from central Asia to easternEurope and the ancient towns of thenorthern Black Sea coast. Coins of

Kushan rulers have been found in Kiev,

CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGEPhotos © APN

Rectangle on map,right, marks majorterritories of the

ancient Kushan

Empire, whichstretched across a

vast expanse ofAsia, shown Indetailed map below.Detailed map istaken from

"Dynastic Art ofthe Kushans" byJohn M. Rosenfield,the most

comprehensivestudy on Kushancivilization thus far

written In a

Western language,published in theU.S.A. In 1967.

KUSHAN CIVILIZATION (Continued)

An empire created by

in Ethiopia and Scandinavia as well asin towns of the former Roman Empire,

while Roman coins of Augustus andTiberius have been discovered in

western and southern India.

Kushan coins from the Kama area

(southwest of the Urals) and a silvervessel from Khorezm in the eastern

Urals point to links with northern neigh¬bours. Dishes produced by craftsmenin the town which once stood on the

same site as present-day Dushanbe(capital of the Soviet Tajik Republic)show pictures of the god Dionysius.Indian bone carvings of the Kushanperiod have been discovered in Pom¬peii, and Roman glassware has beenunearthed in the palace of the Kushanrulers at Begram, north of Kabul.

In the Roman Empire, the Asiaticcult of Mithra extended as far as Brit¬

ain, oriental spices and silk werefashionable in Rome, and Roman arti¬cles have often been found in western

Asia, the Caucasus, Hindostán, centralAsia and Indo-china. Kushan ambas¬

sadors were present in Rome at thecelebrations held by Trajan after hisvictory over the Dacians at the end ofthe 1st century A.D.

Thus the Kushan period was not

simply the continuation of previouslyestablished relations between East and

West but qualitatively a new stage inthe development of this important his¬torical and cultural process.

L.ITTLE more than a century

has passed since scholars first begantheir investigations of the Kushanepoch. The origins and birth of theKushan civilization are still shrouded in

much mystery despite the earlyaccounts and chronicles left to us bythe ancient Greeks, Romans and Chi¬

nese. The patient effort of manyscientists and scholars from different

countries, combined with recent

archaeological discoveries, is slowlyhelping to unravel the secrets of theirpast.

Here it is encouraging to note thatone of the themes of a new Unesco

project, "Studies on the Civilizationsof the Peoples of Central Asia" isdevoted to the history of the Kushans.Last year, Unesco organized an inter¬national conference at Dushanbe on

the history, archaeology and culture ofCentral Asia during the Kushan per¬iod, attended by scholars from manycountries, which has given new im¬petus to the study of this importantaspect of world history.

former nomads

The history of the Kushans covers aperiod of about five centuries, betweenthe downfall of the Graeco-Bactrian

kingdom in the second or first centur¬ies B.C. and the rise of the empireof the Ephtalites, or White Huns, at theend of the fourth or early in the fifthcentury A.D. (1).

Very little is known about the earlyyears of the Kushan State. It is nowgenerally agreed that it was created bya nation of former nomads whose rulingprinces gave themselves the dynasticname Kushanas (Kuei Shuang, in Chi¬nese chronicles). Who these nomadswere is still not absolutely certain, butcurrent evidence clearly points totribes from the northern regions ofCentral Asia who formed a confederacywith other tribes called Yueh-Chih, Wu-

Sun, and the Sakas, a Scythian peopleof Central Asian origin.

s.I OME time between the se¬

cond and first centuries B.C., these

tribes joined together to overthrow theGreek kingdom of Bactria. In thestruggle which ensued the Kushansmust have headed all the other nation-

tribes of the confederation since theygave their name to the new state inBactria.

The first ruler whose name is re¬

corded in history is Kujula Kadphiz(there are many spellings of Kushannames), who proclaimed himself "Kingof Kings" and carried out the firstgreat policy of Kushan unification,uniting Bactria and Sogdiana (whosecapital city was Samarkand), andextending his influence over the Ka¬bul valley and Kashmir to the south.

His successor, Vima Kadphiz, contin¬ued to expand the kingdom to thesouth and south-east, spreading itscultural influence as far as Benares.

In the north, the ancient kingdom ofKangha (later known as Khorezm) wasalso united into the empire.

It was under Kanishka that Kushan

reached the zenith of its cultural in¬

fluence. Although Kanishka's namescarcely figures at all in the historiesintended for the general reader, there

CONTINUED ON PAGE 11

(1) Kushan chronology has tantalized scho¬lars for generations, and very few eventscan be dated with any precision or certainty.Even the dates of the reign of EmperorKanishka, the best-known personality ofKushan history, Is sharply disputed, withdifferent schools fixing the beginning of hisreign at A.D. 78; A.D. 110-115; A.D. 128; andA.D. 144. Editor's note.

Photo © Dominique Darbols, Paris

This monumental headless statue Is thought to represent Kanishka, the great rulerof the Kushans. It was discovered at Surkh Kotal (north-eastern Afghanistan)In the ruins of the acropolis raised by Kanishka towards the end of the first century A.D.An almost Identical headless figure, now In the archaeological museum at Mathura(Afghanistan), bears an inscription clearly identifying it as a statue of Kanishka.French archaeological missions have made numerous excavations at Surkh Kotalunder the direction of Professor Daniel Schlumberger. Among Important remainsthey have brought to light is a massive stone Inscription (detail below) which has provedto be one of the most significant discoveries of the past twenty years in historicaland philological studies of this part of Asia. This Kushan text is composed of 25 lineswritten in Greek characters. Though not yet fully deciphered, It has thrownnew light on the construction of the Surkh Kotal acropolis by the great Kanishka.

Photo © Dominique Darbols, from 'L'Afghanistan et son Art" by Jeanine Auboyer,published by Ed. Cercle d'Art, Paris 1968, and ARTIA, Prague

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Kushan portraitgallery of2,000 years ago

All the Kushan sculptures on these pages,

with the exception of photo 10, are recentdiscoveries made in southern Soviet

Uzbekistan. Number 10, unearthed near

Begram (Afghanistan), is believed to representa water goddess. Carved in ivory, thisoutstanding work of the Gandhara school(see photos page 10) is now in the Kabulmuseum. Most of the sculptures shown on

these pages were modelled in clay and thenpainted. They were recovered from the mainhall of a Kushan palace at Kalchayan,

excavated a few years ago by an expeditionled by the Soviet woman archaeologist,Professor Galina Pugachenkova. Characterportraits par excellence, the sculptures depicta cross-section of people in one area of theKushan Empire 2,000 years ago. The portrait

gallery includes an almost complete figureof a Kushan prince (3), a warrior and abowman (4 and 8), a jester (5) and a

satyr (12). The woman's head (9) wasunearthed at Dalversin-tepe, another Kushancity excavated by the same expedition insouthern Uzbekistan. Discoveries at the two

sites have given scholars new insight intoKushan culture and particularly the monumentalstatuary art of this region which formedpart of northern Bactria.

Photos © APN

This extraordinary piece ofsculpture, which couldeasily be taken for one ofthe saints gracing themedieval cathedrals of

Europe, is an example of theGandhara art school that

flowered In Central Asia,In the first centuries of

our era, during the Kushanperiod. Gandhara art wasinfluenced by the styles ofmany countries IncludingGreece, Rome and Persia.The sculpture Is a detail of"A Pilgrim's Offering toBuddha", below, now inthe Peshawar museum

(Pakistan).

Photos © Roland Michaud - Rapho

KUSHAN CIVILIZATION (Continued from page 7)

Kanishka, one of the great sovereigns of Antiquity

can be little doubt that he was one of

the greatest sovereigns that ever heldsway in the ancient world.

Kanishka is remembered as one of

the great patrons of art and religion,who turned Gandhara into a veritable

holy land of Buddhism (although as weshall see in a moment religious toler¬ance was the hallmark of Kushan

civilization). Kanishka convened theFourth Buddhist Council, and it is gen¬

erally believed that the Buddhism ofthe Great Vehicle made its appearance

under his reign and patronage.

II HE overthrow of Greek ruleby no means led to a decline In thecultural and political importance ofBactria and its neighbouring regions.Greek, dynasties in Bactria and Indiahad already become isolated fromMediterranean civilization by the sec¬ond and first centuries B.C. and had

degenerated into warring groups.However strange it may seem, it wasnot until the Greek rulers had been re¬

placed by Kushan kings that the ancientlocal traditions received a new impetus.

The mutual influence of Greek and

local Bactrian cultures goes back asearly as the Achaemenian epoch in thefourth century B.C. when the first set¬tlers from the Hellenic world appearedin the area and founded their colonies.

Bactria also played an important partin Alexander the Great's plan to unitethe Hellenes with the peoples of theEast. The fact that the Kushans

adopted the Greek script to recordthe ancient Bactrian language is alsoan event of great cultural significance.

Thus, three different historical and

cultural components, I. e. the local Bac¬trian, the Hellenic and the nomadiccombined with the traditions of the

neighbouring peoples in Central Asia,Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and Iranto create that complex and unique com¬bination of ethnic, cultural, social and

political phenomena we know as theKushan civilization.

Central Asia thus came to play atremendous role in the dissemination

of Greek, Roman and Indian culture inthe Far East. The evidence of written

records and archaeological findingssuggests that the whole eastern partof the Great Silk Route was entirelyin the hands of the Sogdians by thefourth century A.D. The Sogdians hadfounded their colonies and settlements

in the heart of Asia for trade with

many peoples. Sogdian silks, com¬peting with those from China and the

Far East, later penetrated into Byzan¬tium and western Europe. This issupported by recent finds of silk bear¬ing "old" Sogdian inscriptions amongEuropean church treasures.

This union of the peoples of Cen¬tral Asia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Indiaand eastern Iran within the framework

of a single state, and their comparativesecurity from foreign invasions, led toa flourishing in trade and great pros¬perity in that part of the world.

The Kushan period is furthermoremarked by a very significant fact: theprolonged and fruitful co-existence ofthe traditions of the various peopleswho inhabited the empire and of theirdifferent religious systems and beliefs.

The Kushan pantheon bears witness

to this religious tolerance and the co¬existence of different cultural tradi¬

tions. Coins struck In the second

century A.D. during the reign of Kan¬ishka bear the names and effigies ofgods from the Indian, Persian and Hel¬lenic pantheons: Mithras the defenderof truth; Ordokhsh the goddess offertility; the mighty god of war, Vere-tragna; the Indian Shiva as well asBuddha; Helios, Selena and even

Serapis whose cult was well-knownin Hellenic Egypt.

The syncretic character of the Ku¬shan religious pantheon reflected theethnic and cultural diversity of thepopulation of this vast empire, and themany standards and traditions whichhad developed through close mutualcontact, and had formed a common

bond throughout the kingdom.

This tolerance, in the broadest sense

of the word, was an important factorin the flowering of culture, making itpossible to preserve the essential fea¬tures of local traditions and ways,while it helped to mould new culturalvalues for the entire nation.

IHE Kushan Empire, as wehave seen, was instrumental in the widedissemination of Buddhism in Asia.'

But this did not lead by any means tothe disappearance of local religionsand traditions. It was a fruitful,

complex process of mutual influenceand acceptance of new ideas.

The history of Buddhism in CentralAsia offers us some interestinginsights in this respect, despite thefact that Buddhism was never the pre¬

vailing religion there. The followersof Buddhism in Bactria not only learn¬ed to read the Buddhist texts and

translated them into Sanskrit but also

prepared careful commentaries andexplanations of the texts.

This approach can also be seen inreligious architecture. The designand structure of the Buddhist templesin Bactria (and later in Central Asiagenerally) did not as a rule correspondto the Buddhist sanctuaries of the pre-

Kushan and early Kushan periods inIndia, but rather to the religious archi¬tecture of Near and Central Asia with

its enclosed sanctuary surrounded bynarrow circular corridors.

Central Asia became the centre from

which Buddhist culture spread acrossthe face of Asia to China, Japan andKorea. Chinese manuscripts containthe names of more than ten Buddhist

monks from Bactria, Sogdiana and Par¬thia who wrote religious texts andtranslated them into Chinese. And

some authorities have rightly assertedthat China would not have known

Buddhism in the 2nd-4th centuries A.D.

had it not been for the Central Asian

monks.

cI ENTRAL Asia thus became

the direct link between the Near and

Far East. This was no mechanical

link implying the mere transfer of onepeople's culture to another. It involveda total mastery of different culturalvalues and their fusion into a new and

higher synthesis.

It was during the Kushan period thatthe peoples of the East first becameaware of the tremendous importanceof relations between peoples as wellas states, and created common cultu¬ral values which served to cement

together all the peoples of this vastregion. And no less important, in thecourse of this process of assimilationthe local traditions and features of

each component part of the commonculture were preserved.

These features, common to all the

people of the Kushan Empire, havebecome clearly apparent over the lastfew years in the field of art, where atthe same time the unique character oflocal art trends and schools can be

readily discerned.

For several decades scholars have

been arguing over the origins andnature of Kushan art. Specimens ofKushan art found in Gandhara (WestPakistan) were examined to establishtheir link with ancient Roman traditions

or Buddhist art. The discovery of 1 1Kushan works belonging to the Ma- ' 'thura school of India, finds in Pakis¬

tan (Taxila and Butkara), Afghanistan

CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE

KUSHAN CIVILIZATION (Continued)

The influence of Kushan civilization was

prolonged in Central Asia well afterthe Empire had ceased to exist Tracesof its artistic legacy are seen in thesetwo paintings copies of sections ofa 7th-8th century fresco discoverednear Samarkand (Uzbekistan) in 1965by a Soviet archaeological expeditionled by Professor V. Shishkin. Thesedetails show two richly garbed bearersof gifts (above) and a horseman (below).

12

(Begram, Hadda and more recentlySurkh Kotal) and in Central Asia (Air-tarn and the recent discoveries in

Khalchayan and Dalverzin-Tepe) havecompletely revised earlier ideas aboutthe origins and nature of that complex,many-sided phenomenon that wasKushan art.

Today we can definitely state thatseveral different artistic schools and

trends existed during the Kushan per¬iod, which though often inter-connect¬ed were also artistically independent.Bactrian art occupied a special positionin Kushan art as a whole, and amazing

specimens have been found recently innorthern Afghanistan and Central Asia.It was in Bactria that Kushan art first

emerged to be developed later byother schools.

The art of the Kushans survived longafter the downfall of the empire andbecame an inspiration for many paint¬ers and masters from the earlymedieval countries and regions of Cen¬tral Asia, Hindostán and the Far East.Its influence is clearly discernible inthe sculpture of the Guptas in India andin wall paintings and reliefs in Sog¬diana (Pjanjikent, Varakhsha) and east¬ern Turkestan.

IHE cultural and historical

ties which developed during theKushan period continued to be felt forcenturies in this vast area, and Kushan

art has made a particularly importantcontribution to the medieval art of Af¬

ghanistan, Iran and Central Asia.Scholars are now tracing Kushan in¬fluences in the later religious philo¬sophies and thinking of India as well asin the culture of the peoples of northIndia, West Pakistan, Afghanistan andCentral Asia. It is quite obvious thatKushan culture forms an integral partof the history and cultural heritage ofthe descendants of these peoples

today.

By virtue of their high level of dev¬elopment, their originality and grace,Kushan art and culture stand on a parwith the culture of ancient Greece and

Rome. Each decade, every year, con¬

tinues to provide new finds. The 1960swere particularly rich and fruitful.

Thanks to the joint efforts of schol¬ars from Afghanistan, India, theU.S.S.R., Pakistan and Iran, the Frencharchaeological mission in Afghanistan,Italian and Japanese expeditions, andthe work of scholars from the U.S.A.,Great Britain and other countries, im¬

portant new material has come to lighton the Kushan period. And perhapsthe day will soon come when the keywill be found to unlock all the mysteriesof this remarkable and unique periodin human civilization.

COINAGE OF THE

KUSHAN RULERS

«# i.J

Images of Kushan rulers have come down to us on the coins struckduring their reigns. Portrait on coin, above left, is that of Kujula Kadphiz,first unifier of the Kushan Empire. Above right, reverse of same coin.Below right, coin bearing the image of King Kanishka, a great patron of thearts, under whom the Empire reached the zenith of its cultural influence.Below left, reverse of same coin. The documentary evidence of Kushancoins, unearthed in large numbers from many sites, has been of greatvalue to historians and scholars seeking to reconstruct the historyof the Kushan Empire. Near Begram (or Kapisa), the former summercapital of the Kushan Empire, north-east of Kabul (Afghanistan),no less than 30,000 coins dating from various periods were discoveredin 1830. Other rich archaeological finds made at Begram include a greathoard of luxury objects: Syrian glass, Chinese lacquer ware, Indian ivorycarvings, Hellenistic bronze figurines, plaster models for silver plaquesfrom the Graeco-Latin West. The Begram finds are evidenceof the many contacts and exchanges which the Kushan Empirepromoted between the peoples of the Ancient World.

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Photos © Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris

UNKNOWN TREASURES

OF HIMALAYAN ART

by Madanjeet Singh

A unique artistic heritage, still virtually unknown to the world at large, ishidden in the fastnesses of the Himalayan ranges. Until recently no singleaccount of Himalayan art covering the entire region from Ladakh in thewest to Bhutan in the east had been published, chiefly because itsmagnificent wall-paintings and sculptures are located mainly in remotetemples and monasteries. This omission has now been made good withthe publication of "Himalayan Art" by Madanjeet Singh, the first volumein a new series of Unesco Art Books (published in U.K. by Macmillan andCo. Ltd., London; in U.S.A. by the New York Graphic Society, Greenwich,Conn.; see inside back cover). Thanks to the help of the Indian andNepalese governments and with the authorization of the Dalai Lama andthe local rulers of Sikkim and Bhutan, Madanjeet Singh was able to reachthe most inaccessible religious communities and to photograph works ofart whose reproduction had hitherto been forbidden. With the followingarticle, written specially for this issue of the "Unesco Courier" byMadanjeet Singh, we reproduce a number of these works (some in fullcolour) selected from "Himalayan Art". To collect material for this firstcomplete account of a significant chapter in the history of Asian and worldart, Mr. Singh undertook thirty-five expeditions by helicopter, jeep, pony

and on foot to visit mountain shrines, and made over 7,000 repro¬ductions of manuscripts, wall-paintings and sculptures.

Photos © Madanjeet Singh

TT

// 'H

v .&

The palace of Bhatgaon,a town near Kathmandu,capital of Nepal, is amasterpiece ofHindu-Buddhist art and

architecture. It was built

and enhanced bymonarchs of the Malla

dynasty, under whosepatronage the arts andartists of Nepal won widerenown. Above, a statueof the ruler, BhupadintraMalla (late 17th-early18th century), a strikingportrait of whom is paintedon the wall of the Talejutemple at Bhatgaon.The door façade of thistemple In gilt, copperand brass, embellishedwith figures of Hindudeities (left) is one of themost exquisite Nepaleseworks of the period.

T,HE eminent Indian sage

Swami Vivekananda was once askedin the United States whether India'sheat had influenced the forms of India's

spiritual heritage and religions. Hereplied that India's greatest spiritualinspirations were nourished not so

much in its tropical climate as throughthe meditations of ascetics in the Hima¬

laya, which means "abodes of snow".

Among these saints the one mostrevered in the Himalaya is the Indiansage Padmasambhava (750-800 A.D.);there is hardly a Buddhist shrine inthe mountains that does not contain

an image of this Siddha or Tantra Guru.

According to tradition, it was atRiwalsar in the Punjab Hills that Pad¬masambhava, who came from Uddiyana

MADANJEET SINGH is a rare combination of

scholar, painter, writer and photographer. Along-time student of Asian art and Europeanart history, he became known internationallywith his first book, 'Indian Sculpture InBronze and Stone", published in Rome bythe Institute of the Middle and Far East in

1952. This was followed in 1954 by 'India:Paintings from Ajanta Caves" (A UnescoWorld Art Series album) published by theNew York Graphic Society. Mr. Singhdevoted a later book to the art of this famous

Indian shrine ("Ajanta', published jointly In1964 by Thames and Hudson. London, andThe Macmillan Company of New York). Amember of the Indian Diplomatic Service,Mr. Singh is now First Secretary at the IndianEmbassy In Madrid.

(the Swat valley in Kashmir), gave apopular basis to the mystical elementsof Tantric philosophy and iconography.He thus became a symbol of the spiritof the time, in an age when Buddhistand Hindu practices and art formspractically lost their separate identity.

Padmasambhava is said to have

travelled several times between Tibet

and Kashmir via Riwalsar despite thedifficult journey involving three orfour months. Although his specificroutes of travel are not known, thefootpaths had been well recognizedsince the time of Thonmi Sambhota,the minister of the famous Tibetan

king Srongtsen-gampo (died 650 A.D.).Thonmi Sambhota had journeyed toKashmir to learn the Sanskrit alphabetand had also brought back to Tibetseveral models of Kashmiri art.

Since his time the holiest of all

mountains, Kailasha, by the sacredlake Manasarovara, could be approach¬ed from the important Buddhist centreJalandhara by following the riverSutlej upstream. This great river withits source beyond the Indian frontiersflows for nearly 800 kilometres beforedescending to the Indian plains. Simi¬larly, the routes to Kashmir, which had -i r

become a chief centre of Buddhist | Jjlearning since Emperor Ashoka's time(273-232 B.C.), were well marked byBuddhist pilgrims.


HIMALAYAN ART (Continued)

16

The recent discovery of terracotta figures dating back to300 B.C. confirms the early origins of art in Nepal, a countrywhose climates and terrains (including Everest, the world'shighest peak) are as varied as the ethnic origins of its people.For unbroken centuries, Nepal was an illustrious centre ofthe arts. Masterpieces of its painting and sculpture arepreserved In the country's temples and monasteries.This graceful 10th century limestone sculpture,"Nativity of the Buddha", from Kathmandu, recalls the styleof paintings in the Ajanta caves, in central India.

Photo © Madanjeet Singh

These were and still are formid¬

able footpaths winding their waythrough high snowy passes of greatbeauty and grandeur and equallygreat hardship. These ancient tracksin the western Himalaya were amongthe footpaths I was able to partlyretrace in the course of my 35 majorexpeditions through the entire mountainranges from Kashmir in the west toBhutan in the east (see map page 6).

By this time I had already coveredpicturesque Nepal, a journey whichwas indeed stimulating because everynook and corner in the Kathmandu

valley is studded with marvellouspieces of art; but I did not feel beforethat overwhelming impact of the envir¬onments which apparently broughtforth Himalayan art, until I saw theawe-inspiring peaks of mighty splen¬dour in western Himalaya.

For example, as I crossed the diffi¬cult Rohtang pass (4,100 metres),where the river Beas is born, I at oncecame face to face with a mass of snow-

covered peaks which like ocean wavesextend beyond the horizon. The greenluxuriance of pines and foliage of thefoothills (Siwalik) disappears and belowthe brilliant ice line of mountain sum¬

mits are the deep valley bottoms ofbrownish rocks which are completelydestitute of vegetation of any kind.This area (typical of Ladakh) is likea vast desert, and it is mostly in thesemountain belts that several of the Bud¬

dhist monasteries are situated.

Both Hinduism and Buddhism have

a strong monastic emphasis and it wasinevitable that these institutions, which

by tradition were set up in isolatedareas, but on major trade routes,should become the basis of religiouslife in the Himalaya and also thecentres of art, education and culture.

The Himalayan monasteries and tem¬ples containing incredibly beautifulworks of art are invariably situatedalong the intersections of the enormoushigh valleys, which are formed by thetwo great rivers, the Indus and theBrahmaputra, flanking in the west andin the east the valleys of rivers suchas the Sutlej, Ganges, Jamuna, Kali,Bhagmati, Tista, Sankosh, etc., whichflow across the mountains roughly fromnorth to south.

This is why, except in some regionsof the western Himalaya, it is mostlyimpossible to travel laterally from westto east or vice versa. Therefore, beforeembarking on each new expedition Ihad to return to the "bases" i.e. Cal¬

cutta in the east and New Delhi in the

west. It is not possible even to gofrom western Bhutan to the eastern

part of the country without goingthrough the Indian plains, unless ofcourse one is prepared to undertake ajourney of over a month with all thehardships thrown in.

In these circumstances the cross

currents of history and styles of artforms have reached these regionsslowly in time with the pace of thetrade caravans that still traverse the


THE WHEEL OF EXISTENCE

Ladakh, in the lap of the majestic snow-coveredKarakoram mountains, in north-east Kashmir,is a region of desolate valleys, almost impenetrablegorges and vast glaciers. With an area ofabout 117,000 square kilometres, Ladakh has apopulation of barely 88,000. This province ofthe ancient Kushan Empire (see article page 4)is an age-old route from India to Central Asia,linked to the great Silk Route. Buddhismreached Ladakh in the second century B.C. Monasteriesfounded down the centuries were embellished

with paintings and sculpture of great beauty.Above, detail of a sketch depicting a 15th-16thcentury mural, "The Wheel of Existence", richin mystic symbolism. This work decorates theThikse monastery, with its terrace (below) openingon to majestic Himalayan panorama. Right,"The Great Renunciation", a magnificentwall painting in the Hemis monastery, Ladakh(17th century). Gautama Buddha takes leaveof his family, cuts off his flowing hair andrenounces worldly life.



Portrait of a Sikkim princess, a rare work of secular art

18

deep river valleys and the tortuouspasses of Ladakh, Himachal Pradesh,Nepal, Sikkim and Bhutan. It was thecaravans and pilgrims that carried theculture of India into the Himalaya, pre¬dominantly from the Buddhist centresof Kashmir and the great monasticinstitutions of the Ganges basin inBihar and Bengal.

As Buddhism fanned out through theHimalaya to become the religion ofall Asia, its art models carried on

painted banners by pilgrims also tra¬versed the "silk routes" of Central

Asia and later reached Tibet, whencethey slowly turned back upon theHimalayan kingdoms of Bhutan andSikkim as late as the fifteenth andsixteenth centuries a one-millennium

journey covering a linear distance ofabout six hundred kilometres. It is as

if the love songs of medieval Provencehad finally reached the Hebrides lastyear.

My journeys in Bhutan and particu¬larly the western part of Sikkim werethe toughest even though the foot¬paths in these regions are at muchlower heights than in the western Hima¬laya. There are monasteries such asTak-sang or "Tiger's nest" in Bhutanhanging at a thousand feet on a ver¬tical rock face, and approached bynarrow footsteps cut out in the rock.

For me the frustrating part of labor¬iously climbing up to some of theseshrines was not so much the effort and

fatigue but often the deep disappoint¬ment of not finding any art object ofmerit or data to suit my purpose. Tak-sang monastery is a case in point.

But at other times I was fully com¬pensated when I discovered somelovely masterpieces of art at the mostunexpected localities. For example,while trekking in western Bhutan fromthe monastery of Wangdu Phodrang tothe famous castle-monastery of Pun-akha, I accidentally came across thesmall but most lovely shrine of Bajocontaining some of the finest earlierexamples of the Buddha figure inBhutan.

To give readers some idea of therough going in western Sikkim, I willbriefly describe one such visit tothe monastery of Sinon.

There is a fairly good jeepable roadfrom the Sikkimese capital Gangtok tothe Pemiangtse monastery, where thepresent ruler of Sikkim once served asa lama. About five kilometres from

Pemiangtse, however, the only accessto Tashi Dhing monastery on the wayto Sinon shrine is a narrow footpathwhich winds along an almost verticalcliff overlooking a river.

This track is not even wide enoughfor mules and hence my interpreter andthe five porters carrying our baggagehad to walk about five kilometres to a

point where a messenger boy had been

sent the day before to arrange forsome mules for our ascent to the mon¬

asteries of Tashi Dhing and Sinon.

Hardly had we set out on the journeywhen I slipped and fell. If it were notfor a sturdy bush three metres below,this article would not have seen the

light of day. I then had to take off myshoes and walk barefooted on burninghot slates for the rest of this torment¬

ing trek. The agony was prolongedwhen the mules did not show up, andhaving come to a point of no return,and because of blisters on my feet, Iwrapped jute rags around my feet toscale a steep slope of another fivekilometres to Tashi Dhing monastery.A kilometre indeed is a very long dis¬tance in these regions.

Exhausted from the climb, heat andaltitude, I never felt so comforted inmy life as when I dipped my blisteredfeet in a bowl of hot water with salt,which was offered to me by the HeadLama. Hsuan Tsang, the noted Chi¬nese Buddhist pilgrim who visitedIndia in the 7th century, has describedthis method of hospitality at the monas¬teries in his famous memoirs, and itis amazing how in the 20th centuryin some parts of the world suchpractices can still have their comfort¬ing validity.

FrROM Tashi Dhing to Sinonis another four kilometres of steeperclimb and there, against the back¬ground of the eternal snows of Kan-chenjunga (8,578 metres), is theancient monastery of Sinon contain¬ing some of the loveliest wall-paintingsin Sikkim.

One of the most beautiful paintingshere is that of the donor princess PediWangmo (see colour photo opposite),the half-sister of the ruler Chador

Namgyal, who was born in 1686. In abizarre plot, reminiscent of medievalEurope, Pedi Wangmo had conspiredwith a Tibetan doctor who assassinat¬

ed Chador Namgyal by opening one ofthe ruler's arteries, thus causing himto bleed to death. A troop of soldierspursued the princess to Namchi(another important monastery which Ivisited), where the doctor was execut¬ed and.Pedi Wangmo was strangledto death with a. silk scarf.

However,, images of secular import,such as those of donors like PrincessPedi Wangmo, are few. The art ofthe Himalaya is largely a religious artand from 'the time of the Indus valleyculture in the 3rd millennium B.C. to

the present day, it has been largelydevoted to the making of images ofdeities.

Hinduism has many gods, and eachof these gods has many forms; butthis vast pantheon was ordered, syste¬matized and standardized in the ancient

holy text books, mostly of the Guptaperiod (4th to 6th centuries A.D.).Every form of each of the gods is assi¬gned a special shape, particular coloursand individual attributes, and all holy¡mages have to be made to exactspecifications.

The three major gods at the top ofthe Hindu pantheon known as theHindu trinity are Brahma, Shiva andVishnu, but in the art of the HimalayaShiva and Vishnu are by far the mostpopular.

The philosophy of Shiva, a god ofcreative energy, is particularly applic¬able in the mountains, and in his moreterrible aspect he is frequently evokedas a protector deity who will save thepeople from their enemies and fromnatural disasters.

Vishnu, on the other hand, appearsin more peaceful and joyful forms inmost of his ten incarnations. In some

of these he is half-man, half-animal,but his best loved manifestation is that

of Krishna, the flute-playing countryboy whose love for the cowgirl, Radha,is one of the most popular themes inpainting.

Similarly, the Buddhist faith is theinspiration and reason for Himalayan


COLOUR PAGES

Opposite

This portrait, distinguished ' by itsremarkable colours, balanced compositionand the intense, yet absent expressionon the subject's face, is of Pedi Wangmo,half-sister of a 17th century Sikkimese ruler.It hangs in the main chapel of themonastery of Sinon, in western Sikkim,which was built under Pedi Wangmo'spatronage. Sikkim's art was mostsuccessful when its painters were ableto break through ' imposed formalism,and portray with individuality and relativefreedom what they saw -,nd felt.

Overleaf

"The Court of Chhoikyong", a magnificent17th century painting in Wangdu Phodrangmonastery, Bhutan, illustrates the greatfreedom with which Himalayan artists usedtheir imagination to enlarge and enhancethe sometimes awesome figures in theBuddhist religion. This group is part ofthe Wheel of Existence, which showsthe world's unreality, to which everyliving being is Inextricably bound.


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art but the form of Buddhism thatwas carried to the mountains around

the eighth century A.D. by Padmasam¬bhava bears scant resemblance to the

simple teachings that had been setforth about twelve hundred years be¬fore by the historic Buddha, Siddhar-tha Gautama.

What the Himalayan people receivedwas Buddhism in the vastly elaboratedform it had taken during its longsettlement in India. By the early yearsof the Christian Era the historic Buddhawas deified and elevated into an eter¬

nal, absolute, primordial principle. Atthe same time Indian Buddhism not

only permitted the use of idols buttook over a vast array of deities fromthe Hindu religion.

The branch of Buddhism that became

most popular in the Himalaya wasVajrayana. Vajrayana worship reliedon magical formulas and magical cere¬monies and on the introduction of

goddesses (Taras) and Buddhas-to-be(Bodhisattvas) to the ever-expandingBuddhist pantheon. Popularly knownas Lamaism, this branch of the religiontaught that the devotee could summonup a huge number of imagined deitiesby means of certain magical formulas.

Both in Hindu and in Buddhist Tan-

trie beliefs, the duality of the sexes wasdeveloped with particular emphasis.One of the cardinal doctrines was the

worship of the spiritual-sexual prin¬ciple: the union of opposites. < Dhyana,or meditation as abstract thought, wasregarded as the male principle, whichremained inert until activated by a cos¬mic female energy (Shakti, or Prajna).

By the eighth century, when Bud¬dhism reached Tibet, Vajrayana waspractically the only form of Buddhismthat still survived in India, its strong¬holds located in such famous monasticinstitutions as Nalanda and Vikrama-shila. From these monasteries Gau¬tama's ancient creed, now metamor¬

phosed into Tantric Buddhism, came tothe Himalaya, where today it still sur¬vives, being in fact the state religionof Sikkim and Bhutan.

In the remote monasteries of the

Himalaya, Vajrayana, - or Tantric Bud¬dhism and its art underwent further

change, largely in spirit, when itencountered natives who believed then,

and believe now, in demons, sorcery,and the pervasive presence of malevo¬lent spirits.


Opposite

In the 18th century, Himalayan paintersand sculptors abandoned the strictrules of religious iconography, gavefree rein to their imagination and drewinspiration from folk art. The resulthas been some extraordinary worksof art fresh in modernism. In painting,left, inspired by a popular tale,a legendary monster, Yama, is being ledaway to atone for his sins.


The people of Ladakh have long placed faith In protector deities.In Tantric Buddhism, the most fearless of these deities Is Yamantaka,often represented as an eagle (above) and a yak (below), as shownin these striking 15th-16th century paintings in Ladakh's Thiksemonastery. Situated astride the major trade routes, the monasteriesand temples became centres of art, education, and culture. Artistshad to rely on Indian merchants for their pigments, especially carmineand Indigo. The Tibetan polygrapher, Taranatha, records thatpart of the duty which was paid by traders as transit fees in Nepal,consisted of paints for local artists.

In a lonely corner of many of Bhutan's monasteries, a small dark roomhung with the skins, teeth and claws of animals enshrines a statue calleda "Bhayankara", the effigy of an enemy. The one seen above is in themonastery of Wangdu Phodrang (16th-17th century). Reserved for denizensof the demoniac world, such rooms are often decorated with paintingsof evil spirits, magicians and witches. Tradition has it that the earliestsettlers in Bhutan's valleys were nomadic tribes from eastern India, butvirtually nothing is known of Bhutan's people and history before the15th century. At that time refugee craftsmen from Tibet arrived inBhutan and set up many workshops for bronze casting. Below,an 18th century painted statue of Padmasambhava, a guru, or Hindu saint,at the Pemiangtse monastery, in Sikkim, where this sage is deeplyvenerated. Nourished by the influence of Indian, Chinese, Iranian andUighurlan (Chinese Turkestan) arts, that of Sikkim flowered in a widevariety of forms.


This influence is seen in what are

called Goinkhangs, which are reservedfor the inmates of the demoniac world.

A Goinkhang is usually a small, darkroom in a lonely corner of a monastery,in the eerie gloom of which are hunghuge skins and the teeth and nails ofanimals, as well as the remains of

sacrificial victims or enemies alongwith their weapons and armour. Thewalls of the room are covered with

paintings of the misshapen forms ofdemons, black magicians, witches, fero¬cious animals, and vultures.

The atmosphere is typically Himal¬ayan, for these people, after all, spendtheir lives under the shadows of the

groaning and cracking sound of des¬cending glaciers and of great avalan¬ches tumbling from the mountains. Thepaintings are typically Himalayan, too:although Buddhist art in general hadits terrifying figures, the artists of theHimalaya had great freedom to enlargeand improve upon this grotesqueworld. Paintings of terrifying gods aremeant to strike terror an emotion that,temporarily at least, thrusts a manoutside of himself.

The Buddhist concept of the cycleof births and deaths is enacted here

in all its sorrow and pain until finallyit points the path of nirvana (salvation).

In contrast to the Goinkhang is theserene, peaceful atmosphere insidethe temple chapels that form the centreof these monasteries. Paintings on thewalls and ceilings of the chapels depicteither Jatakas, scenes of events from

Gautama Buddha's life, or portraits ofTantra gurus (Siddhas). The guruswere the most eminent esoteric per¬sonalities of medieval India, and theyprovide ¡deal links between Hindu andBuddhist Tantricism.

The wall-paintings are done eitherdirectly on the dry plaster not, asWestern frescos are, in wet plaster

or upon canvas glued to the walls.The temple walls are also hung withcloth paintings and brilliant brocadebanners. The focal point of the cha¬pels is the altar, which holds largeenthroned images of gilded stucco orbrass. Incense burns at one side, andoil lamps provide the only light apartfrom a few small windows and the

main door.

Because Tantric art is meant to serve

a religious, rather than an aestheticpurpose, and because artists believedthat they acquired spiritual merit bycopying prototypes, the art has notgreatly changed over the centuries.The emphasis is not on style but oniconography.

The earliest known motif is the naked

Siva prototype, with phallus erect, whosits in a Yoga posture. First seen inthe Indus valley civilization of the thirdmillennium B.C., its corollaries are therepresentation of fierce deities, theprotector gods, who are often por¬trayed with blue or black skin and setin furious scenes suitable to the deep-seated demonism that formed the

Himalaya's aboriginal faith.


Human and animal forms of a more or less mythological nature, floating in space asif engaged on some mysterious quest, are elements in a "Tantric Manifestation of Symbols",a painting at the Thikse monastery, Ladakh (see page 17). A later form of Hinduism,Tantricism gave birth to a wealth of separate symbolic elements which coalesce and thendisintegrate only to join together once more in new symbolic forms. Tantric artistswere thus increasingly able to abandon classical figurative representations and tocreate an art rich in colour and line symbolism.

Photo © Mandanjeet Singh

25

Above, a young dancer of the Bayanlhan Philippine DanceCompany In "The Trees of Fire", a selection of dances fromthe mountain province of northern Luzon.

The subli, a spirited dance ofSpanish inspiration, is usuallyperformed in May in honour of aCatholic religious festival. Itsmusical accompaniment Issupplemented by bamboo castanetscarried by the dancers.

Photos © Odile Montserrat Contact

The Tinlkling (right), the most famous,exciting and difficult of allPhilippine dances, expresses the carefreeexuberance of a rural festival on the

island of Leyte. Young couples,barefooted, skip perilously betweenrapidly clapped bamboo poles (detailbelow). Their movements imitate thelonglegged tinikling birds, which inhabitthe rice fields. This dance Is often the

dramatic finale to a Bayanlhan programme.

The vivacity of

Philippine folk balletI HE Republic of the Philippines

is more than a meeting place for East andWest: its 7,000 islands, grouped in a roughtriangle in the Pacific Ocean, form acrucible in which Asian and Europeancultures have combined with the tradi¬

tional Philippine way of life to producea national heritage of infinite variety andvitality.

Interpreting this kaleidoscopic culturethrough music and dance is the missionof the Bayanihan Philippine Dance Com¬pany, which was established in 1956 tostimulate interest among Filipinos in theirnational folklore.

"Bayanihan" is a Tagalog word mean¬ing the ancient custom of working to¬gether. In fact, it is a way of life amongthe rural populations, born out of theneed of a people with meagre resourcesto band together to achieve their goals:its symbol is a house being moved onthe shoulders of neighbours.

This is the spirit in which the company

was formed, in which it grew, and withwhich it remains imbued today. Thereare no stars, and the dancers are not

professionals.

The Bayanihan Company itself waspart of a much broader movement whichgained momentum after World War II,when the President of the Philippinesset up a special cultural committee tostudy folk customs and traditions on anational scale.

The man who gave special impetus tothis movement was Alejandro R. Roces(now president of the Unesco NationalCommission of the Philippines) whodirected the committee and arranged forspecial teams to tour the country andrecord and study the traditional dances,customs and folklore in the islands and

mountain areas.

The opportunity which catapulted theBayanihan Philippine Dance Company tointernational prominence was provided in1958, when these gifted young dancers


28

PHILIPPINE FOLK BALLET (Continued)

responded to a government appeal fora cultural programme to represent thePhilippines at the World's Fair at Brus¬sels, Belgium.

The artistry with which this spiritedyoung ensemble presented its country'sancient and contemporary dances inBrussels, the scope and diversity oftheir repertoire embracing Philippine,Arabic, Malayan, Spanish and Americanelements their colourful costumes,

and the subtlety of their dancing wereaspects which enchanted the specta¬tors and showed that Bayanihan wasa most effective way of projecting tothe world an impression of the pastand present facets of Philippine life.

In 1959, the company was desig¬nated to "officially represent the Philip¬pines as cultural mission to the Amer¬icas and Europe for one year. . .", andin 1960, they won the special criticsaward for folk ensembles at the Fêtedes Nations in Paris. Since then,

regular tours abroad have been org¬anized; the latest, In 1968, took Bayan¬ihan to North America, Latin Americaand Europe, where their programme, 'incorporating many new dances, wasacclaimed by audiences and criticsalike.

At least as important as its Inter¬national tours are Bayanihan's activitiesat home. Through weekly recitals andvisits to the country's far-flung islands,it is playing a major part in stimulat¬ing renewed interest among the peopleof the Philippines in their diverse folkdances and customs.

This task was started back in the

1930s by an informal group called theFilipiniana Folk Music and Dance Com¬mittee, which was begun at the Philip¬pine Women's College now a uni¬versity to preserve and encouragethe folk music of the islands. Out of

this committee grew the BayanihanFolk Arts Centre, formed in Manila todo research on Philippine culture, topreserve the country's art forms andpromote their use in daily life, andto organize the dance company's per¬formances at home and abroad.

Although traditional dances are "re¬novated" before being presented, theirauthenticity is assured by the workof a team of researchers who often

travel far through the woods of thesouth Philippine islands, or over themountains of the northern regions insearch of ancient dances kept alive byisolated villages.

Mrs. Lucrecia Urtula, the dance di¬rector and choreographer of Bayanihan,acts quickly when word comes throughthat a festival is to be held In a

distant jungle or mountain clearing.Most of the indigenous festivals arereligious in character and tied closelyto the seasons. To pass up thechances to see one, film its dances

and tape record its music often meansan opportunity lost for at least a year.

Along with the music and the stepsof the dances, the researchers areanxious to duplicate the original cos¬tumes. This sometimes presents aproblem. In one of the southern


THE DANCE OF RETRIBUTION

HESE photos of the BayanihanPhilippine Dance Company recount the legendof the Tagablli, an ill-starred tableau whosedimensions correspond to classic tragedy.Against a background of lightning and thun¬der, a poet and chorus intone, and symboli¬cally weave into a tapestry, a plot of love,jealousy and retribution. The favourite wifeof the Datu, or chief, of the Tagabili tribeon the island of Mindanao (centre figure inphoto above) falls in love with her husband'syounger brother. After she reveals her truefeelings during a dance with her husband(left), the Datu engages his brother in mortalcombat (below) and slays him. As punish¬ment, his young daughter falls ill. Accord¬ing to Tagabili belief, she can be savedonly through marriage. Neighbouring tribesand four noble suitors are summoned, eachof whom vies for her hand with a different

'dance. As the guests wait expectantly

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S*S

(above), the princess chooses a poet-princewho wins her heart with a tove song ofhis own composition. But before the marriagecan proceed, tragedy intervenes when theprincess falls into a death trance. The chief'sfavourite wife (right) is grief-stricken by theresults of her folly, and the performance endswith the symbolic burning of his house,signifying the end of his lineage.

Photos © Odile Montserrat

WHEN

THE EARTH SHOOK

IN

KHORASSAN

by Rex Keating

Photo Unesco - Rex Keating

Y<OU take off from Teheran

in the early morning and you flytowards the rising sun. On your leftthe snow crystals glitter on the crownof Demavend rising in perfection to18,000 feet, below your wings undul¬ates the great central desert of Iran.

And so it is for 800 kilometres until

REX KEATING of Unesco's Radio Sectionhas specialized In the popularization ofscience, and In this connexion went toIran last autumn to gather material for"When the World Shook," a series of radioprogrammes on the scientific investigation ofthe Khorassan earthquake disaster. He hasalso devoted many years of study to thehistory of the archaeology of ancient Egypt, onwhich he has written widely. In particularhe has been closely associated with Unesco'sinternational campaign to save the monu¬ments of Nubia since it was launched in 1960.

He recently returned to Sudanese Nubia towitness the closing phase of the campaign'sarchaeological investigations on which he Ispreparing a history as a follow up to hisbook, "Nubian Twilight," published in 1963 byRupert Hart-Davis Ltd., London, and Harcourt,Brace and World Inc., New York.

Photo © Gamma, Paris

and minutes later we bumped to astandstill on an improvised landing

strip.

For twenty minutes a jeep rattledmy bones over a corrugated trackand suddenly we were in the outskirtsof a dusty little town. It was Gonabad.Here dwell some 8,000 people, in a

township which has achieved unsoughtimportance as headquarters for all therescue and relief services concentrated

in the earthquake zone; here, too, hadbeen set up the camp for the team ofUnesco scientists at work in the area.

A feature of this town and of villages

in the region is the brick tower atopmany of the houses. The tower isclosed on three sides; the open side,which faces the prevailing wind, Isdivided into vertical compartments andthese extend down through the roof ofthe house to form an ingenious ventil¬

ating system.

Also characteristic of Khorassan


The earthquake which shook the Iranian province of Khorassan on August 31, 1968lasted perhaps ten seconds, yet it killed between 12,000 and 16,000 people andrendered 150,000 homeless. Below left, gleaming tiled dome of a medieval mosquestands miraculously unscathed amid shattered walls and heaped rubble in Karkhk,one of the hardest hit townships. Below, the aftermath of the disaster. Squatting besidethe tumbled ruins of their homes, women grieve for dead relatives. In Karkhk, wherethis photograph was taken, hardly a family was not bereaved.

from the horizon comes a metallic

flash. It is the golden dome of theShrine of the Imam Reza, and moments

later you touch down at Meshed, toMoslems of the Shi'ite sect the most

holy of cities. It is also the capital ofthe Khorassan Province of Iran. Here,

if. you are a tourist, you pause forseveral days to see the sights and theyare well worth the seeing.

My destination was elsewhere. FromMeshed, an aircraft a tiny two-seater

flew me due south perilously closeto the summits of range upon range ofcoloured mountains. Here the world

has been turned inside out in a chaos

of distorted rock strata. Looking downon the tortured landscape I needed noconvincing that this was one of thenotorious seismic regions of our planet.

For 200 miles the shadow of our

wings dipped and swayed above thatdevil's playground, until a speck on asandy level resolved itself into a tent

WHEN THE EARTH SHOOK (Continued)

As if a giant mole had burrowed beneath the surface

houses are the domed roofs. To stand

at roof level among a forest of suchtowers and domes is infinitely satisfy¬ing to the eye, yet most are built ofadobe mud-brick like the houses

beneath, and in this seismic area such

dwellings are nothing less than deathtraps, destined to collapse at the firstheavy tremor.

The earthquake which shattered thepeace of a summer's afternoon on

August 31, 1968, lasted perhaps 10 sec¬onds, yet it killed between 12,000 and16,000 people and rendered 150,000homeless and destitute. Some two

hundred and thirty villages wereshaken; several, like Dashti-Biaz, sim¬ply fell to fragments so completelythat the remains had to be bulldozed

into the earth, leaving only the fruittrees and a pattern of irrigated fieldsto show that people had once livedthere.

A second shock several days latershattered the large village of Firdos,and it is a strange twist of fate that thissame Firdos was once a great citycalled Toon until, in the year 856, anearthquake destroyed it and, say theold chronicles, 45,000 people perished.

I came upon the large village ofKarkhk from the hills which enfold itand stood for a moment looking downinto a township 'celebrated throughoutKhorassan for its craftsmen 'and as a

holiday resort. I might have been onthe outskirts of an ancient city aban¬doned centuries ago to the hawks andjackals.

The effect was heightened by theremains of a blue-domed mosque lean¬ing in drunken ruin. Around 1t, windowframes and doorways stared sight¬lessly from heaps of rubble which hadonce been houses. A flutter of torn

curtain was the only indication thatpeople had lived, loved and workedthere less than a month before. In the

distance a cloud of dust and a low

rumbling marked the presence of abulldozer pounding the hulks of build¬ings back into the earth.

I walked down into what had once

been a town renowned for its beauty.

It was my first sight of the aftermathof an earthquake "and it took me by thethroat. Here and there men were still

digging among the rubble a monthafter the disaster in the vain hope ofrecovering the body of a missing rela¬tive for proper burial, or a few prizedpossessions. It was a scene of deso¬lation. Only the school, strongly builtof baked brick over a metal frame,

stood foursquare, unharmed.

Among the tumbled ruins of a Saf-favid mosque a donkey munched con-

Photos © Paris Match

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This dramatic photograph shows the effect of the 1968 earthquake at Karkhk Ineastern Iran. The aerial picture taken from 5,500 feet includes an area of cultivated landset in the hills of Khorassan. Contorted fissures can be seen spreading like tentaclesacross the landscape. The original path of the main mountain stream of the town(left of photo) has been totally obliterated. Karkhk until last year was a town renownedfor its beauty and as a holiday resort. It is now a heap of rubble and ruinedbuildings, as photo opposite grimly shows.

tentedly. An old man, its owner,pointed to the hillock of rubble. "Mywife was there when the mosque beganto vibrate horribly. She felt no fear.Here in the house of God what harm

could come to her? Then the dome

fell and the lives of twelve women

praying directly beneath were extin¬guished. She, being in a corneragainst the wall, was dug out, unhurt."He shook his head. "Buried under

there are carpets of great age andbeauty; they should not be forgottenby the rescuers."

Some 8,000 persons, including manyvisitors, had been in Karkhk on thatSaturday afternoon. Within seconds3,000 were dead and hundreds injured.The homeless survivors, some 4,000,

I found in a canvas village erected onthe edge of the ruins.

Tents stood row upon row, each sur¬

rounded with household goods rescuedfrom the rubble pitiful little heaps ofjunk, no more. Moving among them,volunteer workers from the Red Lion

and Sun Society (the Iranian equiva¬lent of the Red Cross) were handingout clothing. In the midst of a groupof devout men a mullah was recitingprayers for the dead, while women

keened softly in the background.

Yet in the midst of tragedy, the placewas vivid with life and movement.

Children played noisily among flutter¬ing chickens, women were preparingthe mid-day meal on portable stovesoutside each tent, others chattered

animatedly while drawing clear waterfrom taps placed at regular intervals.

IHIS water supply and asewage system vital elements in acamp of this size if health is to be safe¬guarded had been installed by theHealth Corps of the Iranian Army ; irri¬gation channels, roads and bridges hadbeen repaired by the Extension andDevelopment Corps. All these youngmen with others from the Education

Corps (the "Army of Knowledge") wereconscripts on National Service.

A temporary school was in full cry,repeating the lessons aloud in theIranian fashion, while in a neighbouringtent some fifty little girls worked oncarpet weaving, sewing and stitchingunder the care of án instructress.

Stores were piled on all sides tents,medical supplies, foodstuffs, cooking

utensils, clothing, much of it donatedby sympathetic countries. A bakeryand a soup kitchen for the volunteerworkers was further evidence of the

speed and efficiency with which theRed Lion and Sun Society had movedin on the devastated area.

I was taken to see the main fault,

where the earthquake originated. Snak¬ing across the plain for 60 kilometresand beyond through mountain rangeswhich bounded the valley to eastand west, it was as if a giant mole hadburrowed just below the surface.

At well-defined points the earth wasthrust upwards, elsewhere it had fallenbelow the original level, showing clear¬ly where forces of compression andexpansion had been released by thetitanic shearing of rocks perhaps10 kilometres down in the earth's crust.

That the shearing had been a scis¬soring movement was shown by thedisplacement of surface features, suchas irrigation embankments, by as muchas five metres. The ill-starred villageof Dashti-Biaz, for example, had lain

squarely astride the fault at its west¬ern extremity.

My guide was Dr. N. Ambraseys,geologist and earthquake engineer of


33

WHEN THE EAÜTH SHOOK (Continued)

Anatomy of a seismic disaster

Imperial College, London, who, to¬

gether with his colleague Dr. J. Tcha-lenko, Dr. S. Budnov, a Yugoslav

earthquake engineer, and ProfessorT. Tassios from the Technical Univer¬

sity of Athens, had been sent out toKhorassbn by Unesco to trace and

map the ramifications of the "quake".

S

34

TANDING in that deserted

steppeland Dr. Ambraseys described

what had probably happened some sixmiles below our feet. The complex

structure of the earth's crust in mount¬

ainous regions of a certain nature

gives rise to internal pressure of un¬imaginable intensity, pressures which

generate energy on a vast scale.

The pressures build up until there

comes a moment when something gives

. way a weak point, or geological fault.It can be likened to a stretched spring

with a flaw in its steel the spring

breaks at that point and the stored

energy is released. So with theearth. The imprisoned energy breaks

out with cataclysmic violence, shearing

the rocks and giving rise to powerfulvibrations in the crust which travel

outwards in all directions like waves

in a pond.

It is these vibrations which shake

the foundations of buildings to the

point of collapse. A curious featureof some earthquakes, as I saw for my¬self in Khorassan, is that buildings

quite close to the source of the earth¬

quake, say within a kilometre or so, are

damaged but do not collapse, whileothers, fifteen or twenty kilometres off,fall into ruins.

The reason for this seeming paradoxIs that near to the source the shock is

violent but short; as the distance

increases so does the violence de¬

crease but the period of shaking length¬

ens and may last as long as 20 or

30 seconds. Only buildings designedto be earthquake resistant can stand

up to prolonged shaking of this kind.

Hence the presence of Ambraseysand his colleagues. Earthquake

engineers can recommend various

categories of structures which whileusing local materials as far as possiblewill be less vulnerable to earthquake

shock.

That crack snaking across the des

erted plain exhibited a detachmentfrom man and his works that I found

terrifying. It would have made no

difference had a city of two million

souls lain in its path. And far belowthe surface those uncontrollable forces

were still active. Later, in a tent not

10 miles away, I was to listen to the

cracking and tearing of the earth'scrust as the vestiges of pent-up ener¬

gy sought to release the strain and

restore equilibrium.

These "micro-shocks", the invariable

aftermath of an earthquake, had been

recorded by a group of three men from

the Geophysical Laboratories of theInstitute of Geological Sciences, Edin¬

burgh: a seismologist. Dr. Stuart Cram-pin, and two assistants. At Unesco's

instigation they had brought to thisremote corner of Asia a collection of

electronic apparatus which represent¬

ed the last word in earthquake

detection.

An R.A.F. Hercules transport had

flown them out to Teheran together

with the out-size truck bearing their

equipment. This monster had been

edged into the aircraft with less thanan inch to spare between it and the

roof of the Hercules. From Teheran

they had nursed their delicate loadof instruments across 1,000 miles of

Iran to the scene of the disaster and

there at the foot of a mountain they

had set up their camp.

0 N the slope 100 feet or soabove, a flame-coloured tent marked

the location of a group of three seismo¬

meters (earthquake detectors) and the

Ultra High Frequency and Very High

Frequency radio receivers. These lat¬ter were tuned to two out-stations set

up by the Edinburgh men 20 and

50 kilometres away respectively, which

were detecting earth tremors and

transmitting the data by automatic

radio back to the central camp.

Analysis of the three sets of signals

made it possible to take bearings andso to pin-point the source of the

"events", as they are termed. The

signals are recorded on magnetic tape

by a machine with no less than twenty-

one recording heads, and by speeding

up the playback of the recorded signals

some fifty-six times the earthquakeshocks become audible and one can

actually hear the rocks being tornasunder far below the surface.

However, this spectacular device is

really no more than a convenient

method of monitoring and storing the

signals; the actual hour-by-hour record

and analysis of shocks is printed on a

continuous paper strip by an ingenious

electrical device known as a jet-pen

recorder.

Incidentally, I was startled to spotan electric vacuum cleaner inside the

tent housing the apparatus, not to

mention a carpet on the floor. None

of this, I was assured, implied exag¬

gerated leanings towards domesticitybut was essential to keep down dust,

a grain of which could put the record¬ers out of action.

IHE seismometers lay in a

rocky hole, deceptively simple cylin¬ders in appearance, yet capable of de¬

tecting tremors on the far side of theearth my footsteps on the nearby

mountain face showed up as violent

disturbances on the paper record.

Two weeks after the original shockthe scientists had recorded no less

than 400 after-shocks daily; at the

time of my visit, a month after the

disaster, 100 "events" were still beingrecorded in 24 hours. This manifesta¬

tion of science at its most sophisticat¬

ed level among the wastelands ofeastern Iran was, to me, in the besttraditions of science fiction. Yet in

that camp there was nothing of fiction

or fantasy in a routine geared exclu¬

sively to scientific observation and

analysis.

The question may be asked: why goto all this trouble and expense? If

ever it becomes possible to predict

earthquakes it can only be through

the amassing and study of a vastamount of data in relation to the seis¬

mic regions of the world, painstakingly

collected by scientific observation andmeasurement.

A great earthquake and its after¬shocks offer an opportunity of collect¬

ing vital information in a short time,provided you can get equipment to

the spot soon enough; on the other

hand, the engineers concerned with

the design of earthquake-resistantbuildings can also obtain from the ins-

pection of damage factual Informationon which they can test their theoriesabout the behaviour of different kinds

of buildings under seismic stresses.

In some places, even today, It would

be possible to forecast the likelihoodof a seismic disturbance but not, unfor¬

tunately, its time or intensity. Never¬theless in an unstable area of that

kind and with such information avail¬

able a planning authority would bewell advised to steer clear of majorconstructional works such as new

towns, nuclear power plants or hydro¬electric stations. Or if building is

unavoidable, then it should be earth¬

quake resistant both in design andconstruction.

Obviously earthquakes must be stud¬ied on the spot, and as soon as pos¬

sible after a disaster. To locate, co¬

ordinate and organize the transport ofa team of specialists seismologists,

geologists and earthquake engineers

literally at a few hours notice is beyond

the scope of most Individual countries.It has become an international opera¬tion with Unesco at the centre of a

communications network which strad¬

dles the globe.

w.ITHIN an hour or so of a

major earthquake the scientist respon¬

sible at Unesco Headquarters is noti¬

fied, at any hour of the day or night. He

immediately makes contact with indivi¬

dual specialists. They form a pool, as

it were, of scientists and engineers

who stand ready to drop everythingand take off for the scene of the

disaster. They could come from as

many as half a dozen countries.

On returning to their universities or

institutes they prepare detailed reports

of their findings and conclusions which

are published by Unesco and distri¬buted to the interested bodies in all

member states. This was the pro¬cedure followed in the Khorassan

earthquake.

Here is an instance of science in

the service of mankind, working unob¬trusively for the prevention of death.

And as the corpus of knowledge

grows, we may look forward to a time

when the appalling human misery of

a Khorassan, a Skopje or an Agadirwill be a thing of the past.

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pPhoto Unesco - Rex Keating

Amassing and analysing vital scientific data following a majorearthquake such as the Khorassan disaster has become anInternational operation co-ordinated by the earthquake emergencyservice operated by Unesco from its Paris headquarters.Within hours of a serious earth tremor this service can contact

and despatch to the stricken area a group of scientists andengineers. The tent, above, pitched on the edge of a vastplain in Iran is an outpost used by seismologists of a Unescomission carrying out a scientific Investigation of the Khorassanearthquake. Here, and at two unmanned stations miles away,the after-shocks that continue deep underground long afterthe major shock are detected by seismometers.

35

HIMALAYAN ART

(Continued from page 24)

Another characteristic motif is the

ever popular Mithuna, or lovers, some¬times in sexual embrace. Depicted ina variety of forms, these are knownin Tibet as the "yab-yum", or mother-father couple. A third anthropomorphictheme is the human-animal configura¬tion, in which the deity appears ashalf-human and half-ánimal.

An ensemble of these cardinal motifs

and several other subsidiary symbolspopular in- the Himalaya is the Wheelof Life. First seen in a Gupta periodpainting at the Ajanta caves in India,the Wheel of Life sums up both pic-torially and philosophically the Hinduand Buddhist view of life and thecauses of human sorrow.

Cultural influences from great civi¬lizations have reached the Himalaya

only after a considerable time lag,because of the hardships in the pathsof travellers, but similarly the ultimatedecline of its traditions has been delay¬ed by geographical isolation. Eventoday in the great river valleys ringedby the gigantic mountain ranges canbe found traces of culture, which arederived from those of northern and

central India and remain closely alliedto them.

But the isolation, the geographicalhardship and the grandeur of the area,have given the beliefs and the cul¬ture that expresses them a magnifi¬cence and mystery of their own. Themasterpieces of ancient art preservedin the Himalayan monasteries and tem¬ples reflect great periods in the historyof Asia and the world in the same wayas the ruins of Pompeii give an insightinto the civilization of Rome at its

height.

PHILIPPINE FOLK BALLET

36

(Continued from page 28)

regions, they saw beautiful beadedattire and, in order to guarantee theauthenticity of the costumes to bereproduced, by Bayanihan's seam¬stresses, they asked if they could buya model costume. The tribesmen

agreed, and the Philippine Women'sUniversity footed the bill. . . six horses.

As important as the audio and visualaspects of the dances are their his¬tories, and the researchers from the

Folk Arts Centre closely question theoriginal performers about their back¬ground and origins. These interviewsoften must be conducted through in¬terpreters, for 87 dialects are spokenin the Philippines.

In addition to tape recordings andfilms of local musicians playing in theauthentic manner, the field study tripshave yielded a full set of Philippinemusical instruments. Local masters

teach the Bayanihan musicians how toplay such unusual instruments as thekulintangan, a set of eight graduatedgongs used by Muslim Filipinos, thebamboo xylophone called the gabbang,and the balingging, a bamboo fluteblown with the nostril.

After a field trip, Mrs. Urtula facesthe delicate and sometimes monu¬

mental task of choreographing localdances so that they can be presentedon a modem stage to internationalaudiences, and at the same time remain

truly representative of the culture fromwhich they evolved.

For instance, the Pagdiwata, a riceplanting dance discovered on thewestern island of Palawan, ¡s a forty-eight hour performance that had to becondensed, shaped and moulded intoa theatrical piece. The most importantaspects of the two day marathon were

selected and co-ordinated from the

tapes and films made in the field, andthe final result is a dramatic, sevenminute dance highlighted by the state¬ly whirling of the high priestess andher attendants, who bear lightedcandles on their heads and on the

backs of their hands, joined in a prayerof thanksgiving for a bountiful harvest,and supplication for continued protec¬tion and favour.

Most of the dancers are in their

teens or early twenties. They areadmitted into the company only afterstrict auditions, and if they marry theymust leave. To ensure a reservoir of

young talent, the Bayanihan Folk ArtsCentre has a regular programme oftraining for young men and womenfrom whose ranks are chosen the

members of the dance company. Thismay help explain the youthful anddynamic quality of the troupe, whichhas impressed spectators throughoutthe world.

Providing facilities for research,recruitment and training is the Philip¬pine Women's University, in whose en¬vironment Bayanihan first flourished,and which continues to play a majorpart in its success.

The panorama that Bayanihan un¬folds to its audiences affords an oppor¬tunity of seeing folk art which, morethan a preservation of the past, is afunctioning, essential part of the Philip¬pines of today. The myriad styles andtechniques, ranging from fierce, primi¬tive dances and displays of prowess,through stately social dances or reli¬gious ceremonials, to folk antics andbursts of dazzling virtuosity, are allPhilippine in origin, and yet testify tothe cultural calling cards that havebeen left in this nation of islands eastof the Asian land mass.

Asia's growing road networkTo complete the ten main routes

projected in its Five Year Plan, the AsianHighway System needs $440 million inexternal aid to supplement the $500 mil¬lion contributed by the participatingcountries. It is hoped to reach thegoal of minimum International road con¬nexions joining the nations of the mostpopulated region of the world within twoto three years.

Well-suited

for 300 degrees C.A new lightweight fire protection suit,

claimed to protect its wearer at tem¬peratures over 300 degrees centigrade, hasbeen developed in Sweden. Made ofrayon and alumlnized polyester, It has beendesigned to repel 98 per cent of radiationheat through reflection. It gives thewearer great freedom of movement Inemergencies, such as rescuing peoplefrom car or airplane wrecks, because ofits light weight and design.

50 years

of Byelorussia

0.JN January 1, 1969, the Byelo¬russian Soviet Socialist Republic, one ofthe 125 member states of Unesco and aco-founder of the United Nations, cele¬brated the 50th anniversary of Its creation.Formerly a backward, Illiterate andagrarian outskirt of czarist Russia, Bye¬lorussia has become a developed countrywhose industrial goods are now on salein 80 countries the world over.

What is Byelorussia now?

It is one of the 15 sovereign republics,which make up the Soviet Union, situatedalmost in the heart of the Europeancontinent with its capital at Minsk (pop.772,000).

It is 207,500 sq. km. of dense forests,picturesque fields, bottomless swamps andcountless rivers which, if put together inlength, could run around the Equatorseveral times.

It has 9 million people, mostly Byelo¬russians, who, by their culture, languageand origin, are very close to the Russianand Ukrainian nations.

It is the only republic in the U.S.S.R.whose population has not yet reached thepre-war figure because 2,500,000 people,or every fourth inhabitant, died during theSecond World War.

It is a land (called the "Hartfsan Re¬public" during the war) which has virtuallyarisen, Phoenix-like, from the ashes of warafter the 1941-44 invasion of the Nazi

armies, and had to start to build almost

everything from scratch all over again.

It has 76 Industrial centres, rankingsecond in the U.S.S.R. for production oflorries, motorcycles, watches and clocks,and ¡s a major producer of potatoes, flax,hemp and wheat.

Its Academy of Sciences boasts30 research institutes and laboratories; in

Gl jü G3->

u' ^ r ""

EflSuicides increasing

Suicide has climbed to third place as acause of death among people aged 15 to45 years in Canada, Austria, Denmark,Finland, Federal Republic of Germany,Hungary, Sweden and Switzerland, accord¬ing to a World Health Organization reportfor 1955-1966. Suicide rates are highestamong men, especially those aged 75, orover.

Unesco and its programmeUnesco has just published the first two

brochures in a series entitled "Unesco and

its Programme." The brochures, "The Rightto Education" and "Teachers for the Schools

of Tomorrow" are available in English,French or Spanish editions. Priced at$1.00; 6/- or 3.50 F, they can be orderedfrom Sales Section, Unesco, Place de Fon¬tenoy, Paris-7e. For distribution to schools,libraries, non-governmental organizationsand other educational bodies, specimencopies can be obtained, free of charge,from Unesco's Public Liaison Division.

Besides its professional orchestras andtheatre and ballet companies, Byelorussiahas many amateur groups in which over360,000 adults and young people devotethemselves to the performing arts. Here,young amateur musicians play the tsymbaly,a Byelorussian folk instrument.

all, 185 research centres with a staff of17,000 scientists.

It has 28 higher educational establish¬ments with a student body of 125,000 and126 "technicums" (junior colleges whichtrain engineers, doctors, etc.) with anenrolment of 140,000 students, while1,769,000 pupils attend general schools ofall levels.

18 theatres, 46 museums, 20,500 li¬braries with 80 million books, 5,600 clubs,23 recreation parks, 5,500 film projectorsprovide for cultural leisure and entertain¬ment.

The republic prints 54 magazines,and 176 newspapers with a circulation offour million copies; in 1967, It produced2,000 book titles accounting for 22 millioncopies.

In the steps ofHans Christian Andersen

The town of Sestri Levante, on theItalian Riviera, where the famous Danishwriter of fairy tales, Hans Christian Ander¬sen, lived for many years, has establisheda competition open to Italian and Danishwriters. The 1968 Andersen Prize for the

best fairy tale of the year has beenawarded to Maria Remiddi, managingeditor of the Italian edition of the "Unesco

Courier," for her story "The King's Testa¬ment." Gold medals were awarded to the

Danish writers Arne Hartmann and

Gudrun Hangor.

The ark under wayIn its latest global report, "The Ark Under

Way," the World Wildlife Fund, set upIn 1961 as an International organization forsaving the world's wildlife and wild places,notes encouraging progress in the work itaccomplished between 1965 and 1967. Bythe end of 1967, the Fund had financed

183 conservation projects, mostly in Africa.In "The Ark Under Way," Peter Scott,chairman of the Fund, recalls that out ofsome 200 species of animals that havedisappeared In the last 2,000 years, 38 percent have become extinct in the last

50 years. He urges more research inecology, more land to be set aside assanctuaries and, above all, education topromote wildlife conservation.

Unesco science prizefor British inventor

Prof. R.S. Silver, British inventor of themulti-stage flash distillation process fordesalting sea water, was awarded theUnesco Science Prize for 1968 at a cere¬

mony in Unesco House, on November 5,1968. He is the first winner of the

$3,000 prize, established for "outstandingcontributions to the technological develop¬ment of a developing Member State orregion." In the multi-stage flash distillationprocess, which can be used with bothatomic reactor and ordinary fuels, seawater is heated under pressure, and whenthe pressure is released it suddenly"flashes" into steam, which condensesinto fresh water. First installed in Kuwait

in 1957, the system has since been setup in many other countries.

Flashes...

Under its recent "Manifesto on the

Conservation of Nature and Natural Re¬

sources." the Somali Republic is to intro¬duce special laws, establish national parksand nature reserves, and teach conserva¬tion in schools.

By 1980, there are likely to be 130million motor vehicles in the United States,

using 107 thousand million gallons of fuelannually.

The 1968 Unesco painting award hasbeen won by Spanish artist Manuel Her¬nandez Mompé for his work "Ansia deVivir." The award is made every twoyears to honour the work of an outstand¬ing modern artist.

With 9,652,000 passengers in J 967,Heathrow, near London, is the worJd's

busiest airport. In 1970, 20 million peoplewill pass through Heathrow.

BOOKSHELF

RECENT UNESCO BOOKS

Statistical Yearbook 1967

Population, education, libraries andmuseums, book production, news¬papers, paper consumption, film andcinema, radio and TV.

1968 ($20; £6 stg.)

International Yearbook

of Education Vol. XXIX - 1967

International Bureau of Education,Geneva - Unesco, 1968

($13; 77/- stg.)

International Understanding asin Integral Part of the SchoolCurriculum

International Bureau of Education,

Geneva - Unesco, 1968

($8.50; 51/- stg.)

The Social Sciences:

Problems and Orientations

32 articles and studies in

English or FrenchCo-edition Mouton and Co., The

Hague - Unesco, 1968 ($13; 77/-)

Educational Planningin the U.S.S.R.

Unesco - International Institute for

Educational Planning, ParisA study by K. Nozhko, E. Monoszon,V. Zhamin and V. Severtsev

1968 ($6; 36/- stg.)

MAN AND HIS PLANET

The Origin of LifeBy J.D. BernaiWorld Publications, Cleveland,Ohio, U.S.A., 1968 ($12.50)

Not So Rich as You Think

By George R. StewartHoughton Mifflin, New York, 1968($5)

Great Waters

By Sir Auster HardyHarper and Row, New York, 1968($10.95)

Harvest of the Sea

By John BardachHarper and Row, New York, 1968($6.95)

A Dictionary of European WritersPrepared by W.N. Hargreaves-Mawdsley, J.M. Dent and Sons Ltd.,London, 1968 (38/- stg.)

Dryden(Literature in Perspective)By Dennis DavisonEvans Brothers, London, 1968(paperback 8/6 stg.)

The Pakistanis

(The Modern World)By Ian StephensOxford Univ. Press, London, 1968(paperback 8/6 stg.)

Sight, Sound and Society(Motion Pictures and Televisionin America)Edited by David Manning Whiteand Richard Averson

Beacon Press, Boston, U.S.A.1968 ($7.50)

The Course of Irish HistoryEdited by TW. Moodyand F.X. Martin

The Mercier Press Ltd., Cork, Ireland,1967 (hardback 40/- stg.;paperback 21/-)

Letters to the Editor

38

RESPECT FOR OTHER FAITHS

Sir.

I should like to see you publishsomething on the different religions ofthe world. Sometimes, we tend to lookdown on other faiths; if we understoodthem better, I think we would feel lesssuperior.

Marlene Hung Fok KingPort Louis, Mauritius

OUR TWELFTH EDITION

Sir,

I was delighted to learn that aHebrew edition has been added to the

11 existing languge editions of the"Unesco Courier". I look forward to

many more years of pleasure fromreading your magazine one of theworld's most remarkable publications.

Felix Allouche

Bath-Yam, Israel

SYMBOL OF A COSMIC TRUTH

Sir,

I was astonished to see in your issueon the Ramayana and the Mahabha-rata (December 1967) that nobodyexplained the Ramayana as a veiledrepresentation of a cosmic truth.

The Ramayana represents the journeyof the soul from the Region of Blissdown into matter (into desire and lust)until the deepest point is reached.Then the Voice of Silence (the Innervoice conscience) comes as a messen¬ger from the Ego, and a battle ensuesbetween the soul and the powers ofevil, with evil finally being conquered.After his conversion, Man begins hisjourney back to the "father-house". Atthe end of this journey, he has regain¬ed the Region of Bliss.

Rama is the soul. That is why hisbirth was supernatural. Sita is thebody. That is why she was not bornof woman, but rose up from a furrowwhen her father was ploughing a field inpreparation for a sacrifice.

Rama and Sita are banished from

Ayodhya (the Region of Bliss, or heav¬en), and when they arrive in DandakaForest (the earth), Sita falls prey toRavana (evil, lust, desire, ignorance),and she is taken to Lanka, deep intothe mire of sensual things. Then Ramasends Hanuman (conscience) to Sita,and struggles down to meet her. Thebattle between good and evil Is Joined,with Rama fighting the forces of evil.

His adversary, Ravana, is helped by,among others, Khoembhakarna, thehuge giant who represents sloth (Evenafter Man admits the error of his ways,he must still struggle against sloth andhabit).

When Khoembhakarna is killed, Indra-jit continues the fight, shooting arrowswhich change into poisonous snakes.The evil powers have the upper handuntil Hanuman fetches the magic herbfrom Mount Kalasan (help from onhigh meditation, contemplation, .etc.).Then the final struggle against Ravanastarts. He has ten heads, which mustbe cut off at the same time; if only onehead is cut off, it grows back again (IfMan conquers one aspect of evil, hefalls prey to another. Man can triumph

over evil only if he defeats it in allits aspects). With divine help (theBrahma weapon), Rama fights with allhis strength and slays Ravana.

After his conversion, Man regardsthe body as being intrinsically evil, thecause of all his troubles. He chas¬

tises- the body (Rama repudiates Sita).But Sita vindicates herself in an ordeal

by fire. Man must learn that the thingsof the body are not in themselves evil;they are also from God. Only Man'sattitude is evil when he uses his bodywith lust, desire and sensuality.

With Sita's exoneration, the body andsoul become, one, and may strive to¬gether to attain perfection (Be ye there¬fore perfect, as your Father in heavenis perfect). In this way, Rama and Sitaregain Ayodhya (Man enters heaven,the Region of Bliss).

That is the original conclusion of theepic. The second part is more recent,and does not belong to the originalstory.

Parallels are found with other stories.

Perseus and his mother were banished

from Argos, and Perseus had to over¬come evil in the person of Polydectes.The story of Paradise, together with theGospel, forms another parallel. Andthere are others.

The fact that these stories may alsobe interpreted as sun myths takes awaynothing from the cosmic truth theyrepresent. The sun also descends intothe underworld to fight the powers ofevil.

In this case, Rama is the sun. Hewins his bride by bending a bow; hesuffers for the welfare of others; hefights against the powers of evil anddarkness; he wins by means of a magicweapon, which he alone can use.His bride's name Sita actually meansfurrow (e.g. the earth wed to the sun).

This duality of truths was discoveredlong ago, and has given birth to theadage, "So on high, so below".

When thinking about the Ramayana,the reader will doubtless find, by usingthe above key, that many episodes inthe story and many persons becomeclearer to him. I was surprised thatamong the very learned authors writ¬ing in the "Unesco Courier", noneexplained the Ramayana as the repres¬entation of an eternal truth.

Dr. H. BongersBilthoven, the Netherlands

SCHOLARSHIPS FOR NON-WHITE

SOUTH AFRICANS

Sir,

I wish to thank the students of the

University of East Anglia for establish¬ing a scholarship fund for the assistanceof non-white South African students

(Letters to the Editor, January 1968).This scholarship will be a valuable addi¬tion to the many already offered bySouth African trusts to our own people.

A list compiled by the Education In¬formation Centre (P.O. Box 97) inJohannesburg to provide information toprospective and other interested non-white students, shows that there are198 separate funds from which one ormore scholarships and bursaries areawarded annually to non-white students.

Grants and loans are also readily avail¬able from both universities and trainingcolleges.

Our association's Students' Aid Fund

is one of the smaller trusts, but its capi¬tal amount shows a steady increase.In 1968 we were assisting five non-white women students, one post grad¬uate and four undergraduates. In add¬ition, some of our branches administer

their own bursary funds for non-whitestudents.

If the students and members of the

Senate of the University of East Angliawish any further information on thissubject, I shall be happy to supply it.

' Eleanor ChaplinNational President

South African Association of

University WomenDurban, South Africa

HUMAN RIGHTS- AND DUTIES

Sir,

Your number on Human Rights . . .Tomorrow (November 1968) affirmsthat little respect is felt for humanrights today; "... Man is no longermuch in fashion among the leaders ofthe nations ..." But was he ever in

fashion? Have these leaders at anytime hesitated to call upon men to des¬troy each other in the name of God,Allah, or the Fatherland?

Are not the numerous atrocities com¬

mitted by Man ample evidence that heshould be reminded of his duties as

well as his rights? Man's worth ismeasured on the basis of the duties he

has fulfilled, not on the basis of his

rights.Saly Levy

Zurich, Switzerland

" SORRY I SOLD OUT "

Sir,

Bravo for the issue devoted to Japanon the occasion of the Meiji Centenary(September-October 1968). The inter¬esting articles in every issue not onlygive one the satisfaction of learningsomething new, but also show clearlythat there are still many problems to besolved.

I have only one complaint: the diffi¬culty I have in obtaining your magazine.When it is due to appear I go day afterday to the bookshop, but on manyoccasions finally to hear the booksellersay, sadly, "I'm sorry, the 'UnescoCourier' was sold out this morning."When that happens, all I can do is tohope for better luck the following month.

Josef WyzzotChorzow, Poland

ANTIQUE SITE IN PERIL

Sir,

Could you devote an article in afuture issue to the recently discoveredarchaeological site at Marseille. It Isnow threatened with being swept awayto make place for modern buildings,which I think the municipality could erectelsewhere.

C. Bonnafour

Malsons Alfort, France

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Just published

The first volume

in a new series of

UNESCO

ART

BOOKS

HIMALAYAN ART

by Madanjeet Singh

Published by

Macmillan and Co. Ltd.,London, Bombay, Calcuttaand Madras

Macmillan South Africa

(Publishers) Pty Ltd.,Johannesburg

The Macmillan Companyof Australia Pty Ltd.,Melbourne

The Macmillan Companyof Canada Ltd., Toronto

In U.S.A., published by theNew York Graphic Society,Greenwich, Conn. ( $35.00)

296 pages

13 inches by 11 inches

Cloth binding

Price: £12.12.0

140 full-colour photographs and many black and whiteillustrations

A fascinating account of a unique and virtually unknownchapter in Asian and world art

Wall-paintings and sculpture of Nepal, Sikkim, Bhutan and

the Himalayan plateaux and valleys

A magnificent pictorial record of works which it has never

been possible to photograph before

WHERE TO RENEW YOUR SUBSCRIPTIONand order other Unesco publications

Order from any bookseller, or write direct tothe National Distributor in your country. (See listbelow ; names of distributors in countries notlisted will be supplied on request.) Payment ismade in the national currency ; the rates quotedare for an annual subscription to THE UNESCOCOURIER in any one language.

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HIDDEN ART

OF THE HIMALAYA

In a rocky wilderness walled in by mightyHimalayan peaks, 16th century Buddhist monksfounded this religious community, the Kyemonastery, on the northern tip of India.The Kye monastery and other remote templeson the slopes of the Himalaya abound in hithertovirtually unknown masterpieces of paintingand sculpture, recently revealed to the, worldthrough the expeditions of a venturesomeIndian scholar, Madanjeet Singh(see story page 14).


Civilizations of Central Asia and the Himalayas; The...

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