Allahabad Pillar

The Allahabad Pillar is a stambha, containing one of the pillar edicts of Ashoka, erected by Ashoka, emperor of the Maurya dynasty, who reigned in the 3rd century BCE. While it is one of the few extant pillars that carry Ashokan edicts, it is particularly notable for containing later inscriptions attributed to the Gupta emperor Samudragupta (4th century CE). Also engraved on the stone are inscriptions by the Mughal emperor Jahangir, from the 17th century.

According to some scholars, the pillar was moved from its original location and installed within Akbar's Allahabad Fort in Prayagraj (formerly Allahabad), Uttar Pradesh by Emperor Akbar himself, but this theory is disputed by other scholars who point out the absence of any confirmatory evidence that the pillar was moved, and pre-Mughal inscriptions that indicate that it was already present in its current location. As the fort is now occupied by the Indian Army, the public are only allowed limited access to the premises and special permission is required to view the pillar.

The Allahabad Pillar is a single shaft of polished sandstone standing 35 feet (10.7 m) high. It has a lower diameter of 35 inches (0.9 m) and an upper diameter of 26 inches (0.7 m). The customary lotiform bell-shaped capital seen in the other Ashoka Pillars is lost, as is whichever statue mounted it. However the abacus, adorned by a "graceful scroll of alternate lotus and honeysuckle" that the statue must have rested upon, was found nearby. Cunningham believed that the capital must have been mounted by a single lion. The abacus is almost identical to the one found on the pillar at Sankasya suggesting proximate erection dates.

According to the theory proposed by 19th-century archaeologists, and supported by Indian scholars such as Upinder Singh, the Allahabad Pillar came from somewhere else, probably Kaushambi. The Ashokan inscriptions suggest that the pillar was first erected at Kaushambi, an ancient town some 30 miles (50 kilometres) west of its current location which was then the capital of the kingdom of Vatsa. It was moved to Allahabad much later when the region came under Muslim rule. The presence of another broken pillar at Kaushambi near the ruins of the Ghoshitarama monastery has led some to believe that the Allahabad Pillar might have been one of a pair, not unlike the ones discovered at Rampurva.

The pillar has been taken down and re-erected a number of times since the 13th century. It was once re-erected during the time of Jahangir in 1605, albeit crowned by a globe surmounted by a cone, and was later sketched by the Jesuit missionary, Joseph Tiefenthaler, in the mid-18th century. General Kyd pulled the pillar down in 1798. In 1838, Captain Edward Smith "of the Engineers" set up the pillar once again, this time with a new lion capital of his own design. Cunningham criticised this effort at restoration as "a signal failure" as he thought the statue was "small and recumbent". He summed up the design with the following remark,

Indeed, it looks to me not unlike a stuffed poodle stuck on the top of an inverted flower pot.

An alternate theory proposed by Krishnaswamy and Ghosh in 1935 states that the Allahabad Pillar was never moved. They dismissed the theory that Muslim Sultans, anyone from the Mughal empire, Hindu kings before the arrival of Islam, or any private individual may have moved the pillar from Kaushambi to the current location. Their arguments are based on the dates of the numerous inscriptions on the pillar, the lack of textual evidence in any historical texts, or of a reason for anyone to move the pillar from Kaushambi to Allahabad, since there is no evidence that these were significant cities. They also dismiss the possibility that a private individual may have moved it because the pillar is too big and heavy, and required a very large amount of resources to move it. Ashoka may have installed it at Prayag because the confluence of Ganges and Yamuna rivers was already a major pilgrimage site during his time, thus a location that gave more access and visibility to his edicts. The Ashokan inscription is merely a copy of the Kausambi inscription, state Krishnaswamy and Ghosh. The surface damage and the addition of numerous new inscriptions happened while the pillar stood in Allahabad.

A third theory was proposed in 1979 by John Irwin, who concurred with Krishnaswamy and Ghosh that the Allahabad Pillar was never moved and was always at the confluence of the rivers Ganges and Yamuna. He further stated that the pillar's origins were undoubtedly pre-Ashokan based on all the evidence at the site, the major and minor inscriptions as well as textual evidence, taken together. According to Irwin, an analysis of the minor inscriptions and ancient scribblings on the pillar first observed by Cunningham, also noted by Krishnaswamy and Ghosh, reveals that these included years and months, and the latter "always turns out to be Magha, which also gives it name to the Magh Mela", the bathing pilgrimage festival of the Hindus.