TIBETAN TRADITIONS AND CUSTOMS. 225
original signification of the word Sakya , derived from therecords of a nation which was so largely indebted for its ideasand its traditions to later foreign sources.
That evidence should, however, be stated. The Tibetan Evidencesacred books preserve an account of the Sakya creation ; of ° f J. ll)etanthe non-sexual procession of the ancient Sakya kings ; and of as to thethe settlement of the Sakyas at Kapila, the birthplace of Sakyas.Buddha . Their chief seat was the kingdom of Kosala, nearthe southern base of the Himalayas. Tibetan traditions placethe early Indian homes of the Sakyas on the banks of theBhaglrathl, as distinctly as the Vedic hymns place the homesof the primitive Aryans on the tributaries of the Indus. Theyclaim, indeed, for Buddha a Kshattriyan descent from thenoble Ishkvaku or Solar line. But it is clear that the racecustoms of the Indo-Sakyas differed in important respects fromthose of the Indo-Aryans.
At birth, the Sakya infant was made to bow at the feet of a Sakya racetribal image, Taksha Sakya-vardana, which, on the presenta- customs -tion of Buddha , itself bowed down to the divine child. 1 Inregard to marriage, the old Sakya law is said to have alloweda man only one wife. 2 The dead were disposed of by burial,although cremation was not unknown. In the topes or funeralmounds of Indian Buddhism is apparently seen a reproductionof the royal Scythian tombs of which Herodotus speaks. 3Perhaps more remarkable is the resemblance of the greatco-decease of Buddha’s companions to the Scythian holo-causts of the followers, servants, and horses of a dead monarch. 4On the death of Buddha, according to the Tibetan texts, a co-decease of 18,000 of his disciples took place. On the deathof the faithful Maudgalyayana, the co-decease of disciplesamounted to 70,000; while on that of Sariputra, the co-decease of Buddhist ascetics was as high as 8o,ooo. 5 Thecomposite idea of a co-decease of followers, together with theBuddhist funeral mound over the relics of an illustrious person-age, was in accordance with obsequies of the Scythian type.
Whatever may be the scientific value of such analogies, the Scythicinfluence of the Scythian dynasties in Northern India is ahistorical fact. The Northern or Tibetan form of Buddhism , 40-634 ’represented by the Scythian monarch Kanishka and the Fourth A - D -
1 Mr. Rockhill’s Life of the Buddha, p. 17. 2 Idem, p. 15.
4 The slaughter of the king’s concubine, cup-bearer, and followers is
also mentioned in Herodotus , iv. 71 and 72.
5 Mr. Rockhill’s Life of the Buddha, p. 141, footnote 3, and p. 148.