Memoirs of the Archæological Survey of India. Excavations at Paharpur Bengal

G. C. Chandra who was then Superintendent of the Eastern Circle carried out the excavation of the cells on the south-east side of the monastery and the adjoining courtyard. [...] Situation.—The situation of Paharpur at a distance of about 29 miles to the nortwest of Mahasthan (ancient Pundravardhs.na) the capital of this part of the country and over 30 miles to the south-east of Bangarh the ancient Bot-vanilla the secondary capital of North Bengal does not afford any special attration to the founder of a monastic establishment unless the idea was to develop a [...] Paharpur of sculptural and epigrphical remains of a period earlier than that of the Nitta the main fabric of the Paharpur temple and monastery has to be attributed to the time of the early Pala emperors in the latter part of the 8th century A. D. As Eastern India was the last stronghold of Buddhism in India it was but natural that the great monastery at Paharpur continued to flourish almost [...] It is at this period that Bengal was trying to assert its indivduality in the sphere of art and the first attempt at the formation of a school of sculpture (as at Paharpur) must be traced to the end of the 8th and beginning of the 7th century A. D. This effort hoviever appears to have proved somewhat abortive owing probably to the unsettlepolitical condition of Bengal from the middle of [...] With the advent of the Alas who professed the Buddhist religion Buddhism was in the ascendent in Bengal and Bihar although the determined antagoinam of the later Buddhists to Brahmanism does not manifest itself in the establisments at Nalanda and Paharpur which flourished during the times of the Palas.