Word: sanchi
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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After Sariputta and Moggallana died (about 480 B.C.), their bones were preserved inside two stupas (large stone monuments) at Sanchi in central India, which became a center of Buddhist pilgrimages. Later generations of Buddhists neglected them, but in 1851 a British military engineer found the bones and sent them to London. They were bought by the Victoria and Albert Museum, and the caskets containing the bones remained on view there for almost a half century...
Last week the bones were ceremoniously carried back to Sanchi. Prime Minister Nehru opened the celebration, and officials of eight Asiatic countries were on hand, among them Burma's pious Premier U Nu. Before a reverent crowd of 100,000, the bones, encased in glass, were carried up to a new stupa, built on a hilltop near the old ruins. Then, while saffron-robed monks chanted Buddhist litanies, the remains of the honored disciples Sariputta and Moggallana were laid to rest...
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