History of Science in South Asia A journal for the history of all forms of scientific thought and action, ancient and modern, in all regions of South Asia  A Model of the Universe in Kathmandu  s Old Royal Palace Gudrun Bühnemann University of Wisconsin-Madison  style citation form: Gudrun Bühnemann.   A Model of the Universe in Kathmandu  s Old Royal Palace.   History of Science in South Asia, 8 (2020): 1  12. DOI: 10.18732/hssa.v8i0.59. MLA  Online version available at: http://hssa-journal.org  HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN SOUTH ASIA A journal for the history of all forms of scientific thought and action, ancient and modern, in all regions of South Asia, published online at http://hssa-journal.org  ISSN 2369-775X  Editorial Board:              Dominik Wujastyk, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada Kim Plofker, Union College, Schenectady, United States Dhruv Raina, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India Clemency Montelle, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand Fabrizio Speziale, School of Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (EHSS), Paris, France Michio Yano, Kyoto Sangyo University, Kyoto, Japan  Publisher: History of Science in South Asia Principal Contact: Dominik Wujastyk, Editor, University of Alberta Email:  wujastyk@ualberta.ca  Mailing Address: History of Science in South Asia, Department of History and Classics, 2  81 HM Tory Building, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, T6G 2H4 Canada This journal provides immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge. Copyrights of all the articles rest with the respective authors and published under the provisions of Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. The electronic versions were generated from sources marked up in LATEX in a computer running GNU/LINUX operating system. PDF was typeset using X TEX from TEXLive. The base font used for Latin script and oldstyle numerals was TEX Gyre Pagella developed by GUST, the Polish TEX Users Group.  A Model of the Universe in Kathmandu  s Old Royal Palace Gudrun Bühnemann University of Wisconsin-Madison  HE HANŪM N HOK , THE OLD ROYAL PALACE OF KATHMANDU IS, along with other buildings on the Darbar Square, among the world heritage sites listed by UNESCO. The palace was built and rebuilt over a long period of time and thus contains sections belonging to different time periods. The section dating to the period of the   ha kings (the second half of the eighteenth century) has long been accessible to the public. However, the sections dating originally from the Malla period (the twelfth to eighteenth centuries) have been strictly off-limits and inaccessible even to scholars. They were described by Vajr c rya (1976), published in Nepali. This scholar had access to the palace for a short time in the 1970s but was not allowed to take photographs. Thus, the sites have remained unstudied and undocumented in photographs. In early 2012, two courtyards became (partially) accessible to the public: (Man)mohan (also called Mohank lī) courtyard and Sundarī courtyard. Scholarly work is still di icult here; some shrines are closed and photography is not permitted. Mohan courtyard (Fig. 1), the residential courtyard of the Malla kings and their families, was built in 1649 under King Prat pa Malla of Kathmandu (r. 1641   1674). It was repaired and reconfigured in 1822 under King R jendra Vikram Sh h and has undergone many renovations up to the present. In the centre of the courtyard is a sunken stepped fountain (Fig. 2), which boasts a large number of Tantric sculptures along its walls, which are mostly unidentified. The fountain was constructed in 1652 under King Prat pa Malla, who contributed significantly to enhancing the royal palace with works of art. The focus of this paper is one artifact in this courtyard (Fig. 3). It was commissioned and installed by King Prat pa Malla in 1656, a few years after the fountain, as is attested in an inscription on the artifact. Two statues, identified as Ga e a and P rvatī, now flank the artifact. They were apparently moved here from another location and seem to belong to a group of sculptures of the  iva family ( ivapariv ra), which included Ga e a, a seated P rvatī with her hands forming the añjali gesture, Skanda and Nandī placed around a  ivali ga.  T  HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN SOUTH ASIA 8 (2020) 1  12  DOI: 10.18732/HSSA.V8I0.59  2  A MODEL OF THE UNIVERSE IN KATHMANDU  S OLD ROYAL PALACE  Figure 1: Mohan courtyard in the Hanūm n hok  palace. Photo courtesy of N. Gutschow.  The entire artifact is a model of the universe likely based on Pur  ic concepts. The text inscribed on the uppermost disk (Fig. 4) refers to it as bhūgola, a word whose literal meaning is   earth ball  , that is, the terrestrial globe. The word bhūgola is glossed as p thvī, earth, in the inscription and bhuvana (  world, earth  ) in a ritual text, which post-dates the artifact and can be attributed to the eighteenth century. This term is applicable to the uppermost disk which is round and inscribed with the names of different continents, as discussed below. The model shows, at the bottom, seven disks (Fig. 5) each featuring a wavy band, the traditional design symbolizing water. On one side (Fig. 6) (the side where Var ha  s foot points forward) the wavy line is interrupted and the names of the seven parts or lokas of the subterranean region are inscribed, one on each disk, starting from the lowermost one: p t laloka, ras talaloka, tal talaloka, mah talaloka, sutala&lt;tala&gt;loka, vitala&lt;tala&gt;loka and atala&lt;tala&gt;loka.1 A tortoise (kūrma) occupies the space atop these disks (Fig. 7). Viṣ u  s boar avat ra (Var ha) is positioned on its back with his legs in the militant ( lī ha) stance. His left foot is placed on the tortoise  s head. According to Indian mythology Var ha rescues the earth from the cosmic waters. Here he 1 The names are written as p t la roka , ras talo roka , tal tala roka , m h tala roka ,  sūtala roka , vitala roka  and atala roka .  HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN SOUTH ASIA 8 (2020) 1  12  GUDRUN B HNEMANN  3  Figure 2: Sunken stepped fountain and model of the universe. Photo courtesy of S. Dongol.  is shown with a boar  s head, a human body and a long garland of forest flowers (vanam l ) around his neck. He is shown in the form of a four-armed Bhūvar ha, who holds a disk (cakra) and a lotus in his upper hands and a club and a conch in the lower hands. The deity supports the earth goddess (Bhū) on the upraised elbow of his upper left arm.2 The back of the sculpture of Var ha is adorned with a floral design (Fig. 8), which indicates that the artifact was meant to be viewed from all sides. The earth goddess holds a large disk, the bhūgola, aloft with the palm of her proper left hand. She sits in lalit sana, with her right leg folded and her left leg hanging down. The outer rim of the disk is encircled by the body of a divine serpent (n ga). The lower disks, the tortoise, the figure of Bhūvar ha and the bhūgola are made of brass. The artifact measures about 26cm in height and the upper disk, the bhūgola, 44 cm in diameter. 2 For the iconography of Var ha, see, for example, Gail (1977) and Rangarajan (1997: 34  46). For Var ha sculptures in the Kathmandu Valley, see von Schroeder  (2019: 515  16), especially the four-armed Bhūvar ha from Bhaktapur (von Schroeder 2019: 524, plate 169B).  HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN SOUTH ASIA 8 (2020) 1  12  4  A MODEL OF THE UNIVERSE IN KATHMANDU  S OLD ROYAL PALACE  Figure 3: Model of the universe. Photo courtesy of S. Dongol.  The upper disk bears detailed inscriptions, including the names of the principal rivers and mountains with their dimensions and extensions on the seven continents (dvīpa), the names of the oceans surrounding the continents and the names of the cities (purī) surrounding Mount Sumeru. The yellow and red powders applied to parts of the disk show that the artifact has become an object of worship. An untitled eighteenth-century ritual text written in the Newari language and catalogued as   The method for making fire offerings to the [deities in the] fountain of Mohancuka on its anniversary  3 details invocations made for a ritual 3 The name of the ritual text has been reconstructed in Sanskrit as *Mohanacukapra  lik varṣavardhan hutividhi. The text is known from two manuscripts. The more important of the two is a concertina-type paper manuscript (thy saphū) preserved in the National Archives of Nepal in Kathmandu (MS Kathmandu NAK 8/1994) and access-  ible through the Nepalese-German Manuscript Cataloguing Project (NGMCP), reel no. A 1252/16. The manuscript may date back to the eighteenth century. The second manuscript of the text was formerly in the private collection of Ram Jvalanand Sharma, Patan and now belongs to his son Niran  HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN SOUTH ASIA 8 (2020) 1  12  GUDRUN B HNEMANN  5  Figure 4: Uppermost disk. Photo courtesy of S. Dongol.  performed on the anniversary of the consecration of the fountain in the centre of the courtyard. This text includes the model of the universe as one object of worship among a large number of Tantric deities whose sculptures are installed in the fountain. This fact may indicate that in the eighteenth century the model, considered a divinity, was positioned closer to the fountain. The ritual text directs the priest(s) to make fire offerings to the bhūgola by uttering the names of the seven subterranean regions p t la, ras tala, tal tala, mah tala, sutalatala, vitalatala, atalatala, followed by the names kūrma (tortoise), Var ha (Boar) and p thvī (Earth). The brief passage runs as follows:   4 यात॥ तत  भवन पातालल  ाय नम ॥ Jvalanand (Rajopadhyaya) Sharma. Mr. Sharma made a photocopy of the manuscript available to me after removing the seed syllables (not to be shown to the non-initiated) in the text with a white correction fluid. This late-nineteenth-century concertina-type paper manuscript (thy saphū) is probably a copy of the first ma-  nuscript. Shrestha (2013) reproduced the Patan manuscript, in which the mantras had been removed with white correction fluid. He also transcribed the text of the manuscript from the Newari into Devan garī script but offered no analysis or translation.   instead of भवन.   4 The scribe wrote भवल  HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN SOUTH ASIA 8 (2020) 1  12  6  A MODEL OF THE UNIVERSE IN KATHMANDU  S OLD ROYAL PALACE  Figure 5: Seven disks with water design. Photo courtesy of G.V. Vajracharya.  रसातलल  ाय नम ॥ तलातलल  ाय नम ॥ महातलल  ाय नम ॥   सतलतलल  ाय नम ॥ िवतलतलल  ाय नम ॥  तलतलल  ाय नम ॥    मर ॥ वराह॥ प िथव ॥   Then [an offering] for the   [model of the] universe   (bhuvana). Obeisance to p t laloka. Obeisance to ras talaloka. Obeisance to tal talaloka. Obeisance to mah talaloka. Obeisance to sutalatalaloka. Obeisance to vitalatalaloka. Obeisance to atalatalaloka. Tortoise. Boar. Earth.    HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN SOUTH ASIA 8 (2020) 1  12  GUDRUN B HNEMANN  7  Figure 6: Names of the seven parts (loka) of the subterranean regions. Photo courtesy of S. Dongol.  The names invoked in the ritual text are identical with the ones in the final section of the text inscribed on the uppermost disk of the artifact, the bhūgola. They are:5 प   व  वराह    मर  िवतलल      सतलल    महातलल    तलातलल    रसातलल    पातालल  म.6    Earth. Boar. Tortoise. Vitalaloka, sutalaloka, mah talaloka, tal talaloka, ras talaloka, p t laloka.   5 Vajr c rya 1976: 217. 6 The inscription as published by   Vajr c rya (1976: 217) reads: िवतल र    , सतल  र    , महातल र    , तलातल र    , रसातल र    and पाताल र    .  HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN SOUTH ASIA 8 (2020) 1  12  8  A MODEL OF THE UNIVERSE IN KATHMANDU  S OLD ROYAL PALACE  Figure 7: Tortoise, Var ha (Boar) and Earth Goddess. Photo courtesy of S. Dongol.  Figure 8: Back of the figure of Var ha with floral design. Photo courtesy of S. Dongol.  HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN SOUTH ASIA 8 (2020) 1  12  GUDRUN B HNEMANN  9  One name, atalatalaloka, has been omitted, which could be a printing error or an oversight on the part of Vajr c rya. Compared to the brief passage in the ritual text, the inscription on the disk, written in the Newari language (with some Sanskrit), is much more detailed than the ritual text. It was published by Vajr c rya (1976: 212  17 (inscription 25)). Already in the 1970s parts of the text could no longer be deciphered and are indicated by dots in the publication. The inscription has further deteriorated since then and the disk is now affected with rust. From the inscribed text we learn that the artifact was commissioned by King Prat pa Malla in 1656. The text inscribed on the disk is arranged as a chart which contains lotus petals, squares and circles but no engraved figures. It awaits a detailed study based on high-quality photographs.7 We do not know the source(s) for the text inscribed on the disk. Material from the Pur  a literature is likely to have been used. The inscription states that King Prat pa Malla had the bhūgola (glossed as p thvī) inscribed after consulting personally the     stras  .8 Questions that can be raised are: Why did the king commission this artifact? What was its use before the eighteenth century, when the ritual text included it as one of the objects venerated in courtyard? Was its function purely religious, educational or related to royal prestige? One possible function may be suggested by dharma  stra texts that discuss the merits of gift giving (d na). They recommend that a king give the gift of the earth to Brahmins as part of a meritorious ritual. Such a gift is already described in section 10 titled bhūmid na of the Atharvaveda-Pari iṣṭa. A description of the ritual is also found in Matsya-Pur  a 284.1-21 and cited in the   section on gifting   (d nak   a) of Lakṣmīdhara  s K tyakalpataru.9 This latter text was composed in the first half of the twelfth century in central North India. According to this textual material, the king should make a golden replica of the earth that includes Jambūdvīpa with its parts such as Mount Meru and the nine subcontinents (varṣa). As K tyakalpataru, D nak   a 4.11.1-2 states (citing the MatsyaPur  a):    थात  स प  व  यािम धरादानमन  तमम ।  पाप  षय र  न णामम    यिवनाशनम॥  4.11.1 7 Due to the inaccessibility of the artifact and the di iculties involved in reading the inscription it is not possible to provide a detailed analysis at this time. 8 See Vajr c rya 1976: 213:    यप  तापम  लद व प  भ   ठा  रसन थम शा    स स याव िप ायाव   व भ   ल      and p. 217:   प   व      य िब या ा  र      वयम व सवर [  lacuna  ]मवल  य  यप  तापम  लद वन िल ािपतभ   लिमित॥ 9 See Brick (2015: 336  39 (text) and 115  17 (translation)) for this ritual.  HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN SOUTH ASIA 8 (2020) 1  12  10  A MODEL OF THE UNIVERSE IN KATHMANDU  S OLD ROYAL PALACE    ारय   पि  थव   ह म      ब   व पान ािरण म ।  मयार दापवर तवत   म  य  म र समि  वताम।  ल  पाला     प ता  नववष र समि  वताम॥  4.11.210 I shall now explain the unsurpassable Gift of the Earth, which destroys men  s sins and obliterates inauspiciousness. (1) A man should have a golden Earth built that contains a replica of Jambūdvīpa, including the Border Mountains, Mount Meru at its center, the eight World-Protectors, and the nine Subcontinents.   (2)11  The uppermost disk of King Prat pa Malla  s artifact, the bhūgola, is indeed a golden colour and appears to correspond to that description. However, the objection can be raised that if the artifact was indeed a case of a bhūmid na, why is it still in the palace of the donor and not with the donee? Prat pa Malla  s artifact may have also functioned as a symbol of power and prestige. Sumathi Ramaswamy has written extensively on the significance and role of globes in Mughal India as symbols of world rulership, authority, power and prestige. Her picture album   Going Global in Mughal India  12 includes representations of Mughal kings holding globes in their hands or standing on them or using them as a footstool. Many of these globes date from the time of Sh h Jah n, the mid-seventeenth century, which is also the time when Prat pa Malla  s bhūgola was made. The globes held or stepped upon by the Mughal kings are spherical European globes. Several spherical globes based on concepts from the Pur  as have also been noted.13 The oldest Pur  ic globe is the one made by one Kṣemakar a, whose date corresponds to 1571 CE. It is now in the Museum of the History of Science at Oxford14 and was studied by Digby (1973). The piece is actually a storage box with an attached hinge and locking clasp. There is apparently no artifact comparable in shape to King Prat pa Malla  s model of the universe with its lower disks, the figures of the tortoise, Viṣ u  s Boar manifestation supporting the earth goddess holding the bhūgola. It is quite possible that the king, who is considered an innovator and somewhat of an eccentric in Nepalese history,15 was the first to commission this object. Since the artifact contains not just a sculpture of the earth goddess, but of Var ha rescuing the goddess it may also allude to Prat pa Malla rescuing his country. 10 11 12 13 14  Brick 2015: 336. Brick 2015: 115. See Ramaswamy 2019. Schwartzberg 1992: 352  58. Accession no. 10/27-10, no. 2191 of the  late L. Evans Collection. See also Gole 1989: 26, 74 and Schwartzberg 1992: 352, 426 (plate 26). 15 Slusser 1982: v. 1, 191.  HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN SOUTH ASIA 8 (2020) 1  12  GUDRUN B HNEMANN  11  ACK NOWL E D G E M E N T S I would like to thank M. A. Geslani, T. L. Knudsen, G. J. R. Mevissen, S. R. Sharma, K. Tamot, K. G. Zysk and the anonymous referees of the journal for helpful suggestions. IN D E X O F M A N U S C R I P T S Kathmandu NAK 8/1994, 4  TEX T E D IT IO N S Atharvaveda-Pari iṣṭa Bolling, G. M. and von Negelein, J. (1909  10) (eds.), The Pari iṣṭas of the Atharva Veda. Vol. 1: Text and Critical Apparatus (Leipzig: Otto Harrassowitz), http://n2t.net/ ark:/13960/t13p0r37q, (on 12 Apr. 2020). Matsya Mah pur  a  Joshi, K. L., Nagar, S., et al. (2007) (eds.), Matsya Mah pur  a. An Exhaustive Introduction, Sanskrit Text, English Translation, Scholarly Notes and Index of Verses. Translated into English by a Board of Scholars (Delhi: Parimal Publications). REF E RE NC E S  Brick, D. (2015), Brahmanical Theories of the Gift: A Critical Edition and Annotated Translation of the D nak   a of the K tyakalpataru (Cambridge, MA: Department of South Asian Studies, Harvard University). Digby, S. (1973),   The Bhugola of Ksema Karna: A Dated Sixteenth-Century Piece of Indian Metalware  , Art and Archaeology Research Papers, 4: 10  31. Gail, A. (1977),   Viṣ u als Eber in Mythos und Bild  , in H. Härtel (ed.), Beiträge zur Indienforschung. Ernst Waldschmidt zum 80. Geburtstag gewidmet (Berlin: Museum für indische Kunst), 127  68. Gole, S. (1989), Indian Maps and Plans. From earliest Times to the Advent of European Surveys (New Delhi: Manohar). Ramaswamy, S. (2019),   Going Global in Mughal India  , Duke University, https://sites.duke.edu/globalinmughalindia, (on 29 June 2019). Rangarajan, H. (1997), Var ha Images in Madhya Pradesh. An Iconographic Study (Mumbai: Somaiya Publications).   kya, H. (1995), Lalitpur ma galbaj r sthita sundarīcok tus hiti = Lalit Festival (lalit mahotsav), April 18  24, 1995 (Patan: s.n.); 3 pages.  HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN SOUTH ASIA 8 (2020) 1  12  12  A MODEL OF THE UNIVERSE IN KATHMANDU  S OLD ROYAL PALACE  Schwartzberg, J. E. (1992),   South Asian Cartography  , in J. B. Harley and D. Woodward (eds.), The History of Cartography. Volume 2, Book 1: Cartography in the Traditional Islamic and South Asian Societies (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press), 293  509. Shrestha, S. S. (2013),   Busadhana Manuscript of Mohanchowk Hiti  , in M. Ary l et al. (eds.), Sm rik  2069 (Kathmandu: Hanum n hok  darb r sa grah laya vik s samiti (Hanumandhoka Royal Palace Museum Development Committee)), 11  9. Slusser, M. S. (1982), Nepal Mandala: A Cultural Study of the Kathmandu Valley, 2 vols. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press). Vajr c rya, G. (1976), Hanūm n hok  r jadarb r (K ṭhm  au : Nep la ra E iy lı   Adhyayan Sa sth n, Tribhuvan-Vi vavidy laya); in Nepali. Von Schroeder, U. (2019), Nepalese Stone Sculptures. Volume 1: Hindu (Weesen, Switzerland: Visual Dharma Publications).  HISTORY OF SCIENCE IN SOUTH ASIA 8 (2020) 1  12  Please write to  wujastyk@ualberta.ca  to file bugs/problem reports, feature requests and to get involved. The History of Science in South Asia   Department of History and Classics, 2  81 HM Tory Building, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, T6G 2H4, Canada.