Shakyamuni Visits His Mother

After spending a few years at Sravasti and traveling around The Buddha decides to go to heaven to talk to his mother Queen Mayadevi who died shortly after giving birth to him. He ascended into heaven to teach his mother and the other gods who followed him when he returned to Earth at Sankasia. He had been up so long though people began to worry. Buddha told the people he would return in eight days and when he did he came down a golden staircase with Brahma and Indra on either side. Shakyamuni immediatly took a bath and his hair and clippings were put inside a stupa on the spot. As the story goes his mother returned via reincarnation later as a prince in a nearby kingdom. King Ashoka (200 B.C.E.) found the site and what appeared to be stairs going deep into the ground. He excavated but could not find an end to the stairs. Very little exists of the site today other than a rebuilt stupa near some ruins and an Ashokan Lion statue.

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This site was created by Dave Sexton at the NEH Summer Institute "Literatures, Religions, and Arts of the Himalayan Region," held at the College of the Holy Cross, Summer 2011