Part 9 - Early history of excavation of the site at Sārnāth

The first published record of the earliest excavation of the site comes from Jonathan Duncan, the Resident of Benaras. It was Jagat Singh, the Dewan of Raja Chait Singh of Benaras. He started digging the place in 1794 to obtain bricks for building a market place at Benaras, named after him. Duncan’s account even states that Jagat Singh got hold of a relic casket containing a few human bones, some decayed pearls, gold leaves and other ordinary jewels. Though the excavation was done from a purely business needs it was enough to create a stir in the interested British circles. Miss Emma Roberts reports in 1834 that some 40 or 50 years ago (roughly 1794) the Sārnāth ruins attracted the attention of the British^[1] and a conscious effort was put to the excavation and restoration of the ancient structures.

The first archaeological excavation was carried out in 1815- 16 by Colonel C. Mackenzie examined some of the remains and brought to notice a few sculptures when he presented them to the Asiatic Society of Bengal. But it was casual and did not reveal any planning. The extensive exploration of the site at his own expense was done by Sir Alexander Cunningham from December 1834- 36. The monuments examined by him were Dhamek Stupa, Dharmarajika stupa known as Jagat Singh’s stupa, a monastery to the north of the last and the Chaukhandi stupa. His excavation was followed by Major Markham Kittoe. He excavated some of the stupas and made a rough sketch of these sites. Further he proposed that the monastery located to the west of Dhamek stupa was a hospital on the basis of pestles and mortars found there. But he found no time to compile his discoveries because of his ill-health and untimely death.^[2] From 1904-05 onwards regular excavations being done and finally most of the monuments and ruins were brought to notice.