Dolmens, tombs and the many rock-temples from India to Korea possess the generalized significance of representing the cosmic dome. Among the Celts of Brittany and Ireland mounds such as this one were known as cairns.

hroughout Northern Europe, the Mediterranean, and India in the second millennium BCE, a highly developed cult of the dead led to the construction of extensive areas of dolmens, rows of stones, and finally to the erection of stone cist-graves above the earth's surface. This form of grave, reserved mainly for tribal chieftains and heroes consisted, as a rule, of several stone slabs which served as a foundation and floor, staggered stone slabs of the same size which formed the chamber walls, and a huge capstone. Occasionally the capstone had a curved surface. All around the burial chamber rubble of flat stones was heaped up in a circle, forming the base and defining the outer limits of the earth mound which covered the entire structure.

THE MOUND

A monumental burial mound was also common in northern India during the lifetime of the Buddha. The Enlightened One himself instructed his disciples to commemorate great kings and sages by erecting at crossroads so-called stupas, mounds of earth enclosing a relic. One can see from Buddhist texts how widely they were disseminated and how popular they were. It is said that after the death of the Buddha eight of the mightiest princes fought among themselves for the ashes and bones of his mortal body. Each of them wanted to erect a huge stupa above these relics.

By the second century BCE the stupa had the following form based on that of the mandala: a square, or alternatively circular base called a medhi, was made of baked brick, set in clay. Upon this platform the hemispherical anda (egg) was erected, one layer after another. The heaped up earth over Megalithic graves had an outline or contour roughly in the shape of a hyperbola. This led to the idea of giving the reliquary the symbolic abstract form of a partially buried sphere or hemisphere. Since the diameter of the anda was in most cases less than that of the medhi, there was room for a raised path for processions (pradakshina-patha). The flights of steps leading up to this path and the terrace were furnished with a wooden railing (vedika), embedded in the brick. From the crown of the anda there rose a wooden mast, which often ran right through the stupa from top to bottom. It bore the ancient oriental royal emblem of the umbrella or parasol (chattravali). Mast and umbrella were surrounded by a square wooden railing, which in its structure resembled that on the platform.

In early stupas the reliquary was invariably located in the center of the sphere, i.e. on the platform. This situation was suggested by earlier Megalithic tombs, which had the burial chamber in the middle, and of greater importance was the fact that the whole shape of the stupa would be meaningless unless the earth mound and brick casing were built around this central point. Notwithstanding considerations of this kind the relic was, however, often placed in a cubic receptacle (harmika) on the crown of the dome. A shift of the ritual center only became possible after the stupa had lost its original significance as a burial mound, during the reign of Ashoka, and had become an interminably repeated symbol of the teaching and cosmology of the Buddha. The cubic chamber of a Megalithic tomb was replaced in the stupa by the reliquary, which was moved from the center of the anda to its summit; the rounded form of the anda became the image of the infinite cosmos. The Aryan symbol of the axis of the universe, the tree in the middle of the village under which the elders took council, reappears in the stupa as a vertical wooden axis.

THE WORLD MOUNTAIN

Mountain symbolism takes many forms deriving from height and center. In so far as mountains are tall, lofty, raising abruptly to meet the Heavens, they form part of the symbolism of transcendence and, in so far as they are often numinous places where the gods have revealed their presence, they share in the symbolism of manifestation. Mountains are places where Heaven and Earth meet, where the gods have their home and human ascension its boundary. Viewed from above, the vertical point of their peaks makes them the centers of the world: seen from below, they stand against the horizon like World Axes, their slopes like a ladder to be climbed. Mountains are both the center and the axis of the world. The primordial separation of heaven and earth is common to all the creation myths of the world. When a structure is placed at the center of the sacred space, the result is an architectonic image of the Universe (imago mundi) a World Mountain bridging Earth and Heaven. The center of the world can be constructed anywhere, since one can build a microcosm anywhere in stone or brick. The well known Egyptian pyramids and the ziggurats of Mesopotamia represent artificial mountains -- because to all traditional cultures the cosmos was interpreted as a mountain, while the highest point of the temple, being assimilated to the peak of the magic mountain, was considered the supreme summit of the cosmic mountain. The construction always takes into account the four cardinal directions.

THE SYMBOL OF THE PARASOL

The parasol is a symbol of Heaven and as a consequence, the Asia-wide emblem of kingship. It is the regalia of the chakravarti-king, the universal monarch seated at the hub of a wheel. The Monarch is identified with the cosmic axis represented by the staff of the parasol. Awnings themselves are Heaven and very clearly related to dome symbolism. In Laos, according to legend, a parasol was set upon a mountain as an image of the world. In aniconic depictions of the Buddha, the meaning is the same -- the parasol stands for Heaven, the throne for the intermediate world, and his footprints for Earth. The parasol, therefore, is a symbol for the Buddha himself. The parasols on top of stupas and pagodas are celestial levels. Since they are placed above the dome they stand for extracosmic levels and superhuman states.

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Silbury Hill, Wiltshire, England (c.2700 BCE) is the largest man-made monument in Europe and is part of a larger complex including the Avebury stone circles and Stonehenge.

The stupas of northern India owe their stability to to a filling of squared-off rubble which could not of itself shift or cause shrinkage. Owing to a shortage of easily obtainable stone, building could only be accomplished with a combination of brick and earth. And, massive stupas of solid brick were ruled out on economic grounds. For these reasons builders resorted to the technique of dividing the interior of the hemispherical dome into chambers by means of vertical wall sections, arranged radially, and filling these chambers with loose earth and rubble.

In many cosmologies, the universe is likened to a chamber, or a cubic box with a lid of the heavens surmounting it. Either the entire box is seen to revolve, or just the lid. The center of revolution is the constellation of the Great Bear, which was worshipped for its stability. Instead of moving like the other constellations, it appears to simply rotate. The firmament is supported by the World Mountain.

The dome is universally regarded as a representation of the vault of Heaven. Domes are commonly set upon four pillars or upon a structure with a square ground-plan. This relates to the symbolism of the sky as covering and the earth as supporting, while the sky is seen as round and the earth as square.

From the top of the dome rises the world axis. In the case of the stupa, it is always actualized in a pole or a series of parasols rising above it.

All photos ©Roger Shepherd