India’s Independence brought into the limelight the famous Capital of the Asoka Pillar at Sarnath. Its crest has been adopted as the National Seal of Government of the Indian Union and it appears on the new commemorative stamps, while the Chakra or the "Wheel of the Good Law", figures on our National Flag.

This is the story of the Asoka Pillar. The Buddhist site at Saranath, four miles north of Banaras where the Pillar was discovered possesses a special interest as it was here that after attaining Divine Wisdom at Gaya, Gautama Buddha preached his first sermon, or, as is described in the Buddhist sacred texts, began ‘to turn the Wheel of the Good Law’. This event is believed to have taken place in the year 528 B.C.

One of the finest and oldest sculptures amongst others preserved in the Sarnath Museum is the bell-shaped Capital of the Asoka Pillar, Perso-Hellenistic in style, unearthed during the excavations conducted by Mr F O Oertel in 1904-05. It is seven feet high, the bell-shaped lower member surmounted by four lions standing back to back, the middle portion above the fluted bell being adorned with figures of a horse, a lion, an elephant and a bull. Sir John Marshall remarks that the figures and the crowning lions "are wonderfully vigorous and true to nature and are treated with that simplicity and reserve which is the keynote of all great masterpieces of plastic art. India certainly has produced no other sculpture equal to them."

This monument with others of the same period bear testimony to the existence of an independent style at Banaras, their main peculiarity being their lustrous polish which is mainly responsible for their preservation. The art of giving such high polish to stone was learnt by the Indian artists from their contemporaries of Persia, but it went out of use in India about the first century B.C. While the technique of execution of the Capital is in every sense foreign, it is evident that in accordance with the prevailing Indian custom, the carving was done under the guidance of a learned Buddhist monk, conversant with the scriptures. The placing of the wheel symbolizing the Buddhist "Wheel of Righteousness" or the "Wheel of the Good Law" at the summit of the Pillar must be credited to the ingenuity of the same monk. He must have also suggested the utilisation of the circular abacus for the representation of an appropriate motive from the Buddhist texts.

The interpretation of the four animals figured in bold belief according to the views of the Burmese Pali scholar who visited the Sarnath Museum, is that it is intended to illustrate the Anotatta, one of the eight great lakes mentioned in Buddhist texts, in which the Buddha used to bathe. It is also with the water of this lake that his mother Mahamaya was bathed before her conception.

The lake which has been described and illustrated in a Buddhist manuscript on palm leaves in Burmese characters, has four mouths guarded respectively by the horse, the dragon, the bull and the elephant. Their positions on the lake are: the lion faces east, the horse the north, the bull the west and the elephant the south. The animals on the drum of the Capital are carved in the same order and it can be assumed that in its original position on top of the Pillar. The Capital must have been placed in such a way that the animals faced their respective directions.

Dr Bloch conjectured that they respectively symbolised the god Surya, the godess Durga, Indra and Shiva and were meant to indicate the subordination of the Brahamanical deities to Gautama Buddha and his Law. Dr Vogel held that they, being the four noble beasts of the Buddhists, were only ornamental motives. It is also possible that they represented the four Noble Truths of Buddhism which are :

The noble truth about suffering, the noble truth about the origin of suffering, the noble truth regarding the cessation of suffering and the noble truth about the way leading to the cessation of suffering.

The crowning ornament of the Capital is the Wheel carved in the round which must have been chosen by the Buddhist Emperor Asoka in reference to the traditional comparison of the Buddhist doctrine to that symbol.