ey were descended from a child of the sun called
Jarasabda or Jarasasta, which no doubt represents Zarathustra.

The river Candrabhaga is the modern Chenab and the town founded by
Samba is Mulasthana or Multan, called Mu-la-san-pu-lu by the Chinese
pilgrim Hsuan Chuang. The Bhavishya Purana calls the place Sambapuri
and the Chinese name is an attempt to represent Mulasamba-puri. Hsuan
Chuang speaks enthusiastically of the magnificent temple,[1159] which
was also seen by Alberuni but was destroyed by Aurungzeb.
Taranatha[1160] relates how in earlier times a king called Sri
Harsha burnt alive near Multan 12,000 adherents of the Mleccha sect
with their books and thereby greatly weakened the religion of Persians
and Sakas for a century. This legend offers difficulties but it shows
that Multan was regarded as a centre of Zoroastrianism.

Multan is in the extreme west Of India, but sun temples are found in
many other parts, such as Gujarat, Gwalior and the district of Gaya,
where an inscription has been discovered at Govindapur referring to
the legend of Samba. This same legend is also related in the Kapila
Samhita, a religious guide-book for Orissa, in connection with the
great Sun temple of Konarak.[1161]

In these temples the sun was represented by images, Hindu convention
thus getting the better of Zoroastrian prejudices, but the costume of
the images shows their origin, for the Brihatsamhita[1162] directs
that Surya is to be represented in the dress of the northerners,
covered from the feet upwards and wearing the girdle called avyanga
or viyanga. In Rajputana I have seen several statues of him in high
boots and they are probably to be found elsewhere.

Fortuitously or otherwise, the cult of the sun was often associated
with Buddhism, as is indicated by these temples in Gaya and Orissa and
by the fact that the Emperor Harsha styles his father, grandfather and
great-grandfather _paramadityabhakta_, great devotees of the
sun.[1163] He himself, though a devout Buddhist, also showed honour to
the image of Surya, as we hear from Hsuang Chuang.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1144: They are forbidden by strict theology, but in practice
there are exceptions, for instance, the winged figure believed to
represent Ahura Mazda, found on Achaemenian reliefs.]

[Footnote 1145: Though the principles of Zoroastrianism sound
excellent to Europeans, I cannot discover that ancient Persia was
socially or politically superior to India.]

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