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From Civilizations

The 60-foot-tall sandstone pillar in Vaishali, in northeastern India, is one of 40 columns erected by Ashoka at sites associated with the life of the Buddha. (The Vaishali monument marks the site of the Buddha’s last sermon.) Its naturalistically carved lion was probably influenced by Greek funerary sculpture, such as a fourth-century B.C. stone lion from Amphipolis, in Macedonia.