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The story of the rediscovery of the remains of Vikramshila begins with Buchanan, who noticed them on 16th January, 1811, during his second visit in the vicinity and should actually be credited for having been the next recorded visitor, centuries after Dharmasvamin. With the region having gradually shaded into oblivion, even locals had no idea about the ruins which they called as ‘Dorohor’ (i.e. Heritage).Buchanan, unable to appreciate their actual purpose, guessed them as having been ‘a Rajah’s house’ and “always a round hill perhaps fifty feet in perpendicular height; but without digging it would be impossible to determine positively whether or not it may not have been a building. If it has been a building, it, in all probability, has been a solid temple, no house in decay being capable of leaving such a ruin.
There are traces of a square fortification round it, and the surface of the earth within that is covered with broken bricks. Many squared stones, one very long, are lying in various parts of the vicinity.” C.E.A.W. Oldham, commenting upon Buchanan’s journal in 1929, perhaps rightly suggested the possibility of the site, then unknown to any archaeologist and missing from the survey maps of the time, as possibly representing the ruins of the great centre, with the solid temple probably representing a stupa, and desired for exploration trenches to be dug for further confirmation.
To be continued...