III. DRAVIDIAN TEMPLES…

III. DRAVIDIAN TEMPLES

CONTENTS.

Tanjore--Tiruvalur--Seringham--Chillambaram--Ramisseram-- Mádura--Tinnevelly--Combaconum--Conjeveram--Vellore and Peroor--Vijayanagar.

When we turn from these few scattered rock-cut examples to the great structural temples of the style, we find their number is so great, their extent so vast, and their variety so perplexing, that it is extremely difficult to formulate any distinct ideas regarding them, and still more so, as a matter of course, to convey to others any clear idea on the subject. To any one at all familiar with the present status of the population of the province, the greatest wonder is how such a people could ever have conceived, much less carried out, such vast undertakings as these, and that so recently that some of the greatest and boldest were only interrupted by our wars with the French little more than a century ago. The cause of this, however, is not far to seek. Ever since we took possession of the country, our countrymen have been actuated by the most beneficent intentions of protecting the poor against the oppression of the rich. By every means we have sought to secure the ryot in his holding, and that he should not be called on to pay more than his fair share of the produce of his land; while to the landowner we have offered a secure title to what belonged to him, and a fixed income in money in lieu of his portion of the produce. To a people, however, in the state of civilization to which India has reached, a secure title and a fixed income only means the power of borrowing on the occasion of a marriage, a funeral, or some great family festival, ten times more than the borrower can ever pay, and our courts as inevitably give the lender the power of foreclosing his mortgage and selling the property. During the century in which this communistic process has been going on the landed aristocracy have gradually disappeared. All the wealth of the country has passed into the hands of the money-lenders of the cities, and by them dissipated in frivolities. If the aim of the government is to reduce the whole population to the condition of peasant proprietors, occupying the land without capital, and consequently on the verge of starvation, they have certainly succeeded. It may be beneficent, and may produce the greatest happiness to the greatest number; but in such a community neither science, nor literature, nor art have any place, and religion itself becomes degraded by the status of its votaries.

Before we interfered, the condition of things was totally different. The practical proprietorship of the land was then in the hands of a few princes or feudal lords, who derived from it immense revenues they had no means of spending, except in works of ostentation, which in certain stages of civilization are as necessary for the employment of the masses as for their own glorification. In such a country as India the employment of one-half of the population in agriculture is sufficient to produce food for the whole, while the other half are free for any employment that may be available. We in this country employ our non-agricultural half in manufactures and commerce. The southern Indians had neither, and found no better occupation for the surplus population than in temple-building. Whether this was more profitable or beneficial than hammering iron or spinning cotton is not a question it is necessary to enter on here. It is enough to know the fact, and to mark its consequences. The population of southern India in the 17th and 18th century was probably hardly less than it is now--some thirty millions--and if one-third or one-fourth of such a population were to seek employment in building, the results, if persevered in through centuries, would be something astonishing. A similar state of affairs prevailed apparently in Egypt in the time of the Pharaohs, but with very different results. The Egyptians had great and lofty ideas, and a hankering after immortality, that impressed itself on all their works. The southern Indians had no such aspirations. Their intellectual status is, and always was, mediocre; they had no literature of their own--no history to which they could look back with pride, and their religion was, and is, an impure and degrading fetishism. It is impossible that anything very grand or imposing should come out of such a state of things. What they had to offer to their gods was a tribute of labour, and that was bestowed without stint. To cut a chain of fifty links out of a block of granite and suspend it between two pillars, was with them a triumph of art. To hollow deep cornices out of the hardest basalt, and to leave all the framings, as if of the most delicate woodwork, standing free, was with them a worthy object of ambition, and their sculptures are still inexplicable mysteries, from our ignorance of how it was possible to execute them. All that millions of hands working through centuries could do, has been done, but with hardly any higher motive than to employ labour and to conquer difficulties, so as to astonish by the amount of the first and the cleverness with which the second was overcome--and astonished we are; but without some higher motive true architecture cannot exist. The Dravidians had not even the constructive difficulties to overcome which enabled the mediæval architects to produce such noble fabrics as our cathedrals. The aim of architects in the Middle Ages was to design halls which should at the same time be vast, but stable, and suited for the accommodation of great multitudes to witness a lofty ritual. In their struggle to accomplish this they developed intellectual powers which impress us still through their works. No such lofty aims exercised the intellectual faculties of the Hindu. His altar and the statue of his god were placed in a dark cubical cell wholly without ornament, and the porch that preceded that was not necessarily either lofty or spacious. What the Hindu architect craved for, was a place to display his powers of ornamentation, and he thought he had accomplished all his art demanded when he covered every part of his building with the most elaborate and most difficult designs he could invent. Much of this ornamentation, it is true, is very elegant, and evidences of power and labour do impress the human imagination, often even in defiance of our better judgment, and nowhere is this more apparent than in these Dravidian temples. It is in vain, however, we look among them for any manifestation of those lofty aims and noble results which constitute the merit and the greatness of true architectural art, and which generally characterise the best works in the true styles of the western world.

* * * * *

Turning from these generalities to the temples themselves, the first great difficulty experienced in attempting either to classify or describe them is that no plans of them exist. I know myself upwards of thirty great Dravidian temples, or groups of temples, any one of which must have cost as much to build as an English cathedral, some a great deal more; but of all these there are only three, or it may be four, of which even a moderately trustworthy plan is available. Two-thirds of these have been sufficiently photographed by Dr. Hunter, Capt. Lyon,[374] and others; the remaining third I know either from personal inspection or from drawings and descriptions. This is, of course, irrespective of village temples, and, it may be, of some extensive groups which have been overlooked. If these temples had been built like those of the Greeks, or even as the Christian churches in the Middle Ages, on one uniform plan, changing only with the progress of time, one or two plans might have sufficed; but the fact is that, in nine cases out of ten, Dravidian temples are a fortuitous aggregation of parts, arranged without plan, as accident dictated at the time of their erection; and, without plans, no adequate idea can be conveyed to those who have not seen them. The one great exception to this rule is to be found at Tanjore. The great Pagoda there was commenced on a well-defined and stately plan, which was persevered in till its completion. As will be seen from the annexed diagram (Woodcut No. 190) it consists of two courts,[375] one a square of about 250 ft., originally devoted to minor shrines and residences; but when the temple was fortified by the French in 1777[376] it was converted into an arsenal, and has not been re-appropriated to sacred purposes. The temple itself stands in a courtyard extremely well proportioned to receive it, being about 500 ft. long by half that in width, the distance between the gateway and the temple being broken by the shrine of the Bull Nundi,[377] which is sufficiently important for its purpose, but not so much so as to interfere with the effect of the great vimana, which stands near the inner end of the court. The perpendicular part of its base measures 82 ft. square, and is two storeys in height, of simple outline, but sufficiently relieved by niches and pilasters. Above this the pyramid rises in thirteen storeys to the summit, which is crowned by a dome said to consist of a single stone, and reaching a height of 190 ft. The porch in front is kept low, and as will be seen from the woodcut (No. 191) the tower dominates over the gopuras and surrounding objects in a manner that imparts great dignity to the whole composition.

Besides the great temple and the Nundi porch there are several other smaller shrines in the enclosure, one of which, dedicated to Soubramanya, a son of Siva’s, is as exquisite a piece of decorative architecture as is to be found in the south of India, and though small, almost divides our admiration with the temple itself (Woodcut No. 192). It is built behind an older shrine, which may be coeval with the great temple as originally designed.

One of the peculiarities of the Tanjore temple is that all the sculptures on the gopuras belong to the religion of Vishnu, while everything in the courtyard is dedicated to the worship of Siva. At first I felt inclined to believe it had been erected wholly in honour of the first-named divinity, but am now more inclined to the belief that it is only an instance of the extreme tolerance that prevailed at the age at which it was erected, before these religions became antagonistic.

What, then, was that age? Strange to say, though so complete and uniform, and standing, as it does, almost alone, its date is not known. Mr. Norman, a competent authority, in the text that accompanied Tripe’s photographs, says it was erected by Kadu Vettiya Soran, or Cholan,[378] a king reigning at Conjeveram in the beginning of the 14th century. At one time I hoped it was earlier, but on the whole I am now convinced that this must be very nearly the truth.

The Soubramanya is certainly one century, probably two centuries, more modern. The Bull itself is also inferior in design, and therefore more modern than those at Hullabîd, which belong probably to the 13th century, and the architecture of his shrine cannot be carried back beyond the 15th century. It may even be considerably more modern. It is disappointing to find the whole so recent in date, but there seems no excuse for ascribing to this temple a greater antiquity than that just mentioned.

TIRUVALUR.

The temple at Tiruvalur, about thirty miles west of Madras, contrasts curiously with that at Tanjore in the principles on which it was designed, and serves to exemplify the mode in which, unfortunately, most Dravidian temples were aggregated.

The nucleus here was a small village temple (Woodcut No. 193), drawn to the same scale as the plan of Tanjore in Woodcut No. 190. It is a double shrine, dedicated to Siva and his consort, standing in a cloistered court which measures 192 ft. by 156 ft. over all, and has one gopura in front. So far there is nothing to distinguish it from the ordinary temples found in every village. It, however, at some subsequent period became sacred or rich, and a second or outer court was added, measuring 470 ft. each way, with two gopuras, higher than the original one, and containing within its walls numberless little shrines and porches. Additions were again made at some subsequent date, the whole being enclosed in a court 940 ft. by 701 ft.--this time with five gopuras, and several important shrines. When the last addition was made, it was intended to endow the temple with one of those great halls which were considered indispensable in temples of the first class. Generally they had--or were intended to have--1000 columns; this one has only 688, and only about one-half of these carry beams or a roof of any sort. There can, however, be very little doubt that, had time and money been available, it would have been completed to the typical extent. As it is, it is probably owing to our management of the revenues of the country that the requisite funds were not forthcoming, and the buildings stopped probably within the limits of the present century.

The general effect of such a design as this may be gathered from the bird’s-eye view (Woodcut No. 194). As an artistic design, nothing can be worse. The gateways, irregularly spaced in a great blank wall, lose half their dignity from their positions; and the bathos of their decreasing in size and elaboration, as they approach the sanctuary, is a mistake which nothing can redeem. We may admire beauty of detail, and be astonished at the elaboration and evidence of labour, if they are found in such a temple as this, but as an architectural design it is altogether detestable.

SERINGHAM.

The temple which has been most completely marred by this false system of design is that at Seringham, which is certainly the largest, and, if its principle of design could be reversed, would be one of the finest temples in the south of India (Woodcut No. 195, p. 349). Here the central enclosure is quite as small and as insignificant as that at Tiruvalur, and except that its dome is gilt has nothing to distinguish it from an ordinary village temple. The next enclosure, however, is more magnificent. It encloses the hall of 1000 columns, which measures some 450 ft. by 130 ft. The number of columns is, I believe, sixteen in front by sixty in depth, or 960 altogether; but I do not feel sure there is not some mistake in my observations, and that the odd forty are to be found somewhere. They consequently are not spaced more than 10 ft. apart from centre to centre; and as at one end the hall is hardly over 10 ft. high, and in the loftiest place only 15 ft. or 16 ft., and the pillars spaced nearly evenly over the floor, it will be easily understood how little effect such a building really produces. They are, however, each of a single block of granite, and all carved more or less elaborately. A much finer portico stretches across this court from gopura to gopura; the pillars in it are much more widely spaced, and the central aisle is double that of those on the sides, and crosses the portico in the centre, making a transept; its height, too, is double that of the side aisles. It is a pleasing and graceful architectural design; the other is only an evidence of misapplied labour. The next four enclosures have nothing very remarkable in them, being generally occupied by the Brahmans and persons connected with the temple. Each, however, has, or was intended to have, four gopuras, one on each face, and some of these are of very considerable magnificence. The outer enclosure is, practically, a bazaar, filled with shops, where pilgrims are lodged, and fed, and fleeced. The wall that encloses it measures 2475 ft. by 2880 ft.,[379] and, had its gopuras been finished, they would have surpassed all others in the south to the same extent as these dimensions exceed those of any other known temple. The northern gopura, leading to the river and Trichinopoly, measures 130 ft. in width by 100 ft. in depth; the opening through it measures 21 ft. 6 in., and twice that in height. The four jambs or gateposts are each of a single slab of granite, more than 40 ft. in height, and the roofing-slabs throughout measure from 23 ft. to 24 ft. Had the ordinary brick pyramid of the usual proportion been added to this, the whole would have risen to a height of nearly 300 ft. Even as it is, it is one of the most imposing masses in southern India, and probably--perhaps because it never was quite finished--it is in severe and good taste throughout.[380] Its date, fortunately, is perfectly well known, as its progress was stopped by its being occupied and fortified by the French during our ten years’ struggle with them for the possession of Trichinopoly; and if we allow fifty years for its progress, even this would bring the whole within the limits of the 18th century. The other three gopuras of this enclosure are in the same style, and were commenced on the same scale, but not being so far advanced when we stopped the work, their gateposts project above their walls in a manner that gives them a very singular appearance, and has led to some strange theories as to their design.

Looked at from a distance, or in any direction where the whole can be grasped at once, these fourteen or fifteen great gate towers cannot fail to produce a certain effect, as may be gathered from the view in Woodcut No. 195; but even then it can only be by considering them as separate buildings. As parts of one whole, their arrangement is exactly that which enables them to produce the least possible effect that can be obtained either from their mass or ornament. Had the four great outer gopuras formed the four sides of a central hall, and the others gone on diminishing, in three or four directions, to the exterior, the effect of the whole would have been increased in a surprising degree. To accomplish this, however, one other defect must have been remedied: a gateway even 150 ft. wide in a wall nearly 2000 ft. in extent is a solecism nothing can redeem; but had the walls been broken in plan or star-shaped, like the plans of Chalukyan temples, light and shade would have been obtained, and due proportions of parts, without any inconvenience. But if the Dravidians ever had it in them to think of such things, it was not during the 17th and 18th centuries, to which everything in this temple seems to belong.

CHILLAMBARAM.

The temple at Chillambaram is one of the most venerated, and has also the reputation of being one of the most ancient, temples in southern India. It was there, therefore, if anywhere, that I at one time hoped to find some remains that would help to elucidate the history of the style. It was, besides, so far removed from any capital city or frequented haunt of man that one might hope to find its original form unaltered.

It is old, but I am afraid the traditions that connect its foundation with Hiranya Verma of Kashmir, in the beginning of the 6th century, on which I was at one time inclined to rely,[381] are of too impalpable a nature to be depended upon. I see no great reason for doubting that there may have been a connexion between the kings of Chola and those of Kashmir at the period; but I cannot see anything in this temple either of so early an age, or any feature in the style of Kashmiri architecture. On the other hand, the foundation of the temple appears to be clearly described in the following passage of the Kongadesa Raja Kal:--“Vira Chola Raya (A.D. 927 to 977) one day saw on the sea-shore the Sabhápati of Chillambara (Siva), attended by Parvati, dancing and beating the damaraka (a kind of drum); he therefore expended great sums of money in building the Kanaka, or Golden Sabha.”[382] A little further on, it is said, “Ari Vari Deva (A.D. 1004), observing that his grandfather had built only a Kanaka Sabhá to the Chillambara deity, he built gopuras, maddals (enclosures), madapanas (image-houses), sabhás (holy places or apartments), and granted many jewels to the deity.” If this last could be applied to the great enclosure, it would be a most important date; but on a careful examination of the whole circumstances of the case I feel convinced that these passages refer only to the two inner enclosures, B B, at the west end of the tank (Woodcut No. 196). They, indeed, measuring about 320 ft. square, appear to have been the whole of the original temple, at least in the 10th and 11th centuries, always supposing that any part of the building is really as old as this. On the whole, however, I am inclined to believe that this inner temple is really the one referred to in the above extract. The temple of Parvati, C, on the north of the tank, was added afterwards, most probably in the 14th or 15th century, and to that age the great gopuras and the second enclosure also belong. The hall of 1000 columns, E, was almost certainly erected between 1595 and 1685, at which time, we learn from the Mackenzie MSS., the kings of the locality made many donations to the fane.[383] It was then, also, in all probability, the outer enclosure was commenced; but it never was carried out, being in most places only a few feet above the foundation.

The oldest thing now existing here is a little shrine in the inmost enclosure (opposite A in the plan), with a little porch of two pillars, about 6 ft. high, but resting on a stylobate, ornamented with dancing figures, more graceful and more elegantly executed than any other of their class, so far as I know, in southern India. At the sides are wheels and horses, the whole being intended to represent a car, as is frequently the case in these temples. Whitewash and modern alterations have sadly disfigured this gem, but enough remains to show how exquisite, and consequently how ancient, it was. It was dedicated to Verma, the god of dancing, in allusion, probably, to the circumstance above mentioned as leading to the foundation of the temple.

In front of it is a shrine of very unusual architecture, with a tall copper roof, which, I have no doubt, represents or is the golden sabhá above referred to, and in front of this is a gopura and pillared porch, making up what seems to have been the temple of Vira Deva. The outer enclosure, with the buildings it contains, are, it appears, those of Ari Vari.

The temple of Parvati, C, is principally remarkable for its porch, which is of singular elegance. The following woodcut (No. 197) gives some idea of its present appearance, and the section (Woodcut No. 198) explains its construction. The outer aisles are 6 ft. in width, the next 8 ft., but the architect reserved all his power for the central aisle, which measures 21 ft. 6 in. in width, making the whole 50 ft. or thereabouts. In order to roof this without employing stones of such dimensions as would crush the supports, recourse was had to vaulting, or rather bracketing, shafts, and these brackets were again tied together by transverse purlins, all in stone, and the system was continued till the width was reduced to a dimension that could easily be spanned. As the whole is enclosed in a court surrounded by galleries two storeys in height, the effect of the whole is singularly pleasing.

Opposite to this, across the tank, is the hall of 1000 columns, similar in many respects to that at Seringham, above described, but probably slightly more modern. Here the pillars are arranged twenty-four in front by forty-one in depth, making 984; but in order to get a central space, four in the porch, then twenty-eight, then two, and again twenty-four, have been omitted, altogether fifty-eight; but, on the other hand, those of the external portico must be added, which nearly balances the loss, and makes up the 1000.[384] It must be confessed this forest of granite pillars, each of a single stone, and all more or less carved and ornamented, does produce a certain grandeur of effect, but the want of design in the arrangement, and of subordination of parts, detract painfully from the effect that might have been produced. Leaving out the pillars in the centre is the one redeeming feature, and that could easily have been effected without the brick vaults, formed of radiating arches, which are employed here--another certain proof of the modern age of the building. These vaults are certainly integral, and as certainly could not have been employed till after the Mahomedans had settled in the south, and taught the Hindus how to use them.

Although this temple has been aggregated at different ages, and grown by accident rather than design like those at Tiruvalur and Seringham just described, it avoids the great defect of these temples, for though like them it has no tall central object to give dignity to the whole from the outside, internally the centre of its great court is occupied by a tank, round which the various objects are grouped without at all interfering with one another. The temple itself is one important object, to the eastward of it; the Parvati temple another, on the north, and forms a pleasing pendant to the 1000-columned choultrie on the south. Alongside the Parvati another temple was commenced (Woodcut No. 199), with a portico of square pillars, four in front, and all most elaborately ornamented, but in such a manner as not to interfere with their outline or solidity.

From its unfinished and now ruined state, it is not easy to say to whom this temple was dedicated--most probably Soubramanya--nor to feel sure of its age. From its position, however, and the character of its ornamentation, there seems little doubt that it belongs to the end of the 17th and first half of the 18th century. From its style, I would be inclined to ascribe it to the earlier date, but in that case it is difficult to understand its not being finished. When they had money to erect the great hall, and to commence a new enclosure, they might certainly have spared enough to complete this solitary shrine.

RAMISSERAM.

If it were proposed to select one temple which should exhibit all the beauties of the Dravidian style in their greatest perfection, and at the same time exemplify all its characteristic defects of design, the choice would almost inevitably fall on that at Ramisseram, in the island of Paumben (Woodcut No. 200). In no other temple has the same amount of patient industry been exhibited as here, and in none, unfortunately, has that labour been so thrown away for want of a design appropriate for its display. It is not that this temple has grown by successive increments like those last described; it was begun and finished on a previously settled plan, as regularly and as undeviatingly carried out as that at Tanjore, but on a principle so diametrically opposed to it, that while the temple at Tanjore produces an effect greater than is due to its mass or detail, this one, with double its dimensions and ten times its elaboration, produces no effect externally, and internally can only be seen in detail, so that the parts hardly in any instance aid one another in producing the effect aimed at.

The only part of the temple which is of a different age from the rest is a small vimana, of very elegant proportions, that stands in the garden, on the right hand of the visitor as he enters from the west[385] (D). It has, however, been so long exposed--like the temple on the shore at Mahavellipore--to the action of the sea-air, that its details are so corroded they cannot now be made out, and its age cannot consequently be ascertained from them. It is safe, however, to assert that it is more modern than any of the rock-cut examples above quoted; possibly it may be of the 11th or 12th century. Its dimensions may be guessed as 50 ft. in height, by 30 ft. or 40 ft. in plan, so that it hardly forms a feature in so large a temple. From the four bulls that occupy the platform under the dome, it is evident it was originally dedicated to Siva, as the whole temple now apparently is, though the scene of Rama’s most celebrated exploit, and bearing his name.

Externally the temple is enclosed by a wall 20 ft. in height, and possessing four gopuras, one on each face, which have this peculiarity, that they alone, of all those I know in India, are built wholly of stone from the base to the summit. The western one (D) alone, however, is finished, and owing apparently to the accident of its being in stone, it is devoid of figure-sculpture--some half-dozen plaster casts that now adorn it having been added quite recently. Those on the north and south (A and C) are hardly higher than the wall in which they stand, and are consequently called the ruined gateways. Such a thing is, however, so far as I know, unknown in southern India. Partly from their form, and more from the solidity of their construction, nothing but an earthquake could well damage them, and their age is not such as would superinduce ruin from decay of material. These, in fact, have never been raised higher, and their progress was probably stopped in the beginning of the last century, when Mahomedan, Mahratta, and other foreign invaders checked the prosperity of the land, and destroyed the wealth of the priesthood. The eastern façade has two entrances and two gopuras. The smaller, not shown in the plan, is finished. The larger one (B in the plan) never was carried higher than we now see it. Had it been finished,[386] it would have been one of the largest of its class, and being wholly in stone, and consequently without its outline being broken by sculpture, it would have reproduced more nearly the effect of an Egyptian propylon than any other example of its class in India.

The glory, however, of this temple resides in its corridors. These, as will be seen by the plan, extend to nearly 4000 feet in length. The breadth varies from 20 ft. to 30 ft. of free floor space, and their height is apparently about 30 ft. from the floor to the centre of the roof. Each pillar or pier is compound, and richer and more elaborate in design than those of the Parvati porch at Chillambaram (Woodcut No. 197), and are certainly more modern in date.

The general appearance of these corridors may be gathered from the annexed woodcut (No. 201), but no engraving, even on a much more extended scale, can convey the impression produced by such a display of labour when extended to an uninterrupted length of 700 ft. None of our cathedrals are more than 500 ft., and even the nave of St. Peter’s is only 600 ft. from the door to the apse. Here the side corridors are 700 ft. long, and open into transverse galleries as rich in detail as themselves. These, with the varied devices and modes of lighting, produce an effect that is not equalled certainly anywhere in India. The side corridors are generally free from figure-sculpture, and consequently, from much of the vulgarity of the age to which they belong, and, though narrower, produce a more pleasing effect. The central corridor leading from the sanctuary is adorned on one side by portraits of the rajas of Ramnad in the 17th century, and opposite them, of their secretaries. Even they, however, would be tolerable, were it not that within the last few years they have been painted with a vulgarity that is inconceivable on the part of the descendants of those who built this fane. Not only they, however, but the whole of the architecture has first been dosed with repeated coats of whitewash, so as to take off all the sharpness of detail, and then painted with blue, green, red, and yellow washes, so as to disfigure and destroy its effect to an extent that must be seen to be believed. Nothing can more painfully prove the degradation to which our system has reduced the population than this profanity. No upper class, and consequently no refinement, now remains, and the priesthood, instead of being high bred and intellectual Brahmans, must be sunk into a state of debasement from which nothing can now probably redeem them.

Assuming, however, for the nonce, that this painting never had been perpetrated, still the art displayed here would be very inferior to that of such a temple as, for instance, Hullabîd, in the Mysore, to be described further on. The perimeter, however, of that temple is only 700 ft.; here we have corridors extending to 4000 ft., carved on both sides, and in the hardest granite. It is the immensity of the labour here displayed that impresses us, much more than its quality, and that, combined with a certain picturesqueness and mystery, does produce an effect which is not surpassed by any other temple in India, and by very few elsewhere.

The age of this temple is hardly doubtful. From first to last its style--excepting the old vimana--is so uniform and unaltered that its erection could hardly have lasted during a hundred years, and if this is so, it must have been during the 17th century, when the Ramnad rajas were at the height of their independence and prosperity, and when their ally or master, Tirumulla Nayak, was erecting buildings in the same identical style at Mádura. It may have been commenced fifty years earlier (1550), and the erection of its gopuras may have extended into the 18th century, but these seem the possible limits of deviation. Being so recent, any one on the spot could easily ascertain the facts. They could indeed be determined very nearly from the photographs, were it not for the whitewash and paint, which so disfigure the details as to make them almost unrecognisable.

MÁDURA.

If the native authorities consulted by the late Professor Wilson in compiling his Historical sketch of the Kingdom of Pándya could be relied upon, it would seem that the foundation of the dynasty ought to be placed some five or six centuries before the Christian Era.[387] Even, however, if this is disputed, the fact of the southern part of the Peninsula being described as the “Regio Pandionis” by classical authorities is sufficient to prove that a kingdom bearing that name did exist there in the early centuries of the Christian Era. Their first capitals, however, seem to have been Kurkhi, possibly the Kolkhi of the Periplus, near Ramnad, and Kalyana, near Cape Comorin. The story of Kula Sekhara founding Mádura, and the fabulous incidents with which the tale is adorned, is one of the favourite legends of the south, and is abundantly illustrated in sculptures of Tirumulla Nayak’s choultrie and in other buildings of the capital.

For our present purposes it is hardly worth while to attempt to investigate the succession of the dates of the seventy-three kings who are said to have succeeded one another before the accession of the Nayak or Naik dynasty, in 1532, inasmuch as no building is now known to exist in the kingdom that can claim, even on the most shadowy grounds, to have been erected by any of these kings. It may have been that, anterior to the rise of the great Chola dynasty, in the 10th and 11th century, that of Mádura may have had a long period of prosperity and power; but certain it is, that if they did build anything of importance, its existence cannot now be identified. After that, for a while they seem to have been subjected to the Bellala dynasty of the Mysore, and the same Mahomedan invasion that destroyed that power in 1310 spread its baneful influence as far as Ramnad, and for two centuries their raids and oppressions kept the whole of southern India in a state of anarchy and confusion. Their power for evil was first checked by the rise of the great Hindu state of Vijayanagar, in the Tongabhadra, in the 14th century, and by the establishment, under its protection, of the Nayak dynasty by Viswanath Nayak, in the beginning of the 16th. After lasting 210 years, the last sovereign of the race--a queen--was first aided, and then betrayed, by Chanda Sahib the Nawaub of the Carnatic, who plays so important a part in our wars with the French in these parts.

It may be--indeed, probably is the case--that there are temples in the provinces that were erected before the rise of the Nayak dynasty, but certain it is that all those in the capital, with the great temple at Seringham, described above, were erected during the two centuries of their supremacy, and of those in the capital nine-tenths at least were erected during the long and prosperous reign of the tenth king of this dynasty, Tirumulla Nayak, or as he is more popularly known, Trimul Naik, who reigned from 1621 to 1657.[388]

Of his buildings, the most important, for our purposes[389] at least, is the celebrated choultrie which he built for the reception of the presiding deity of the place, who consented to leave his dark cell in the temple and pay the king an annual visit of ten days’ duration, on condition of his building a hall worthy of his dignity, and where he could receive in a suitable manner the homage of the king and his subjects. As will be seen from the plan (Woodcut No. 202) the hall is 333 ft. long by 105 ft. in width, measured on the stylobate, and consists of four ranges of columns, all of which are different, and all most elaborately sculptured. An elevation of one is given (Woodcut No. 203), but is not so rich as those of the centre, which have life-sized figures attached to them, and are even more elaborate in their details. In this instance it will be observed that the detached bracketing shaft at Chillambaram has become attached to the square central pier, and instead of the light elegance that characterised that example, has become a solid pier, five or six feet in depth--richer certainly, but far from being either so elegant or so appropriate as the earlier example.

The view of the interior (Woodcut No. 204) gives some, but only a faint, idea of the effect. The sides are now closed with screens, and it is difficult to procure good photographs; but in effect, as in detail, it is identical with the corridors at Ramisseram, where the light is abundant.

As the date of this hall is perfectly well known--it took twenty-two years to erect it, 1623 to 1645--it becomes a fixed point in our chronology of the style. We can, for instance, assert with perfect certainty that the porch to Parvati’s shrine at Chillambaram (Woodcut No. 197) is certainly anterior to this, probably by a couple of centuries, and, with equal certainty that the corridors at Ramisseram are contemporary. From the history of the period we learn that the rajas of Ramnad were at times independent, at others at war with the Nayaks; but in Tirumulla Nayak’s time either his allies or dependants; and the style and design of the two buildings are so absolutely identical that they must belong to the same age. It is, indeed, most probable that the king of Mádura may have assisted in the erection of the temple. If he had indeed been allowed any share in making the original design, the temple would probably have been a nobler building than it is; for, though the details are the same, his three-aisled hall leading to the sanctuary would have been a far grander feature architecturally than the singled-aisled corridors that lead nowhere. The expense of one of the single-aisled corridors at Ramisseram, 700 ft. long, would have been about the same as the triple-aisled choultrie at Mádura, which is half their length. If, consequently, the choultrie cost a million sterling--as is confidently asserted--the temple must have cost between three and four millions; and such an estimate hardly seems excessive when we consider the amount of labour expended on it, and that the material in both is the hardest granite.

The façade of this hall, like that of almost all the great halls in the south of India, is adorned either with Yalis--monsters of the lion type trampling on an elephant--or, even more generally, by a group consisting of a warrior sitting on a rearing horse, whose feet are supported on the shields of foot soldiers, sometimes slaying men, sometimes tigers. These groups are found literally in hundreds in southern India, and, as works exhibiting difficulties overcome by patient labour, they are unrivalled, so far as I know, by anything found elsewhere. As works of art, they are the most barbarous, it may be said the most vulgar, to be found in India, and do more to shake one’s faith in the civilization of the people who produced them than anything they did in any other department of art. Where these monstrosities are not introduced, the pillars of entrances are only enriched a little more than those of the interior, when the ornamentation is in better taste, and generally quite sufficiently rich for its purpose.

Immediately in front of his choultrie, Tirumulla Nayak commenced a gopura, which, had he lived to complete it, would probably have been the finest edifice of its class in southern India. It measures 174 ft. from north to south, and 107[390] ft. in depth. The entrance through it is 21 ft. 9 in. wide; and if it be true that its gateposts are 60 ft. (Tripe says 57 ft.) in height, that would have been the height of the opening.[391] It will thus be seen that it was designed on even a larger scale than that at Seringham, described above, and it certainly far surpasses that celebrated edifice in the beauty of its details. Its doorposts alone, whether 57 ft. or 60 ft. in height, are single blocks of granite, carved with the most exquisite scroll patterns of elaborate foliage, and all the other carvings are equally beautiful. Being unfinished, and consequently never consecrated, it has escaped whitewash, and alone, of all the buildings of Mádura, its beauties can still be admired in their original perfection.

The great temple at Mádura is a larger and far more important building than the choultrie; but, somehow or other, it has not attracted the attention of travellers to the same extent that the latter has. No one has ever attempted to make a plan of it, or to describe it in such detail as would enable others to understand its peculiarities. It possesses, however, all the characteristics of a first-class Dravidian temple, and, as its date is perfectly well known, it forms a landmark of the utmost value in enabling us to fix the relative date of other temples.

The sanctuary is said to have been built by Viswanath, the first king of the Nayak dynasty, A.D. 1520, which may possibly be the case; but the temple itself certainly owes all its magnificence to Tirumulla Nayak, A.D. 1622-1657, or to his elder brother, Muttu Virappa, who preceded him, and who built a mantapa, said to be the oldest thing now existing here. The Kalyana mantapa is said to have been built A.D. 1707, and the Tatta Suddhi in 1770. These, however, are insignificant parts compared with those which certainly owe their origin to Tirumulla Nayak.

The temple itself is a nearly regular rectangle, two of its sides measuring 720 ft. and 729 ft., the other two 834 ft. and 852 ft. It possessed four gopuras of the first class, and five smaller ones; a very beautiful tank, surrounded by arcades; and a hall of 1000 columns, whose sculptures surpass those of any other hall of its class I am acquainted with. There is a small shrine, dedicated to the goddess Minakshi, the tutelary deity of the place, which occupies the space of fifteen columns, so the real number is only 985; but it is not their number but their marvellous elaboration that makes it the wonder of the place, and renders it, in some respects, more remarkable than the choultrie about which so much has been said and written. I do not feel sure that this hall alone is not a greater work than the choultrie; taken in conjunction with the other buildings of the temple, it certainly forms a far more imposing group.

As mentioned above, the great Vaishnava temple at Seringham owes all its magnificence to buildings erected during the reign of the Nayak dynasty, whose second capital was Trichinopoly, and where they often resided. Within a mile, however, of that much-lauded temple is another, dedicated to Siva, under the title of Jumbúkeswara, which, though not so large as that dedicated to Sri Rangam, far surpasses it in beauty as an architectural object. The first gateway of the outer enclosure is not large, but it leads direct to the centre of a hall containing some 400 pillars. On the right these open on a tank fed by a perpetual spring, which is one of the wonders of the place.[392] The corresponding space on the left was intended to be occupied by the 600 columns requisite to make up the 1000, but this never was completed. Between the two gopuras of the second enclosure is a very beautiful portico of cruciform shape, leading to the door of the sanctuary, which, however, makes no show externally, and access to its interior is not vouchsafed to the profane.[393] The age of this temple is the same as that of its great rival, except that, being all of one design, it probably was begun and completed at once, and from the simplicity of its parts and details may be earlier than the great buildings of Tirumulla Nayak. If we assume A.D. 1600, with a margin of ten or fifteen years either way, we shall probably not err much in its date.

One of the great charms of this temple, when I visited it, was its purity. Neither whitewash nor red nor yellow paint had then sullied it, and the time-stain on the warm-coloured granite was all that relieved its monotony; but it sufficed, and it was a relief to contemplate it thus after some of the vulgarities I had seen. Now all this is altered. Like the pagodas at Ramisseram, and more so those at Mádura, barbarous vulgarity has done its worst, and the traveller is only too fully justified in the contempt with which he speaks of these works of a great people which have fallen into the hands of such unworthy successors.

TINNEVELLY.

Though neither among the largest nor the most splendid temples of southern India, that at Tinnevelly will serve to give a good general idea of the arrangement of these edifices, and has the advantage of having been built on one plan, and at one time, without subsequent alteration or change. Like the little cell in the Tiruvalur temple (Woodcut No. 193), it has the singularity of being a double temple, the great square being divided into equal portions, of which one is dedicated to the god Siva, the other to his consort Parvati. The preceding plan (Woodcut No. 205) represents one of the halves, which, though differing in arrangement from the other, is still so like it as to make the representation and description of one sufficient for both.

The general dimensions of the whole enclosure are 508 ft. by 756 ft., the larger dimension being divided into two equal portions of 378 ft. each. There are three gateways to each half, and one in the wall dividing the two; the principal gateway faces the entrance to the temple, and the lateral ones are opposite each other. An outer portico precedes the great gateway, leading internally to a very splendid porch, which, before reaching the gateway of the inner enclosure, branches off on the right to the intermediate gateway, and on the left to the great hall of 1000 columns--10 pillars in width by 100 in depth.

The inner enclosure is not concentric with the outer, and, as usual, has only one gateway. The temple itself consists of a cubical cell, surmounted by a vimana or spire, preceded by two porches, and surrounded by triple colonnades. In other parts of the enclosure are smaller temples, tanks of water, gardens, colonnades, &c., but neither so numerous nor so various as are generally found in Indian temples of this class.

The great 1000-pillared portico in the temple is one of the least poetic of its class in India. It consists of a regiment of pillars 10 deep and extending to 100 in length, without any break or any open space or arrangement. Such a forest of pillars does, no doubt, produce a certain effect; but half that number, if arranged as in some of the Chalukyan or Jaina temples, would produce a far nobler impression. The aim of the Dravidians seems to have been to force admiration by the mere exhibition of inordinate patient toil.

COMBACONUM.

If the traditions of the natives could be trusted, Combaconum--one of the old capitals of the Chola dynasty--is one of the places where we might hope to find something very ancient. There are fragments of older temples, indeed, to be found everywhere, but none in situ. All the older buildings seem to have been at some time ruined and rebuilt, probably on the same site, but with that total disregard to antiquity which is characteristic of the Hindus in all ages. One portico, in a temple dedicated to Sri Rama, is very like that leading from the second to the third gopura in the temple of Jumbúkeswara, described above, but, if anything, it is slightly more modern. There is also one fine gopura in the town, represented in the last woodcut (No. 206). It is small, however, in comparison with those we have just been describing, being only 84 ft. across and about 130 ft. in height. Those of Seringham and Mádura have, or were intended to have, at least double these dimensions.

It is, however, a richly-ornamented example of its class, and the preceding woodcut conveys a fair impression of the effect of these buildings generally. It is not old enough to be quite of the best age, but it is still not so modern as to have lost all the character and expression of the earlier examples.

CONJEVERAM.

Conjeveram is another city where tradition would lead us to expect more of antiquity than in almost any city of the south. It is said to have been founded by Adondai, the illegitimate son of Kolotunga Chola, in the 11th or 12th century, and to have succeeded Combaconum as the capital of the Chola Mandalam. Even before this, however, it is supposed to have been inhabited by Buddhists,[394] and that they were succeeded by Jains. If this is so, all that can be said is, that neither of these religions have left any traces of their existence on the spot, and many passages in the Mackenzie MSS. would lead us to suppose that it was a jungle inhabited by savage Kurumbars when the Cholas took possession of it.

Be this as it may, the two towns, Great and Little Conjeveram, possess groups of temples as picturesque and nearly as vast as any to be found elsewhere. The great temple at the first-named place possesses some first-class gopuras, though no commanding vimana. It has, too, a hall of 1000 columns, several large and fine mantapas, large tanks with flights of stone steps, and all the requisites of a first-class Dravidian temple, but all thrown together as if by accident. No two gopuras are opposite one another, no two walls parallel, and there is hardly a right angle about the place. All this creates a picturesqueness of effect seldom surpassed in these temples, but deprives it of that dignity we might expect from such parts if properly arranged.

There may be some part I did not see[395] which may be older, but certainly none of the principal buildings are so old as Parvati’s shrine at Chillambaram, but all seem equally to be anterior to the great building epoch of the Nayak dynasty. They probably are the last efforts of the Cholas; but here, again, whitewash and red paint have done so much to obliterate the record, that it is not safe to dogmatise regarding the age of any buildings in either of the two Conjeverams.

VELLORE AND PEROOR.

Although the temples at Vellore and at Peroor, near Coimbatore, can only rank among the second class as regards size, they possess porticos of extreme interest to architectural history, and are consequently worthy of more attention than has been bestowed upon them. That at Vellore, however, is unfortunately situated in the fort occupied by the British, and has consequently been utilised as a store. Walls have been built between its piers, and whitewash and fittings have reduced it to that condition which we think appropriate for the noblest works of art in India. Enough, however, still remains to enable us to see that it is one of the most elegant as well as one of the oldest porches or mantapas in the south. As will be seen from the woodcut (No. 207), the Yalis and rearing horsemen are clearly and sharply cut, and far from being so extravagant as they sometimes are. The great cornice too, with its double flexures and its little trellice-work of supports, is not only very elegant in form, but one of those marvels of patient industry, such as are to be found hardly anywhere else. There are many such cornices, however, in the south: one at Avadea Covill is deeper and more elaborate than even this one. The outer facing there is said to be only about an inch in thickness, and its network of supports is more elaborate and more delicate than those at Vellore, though it is difficult to understand how either was ever executed in so hard a material. The traditions of the place assign the erection of the Vellore porch to the year 1350, and though this is perhaps being too precise, it is not far from the truth. The bracket shafts (Woodcut No. 208) are similar but even more elegant than those in Parvati’s porch at Chillambaram; but they are--some of them at least--attached to the pier by very elegant open-work, such as is found in Pratapa Rudra’s temple at Worangul (Woodcut No. 217) or in the windows at Hullabîd. As both these examples are earlier than 1300, it might seem that this one was so also, but it is difficult to feel certain when comparing buildings so distant in locality, and belonging to different styles of art. On the whole, however, I am inclined to believe that between 1300 and 1400 will be found the true date of this porch.

The date of the porch at Peroor is ascertained within narrow limits by the figure of a Sepoy loading a musket being carved on the base of one of its pillars, and his costume and the shape of his arm are exactly those we find in contemporary pictures of the wars of Aurungzebe, or the early Mahrattas, in the beginning of the 18th century. As shown in Woodcut No. 209, the bracket shafts are there attached to the piers as in Tirumulla Nayak’s buildings, and though the general character of the architecture is the same, there is a coarseness in the details, and a marked inferiority in the figure-sculpture, that betrays the distance of date between these two examples.

Slight as the difference may appear to the unpractised eye, it is within the four centuries that include the dates of these two buildings (1350 to 1750) that practically the whole history of the Dravidian temple architecture is included. There are rock-cut examples before the first date, and some structural buildings in Dharwar on a smaller scale, which are older, but it is safe to assert that nine-tenths, at least, or more, of those which are found south of the Tongabhadra, were erected between these dates.

Of course it is not meant to assert that, before the first of these dates, there were not structural temples in the south of India. So far from this being the case, it seems nearly certain that during the six or seven centuries that elapsed between the carving of the rocks at Mahavellipore and the erection of the Vellore pagoda, numerous buildings must have been erected in order that a style should be elaborated and so fixed that it should endure for five centuries afterwards, with so little change, and with only that degradation in detail, which is the fatal characteristic of art in India.

It seems impossible that the horsemen, the Yalis, and above all, the great cornice of double curvature, shown in the woodcut (No. 207), could have been brought to these fixed forms without long experience, and the difficulty is to understand how they could ever have been elaborated in stone at all, as they are so unlike lithic forms found anywhere else; yet they are not wooden, nor is there any trace in them of any of their details being derived from wooden architecture, as is so evidently the case with the Buddhist architecture of the north. The one suggestion that occurs to me is that they are derived from terra-cotta forms. Frequently, at the present day, figures of men on horseback larger than life, or of giants on foot, are seen near the village temples made of pottery, their hollow forms of burnt clay, and so burnt as to form a perfect terra-cotta substance. Most of the figures also on the gopuras are not in plaster as is generally said, but are also formed of clay burnt. The art has certainly been long practised in the south, and if we adopt the theory that it was used for many ornamental purposes before wood or stone, it will account for much that is otherwise unintelligible in the arts of the south.

VIJAYANAGAR.

The dates just quoted will no doubt sound strange and prosaic to those who are accustomed to listen to the childish exaggerations of the Brahmans in speaking of the age of their temples. There is, however, luckily a test besides the evidence above quoted, which, if it could be perfectly applied, would settle the question at once.

When in the beginning of the 14th century the Mahomedans from Delhi first made their power seriously felt in the south, they struck down the kingdom of the Hoisala Bellalas in 1310, and destroyed their capital of Hullabîd; and in 1322 Worangul, which had been previously attacked, was finally destroyed, and it is said they then carried their victorious arms as far as Ramnad. The Mahomedans did not, however, at that time make any permanent settlement in the south, and the consequence was, that as soon as the Hindus were able to recover from the panic, Bukka and Harihara, princes it is said of the deposed house of Worangul, gathered around them the remnants of the destroyed states, and founded a new state in the town of Vijayanagar on the Tongabhadra. An earlier city it is said had been founded there in 1118, by a Vijaya Rayal, but only as a dependency of the Mysore Raj, and there is consequently no reason for supposing that any of the buildings in the city belong to that period, nor indeed till the new dynasty founded by Bukka had consolidated its power, which was certainly not before the beginning of the 15th century.

The city was finally destroyed by the Mahomedans in 1565, but during the two previous centuries it maintained a gallant struggle against the Bahmuny and Adil Shahi dynasties of Kalburgah and Bijapur, and was in fact the barrier that prevented the Moslems from taking possession of the whole country as far as Cape Comorin.

Its time of greatest prosperity was between the accession of Krishna Deva, 1508, and the death of Achutya Rayal, 1542, and it is to their reigns that the finest monuments in the city must be ascribed. There is, perhaps, no other city in all India in which ruins exist in such profusion or in such variety as in Vijayanagar, and as they are all certainly comprised within the century and a half, or at the utmost the two centuries, that preceded the destruction of the city, their analogies afford us dates that hardly admit of dispute.

Among those in the city the most remarkable is that dedicated to Vitoba, a local manifestation of Vishnu. It was erected by Achutya Rayal, A.D. 1529-1542, and never was finished; and if it were not that no successor ever cares in India to complete the works begun by his predecessor, we might fancy the works were interrupted by the siege. The principal part of the temple consists of a porch, represented in the annexed woodcut (No. 210). It is wholly in granite, and carved with a boldness and expression of power nowhere surpassed in the buildings of its class.[396] As will be observed, it has all the characteristic peculiarities of the Dravidian style: the bold cornice of double flexure, the detached shafts, the Yalis, the richly-carved stylobate, &c. But what interests us most here is that it forms an exact half-way house in style between such porches as those at Vellore and Chillambaram, and that of Tirumulla Nayak at Mádura. The bracket shafts are detached here, it is true, but they are mere ornaments, and have lost their meaning. The cornice is as bold as any, but has lost its characteristic supports, and other changes have been made, which would inevitably have led in a short time to the new style of the Nayak dynasty.

The little building on the right is the car of the god, formed of a single block of granite, with movable wheels, but they are the only parts that move. There are, besides, either one or two pavilions, smaller, but similar in design to that represented in the woodcut, a gopura, and other adjuncts, which would be interesting, if we had the means of comparing and describing them.

Although the temple of Vitoba is certainly one of the most remarkable ruins in India, and there are other temples of great beauty and extent in the capital, it is not quite clear that it is there the chefs-d’œuvre of this dynasty are to be found, but rather at a place called Tarputry, about one hundred miles a little east of south from the capital. There are two temples there: the one now in use, dedicated to Vishnu, is the elder, and in so far as whitewash and paint will allow one to judge, ranges with the works of the earliest kings of the Vijayanagar dynasty; but the wonders of the place are two gopuras belonging to a now deserted temple on the banks of the river, about a quarter of a mile from the others. One of these was apparently quite finished, the other never carried higher than the perpendicular part. In almost all the gopuras of India this part is comparatively plain, all the figure-sculpture and ornament being reserved for the upper or pyramidal part. In this instance, however, the whole of the perpendicular part is covered with the most elaborate sculpture, cut with exquisite sharpness and precision, in a fine close-grained hornblende (?) stone, and produces an effect richer, and on the whole perhaps in better taste, than anything else in this style (Woodcuts Nos. 211, 212). It is difficult of course to institute a comparison between these gopuras and such works as Tirumulla Nayak’s choultrie, or the corridors at Ramisseram; they are so different that there is no common basis of comparison but the vulgar one of cost; but if compared with Hullabîd or Baillûr, these Tarputry gopuras stand that test better than any other works of the Vijayanagar Rajas. They are inferior, but not so much so as one would expect from the two centuries of decadence that elapsed between them, and they certainly show a marked superiority over the great unfinished gopura of Tirumulla Nayak, which was commenced, as nearly as may be, one century afterwards.

About fifty miles still further east, at a place called Diggu Hublum, there is a large unfinished mantapa, in plan and design very like that of the temple of Vitoba at Vijayanagar, but its style and details are so much more like those of the Nayaks, that it must be at least a century more modern, and could not therefore have been erected before the destruction of that capital in A.D. 1565. The dynasty, however, continued to exist for one or two centuries after that time, till the country was finally conquered by Tipu Sultan. It must have been by one of the expatriated rajas that this temple was erected, but by whom even tradition is silent. Whoever may have built it, it is a fine bold specimen of architecture, and if the history of the art in the south of India is ever seriously taken up, it will worthily take a place in the series as one of the best specimens of its age, wanting the delicacy and elegance of the earlier examples, but full of character and merit.[397]

CONCLUSION.

The buildings mentioned, and more or less perfectly described, in the preceding pages are in number rather more than one-third of the great Dravidian temples known to exist in the province. In importance and extent they certainly are, however, more than one-half. Of the remainder, none have vimanas, like that of Tanjore, nor corridors, like those of Ramisseram; but several have gopuras quite equal to or exceeding those mentioned above, and many have mantapas of great beauty and extent. Several--such as Avadea Covill, Veeringepuram, Taramungulam, and others--possess features unsurpassed by any in the south, especially the first-named, which may, perhaps, be considered as one of the most elegant of its class, as well as one of the oldest. It would, however, be only tedious to attempt to describe them without plans to refer to, or more extensive illustrations than are compatible with a work of this class. They are, however, worthy of more attention than has been paid to them, and of more complete illustration than has hitherto been bestowed upon them. Taken altogether, they certainly do form as extensive, and in some respects as remarkable, a group of buildings as are to be found in provinces of similar extent in any part of the world--Egypt, perhaps, alone excepted; but they equal even the Egyptian in extent, and though at first sight so different, in some respects present similarities which are startling. Without attempting to enumerate the whole, it may be mentioned that the gopuras, both in form and purpose, resemble the pylons of the Egyptian temples. The courts with pillars and cloisters are common to both, and very similar in arrangement and extent. The great mantapas and halls of 1000 columns reproduce the hypostyle halls, both in purpose and effect, with almost minute accuracy. The absence of any central tower or vimana over the sanctuary is universal in Egypt, and only conspicuously violated in one instance in India. Their mode of aggregation, and the amount of labour bestowed upon them for labour’s sake, is only too characteristic of both styles. There are, besides, many similarities that will occur to any one familiar with both styles.

Is all this accidental? It seems strange that so many coincidences should be fortuitous, but, so far as history affords us any information, or as any direct communication can be traced, we must for the present answer that it is so. The interval of time is so great, and the mode in which we fancy we can trace the native growth of most of the features in India seem to negative the idea of an importation; but there certainly was intercourse between Egypt and India in remote ages, and seed may then have been sown which fructified long afterwards.

If we were to trust, however, to either tradition or to mythological or ethnological coincidences, it is rather to Babylonia than to Egypt that we should look for the incunabula of what are found in southern India. But here the architectural argument is far from having the same distinctness; and, in fact, whichever way we turn, we are forced to confess that these problems are not yet ripe for solution, though enough is known to encourage the hope that the time is not distant when materials will be gathered that will make all clear.

IV. CIVIL ARCHITECTURE

CONTENTS.

Palaces at Mádura and Tanjore--Garden Pavilion at Vijayanagar.

Although, like all nations of Turanian race, the Dravidians were extensive and enthusiastic builders, it is somewhat singular that till they came in contact with the Mahomedans all their efforts in this direction should have been devoted to the service of religion. No trace of any civil or municipal building is to be found anywhere, though from the stage of civilization that they had attained it might be expected that such must have existed. What is, however, even more remarkable is, that kingdoms always at war with one another, and contending for supremacy within a limited area, might have been expected to develop some sort of military architecture. So far, however, as is now known, no castle or fortification of any sort dates from the Pandya, Chera, or Chola days. What is still more singular in a people of Turanian blood is, that they have no tombs. They seem always to have burnt their dead, and never to have collected their ashes or raised any mounds or memorials to their departed friends or great men. There are, it is true, numberless “Rude stone monuments” all over the south of India, but, till they are more thoroughly investigated, it is impossible to say whether they belong to the Dravidians when in a lower stage of civilization than when they became temple builders, or whether they belong to other underlying races who still exist, in scattered fragments, all over the south of India, in a state bordering on that of savages.[398] Whoever these Dolmens or stone circles may have belonged to, we know, at least, that they never were developed into architectural objects, such as would bring them within the scope of this work. No Dravidian tomb or cenotaph is known to exist anywhere.

When, however, the Dravidians came in contact with the Mussulmans this state of affairs was entirely altered, in so far, at least, as civil buildings were concerned. The palaces, the kutcherries, the elephant-stables, and the dependencies of the abodes of the rajas at Vijayanagar and Mádura, rival in extent and in splendour the temples themselves, and are not surpassed in magnificence by the Mahomedan palaces of Bijapur or Bidar.

One of the most interesting peculiarities of these civil buildings is, that they are all in a new and different style of architecture from that employed in the temples, and the distinction between the civil and religious art is kept up to the present day. The civil buildings are all in what we would call a pointed-arched Moorish style--picturesque in effect, if not always in the best taste, and using the arch everywhere and for every purpose. In the temples the arch is never used as an architectural feature. In some places, in modern times, when they wanted a larger internal space than could be obtained by bracketing without great expense, a brick vault was introduced,--it may be said surreptitiously--for it is always concealed. Even now, in building gopuras, they employ wooden beams, supported by pillars, as lintels, to cover the central openings in the upper pyramidal part, and this having decayed, many of the most modern exhibit symptoms of decay which are not observable in the older examples, where a stone lintel always was employed. But it is not only in construction that the Dravidians adhere to their old forms in temples. There are, especially, some gopuras erected within the limits of this century, and erecting even now, which it requires a practised eye to distinguish from older examples; but with the civil buildings the case is quite different. It is not, indeed, clear how a convenient palace could be erected in the trabeate style of the temples, unless, indeed, wood was very extensively employed, both in the supports and the roofs. My conviction is, that this really was the case, and its being so, to a great extent, at least, accounts for their disappearance.

The principal apartments in the palace at Mádura are situated round a courtyard which measures 244 ft. east and west by 142 ft. north and south, surrounded on all sides by arcades of very great beauty. The pillars which support the arches are of stone, 40 ft. in height, and are joined by foliated brick arcades of great elegance of design. The whole of the ornamentation is worked out in the exquisitely fine stucco called “chunan,” or shell lime, which is a characteristic of the Madras Presidency.[399] On one side of the court stands the Swerga Vilasam, or Celestial Pavilion, formerly the throne-room of the palace, now used by the High Court of

Justice. It is an arcaded octagon, covered by a dome 60 ft. in diameter and 60 ft. in height. On another side of this court is placed the splendid hall shown in the annexed woodcut (No. 213), the two corresponding with the Dewanni Khas and Dewanni Aum of Mahomedan palaces. This one, in its glory, must have been as fine as any, barring the material. The hall itself is said to be 120 ft. long by 67 ft. wide,[400] and its height to the centre of the roof is 70 ft.; but, what is more important than its dimensions, it possesses all the structural propriety and character of a Gothic building. It is evident that if the Hindus had persevered a little longer in this direction they might have accomplished something that would have surpassed the works of their masters in this form of art. In the meanwhile it is curious to observe that the same king who built the choultries (Woodcuts Nos. 202, 203 and 204) built also this hall. The style of the one is as different from that of the other as Classic Italian from Mediæval Gothic: the one as much over ornamented as the other is too plain for the purposes of a palace, but both among the best things of their class which have been built in the country where they are found.

The modern dynasty of Tanjore was founded by Eccoji, a brother of Sivagi, the great Máhratta chief, during the decline of the Mádura dynasty in 1675. The palace was probably commenced shortly afterwards, but the greater part of its buildings belong to the 18th century, and some extend even into the 19th.

It is not unlike the Mádura palace in arrangement--is, indeed, evidently copied from it--nor very different in style; but the ornamentation is coarser and in more vulgar taste, as might be expected from our knowledge of the people who erected it (Woodcut No. 214). In some of the apartments this is carried so far as to become almost offensive. One of the most striking peculiarities of the palace is the roof of the great hall externally. As you approach Tanjore, you see two great vimanas, not unlike each other in dimensions or outline, and at a distance can hardly distinguish which belongs to the great temple. On closer inspection, however, that of the palace turns out to be made up of dumpy pilasters and fat balusters, and ill-designed mouldings of Italian architecture, mixed up with a few details of Indian art! A more curious and tasteless jumble can hardly be found in Calcutta or Lucknow.

The palace buildings at Vijayanagar are much more detached and scattered than those either at Tanjore or Mádura, but they are older, and probably reproduce more nearly the arrangements of a Hindu prince’s residence, before they fell completely under the sway of Moslem influence. Practically the palace consists of a number of detached pavilions, baths, hareems, and other buildings, that may have been joined by wooden arcades. They certainly were situated in gardens, and may consequently have had a unity we miss in their present state of desolation. One of these pavilions is represented in the preceding woodcut (No. 215). It is a fair specimen of that picturesque mixed style which arose from the mixture of the Saracenic and Hindu styles.

Even this mixed style, however, died out wherever the Europeans settled, or their influence extended. The modern palaces of the Nawabs of the Carnatic, of the Rajas of Ramnad or Travancore, are all in the bastard Italian style, adopted by the Nawabs of Lucknow and the Babus of Calcutta. Sometimes, it must be confessed, the buildings are imposing from their mass, and picturesque from their variety of outline, but the details are always detestable, first from being bad copies of a style that was not understood or appreciated, but also generally from their being unsuited for the use to which they were applied. To these defects it must be added, that the whole style is generally characterised by a vulgarity it is difficult to understand in a people who have generally shown themselves capable of so much refinement in former times.

In some parts of the north of India matters have not sunk so low as in the Madras Presidency, but in the south civil architecture as a fine art is quite extinct, and though sacred architecture still survives in a certain queer, quaint form of temple-building, it is of so low a type that it would hardly be a matter of regret if it, too, ceased to exist, and the curtain dropped over the graves of both, as they are arts that practically have become extinct.

I. INTRODUCTORY

CONTENTS.

Temple at Buchropully--Kirti Stambha at Worangul--Temples at Somnathpûr and Baillûr--The Kait Iswara at Hullabîd--Temple at Hullabîd.

Of the three styles into which Hindu architecture naturally divides itself, the Chalukyan is neither the least extensive nor the least beautiful, but it certainly is the least known. The very name of the people was hardly recognised by early writers on Indian subjects, and the first clear ideas regarding them were put forward, in 1826, in a paper by Sir Walter Elliot, in the fourth volume of the ‘Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society.’ To this he added another paper, in the twentieth volume of the ‘Madras Journal:’ and since then numerous inscriptions of this dynasty and of its allied families have been found, and translated by General Le Grand, Jacob and others, in the ‘Bombay Journal,’ and by Professor Dowson in the ‘Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society’ here.[401]

From all this we gather that early in the sixth century of our era[402] this family rose into importance at Kalyan--in what is now the Nizam’s territory--and spread eastward as far as the shores of the Bay of Bengal, in the neighbourhood of the mouths of the Kistnah and Godavery. They extended, in fact, from shore to shore, right across the peninsula, and occupied a considerable portion of the country now known as Mysore, and northward extended as far, at least, as Dowlutabad.

Beyond this, they seem to have been closely allied with the Ballabhi dynasty of Gujerat, and afterwards to be the parent stems from which the Hoisala Bellalas of Dwarasamudra took their rise.

Their affiliations and descents are more easily traced than their origin. Jaya Singa, the founder of the Kalyan dynasty (A.D. 500?), claims to be of the Solar race of Rajputs, and descended from kings reigning in Ayodhya 1000 years (fifty-nine generations) before his time. This, however, seems as likely to be a reminiscence of the origin of their religion as of their race; for, though we are not yet in a position to prove it, it seems likely that the Chalukyas were originally Jains. At all events, it seems clear that the extension of the Jaina religion is nearly conterminous with that of Chalukyan sway, and the time at which the religion spread over India was also coincident with their rise and fall.

It would, of course, be too much to assert that the Chalukyas were either the revivors of the Jaina faith or even its principal propagators; but, during the early part of their history, this form of faith is inextricably mixed up with the more orthodox religions as practised by them, and prevails to the present day, in the countries where they ruled. The style of architecture which they invented when Jains was, it is true, practised afterwards by them both as Vaishnavas and Saivas; but it seems to have had its origin in the earlier form of faith.

Like all dynasties of Central and Northern India, the Chalukyas suffered eclipse in the dark ages that intervened between A.D. 750 and 950;[403] and the difficulty is to know whether we have any temples in their style before that period. Those at Aiwulli and Purudkul described above (Woodcuts Nos. 121 and 189), belong to their age, and may have been erected by early kings of this race; but they do not belong to their style. Their sikras, or towers, either show the curvilinear outline of the northern style, or the storeyed pyramids of the Dravidians. It is as if this intrusive race adopted hesitatingly the styles of earlier inhabitants of the country, but that it was not till they had consolidated their power, and developed peculiar institutions of their own, that they expressed them in the style to which their name has been affixed.

It is more than probable that the materials exist for settling these and all other questions connected with this style; but, unfortunately, if it is so, they exist in the Nizam’s territory, and that is terra incognita to us in so far as architecture is concerned. No one has yet passed through it who had any knowledge of the art, or was even aware that any interest attached to the forms or age of the buildings. It thus happens that, but for a few stray photographs, it must have been passed over as a style less known, from an artistic point of view, than that of almost any civilized country in the world. The rulers of the Hydrabad territory being bigoted Mahomedans, it is to be feared that great destruction of native temples may have taken place; but the real cause of our ignorance on the subject is the indifference and apathy to such matters in those who rule the rulers, and who, if they chose, could clear up the whole mystery in a few months or years, and with little expense to themselves, beyond expressing a wish that it should be done.

It may be, however, that the remains have perished. The line of Mahomedan capitals--Bijapur, Kalburgah, Bidar, and Hydrabad--which have long occupied the native country of the Chalukyas, is painfully suggestive of the destruction of Hindu temples; but still the wealth of remains that exists in Dharwar on the south and west, and the Berars on the north of the Nizam’s territories, is so great that all certainly cannot have perished, and many will probably be found to solve the historical enigmas, though they may not be sufficient to restore the style in its integrity.

Whether Kalyani itself has escaped is by no means clear. In a list of remains in the Bombay Presidency, prepared by Mr. Burgess, dated 1873, there are the following entries:--“Three miles to the south-east of town, some fine temples and other ruins;” and further on, on the authority of the late Bhau Daji, it is stated, “has extensive ruins for miles around. There are caves in the hills, called Hazar Khotri, or Thousand Chambers. Pir Padshah Musjid is probably part of a Hindu temple.” If this is so, the history of the style is probably all there, and only awaits the advent of some one capable of reading it.

The simplest and most typical example of the style that I know, and the one, consequently, which will serve best to explain its peculiarities, is at a place called Buchropully, not far from Hydrabad. It probably is also one of the oldest, and may even date before the cataclysm; but this is only a guess. I have no such real knowledge of the early form of the style as would enable me to feel sure on such a subject. As will be observed, the temple itself is polygonal, or star-shaped, of twenty-four sides (Woodcut No. 216). These, however, are not obtained, as in the northern style, by increments added flatly to a square, as will be explained hereafter, but are points touching a circle, in this instance apparently right angles, but afterwards were either more acute or flatter than a right angle. There are four principal faces, however, larger than the others: three occupied by niches, the fourth by the entrance. The roof is in steps, and with a flat band on each face in continuation of the larger face below. The summit ornament is a flower or vase, in this instance apparently incomplete. The porch is simple, consisting only of sixteen pillars, disposed equidistantly, without any attempt at the octagonal dome of the Jains or the varied arrangements subsequently attempted.

Although of no great magnificence in itself, this temple is interesting as possessing all the features which distinguish the Chalukyan style from those that surround it either on the north or south. Instead of their square plans, this one is practically star-shaped. The sikra is a straight-lined cone, and its decorations in steps is as unlike the Dravidian spire in storeys as it is to the curvilinear outline of the Jaina or northern temples. The porch, too, is open, and consists of columns spaced equidistantly over its floor, without either the bracketing arrangements of the southern or the domical forms of the northern styles. Situated as it was locally, half-way between the Dravidian and northern styles, the Chalukyan borrowed occasionally a feature or form from one or from the other, but never to such an extent as to obliterate its individuality, or to prevent its being recognised as a separate and distinct style of architecture.

When the Nizam’s territory is examined, we shall probably be able to trace all the steps by which this simple village example developed into the metropolitan temple of Hammoncondah, the old capital, six miles north of Worangul. According to an inscription on its walls, this temple was erected, in A.D. 1163, by Pratapa Rudra,[404] who, though not exactly himself a Chalukya in blood, succeeded to their possessions and their style. The temple itself is triple, having three detached cells of very considerable dimensions, in front of which is a portico, supported by between 240 or 300 pillars, disposed in a varied and complicated pattern,[405] but without any sign, so far as I can trace, of the Jaina octagonal arrangement for a dome. Like most of these late temples, this one was never finished. It was too extensive for one king’s reign, even for one so powerful as he was who undertook it, and before it was heartily taken up again the Mahomedans were upon them (in A.D. 1309), and there was an end of Hindu greatness and of Hindu art.

Some of its details, however, are of great beauty, especially the entrances, which are objects on which the architects generally lavished their utmost skill. The preceding woodcut (No. 217) will explain the form of those of the great temple, as well as the general ordinances of the pillars of the great portico. Nothing in Hindu art is more pleasing than the pierced slabs which the Chalukyas used for windows. They are not, so far as I recollect, used--certainly, not extensively--in any other style, but as used by them are highly ornamental and appropriate, both externally and internally.

The pillars, too, are rich, without being overdone; and as it is only in pairs that they are of the same design, the effect of the whole is singularly varied, but at the same time pleasing and elegant.

There are at Hammoncondah or Worangul a great number of smaller temples and shrines, in the same style as the great temple, and, like it, apparently all dedicated to Siva, from the constant presence of his bull everywhere. Most are ruined; but whether this is owing to Moslem bigotry or faulty construction, it is difficult to say. Judging from appearances, I am inclined to believe the latter was the true cause. The mode of building is without mortar, and the joints are by no means well fitted. The style is also remarkably free from figure-sculpture, which is generally the thing that most easily excites the iconoclastic feelings of the followers of the Prophet.

In Worangul there are four Kirti Stambhas, as they are called, facing one another, as if they formed the entrances to a square enclosure (Woodcut No. 218). No wall is there, however, nor is there anything inside; so the object of their erection is by no means apparent. They were set up by the same Pratapa Rudra who built the great temple in the old capital, and built several others in this new city. It cannot be said they are particularly elegant specimens of art. Their main interest lies in their being the lineal descendants of the four gateways at Sanchi (Woodcut No. 33), and they may have been erected to replace some wooden or frailer structure which had fallen into decay. Whether this is so or not, they are curious as exemplifying how, in the course of a thousand years or thereabouts, a wooden style of building may lose all traces of its origin and become as essentially lithic as these, but still betray its origin as clearly as they do; for it seems most unlikely that any such form could have been invented by any one using stone constructions, and that only.

MYSORE.

It is in the province of Mysore, however, that the Chalukyan style attained its fullest development and highest degree of perfection during the three centuries--A.D. 1000 to 1300--in which the Hoisala Bellalas had supreme sway in that country. Three temples, or rather groups of temples, were erected by them--the first at a place called Somnathpûr, south of Mysore, by Vinaditya Bellala, who ascended the throne A.D. 1043; the second at Baillûr, in the centre of the province, owed its origin apparently to Vishnu Verddhana, in or about A.D. 1114; the last and greatest at a place they called Dwarsamudra--the Gate of the Sea--now known as Hullabîd, not far from the last-named, from which the capital was removed by Vijaya Narsinha, in 1145. It continued to be the metropolis of the kingdom, till it was destroyed and the building of the great temple stopped by the Mahomedan invasion in A.D. 1310-1311.[406]

Even in this short series we see evidence of that downward progress of art, especially in sculpture, which is everywhere the characteristic of Hindu art. Though the design is the grandest, the sculpture and details of Hullabîd are inferior to those of Baillûr, and Somnathpûr seems superior to both. We consequently long to trace back the history of the style to some more distant date, when we might find it emerging in purity and elegance from some unknown prototype. Unfortunately, we are not at present able to do this. We are obliged to leap over the dark ages to the caves and temples of Badami and Aiwulli, and have no intermediate examples to connect the two. It is more than probable that they do exist, and will be found when looked for. Meanwhile, however, we can only assume that the star-like plans and peculiar details of the style were elaborated between the 6th and the 10th centuries in Central and Western India, but where and by whom remains still to be discovered.

Like the great temple at Hammoncondah, that at Somnathpûr is triple, the cells, with their sikras, being attached to a square pillared hall, to the fourth side of which a portico is attached, in this instance of very moderate dimensions.[407] The whole stands in a square cloistered court, and has the usual accompaniments of entrance-porches, stambhas, &c.

The following illustration (No. 219) will give an idea--an imperfect one, it must be confessed--of the elegance of outline and marvellous elaboration of detail that characterises these shrines. Judging from the figure of a man in one of the photographs, its height seems to be only about 30 ft., which, if it stood in the open, would be almost too small for architectural effect; but in the centre of an enclosed court, and where there are no larger objects to contrast with it, it is sufficient, when judiciously treated, to produce a considerable impression of grandeur, and apparently does so in this instance.

The temple at Somnathpûr is a single but complete whole; that at Baillûr, on the other hand, consists of one principal temple, surrounded by four or five others and numerous subordinate buildings, enclosed in a court by a high wall measuring 360 ft. by 440 ft., and having two very fine gateways or gopuras in its eastern front. As will be seen from the following plan (Woodcut No. 220), the great temple consists of a very solid vimana, with an anterala, or porch; and in front of this a porch of the usual star-like form, measuring 90 ft. across. The whole length of the temple, from the east door to the back of cell, is 115 ft., and the whole stands on a terrace about 3 ft. high, and from 10 ft. to 15 ft. wide. This is one of the characteristic features of Chalukyan design, and adds very considerably to the effect of their temples.

The arrangements of the pillars have much of that pleasing subordination and variety of spacing which is found in those of the Jains, but we miss here the octagonal dome, which gives such poetry and meaning to the arrangements they adopted. Instead of that, we have only an exaggerated compartment in the centre, which fits nothing, and, though it does give dignity to the centre, it does it so clumsily as to be almost offensive in an architectural sense.

It is not, however, either to its dimensions, or the disposition of its plan, that this temple owes its pre-eminence among others of its class, but to the marvellous elaboration and beauty of its details. The effect of these, it is true, has been, in modern times, considerably marred by the repeated coats of whitewash which the present low order of priests consider the most appropriate way of adding to the beauty of the most delicate sculptures. Notwithstanding this, however, their outline can always be traced, and where the whitewash has not been applied, or has been worn off, their beauty comes out with wonderful sharpness.

The following woodcut (No. 221) will convey some idea of the richness and variety of pattern displayed in the windows of the porch. These are twenty-eight in number, and all are different. Some are pierced with merely conventional patterns, generally star-shaped, and with foliaged bands between; others are interspersed with figures and mythological subjects--the nearest one, for instance, on the left, in the woodcut, represents the Varaha Avatar, and others different scenes connected with the worship of Vishnu, to whom the temple is dedicated. The pierced slabs themselves, however, are hardly so remarkable as the richly-carved base on which they rest, and the deep cornice which overshadows and protects them. The amount of labour, indeed, which each facet of this porch displays is such as, I believe, never was bestowed on any surface of equal extent in any building in the world; and though the design is not of the highest order of art, it is elegant and appropriate, and never offends against good taste.

The sculptures of the base of the vimana, which have not been whitewashed, are as elaborate as those of the porch, in some places more so; and the mode in which the undersides of the cornices have been elaborated and adorned is such as is only to be found in temples of this class. The upper part of the tower is anomalous. It may be that it has been whitewashed and repaired till it has assumed its present discordant appearance, which renders it certainly a blot on the whole design. My own impression rather is, that, like many others of its class, it was left unfinished, and the upper part added at subsequent periods. Its original form most probably was that of the little pavilions that adorn its portals, one of which is represented in the following woodcut (No. 222), which has all the peculiar features of the style--the flat band on each face, the three star-like projections between, and the peculiar crowning ornament of the style. The plan of the great tower, and the presence of the pavilions where they stand, seems to prove almost beyond doubt that this was the original design; but the design may have been altered as it progressed, or it may, as I suspect, have been changed afterwards.

There seems to be little or no doubt about the date of this temple. It was erected by Vishnu Verddhana, the fourth king of the race, to commemorate his conversion by the celebrated Rama Anuja from the Jaina to the Hindu faith. He ascended the throne A.D. 1114, and his conversion took place soon afterwards; but it is possible he did not live to finish the temple, and as the capital was removed by the next king to Hullabîd, it is possible that the vimana of the great temple, and the erection of some at least of the smaller shrines, may belong to a subsequent period.

HULLABÎD.

The earliest temple known to exist at Hullabîd is a small detached shrine, known by the inexplicable name of Kait Iswara, dedicated to Siva, and probably erected by Vijaya, the fifth king of the Bellala dynasty. Its general appearance will be understood from the next woodcut (No. 223). It is star-shaped in plan, with sixteen points, and had a porch, now so entirely ruined and covered up with vegetation that it is difficult to make out its plan. Its roof is conical, and from the basement to the summit it is covered with sculptures of the very best class of Indian art, and these so arranged as not materially to interfere with the outlines of the building, while they impart to it an amount of richness only to be found among specimens of Hindu art.[408] If it were possible to illustrate this little temple in anything like completeness, there is probably nothing in India which would convey a better idea of what its architects were capable of accomplishing.

It is, however, surpassed in size and magnificence by its neighbour, the great temple at Hullabîd, which, had it been completed, is one of the buildings on which the advocate of Hindu architecture would desire to take his stand. Unfortunately, it never was finished, the works having been stopped by the Mahomedan conquest in 1310 A.D., after they had been in progress apparently for eighty-six years. It is instructive to observe that the single century that elapsed between the execution of the sculpture of the Kait Iswara and of this temple, was sufficient to demonstrate the decay in style which we have already noticed as an inherent characteristic of Indian art. The sculptures of Hullabîd are inferior to those of the Kait Iswara, and those of that temple, again, to those at Baillûr.

The general arrangements of the building are given on the annexed plan (Woodcut No. 224), from which it will be perceived that it is a double temple. If it were cut into halves, each part would be complete with a pillared porch of the same type as that at Baillûr, above referred to, an anterala or intermediate porch, and a sanctuary containing a lingam, the emblem of Siva. Besides this, each half would have in front of it a detached, pillared porch as a shrine for the Bull Nundi, which, of course, was not required in a Vaishnava temple. Such double temples are by no means uncommon in India, but the two sanctuaries usually face each other, and have the porch between them. Its dimensions may roughly be stated as 200 ft. square over all, including all the detached pavilions. The temple itself is 160 ft. north and south, by 122 ft. east and west. Its height, as it now remains, to the cornice is about 25 ft. from the terrace on which it stands. It cannot, therefore, be considered by any means as a large building, though large enough for effect. This, however, can hardly be judged of as it now stands, for there is no doubt but that it was intended to raise two pyramidal spires over the sanctuaries, four smaller ones in front of these, and two more, one over each of the two central pavilions. Thus completed, the temple would have assumed something like the outline shown in the woodcut (No. 225), and if carried out with the richness of detail exhibited in the Kait Iswara (Woodcut No. 223) would have made up a whole which it would be difficult to rival anywhere.

The material out of which this temple is erected is an indurated potstone, of volcanic origin, found in the neighbourhood. This stone is said to be soft when first quarried, and easily cut in that state, though hardening on exposure to the atmosphere. Even this, however, will not diminish our admiration of the amount of labour bestowed on the temple, for, from the number of parts still unfinished, it is evident that, like most others of its class, it was built in block, and carved long after the stone had become hard. As we now see it, the stone is of a pleasing creamy colour, and so close-grained as to take a polish like marble. The pillars of the great Nundi pavilion, which look as if they had been turned in a lathe, are so polished as to exhibit what the natives call a double reflection--in other words, to reflect light from each other. The enduring qualities of the stone seem to be unrivalled, for, though neglected and exposed to all the vicissitudes of a tropical climate for more than six centuries, the minutest details are as clear and sharp as the day they were finished. Except from the splitting of the stone arising from bad masonry, the building is as perfect as when its erection was stopped by the Mahomedan conquest.

It is, of course, impossible to illustrate completely so complicated and so varied a design; but the following woodcut (No. 226) will suffice to explain the general ordonnance of its elevation. The building stands on a terrace ranging from 5 ft. to 6 ft. in height, and paved with large slabs. On this stands a frieze of elephants, following all the sinuosities of the plan and extending to some 710 ft. in length, and containing not less than 2000 elephants, most of them with riders and trappings, sculptured as only an Oriental can represent the wisest of brutes. Above these is a frieze of “shardalas,” or conventional lions--the emblems of the Hoisala Bellalas who built the temple. Then comes a scroll of infinite beauty and variety of design; over this a frieze of horsemen and another scroll; over which is a bas-relief of scenes from the ‘Ramayana,’ representing the conquest of Ceylon and all the varied incidents of that epic. This, like the other, is about 700 ft. long. (The frieze of the Parthenon is less than 550 ft.) Then come celestial beasts and celestial birds, and all along the east front a frieze of groups from human life, and then a cornice, with a rail, divided into panels, each containing two figures. Over this are windows of pierced slabs, like those of Baillûr, though not so rich or varied. These windows will be observed on the right and left of the woodcut. In the centre, in place of the windows, is first a scroll, and then a frieze of gods and heavenly apsaras--dancing girls and other objects of Hindu mythology. This frieze, which is about 5 ft. 6 in. in height, is continued all round the western front of the building, and extends to some 400 ft. in length. Siva, with his consort Parvati seated on his knee, is repeated at least fourteen times; Vishnu in his nine Avatars even oftener. Brahma occurs three or four times, and every great god of the Hindu Pantheon finds his place. Some of these are carved with a minute elaboration of detail which can only be reproduced by photography, and may probably be considered as one of the most marvellous exhibitions of human labour to be found even in the patient East.

It must not, however, be considered that it is only for patient industry that this building is remarkable. The mode in which the eastern face is broken up by the larger masses, so as to give height and play of light and shade, is a better way of accomplishing what the Gothic architects attempted by their transepts and projections. This, however, is surpassed by the western front, where the variety of outline, and the arrangement and subordination of the various facets in which it is disposed, must be considered as a masterpiece of design in its class. If the frieze of gods were spread along a plain surface it would lose more than half its effect, while the vertical angles, without interfering with the continuity of the frieze, give height and strength to the whole composition. The disposition of the horizontal lines of the lower friezes is equally effective. Here again the artistic combination of horizontal with vertical lines, and the play of outline and of light and shade, far surpass anything in Gothic art. The effects are just what the mediæval architects were often aiming at, but which they never attained so perfectly as was done at Hullabîd.

Before leaving Hullabîd, it may be well again to call attention to the order of superposition of the different animal friezes, alluded to already, when speaking of the rock-cut monastery described by the Chinese Pilgrims (ante, p. 135). There, as here, the lowest were the elephants; then the lions; above these came the horses; then the oxen; and the fifth storey was in the shape of a pigeon. The oxen here is replaced by a conventional animal, and the pigeon also by a bird of a species that would puzzle a naturalist. The succession, however, is the same, and, as mentioned above, the same five genera of living things form the ornaments of the moonstones of the various monuments in Ceylon. Sometimes in modern Hindu temples only two or three animal friezes are found, but the succession is always the same, the elephants being the lowest, next above them are the lions, and then the horses, &c. When we know the cause of it, it seems as if this curious selection and succession might lead to some very suggestive conclusions. At present we can only call attention to it in hopes that further investigation may afford the means of solving the mystery.

If it were possible to illustrate the Hullabîd temple to such an extent as to render its peculiarities familiar, there would be few things more interesting or more instructive than to institute a comparison between it and the Parthenon at Athens. Not that the two buildings are at all like one another; on the contrary, they form the two opposite poles--the alpha and omega of architectural design; but they are the best examples of their class, and between these two extremes lies the whole range of the art. The Parthenon is the best example we know of pure refined intellectual power applied to the production of an architectural design. Every part and every effect is calculated with mathematical exactness, and executed with a mechanical precision that never was equalled. All the curves are hyperbolas, parabolas, or other developments of the highest mathematical forms--every optical defect is foreseen and provided for, and every part has a relation to every other part in so recondite a proportion that we feel inclined to call it fanciful, because we can hardly rise to its appreciation. The sculpture is exquisitely designed to aid the perfection of the masonry--severe and godlike, but with no condescension to the lower feelings of humanity.

The Hullabîd temple is the opposite of all this. It is regular, but with a studied variety of outline in plan, and even greater variety in detail. All the pillars of the Parthenon are identical, while no two facets of the Indian temple are the same; every convolution of every scroll is different. No two canopies in the whole building are alike, and every part exhibits a joyous exuberance of fancy scorning every mechanical restraint. All that is wild in human faith or warm in human feeling is found portrayed on these walls; but of pure intellect there is little--less than there is of human feeling in the Parthenon.

It would be possible to arrange all the buildings of the world between these two extremes, as they tended toward the severe intellectual purity of the one, or to the playful exuberant fancy of the other; but perfection, if it existed, would be somewhere near the mean. My own impression is, that if the so-called Gothic architects had been able to maintain for two or three hundred years more the rate of progress they achieved between the 11th and the 14th century, they might have hit upon that happy mean between severe constructive propriety and playful decorative imaginings which would have combined into something more perfect than the world has yet seen. The system, however, as I have endeavoured to point out elsewhere, broke down before it had acquired the requisite degree of refinement, and that hope was blighted never to be revived. If architecture ever again assumes an onward path, it will not be by leaning too strongly towards either of the extremes just named, but by grasping somewhere the happy mean between the two.

For our present purpose, the great value of the study of these Indian examples is that it widens so immensely our basis for architectural criticism. It is only by becoming familiar with forms so utterly dissimilar from those we have hitherto been conversant with, that we perceive how narrow is the purview that is content with one form or one passing fashion. By rising to this wider range we shall perceive that architecture is as many-sided as human nature itself, and learn how few feelings and how few aspirations of the human heart and brain there are that cannot be expressed by its means. On the other hand, it is only by taking this wide survey that we appreciate how worthless any product of architectural art becomes which does not honestly represent the thoughts and feelings of those who built it, or the height of their loftiest aspirations.

* * * * *

To return, however, from this digression. There are some eight or nine different temples in this style illustrated by photographs in the great work on the ‘Architecture of Dharwar and Mysore,’[409] which exhibit the peculiarities of this style in more or less detail; but none of these plates are accompanied by plans or details that throw new light on the subject, and none of the temples are either so large or so beautiful as those just described, so that the enumeration of their unfamiliar names would add very little to the interest of the subject.

It would be very interesting, however, if we could adduce some northern examples of the style from either the capital city of the Ballabhis, or some town in their kingdom. For about two centuries--A.D. 500 to 700--they were a leading power in India, and closely allied to the Chalukyas; and their style, if any examples could be found, would throw great light on that of their southern allies just at the period when it is most wanted. Unfortunately, however, even the site of their capital is unknown. If it were at Wulleh, near Gogo, on the shores of the Gulf of Cambay, as is generally supposed, it has perished root and branch. Not one vestige of its architecture now remains, and what antiquities have been found seem all to belong to a much more modern period, when a city bearing that name may have existed on the spot. If it were situated near Anhulwarra Puttun, which seems far more probable, it has been quarried to supply materials for the successive capitals which from that time forward have occupied that favoured neighbourhood, and it would require the keen eye of a practised archæologist to detect Chalukyan details in the temples and mosques that have been erected there during the last 800 years. Nothing of the sort has yet been attempted, and no materials consequently exist for the elucidation of one of the most interesting chapters in the history of Indian art.

I. INTRODUCTORY

CONTENTS.

Introductory--Dravidian and Indo-Aryan Temples at Badami--Modern Temple at Benares.

Of the three styles into which Hindu architecture naturally divides itself, the northern is found spread over a far larger portion of the country than either of the other two. It wants, however, the compactness and strongly-marked individuality of the Dravidian, and never was developed with that exuberance which characterised the southern style from the 15th to the 18th century. In many respects it resembles more the Chalukyan style, the examples being small and elegant, and found dispersed over the face of the country, where wanted, without any apparent massing together in particular spots.

Unfortunately, we have no name which would describe the style in its ethnographical and geographical relations without being open to the objection of expressing either too much or too little. In this respect the southern style is singularly fortunate: Dravidian correctly limits it to people speaking Tamil, Telugu, or some cognate dialect; and the country where the people speaking those tongues are to be found is generally and correctly known as Dravida Desa, or country of the Dravidians.

The term Chalukyan, applied to the second style, is not so expressive; but it is unobjectionable, as it cannot mislead any one. It is only a conventional term, derived from the principal known dynasty ruling in that country, applied to a style occupying a borderland between the other two, but a land that has not yet been fully surveyed, and whose boundaries cannot now be fixed with precision. Till they are, a conventional name that does not mislead is all that can be hoped for.

If it were allowable to adopt the loose phraseology of philological ethnography, the term Aryan might be employed, as it is the name by which the people practising this style are usually known in India, and it would be particularly convenient here, as it is the correct and direct antithesis of Dravidian. It is evident, however, that any such term, if applied to architecture, ought to be descriptive of some style practised by that people, wherever they settled, all across Europe and Asia, between the shores of the Atlantic and the Bay of Bengal;[410] and it need hardly be said that no such style exists. If used in conjunction with the adjective Indian or Indo, it becomes much less objectionable, and has the advantage of limiting its use to the people who are generally known as Aryans in India--in other words, to all those parts of the country where Sanscrit was ever spoken, or where the people now speak tongues so far derived from Sanscrit as to be distinguishable as offsets of that great family of languages. Its use, in this respect, has the great convenience that any ordinary ethnographical or linguistic map of India is sufficient to describe the boundaries of the style. It extends, like the so-called Aryan tongues, from the Himalayas to the Vindhya mountains. On the east, it is found prevalent in Orissa; and on the west in Maharastra. Its southern boundary between these two provinces will only be known when the Nizam’s territory is architecturally surveyed; but meanwhile we may rest assured that wherever it is traced the linguistic and architectural boundary-lines will be found coincident.

Another reason why the term Aryan should be applied to the style is, that the country just described, where it prevails, is, and always has been, called Aryavarta by the natives themselves. They consider it as the land of the pure and just--meaning thereby the Sanscrit-speaking peoples--as contradistinguished from that of the casteless Dasyus, and other tribes, who, though they may have adopted Brahmanical institutions, could not acquire their purity of race.

The great defect of the term, however, is that the people inhabiting the north of India are not Aryans in any reasonable sense of the term, whatever philologists may say to the contrary. The Sanscrit-speaking people, who came into India 2000 or it may be 3000 years B.C., could never have been numerically one-half of the inhabitants of the country, except, perhaps, in some such limited district as that between the Sutlej and the Jumna; and since the Christian Era no Aryan race has migrated eastward across the Indus, but wave after wave of peoples of Turanian race, under the names of Yavanas, Sakas, Hunas, or Mongols, have poured into India. This, combined with the ascendancy of the aboriginal races during the period when Buddhism was the religion of the country, has so completely washed out Aryanism from northern India during the building ages, that there is probably no community there which could claim one-tenth of pure Aryan blood in its veins, and with nine-tenths of impurity the term is certainly a misnomer. If it were not, we would certainly find some trace of external Aryan affinities in their style; but this is not the case. In fact, no style is so purely local, and, if the term may be used, so aboriginal, as this. The origin of the Buddhist style is obvious and unmistakeable; that of the Dravidian and Chalukyan nearly as certain, though not quite so obvious; but the origin of the northern Hindu style remains a mystery, unless, indeed, the solution suggested above (ante, p. 224) be considered an explanation. It may be so, to some extent; but I confess it is to my mind neither quite satisfactory nor sufficient.

The style was adopted by the Jains, who, as the successors of the Buddhists, certainly were not Aryans, and several examples of the peculiar forms of their vimanas, or sikras have already been given (Woodcuts Nos. 137, 145, &c.); but it still remains to be ascertained from what original form the curvilinear square tower could have arisen. There is nothing in Buddhist, or any other art, at all like it. It does not seem to have been derived from any wooden form we know, nor from any brick or stone, or tile mode of roofing found anywhere else. I have looked longer, and, perhaps, thought more, on this problem than on any other of its class connected with Indian architecture, but I have no more plausible suggestion to offer than that hinted at above. The real solution will probably be found in the accidental discovery of old temples--so old as to betray in their primitive rudeness the secret we are now guessing at in vain. Meanwhile we probably may remain sure that it was not an imported form, but an indigenous production, and that it has no connection with the architecture of any other people Aryan, or others outside of India.

The view above proposed for the origin of the style derives considerable support from the mode in which the temples are now found distributed. There are more temples now in Orissa than in all the rest of Hindustan put together. They are very frequent in Maharastra, and, if we admit the Jains, who adopted this style, they are ten times more frequent in Gujerat and the valley of the Nerbudda than in the valley of the Ganges, or in Aryavarta, properly so called. The first and most obvious explanation of this fact might be that the last-named country has for 600 years been occupied by a Mahomedan empire, and they, hating idolatry and idol temples, have destroyed them wherever they were so absolutely in possession of the country as to be able to do so with impunity. This may be so, and it is an argument which, with our present materials, it is difficult to disprove. My impression, however, is that it does not correctly represent the true state of the case. That the Moslems did ruthlessly destroy Jaina temples at Ajmir, Delhi, Canouge, and elsewhere, may be quite true, but then it was because their columns served so admirably for the construction of their mosques. The astylar temples of the followers of Siva or Vishnu could only have served as quarries, and no stones that had been previously used in Hindu temples have been traced to any extent in Moslem buildings. Even admitting that at Delhi or Allahabad, or any of their capitals, all Hindu buildings have been utilised, this hardly would have been the case at such a provincial capital as Fyzabad, once Ayodhya, the celebrated capital of Dasaratha, the father of the hero of the ‘Ramayana,’ but where not one carved stone or even a foundation can be discovered that belongs to any ancient building.[411] The most crucial instance, however, is the city of Benares, so long the sacred city, par excellence, of the Hindus, yet, so far as is known, no vestige of an ancient Hindu temple exists within its precincts. James Prinsep resided there for ten years, and Major Kittoe, who had a keener eye than even his great master for an architectural form, lived long there as an archæologist and architect. They drew and measured everything, yet neither of them ever thought that they had found anything that was ancient; and it was not till Messrs. Horne and Sherring[412] started the theory that the buildings around the Bakariya Kund were ancient Buddhist or Hindu remains, that any one pretended to have discovered any traces of antiquity in that city. They certainly, however, are mistaken. Every building about the Bakariya Kund was not only erected by the Mahomedans, but the pillars and roofing-stones, with the fewest possible exceptions, were carved by them for the purposes for which they were applied. They may have used the stones of some deserted monasteries, or other Buddhist buildings, in the foundations or on their terraces, or for little detached pavilions; but all the architecture, properly so called, is in a style invented, or at least introduced by the Pathans, and brought to perfection under Akbar. That the Moslems did destroy Hindu temples may be admitted, but it is not clear that this was done wantonly. In all the instances which are authenticated, it was to gain ready-made materials for their mosques, and it was not till the time of Aurungzebe that any of their monarchs felt himself sufficiently powerful or was so bigoted as to dare the power and enmity of the Brahmans of Benares, by erecting a mosque on the site of one of the most sacred temples as an insult and a defiance to the Hindus. Even then, had such a temple as the great one at Bhuvaneswar ever existed in Benares, every stone of which, from the ground to the kullus, is covered with carving, it seems impossible that all these carved stones should be hid away and not one now to be found. I am myself personally tolerably familiar with Benares, and the conviction such knowledge as I have forces on my mind is, that though the city was the earliest and most important settlement of the Vedic Brahmans--the sacred city of the Aryan Hindus from the remotest ages--yet just from that cause it had fewer temples than any of the cities inhabited by less pure races. What few fragments remain are Buddhist or Jaina, and we must consequently ascribe the absence of anything really ancient more to the non-building instincts of the Brahmanical Aryans than the iconoclastic bigotry of the Moslems.

All this will be clearer as we proceed; but meanwhile it may be well to point to one or two other instances of this. The rock at Gualior was one of the earliest conquests of the Moslems, and they held it more or less directly for five centuries. They built palaces and mosques within its precincts, yet the most conspicuous objects on the hill are Hindu temples, that were erected before they obtained possession of it. In like manner Chittore was thrice besieged and thrice sacked by the Mahomedans, but its numerous buildings are intact, and I do not recollect observing a single instance of wanton destruction in the place. An even more striking instance is found at Ellora. Though Aurungzebe, the most bigoted of his race, built his capital in its neighbourhood, and lies buried within sight of the caves, there is no proof that he or any of his race were the authors of any of the damage that has been done to the idols there. Practically, they are intact, or have only received such mutilation as is easily accounted for from other causes.

It would be tedious to attempt it, but, fortunately, it is not necessary for our present purposes to go into the whole evidence; but I may state that the impression I have derived from such attention as I have been able to give to the subject is, that the absence of old temples in northern India is more owing to ethnographic than to religious causes. It seems more probable that they never existed than that they were destroyed. No temples are mentioned in the Vedas or the older Indian writings, and none were required for the simple quasi-domestic rites of their worship; and so long as they remained pure no temples were built. On the other hand, it appears as if between the fall of Buddhism and the advent of the Moslems the Jains had stepped in with a ready-made religion and style, and the followers of Siva and Vishnu had not time to develope anything very important in these northern provinces before it was too late.

If these views are correct, it is evident that though we may use the term Indo-Aryan as the most convenient to describe and define the limits of the northern style, the name must not be considered as implying that the Aryans, as such, had anything to do either with its invention or its use. All that it is intended to convey is, that it was invented and used in a country which they once occupied, and in which they have left a strong impress of their superior mental power and civilization.

If this reservation is always borne in mind, I know of no term that more conveniently expresses the characteristics of this style, and it is consequently proposed to adopt it in the following pages as the name of the style that prevailed among the Hindus in northern India, between the Vindhya and Himalayan mountains, from the 7th century to the present day.

The general appearance of the northern temples, and the points of difference between them and those of the south, will be appreciated from the above woodcut (No. 227), representing two very ancient temples, built in juxtaposition, at Badami, in Dharwar. That on the left is a complete specimen of Dravidian architecture. There is the same pyramidal form, the same distinction of storeys, the same cells on each, as we find at Mahavellipore (Woodcut No. 181), at Tanjore (Woodcut No. 191), or at Mádura (Woodcut No. 183). In the right-hand temple, the Indo-Aryan, on the contrary, the outline of the pyramid is curvilinear; no trace of division of storeys is observable, no reminiscence of habitations, and no pillars or pilasters anywhere. Even in its modern form (Woodcut No. 228), it still retains the same characteristics, and all the lines of the pyramid or sikra are curvilinear, the base polygonal. No trace of utilitarianism is visible anywhere. If Woodcut No. 228 is compared with that at page 331 (Woodcut No. 183), the two styles will be exhibited in their most modern garbs, when, after more than 1000 years’ practice, they have receded furthest from the forms in which we first meet them Yet the Madras temple retains the memory of its storeys and its cells. The Bengal example recalls nothing known in civil or domestic architecture.

Neither the pyramid nor the tumulus affords any suggestion as to the origin of the form, nor does the tower, either square or circular; nor does any form of civil or domestic architecture. It does not seem to be derived from any of these; and, whether we consider it as beautiful or otherwise, it seems certainly to have been invented principally at least for æsthetic purposes, and to have retained that impress from the earliest till the present day.

The plan of a northern temple is always a square internally, and generally the same form is retained in the exterior; but very rarely, if ever, without some addition. In some instances it is only a thin parallel projection, as at A in the diagram (No. 229). Sometimes it has two such slices added, as at B; but in the oldest examples these are only half the thickness shown here. From this they proceeded to three projections, as at C, the oldest examples being the thinnest. In more modern times the thickness of the projections became equal to their distance from each other, as at D; so that the temple became in plan practically a square, the sides of which were parallel to the diagonal of the original square or to the line E F G. Even, however, when this was the case, the cell always retained its original form and direction, and the entrance and windows kept their position on what had thus practically become the angles of the building. This is the case with the temple at Benares, shown in Woodcut No. 228, and generally also with the Jaina temples, and especially the case with the temple on the Takht-i-Suleiman at Kashmir. Although the depth and width of these offsets vary considerably even in the same design, the original square is never lost sight of; the four central angles, as at F, being always larger and more strongly accentuated than the others, and their line is always carried through to the summit of the pyramid.

It will be observed that by this process we have arrived at the same form or plan for a solid building that was attained by the arrangement of pillars described above, page 216. In fact, the two forms were elaborated simultaneously, and were afterwards constantly used together. My impression is, that the pillared arrangement is the oldest, and led to the deepening of the additions to the solid square till the two became identical in plan. Whether this were so or not, it is one of the most distinguishing features of northern Hindu architecture.

In the very centre of India, near a place marked Adjmîrghur on the map, is a sacred tank, from which it is said that the Soane flows to the north, the Mahanuddi to Cuttack in the Bay of Bengal, and the Nerbudda to the Indian Ocean. All these rivers certainly have their sources in the hill. The spot has always been held sacred, and is surrounded by temples--as far as can be gathered from the imperfect accounts available--of great age. On the south and east of this hill extends the great and fertile table-land of Chutteesghur. This is now, and has always been, so far as our knowledge extends, one of the principal seats of the native tribes. My conviction is, that if that country and the surrounding valleys could be examined, much older forms of these temples might be discovered--some perhaps so old as to betray the secret of their origin; but, till this is done, the Bengali devala must be relegated--like the Irish round towers[413]--to the category of unexplained architectural puzzles.

II. ORISSA

CONTENTS.

History--Temples at Bhuvaneswar, Kanaruc, Puri, Jajepur, and Cuttack.

The two provinces of India, where the Indo-Aryan style can be studied with the greatest advantage, are Dharwar on the west, and Orissa on the east coast. The former has the advantage of being mixed up with the Dravidian style, so as to admit of synonyms and contrasts that are singularly interesting, both from an ethnological and historical point of view. In Orissa, on the contrary, the style is perfectly pure, being unmixed with any other, and thus forms one of the most compact and homogeneous architectural groups in India, and as such of more than usual interest, and it is consequently in this province that the style can be studied to the greatest advantage.

One of the most marked and striking peculiarities of Orissan architecture is the marked and almost absolute contrast it presents to the style of the Dravidian at the southern end of the peninsula. The curved outline of the towers or vimanas has already been remarked upon, but, besides this, no Orissan towers present the smallest trace of any storeyed or even step-like arrangement, which is so universal further south, and the crowning member is never a dome, nor a reminiscence of one. Even more remarkable than this, is the fact that the Orissan style is almost absolutely astylar. In some of the most modern examples, as for instance in the porches added to the temples at Bhuvaneswar and Puri in the 12th and 14th centuries, we do find pillars, but it is probably correct to state that, among the 500 or 600[414] original shrines at Bhuvaneswar, not one pillar is to be found. This is the more remarkable, because, within sight of that capital, the caves in the Udayagiri (ante, p. 140) are adorned with pillars to such an extent as to show that their forms must have been usual and well known in the province before any of the temples were constructed. When we recollect that no great temple in the south was considered complete without its hall of 1000 columns, and many besides this had hundreds dispersed about the place, and used for every conceivable purpose, the contrast is more striking, and shows what a complete barrier the Chalukyas, whoever they were, interposed between the two races on this side of India, though not on the other. As a rule, every Orissan temple consists of two apartments, similar in plan, as shown in the diagram (Woodcut No. 124). The inner one is generally a cube, surmounted by a tower, here called Bara Deul, or Dewul, corresponding with the vimana of the south, and in it the image or images of the gods are enshrined; in front of this is a porch, called Jagamohan, equally a cube or approaching it, and surmounted by a pyramidal roof of varying pitch. The peculiarities are illustrated in the diagram (Woodcut No. 124) just referred to, which purports to be an elevation of the celebrated Black Pagoda at Kanaruc. It is only, however, an eye-sketch, and cannot be depended upon for minute detail and correctness, but it is sufficient to explain the meaning of the text. Sometimes one or two more porches were added in front of this one, and called Nât and Bhog mandirs (mantapas), but these, in almost every instance, are afterthoughts, and not parts of the original design. Be this as it may, in every instance in Orissa the tower with its porch forms the temple. If enclosed in a wall, they are always to be seen outside. There are gateways, it is true, but they are always subordinate, and there are none of those accretions of enclosures and gopuras that form so marked a characteristic of the southern style. There generally are other shrines within the enclosures of the great temples, but they are always kept subordinate, and the temple itself towers over everything to even a greater extent than that at Tanjore (Woodcut No. 191), giving a unity and purpose to the whole design, so frequently wanting in the south.

Other contrasts will come out as we proceed, but, in the meanwhile, few examples bring out more clearly the vast importance of ethnography as applied to architecture. That two people, inhabiting practically the same country, and worshipping the same gods under the guidance of the same Brahmanical priesthood, should have adopted and adhered to two such dissimilar styles for their sacred buildings, shows as clearly as anything can well do how much race has to do with these matters, and how little we can understand the causes of such contrasts, unless we take affinities or differences of race into consideration.

HISTORY.

Thanks to the industry of Stirling and others, the main outlines of the history of Orissa have been ascertained with sufficient accuracy to enable us to describe its architecture without the fear of making any important chronological blunders. It is true that the dates of only two of its temples have been ascertained with tolerable certainty. The great one at Bhuvaneswar is said to have been erected in or about A.D. 637, and that at Puri in A.D. 1174, nearly the first and the last of the series. My impression is that the series may be carried back to about the year 500, but in the other direction it can hardly be extended beyond the year 1200, but within these limits it seems possible to arrange the sequence of all the temples in the province without much difficulty, and to ascertain their dates with at least a fair approximate certainty.[415]

With the exception of the great temple of Juganât at Puri, all the buildings described in this chapter were erected under the great Kesari dynasty, or “Lion line,” as Hunter calls them. Few of the particulars of their history have been recorded, but we know at least the date of their accession, A.D. 473, and that in A.D. 1131 they were succeeded by a new dynasty, called Ganga Vansa, the third of whom was the builder of the great Puri Temple.

As mentioned in a previous part of this work, Orissa was principally Buddhist, at least from the time of Asoka, B.C. 250, till the Gupta era, A.D. 319, when all India was distracted by wars connected with the tooth relic, which was said to have been preserved at Puri--then in consequence called Danta Pura--till that time. If the invaders came by sea, as it is said they did, they probably were either Mughs from Arrakan, or the Burmese of Pegu, and if their object was to obtain possession of the tooth, they as probably were Buddhists; but as they have left no buildings that have yet been identified as theirs, it is impossible now to determine this. Whoever they were, they were driven out, after 146 years’ possession, and were succeeded in or about A.D. 473 by Yayati, the first of the Kesari line.[416] The annals of the race unfortunately do not tell us who the Kesaris were, or whence they came. From the third king before the Yavana invasion being called Bato Kesari, it seems probable it may have been only a revival of the old dynasty; and from the circumstances narrated regarding the expulsion of these strangers, it looks as if it were due more to a local rising than to extraneous aid. If they came from the interior, it was from the north-west, where a similar style seems to have prevailed. Their story, as told in their own annals, states that the first, or one of the first kings of the race, imported, about the year A.D. 500, a colony--10,000 Brahmans--from Ayodhya, and they being all bigoted Saivites, introduced that religion into the province, and rooted it so firmly there, that it was the faith of the land so long as the Kesaris ruled.[417] If we read 100 as the number of the Brahmans, and A.D. 600 as the date of their advent, we shall probably be nearer the truth; but be this as it may, these Brahmans were settled at Jajepur, not at Bhuvaneswar, and soon came into conflict with a class of “Old Brahmans,” who had been established in the province long before their arrival. Mr. Hunter supposes them to have been Buddhists--Brahmans converted to the Buddhist faith--which seems probable, but if this were so, they would certainly have become Vaishnavas on the decline of that religion, and such, I fancy, was certainly the case in this instance.

The architecture of the province seems to me to confirm this view of the case, for, unless I am very much mistaken, the oldest temple in the city of Bhuvaneswar is that called Parasurameswara (Woodcut No. 230), which from its name, as well as the subjects portrayed on its walls, I would take to be certainly Vaishnava. It may, however, belong to the preceding dynasty. Its style is certainly different from the early Kesari temples, and more like what we find in Dharwar and at other places outside the province. If, indeed, it were not found in a city which there seems every reason for thinking was founded by the Lion kings, I would not hesitate to give it a date of A.D. 450, instead of A.D. 500. It is not large, being only 20 ft. square[418] at its base; but its sculptures are cut with a delicacy seldom surpassed, and there is an appropriateness about the ornaments greater than is seen in most of the temples.

The temple itself is apparently 38 ft. in height, and from the summit to the base it is covered with sculptures of the most elaborate character, but still without detracting from the simplicity and vigour of its outline.

If I am correct in assigning so early a date to the tower of this temple, it is evident that the porch must be a subsequent addition: in the first place, because it fits badly to the tower, but more because the necessities of its construction require pillars internally, and they do not occur in Orissan architecture till a long subsequent date. It may, however, be that if this is really the oldest temple of its class in Orissa, its design may be copied from a foreign example, and borrowed, with all its peculiarities, from a style practised elsewhere. Be that as it may, it is interesting as showing the mode by which light was sometimes introduced into the porches of these temples between the ends of the beams of the stone roof. As the sloping roofing-stones project considerably beyond the openings, a subdued light is introduced, without either the direct rays of the sun, or the rain being able to penetrate.

The temple of Mukteswara (Woodcut No. 231) is very similar in general design to that of Parasurameswara, but even richer and more varied in detail, and its porch partakes more of the regular Orissan type. It has no pillars internally, and the roof externally exhibits at least the germ of what we find in the porches of the great temple at Bhuvaneswar and the Black Pagoda. Its dimensions are somewhat less than those of the last temple described, but in its class it may be considered the gem of Orissan architecture.

The style of these temples differs so much from that of the next group, of which the great temple is the typical example, that I was at one time inclined to believe they may have belonged to different religions--this one to the Vaishnava, that to the Saiva. I have no means, however, of verifying this conjecture, and it is not always easy to do so even on the spot, for in India there is nothing so common as temples originally destined for the worship of one deity being afterwards devoted to that of another. Whatever may be the case in this instance, it is well to bear this in mind, as, whenever we have a complete history of Orissan architecture, these distinctions may lead to most important historical deductions.

Besides these, there are several other temples which, from the style of their architecture, I would feel inclined to place as earlier than the great temple. One is known as Sari Dëul, near the great temple, and another, a very complete and beautiful example, is called Moitre (query Mittra) Serai, which is almost a duplicate, on a small scale, of the great temple, except that it has no repetition of itself on itself. As above pointed out, almost all the ornaments on the façades of Buddhist temples are repetitions of themselves; but the Hindus do not seem to have adopted this system so early, and the extent to which it is carried is generally a fair test of the age of Hindu temples. In the great Pagoda there are eight copies of itself on each face, and in the Raj Rani the system is carried so far as almost to obliterate the original form of the temple.

GREAT TEMPLE, BHUVANESWAR.

The great temple at Bhuvaneswar is one of the landmarks in the style. It seems almost certainly to have been built by Lelat Indra Kesari, who reigned from A.D. 617 to A.D. 657, and, taking it all in all, it is perhaps the finest example of a purely Hindu temple in India.

Though not a building of the largest class, the dimensions of this temple in plan are, so far as I can make out, far from contemptible. The whole length is nearly 300 ft., with a breadth varying from 60 ft. to 75 ft. The original temple, however, like almost all those in Orissa, consisted only of a vimana, or Bara Dewul, and a porch or Jagamohan, shaded darker in the plan (Woodcut No. 232), and they extend only to 160 ft. The Nat and Bhog-mandirs, shaded lighter, were added in the beginning of the 12th century. Though several temples have all these four apartments, so far as I can make out, none were originally erected with them. The true Orissan temple is like that represented in Woodcut No. 124, a building with two apartments only, and these astylar, or practically so: the pillars were only introduced in the comparatively modern additions.

The outline of this temple in elevation is not, at first sight, pleasing to the European eye; but when once the eye is accustomed to it, it has a singularly solemn and pleasing aspect. It is a solid, and would be a plain square tower, but for the slight curve at the top, which takes off the hardness of the outline and introduces pleasingly the circular crowning object (Woodcut No. 233). As compared with that at Tanjore (Woodcut No. 191), it certainly is by far the finer design of the two. In plan the southern example is the larger, being 82 ft. square. This one is only 66 ft.[419] from angle to angle, though it is 75 ft. across the central projection. Their height is nearly the same, both of them being over 180 ft., but the upper part of the northern tower is so much more solid, that the cubic contents of the two are probably not very different. Besides, however, greater beauty in form, the northern example excels the other immeasurably in the fact that it is wholly in stone from the base to the apex, and--what, unfortunately, no woodcut can show--every inch of the surface is covered with carving in the most elaborate manner. It is not only the divisions of the courses, the roll-mouldings on the angles, or the breaks on the face of the tower: these are sufficient to relieve its flatness, and with any other people they would be deemed sufficient; but every individual stone in the tower has a pattern carved upon it, not so as to break its outline, but sufficient to relieve any idea of monotony. It is, perhaps, not an exaggeration to say that if it would take a sum--say a lakh of rupees or pounds--to erect such a building as this, it would take three lakhs to carve it as this one is carved. Whether such an outlay is judicious or not, is another question. Most people would be of opinion that a building four times as large would produce a greater and more imposing architectural effect; but this is not the way a Hindu ever looked at the matter. Infinite labour bestowed on every detail was the mode in which he thought he could render his temple most worthy of the deity; and, whether he was right or wrong, the effect of the whole is certainly marvellously beautiful. It is not, however, in those parts of the building shown in the woodcut that the greatest amount of carving or design was bestowed, but in the perpendicular parts seen from the courtyard (Woodcut No. 234). There the sculpture is of a very high order and great beauty of design. This, however, ought not to surprise when we recollect that at Amravati, on the banks of the Kistnah, not far from the southern boundary of this kingdom, there stood a temple more delicate and elaborate in its carvings than any other building in India,[420] and that this temple had been finished probably not more than a century before the Kesari dynasty was established in Orissa; and though the history of art in India is written in decay, there was not much time for decline, and the dynasty was new and vigorous when this temple was erected.

Attached to the Jagamohan of this temple is a Nat-mandir, or dancing-hall, whose date is, fortunately, perfectly well known, and enables us to measure the extent of this decay with almost absolute certainty. It was erected by the wife of Salini between the years 1099 and 1104.[421] It is elegant, of course, for art had not yet perished among the Hindus, but it differs from the style of the porch to which it is attached more than the leanest example of Tudor art differs from the vigour and grace of the buildings of the early Edwards. All that power of expression is gone which enabled the early architects to make small things look gigantic from the exuberance of labour bestowed upon them. A glance at the Nat-mandir is sufficient for the mastery of its details. A week’s study of the Jagamohan would every hour reveal new beauties.

The last woodcut may convey some idea of the extent to which the older parts were elaborated: but even the photograph hardly enables any one not familiar with the style to realise how exquisite the combination of solidity of mass with exuberance of ornament really is.

* * * * *

During the four centuries and a half which elapsed between the erection of these two porches, Bhuvaneswar was adorned with some hundreds of temples, some dozen of which have been photographed, but hardly in sufficient detail to enable the student to classify them according to their dates. On the spot[422] it probably would be easy for any one trained to this class of study, and it would be a great gain if it were done. The group nearest in richness and interest is that at Khajurâho, mentioned above (p. 245); but that group belongs to an age just subsequent[423] to that of the Bhuvaneswar group, and only enables us to see that some of the most elaborate of the Cuttack temples may extend to the year 1000 or thereabouts. It is to this date that I would ascribe the erection of the Raj Rani temple. The names of those of which I have photographs, with their approximate data, are given in the list at the end of this chapter; but I refrain from burdening the text with their unpronounceable names, as I despair, by any reasonable number of woodcuts, of illustrating their marvellous details in anything like a satisfactory manner.

The Raj Rani temple, as will be seen from the woodcut (No. 235), is small; but the plan is arranged so as to give great variety and play of light and shade, and as the details are of the most exquisite beauty, it is one of the gems of Orissan art. The following woodcut (No. 236), without attempting to illustrate the art, is quoted as characteristic of the emblems of the Kesari line. Below the pillar are three kneeling elephants, over which domineer three lions, the emblems of the race. Above this a Nagni, or female Naga, with her seven-headed snake-hood, adorns the upper part of the pillar. They are to be found, generally in great numbers, in almost all the temples of the province. Over the doorway are the Nava

Graha, or nine planets, which are almost more universal, both in temples dedicated to Vishnu and in those belonging to the worship of Siva. Indeed, in so far as any external signs are concerned, there does not seem to be any means by which the temples of the two religions can be distinguished from one another. Throughout the province, from the time we first meet it, about A.D. 500, till it dies out about A.D. 1200, the style seems to be singularly uniform in its features, and it requires considerable familiarity with it to detect its gradual progress towards decay. Notwithstanding this, it is easy to perceive that there are two styles of architecture in Orissa, which ran side by side with one another during the whole course. The first is represented by the temples of Parasurameswara and Mukteswara (Woodcuts No. 230, 231); the second by the great temple (Woodcut No. 233). They are not antagonistic, but sister styles, and seem certainly to have had at least partially different origins. We can find affinities with that of the Mukteswara group in Dharwar and most parts of northern India: but I know of nothing exactly like the great temple anywhere else. It seems to be quite indigenous, and if not the most beautiful, it is the simplest and most majestic of the Indo-Aryan styles. It may look like riding a hobby to death, but I cannot help suspecting a wooden origin for it--the courses look so much more like carved logs of wood laid one upon another than courses of masonry, and the mode and extent to which they are carved certainly savours of the same material. There is a mosque built of Deodar pine in Kashmir, to be referred to hereafter, which certainly seems to favour this idea; but till we find some older temples than any yet discovered in Orissa this must remain in doubt. Meanwhile it may be well to point out that about one-half of the older temples in Orissa follow the type of the great temple, and one-half that of Mukteswara; but the two get confounded together in the 8th and 9th centuries, and are mixed together into what may almost be called a new style in the Raj Rani and temples of the 10th and 11th centuries.

KANARUC.

With, perhaps, the single exception of the temple of Juganât at Puri, there is no temple in India better known and about which more has been written than the so-called Black Pagoda at Kanaruc; nor is there any one whose date and dedication is better known, if the literature on the subject could be depended upon. Stirling does not hesitate in asserting that the present edifice, “as is well known, was built by the Raja Langora Narsingh Deo, in A.D. 1241, under the superintendence of his minister Shibai Sautra;”[424] and every one who has since written on the subject adopts this date without hesitation,[425] and the native records seem to confirm it. Complete as this evidence, at first sight, appears, I have no hesitation in putting it aside, for the simple reason that it seems impossible--after the erection of so degraded a specimen of the art as the temple of Puri (A.D. 1174)--the style ever could have reverted to anything so beautiful as this. In general design and detail it is so similar to the Jagamohan of the great temple at Bhuvaneswar that at first sight I should be inclined to place it in the same century; but the details of the tower exhibit a progress towards modern forms which is unmistakeable,[426] and render a difference of date of two or possibly even three centuries more probable. Yet the only written authority I know of for such a date is that given by Abul Fazl. After describing the temple, and ascribing it to Raja Narsingh Deo, in A.D. 1241, with an amount of detail and degree of circumstantiality which has deceived every one, he quietly adds that it is said “to be a work of 730 years’ antiquity.”[427] In other words, it was erected in A.D. 850 or A.D. 873, according to the date we assume for the composition of the Ayeen Akbery. If there were a king of that name among the Rois fainéants of the Kesari line, this would suffice; but no such name is found in the lists.[428] This, however, is not final; for in an inscription on the Brahmaneswar temple the queen, who built it, mentions the names of her husband, Udyalaka, and six of his ancestors; but neither he nor any of them are to be found in the lists except the first, Janmejaya, and it is doubtful whether even he was a Kesari king or the hero of the ‘Mahabharata.’[429] In all this uncertainty we have really nothing to guide us but the architecture, and its testimony is so distinct that it does not appear to me doubtful that this temple really belongs to the latter half of the 9th century.

Another point of interest connected with this temple is, that all authors, apparently following Abul Fazl, agree that it was like the temple of Marttand, in Kashmir (ante, p. 287), dedicated to the sun. I have never myself seen a Sun temple in India, and being entirely ignorant of the ritual of the sect, I would not wish to appear to dogmatise on the subject; but I have already expressed my doubts as to the dedication of Marttand, and I may be allowed to repeat them here. The traces of Sun worship in Bengal are so slight that they have escaped me, as they have done the keen scrutiny of the late H. H. Wilson.[430]

In the Vedas it appears that Vishnu is called the Sun, or it may be the sun bears the name of Vishnu;[431] and this may account, perhaps, for the way in which the name has come to be applied to this temple, which differs in no other respect from the other temples of Vishnu found in Orissa. The architectural forms are identical; they are adorned with the same symbols. The Nava Graha, or nine planets, adorn the lintel of this as of all the temples of the Kesari line. The seven-headed serpent-forms are found on every temple of the race, from the great one at Bhuvaneswar to this one, and it is only distinguishable from those of Siva by the obscenities that disfigure a part of its sculptures. This is, unfortunately only too common a characteristic of Vaishnava temples all over India, but is hardly, if ever, found in Saiva temples, and never was, so far as I know, a characteristic of the worship of the Sun god.

Architecturally, the great beauty of this temple arises from the form of the design of the roof of the Jagamohan, or porch--the only part now remaining. Both in dimensions and detail, it is extremely like that of the great temple at Bhuvaneswar, but it is here divided into three storeys instead of two, which is an immense improvement, and it rises at a more agreeable angle. The first and second storeys consist of six cornices each, the third of five only, as shown in the diagram Woodcut No. 124. The two lower ones are carved with infinite beauty and variety on all their twelve faces, and the antefixæ at the angles and breaks are used with an elegance and judgment a true Yavana could hardly have surpassed. There is, so far as I know, no roof in India where the same play of light and shade is obtained with an equal amount of richness and constructive propriety as in this instance, nor one that sits so gracefully on the base that supports it.

Internally, the chamber is singularly plain, but presents some constructive peculiarities worthy of attention. On the floor it is about 40 ft. square, and the walls rise plain to about the same height. Here it begins to bracket inwards, till it contracts to about 20 ft., where it was ceiled with a flat stone roof, supported by wrought-iron beams--Stirling says nine, nearly 1 ft. square by 12 ft. to 18 ft. long.[432] My measurements made the section less--8 in. to 9 in., but the length greater, 23 ft.; and Babu Rajendra points out that one, 21 ft. long, has a square section of 8 in. at the end, but a depth of 11 in. in the centre,[433] showing a knowledge of the properties and strength of the material that is remarkable in a people who are now so utterly incapable of forging such masses. The iron pillar at Delhi (Woodcut No. 281) is even a more remarkable example than this, and no satisfactory explanation has yet been given as to the mode in which it was manufactured. Its object, however, is plain, while the employment of these beams here is a mystery. They were not wanted for strength, as the building is still firm after they have fallen, and so expensive a false ceiling was not wanted architecturally to roof so plain a chamber. It seems to be only another instance of that profusion of labour which the Hindus loved to lavish on the temples of their gods.

PURI.

When from the capital we turn to Puri, we find a state of affairs more altered than might be expected from the short space of time that had elapsed between the building of the Black Pagoda and the celebrated one now found there. It is true the dynasty had changed. In 1131, the Kesari Vansa, with their Saiva worship, had been superseded by the Ganga Vansa, who were apparently as devoted followers of Vishnu; and they set to work at once to signalise their triumph by erecting the temple to Juganât, which has since acquired such a world-wide celebrity.

It is not, of course, to be supposed that the kings of the Ganga line were the first to introduce the worship of Vishnu to Orissa. The whole traditions, as recorded by Stirling, contradict such an assumption, and the first temple erected on this spot to the deity is said to have been built by Yayati, the founder of the Kesari line.[434] He it was who recovered the sacred image of Juganât from the place where it had been buried 150 years before, on the invasion of the Yavanas, and a “new temple was erected by him on the site of the old one, which was found to be much dilapidated and overwhelmed with sand.”[435] This, of course, was before the arrival of the Ayodhya Brahmans alluded to above, who, though they may have retained possession of the capital during the continuance of the dynasty, did not apparently interfere with the rival worship in the provinces.

It would indeed be contrary to all experience if, in a country where Buddhism once existed, those who were followers of that faith had not degenerated first into Jainism and then into Vishnuism. At Udayagiri we have absolute proof in the caves of the first transition, and that it continued there till the time when the Mahrattas erected the little temple on the southern peak. In like manner, there seems little doubt that the tooth relic was preserved at Puri till the invasion of the Yavanas, apparently, as before mentioned, to obtain possession of it. According to the Buddhist version, it was buried in the jungle, but dug up again shortly afterwards, and conveyed to Ceylon.[436] According to the Brahmanical account, it was the image of Juganât, and not the tooth, that was hidden and recovered on the departure of the Yavanas, and then was enshrined at Juganât in a new temple on the sands. The tradition of a bone of Krishna being contained in the image[437] is evidently only a Brahmanical form of Buddhist relic worship, and, as has been frequently suggested, the three images of Juganât, his brother Balbhadra, and the sister Subhadhra, are only the Buddhist trinity--Buddha, Dharma, Sanga--disguised to suit the altered condition of belief among the common people. The pilgrimage, the Rât Jutra, the suspension of caste prejudices, everything in fact at Puri, is redolent of Buddhism, but of Buddhism so degraded as hardly to be recognisable by those who know that faith only in its older and purer form.

The degradation of the faith, however, is hardly so remarkable as that of the style. Even Stirling, who was no captious critic, remarks that it seems unaccountable, in an age when the architects obviously possessed some taste and skill, and were in most cases particularly lavish in the use of sculptural ornament, so little pains should have been taken with the decoration and finishing of this sacred and stupendous edifice.[438] It is not, however, only in the detail, but the outline, the proportions, and every arrangement of the temple, show that the art in this province at least had received a fatal downward impetus from which it never recovered.

As will be seen from the annexed plan[439] (Woodcut No. 237), this temple has a double enclosure, a thing otherwise unknown in the north. Externally it measures 670 ft. by 640 ft., and is surrounded by a wall 20 ft. to 30 ft. high, with four gates. The inner enclosure measures 420 ft. by 315 ft., and is enclosed by a double wall with four openings. Within this last stands the Bara Dewul, A, measuring 80 ft. across the centre, or 5 ft. more than the great temple at Bhuvaneswar; with its porch or Jagamohan, B, it measures 155 ft. east and west, while the great tower rises to a height of 192 ft.[440] Beyond this two other porches were afterwards added, the Nat-mandir, C, and Bhog-mandir, D, making the whole length of the temple about 300 ft., or as nearly as may be the same as that at Bhuvaneswar. Besides this there are, as in all great Hindu temples, numberless smaller shrines within the two enclosures, but, as in all instances in the north, they are kept subordinate to the principal one, which here towers supreme over all.

Except in its double enclosure, and a certain irregularity of plan, this temple does not differ materially in arrangement from the great ones at Bhuvaneswar and elsewhere; but besides the absence of detail already remarked upon, the outline of its vimana is totally devoid either of that solemn solidity of the earlier examples, or the grace that characterised those subsequently erected; and when we add to this that whitewash and paint have done their worst to add vulgarity to forms already sufficiently ungraceful, it will easily be understood that this, the most famous, is also the most disappointing of northern Hindu temples.[441] As may be seen from the preceding illustration (Woodcut No. 238), the parts are so nearly the same as those found in all the older temples at Bhuvaneswar, that the difference could hardly be expressed in words; even the woodcut, however, is sufficient to show how changed they are in effect, but the building itself should be seen fully to appreciate the degradation that has taken place.

JAJEPUR AND CUTTACK.

Jajepur, on the Byturni, was one of the old capitals of the province, and even now contains temples which, from the squareness of their forms, may be old, but, if so, they have been so completely disguised by a thick coating of plaster, that their carvings are entirely obliterated, and there is nothing by which their age can be determined. The place was long occupied by the Mahomedans, and the presence of a handsome mosque may account for the disappearance of some at least of the Hindu remains. There is one pillar, however, still standing, which deserves to be illustrated as one of the most pleasing examples of its class in India (Woodcut No. 239). Its proportions are beautiful, and its details in excellent taste; but the mouldings of the base, which are those on which the Hindus were accustomed to lavish the utmost care, have unfortunately been destroyed. Originally it is said to have supported a figure of Garuda--the Vahana of Vishnu--and a figure is pointed out as the identical one. It may be so, and if it is the case, the pillar is of the 12th or 13th century. This also seems to be the age of some remarkable pieces of sculpture which were discovered some years ago on the brink of the river, where they had apparently been hidden from Mahomedan bigotry. They are in quite a different style from anything at Bhuvaneswar or Kanaruc, and probably more modern than anything at those places.

Cuttack became the capital of the country in A.D. 989-1006, when a certain Markut Kesari built a stone revêtement to protect the site from encroachment of the river.[442] It too, however, has suffered, first from the intolerant bigotry of the Moslem, and afterwards from the stolid indifference[443] of the British rulers, so that very little remains; but for this the nine-storeyed palace of Mukund Deo, the contemporary of Akbar, might still remain to us in such a state at least as to be intelligible. We hear so much, however, of these nine-storeyed palaces and viharas, that it may be worth while quoting Abul Fazl’s description of this one, in order to enable us to understand some of the allusions and descriptions we afterwards may meet with:--“In Cuttack,” he says, “there is a fine palace, built by Rajah Mukund Deo, consisting of nine storeys. The first storey is for elephants, camels, and horses; the second for artillery and military stores, where also are quarters for the guards and other attendants; the third is occupied by porters and watchmen; the fourth is appropriated for the several artificers; the kitchens make the fifth range; the sixth contains the Rajah’s public apartments; the seventh is for the transaction of private business; the eighth is where the women reside; and the ninth is the Rajah’s sleeping apartment. To the south,” he adds, “of this palace is a very ancient Hindu temple.”[444]

As Orissa at the period when this was written was practically a part of Akbar’s kingdom, there seems little doubt that this description was furnished by some one who knew the place. There are seven-storeyed palaces at Jeypur and Bijapur still standing, which were erected about this date, and one of five storeys in Akbar’s own palace at Futtehpore Sikri, but none, so far as I know, of nine storeys, though I see no reason for doubting the correctness of the description of the one just quoted.

Although it thus consequently happens that we have no more means of ascertaining what the civil edifices of the Indo-Aryans of Orissa were like, than we have of those of the contemporary Dravidians, there is a group of engineering objects which throw some light on the arts of the period. As has been frequently stated above, the Hindus hate an arch, and never will use it except under compulsion. The Mahomedans taught them to get over their prejudices and employ the arch in their civil buildings in later times, but to the present day they avoid it in their temples in so far as it is possible to do so. In Orissa, however, in the 13th century, they built numerous bridges in various parts of the province, but never employed a true arch in any of them. The Atarah Nullah bridge at Puri, built by Kebir Narsingh Deo, about 1250, has been drawn and described by Stirling, and is the finest in the province of those still in use. Between the abutments it is 275 ft. long, and with a roadway 35 ft. wide. That shown in the above woodcut (No. 240) is probably older, and certainly more picturesque, though constructed on the same identical plan. It may be unscientific, but many of these old bridges are standing and in use, while many of those we have constructed out of the ruins of the temples and palaces have been swept away as if a curse were upon them.

CONCLUSION.

The above may be considered as a somewhat meagre account of one of the most complete and interesting styles of Indian architecture. It would, however, be impossible to do it justice without an amount of illustration incompatible with the scope of this work, and with details drawn on a larger scale than its pages admit of. It is to be hoped that Babu Rajendra’s work may, to some extent, at least, supply this deficiency. The first volume can only, however, be considered as introductory, being wholly occupied with preliminary matters, and avoiding all dates or descriptions of particular buildings. The second, when it appears, may remedy this defect, and it is to be hoped will do so, as a good monograph of the Orissan style would convey a more correct idea of what Indian art really is than a similar account of any other style we are acquainted with in India. From the erection of the temple of Parasurameswara, A.D. 500, to that of Juganât at Puri, A.D. 1174, the style steadily progresses without any interruption or admixture of foreign elements, while the examples are so numerous that one might be found for every fifty years of the period--probably for every twenty--and we might thus have a chronometric scale of Hindu art during these seven centuries that would be invaluable for application to other places or styles. It is also in Orissa, if anywhere that we may hope to find the incunabula that will explain much that is now mysterious in the forms of the temples and the origin of many parts of their ornamentation. An examination, for instance, of a hundred or so of the ruined and half-ruined temples of the province would enable any competent person to say at once how far the theory above enunciated (Woodcut No. 124)--to account for the curved form of the towers--was or was not in accordance with the facts of the case, and, if opposed to them, what the true theory of the curved form really was. In like manner, it seems hardly doubtful that a careful examination of a great number of examples would reveal the origin of the amalaka crowning ornament. I feel absolutely convinced, as stated above, that it did not grow out of the berry of the Phyllanthus emblica, and am very doubtful if it had a vegetable origin at all. But no one yet has suggested any other theory which will bear examination, and it is only from the earliest temples themselves that any satisfactory answer can be expected.

It is not only, however, that these and many other technical questions will be answered when any competent person undertakes a thorough examination of the ruins, but they will afford a picture of the civilization and of the arts and religion of an Indian community during seven centuries of isolation from external influences, such as can hardly be obtained from any other source. So far as we at present know, it is a singularly pleasing picture, and one that will well repay any pains that may be taken to present it to the English public in a complete and intelligible form.

TENTATIVE LIST OF DATES AND DIMENSIONS OF THE PRINCIPAL ORISSAN TEMPLES.

External Internal Dimensions Dimensions Dates. of Towers. of Cells.

ft. ft. ft. ft. 500-600 { Parasurameswara 20 × 20 11 × 9 { Mukteswara 14 × 14 6 × 6 600-700 { Sari Dewala 24 × 22 12 × 12 { Moitre Serai { Ananta Vasu Deva 26 × 26 16 × 14 657 Bhuvaneswar 66 × 60 42 × 42 { Sideswara 700-850 { Vitala Devi { Markandeswara in Puri { Brahmeswara 873 Kanaruc 60 × 60 40 × 40 (?) 900-1000 { Kedareswar { Raj Rani 32 × 25 12 × 12 1104 Nat Mandir at Bhuvaneswar 1198 Juganât, Puri 73 × 73 29 × 29[445]

III. WESTERN INDIA

CONTENTS.

Dharwar--Brahmanical Rock-cut Temples.

DHARWAR.

If the province of Orissa is interesting from the completeness and uniformity of its style of Indo-Aryan architecture, that of Dharwar, or, more correctly speaking of Maharastra, is almost equally so from exactly the opposite conditions. In the western province, the Dravidian style struggles with the northern for supremacy during all the earlier stages of their growth, and the mode in which the one influenced the other will be one of the most interesting and instructive lessons we can learn from their study, when the materials exist for a thorough investigation of the architectural history of this province. In magnificence, however, the western can never pretend to rival the eastern province. There are more and far finer buildings in the one city of Bhuvaneswar alone than in all the cities of Maharastra put together, and the extreme elaboration of their details gives the Orissan examples a superiority that the western temples cannot pretend to rival.

Among the oldest and most characteristic of the Dharwar temples is that of Papanatha, at Purudkul, or Pittadkul, as it is now spelt. As will be seen from the plan of this temple given above (Woodcut No. 122, page 221), the cell, with its tower, has not the same predominating importance which it always had in Orissa; and instead of a mere vestibule it has a four-pillared porch, which would in itself be sufficient to form a complete temple on the eastern side of India. Beyond this, however, is the great porch, Mantapa, or Jagamohan--square, as usual, but here it possesses sixteen pillars, in four groups, instead of the astylar arrangements so common in the east. It is, in fact, a copy, with very slight alterations, of the plan of the great Saiva temple at the same place (Woodcut No. 189), or the Kylas at Ellora (Woodcut No. 186). These, with others recently brought to light, form a group of early temples wholly Dravidian in style, but having no affinity, except in plan, with the Temple of Papanatha, which is as essentially Indo-Aryan in all its architectural arrangements. This, in fact, may be looked upon as the characteristic difference between the styles of Dharwar and Orissa. The western style, from its proximity to the Dravidian and admixture with it, in fact, used pillars freely and with effect whenever wanted; while their use in Orissa is almost unknown in the best ages of the style, and their introduction, as it took place there, showed only too clearly the necessity that had arisen in the decay of the style, to supply with foreign forms the want of originality of invention.

The external effect of the building may be judged of from the above woodcut (No. 241). The outline of the tower is not unlike that of the Parasurameswara temple at Bhuvaneswar, with which it was probably contemporary--circa A.D. 500--but the central belt is more pronounced, and always apparently was on the west side of India. It will also be observed in this tower that every third course has on the angle a form which has just been described as an amalaka in speaking of the crowning members of Orissan temples. Here it looks as if the two intermediate courses simulated roofs, or a roof in two storeys, and then this crowning member was introduced, and the same thing repeated over and over again till the requisite height was obtained. In the Parasurameswara there are three intermediate courses (Woodcut No. 230); in the great tower at Bhuvaneswar, five; and in the more modern temples they disappear from the angles, but are supplied by the miniature temple-forms applied to the sides. In the temple at Buddh Gaya the same form occurs (Woodcut No. 16) on the angle of each storey; but there it looks more like the capital of a pillar, which, in fact, I believe to be its real original. But from whatever form derived, this repetition on the angles is in the best possible taste; the eye is led upwards by it, and is prepared for the crowning member, which is thus no longer isolated and alone, but a part of a complete design.

The frequency of the repetition of this ornament is, so far as is now known, no bad test of the age of a temple. If an example were found where every alternate course was an amalaka, it probably would be older than any temple we have yet known. It would then represent a series of roofs, five, seven, or nine storeys, built over one another. It had, however, passed into conventionalities before we meet with it.

Whenever the temples of this district are thoroughly investigated, they will, no doubt, throw immense light on the early history of the style.[446] As the case now stands, however, the principal interest centres in the caves of Badami, which being the only Brahmanical caves known that have positive dates upon them, they give us a fixed point from which to reason in respect of other series such as we have never had before. For the present, they must make way for other examples better known and of more general architectural interest.

BRAHMANICAL ROCK-CUT TEMPLES.

Although the structural temples of the Badami group[447] in Dharwar are of such extreme interest, as has been pointed out above, they are surpassed in importance, for our present purposes at least, by the rock-cut examples.

At Badami there are three caves, not of any great dimensions, but of singular interest from their architectural details and sculptures, and more so from the fact that one of them, No. 3, contains an inscription with an undoubted date upon it. There are, as pointed out above, innumerable Buddhist inscriptions on the western caves, but none with dates from any well-ascertained era, and none, unfortunately, of the Brahmanical caves at Ellora or elsewhere have inscriptions that can be called integral, and not one certainly with a date on it. The consequence is, that the only mode by which their ages could be approximated was by arranging them in sequences, according to our empirical or real knowledge of the history of the period during which they were supposed to have been excavated. At Ellora, for instance, it was assumed that the Buddhist preceded the Brahmanical excavations, and that these were succeeded by the Jaina; and various local and architectural peculiarities rendered this hypothesis extremely probable. Arguing on this basis, it was found that the one chaitya cave there, the Viswakarma, was nearly identical in style with the last of the four chaityas at Ajunta (No. 26), and that cave, for reasons given above, was placed at the end of the 6th century, say A.D. 600. The caves next it were assumed to occupy the 7th century, thus leading on to the Rameswara group, about A.D. 700, and the Jaina group would then have occupied the next century. The age of the Kylas or Dravidian group, being exceptional, could only be determined by extraneous evidence, and, as already pointed out, from its extreme similarity with the great temple at Pittadkul, belongs almost certainly to the 8th century; and from a similar chain of reasoning the Jaina group is brought back to about the same age, or rather earlier, say A.D. 650.

The inscription on the No. 3 cave at Badami is dated in the twelfth year of the reign of a well-known king, Mangaliswara, in the 500th year after the inauguration of the Saka king, or in 79; the date therefore is A.D. 579. Admitting, which I think its architecture renders nearly certain, that it is the earliest of the three, still they are so like one another, that the latest must be assumed to have been excavated within the limits of the next century, say A.D. 575-700. Comparing the architecture of this group with that known as the central or Rameswara group at Ellora, it is so nearly identical, that though it may be slightly more modern, it can hardly now be doubted they too, including perhaps the cave known as the Ashes of Ravana, must have been excavated in the 7th century. Instead, therefore, of the sequence formerly adopted, we are forced to fall back on that marvellous picture of religious toleration described by the Chinese Pilgrim as exhibited at Allahabad in the year A.D. 643. On that occasion the King Siladitya distributed alms or gifts to 10,000 priests (religieux), the first day in honour of Buddha, the second of Aditya the Sun (Vishnu?), and the third in honour of Iswara or Siva;[448] and the eighteen kings who assisted at this splendid quinquennial festival seem promiscuously to have honoured equally these three divinities. With this toleration at head-quarters, we ought not to be surprised if we find the temples of the three religions overlapping one another to some extent.

The truth of the matter is, that one of the greatest difficulties an antiquary experiences before the 8th century, is to ascertain to what divinity any temple or a cave is dedicated. In the three caves, for instance, at Badami, the sculptures are wholly Vaishnava, and no one would doubt that they were dedicated to that deity, but in the sanctuaries of all is the lingam or emblem of Siva. It has been suggested that this may have been an afterthought, but if so the cave must have been without meaning. There is no sinhasan or throne on which an image of a deity could be placed, nor is the cell large enough for that purpose.

Unfortunately there are no Buddhist buildings or caves so far south as Badami, and we are consequently deprived of that means for comparison; and before anything very definite can be laid down, it will require that some one familiar with the subject should go over the whole of the western caves, and institute a rigid comparison of their details. Meanwhile, however, the result of the translations of the inscriptions gathered by Mr. Burgess, and of his plans and views,[449] is that we must compress our history of the western caves within narrower limits than originally seemed necessary.[450] The buildings in the Dharwar district seem all to be comprised between the years 500 and 750 A.D., with probably a slight extension either way, and those at Ellora being certainly synchronous, must equally be limited to the same period of time.

Pending a more complete investigation, which I hope may be undertaken before long, I would propose the following as a tentative chronology of the far-famed series of caves at Ellora:--

Buddhist:--Viswakarma to Das Avatara A.D. 500-600 Jaina:--Indra, Juganât, Subhas, &c. 550-650 Hindu:--Rameswara to Dhumnar Lena 600-750 Dravidian:--Kylas 725-800

The cave at Elephanta follows of course the date here given for the Dhumnar Lena, and must thus date after the middle of the 8th century.[451]

These dated caves and buildings have also rendered another service to the science of archæology, inasmuch as they enable us to state with confidence that the principal caves at Mahavellipore must be circumscribed within the same limits. The architecture there being so lean and poor, is most misleading, but, as hinted above, I believe it arose from the fact that it was Dravidian, and copied literally from structural buildings, by people who had not the long experience of the Buddhists in cave architecture to guide them, for there seems to have been no Buddhists so far south. But be that as it may, a comparison of the Hindu sculptures at Badami with those of Ellora on the one hand, and Mahavellipore on the other, renders it almost absolutely certain that they were practically contemporary. The famous bas-relief of Durga, on her lion, slaying Mahasura, the Minotaur,[452] is earlier than one very similar to it at Ellora; and one, the Viratarupa,[453] is later by probably a century than the sculpture of the same subject in cave 3 at Badami.[454] Some of the other bas-reliefs are later, some earlier, than those representing similar subjects in the three series, but it seems now impossible to get over the fact that they are practically synchronous. Even the great bas-relief, which I was inclined to assign to a more modern period, probably belongs to the 7th or 8th century. The great Naga king, whom all the world are there worshipping, is represented as a man whose head is shaded by a seven-headed serpent-hood, but also with a serpent-body from the waist downwards. That form was not known in the older Buddhist sculptures, but has now been found on all the Orissan temples (for instance Woodcut No. 236), and nearly as frequently at Badami.[455] This difficulty being removed, there seems no reason why this gigantic sculpture should not take the place, which its state of execution would otherwise assign to it--say A.D. 700--as a mean date, subject to subsequent adjustment.

In a general work like the present it is of course impossible to illustrate so extensive a group as that of the Brahmanical caves to such an extent as to render their history or affinities intelligible to those who have not by other means become familiar with the subject. Fortunately, however, in this instance the materials exist by which any one may attain the desired information with very little difficulty. Daniell’s drawings--or rather Mr. Wales’--made in 1795, have long made the public acquainted with the principal caves at Ellora; Sir Charles Malet’s paper in the sixth volume of the ‘Asiatic Researches;’ Seely’s ‘Wonders of Ellora,’ published in 1820, and numerous other works, with the photographs now available, supply nearly all that can be desired in that direction. The same may be said of Elephanta, which has been exhaustively treated by Mr. Burgess in the work above referred to. Chambers’ paper in the second volume of the ‘Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society,’ supplies, with Dr. Hunter’s photographs, a vast amount of information regarding the Mahavellipore antiquities; and Mr. Burgess’s recent report on the Dharwar caves completes, to a great extent, the information wanted to understand the peculiarities of the group. Notwithstanding this, it is well worthy of a monograph, insomuch as it affords the only representation of the art and mythology of the Hindus on the revival of their religion, which was commenced by the Guptas A.D. 318-465, but really inaugurated by the great Vicramaditya, A.D. 495-530, and which, when once started, continued to nourish till the great collapse in the 8th century.

After all, however, the subject is one more suited to the purposes of the mythologist and the sculptor than to the architect. Like all rock-cut examples, except the Dravidian, the caves have the intolerable defect of having no exteriors, and consequently no external architectural form. The only parts of them which strictly belong to architectural art are their pillars, and though a series of them would be interesting, they vary so much, from the nature of the material in which they are carved, and from local circumstances, that they do not possess the same historical significance that external forms would afford. Such a pillar, for instance, as this one from the cave called Lanka, on the side of the pit in which the Kylas stands (Woodcut No. 242), though in exquisite taste as a rock-cut example, where the utmost strength is apparently required to support the mass of rock above, does not afford any points of comparison with structural examples of the same age. In a building it would be cumbersome and absurd; under a mass of rock it is elegant and appropriate. The pillars in the caves at Mahavellipore fail from the opposite fault: they retain their structural form, though used in the rock, and look frail and weak in consequence; but while this diversity in practice prevailed, it prevents their use as a chronometric scale being appreciated, as it would be if the practice had been uniform. As, however, No. 3 at Badami is a cave with a positive date, A.D. 579, it may be well to give a plan and section (Woodcuts Nos. 243 and 244) to illustrate its peculiarities, so as to enable a comparison to be made between it and other examples. Its details will be found fully illustrated in Mr. Burgess’s report.

Though not one of the largest, it is still a fine cave, its verandah measuring 70 ft., with a depth of 50 ft., beyond which is a simple plain cell, containing the lingam. At one end of the verandah is the Narasingha Avatar; at the other end Vishnu seated on the five-headed serpent Ananta. The front pillars have each three brackets, of very wooden design, all of which are ornamented by two or three figures, generally a male and female, with a child or dwarf--all of considerable beauty and delicacy of execution. The inner pillars are varied, and more architectural in their forms, but in the best style of Hindu art.

Compared with the style of art found at Amravati, on the opposite coast, it is curious to observe how nearly Buddha, seated on the many-headed Naga,[456] resembles Vishnu on Ananta in the last woodcut, and though the religion is changed, the art has hardly altered to such an extent as might be expected, considering that two centuries had probably elapsed between the execution of these two bas-reliefs. The change of religion, however, is complete, for though Buddha does appear at Badami, it is in the very subordinate position of the ninth Avatar of Vishnu.[457]

Sometimes the Hindus successfully conquered one of the main difficulties of cave architecture by excavating them on the spur of a hill, as at the Dhumnar Lena at Ellora, or by surrounding them by courts, as at Elephanta; so that light was introduced on three sides instead of only one, as was too often the case both with Buddhist and Hindu excavations. These two, though probably among the last, are certainly the finest Hindu excavations existing, if looked at from an architectural point of view. The Ellora example is the larger and finer, measuring 150 ft. each way (Woodcut No. 245). That at Elephanta, though extremely similar in general arrangement, is less regular in plan, and also somewhat smaller, measuring only 130 ft. by 120 ft. It is easy to see that if these temples stood in the open they would only be porches, like that at Baillûr (Woodcut No. 221), and numberless other examples, which are found everywhere; but the necessities of rock-cut architecture required that the cella should be placed inside the mantapa, or porch, instead of externally to it, as was always the case in structural examples. This, perhaps, was hardly to be regretted; but it shows how little the practice of cutting temples in the rock was suited to the temple-forms of the Hindus, and we need not, therefore, feel surprised how readily they abandoned it when any idea of rivalling the Buddhists had ceased to prompt their efforts in this direction.

So far as I know, there is only one example where the Indo-Aryan architects attempted to rival the Dravidian in producing a monolithic exterior. It is at a place called Dhumnar, in Rajputana, where, as already mentioned (ante, p. 162), there is an extensive series of late Buddhist excavations. In order to mark their triumph over that fallen faith, the Hindus, apparently in the 8th century, drove an open cutting into the side of the hill, till they came to a part high enough for their purpose. Here they enlarged this cutting into a pit 105 ft. by 70 ft., leaving a temple of very elegant architecture standing in the centre, with seven small cells surrounding it, precisely as was done in the case of the Kylas at Ellora. The effect, however, can hardly be said to be pleasing (Woodcut No. 246). A temple standing in a pit is always an anomaly, but in this instance it is valuable as an unaltered example of the style, and as showing how small shrines--which have too often disappeared--were originally grouped round the greater shrines. The value of this characteristic we shall be better able to appreciate when we come to describe the temples at Brambanam and other places in Java. When the Jains adopted the architecture of the Buddhists, they filled their residential cells with images, and made them into little temples, and the Hindus seem to some extent to have adopted the same practice as here exemplified, but never carried it to the same extent.

With a sufficient number of examples, it would be easy to trace the rise and fall of this cellular system, and few things would be more interesting; for now that we find it in full force in the Buddhist monasteries at Gandhara (ante, p. 171), it would be most important to be able to say exactly when the monk made way to the image. In India Proper there is no instance of this being done in Buddhist times, or before A.D. 650, and hitherto we have been in the habit of considering it a purely Jaina arrangement. This must now be modified, but the question still remains--to what extent should this be done?

One more illustration must conclude what we have at present to say of Hindu rock-cut temples. It is found near Poonah, and is very little known, though much more appropriate to cave architecture than most examples of its class. The temple itself is a simple pillared hall, with apparently ten pillars in front, and probably had originally a structural sikra built on the upper plateau to mark the position of the sanctuary. The most original part of it, however, is the Nundi pavilion, which stands in the courtyard in front of the temple (Woodcut No. 247). It is circular in plan, and its roof--which is a great slab of rock--is supported by, apparently, sixteen square pillars of very simple form. Altogether it is as appropriate a bit of design as is to be found in Hindu cave architecture. It has, however, the defect only too common in those Hindu excavations--that, being in a pit, it can be looked down upon; which is a test very few buildings can stand, and to which none ought to be exposed.

IV. CENTRAL AND NORTHERN INDIA

CONTENTS.

Temples at Gualior, Khajurâho, Udaipur, Benares, Bindrabun, Kantonuggur, Amritsur.

There are certainly more than one hundred temples in Central and Northern India which are well worthy of being described in detail, and, if described and illustrated, would convey a wonderful impression of the fertility in invention of the Hindu mind and of the elegance with which it was capable of expressing itself. None of these temples can make the smallest pretension to rival the great southern examples in scale; they are all, indeed, smaller even than the greater of Orissan examples; and while some of them surpass the Orissan temples in elegance of form, many rival them in the profuse elaboration of minute ornamental details.

None of these temples--none, at least, that are now complete--seem to be of any great antiquity. At Erun, in the Saugor territory, are some fragments of columns, and several sculptures that seem to belong to the flourishing age of the Guptas, say about A.D. 450; and in the Mokundra Pass there are the remains of a choultrie that may be as old, or older, but it is a mere fragment,[458] and has no inscription upon it.

Among the more complete examples, the oldest I know of, and consequently the most beautiful, is the porch or temple at Chandravati, near Jahra Puttun, in Rajputana. In its neighbourhood Colonel Tod found an inscription, dated A.D. 691,[459] which at one time I thought might have been taken from this temple, and consequently might give its date, which would fairly agree with the style,[460] judged from that of some of the caves at Ellora, which it very much resembles. As recent discoveries, however, have forced us to carry their dates further back by at least a century, it is probable that this too must go back to about the year 600, or thereabouts. Indeed, with the Chaöri in the Mokundra Pass, and the pillars at Erun, this Chandravati fragment completes the list of all we at present can feel sure of having been erected before the dark ages. There may be others, and, if so, it would be well they were examined, for this is certainly one of the most elegant specimens of architecture in India (Woodcut No. 248). It has not the poetry of arrangement of the Jaina octagonal domes, but it approaches very nearly to them by the large square space in the centre, which was covered by the most elegantly designed and most exquisitely carved roof known to exist anywhere. Its arrangement is evidently borrowed from that of Buddhist viharas, and it differs from them in style because their interiors were always plastered and painted; here, on the contrary, everything is honestly carved in stone.[461]

Leaving these fragments, one of the oldest, and certainly one of the most perfect, in Central India is the now desecrated temple at Barrolli, situated in a wild and romantic spot, not far from the falls of the Chumbul, whose distant roar in the still night is the only sound that breaks the silence of the solitude around them. The principal temple, represented in the Woodcut No. 249, may probably be added to the list of buildings enumerated above as erected before 750 A.D. It certainly is at least a century more modern than that at Chandravati, and, pending a more precise determination, may be ascribed to the 8th or 9th century, and is one of the few of that age now known which were originally dedicated to Siva. Its general outline is identical with that of the contemporary Orissan temples. But instead of the astylar enclosed porch, or mantapa, it has a pillared portico of great elegance, whose roof reaches half-way up the temple, and is sculptured with a richness and complexity of design almost unrivalled, even in those days of patient prodigality of labour. It will be observed in the plan (Woodcut No. 250) that the dimensions are remarkably small, and the temple is barely 60 ft. high, so that its merit consists entirely in its shape and proportions, and in the elegance and profusion of the ornament that covers it.

In front of the temple is a detached porch, here called a Chaöri, or nuptial hall (the same word, I believe, as Choultrie in the south), in which tradition records the marriage of a Huna (Hun) prince to a Rajputni bride, for which purpose it is said to have been erected;[462] but whether this is so or not, it is one of the finest examples of such detached halls known in the north. We miss here the octagonal dome of the Jains, which would have given elegance and relief to its ceiling, though the variety in the spacing of the columns has been attained by a different process. The dome was seldom if ever employed in Hindu architecture, but they seem to have attempted to gain sufficient relief to their otherwise monotonous arrangement of columns by breaking up the external outline of the plan of the mantapa, and by ranging the aisles diagonally across the building, instead of placing them parallel to the sides.

The other two temples here are somewhat taller and more pointed in their form, and are consequently either more modern in date, or if of the same age--which may possibly be the case--would bring the date of the whole group down to the 10th century, which, after all, may be their true date, though I am at present inclined to think the more ancient date more consistent with our present knowledge.

A little way from the great temple are two pillars, one of which is here represented (Woodcut No. 251). They evidently supported one of those torans, or triumphal archways, which succeeded the gateways of the Buddhist topes, and form frequently a very pleasing adjunct to Hindu temples. They are, however, frail edifices at best, and easily overthrown, wherever the bigotry of the Moslems came into play.

GUALIOR.

One temple, existing in the fortress of Gualior, has been already described under the title of the Jaina Temple (ante, p. 244), though whether it is Jaina or Vaishnava is by no means easily determined. At the same place there is another, bearing the not very dignified name of the Teli ka Mandir, or Oilman’s Temple (Woodcut No. 252). It is a square of 60 ft. each way, with a portico on the east projecting about 11 ft. Unlike the other temples we have been describing, it does not terminate upwards in a pyramid, nor is it crowned by an amalaka, but in a ridge of about 30 ft. in extent, which may originally have had three amalakas upon it. I cannot help believing that this form of temple was once more common than we now find it. There are several examples of it at Mahavellipore (Woodcuts Nos. 181, 182), evidently copied from a form common among the Buddhists, and one very beautiful example is found at Bhuvaneswar,[463] there called Kapila Devi, and dedicated to Siva. The Teli ka Mandir was originally dedicated to Vishnu, but afterwards converted to the worship of Siva. There is no inscription or any tradition from which its date can be gathered, but on the whole I am inclined to place it in the 10th or 11th century.

KHAJURÂHO.

As mentioned above, the finest and most extensive group of temples belonging to the northern or Indo-Aryan style of architecture is that gathered round the great temple at Bhuvaneswar. They are also the most interesting historically, inasmuch as their dates extend through five or six centuries, and they alone consequently enable us to bridge over the dark ages of Indian art. From its remote situation, Orissa seems to have escaped, to a great extent at least, from the troubles that agitated northern and western India during the 8th and 9th centuries; and though from this cause we can find nothing in Central India to fill up the gap between Chandravati and Gualior, in Orissa the series is complete, and, if properly examined and described, would afford a consecutive history of the style from say 500 to 1100 or 1200 A.D.

Next in interest and extent to the Bhuvaneswar group is that at Khajurâho,[464] in Bundelcund, as before mentioned (p. 245). At this place there are now to be found some thirty important temples, all of which, with the exception of the Chaonsat Jogini and the Ganthai, described when treating of Jaina architecture, are of the same or nearly the same age. Nor is it difficult, from their style and from the inscriptions gathered by General Cunningham, to see what that age was. The inscriptions range from A.D. 954 to A.D. 1001; and though it is not clear to what particular temple they apply, we shall not probably err much if we assign the whole twenty-eight temples he enumerates to the century beginning 950 and ending 1050, with a margin of a few years either way. What renders this group more than usually interesting is, that the Khajurâho temples are nearly equally divided between the three great Indian religions: one-third being Jaina, one-third Vaishnava, and the remainder Saiva; and all being contemporary, it conveys an impression of toleration we were hardly prepared for after the struggles of the preceding centuries, though it might have been expected three centuries earlier.

A curious result of this toleration or community of feeling is, that the architecture of all the three groups is so similar that, looking to it alone, no one could say to which of the three religions any particular temple belonged. It is only when their sculptures are examined that their original destination becomes apparent, and even then there are anomalies which it is difficult to explain. A portion, for instance, of the sculptures of the principal Saiva temple--the Kandarya Mahadeo--are of a grossly indecent character;[465] the only instance, so far as I know, of anything of the sort being found in a Saiva temple, that bad pre-eminence being reserved to temples belonging to the worshippers of Vishnu. It is possible that it may originally have belonged to the latter sect; but, taking all the circumstances into consideration, this is most unlikely, and the fact must be added to many others to prove how mixed together the various sects were even at that time, and how little antagonistic they then were to each other.

The general character of these temples may be gathered from the annexed representation (Woodcut No. 253) of the principal Saiva temple, the Kandarya Mahadeo. As will be seen from the plan (Woodcut No. 254), it is 109 ft. in length, by 60 ft. in breadth over all, and externally is 116 ft. above the ground, and 88 ft. above its own floor. Its basement, or perpendicular part, is, like all the great temples here, surrounded by three rows of sculptured figures. General Cunningham counted 872 statues on and in this temple, ranging from 2½ ft. to 3 ft. in height, or about half life-size, and they are mixed up with a profusion of vegetable forms and conventional details which defy description. The vimana, or tower, it will be observed, is built up of smaller repetitions of itself, which became at this age one of the favourite modes of decoration, and afterwards an essential feature of the style. Here it is managed with singular grace, giving great variety and play of light and shade, without unnecessarily breaking up the outline. The roof of the porch, as seen in front, is a little confused, but as seen on the flank it rises pleasingly step by step till it abuts against the tower, every part of the internal arrangement being appropriately distinguished on the exterior.

If we compare the design of the Jaina temple (Woodcut No. 136) with that of this building, we cannot but admit that the former is by far the most elegant, but on the other hand the richness and vigour of the Mahadeo temple redeem its want of elegance and fascinates in spite of its somewhat confused outline. The Jaina temple is the legitimate outcrop of the class of temples that originated in the Great Temple at Bhuvaneswar, while the Kandarya Mahadeo exhibits a complete development of that style of decoration which resulted in continued repetition of itself on a smaller scale to make up a complete whole. Both systems have their advantages, but on the whole the simpler seems to be preferable to the more complicated mode of design.

UDAIPUR.

The examples already given will perhaps have sufficed to render the general form of the Indo-Aryan temple familiar to the reader, but as no two are quite like one another, their variety is infinite. There is one form, however, which became very fashionable about the 11th century, and is so characteristic that it deserves to be illustrated. Fortunately a very perfect example exists at a place called Udaipur, near Bhilsa, in the Bhopal territory.

As will be seen from the Woodcut (No. 255) the porch is covered with a low pyramidal roof, placed diagonally on the substructure, and rising in steps, each of which is ornamented with vases or urns of varying shapes. The tower is ornamented by four flat bands, of great beauty and elegance of design, between each of which are thirty-five little repetitions of itself, placed one above the other in five tiers, the whole surmounted by an amalaka, and an urn of very elegant design. As every part of this is carved with great precision and delicacy, and as the whole is quite perfect at the present day, there are few temples of its class which give a better idea of the style than this one. Fortunately, too, its date is perfectly well known. From an inscription copied by Lieutenant Burt, it appears it was erected by a king who was reigning at Malwa, in the year 1060 of our era.[466]

At Kallian, in Bombay harbour, there is a temple called Ambernath, very similar to this, on making drawings and casts from which the Bombay government has lately spent a good deal of money.[467] It is, however, in a very ruinous state, and even when perfect could never have been equal to this one at Udaipur, and to many others on which the money might have been better laid out. In it there is a slab with an inscription, dated in the Saka year 782, or A.D. 860.[468] It is not quite clear, however, whether this inscription belongs to the temple which we now see, or to an earlier one, fragments of which are found built into the vimana of the present one. If the date of the temple is that just quoted, as Dr. Bhau Daji would have us believe, all that can be said is that it is utterly anomalous. If it is in A.D. 1070, as another inscription he quotes found near the place might lead us to infer,[469] it accords with all else we know of the style.

One other illustration must complete what we now have to say regarding these Indo-Aryan temples. It is one of the most modern of the style, having been erected by Meera Baie, the wife of Khumbo Rana of Chittore (A.D. 1418-1468). Khumbo was, as is well known, devoted to the Jaina faith, having erected the temple at Sadri (Woodcut No. 133), and the Pillar of Victory (Woodcut No. 143); yet here we find him and his wife erecting in their capital two temples dedicated to Vishnu. The king’s temple, which is close by, is very much smaller than this one, for which his wife gets credit. In plan, the only peculiarity is that the pradakshina, or procession-path round the cell, is here an open colonnade, with four little pavilions at the four corners, and this is repeated in the portico in the manner shown in the annexed diagram (Woodcut No. 256).

The roof of the portico, in the form of a pyramid, is placed diagonally as at Udaipur, while the tower itself is of so solid and unbroken an outline, that it might at first sight be ascribed to a much earlier date than the 15th century (Woodcut No. 257). When, however, it is closely looked at, we miss the frequent amalaka bands and other ornamental features of earlier times, and the crowning members are more unlike those of ancient temples. The curve, too, of its outline is regular from base to summit, and consequently feebler than that of the older examples; but taking it all in all, it certainly is more like an ancient temple than any other of its age I am acquainted with. It was a revival, the last expiring effort of a style that was dying out, in that form at least.

VISHVESHWAR, BENARES.

If you ask a Brahman of Benares to point out to you the most ancient temple of his city, he inevitably leads you to the Vishveshwar, as not only the most holy, but the oldest of its sacred edifices. Yet it is known, and cannot be disputed, that the temple, as it now stands, was erected from the foundation in the last century, to replace one that had been thrown down and desecrated by the bigot Aurungzebe. This he did in order that he might erect on the most venerated spot of the Hindus his mosque, whose tall minarets still rear their heads in insult over all the Hindu buildings of the city. The strange thing is, that in this assertion the Brahmans are not so very far from representing the true state of the case. There is hardly any great city in Hindustan that can show so few evidences of antiquity as Benares. The Buddhist remains at Sarnath hardly can be said to belong to the city, and even there they are, as above explained, the most modern examples of their class in India. The fact is, that the oldest buildings in the city are the Moslem tombs and buildings about the Bukariya Kund, and they almost certainly belong to the 15th century. Even the temple of Vishveshwar, which Aurungzebe destroyed, was not erected before the reign of his predecessor Akbar. The style is so nearly identical with that of known buildings of his reign, at Muttra and elsewhere, that there can be no doubt on this head. When desecrated it was the principal, and probably the most splendid, edifice of its class in the city. It may be, and probably is true, that the Vedic Brahmans erected their fire altars, and worshipped the sun, and paid adoration to the elements on this spot 4000 years ago. It may be also that the emblem of Siva has attracted admiring crowds to this spot for the last 1000 years; but there is no material evidence that before the time of Akbar (A.D. 1556-1605) any important permanent building was ever erected there to dignify the locality.

The present temple is a double one: two towers or spires almost exactly duplicates of each other. One of these is represented in the preceding woodcut (No. 258), and they are connected by a porch, crowned by a dome borrowed from the Mahomedan style, which, though graceful and pleasing in design, hardly harmonises with the architecture of the rest of the temple. The spires are each 51 ft. in height, and covered with ornament to an extent quite sufficient even in this style. The details too are all elegant, and sharply and cleanly cut, and without any evidence of vulgarity or bad taste; but they are feeble as compared with the more ancient examples, and the forms of the pyramidal parts have lost that expression of power and of constructive propriety which were so evident in the earlier stages of the art. It is, however, curiously characteristic of the style and place, that a building, barely 50 ft. in length, and the same in height, should be the principal temple in the most sacred city of the Hindus, and equally so that one hardly 150 years old should be considered as the most ancient, while it is only that which marks this most holy spot in the religious cosmogony of the Hindus.

TEMPLE OF SCINDIAH’S MOTHER, GUALIOR.

One more example must suffice to explain the ultimate form which the ancient towers of the Orissan temples have reached in the present century. It is just finished, having been erected by the mother of the present reigning Maharajah of Gualior, and to it has been added a tomb or cenotaph either by herself or her son. As will be seen from the woodcut (No. 259) it is elegant, though feeble as compared with ancient examples. The Mahomedan dome appears in the background, and the curved Bengali roof in the pavilion in front. The most striking peculiarity of the style is, that the sikras have nearly lost the graceful curved form, which is the most marked peculiarity of all the ancient examples. As has already been remarked, the straight-lined pyramid first appears in the Takht-i-Suleiman’s temple in Kashmir, where its introduction was probably hastened by the wooden straight-lined roofs of the original native style. It is equally evident, however, in a temple which Cheyt Sing, the Raja of Benares, erected at Ramnugger in the end of the last or beginning of the present century. Since that time the tendency has been more and more in that direction, and if not checked, the probability is that the curve will be entirely lost before the century is out. To an European eye, accustomed only to our straight-lined spires, that may seem hardly a matter for regret; but to any one educated in Eastern forms it can scarcely appear doubtful that these spires will lose half their charm if deprived of the graceful curved outline they have so long retained.

BINDRABUN.

In order not to interrupt the story of the gradual development of the style, the history has been brought down to the present day in as nearly a consecutive manner as possible, thus anticipating the dates of several temples. It seems expedient, however, in any history that this should be done, for few things of its class are more interesting than to trace the progressive changes by which the robust form of the Parasurameswara temple at Bhuvaneswar, or of the great temple there, became changed into the feeble elegance of the Vishveshwar or Gualior temples. The few examples that can be adduced in such a work as this may not suffice to make this so clear to others as it is to myself. With twenty or thirty examples it could be made self-evident, and that may one day be done, and this curious chapter in architectural history be thus added to the established sequences which every true style of art affords. Meanwhile, however, it is necessary to go back a little to mention one or two aberrant types which still are not without interest.

As mentioned above, it does not appear proven that the Moslems did wantonly throw down the temples of the Hindus, except when they wanted the materials for the erection of mosques or other buildings. But, whether this was so or not, it is evident that the first three centuries of Mahomedan rule in India were singularly unfavourable for the development of Hindu art in any part of the country where their rule was firmly established. With the tolerant reign of Akbar, however, a new state of affairs was inaugurated. Not only was he himself entirely devoid of religious bigotry, but most--or at least the most eminent--of his ministers and friends were Hindus, and he lent an attentive ear to the Christian missionaries who frequented his court. But, besides its tolerance, his reign was marked by a degree of prosperity and magnificence till then unknown during that of any other Indian sovereign of his faith. Not only are his own buildings unrivalled in their extent and magnificence, but he encouraged all those around him to follow his example, and found, among others, a most apt imitator in the celebrated Man Singh of Ambêr, afterwards of Jeypore, who reigned A.D. 1592-1615. He erected at Bindrabun a temple, which either he left unfinished at his death, or the sikra of which may have been thrown down by Aurungzebe. It is one of the most interesting and elegant temples in India, and the only one, perhaps, from which an European architect might borrow a few hints.

The temple, as it now stands, consists of a cruciform porch, internally nearly quite perfect, though externally it is not clear how it was intended to be finished (Woodcuts Nos. 260, 261). The cell, too, is perfect internally--used for worship--but the sikra is gone; possibly it may never have been completed. Though not large, its dimensions are respectable, the porch measuring 117 ft. east and west, by 105 ft. north and south, and is covered by a true vault, built with radiating arches--the only instance, except one, known to exist in a Hindu temple in the north of India. Over the four arms of the cross the vault is plain, and only 20 ft. span, but in the centre it expands to 35 ft., and is quite equal in design to the best Gothic vaulting known. It is the external design of this temple, however, which is most remarkable. The angles are accentuated with singular force and decision, and the openings, which are more than sufficient for that climate, are picturesquely arranged and pleasingly divided. It is, however, the combination of vertical with horizontal lines, covering the whole surface, that forms the great merit of the design. This is, indeed, not peculiar to this temple; but at Bhuvaneswar, Hullabîd, and elsewhere, the whole surface is so overloaded with ornament as to verge on bad taste. Here the accentuation is equal, but the surfaces are comparatively plain, and the effect dependent on the elegance of the profile of the mouldings rather than on the extent of the ornamentation. Without elaborate drawings, it would be difficult to convey a correct impression of this; but the annexed view (Woodcut No. 262) of a balcony, with its accompaniments, will suffice to illustrate what is meant. The figures might as well be omitted: being carved where Moslem influences had long been strong, they are the weakest part of the design.

The other vaulted temple, just alluded to, is at Goverdhun, not far off, and built under the same tolerant influence during the reign of Akbar. It is a plain edifice 135 ft. long by 35 ft. in width externally, and both in plan and design singularly like those early Romance churches that are constantly met with in the south of France, belonging to the 11th and 12th centuries. If, indeed, the details are not too closely looked into, it might almost pass muster for an example of Christian art at that age,[470] while except in scale the plan of the porch at Bindrabun bears a most striking resemblance to that of St. Front at Perigeux (Woodcut No. 328, vol. i.). The similarity is accidental, of course; but it is curious that architects so distant in time and place should hit so nearly on the same devices to obtain certain desired effects.

KANTONUGGUR.

In addition to the great Indo-Aryan style of temple-building described above, there are a number of small aberrant types which it might be expedient to describe in a more extensive work; but, except one, none of them seem of sufficient importance to require illustration in a work like the present. The exceptional style is that which grew up in Bengal proper on the relaxation of the Mahomedan severity of religious intolerance, and is practised generally in the province at the present day. It may have existed earlier, but no examples are known, and it is consequently impossible to feel sure about this. Its leading characteristic is the bent cornice, copied from the bambu huts of the natives. To understand this, it may be as well to explain that the roofs of all the huts in Bengal are formed of two rectangular frames of bambus, perfectly flat and rectangular when formed, but when lifted from the ground and fitted to the substructure they are bent so that the elasticity of the bambu, resisting the flexure, keeps all the fastenings in a state of tension, which makes a singularly firm roof out of very frail materials. It is the only instance I know of elasticity being employed in building, but is so singularly successful in attaining the desired end, and is so common, that we can hardly wonder when the Bengalis turned their attention to more permanent modes of building they should have copied this one. It is nearly certain that it was employed for the same purposes before the Mahomedan sovereignty, as it is found in all the mosques at Gaur and Malda; but we do not know of its use in Hindu temples till afterwards, though now it is extremely common all over northern India.

One of the best examples of a temple in this style is that at Kantonuggur, twelve miles from the station at Dinajepore. It was commenced in A.D. 1704 and finished in 1722.[471] As will be seen from the annexed illustration (Woodcut No. 263), it is a nine-towered temple, of considerable dimensions, and of a pleasingly picturesque design. The centre pavilion is square, and, but for its pointed form, shows clearly enough its descent from the Orissan prototypes; the other eight are octagonal, and must, I fancy, be derived from Mahomedan originals. The pointed arches that prevail throughout are certainly borrowed from that style, but the building being in brick their employment was inevitable.

No stone is used in the building, and the whole surface is covered with designs in terra-cotta, partly conventional, and these are frequently repeated, as they may be without offence to taste; but the bulk of them are figure-subjects, which do not ever seem to be repeated, and form a perfect repository of the manners, customs, and costumes of the people of Bengal at the beginning of the last century. In execution they display an immeasurable inferiority to the carvings on the old temples in Orissa or the Mysore, but for general effect of richness and prodigality of labour this temple may fairly be allowed to compete with some of the earlier examples.

There is another and more ornate temple, in the same style, at Gopal Gunge,[472] in the same district, but in infinitely worse taste; and one known as the Black Pagoda, at Calcutta, and many others all through Lower Bengal; but hardly any so well worthy of illustration as this one at Kantonuggur.

AMRITSUR.

One other example may serve for the present to complete what we have at present to say regarding the temples of modern India. This time, however, it is no longer an idol-shrine, but a monotheistic place of prayer, and differs, consequently, most essentially from those we have been describing. The religion of the Sîkhs appears to have been a protest alike against the gross idolatry of the Hindus and the inflexible monotheism of the Moslems. It does not, however, seem that temples or gorgeous ceremonial formed any part of the religious system propounded by its founders. Reading the ‘Granth’ and prayer are what were insisted upon, but even then not necessarily in public. We, in consequence, know nothing of their temples, if they have any; but Runjeet Singh was too emulous of the wealth of his Hindu and Moslem subjects in this respect not to desire to rival their magnificence, and consequently we have the Golden Temple in the Holy Tank at Amritsur--as splendid an example of its class as can be found in India, though neither its outline nor its details can be commended (Woodcut No. 264). It is useful, however, as exemplifying one of the forms which Indian temple-architecture assumed in the 19th century, and where, for the present, we must leave it. The Jains and Hindus may yet do great things in it, if they can escape the influence of European imitation; but now that the sovereignty has passed from the Sîkhs we cannot expect their priests or people to indulge in a magnificence their religion does not countenance or encourage.