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Sion into storeys is observable, and there are no pillars or pilasters anywhere. The porch, on the other hand, “has a conical top with a series of cornices. The rough outline sketch given in p. 348 willillustrate our remarks, Dr. Fergusson points out that the modern temples of Benares (and no Benares temple is over two centuries old) retain, in spite of modifications, the same charac- teristic features as the Vimanas of Orissa built twelve centuries ago.t , * Bhuvanesvara is within one night’s journey from Cuttack, The present writer visited the place eight years ago. ' f It is scarcely necessary to inform our readers that all the facts em- bodied in this chapter are from Dr, Fergusson’s excellent and exhaustive work on the History of Indian and Eastern Architecture. CHAP. VIM] HINDU & JAINA ARCHITECTURE, &C. 347 Several hundreds of temples are said to have been built in Bhuvanesvara, and numerous specimens still remain, and strike the beholder with astonishment. ‘ The most celebrated of them is what is called the a Temple of Bhuvanesvara, and was built between 617 and 657 A.D. The original structure, consisting of the Vim4na and the porch was 160 feet in length ; the Nata Mandir and the Bhoga Mandir having been added in the 12th century. The interior of the Vimana is a square of 66 feet, and the tower rises to 180 feet. The whole edifice is of stone, and the exterior is covered with the most elaborate carving and sculpture work. , Every individual stone has a pattern carved on it, and this wonderful carving is estimated to have cost three times as much as the erection of the building itself. “Most people would be of opinion that a building four’ times as large would produce a greater and more im-_ posing 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 mar- vellously beautiful. * * The sculpture is of a very — high order and great beauty of design.” —Fergusson, Pp. 422. The far famed “ Black Pagoda” of Kanarak, of which the porch alone now remains, is supposed to have been built in 1241 A.D.; but Dr. Fergusson maintains, with | 348 PAURANIK PERIOD. [BOOK v. good reason, that it was built in 850 or 873 A.D. The floor is 40 feet square; the roof slopes inwards till it | a Saas ——— eres a L ul rs ¥ Black Pagoda of Kanarak restored. contracts to about 20 feet where it was ceiled with one flat stone roof supported by wrought-iron beams, 21 or 23 feet long, shewing a knowledge of forging iron which has ‘ WAP, VIL] HINDU & JAINA ARCHITECTURE, &C. 349 een lost to the Hindus:since.. The exterior is carved. _ ‘with infinite beauty and variety on all their twelve ~aces, and the antefixce at the angles and bricks are used with an elegance and judgment—a true Yavana could hardly have surpassed.” Fergusson, p. 428. Next we come to the great temple of Jagann4tha at Puri, built after the Vaishnava faith had supplanted the Saiva religion as the prevailing creed of Orissa. It is not! merely the change in creed, but. the degeneracy in the spirit of Hinduism that.is stamped on this later edifice of 1174 A.D. “It is not, however, only in the detail, but the outline, the proportions, and every ar- rangement of the temple shew that the art in this pro- vince at least had received a fatal downward impetus. from which it never recovered.”-—Fergusson, p. 430. . The Viména of this temple is 85 feet across the centre and rises to a height of 192 feet; with the porch the total length is 155 feet, while with the Nata Mandir and the Bhoga Mandir it is like the Great Temple of Bhu- vanesvara 300 feet in length. The province of Bundelcund is rich in ancient Hindu temples, richer than any other province in Northern India, except Orissa. Khajuraho in Bundelcund boasts of a group of some thirty great temples, nearly all of which belong to the century from 950 to 1050 A.D.; the first century, as our readers will remember, of Raj- put supremacy succeeding to the dark age of political convulsions, An excellent woodcut given in Dr. Fer- 350 PAURANIK PERIOD. {BOOK ¥ . gusson’s work of one of these temples shews the modi: fication which the Orissa style had undergone. The one tall Vimana is surrounded by a number of smaller, Vimanas adjoining to it en all sides. The basement is: high, and is surrounded by three rows of sculptured, figures. General Cunningham counted 872 statues, mixed up with a profusion of vegetable forms and con- ventional details. The height of the temple is 116 feet, 2.é., 88 feet above its floor, and the outward appearance is elaborately ornate and rich, In Bhopal territory there is a perfect example of a temple of the 11th century. It was built by a king of Malwa in 1060 A.D. The Vimana is ornamented by four flat bands of great beauty and elegance, and the Amalaka surmounting it. is also exquisite in design. The carving on the temple is marked throughout by precision and delicacy. — Pass we on to Rajputana. .Among the celebrated ruins of Chittore, we have seen the temples built by the queen of Kumbhu. Kumbhu was a great conqueror, and was a Jaina by faith, and erected the Jaina temple at Sadri and the marble pillar of victory at Chittore. His queen, Meera Bye, seems to have been an orthodox: Hindu, and built two temples (1418-1468 “A. D.) which are now in ruins, and overgrown with trees. The style both of the Vimana and of the porch is, of course, that of the Orissa temples. There is a colonnade round the temple, with four little pavilions CHAP. VIL] HINDU & JAINA ARCHITECTURE, &C. 351 at the four corners, and this is repeated in the por- tico. There are specimens of ancient temples in the Maharashtra country,but neither so rich nor so numerous as in Orissa. The interest of the Mahratta temples consists in the fact that here the Orissa or North Indian style struggles with the Dravidian or South Indian style for supremacy. The Mahrattas are a people of the Dravidian race, but their early contact with the Aryans and assumption of Aryan civilization incline them to adopt the Aryan or North Indian style. Hence, traces of both styles are observable in their struc- tures, While specimens of early temple architecture are, thus numerous in Orissa, in Bundelcund, in Malwa, | in Maharashtra, and in Rajputana,—why are they SO} rare in the very home of the Indo-Aryans,—in thel | basin of the Ganges and the Jumna? The reply is obvious. Temple architecture did not properly com- mence (except in Orissa) as we have seen before, earlier thanthe tenth and eleventh centuries, In the twelfth century the Mahommedans conquered the basin of the Ganges and the Jumna, and not only demolish- ed many of the old existing temples to raise mosques and minars with the stone,.but effectually stopped the further progress of temple architecture. A vigorous progress in arts is not possible when political life is. extinct ; and such feeble attempts as might otherwise 352 . PAURANIK PERIOD. —- [BOOK V, have been witnessed were, probably, stopped by ‘the bigoted conquerors. Hindu independence still lingered in Rajputana, Maharashtra, Malwa, Bundelcund, and Orissa, and hence in those provinces we find older tem- ples left uninjured, and later temples erected. A great temple was built at Vrindavana by Man Sing under the tolerant emperor Akbar ; but it is said the lofty spire of the heathen temple offended the eyes of the very devout Aurungzebe, and the temple was knocked down. Every visitor to Vrindavana has seen what remains of this temple, which has to some extent been restored by the British Government. Temple architecture still adhered, though with considerable modifications, to the old Orissa style, but adopted new designs from the Saracenic style. We see this in the modern temples of Benares, in the temple of Visvesvara for instance. The original Vimana of the Orissa temple is: attenuated, and multiplied so as to form a number of small Vimanas round the central one, and the porch instead of having the conical roof of Orissa has a dome of the: Saracenic style, very elegant, but not in keeping with ‘ the style of the temple. In Bengal a new element of beauty was borrowed from the gracefully bent roofs f the ordinary thatched huts of the people. Temples jbuilt of stone are almost unknown in Bengal, but ibrick temples dedicated to Siva are built with their cornices gracefully bent in imitation of thatched roofs, ‘CHAP, VIII] HINDU & JAINA ARCHITECTURE, &C. 353 ‘and the walls are sometimes covered with elaborate designs in terra-cotta.. The pointed arches ‘in these temples are borrowed from the Saracenic style, and altogether the modern Bengal temples of Siva are about as wide a departure from the original North ‘Indian style as could well be imagined. Jaina architecture in Northern India adopted the Orissa type of Vimana, but in course of time resorted to the graceful Saracenic dome also. The practice of grouping temples is more'largely resorted to by Jainas than by the followers of any other religion. Rich individuals, belonging tothe middle classes, contribute temple after temple from-century to century ; and while each individual temple lacks the grandeur of Hindu temples built by royal command, ‘the ‘collection of temples in course of ‘time converts ‘a ‘hill side or a ~ sacred spot into a “city of temples.” ‘Such are ‘the tempies: of Palitana in Guzrat, some of which are as . old as the 11th century, and the latest of which have been constructed in the present ceritury..