No very precise information is to be had about the date of either, but, in their present form at least, they are not the oldest in the valley. According to Brian Hodgson, there are several low, flat, tumuli-like chaityas, with very moderate tees, which are older, and may be of any age; but, as will be seen from the previous woodcut (No. 170), that at Swayambunath is of an irregular clumsy form, and chiefly remarkable for the exaggerated form of its tee. This is, in fact, the most marked characteristic of the modern Thibetan dagoba, which in China is carried frequently to such an extent that the stupa becomes evanescent, and the tee changes into a nine or thirteen storeyed tower. According to Kirkpatrick (p. 151), “this temple is chiefly celebrated for its perpetual fire, the two principal wicks having preserved their flames from time immemorial.” The continual presence of the fire-altar, in connexion with statues of Buddha in Gandhara, would lead us to suspect a connexion between fire-worship and Buddhism in that province, but hardly so intimate as this would seem to indicate.

In Mr. Hodgson’s collection there are nearly one hundred drawings of chaityas in Nepal, all different, most of them small, and generally highly ornamented; but none of them grand, and none exhibiting that elegance of form or beauty of detail which characterises the buildings of the plains. From a low, flat mound, one-tenth of its diameter in height, they rise to such a tall building as this, which is a common form, bearing the name of Kosthakar (Woodcut No. 171), in which the dagoba is only the crowning ornament, and between these there is every conceivable variety of shape and detail. Among others, there is the four-faced lingam of Siva, with a corresponding emblem with four Buddhas; and altogether such a confusion of the two

religions as to confirm the idea hinted at above, that the lingam is really a diminutive dagoba, and not the emblem it is usually supposed to represent, though, no doubt, in modern times understood to have that meaning.

By far the most characteristic and beautiful temples of the Nepalese are those possessing many storeys divided with sloping roofs. They are unlike anything found in Bengal, and all their affinities seem with those in Burmah or China. Usually, they seem to be dedicated to the Saiva faith, but Mr. Hodgson mentions one at Patan, where “Sakya occupies the basal floor, Amitabha the second storey, a small stone chaitya the third, the Dharmadatu Mandala the fourth; the fifth, or apex of the building, externally consisting of a small churamani, or jewel-headed chaitya.”

One of the most elegant of this class is the Bhowani temple at Bhatgaon, represented in the previous woodcut (No. 172). It is five storeys in height, but stands particularly well on a pyramid of five steps, which gives it a greater dignity than many of its congeners. Another, dedicated to Mahadeo, is seen in the centre of the next woodcut (No. 173). It is only two storeys in height, but has the same characteristic form of roof, which is nearly universal in all buildings, civil or ecclesiastical, which have any pretension to architectural design. The temple on the left of the last cut is dedicated to Krishna, and will be easily recognised by any one familiar with the architecture of the plains from its sikra or spire, with the curvilinear outline, and its clustering pavilions, not arranged quite like the ordinary types, but still so as to be unmistakably Bengali.

One other example must complete our illustration of the architecture of Nepal. It is a doorway leading to the durbar at Bhatgaon, and is a singularly characteristic specimen of the style, but partaking much more of China than of India in the style of its ornaments (Woodcut No. 174, p. 307). It is indeed so like an archway in the Nankau Pass, near Pekin—given further on—that I was at first inclined to ascribe them to the same age. The Chinese example, however, is dated in 1345;[335] this one, according to Mr. Hodgson, was erected as late as 1725, yet their ornamentation is the same. In the centre is Garuda, with a seven-headed snake-hood; and on either hand are Nagas, with seven-headed hoods also; and the general character of the foliaged ornaments is so similar that it is difficult to believe in so great a lapse of time between them; but I dare not question Mr. Hodgson’s evidence. Since he was in Nepal the building on the left-hand side of the cut has been “improved.” His drawings show it to have been one of the most picturesque buildings in the valley. It certainly is not so now.

It may be remembered that in speaking of the architecture of Canara (ante, p. 272), I remarked on the similarity that existed

between that of that remote province and the style that is found in this Himalayan valley; and I do not think that any one can look at the illustrations quoted above, especially Woodcuts Nos. 150 and 153, and not perceive the similarity between them and the Nepalese examples, though it might require a familiarity with all the photographs

to make it evident, without its being pointed out. This being the case, it is curious to find Colonel Kirkpatrick stating, more than seventy years ago, that “it is remarkable enough that the Newar women, like those among the Nairs, may, in fact, have as many husbands as they please, being at liberty to divorce them continually on the slightest pretence.”[336] Dr. Buchanan Hamilton also remarks that “though a small portion of the Newars have forsaken the doctrine of Buddha and adopted the worship of Siva, it is without changing their manners, which are chiefly remarkable for their extraordinary carelessness about the conduct of their women;” and he elsewhere remarks on their promiscuousness and licentiousness.[337] In fact, there are no two tribes in India, except the Nairs and Newars, who are known to have the same strange notions as to female chastity, and that, coupled with the architecture and other peculiarities, seems to point to a similarity of race which is both curious and interesting; but how and when the connexion took place I must leave it to others to determine. I do not think there is anything in the likeness of the names, but I do place faith in the similarity of their architecture combined with that of their manners and customs.

Wooden Temples.

In the Himalayan districts between Kashmir and Nepal, in Kulû, Kangra, and Kumaon, there are a vast number of temples, regarding which it would be extremely interesting to have more information than we now possess. They are all in wood, generally Deodar pine, and, like most buildings in that material, more fantastic in shape, but at the same time more picturesque and more richly carved than buildings in more permanent and more intractable materials. What we now know of them, however, is mainly derived from photographs, taken without any system, only as pictures, because the buildings were either picturesque in themselves or so situated as to improve the landscape. No one yet has thought of measuring them, nor of asking to what divinities they are dedicated, and still less of inquiring into their age or traditions; and till this is done it is impossible to treat of them in anything like a satisfactory manner.

Whenever this chapter of Indian architectural history comes to be written, it will form a curious pendant to that of the wooden architecture of Sweden and Norway, the similarities between the two groups being both striking and instructive. It can hardly be expected that any ethnographical or political connexion can be traced between peoples so remote from one another which could influence their architectural forms; but it is curious, if this is so, to observe how people come independently to adopt the same forms and similar modes of decoration when using the same materials for like purposes, and under similar climatic influences. Although it may, consequently, be impossible to trace any influence that the people of the Himalayas could have exerted on the peoples of the north-west of Europe, it is by no means clear that in these wooden structures we may not find the germ of much that is now perplexing us with regard to the earlier forms of Hindu stone architecture. Like Buddhist architecture, there can hardly be a doubt that much of it was derived from wooden originals, and it is difficult to see any locality where wooden styles were likely to be earlier adopted and longer practised than in those valleys where the Deodar pine is abundant, and forms so excellent and so lasting a building material.

An exploration of these valleys, would, no doubt, bring to light many curious monuments, which would not only be interesting in themselves, but might throw considerable light on many now obscure points of our inquiries. One monument, for instance, has recently been discovered by Major Godwin Austen near the foot of the Naga hills in Assam, which is unlike any other known to exist anywhere else.[338] The temple—if temple it may be called—consists of a long corridor, about 250 ft. in length and 21 ft. wide, the roof of which was supported by pillars richly carved, spaced 15 ft. to 21 ft. apart; but its most remarkable features are two rows—one of sixteen, the other of seventeen monoliths—standing in front of this. The tallest is 15 ft., the smallest 8 ft. 5 in., the general range being from 12 to 13 ft. in height, and 18 ft. to 20 ft. in circumference. No two are exactly alike, though all have a general similarity of design to those represented in the preceding woodcut (No. 175), which may be considered as typical of the style. Another similar monolith was found a small distance off, measuring 16 ft. 8 in. in height, and 23 ft. in circumference.

The natives were quite unable to give any account of these curious monuments, nor is it easy to guess why they were placed where they are. So far as I know, no similar monument exists anywhere, for the pillars seem perfectly useless, though attached to two rows of stones that may have borne a roof; otherwise they look like those rows of rude stone monuments which we are familiar with in this country and in Brittany, but which a more artistic people may have adorned with rude carvings, instead of leaving them quite plain, as our forefathers did. As for their carving, the only things the least like them, so far as I know, in India, are the pillars in the temple at Moodbidri (Woodcut No. 152), and in other places in Canara, but there the pillars are actual supports of roofs; these are round-headed, and evidently never were intended for any utilitarian purpose.

Judging from the gateway and other remains of the town of Dimapur, in which these pillars are found, they cannot be of any great age. The gateway is of the Gaur type, with a pointed arch, probably of the 16th or 17th century; and, if Major Austen’s observation is correct, that the sandstone of which they are composed is of a friable and perishable nature, they cannot be of any remote antiquity.

It would be very interesting if a few more similar monuments could be found, and Assam is one of the most promising fields in India for such discoveries. When Hiouen Thsang visited it, in the 7th century, it was known as the kingdom of Kamrup, one of the three principal states of Northern India, and continued populous and important till the Pathan sovereigns of Delhi attempted its conquest in the 15th century. Owing to the physical difficulties of the country, they never were able to succeed in this attempt; but they blockaded the country for many years, and, cut off from the rest of the world, the savage hill tribes on either hand, aided by famine, so depopulated the country that the jungle overpowered the feeble remnant that survived, and one of the richest valleys in the world is now one of the most sparsely inhabited. A good and liberal government might, in a few years, go far to remedy this state of affairs, and, if so blessed, the jungle might again be cleared and rendered fit for human population. When this is done there can be no doubt but that the remains of many ancient cities will be found. Already Captain Dalton has given an account of the ruins of Gohati, which was almost certainly the ancient capital of the province. “Its former importance,” the Commissioner says, “is well attested by the immense extent of its fortifications, and the profusion of carved stones which every excavation of the modern town brings to light. The remains of stone gateways and old stone bridges are found both within and without the old city walls.”[339] Captain Hannay gives a view of one of these bridges. Like all the rest, it is constructed without arches, on the horizontal principle,[340] but it may be as old as the time of the Chinese Pilgrims. Besides these, other ruins have been found and described, in more or less detail, in the pages of the ‘Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal.’ When more fully known they will certainly be of considerable historic and ethnographic value, though they hardly can compare with the vast monuments of such provinces as Orissa or Gujerat, and other parts of India Proper.

Thibet.

It would be extremely interesting if, before leaving this part of the world, it were possible to compile anything like a satisfactory account of the Buddhist style in Thibet, for it is there that Buddhism exists in its greatest purity at the present moment, and there only is it entirely and essentially a part of the system of the people. We would gladly, therefore, compare the existing state of things in Thibet with our accounts of India in the days of the supremacy of the same religion. The jealousy of the Chinese, however, who are now supreme over that nation of priests, prevents free access to the country, and those who have penetrated beyond its forbidden barriers have either done so in the disguise of mendicants, and, consequently, dared neither to draw nor examine minutely what they saw, or else had little taste for portraying what was unintelligible, and, consequently, of very little interest to them.[341]

So far as can be made out from such narratives as we have, there does not seem to be in Thibet a single relic-shrine remarkable either for sanctity or size, nor does relic-worship seem to be expressed either in their architecture or their religious forms. But as no country in the world possesses a larger body of priests in proportion to its population, and as all these are vowed to celibacy and live together, their monasteries are more extensive than any we know of elsewhere—some containing 2000 or 3000 lamas, some, if we may trust M. Huc, as many as 15,000.[342] The monasteries do not seem to be built with any regularity, or to be grouped into combinations of any architectural pretension, but to consist of long streets of cells, mostly surrounding small courtyards, three or four on each side, and sometimes two or even three storeys high; generally, perhaps always, with a small shrine or altar in the centre. The monastery of Bouddha La, outside the city of Lassa, where the Delai Lama resides, seems to be of more magnificence than all the rest—the centre being occupied by a building four storeys high, crowned by a dome (making the fifth) covered entirely with sheets of gold (rather, perhaps, merely gilt), and surrounded by a peristyle of columns, which are gilt also. Around this central palace are grouped a number of smaller ones, where the inferior members of this great ecclesiastical order reside; but of all this it is difficult to form a distinct idea without some better drawings than the native ones, which are at present alone available.

The Delai Lama, who resides in this palace, is believed by the Thibetans to be the living incarnation of the Deity, and, in consequence, is the principal, if not the only, object of worship in Lassa. There are, however, four or five subordinate incarnations in different parts of Thibet and Mongolia, who, though inferior to this one, are still objects of worship in the places where they reside, and by particular sects of Buddhists.

It is this worship of a living rather than of a dead deity that seems to be the principal cause of the difference of the architectural forms of India and Thibet. In the countries we have hitherto been describing no actual incarnation of the Deity is believed to have taken place since the death of Sakya Muni, though the spirit of God has descended on many saints and holy men; in India, therefore, they have been content to worship images of the departed deity, or relics which recall His presence. In Thibet, where their deity is still present among them, continually transmigrating, but never dying, of course such a form of worship would be absurd; no relic of a still living god can exist, nor is the semblance or the memory of any past manifestation thought worth preserving. A priori, therefore, we should scarcely look here for the same class of sacred edifices as we find in India or Ceylon.

Owing to the jealousy with which the country is guarded against the intrusion of Europeans, we may probably have to wait some time before Thibet itself, or even the valleys dependent upon it in the Himalayas, are so accessible to European travellers as to enable them to supply the data requisite for the purpose. In the meanwhile, however, the view (Woodcut No. 176) of the doorway of the temple at Tassiding is curious as showing a perseverance in the employment of sloping jambs, which we do not meet with in the plains. It will be recollected that this feature is nearly universal in the Behar and early western caves (Woodcuts Nos. 43, 45, and 50), but there we lose it. It may have continued to be commonly employed during the Middle Ages, though the examples have perished; but it is curious to find it cropping up here again after a lapse of 2000 years.[343]

Another view in the porch of the temple at Pemiongchi is also interesting, as showing the form of roof which we are familiar with in the rock examples, and also as illustrating the extent to which the bracket capital of India may be carried under the influence of wooden architecture (Woodcut No. 177). It hardly seems doubtful that the idea was originally derived from wooden construction, but was equally appropriate to masonic forms, and is used in masonry so judiciously by Indian architects that we lose sight of its origin in most instances altogether.

Interesting as these minor styles undoubtedly are from their variety, and valuable though they may be for the hints they afford us in understanding the history of the other styles, they never can be so important as the greater architectural groups that are found on the plains of India itself. A monograph of the styles of Kashmir or Nepal, or of the intermediate valleys, would be an invaluable addition to our knowledge; but hardly more is required in a general history than that their places should be indicated, and their general characteristics so defined as to render them recognisable. Even these minor styles, however, will become more intelligible when studied in connexion with the Dravidian and northern styles, which are those it is next proposed to define and describe.

Temples at Kangra.

Though a little out of their place in the series, there are two small temples in one of the Himalayan valleys which it may be expedient to describe here before leaving this part of the subject, as their peculiarities will assist us in understanding much that has just been said, or that will be presently advanced. Besides this, they do not exactly fit into any other series, but they can hardly be passed over, as they possess what is so rare in Indian temples—a well-ascertained date.

The temples are situated in the village of Kiragrama, not far from Kote Kangra, and, as an inscription on them records, were built by two brothers, Baijnath and Siddhnath, in the year 804 A.D.[344] Neither of them are large. The larger has a porch 20 ft. square inside by 28 ft. (not 48 ft.) over all externally, and the whole length of the temple, from front to rear, is 50 ft. The smaller one is only 33 ft. over all, including the sanctuary. In 1786, the large temple underwent a thorough repair at the hands of a Raja Sinsarchand, which has obliterated many of its features; but it is easy to see at a glance what was done in the beginning of the 9th century, and what 1000 years afterwards. The small temple, though ruinous, is more interesting, because it has escaped the hand of the spoiler. As will be seen from the woodcut (No. 178), it has all the features of a very old temple—great simplicity of outline, no repetitions of itself, and the whole surface of the upper part covered with that peculiar horseshoe diaper which was so fashionable in those early days. It looks here as if it must be copied from some brick or terra-cotta construction; otherwise its repetition over a whole surface seems unaccountable. The amalaka stringcourses are subdued and in good taste, and the crowning ornament well proportioned.[345]

There is little doubt that the sikra of the larger temple was similarly adorned, but all its details are so completely obliterated by the coating of plaster it has received that it has lost its interest. The pillars, however, of its porch retain their forms up to their capitals, at least. The architraves, as may be seen from the woodcut, belong to the repair in 1786. The shafts of the pillars are plain cylinders, of very classical proportions, and the bases also show that they are only slightly removed from classical design. The square plinth, the two toruses, the cavetto, or hollow moulding between, are all classical, but partially hidden by Hindu ornamentation, of great elegance, but unlike anything found afterwards. The capitals are, however, the most interesting parts, though their details are considerably obliterated by whitewash. They belong to what may be styled the Hindu-Corinthian order, though the principles on which

they are designed is diametrically opposed to those of the classical order of the same name. The object of both—as is well-known—is to convert a circular shaft into a square architrave-bearing capital in a graceful and pleasing manner. We all know the manner in which the Ionic and Corinthian capitals effect this; pleasingly, it is true, but not without effort and some little clumsiness, which it required all the skill and taste of classical architects to conquer. To effect this object, the Hindus placed a vase on the top of their column, the bowl of which was about the same diameter as that of the pillar on which it was placed, or rather larger; but such an arrangement was weak, because the neck and base of the vase were necessarily smaller than the shaft of the pillar, and both were still circular. To remedy these defects, they designed a very beautiful class of foliaged ornament, which appears to grow out of the vase, on each of its four faces, and, falling downwards, strengthens the hollows of the neck and leg of the vase, so as to give them all the strength they require, and at the same time to convert the circular form of the shaft into the required square for the abacus of the capital. The Hindus, of course, never had sufficient ability or constructive skill to enable them to produce so perfect a form as the Corinthian or Ionic capitals of the Greeks or Romans; but it is probable that if this form were taken up at the present day, a capital as beautiful as either of these might even now be produced. It is, indeed, almost the only suggestion that Indian architecture seems to offer for European use.

It is by no means clear when this form of capital was first introduced. It first appears, but timidly it must be confessed, in such late Buddhist caves as were excavated after the beginning of the 5th century:—as, for instance, in the Yadnya Sri cave at Nassick (Woodcut No. 81); in the courtyard of the Viswakarma, at Ellora (Woodcut No. 63); and in some of the later caves at Ajunta—the twenty-fourth for instance. It is found at Erun (Woodcut No. 179), among some fragments that I believe to be of the age of the Guptas, about A.D. 400, and it is currently employed in the middle group of Hindu caves at Ellora, such as the Ashes of Ravana, and other caves of that age, say about A.D. 600. It afterwards became frequent, almost universal, with the Jains, down to the time of the Mahomedan conquest. The preceding representation of one (Woodcut No. 180), from a half column of a temple in Orissa, shows it in a skeleton form, and therefore more suited to explain its construction than a fuller capital would do. On its introduction, the bell-shaped or Persepolitan capital seems to have gone out of fashion, and does not again appear in Indian art.

To return from this digression: there can be no doubt that the temple of Baijnath is dedicated to Siva, not only from the presence of the bulls in front of it, in pavilions of the same architecture as the porch, but also because Ganesa appears among its integral sculptures; yet, strange to say, the back niche, is occupied by a statue of Mahavira, the last Jaina Tirthankar, with a perfectly legible inscription, dated in A.D. 1240.[346] It looks as if the age of toleration had not passed even them.

BOOK IV.

DRAVIDIAN STYLE.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY.

The limits within which the Dravidian style of architecture prevailed in India are not difficult to define or understand. Practically they are those of the Madras Presidency, or, to speak more correctly, they are identical with the spread of the people speaking Tamil, or any of the cognate tongues. Dr. Caldwell, in his ‘Grammar,’ estimates these at forty-five or forty-six millions,[347] but he includes among them a number of tribes, such as the Tudas and Gonds, who, it is true, speak dialects closely allied to the Tamil tongues, but who may have learnt them from the superior races, in the same manner that all the nations of the south-west of Europe learnt to speak Latin from the Romans; or as the Cornish men have adopted English, and the Irish and northern Scots are substituting that tongue for their native Gaelic dialects. Unless we know their history, language is only a poor test of race, and in this instance architecture does not come to our aid. It may do so hereafter, but in so far as we at present know, these tribes are in too rude a state to have any architecture of their own in a sufficiently advanced state for our purposes. Putting them aside, therefore, for the present, we still have, according to the last census, some thirty millions of people speaking Tamil, Telugu, Canarese, and Malayalam, whom we have no reason for doubting are practically of the same race, and who, in so far as they are Hindus—not Jains, but followers of Siva and Vishnu—practise one style of architecture, and that known as the Dravidian. On the east coast the boundaries of the style extend as far north as the mouth of the Kistnah, and it penetrates sporadically and irregularly into the Nizam’s territories, but we cannot yet say to what extent, nor within what limits.

On the west coast its natural boundary northwards is the Kistnah, but it did at one time (A.D. 700?) reach as far as Ellora, in latitude 20°; but it seems to have been a spasmodic effort, and it took no permanent root there, while the reflex wave brought the northern styles into the Mysore or other southern countries, where their presence was as little to be expected as that of the Dravidian so far north.

Although considerable progress has lately been made in the right direction, no satisfactory solution has yet been arrived at of the problem of the origin of the Dravidians. The usual theory is that, coming from the westward, they crossed the Lower Indus, passed through Scinde and Gujerat, and, keeping to the right, sought the localities in which we now find them; or rather, that they were pushed into that corner, first by the Aryans, who almost certainly crossed the Upper Indus, and passed through the Punjab into the valley of the Ganges, and afterwards by the Rajputs, who followed nearly in their footsteps.

In favour of this view is the fact first pointed out by Dr. Caldwell,[348] that the Brahuis in Belochistan speak a Dravidian tongue, and may consequently be considered as a fragment of the race dropped there in transitu. But against this view it may be urged that between the Brahuis and the northern Tamils we have a tract of civilized country extending over 1000 miles in which we have no evidence of the passage of the Dravidians, and where it is nearly certain, if it were a national migration, we should find their traces.

So far as history is concerned, in such glimmerings of tradition as we possess, they certainly do not favour this view of matters. Not only to they fail to afford us any trace of such a migration or conquest, but at the earliest time at which we find any mention of them the most civilized and important of their communities occupied the extreme southern point of the peninsula.[349] North of them all was forest, but between the Christian Era and the Mahomedan invasion we find the jungle gradually disappearing, and the southern races pushing northwards, till, in the 14th century, they were checked and driven back by the Moslems. But for their interference it looks as if, at that time, the Dravidians might eventually have driven the Aryans through the Himalayas back to their original seats, as the Maharattas, who are half Dravidians, nearly did at a subsequent period.

If any clear or direct relationship could be discovered between the Tamil and the Median or Accadian languages of Turanian origin, which the decipherment of arrow-headed inscriptions is revealing to us, it might help a good deal in explaining the original introduction of the Dravidians into India, and the numerous Assyrianisms that exist in the mythology and architecture of southern India. Till, however, more progress is made in that direction, it seems it would be more expedient for the present to assume that the Tamil-speaking races are practically aboriginal, and that the evidences of connexion between them and Babylonia are due to continued and close commercial intercourse between the Persian Gulf and the Malabar coast. That such did exist from very remote ages we may feel certain, and its extent seems such as to justify and explain any similarities that are now found existing in southern India.

Be all this as it may, as far back as their traditions reach, we find the Dravida Desa, or southern part of India, divided into three kingdoms or states, the Pandyas, the Cholas, and the Cheras, forming a little triarchy of powers, neither interfered with by the other nations of the earth, nor interfering with those beyond their limits. During the greater part of their existence all their relations of war and peace have been among themselves, and they have grown up a separate people, as unlike the rest of the world as can well be conceived.

Of the three, the most southern was called the Pandyan kingdom; it was the earliest civilized, and seems to have attained sufficient importance about the time of the Christian Era to have attracted the special attention of the Greek and Roman geographers. How much earlier it became a state, or had a regular succession of rulers, we know not,[350] but it seems certainly to have attained to some consistency as early as five or six centuries before the Christian Era, and maintained itself within its original boundaries till in the middle of the last century, when it was swallowed up in our all-devouring aggression.

During this long period the Pandyas had several epochs of great brilliancy and power, followed by long intervening periods of depression and obscurity. The 1st century, and afterwards the 5th or 6th, seem to have been those in which they especially distinguished themselves. If buildings of either of these epochs still exist, which is by no means improbable, they are utterly unknown to us as yet, nor have we any knowledge of buildings of the intervening periods down to the reign of Tirumulla Nayak, A.D. 1624. This prince adorned the capital city of Mádura with many splendid edifices, some of which have been drawn by Daniell and others. What more ancient remains there may be will not be known till the place has been carefully and scientifically explored.

The Chola kingdom extended northwards from the valley of the Cauvery and Coleroon rivers, whose banks seem always to have been its principal seat, nearly to Madras, all along the eastern coast, called after them Cholomandalam or Coromandel. The date of the origin of their kingdom is not known, but their political relations with Kashmir can be traced as early as the 6th century, and probably earlier.[351] Their epoch of greatest glory, however, was between the 10th and 12th centuries, when they seem to have conquered not only their neighbours the Pandyas and Cheras, but even to have surpassed the bounds of the triarchy, and carried their arms into Ceylon, and to have maintained an equal struggle with the Chalukyas in the north. After this period they had no great revival like that of the Pandyas under Tirumulla Nayak, but sank step by step under the Mahomedans, Mahrattas, and English, to their present state of utter political annihilation.

The Cheras occupied the country northward of the kingdom of Pandya, and westward of Chola, including a considerable part of what is now known as Mysore. Their rise according to their own annals took place nearly at the time of the Christian Era, but this most probably is an exaggeration; but there are inscriptions which prove that they were powerful in the 4th and 5th centuries. From this time they seem gradually to have extended their conquest northwards. Their sixteenth king boasts of having conquered Andhra and Kalinga,[352] and their twentieth king, Kongani Raya III., boasts of having conquered Chola, Pandya, Dravida, Andhra, Kalinga, Varada, and Maharastra desas as far as the Nerbudda river.[353] According to the dates in the Kongadesa Rajakal, this must have taken place in the 7th century, but from what we know of history, it could not have taken place till after the overthrow of the Chalukyan dynasty, and consequently hardly before 750. That a southern conquest did take place about that time seems almost certain from the eclipse of the Chalukyas between 750 and 1000,[354] and from the excavation of the Kylas and other temples of Dravidian architecture at Ellora about that time, and there seems no race but the Cheras who could have effected this.

Vira Chola (A.D. 927-977) seems first to have checked their victorious career, and Ari Vara Deva, another Chola king (1004), to have completed their destruction. He also boasts of having carried his victorious standard to the Nerbudda, and to have been a benefactor to Chillambaram, the then famed temple of his race.

This was the last great effort of the early triarchy; after this the rise of the Bellalas in Mysore, and the revival of the Chalukyas in central India, seem to have checked them to such an extent, that they never regained a perfect independence, though at times wealthy and powerful and capable of embarking in the most splendid architectural undertakings.[355]

Although, politically, these three states always remained distinct, and generally antagonistic, the people belonged to the same race. Their architecture is different from any other found in India, but united in itself, and has gone through a process of gradual change from the earliest times at which we become acquainted with it, until we lose sight of it altogether in the last century. This change is invariably for the worse, the earlier specimens being in all instances the most perfect, and the degree of degradation forming, as mentioned above, a tolerably exact chronometric scale, by which we may measure the age of the buildings.

Buddhism, as before hinted, does not seem to have ever gained a footing of much importance among any of the Dravidian races of India, and as early as the 7th century the few votaries of Buddha that existed in the south of India were finally expelled.[356] So completely was it extirpated that I do not know of one single Buddhist monument south of the Kistnah, except the tope at Amravati described above, and am inclined very much to doubt if any really important ones ever existed.

The Jaina religion, on the contrary, continued to nourish at Conjeveram and in the Mysore, and seems to have succeeded Buddhism in these places, and to have attracted to itself whatever tendency there may have been towards the doctrines of Buddhism on the part of the southern people. Though influential from their intelligence, the Jains never formed more than a small numerical fraction of the people among whom they were located.

The Hindu religion, which thus became supreme, is now commonly designated the Brahmanical, in order to distinguish it from the earlier Vedic religion, which, however, never seems to have been known in the south. The two sects into which it is divided consist of the worshippers of Siva and of Vishnu, and are now quite distinct and almost antagonistic; but both are now so overloaded with absurd fables and monstrous superstitions, that it is very difficult to ascertain what they really are or ever were. Nor are we yet in a position to speak confidently of their origin.

Recent discoveries in Assyria seem, however, to point to that country as the origin of much that we find underlying the local colouring of the Vaishnava faith. Garuda, the eagle-headed Vahana, and companion of Vishnu, seems identical with the figure now so familiar to us in Assyrian sculpture, probably representing Ormazd. The fish-god of the Assyrians, Dagon, prefigures the “Fish-Avatar,” or incarnation of Vishnu. The man-lion is not more familiar to us in Assyria than in India, and tradition generally points to the West for the other figures scarcely so easily recognised—more especially Bali, whose name alone is an index to his origin; and Maha Assura, who, by a singular inversion, is a man with a bull’s head,[357] instead of a bull with a man’s head, as he is always figured in his native land. It is worthy of remark that the ninth Avatar of Vishnu is always Buddha himself, thus pointing to a connexion between these two extremes of Indian faith; and we are told by inscriptions of the 14th century that there was then no appreciable difference between the Jains and Vaishnavas.[358] Indeed, as pointed out in the introduction, it seems impossible to avoid considering these three faiths as three stages of one superstition of a native race—Buddhism being the oldest and purest; Jainism a faith of similar origin, but overlaid with local superstitions; and Vishnuism a third form, suited to the capacity of the natives of India in modern times, and to compete with the fashionable worship of Siva.

Both these religions have borrowed an immense amount of nomenclature from the more abstract religions of the Aryan races, and both profess to venerate the Vedas and other scriptures in the Sanscrit language. Indeed it is all but impossible that the intellectual superiority of that race should not make itself felt on the inferior tribes, but it is most important always to bear in mind that the Sanscrit-speaking Aryan was a stranger in India. It cannot indeed be too often repeated that all that is intellectually great in that country—all, indeed, which is written—belongs to them; but all that is built—all, indeed, which is artistic—belongs to other races, who were either aboriginal or immigrated into India at earlier or subsequent periods, and from other sources than those which supplied the Aryan stock.

There does not seem to be any essential difference either in plan or form between the Saiva and Vaishnava temples in the south of India. It is only by observing the images or emblems worshipped, or by reading the stories represented in the numerous sculptures with which a temple is adorned, that we find out the god to whom it is dedicated. Whoever he may be, the temples consist almost invariably of the four following parts, arranged in various manners, as afterwards to be explained, but differing in themselves only according to the age in which they were executed:—

1. The principal part, the actual temple itself, is called the Vimana. It is always square in plan, and surmounted by a pyramidal roof of one or more storeys; it contains the cell in which the image of the god or his emblem is placed.

2. The porches or Mantapas, which always cover and precede the door leading to the cell.

3. Gate pyramids, Gopuras, which are the principal features in the quadrangular enclosures which always surround the Vimanas.

4. Pillared halls or Choultries, used for various purposes, and which are the invariable accompaniments of these temples.

Besides these, a temple always contains tanks or wells for water—to be used either for sacred purposes or the convenience of the priests,—- dwellings for all the various grades of the priesthood attached to it, and numerous other buildings designed for state or convenience.

CHAPTER II.

DRAVIDIAN ROCK-CUT TEMPLES.

Although it may not be possible to point out the origin of the Dravidian style, and trace its early history with the same precision as we can that of Buddhist architecture, there is nothing so mysterious about it, as there is regarding the styles of northern India, nor does it burst on us full blown at once as is the case with the architecture of the Chalukyas. Hitherto, the great difficulty in the case has been, that all the temples of southern India have been found to be of so modern a date. The great building age there was the 16th and 17th centuries of our era. Some structural buildings, it is true, could be traced back to the 12th or 13th with certainty, but beyond that all was to a great extent conjecture; and if it were not for rock-cut examples, we could hardly go back much further with anything like certainty. Recent investigations, however, combined with improved knowledge and greater familiarity with the subject, have now altered this state of affairs to a great extent. It seems hardly doubtful now that the Kylas at Ellora, and the great temples at Purudkul (Pattadkul), are anterior to the 10th century.[359] It may, in fact, be that they date from the 8th or 9th, and if I am not very much mistaken the “raths,” as they are called, at Mahavellipore are as early, if not indeed earlier, than the 5th or 6th, and are in reality the oldest examples of their class known, and the prototypes of the style.

One circumstance which has prevented the age of the Mahavellipore raths being before detected is, that being all cut in granite and in single blocks, they show no sign of wearing or decay, which is so frequently a test of age in structural buildings, and being all in the same material produces a family likeness among them, which makes it at first sight difficult to discriminate between what is old and what new. More than this, they all possess the curious peculiarity of being unfinished, whether standing free, as the raths, or cut in the rock, as caves, or on its face, as the great bas-relief; they are all left with one-third or one-fourth merely blocked out, and in some instances with the intention merely indicated. It looks as if the workmen had been suddenly called off while the whole was in progress, and native traditions, which always are framed to account for what is otherwise most unintelligible, have seized on this peculiarity, and make it the prominent feature in their myths. Add to this that it is only now we are acquiring that knowledge of the subject and familiarity with its details, which will enable us to check the vagaries of Indian speculation. From all these causes it is not difficult to understand how easily mistakes might be made in treating of such mysterious objects.

If we do not know all we would wish about the antiquities of Mahavellipore, it is not because attempts have not been made to supply the information. Situated on an open sea-beach, within one night’s easy dâk from Madras, it has been more visited and oftener described than any other place in India. The first volume of the ‘Asiatic Researches’ (1788) contained an exhaustive paper on them by W. Chambers. This was followed in the fifth (1798) by another by Mr. Goldingham. In the second volume of the ‘Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society’ there appeared what was then considered a most successful attempt to decipher the inscriptions there, by Dr. Guy Babington, accompanied by views of most of the sculptures. The ‘Madras Journal,’ in 1844, contained a guide to the place by Lieutenant Braddock, with notes by the Rev. W. Taylor and Sir Walter Elliot; and almost every journal of every traveller in these parts contains some hint regarding them, or some attempt to describe and explain their peculiarities or beauties. Most of these were collected in a volume in 1869 by a Lieutenant Carr, and published at the expense of the Madras Government, but unfortunately the editor selected had no general knowledge of the subject, nor had he apparently any local familiarity with the place. His work in consequence adds little to our previous stores.

In addition to all this, Colonel Mackenzie undertook to illustrate the place, and employed his staff to make detailed drawings of all the sculptures and architectural details, and a volume containing thirty-seven drawings of the place is in his collection in the India Office, and Daniell has also published some faithful representations of the place. Quite recently it has been surveyed by the revenue surveyors, and photographed by Dr. Hunter, Captain Lyon, and others, so that the materials seem ample; but the fact is, they have been collected at such distant times, and by individuals differing so essentially in capability or instruction, that it is almost impossible, except on the spot, to co-ordinate the whole. Any accomplished architect or archæologist could do it easily in a month, and tell us the whole story. Meanwhile, however, the main features seem tolerably distinct, and ascertained within limits sufficient for our present purposes.

The oldest and most interesting group of monuments at Mahavellipore, are the so-called five raths or monolithic temples standing on the sea-shore—one of these, that with the apsidal termination in the centre of the annexed woodcut (No. 181), stands a little detached from the rest. The other four stand in a line north and south, and look as if they had been carved out of a single stone or rock, which originally, if that were so, must have been between 85 ft. and 40 ft. high at its southern end, sinking to half that height at its northern extremity, and its width diminishing in a like proportion.

The first on the north is a mere Pansala or cell 11 ft. square externally, and 16 ft. high. It is the only one too that seems finished or nearly so, but it has no throne or image internally from which we might guess its destination.