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:—

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.

242. Pillar in Kylas, Ellora.

(From a Drawing by the Author.)