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Mr. Gwilt quotes Pliny as asserting that the Egyptians from time
immemorial dwelt in caves. He holds that Egyptian architecture sprang
from cave temples.
"Everything points to its origin; its simplicity, not to say
monotony; its solidity, almost heaviness, form its principal
characteristics. Then the want of profile and the paucity of members,
the small projection of its mouldings, the absence of apertures, the
enormous diameter of the columns employed, much resembling the pillars
left in quarrying for supports, the pyramidal form of the doors, the
omission of roofs and pediments, the ignorance of the arch, all enable
us to recur to the type from which we have set out." He adds that
"all the upper parts are constructed without reference to
anything but stone work."
It seems to me that from these two writers we get a right idea of
the rise of Indian architecture. Bala or S’iva at the date of the
Rig Veda lived in his cave, like the modern Aghora. By-and-by he made
it into a temple by judicious enlargement and decoration. Then he
began to ornament and shape the mountain outside. Finally, he detached
it and formed the large pyramidal Ratha of Mahâbalipur.
Has not early Indian architecture all the characteristics detailed
by Mr. Gwilt, simplicity, monotony, heaviness, want of profile, small
projection of mouldings? From base to the very summit it is decorated
with stone carvings of the pattern that we might call Chinese
card-case ornamentation, a speciality learned probably in a cave
temple, where from want of height the ornament was never very far from
the observer's eye. And we all know that early Indian columns are
usually enormous at top and slender below, a topsy-turvy feature also
learned in a cave temple.
Râm Râz shows that when the Hindus began to build temples out in
the open, each temple consisted of two parts:—
(1) Of a magnificent pyramidal structure which seemed on the
surface to have no religious functions at all. It was called a "Gopura."
Râm Râz calls these gopuras "towers over the gateways of
temples." He does not seem to know of any uses which we would
call distinctly religious.
(2) A very much smaller and very much less pretentious building was
erected for sacrifices, rites, etc., in old as well as modern times.
This was called the "Vimâna."
Do the titles of these structures throw any light on their origin?
Gopura, the "City of the Bull." S’iva is the great
Bull—and his "City" would be the same as the "Kailas"
of Elora. It would be the Paradise of his followers. The pyramid is
one of his special symbols.
Vimâna. This word is applied to the moveable pavilion of drapery
and boards and tinsel which bears a special god in the processions.
The god of a Vimâna would plainly be much lower in rank and
importance than the Supreme God of the Gopura.
 Can
we draw up the evolution of the Gopura?
The Aghora dwelt in a natural cavern. But this by-and-by changed
into a temple, and when a rude observatory was required, to regulate
agriculture by the stars, the outside would be roughly raised up by
piling up stones; and a rude pyramid would be the convenient form.
Numbers of little yogi-cells are to be seen all over India of this
fashion; and the Egyptian pyramid was evolved somewhat in the same
way.
But as time advanced, and rock chiselling had became an important
operation inside the temple, a bold thought came to the temple
producer. Instead of piling up a few rough stones to make a rude
pyramid, why not remove with a chisel the stone masses from the top?
Why not change a mountain into a Gopura?
But a second peculiarity, difficult at first to understand, is that
this Gopura is often found without any subordinate buildings near it;
the ornamental and apparently useless part of the Temple alone is set
up.
We must remember that in the old days in India the favourite form
of religious expression was the pilgrimage. In the great epic, the Mahâbhârata,
there is no mention of temples. A sage says to Arjuna: "It is the
greatest mystery of the Rishis, O excellent son of Bharata. The holy
pilgrimage to the Tîrthas is more important than sacrifices to the
gods." The Tîrtha was the sacred *
tank so necessary in pilgrimages.
Now this passage explains the solitary rock-detached pyramid, which
viewed by Mr. Fergusson's theories is quite inexplicable. Pilgrimages
meant money, and it came into the head of one set of priests to
produce an unexampled "Home of S’iva." They executed a
pyramid of solid stone, ornamented as richly as the temple interiors;
and produced it practically in the open. Round this could be set a
tank, and the ordinary fripperies of the pilgrimages and processions.
A pilgrimage to such a building would eclipse all rivals, like the Kaâba
in the religion of Mahomet, which is also called the "Home of
God."
Thus with a chisel was evolved the Gopura; and stone Vimânas were
by and by added.
In the year 1772, a gentleman named Chambers went from Madras to
examine some ruins at no great distance off; "ruins," he
says, "hitherto little observed." They were on the sea; and
as he approached a fine pyramid broke the sky line, a lofty pile used
as "a guide to mariners." *
By the pyramid were four other temples, all rock detached and
ornamented with sculptures, but the pyramid was much higher than
these. The place was called Mahvellipuram, the Tamulian for Mahâbalipur,
its old Sanskrit name, the second language having no h in it and using
v for b. Now the word Mahâbalipur is practically the same word as
describes the Gopura, S’iva's pyramid, the "City of S’iva,"
the "City of the Bull." And the stone temples were called
"Rathas," which is a synonym for the word "Vimâna."
Each describes the carriage made of drapery and wood of a god at the
festivals.
The City of Mahâbalipur was an amazing sight. The waves were
gradually eating it up. Mr. Chambers saw a fine temple half demolished
by the sea; and other buildings that no traveller now can see. The
natives told him that not long before the glitter of the metal on the
spires of temples could be seen a long way from the shore. They told
him also that this city was once the most famous city of the East,
that some strange cataclysm had visited it. He was also told that it
had had from the most ancient days another name, the "Seven
Pagodas," which fact induced Mr. Chambers to come to the
conclusion that the Rathas had once been
seven, and that two of them had been demolished by the advancing tide.
Mahâbalipur is the famous Maliarpha of Ptolemy. Whether it had
anything to do with the "Sheba," or "Tarshish," or
"Pout," of the Egyptians and Jews we have not space to
inquire.
And now what is the date of this Gopura pyramid? Perhaps Mr.
Fergusson is right when he tells us confidently that it came into
being 500 A.D. On the other hand there are potentialities of distant
ages that make us tremble. With a chisel of four inches how long would
it take to change a range of rocky hills into a range of temples?
Then, how long would it take for a mighty city to rise up step by
step, and to powerfully influence the civilised world, under the wing
of the God of the Gopura? Then again, how long would it take the sea
to destroy a large city? And a more crucial question, how long would
it take for the soft lapping waves to reduce to sand and hide quite
away two Rathas of solid rock?
I give a drawing of the Rathas done on the spot by that excellent
artist Daniell a hundred years ago. (See Frontispiece). The taller
pyramid from its position does not quite show how much taller it is
than its neighbours.
I also give by the same excellent artist a view of the Kailâs
rock-detached temples of Elora as seen from the top. (Pl.
11, page 147). The two viewed together
bring out some striking facts.
1. Each is a group of minor buildings dominated by a great pyramid.
2. These pyramids have practically the same name, the City of
S’iva (Mahâbalipur, Kailas, Gopura).
3. The minor buildings have the same name Vimânas at Elora, Rathas
at Mahâbalipur, synonyms for processional god-carriages.
4. In both cases we have a mountain changed into a group of temples
by the aid of a small chisel.
p. 156
5. The tall pyramid had steps cut out that it might be used as an
observatory.
6. It is plainly the parent, first of solid pyramids built up of
small stones; and when the arch had been discovered, of doorway
pyramids pierced with a small passage, like the huge traditional
"Gopuras" of Southern India.
But a more startling discovery is in reserve. It quite blows to the
winds Mr. Fergusson's theories.
Daniell's drawing of Kailâs is folio size; and from it I
discovered a strange fact not to be detected in any of Mr. Fergusson's
drawings of the same piles. The Kailâs piles are crowded with heads
of Avalokitishwara in little windows or archways. And if the photo of
the Mahâbalipur pyramid is viewed with a powerful magnifying glass,
the same fact emerges there. I enlarge  one
of these heads from Daniell's drawing. Above is a second head, Ganga,
pouring down the Ganges on S’iva.
And on the point of history Mr. Fergusson breaks down. Râm Râz
cites the great poem of the Râmâyana to show that Ayodhyâ was
"adorned with arched gateways," and was "full of
buildings erected close to one another," and palaces with gardens
"like the celestial mansions which the Siddhas obtain through the
virtues of their austerity." *
Then the S’iva-Buddha alliance did not last. By and by it changed
from admiration to fierce war, and S’ivan persecution. Huguenots
flying from a Dragonnade are not the sort of people who build a Nôtre
Dame Cathedral or an Egyptian pyramid. Van Heeren thinks that Elora
must have taken several centuries to complete, and Mr. Fergusson seems
to have chosen for its construction the very centuries when the fierce
followers of S’iva, Kumârilla Bhatta (A.D. 700), and Sankara Âchârya
(750), were spreading Hindustan with Buddhist blood.
Fa Hian, who visited the Dekhan about A. D. 400, found that the
Buddhists had long been chased away from those regions. Let us suppose
that they came back again A.D. 750, Fergusson's date, and commenced
the mighty works of Elora. Kumârilla Bhatta and Sankara Achârya
would have soon made the operations impossible. Supposing, on the
other hand, that they delayed the commencement until Mr. Fergusson's
other date, A.D. 950. How could the few sparse Buddhists left in India
find the money for such a gigantic enterprise. Also, why did they
build a temple with all the distinctive features of the temples of
their sanguinary persecutors? "Sankara" is one of the names
of S’iva. "Achârya" means "Teacher."
A practical question! If the structures of Mahâbalipur and Elora
were intended for the dormitories of monks, traces of this would be
found in them. Mr. Fergusson admits that this is not the case, but he
says, that they are all unfinished, except the "little Ratha"
at Mahâbalipur. He makes a further confession that this has also no
dormitories, but he says that in form it is a "mere pansil"
(hut of leaves and boughs of an ascetic in a jungle *).
May not this be a solution of the puzzle? The earliest stone structure
in the open was suggested to the Indians by pansils and tents.
The dormitory theory is the most weak part of Mr. Fergusson's case.
Fa Hian tells us that there were fifteen hundred dormitories in the
Sangharâma that he talks of. Now we learn from Heeren that at Elora
there is "a vast number of smaller grottoes," where priests
can rest and where, what seems most important, many thousands of
pilgrims and penitents can be put up. Remember that this Sangharâma
was in the Dekhan. Remember also that it was not a mere rock temple,
but was "constructed out of a great mountain of rock, hewn to the
proper shape." Where else in the Dekhan is a hint of these
dormitories?
 Sir
Alexander Cunningham in his work the "Stűpa of Bharhut,"
gives a bas relief representing some buildings of the period (B.C.
270). I reproduce it here. Mr. Fergusson calls
it a round temple and part of a palace." Compare this with the
small Ratha of Mahâbalipur, as drawn by Daniell. Can we really
believe with Mr. Fergusson that a race which B.C. 270 could build thus
in the open would six hundred years after this waste half a century or
so to produce with a small chisel an edifice like the Mahâbalipur
Pansil.
To sum up, in ancient India there were three main religions.
(1) The religion of S’iva, which dates from the Caveman, Mr.
Gwilt's first stage. The Aryans found this god flourishing in India as
Ahi the Serpent, Bala, the Lingam, etc. The Zend Avestha also takes
note of him as Shouru, who seduced some of the Eranians to heresies
performed in his cave. That cave was supplied with a number of dark
recesses for the impressive horrors of the S’ivan mystery, and vast
halls for the Kailas illuminations; the temple being made apparently
to suit the worship and the worship to suit the temple.
(2) The pastoral period of Mr. Gwilt. The Aryan shepherds crossed
the Hindu Kush and invaded India with their flocks and many gods. At
the date of Megasthenes their priests lived in the open. In the early
epics there are no temples.
(3) The early Buddhists—forbidden by the "Twelve
Observances" to sleep more than one night in one place, and
forbidden the protection of a roof. What good would a vast pile like
Elora be to them? The monks could not enter it. The same remark
applies to the rock-detached Rathas of Mahâbalipur. Whatever their
design it could not have been dormitories for folks who used no
dormitories at all. Indeed, the great topes like the Sanchi seem to
accentuate the fact that the worship for which they were designed was
entirely open-air worship,—circumambulation round a pathway between
the great hemisphere of earth and the richly carved stone railings.
This purely open-air worship was carried on even when kings, converted
to S’iva-Buddhism, had seized the S’iva rock temples.
Thus we find two distinct religions and two distinct architectural
modes of giving effect to them.
(1) The worship of a man (deified) by perambulation round his
relics in a cairn in the open.
(2) The worship of the Supreme God by an ancient and elaborate
mystery which required large halls, dark grottoes, deep gloom, flashes
of light, and Lingams composed of large lumps of bed-rock. There are
more than a thousand rock temples in India all plentifully furnished
with Lingams. Can we believe with Mr. Fergusson that these are all due
to the Buddhists, who in his view originated the pattern.
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authority
erected by King Sadvaha at the instance of Nâgârjuna, 
