DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.9541#0161
138
BUDDHIST ARCHITECTURE.
Book I.
lie explored seem to bear the relation to one another of a vihara 60 ft.
square over all, and a temple of little more than half these dimensions
with a projecting porch on each face.1 Only the foundation of these
buildings now remains, and nothing to indicate how they Were
originally finished.
We may eventually hit on some representation which may enable
as to form definite ideas on this subject, but till we do this we
probably must be content with the interiors as seen in the rock-cut
examples.
Bengal Caves.
None of the Behar caves can, properly speaking, lie called viharas,
in the sense in which the word is generally used, except perhaps the Son
Bhandar, which, as before mentioned, General Cunningham identifies
with the Sattapanni cave, in front of which the first convocation was
held 543 li.C. It is a plain rectangular excavation, 33 ft. !) in. long by
17 ft. wide, and 11 ft. 7 in. to the springing of the curved roof.-' It
has one door and one window, but both, like the rest of the cave,
without mouldings or any architectural features that would assist in
determining its age. The jambs of the doorway slope slightly inwards,
but not sufficiently to give an idea of great antiquity. In front there
was a wooden verandah, the mortice holes for which are still visible in
the front wall.
The other caves, at Barabar and Nagarjuna, if not exactly chaityas
in the sense in which that term is applied to the western caves, were at
least oratories, places of prayer and worship, rather than residences.
One Arhat or ascetic may have resided in them, but for the purpose of
performing the necessary services. There are no separate cells in them,
nor any division that can be considered as separating the ceremonial
from the domestic uses of the cave, and they must consequently, for
the present at least, be classed as chaityas rather than viharas.
The case is widely different when we turn to the caves in Orissa,
which are among the most interesting, though at the same time the
most anomalous, of all the caves in India. They are situated in t wo
isolated hills of sandstone rock, about twenty miles from Cuttack and
five from Bhuvaneswar. The oldest are in the hill called Udayagiri;
the more modern in that portion designated Khandagiii. They became
Jaina about the 10th or 11th century, and the last-named hill is
crowned by a Jaina temple, erected by the Maharattas in the end of
the last century.
1 For this and the other Sarnath re-
mains see Cunningham's ' Archaeological
Reports,' vol. i. p. 114, et seqq., plates
32-34.
- These dimensions are from plate 42,
' Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal,'
for 1S47, by the late Capt. Kittoe.
BUDDHIST ARCHITECTURE.
Book I.
lie explored seem to bear the relation to one another of a vihara 60 ft.
square over all, and a temple of little more than half these dimensions
with a projecting porch on each face.1 Only the foundation of these
buildings now remains, and nothing to indicate how they Were
originally finished.
We may eventually hit on some representation which may enable
as to form definite ideas on this subject, but till we do this we
probably must be content with the interiors as seen in the rock-cut
examples.
Bengal Caves.
None of the Behar caves can, properly speaking, lie called viharas,
in the sense in which the word is generally used, except perhaps the Son
Bhandar, which, as before mentioned, General Cunningham identifies
with the Sattapanni cave, in front of which the first convocation was
held 543 li.C. It is a plain rectangular excavation, 33 ft. !) in. long by
17 ft. wide, and 11 ft. 7 in. to the springing of the curved roof.-' It
has one door and one window, but both, like the rest of the cave,
without mouldings or any architectural features that would assist in
determining its age. The jambs of the doorway slope slightly inwards,
but not sufficiently to give an idea of great antiquity. In front there
was a wooden verandah, the mortice holes for which are still visible in
the front wall.
The other caves, at Barabar and Nagarjuna, if not exactly chaityas
in the sense in which that term is applied to the western caves, were at
least oratories, places of prayer and worship, rather than residences.
One Arhat or ascetic may have resided in them, but for the purpose of
performing the necessary services. There are no separate cells in them,
nor any division that can be considered as separating the ceremonial
from the domestic uses of the cave, and they must consequently, for
the present at least, be classed as chaityas rather than viharas.
The case is widely different when we turn to the caves in Orissa,
which are among the most interesting, though at the same time the
most anomalous, of all the caves in India. They are situated in t wo
isolated hills of sandstone rock, about twenty miles from Cuttack and
five from Bhuvaneswar. The oldest are in the hill called Udayagiri;
the more modern in that portion designated Khandagiii. They became
Jaina about the 10th or 11th century, and the last-named hill is
crowned by a Jaina temple, erected by the Maharattas in the end of
the last century.
1 For this and the other Sarnath re-
mains see Cunningham's ' Archaeological
Reports,' vol. i. p. 114, et seqq., plates
32-34.
- These dimensions are from plate 42,
' Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal,'
for 1S47, by the late Capt. Kittoe.