Manasara Series (I. A Dictionary of Hindu Architecture; II. Indian Architecture according to Manasara-Shilpashastra; III. Manasara on Architecture and Sculpture: Sanskrit Text; IV. Architecture of Manasara: Translation; V. Architecture of Manasara: Illustrations; VI. Hindu Architecture in India and Abroad; VII. An Encyclopaedia of Hindu Architecture) v6.c41.s12.25

v6.c41.s12.25

'The upper row of caves is approached by flights of stairs roughly cut into the rock, which start near some small grottoes serving as quarters for the priests. There is a line of 12 cave temples extending on a uniform level. All of them comprise a cella, square or nearly so, with sides varying from 20 to 32 feet; an ante-chapel, itself as broad as the cella, but only of moderate depth and separated from the cella by a shallow wide passage; a high porch or outer passage, in some cases 20 to 30 feet deep where it is intact, admitting light and air from the face of the cliff. The shrines originally communicated with each other by means of narrow plastered passages leading from one porch to the other through the facing part of the rock wall. But where this had crumbled away or become unsafe, a rough tunnel connecting the ante-chapels had been driven through the rock. The uniformity with which this disposition is repeated in all shrines points to execution upon a definite plan and at no great distance of time, and with this the uniform style of their decoration seems in full accord.’¹