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.s25.128

v6.c41.s25.128

In the words of Herodotus (I, 121), the Persians ‘have neither images nor temples nor altars, these they consider unlawful, and impute folly to those that make them. This is because they do not believe, like the Greeks [and the Hindus] in the personality of the gods. Their practice is to sacrifice to Zeus on the summit of the highest mountains, and under the name of Zeus they understand the whole circumference of the heavens.’ Cicero (*De Republica*, III, IX, 14, *De Legibus*, II, X, 26), by way of explaining the cause of Xerxes’ burning of the temples of Athens, says that it was to punish the Greeks ‘for their sacrilege in their foolish attempt “to shut up within walls the gods, before whom everything ought to be open and free, the gods, whose temple and habitation were the whole universe”.’ The *Avesta*, however, ‘contains no sign or token of the feeling imputed to the Persians by the Greek historian, and more explicitly the Roman orator.’ The Persians burnt the Grecian temples probably ‘to avenge the sacking of Sardes’ (Herodotus, VI, 96, 100).