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.s25.258

v6.c41.s25.258

The denotation and connotation of the term 'architecture' must be brought home in order to adjudge the relative position of architecture with fine or refined arts—numbering some 518 according to Yaśodhara, a commentator of Vātsyāyana's *Kāmaśāstra*. Before that, the essential and exact difference between architecture on the one hand and civil engineering or mere art of building on the other hand should be made clear. The same structure, say, a railway station or a newspaper office may be built both architecturally as well as an object of mere engineering. If the main object of the railway building and the newspaper office were to supply necessary accommodation in the most convenient manner, and if no extra expenditure of money and thought were made for the sake of an artistic look or a symbolic expression, these buildings could not be designated as objects of real architecture, Indian or foreign. The artistic design and symbolic significance are not confined, it should be noted, to the external look alone.