Indian Architecture (Buddhist and Hindu Periods) c15.26

c15.26

Elaborate as were the carvings on the stupa itself, this decoration was excelled by the richness of the accessories surrounding its base. These consisted of the ground balustrade, the processional path which it enclosed, and the four entrances The outer railing was about thirteen feet high and composed of the usual arrangement of uprights, connected by three bars, and surmounted by a massive coping, but the entire scheme was so overlaid with ornamentation that its structural framework is hardly recognizable. Here it may be noted that a discrepancy occurs between the carved copies and the monument itself. For, curiously enough, in all the examples of the former, the sculptor probably with an artist's licence, has depicted four bars, while the actual remains show the traditional number of three only. Within the ground balustrades was the ambulatory, a corridor fifteen feet wide with free-standing pillars placed at intervals, each bearing a small stupa or similar sacred insignia. To enter this passage, in place of the *torana* of the northern type, another kind of portal was devised, in which the railing, where it was interrupted by the opening, was projected so as to form an open portico fronted with pillars, and with two pairs of sedent lions on its coping. As with all buildings of a like nature, the Amaravati stupa did not stand alone, but was surrounded by a courtyard which in the course of time became filled with an aggregation of votive stupas of varying sizes. Towards the western side there are the foundations of a structure which may have been a monastery or even some form of prayer hall, but as with several other remains of a somewhat similar order, it is too fragmentary to be identified.