Indian Architecture (Buddhist and Hindu Periods) c26.7

c26.7

The chief feature of this columned hall, however, is its range of pillars, fifty-six in number, each twelve feet in height, forty of them regularly spaced as a kind of colonnade or aisle around its outer edge, while the remaining sixteen form an oblong court in the centre (Plate LXX). Each pier comprises an entire sculptured group in itself, being fashioned out of one large block of granite, and each is a variant of much the same type of design Clusters of delicately shaped columns form the central portion of these broad supports, some of which are four and five feet across, while interposed between them is the afore-mentioned rearing animal motif, half natural half mythical but wholly rhythmic, the said architectural character of the one acting as a foil to the free and animated sculpturesque treatment of the other. This scheme surrounds the central core of each pier, joining together above to form a single massive capital and below to unite in one moulded pedestal or base, while the colonnade as a whole is so closely spaced as to produce an effect of bewildering intricacy. Then over the piers are bracket supports of prodigious size combined with profusely carved entablatures and above all a flat ceiling ornamented with sunk lotus flowers. When it is understood that every stone is chiselled over with the most elaborate patterns, some merely finely engraved, others modelled in high relief, while not a few are so undercut as to be almost detached, the tropical exuberance of its composition will be realized.