Early Indian Architecture: I. Cities and City-Gates, etc.; II. Bodhi-gharas c6: Foreword

Early Indian Architecture: I. Cities and City-Gates, etc.; II. Bodhi-gharas c6

Language: English

c6.1 — 4 parts

Foreword

c6.1.1

This is the Fourth Volume in the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts programme of reprinting the Collected Works of Ananda Kentish Coomaraswamy, thematically rearranged and re-edited. We had begun the series with the Selected Letters of Ananda K. Coomaraswamy. These were followed by two other volumes, entitled “What is Civilisation?” and “Time and Eternity.” The Selected Letters had revealed the inner-being of this savant who believed in no theories or ideologies and no ‘isms’. He had addressed himself to a vast number of his contemporaries: Scientists, Sanskritists, Writers and Religious thinkers. In the Second Volume, “What is Civilisation?,” another facet of his personality was revealed. This time it was a man exploring the contours of the peaks and troughs of civilisation. Each essay was an exploration of the streams, valleys, of the extensive panoramas of mountain ranges of human civilisation. The staggering spectrum of Coomaraswamy's grasp in this volume was juxtaposed with the minute filigree work and precision of delving into the textual sources of the Hindu, Buddhist, Christian and Islamic traditions in respect of ‘Time’ (Third Volume — “Time and Eternity”). The quality of that writing employs the skills of a master ivory carver, a stone-setter who concretises vision through flawless technique.

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He delved into each term, each notion of Time in these diverse and yet related traditions only to prove that although we live in ‘time’ our deliverance lies in Eternity. Those familiar with Coomaraswamy's later writing, such as the concentrated precision of “Time and Eternity” and another volume soon to be released — “Spiritual Authority and Temporal Power” — sometimes do not give importance to the work of the early Coomaraswamy who, in fact, had physically traversed mountains, investigated material, particularly rocks as a geologist and had known the tools of the crafts of ivory and wood carving and of gems and jewellery. In the Fourth Volume, which comprises essays of Coomaraswamy on architecture, the skills of a craftsman, the disciplines of an archaeologist and of a geologist are evident, and the potential of an emerging metaphysician clear. In a great essay on Indian architecture, “The Symbolism of the Dome” included in Coomaraswamy's “Traditional Art and Symbolism” (*Selected Papers*, edited by Roger Lipsey). Coomaraswamy begins by asserting “The origin of any structural form can be considered either from an archaeological and technical or from a logical and aesthetic, or rather cognitive, point of view: in other words, either as fulfilling a function or as expressing a meaning.

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We hasten to add that these are logical, not real distinctions: function and significance coincide in the form of the work: however, we may ignore the one or the other in making use of the work as a thing essential to the active life of the body or dispositive to the contemplative life of the spirit.” This assertion is the quintessence of Coomaraswamy's own life as one who looked at function and meaning, form and content, matter and spirit together. But the journey from the craftsman to the seer was gradual and imperceptive even if he worked as has been remarked in ‘fiendish pace’. The essays presented in this volume reflect the self-imposed discipline of sifting through archaeological and textual data and making drawings. Never before had sculptural relief been used as evidence for re-constructing forms of Indian architecture. Fergusson had excavated. Burgess had written on construction. Jouveau-Dubreuil had described through a knowledge of the actual architecture and of personal contact with living *sthapatis*, but it was only Coomaraswamy who went into the sculptural reliefs of Śuṅga, Kuṣāṇa, and Āndhra art to recreate elements of architectural form. The results illuminate facets hitherto undiscovered. Also (as unconventional at least for that time), was his approach to look at existing huts of the Indian countryside and relate them to temple types.

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Today, the method of culling out information from two dimensional or three dimensional visual imagery is accepted as is the employment of anthropological data to illuminate archaeological evidence. Coomaraswamy, imperceptibly, effortlessly, and through these essays had changed the course of the purely archaeological method in understanding early Indian architecture. The two essays here — (i) Cities and City gates; and (ii) Palaces — assume renewed significance not only for their content and for the important documentation of the windows, arches, doorways — a primary form of *Bodhi-gharas* — but also as pace-setters of a new art historical methodology.

c6.2

Prof. Michael W. Meister's Introduction carefully points at this methodological transition and the significance of these articles.

c6.3

Coomaraswamy's preoccupation with terms and terminology and textual sources is evident from his methodology in respect of terms relating to Time in the Third Volume of our series. In this volume, the same concern is reflected in the essay on Indian architectural terms. Here, Coomaraswamy was responding to P.K. Acharya's work on Indian architecture and a Dictionary of Hindu Architecture. Coomaraswamy comments on the terms included in the Dictionary, draws attention to others not included by P.K. Acharya, and gives his own interpretation, draws attention to primary sources especially the *Mahāvaṁsa*. This essay is an excellent example of Coomaraswamy's ability for razor-sharp response, almost combativeness, as also constructive illuminating criticism. Perhaps his unpublished papers may still reveal further reflection on these terms and perhaps even reinterpretation. In this essay, it is Coomaraswamy the skilled craftsman, the lexicographer, the investigator of textual terminology that comes to the fore. For example, one can speculate how a later Coomaraswamy would have interpreted the term 'Meru'. Here, he is content to draw attention to E.B. Havell's works on the Himalayas in Indian Art. The metaphysician Coomaraswamy may well have written a whole volume on the 'Meru'.

Cites (1)

Mahāvaṃsa — Pāli

Early Indian Architecture: I. Cities and City-Gates, etc.; II. Bodhi-gharas c6: Foreword

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