The Chalukyan Architecture of the Kanarese Districts c7.17

c7.17

Of the various Hindu styles of architecture the Chālukyan is, perhaps, the least attractive when viewed from a distance. It has no striking outline to catch the eye, and its detail is too crowded and too small to be distinctly seen: they are just piles of chiselled stonework. An inspection at close quarters, however, reveals the qualities for which they are noted. An exuberance of lace-like carving, bands upon bands of minute scrollwork and figure bas-reliefs, and panels and niches, all elbowing each other for room, are among the chief features of the style. Except upon Jaina temples, which have comparatively plain exteriors, hardly a square yard of their walls is bare. Multitudinous lines of moulded string courses, crossed by endless vertical offsets and recesses, break up the wall surfaces into hundreds of projections and indentations which produce a remarkably sparkling effect of light and shade, not altogether unpleasing. Writing of the great temple of Haḷēbīḍ, the most ornate example in the style, Fergusson says: "A person standing between the two great *vimānas* of the western face of the temple, and looking around him, probably sees a greater amount of skilled labour than was ever exhibited in a like space in any other building in the whole world, and the style of workmanship is of a very high class. It is not, of course, pretended that it compares with Greek art or the higher utterances of European intellect, but in many respects it excels anything that Gothic art produced during the middle ages. The qualities of design exhibited at Haḷēbīḍ are certainly not the highest of which the art is capable, but in their grade they may challenge comparison with those of any known building in any other style."¹ One cannot help wondering at the amount of lovely detail, all finished with scrupulous care, tucked away in dark corners in the interiors of most of these buildings, where it is often impossible to see it without the aid of a lantern. But,