The Chalukyan Architecture of the Kanarese Districts c8.s6.5

c8.s6.5

The hall of the temple is divided, longitudinally, into a central nave and two side aisles, as in the last two temples described, the central roof being raised, by a deep sculptured, entablature, considerably above the lower sloping roof of the sides. There are two freestanding pillars on either side, which, with the adjacent pilasters, support the running architrave. Cross slabs, laid over from one entablature to the other, close in the roof, the under surfaces of them being carved. But the three slabs which occupied the three middle bays, one in each, are missing, and the remainder have been pushed up together towards the shrine end. These slabs have been identified, however, with three found in private possession at Dhārwār. Their measurements correspond to the spaces in the respective bays, and their carvings with similar ones in the same positions in two other old temples at Aihoḷe of the same class. The stone is the same, being that of the sandstone of the neighbourhood, in which all these temples are built. It was known that these slabs were carried away, with a fourth one, from the Bādāmi neighbourhood over forty years ago by a judge at Dhārwār, and were set up in his garden there, where I found them. They are illustrated on Plate XVII. At that time, all the old temples in the village, which were not in use as such, were occupied by people as dwellings, and could not well be rifled like this one, lying deserted and ruined in the fields. In the other two similar temples, it is found that the sculpture of Brahmā is in the ceiling bay next the shrine, with Śiva in the central one. This was probably the order here, Viṣṇu on Śeṣa, the narrowest slab, being nearest the entrance doorway.