History of Indian and Eastern Architecture v2.c33.s8.16

v2.c33.s8.16

In Burma these wooden types still exist in more completeness than, perhaps, in any other country. Even if the student is not prepared to admit the direct ethnographic connection between the buildings of Burma and Babylon, he will at any rate best learn in this country to appreciate much in ancient architecture, which without such a living illustration, it is hard to understand. Solomon's House of the Forest of Lebanon is, with mere difference of detail, reproduced at Ava or Amarapura; and the palaces of Persepolis are rendered infinitely more intelligible by the study of these edifices. Burma is almost equally important in enabling us to understand what an active, prosperous Buddhist community may have been in India at a time when that religion flourished there;¹ and altogether, if means were available for its full elucidation, it would form one of the most interesting chapters in the History of Architecture in Asia.