The Ancient and Medieval Architecture of India: A Study of Indo-Aryan Civilisation c12.29

c12.29

The capital of this Vishnu standard is not, as Fergusson supposed, a Persepolitan idea imported into India by the craftsmen of Asoka’s court, but the traditional *Indian* rendering of ancient Vedic symbolism. It is the *amalaka*, the fruit of Vishnu’s blue water-lily, and of the pure white flower of Siva, placed within the four legs of a Vedic altar of sacrifice; one part of the sixteen-petalled flower is turned down upon the shaft, as in the pillars of the Bharhut sculptures (fig. 21), and the other grows upwards to support the altar on which the four lion-guardians of the doors of the sky are placed. The entrance to the chaitya-house was through a porch with three entrances, over which was the *naubat-khâna*, or music-gallery, similar to that shown in the Bharhut relief (Pl. IX, c). This is now in a very ruinous condition,¹ and only the mortice-holes of wooden attachments to it now remain.