The Ancient and Medieval Architecture of India: A Study of Indo-Aryan Civilisation c22.4

c22.4

The "Indo-Saracenic" style of Indian architecture was purely a creation of Fergusson. The Muhammadan invasions made no decisive break in the building traditions of India, except that they brought about a reversion to the ideals of Hînayâna Buddhism. The Indian master-builder continued to build for his Muhammadan rulers according to the Indo-Aryan traditions, just as he had done for Buddhist, Jain, and Hindu. The Indian mosque was the Hindu temple adapted to Muhammadan ritual. Its most typical plan, oriented like a Vishnu shrine, was like that of a Hindu temple, a rectangle with gopurams on the north, south, and west sides, for both the temple and the mosque enshrined the tradition of the Indo-Aryan village. The so-called "Pathan dome," like all other Indo-Muhammadan domes, was the dome of a Hindu mandapam *minus* the external symbolism. The "Indo-Saracenic" arch was the arch of a Hindu vault technically adapted for the wider spans required by the different structural conditions which Muhammadan ritual imposed. No Indian mosque contains a single structural idea borrowed from the Saracenic architecture of Western Asia, Egypt, or Turkey. Muhammadan art in India from its very beginning was, and continued to be, wholly Indian in spirit and in craftsmanship. All the symbolism of its ornament was Indo-Aryan, except that texts from the Quran are used in places where the Hindu sculptor would have put symbolic figures or animals.