The Hindu Temple v1.c7.s2.7

v1.c7.s2.7

In the ‘Mānasollāsa’, II, iii, 1, 132-40 (Cf. also the ‘Nārada Śilpa Śāstra’ of which two chapters on painting are translated by V. Raghavan, JISOA, Vol. III, p. 19 f.), the walls, to which lime plaster (sudhā) has been applied should then be coated with a paste of hide-glue mixed with white earth (kaolin ?) in three layers, and above it another final coat of the same paste mixed with powdered conch, etc. This passage clearly shows that the ‘adamantine glue coating’ or ‘plaster’ the Vajralepa, is applied in several thin coats above the lime plaster, Sudhā. The final coat of Vajralepa, when completely dry, forms the ground of wall paintings. The ‘Mānasollāsa’ describes as further use of the Vajralepa that it is mixed with all colours. In that case, the glue of the boiled buffalo skin is collected on small sticks and allowed to harden. It is then put in an earthen pot with water and melted. This pure glue is to be mixed with the respective pigments. It is thus a tempered medium for painting on the Vajralepa-ground (the reference in V. Dh. III, Ch. XL, to a decoction of hides, may imply this too).