The Hindu Temple v1.c8.s2.7

v1.c8.s2.7

Other factors, of the period and place influence it, while it is being built and leave their mark on its style. Whereas temples are built in differing styles, the Fire-altar is subject to no such variation; its shape is independent of time and place, independent even of extensiveness, so much so that one of the types of the Vedic Altar is prescribed to be made of rhythms only (chandaściti) and not of bricks which are their representatives³⁴. Ancient extant temples and preserved texts date from about the same age³⁵. In the northern half of India it coincides with the rule of the Gupta Dynasty. The ‘Bṛhat Saṃhitā’ and the ‘Matsya Purāṇa’, the former of the sixth century A.D. refer to the standard works on which they are based. Varāhamihira, the author of the ‘Bṛhat Saṃhitā’,