The Hindu Temple v1.c8.s8.7

v1.c8.s8.7

The World Pillar inheres in the World Mountain and transcends it where it becomes visible above the highest stratum of the superstructure. The mountain shape of the Prāsāda is the sheath of its vertical axis. The vertical axis is clothed in it, from the floor of the Garbhagṛha to the shoulder course of the superstructure; from there however it is seen to exceed the body of the superstructure (Śikhara, in Nāgara temples; the series of Bhūmis in Drāviḍa temples). Encased in the vertical shape of a pillar, which is circular, as a rule, or polygonal (Parts VI and VII), it transcends the slopes of the superstructure although for a short distance only. It is therefore called Grīvā or Neck.¹²⁰ It emerges from the body of the Prāsāda to be capped by a dome (Figs. f-h; Part VI) or clasped by an Āmalaka (Pls. I, XLIII, LXXI). These crowning shapes of the Pillar support the finial of the temple. Its Highest Point, the end or beginning of the axis of the temple, is in the centre of the hollow shaft above the Liṅga or image in the Garbhagṛha, above the Womb and Centre of the Cosmos and above the Navel of the Earth.