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The Hindu Temple v1.c9.s2: II. The Curvilinear Superstructure (Śikhara)

The Hindu Temple v1.c9.s2

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II. The Curvilinear Superstructure (Śikhara)

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However manifold the varieties of the pyramidal superstructure proved to be, they do not attain in number, wealth and distinction, the range of the curvilinear Śikhara which belongs to the Hindu temple throughout four-fifths of India. The river Kistna (Kṛṣṇa) is generally taken as the southern boundary of its extent. Temples having curvilinear Śikharas however exist even south of the Kistna and as far as the Tungabhadra.⁵⁷ Amongst the several types and stages of their development, two shapes are fundamental. The one kind of Śikhara, (Fig. d), except for the inward curve of its sides does not differ in detail from the pyramidal type of the superstructure (type IA. 2) as represented in the Sūrya temple at Sūtrapada, for example. Its horizontal courses have generally the profile of cornice mouldings; Gavākṣa ‘windows’ are carved on them. In this type of Śikhara (Fig. d) as well as in the corresponding pyramidal superstructure, an Āmalaka, indispensable as crown of the whole superstructure (Fig. c), may also be placed at the four corners.⁵⁸ There they were seen supporting the topmost course or slab of the superstructure (Temple No. 10, Aihole; Fig. b). This may represent an early stage of the employment of the Āmalaka on the trunk of the superstructure. The Āmalakas are, however, repeated in most of the curvilinear Śikharas in regular intervals reinforcing the curved edge where they mark the Bhūmis, levels, or storeys.⁵⁹ Each Bhūmi has several strata, first only two (Fig. d), and subsequently an ever increasing number of horizontal layers (Pl. LXXI), mouldings and recesses, the mouldings opening their Gavākṣa ‘windows’ as carved symbols (Fig. d) in growing profusion until their rounded shapes are but the meshes of a patterned network which is cast over the Śikhara (Pl. LXXI, etc.).

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⁵⁷ The curvilinear Śikhara, as illustrated in Figure d, is preserved with its Āmalaka intact, on two shrines at Mahākūṭa (ASI, Madras Photographs, 1938-39, Nos. 1744, 1746) and also on two shrines belonging to the Rāmaliṅgeśvara Temple at Kurnool (Satvel; ‘South Indian Epigraphy’, 1940-41, Photographs Nos. 1972-75; 1942-43, Nos. 2251-61); a number of temples having curvilinear Śikharas are in Alampur (Raichur); ‘Annual Rep. Arch. Dept. H. E .H. The Nizam’s Dominions’, 1926-27, Pls. II-IV, X f. On some of the early Śikharas, the corner Āmalakas have their original rounded shape (relief of a Gupta Śikhara, Deogarh; ASI, U. P. Photographs, 1942-43; No. 467).

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⁵⁸ The Āmalaka crown corresponds to the Svayamātṛṇā stone on top of the fifth layer of the Vedic altar. The Āmalaka at the 4 corners has its Vedic analogy in the four naturally perforated stones placed in the 4 directions of the High Altar according to the teaching of the Kaṭhās (‘Āpastamba Śrauta Sūtra’, XIX, 12, 16). Technically however the Āmalaka is not a holed, but a solid stone and serves to lock together the sloping walls of the superstructure.

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⁵⁹ Cf. also type IB. I, the Mahābodhi temple.

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On the earlier temples, from about the 6th century, the distinction between pyramidal and curvilinear superstructure of this type is one of degrees only. The sides bulge but little (Temple IX, etc., Aihole) or else, on the temples of another provincial variety in its later phases (Liṅgarāj Temple, Bhuvaneśvar, Orissa), the Sikhara has almost perpendicular, straight sides which curve in towards the shoulder course only of this truncated superstructure.

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From the beginning, the curvilinear Sikhara has one central projection in the shape of a broad offset, all along its height (Fig. d). Where this superstructure appears on top of the walls of the square Garbhagṛha, the walls themselves are similarly buttressed (Pl. LXXI). The surfaces, in receding planes of the superstructure, are the vertical extensions of the theme of the perpendicular walls of the ‘ground floor’. As one unit, the entire Prāsāda steps forth on the four sides; the central buttresses or offsets frequently even exceed the sides of the Sikhara in height and are extended above its shoulder-course (skandha) into the region of the neck (grīvā) below the Āmalaka (Pls. LXXI, XLIII; Fig. i, p. 212).

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The buttresses have their beginning at the foot of the wall of the temple, including the socle, the Adhiṣṭhāna. The broad projection of the central buttress makes the ground plan of the Prāsāda cruciform (see ground plans, Pt. VII). This is also the form of the central part of the Gārhapatya hearth where it results from the shape itself of the bricks (plan in Part VII). On the perpendicular walls of the temple, within the buttresses, in their niches or ‘massive doors’ (ghanadvāra), are placed as images the divinity in the temple (Pls. LXXI, XLIII). Thus it appears to have stepped from within the Garbhagṛha, through the massive walls of the temple and its ‘solid doors’ for an aspect of the deity has no physical body but it is given form and is bodied forth across the wall and itself is the door, by which the devotee in his heart and mind approaches the central divinity. It is made manifest on the outside of the temple; with this exteriorisation, the Prāsāda wall itself, as it were, keeps pace; in the middle of its surface it steps forth in the shape of a buttress, a symbol of progressive manifestation in terms of architecture. In the course of time the buttresses are increased in number and in depth. Their structural significance is small, no stresses have to be counteracted for the whole monument, the Prāsāda, is built in horizontal courses which rest on their support in the vertical. They do not exert any lateral thrust. Trabeation and corbelling are employed in the Prāsāda and the Maṇḍapas for spanning spaces and constructing domes. The buttresses could be dispensed with structurally but they are indispensably part of the form of the Prāsāda, the monument of manifestation of the Supreme Principle. From the centre of the dark Garbhagṛha, it shows forth in the architectural theme and in the images on the walls of the temple. It leads from the bottom of the temple to its crown, the Āmalaka (Pl. XLIII).

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The buttresses do not form part of the flat roofed dolmen temple. They can be thought of as having originated in brick structures corresponding to the augmentation of a central area, by adding bricks in the four directions as in the piling of Vedic altars (Figs. in Part VII), not only but also in pillared buildings whose halls are made spacious by an analogous arrangement of the pillars. When the buttresses make their appearance on the otherwise plain walls of the Garbhagṛha, its roof is no longer flat but carries the superstructure, the Sikhara (Deogarh, etc.).

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The indispensable buttresses of the temple with the curvilinear Sikhara belong to its total form; they have their origin neither in the stone slabs of the dolmen nor in the Tabernacle of bended branches. Brick laying, as in the Vedic altar, might have facilitated their employment and pillared halls with their regular intercolumniations might also have preceded them. Such as they are they convey directly the meaning of the Prāsāda and are part of its monumental form.

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The other shape of the Śikhara has its perfect appearance in temples such as those in Khajūraho (Pls. I, IV; Fig. i). It surges towards the apex; other smaller Śikharas cling to it in a massed competition of ascent. Although each of them has its edges marked by Bhūmis of many strata and by Āmalakas, these horizontal elements, like the nodules of the stem of a plant, do not break its rising lines. Their curves belong to forms of vegetation, the ribs of the large leaves of Banana plants, of palm trees or bamboo rods fixed in the corners of a square drawn on the ground and bent towards a central point; with their curves the stone built Śikharas of the Khajūraho temples arise and reiterate in their complex organisation the perennial meaning of the Tabernacle of the forest. It served and still serves the performance of worship (pūjā) and vows (vrata). When these Pūjās and Vratas are completed, the leaves and branches which had formed the Tabernacle, having served their purpose, are thrown away, whereas the form of these temporary and humble structures was clothed in brick and stone and raised above the Garbhagṛha, in the innumerable Śikharas known to exist from the Gupta age and which to this day compete towards the Highest Point.

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The Tabernacle of leaves, bamboo or branches is the prototype of the curvilinear Śikhara. The arch of vegetation, the arch of Nature surmounts and encloses the seat of God. In temple chariots with a framework of bamboo, as much as in the temples themselves, it is this ‘Form of Nature’, which remains one of the primeval and sempiternal forms of sacred architecture in India. It is the most sacred of all the forms of the superstructure, destined for the Prāsāda only. It is never placed as superstructure on any Maṇḍapa or any accessory building of the temple proper. There the pyramidal types are accommodated, and at times assimilated to its curves, without however attaining to their unbroken ascent (Pl. I).

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The construction of the curvilinear Śikhara, by means of a division in geometrical progression—by four fold division (caturguṇa sūtra) in this instance—is given in the ‘Hayaśīrṣapañcarātra’, XIII. 324 f. and ‘Agnipurāṇa’, XLII. 15-17. This particular method which is indicated here, underlies the process by which the batter of the curved outline of this type of the Śikhara is determined. The ‘Samarāṅgaṇasūtradhāra’ gives further information and the ‘Bṛhacchilpaśāstra’, with a recent commentary in Gujerati, is partly even more explicit.

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The ‘Agnipurāṇa’ passage speaks only of the four Sūtras, which are to be separately drawn—from the base of the Śikhara up to the other end, the Skandha,—for the ‘purpose of the Śikhara’ (śikharārtham hi sūtrāni catvāri vinipātayet). These vertical parallels are intersected at certain regular intervals by horizontals (Figs. on p. 209 f), of which only one is given in the ‘Agnipurāṇa’ at the height where the Śukanāsā is to end. There a lion’s figure should be carved. In the ‘Agnipurāṇa’, its position marks the middle of the Śikhara. A lion’s figure, carved in the round juts out from above the ‘Śukanāsā’ of the temples in Orissa. The later texts make it clear that the shoulder course of the Śikhara is generally assigned 6 parts in width, the base of the Śikhara measuring 10 such parts (‘Samarāṅgaṇasūtradhāra’, LVII. 664 b; ‘Bṛhacchilpaśāstra’, III. 81). The height of the trunk of the Śikhara being given should be divided by geometrical progression into a certain number of parts, three, four, five or six according to the ‘Samarāṅgaṇasūtradhāra’.⁶⁰ A line parallel to the height is drawn from one end of the Skandha to the base of the Śikhara and one more parallel from the end of the base of the Śikhara. The width of this rectangle is 2 parts and its height is equal to that of the trunk of the Śikhara (Figs. on pp. 209 f). Into as many parts as the height is to be divided—in a geometrical progression—into so many parts also is the narrow side of the rectangle divided. The texts always speak of ‘tri-guṇa, catur-guṇa’, etc., ‘sūtra’. This, no doubt, implies that the division of the height should be in a geometrical progression (guṇa saṅkalita).⁶¹

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From these indications, repeated in the description of practically every single variety of the Śikhara, (in Chapters LVI and LVII of S.S.) it appears that the curve of the Śikhara is given by connecting the points of intersection of these lines.

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The total height has to be divided, for example, in geometrical progression into six parts (ṣaḍguṇa sūtra). The narrow side of the rectangle however has to be divided into six equal parts of its own. The vertical parallels drawn through these points are equidistant. They intersect the horizontal parallels which are drawn in a geometrical progression. The curve is drawn through their points of intersection (Fig. on p. 210).

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The method of drawing the curve was common knowledge and did not require an explanation. A different curve resulted according to the number of divisions. It sufficed if this number was stated; by controlling the lines according to a well known method,⁶² the batter of the superstructure had to be made.

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⁶² “Rekhāvaśena kartavyāḥ praveśāḥ” (S.S. LXV. 18).

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⁶⁰ S.S. LVI. 137: “Caturguṇaiḥ pṛthaksūtraiḥ padmakośaṃ samālikhet”; LVI. 275: “Pṛthaksūtristriguṇitair veṇukośaṃ samālikhet”; LVII. 817: “Sīmnaḥ pañcaguṇaṃ sūtraṃ rekhāntaṃ tatra vartayet”. LVII. 674 prescribes “ṣaḍguṇa sūtra”, etc.—These passages indicate that lines have to be drawn severally from three times to six times, dividing the height of the trunk of the Śikhara in a geometrical progression by three, four, five or six, while another set of lines of corresponding number and at equal distances is drawn parallel to the height, within the rectangle described above. The terms ‘Veṇukośa’, the “sheath of the reed”, ‘Sīmā’, the boundary or width of the Prāsāda, are explained in Part VII.

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The curve is drawn through points of intersection of the horizontal and vertical lines.

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In drawing the curves of Śikharas as Figs. on pp. 209-10 show, based on an interpretation of the term ‘guṇa’ in the sense of ‘guṇa saṅkalita’ or geometrical progression, the writer has had this view confirmed by Mr. E. C. Gentry, A.R.I.B.A., New Delhi.

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⁶¹ The illustrator of the ‘Bṛhacchilpaśāstra’, III. 78-94, attempts a division of the height into equal parts, with the result that the curvilinear outlines of the many varieties of Śikharas are identical in his constructions. The curves moreover, are not drawn through the points of intersection.

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The figures denoting the batter in ‘Canons of Orissan Architecture’, p. 111 f, and the accompanying drawing of the curvature of the ‘gaṇḍi’ do not appear to illustrate a mathematical rule. Cf. however the term “Rekhaguṇāghāṭa” (pp. 114-5).

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The methods practised by the ancients can be ascertained only by measuring the batter of the extant Śikharas and correlating these measurements with the formulæ given in the Vāstuśāstras.

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Practising craftsmen (Dāmodar Mahārāna) in Bhuvaneśvar determine the curve of the ‘gaṇḍi’, i.e. the trunk of the curvilinear Śikhara, “according to its beauty”. They know no formula for its batter; they take however the width of the shoulder course as measuring ¾ of the base (and not 3/5, see p. 207); and the width of the ‘gala’ as ½ of the Mūla-sūtra; the height of the temple being twice, etc. its width (cf. Part VII), the perpendicular walls are assigned a height which is ¾th of the width.

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The Prāsādas as described in the ‘Samarāṅgaṇasūtradhāra’, Chapters LVII, etc., with their curvilinear superstructures (Śikhara) are the most particularly Indian amongst the monumental shapes of the temple. While cube, prism and pyramid belong to sacred architecture not only in India, the monumental shape of

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Curve of Śikhara drawn by means of ‘triguṇa sūtra’, the end of the rectangle being divided by three and the side by geometrical progression of three.

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the ‘Tabernacle’ originally of branches, etc., curving towards one point, is the pre-eminent shape of the Hindu temple. It formed the nucleus of many developments, and has thrown forth multiple proliferations of its shape. Rich in possi-

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The word ‘Vaśa’ which means ‘power’ might be taken to refer to “the lines which constitute the sides of rectangles bearing a square-root relationship with their ends.” Dynamic symmetry however does not seem to be implied in the indications quoted in note 60. See also the proportions and measures given in Part VII. Scarcely any accurate measurements have as yet been made of extant Śikharas.

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bilities they have been elaborated and massed around the central dominant theme, accompanying its direction towards the highest point.

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The curve of the Śikhara drawn by means of ‘ṣaḍguṇa sūtra’ (division and geometrical progression by six) is more attenuated than those drawn by 3, 4 or 5 fold division.

The Main Varieties of the Curvilinear Superstructure

IIA. The Cluster of Śikharas

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The extant temples having curvilinear Śikharas are distinguished by the following features: The plan appears cruciform (see drawings in Part VII); this is, the result of the central major projection of each side, generally called Bhadra, being flanked by more shallow lateral offsets, called Ratha. If the temple has an ambulatory the Bhadras appear like transepts in the plan; the Talacchanda of the Prāsāda is accentuated in the 4 directions, in which the temple seems to step forth from the straight inner walls of the Garbhagṛha. The square of the Garbhagṛha is transmuted into the cross of the Prāsāda; the static centre of the temple is ensconced by its dynamically laid out perimeter. The steps in the plan correspond to the buttresses or planes of the perpendicular wall of the Prāsāda. They have no structural purpose and are the monumental form of the progression from the centre; they are carried up the Śikhara, and terminate at the shoulder-course (skandha); in certain temples as already pointed out, the main offsets of the Śikhara even exceed the skandha and point towards the Āmalaka (Pls. XLIII, XLV; Fig. i).⁸³ Above the skandha, the Āmalaka, held aloft by the round neck, supports the finial.

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⁸³ In this final and ‘excessive’ ascent the buttress quits the body of the building; while it is non-structural throughout its end has the appearance, though not the function, of a flying buttress (Pls. LXXI, XLIII).

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The Śikhara has two main shapes. The one, IIA, consists of a central curvilinear Śikhara surrounded by clusters of similar Śikharas (Pls. I. IV; Fig. i). These are formed by one or several half Śikharas or Śṛṅgas leaning against the ‘chest’ (uras) of the main Śikhara and of each successive Uromañjarī. At the corners, narrow and high quarter-Śikharas fill and round off the recesses between the Uromañjarī and the main Śikhara (mūla-Śikhara or Mañjarī), while smaller part or three-quarter Śṛṅgas are grouped in the lower courses of the Śikhara each in continuation of a buttress or offset of the perpendicular wall of the Prāsāda. The many variations of the theme of the Śikhara cluster are brought about by the number of Uromañjarīs of the Śikhara, the number of Rathas or offsets of the perpendicular wall and the number of horizontal rows in which are set the miniature Śikharas called Tilaka (sesamum seed) at the base of the main Śikhara, the Mūlamañjarī. These factors depend on the specific proportions of the particular type of temple and also on its height and the curvature of the superstructure. All the subsidiary Śikharas and other shapes are always subordinated to the main and dominant central Mūlamañjarī.

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Type IIA has the multiples of its own form set forth in the 4 directions; they ascend moreover from the corners, and each time to the same height as the respective Uromañjarīs; they are accompanied furthermore in this massed competition towards the apex, by lesser replicas at the base, attaining to smaller fractions of the height while they reinforce on their own, lower levels the urgency of the ascent. Each of these multiple replicas has a ‘neck’ (grīvā), Āmalaka and finial of its own; while these terminate the single forms, they punctuate the striving of the entire mass of the superstructure towards the final point which lies beyond its trunk, whatever its height. The single Śṛṅgas, as a rule, are spaced with increasing distances towards the top whereas the single Bhūmis or horizontal courses of which each Śṛṅga is composed, decrease in height towards the summit of the Śikhara. A counter-play of proportions results from this double progression, contracting on the upper register of the wall surfaces of each Śṛṅga and expanding with reference to the superstructure as a whole. Its tension makes even more ostensibly coherent the substantiality of the monument whose texture thus is seen not as that of the stone or the bricks but appears to be composed of the acceleration and the halting of the ascent.

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Temples of this type are represented most perfectly in central India, especially in Khajuraho; in northern Gujarat, and also in Rajputana;⁶⁴ the Rāja-Rāni temple in Bhuvaneśvar, Orissa, belongs to this type according to the style of that country.

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⁶⁴ [^cont]: ...

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Fig. 1. KANDARĪYA TEMPLE, KHAJURAHO. From B. L. Dhama, ‘A Guide to Khajuraho’, Pl. IV.

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The pillared halls which lead to, and surround, the Garbhagṛha occupy the ground floor (samsthāna) only. The vast superstructure is invisible from inside, where halls and Garbhagṛha are closed by trabeate domes of varying height. The main dome is over the centre of the main In this zone across the width of northern India, however, none of the extant temples of this type is earlier than the tenth century. This does not imply the relative lateness of the type; on the contrary, earlier less evolved temples of this type are no longer in existence.⁶³ There ought to be Śikharas with but one set of Uromañjarīs instead of the usual two or four sets; the centre, the Mūlamañjarī, if imagined without the many flanking Śṛṅgas and Tilakas, corresponds to a complete curvilinear Śikhara in the shape in which it has not only the widest distribution but also the longest history (Type II[B]). Although relatively earlier Śikharas of this type (II[B]) are preserved—from c. the sixth century, type IIA of which no earlier representatives than those of the tenth century exist, is the more pure of the two embodying in the main but one prototypal shape which is that of the Tabernacle of bent branches. This shape was amplified by throwing forth multiples from its curvilinear walls, clinging to them like the petals of a bud about

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hall (Mahāmaṇḍapa). The Garbhagṛha, though raised high above the level of the Maṇḍapa, has its dome on a lower level than that of the central dome of the Maṇḍapa.

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The Liṅga in the centre of the Garbhagṛha is straight below the finial and the middle of the Grīvā, if the shaft of the latter is imagined to traverse the whole Prāsāda.

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The interior of the superstructure is not meant to be seen; cf. note 65.

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Seen from the outside, the superstructure three times rises and falls to an ever higher level; each of its peaks is above the centre of a hall; the long drawn out descent of the superstructure above the main hall is met by the steep vertical of the Sukanāsā, the antefix of the front of the Śikhara of the Prāsāda. The Sukanāsā is above the Antarāla or porch of the Garbhagṛha (re. Sukanāsā, see Part VII).

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The steep slope of the back of the Prāsāda (W) is beset with Uromañjarīs. Their Kalaśas, and the high ends of the middle buttress of each, punctuate its curves.

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The perpendicular walls of the temple open up between rooflets and seats. The latter with their sloped backs are shown in the sectional drawing; the seats rest on 'pillars' which also traverse them.

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The temple rises from a high socle (adhiṣṭhāna) and has steps in the East. Below the solid Adhiṣṭhāna is the broad terrace which supports the temples of Kandarīya, Mahādeva and Jagadambā Devī (Pl. I).

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⁶⁴ Jain Temple in Osian; Someśvara Temple in Kiradu, 12th century, etc. The Mūlamañjarī or main Śikhara exceeds by 3/10 parts of the height of the Śikhara, the portion (7/10 parts of the height of the Śikhara) occupied by the Uromañjarīs ('Bṛhacchilpaśāstra', III. So).

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⁶⁵ The 'Four sided' temple of the 'Bṛhat Saṃhitā', LV, having 5 Aṇḍas appears to have had 4 Uromañjarīs massed around its Mūlamañjarī (see Part VII). The Sukanāsā of Type IIA, as a rule, has the outline of a triangular pediment and not of a Gavākṣa. It is however filled by a network (jāla) of Gavākṣa tracery; Tilakas or Kūṭas in many cases add their small but solid shapes to this particular Sukanāsā (Pls. I; LXXI). The topmost Gavākṣa, forming the apex of this pediment is an actual small window opening in the Śikhara of the Kandarīya temple. The interior of this Śikhara (Fig. i) is divided into internal chambers bounded by large piers and having for their floor and ceiling transverse stone beams. The single, dark, room like, corbelled cavities may be entered by an invisible opening above the Antarabhitti, the inner wall of the Prāsāda (see Part VII), whence the stalagmitic interior of the superstructure may be traversed in all directions. It served however no part of the cult and was not meant to be seen. It is built on the principle of the horizontal tie-plate.

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In the temples of Orissa, there are four such horizontal courses only, those of the ceiling (garbha muda) and shoulder-course (ratna muda); between these are the Balimuda and Lakhi muda; these are invisible from outside. Below the Ratnamuda, a small rectangular window opening admits some air and light into the interior of the 'gaṇḍi', the trunk of the Śikhara.

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to open. Far from imitating forms of nature, such as volutes, stems, foliage or flowers, it was made in conformity with the energies active in producing those forms. Repeated in proportionate reductions, the Śṛṅgas, together with the symbols carved on them, integrally belong to the whole Śikhara and with it lead towards the highest point of the temple. The Tabernacle of bamboo, leaves or bended branches translated into brick or stone was elaborated and amplified logically in accordance with the energies of form inherent in its pristine shape.

IIB. The Śikhara Enmeshed in Gavākṣas

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The curvilinear Śikhara II[B] described already in an earlier connection (Fig. d) has been seen on the temples of the Kanarese country, of the seventh century and prior to it. The same type prevails in Orissa from the eighth century and is also frequent in the Decan⁶⁶, in Rajputana (Pl. LXXI), Central India and as far north as the Western Himalayas. Its surfaces, in continuation of the theme of the perpendicular walls of the Prāsāda, are made up in every instance of the central buttress and those at the corner; between these may be added two or four intermediate buttresses. The several buttresses appear as graded planes on the body of the Śikhara; they function each as a pattern unit. The theme of the corner buttresses of the Śikhara remains one and the same throughout the centuries and in all the countries. It can always be recognised as consisting of horizontal units, called Bhūmi, each of which represents the trunk of a miniature Śikhara with its Āmalaka. Such a miniature Śikhara may consist of one or two courses only below its Āmalaka as in Aihole (Fig. d), or it may comprise six courses, as on the Liṅgarāja temple in Bhuvaneśvar. Each course represents the eaves of a roof. These miniature Śikharas are strung together to form the vertically extended corner-buttress, the edge of the total⁶⁷ Śikhara; according to the shape of the total Śikhara and the height at which a small Śikhara is placed, it will be curvilinear or it will appear straight (Pl. LXXI). The horizontal courses give solidity to the soaring movement of the superstructure.

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⁶⁶ At Anjaneri near Nasik; Cousens, op. cit. Pl. LVIII (Temple No. 7).

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⁶⁷ It is called Koṇaka-pāga in Orissa.

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The inner buttresses of each side show, according to the chronological sequence of the temples the single strata or cornices with their ‘attic windows’ either as separate motives or as increasingly connected amongst themselves by the ‘gavākṣas’ or attic windows forming a tracery which is cast like a net (jāla) over them, at first veiling two or three such strata and finally covering the entire length of the Śikhara offset. The body of the Śikhara enmeshed in it, clasped by a creeper (latā), shows by its lateral indentations only the strata themselves, the original roof-edges. Such ‘overgrown’ buttresses are therefore called Latinā, in Vāstu-śāstra. They are one with the tracery of the ‘creeper’, the Latā, that covers each of them. Its unit always remains the curvilinear Gavākṣa.⁶⁸

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⁶⁸ Coomaraswamy, ‘Early Indian Architecture: III’, in ‘Eastern Art’, vol. III, Figs. 57-78, shows various uses of the Gavākṣa motif and its repetition, sectioning and reductions in various

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This, the most widely diffused type of the curvilinear Śikhara, is an amalgam of two constituent shapes. The one, it has been shown already, was the nucleus of the type called IIA. There it formed not only the root-Śikhara but also the model of all the multiple and lateral issues of this type. The Tabernacle formed of branches curving towards the point in which they are gathered is its perennial prototype.

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The other constituent of Śikhara II[B] is the straight trunk of the superstructure in its pyramidal forms such as has been discussed in different stages and types (Figs. a-c). Both the curvilinear Śikhara as also the pyramidal superstructure were built not only in the earlier centuries at one and the same place, in Mahākūṭa and Aihole or in Satvel, Kurnool, in the Deccan, but—by the side of each other—also in the Western Himalayas, in Dvarahat, Almora.⁶⁹

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⁶⁹ ASIAR, 1924-25, Pl. III. Temples of the Maniyan group. ⁷⁰ See however, Coomaraswamy, HIIA, p.

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The close connection of type II[B] with IA.2 has been shown already. The curvilinear form of this type II[B] however is not in any way derived from the pyramidal shape.⁷⁰ It presupposes a curvilinear prototype, the Tabernacle of leaves, bamboo or branches. The Bhūmis—indicated at the corners along the edge of the Śikhara—do not belong to the Tabernacle prototype.

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The curvilinear Śikhara II[B], its edges beset with several Bhūmis, each marked by an Āmalaka crowning the horizontal strata, and itself a miniature Śikhara, is a complex shape; in it the general shape of the Tabernacle comprises parts such as contributed also to the pyramidal trunk of type IA. These are the strata whose contours were assimilated to roof shapes of current types of buildings. Together with their windows they were combined and subordinated to the Āmalaka which gathers and crowns their shapes into one unit, one miniature Śikhara; strung together they are as many as the Prāsāda has Bhūmis in its superstructure. The principle of repetition is seen here applied in the vertical; garlands of closely set miniature Śikharas rise on the arched edges of the Śikhara, type II[B].

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This theme had also become incorporated in the Śikhara type IIA; there, however the web of Gavākṣas is subdued in its effect and altogether ‘overshadowed’ by the powerful proliferations of the Uromañjaris on the sides of the major Śikharas where they form slabs and slices of masonry, compact petal shapes with minor volumes of miniature Śikharas, etc., filling the corners.

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Proliferation in the four or eight directions of space and on various levels is the generative principle of the Śikhara IIA. Superimposition of repeated units,

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Gavākṣa patterns; cf. Part VIII. Pl. XLVI, etc.—Gavākṣa defined as Gonetra or “Bull's eye”, designates also the unit of the pattern of the Jālaka or perforated screen, etc., on South Indian temples. Six varieties are described in the ‘Śilparatna’, XXIV. 9-10; ‘Kaśyapaśilpa’, XI.

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The Orissan variety of the Rekhā temple of the “Nāgara” class (see Part VII) would thus most perfectly be a Latinā temple. This particular variety is not confined to Orissa only, but is also represented in Mayurbhañj, Bengal and Assam in local versions. The ‘Bṛhacchilpa-śāstra’ (Part III, ch. XI. 503), more concise than the ‘Samarāṅgaṇasūtradhāra’ in this case, defines Latinā as ‘Nāgara with one Śṛṅga’ and in Part III. ch. V. 71, assigns Latinā to Gauḍa and Kāmarūpa, i.e. to Bengal, and Assam, where this variety of the Rekhā temple had found general acceptance.

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⁸³ No amount of the compression of miniature straight shapes can produce a curve of the total shape.

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however, as especially seen in II[B] is not particular to the curvilinear Śikhara only. Stūpa shapes, for example, were similarly super-imposed in towering structures.⁷¹ The vertical series of miniature Śikharas, indicative of Bhūmis or levels, is subsumed in type II[B] in the total Śikhara or Tabernacle. The series of small Śikharas is not only completely integrated in its curvilinear edge; they are proportionately part of its height, which they build up in an arithmetical progression, most frequently (S.S. LXIII).

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⁷¹ Coomaraswamy, ib., Pl. XIX. Fig. 69A. The convex curve of the Śikhara known from the sixth century onwards may be contrasted with the concave outline of South Indian gate towers or Gopuras of about 1700 A.D. The latter outline may be seen against those of the roofs of South Indian houses, especially on the Malabar Coast. Their bamboo frame is bent concavely.

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The edge of the Tabernacle in extant stone temple II[B] is not however always beset with the symbolic-architectural detail of miniature Śikharas forming the Bhūmis. In some of the subsidiary shrines around the Liṅgarāja Temple in Bhuvaneśvar, Orissa, the Śikhara with its offsets is otherwise without any complexities; in some of the later West Himālayan temples the one central buttress is flanked by lateral walls as plain as it is itself but for some widely spaced courses of narrow Āmalaka shapes which demarcate the Bhūmis. Such retrogressions in varying degrees towards the original shape of the Tabernacle, prove the leading importance of its total curvilinear shape and the accessory role filled by the various smaller devices all of which are either its replicas on a smaller scale or of parts of it.

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The temples in which the ascent is continued in one theme from the walls of the Prāsāda to the shoulder course of the Śikhara are called Latinā in Vāstu Śāstra. The Latās or single offsets of the Śikhara each with its web of ‘sunray windows’ or Gavākṣas carry the vertical movement steadily upwards. Its urge and also its assurance rest on the curved walls of the Śikhara. Between the several offsets are recessed chases (jalāntara); their shadows outline the verticality of this Śikhara while they also add tone and enliven the many horizontal mouldings which are carried in tiers across the facets and the recessed chases. Between these horizontal mouldings run narrow but deep, horizontal bands of shadows. With their dark lines they clasp the entire volume of the Śikhara. Over it is cast the trellis of point like openings of the Gavākṣas; light and shade thus become part of the texture of this Śikhara.

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This form of the curvilinear Śikhara has been particularly perfected in Orissa;⁷² the coherence of its monumental shape is enriched by carvings; nowhere else in India are the walls of the temple as intimately connected with their sculptures. As the offsets project one from the other so also do their outermost planes show their carved patterns in more than one surface of interlaced scrolls; these fill the panels that form the background of the images of the gods. The temple here is a work of monumental sculpture of which the single carvings form the intricate surface. They are contiguous and unbroken by large openings such as those of windows, etc. These, where present in Maṇḍapas, are screened with sculptured compositions.,

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⁷² The various shapes which contributed to the Orissan temples have their models carved on the walls of the Liṅgarāja and Brahmeśvara temples specially and also on the Citragupteśvara and other of the later temples in Orissa. The stringing of Śṛṅgas on some of the ‘lesser’ Latās or ‘Pāgas’, as they are called there (anuratha pāga), of the temple is a sign of an assimilation by this school of sequences of form which belong to the architecture of central and western India.

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The closed volume of an Orissan temple consists of the Prāsāda and its Maṇḍapa; the former is the Rekhā or Baṛa Deul and the latter is the Piṛhā Deul; its superstructure is pyramidal, it represents type IA. In its fully evolved shape it is crowned by an Āmalaka above a Ghaṇṭā (bell-shape). The two shapes of the superstructure, the curvilinear Śikhara II[B] and the pyramidal Śikhara IA here conjointly, each by the side of the other, form the perfect shape of the Orissan temple, the lower Piṛhā Deul being subordinated to the higher Baṛa Deul in proportionate measurement of which the width of the Prāsāda is the module.⁷³ The balance of these two contrasted superstructures, a closely knit unity of Prāsāda or Baṛa Deul and Maṇḍapa or Piṛhā Deul, is peculiar to Orissa. In the other provinces the superstructures of the Maṇḍapas prepare and defer the climax of the Śikhara of the Prāsāda (Pl. I).

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⁷³ Baṛa Deul and Piṛhā Deul retain the completeness of their shapes, the former is without the connecting projection of the Śukanāsā; it is outlined against the sky in the integrity of its ascending curve, and is separated from the sloping outline of the Piṛhā Deul by a deep incision. In it the shapes of lions (siṃha) jump forth, the one from the ‘Rekhā’, the other from the Piṛhā Deul, they form the sculptural link between Baṛa Deul and Piṛhā Deul.

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Multiform and lending itself to the widest variations however is the clustered Śikhara (IIA). Its Uromañjarīs widen the base of the total superstructure. It is thus specially suitable for Sāndhāra Prāsādas—having an inner ambulatory and projecting Bhadras or buttresses in the middle of the sides (Figs. in Part VII). Bhadra, Śālā, and in addition also Catuṣkikā, an open pillared balcony, can thus be added one upon the other, leading to a further progression and extension of the cruciform plan; while in the vertical direction their digression is gathered up by the Uromañjarīs as they lean against the central body of the Mūlamañjarī. The perpendicular walls are frequently broken by balconied openings in the cardinal directions and deep shadows cut into the body of the temple, while flat surfaces, instead of the mellow graded shades of the Orissan scroll work are a frequent accompaniment and background to the images on these temples.⁷⁴ Altogether these temples are greater in the tension of their units, different in size and power and competing in the same direction; some acquire their full stature, however small, at a low level, while the high road along the central face of the innermost Śikhara is punctuated by the simultaneous rising of several forms of varied surge, to different heights.

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⁷⁴ The architectural contrast of dark expanses of shadow and flat wall surfaces in the light has its equivalent in paintings whose quality lies in the juxtaposition of coloured surfaces (cf. ‘A Painted Ceiling’, JISOA, vol. VII, Pl. XVIII, at Madanpur, in Central India; and the Western school of Indian painting).

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In Rajputana, Osian, etc. the Śikhara is closely related to the Orissa type. The logic of form of the entire temple however is absent. There, open pillared halls are an airy prelude but detract from the grandeur of the closed mass of an Orissan temple, however small its actual dimensions may be.

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In plan, the Orissan temples are more closely related to the scheme ‘Prāsāda Kṣitibhūṣaṇa’ (Part VII) than to the more richly differentiated shapes.

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Here too, the Maṇḍapa or Maṇḍapas, each with a superstructure of its own, are fused with the Prāsāda in one plan; their separate superstructures indicating their number and original separateness (Fig. i, p. 212). They are graded in their slow ascent towards the Mūlamañjarī of the Prāsāda. The superstructures of the Maṇḍapas, though they also as in Orissa belong to the pyramidal type (IA) are assimilated (Fig. i) to the curves of the Śikhara of the Prāsāda.⁷⁵

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⁷⁵ To the Gujarat variety of this type of temple are added a Gūḍha and Sabhā Maṇḍapa, the former closed, as the name implies and one in plan with the Prāsāda proper; in front of the Sabhā Maṇḍapa is an open pillared hall which, as in the Sūrya temple at Modhera, is a separate structure.

IIC. The Composite Śikhara

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Composed of elements of both the ‘overspun’ (IIB) and the ‘clustered’ (IIA) varieties is a third (IIC) type of the Śikhara (Pl. XLIII). Its central offset is carried on in continuation of the buttress of the perpendicular wall; the curve of this projection, covered with the web of ray-windows (gavākṣa), springs from the base of the Śukanāsā. Kept in shape by these offsets on its four sides, the breadth of the segments of this Śikhara is set with horizontal rows of miniature Śikharas alternating with cubical ‘Kūṭas’; these demarcate the storeys of this least ingenuous, and composite, form of the curvilinear Śikhara (Pl. XLV). It belongs to central India and the Deccan; there however the segments frequently are straight rather than curved faces and the four buttresses appear flung upwards like high, independent arches.⁷⁶ On the central Indian temples however with the uniformly curved Śikhara, the horizontal rows of Śṛṅgas and Kūṭas, far from producing a storeyed effect, appear as so many gigantic beaded garlands thrown up towards the neck (grīvā) of the Śikhara. The shadows in the vertical chases keep the single rows more deeply apart than the half shadows lingering over the slightly receding Kūṭas which alternate with the shapes rounded forth in broad light.

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⁷⁶ Cousens, ‘Mediaeval Temples of the Dakhan’ op. cit. Plates, passim. Essentially however there is no difference in type between a temple like the Nīlakaṇṭheśvara at Udayapur of the 11th century (Gwalior; Pl. XLIII) and the temple at Jhodga, Nasik (Cousens, ib. Pl. LIII), although in plan the Udayapur temple is stellate, of the ‘Bhūmija’ variety (S.S. LXV), its buttresses and vertical rows of Śṛṅgas being placed on edge, and not parallel with the main buttresses. Kūṭas flank also the central Latā, in Jhodga, a peculiarity due to its more ‘southern’ geographical position.

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The straightening of the curve of the Śikhara, in the Deccan temples, is an assimilation of the Śikhara to the preference in the more southern parts of India for the pyramidal shape, which is the leading shape of a South Indian temple. This is not only a special feature of the ‘composite’ Śikhara (IIC) just described but also of the Śikhara (IIB) in the Deccan and can best be seen in the Pañcāyatana temple of Goṇḍeśvara at Sinnar.⁷⁷

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⁷⁷ Cousens, ib. Pls. XLIII-XLIV.

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The third or ‘composite’ main variety of the curvilinear superstructure (IIC) is neither overspun by the web of Gavākṣas (IIB) nor is it shaped by a central impulse and its proliferating activity (IIA). While it combines elements of both it loses the cogency of either form. In principle, though not in quantity, type II[B] is its more powerful component.

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Highly flung central offsets overshoot the body of the Śikhara and reach up to the Āmalaka. They terminate as a kind of flying buttresses, disembodied and carrying no weight. On some temples, especially in the Deccan,⁷⁸ they secede from the body of the Śikhara not only at the top; the buttresses, in the four directions, project from the body of the Śikhara like gigantic ribs witnessing a process of disintegrating form; their curved shapes are reminiscent of the bended branches of the Tabernacle.

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⁷⁸ Ib. Pls. LXVIII, LXX, XCII.

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