The Antiquities of Orissa v1.c7.366

v1.c7.366

[22] "That the cities of those days consisted, to a great extent, of mud and mat hovels is very possible: they do so still. Benares, Agra, Delhi, even Calcutta, present numerous constructions of the very humblest class; but that they consisted of those exclusively, is contradicted in several places. In one passage (p. 180) the cities of Sambara that have been overturned, are said to have consisted of stone; in another (p. 470) the same cities are indicated by the appellative *dehyaḥ*, the plastered, intimating the use of lime, mortar or stucco; in another we have specified a structure with a thousand columns, which, whether a palace or a temple, must have been something very different from a cottage; and again (p. 288) supplication is put up for a large habitation which could not be intended for a hut; cities with buildings of some pretence must obviously have been no rarities to the authors of the hymns of the *Ṛgveda*."