The Antiquities of Orissa v1.c7.380

v1.c7.380

It should be observed also that the classification here adopted is not recognised in old Sanskrit works on architecture. They all treat of the subject as one whole without any reference to sects and nationalities. The treatise of Maya, the Dānava, does not, in this respect, differ from that of Viśvakarmā, the architect of the gods. The differences of the two authors refer to [25] details and modes of treatment, and not to general principles, which are alike in all. For instance, the *Mānasāra*, an elaborate treatise on architecture of an early date, alludes to the peculiarities of Buddhist and Jaina images, and the different modes of placing them in temples; but the rules of building and proportion are the same in it as in the *Maya Śilpa*. It should be added, however, that when the different works whose names have already been met with are all discovered, and carefully examined, and compared with the detached notices which occur in the Purāṇas, the Tantras, and other works, the public will be in a better position than now to arrive at a positive opinion on the subject. Of works principally devoted to architecture, Rām Rāz notices the following : viz., 1. *Mānasāra*; 2. *Mayamata*; 3. *Kāśyapa*; 4. *Vayghānasa*; 5. *Sakalādhikāra*; 6. *Viśvakarmīya*; 7. *Sanatkumāra*; 8. *Sārasvatyam*. Of these different works he had considerable portions of the first four, and a few detached chapters of each of the rest. The Library of the Asiatic Society of Bengal contains a MS. of the first, but it does not correspond with the text of Rām Rāz in any particular : it extends to forty-six chapters, while that of Rām Rāz comprises fifty-eight, and the topics, though the same, are differently arranged. A manuscript received from Tanjore corresponds in the number of its chapters with the Asiatic Society's MS.; but its chapters are shorter and very corrupt, and the topics are different. It differs from the others also in naming the work *Mānavasāra* instead of *Mānasāra*.