Vastu-shastra (Vol. I: Hindu Science of Architecture; Vol. II: Hindu Canons of Iconography and Painting) v1.c55.16

v1.c55.16

We have already pointed out that the buildings in India had at least three broad categories:—the residential houses for common people and the middle class people, the palaces and other gorgeous and magnificent structures and the temples. Accordingly we have devoted three separate parts to these three distinct architectural traditions of our land. We have already treated, howsoever meagrely, the common residential houses, the Śālā-bhavanas in the previous part. Let us now proceed with the palaces and other gorgeous buildings. In Indian tradition the king was as high as a god. He was considered as the fifth Lokapāla. Accordingly the Vimāna buildings or Prāsādas as treated in the texts like Mānasāra, Mayamata and Śilparatna do not make any distinction between the residences of the ‘Taitilas’, the gods and those of the Bhūdevas and Nṛdevas, the Brāhmaṇas and the kings. This is really a loop-hole in the treatment of House-architecture as has been treated in the aforesaid texts. The North Indian texts like the Samarāṅgaṇa and the Aparājita however are credited to rehabilitate the tradition on proper lines by drawing a line of demarcation between the secular buildings, the residential houses of men including the lords of men, the kings and the gods. Even in the former category, both these texts are univocal in bestowing the separate attention to both the kinds of planning namely the popular residential houses and the abodes of kings and nobles. In India or for the matter of any other ancient country, the kings had very high previleges and positions, in accordance to which, their abodes could never be conceived to be simple structures. The citedals, the castles, the gorgeous mansions, the fortified huge establishments—all these comprised the making of a king’s palace. Later on when times were more peaceful and prosperous, these palaces further ramified into two distinct establishments, the residential-cum-administrative set-ups, the Nivāsa-bhavanāni and the pleasure-palaces, the Vilāsa-bhavānani.