Vastu-shastra (Vol. I: Hindu Science of Architecture; Vol. II: Hindu Canons of Iconography and Painting) v1.c7.6

v1.c7.6

Shri Shukla's thesis is divided into eight parts, the last two of which deal with iconography as associated with sculpture and painting. The first six parts of it treat of such highly interesting topics as 'Town Planning', 'House Architecture', 'Temple Architecture' 'The Construction of Machines', 'The Articles of Household Furniture' etc., with the usual introductory chapters in the beginning and the Appendices in the end. In the last part (VIII)—Appendices), the author includes charts on site plans, road plans and plan of a palace as well as extensive quotations from the text of Samarangana-Sutradhara, subjectwise. In page 14 of his introductory chapter, he has tried to rearrange the chapters of the text (first 48 ones) in a coherent manner, the arrangement of which in the edited text seems to have been faulty. In all this task he has seldom failed to make full use of the contributions of previous authors on Indian architecture and allied subjects in a critical manner, and to substantiate his own conclusions on the basis of proper evaluation of comprehensive data. The author's own contribution has thus been of a very high order, and the award of the Ph.D. degree is the least credit that can be given to him for this type of scientific and conscientious labour.