A History of South India from Prehistoric Times to the Fall of Vijayanagar c21.108

c21.108

One of the earliest temples and perhaps the finest in this group is that of Ambarnāth in the Thāna district of Bombay. Erected about 1060 in a delightful situation, by the side of a long deep pool, the temple is covered with intricate decoration of a lavish but tasteful design. The two essential parts of the temple are both set diagonally astride the axis making an attractive plan 90 feet long by 75 feet in width. A series of vertical projections and recesses break up the sides and multiply the shadows and lights. There are three doorways, one on each of the free angles of the assembly-hall. There is much excellent carving in the panels of the ceiling and its shallow domes, but the pillars of the main hall, especially the four columns in the centre, are particularly elaborately decorated with conventional designs and figure subjects. A smaller but beautiful replica of Ambarnāth is found at Balsane in Khandesh in the midst of a number of other temples probably built over a period of more than a century. One of these is almost an exact copy of a rock-cut *vihāra*. The Gondeśvara temple (first half of the twelfth century) at Sinnar (Nāsik district) is a *pañcāyatana*, the main temple being surrounded by four smaller supplementary shrines in the same style, all upon a moulded, stepped platform measuring 125 feet by 95 feet. The main shrine occupies the centre of the platform with a nandi pavilion in front. There is a falling off in the quality of the sculpture which seems to indicate a decline in technique.