Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan, or the Central and Western Rajput States of India v3.c43.t1.421

v3.c43.t1.421

Next to, and communicating by a passage with, this hall of the Jain pontiffs, is the most extensive excavation of Dhamnar, locally designated as "Bhim's Bazar."¹ The extreme length of this excavation is about a hundred feet, and the breadth eighty. Although the name of this leader of the Pandus designates every subdivision of this cave, yet everything is Buddhist. The main apartment is that called Bhim's armoury or treasury, the entrance to which is through a vestibule, about twenty feet square, supported by two columns, and having four lateral semicircular niches, now empty, but probably intended for statues : this opens to the armoury, which is a vaulted apartment, about thirty feet by fifteen, having at the further end a dagoba, supporting the roof. These singularly formed columns, if we may so term them, are named after their sacred mounts ; and this is called Sumeru, which being sacred to Adinath, the first pontiff, we may conclude he was here adored. An extensive piazza, full twenty feet wide, evidently a Dharamsala for the pilgrims, runs round this apartment, supported by rows of massive square columns, all cut out of the rock ; and again, on the exterior, are numerous square cells, called the apartments of the Srawaks, or Jain laity ; in one of which there is a supporting dagoba, and in another two statues of the twenty-third pontiff, Parsva. A part of the vaulted roof of Bhim's treasury, as it is called, has fallen in so that the vault of heaven is seen through the aperture of the mountain. This is also attributed to Kaurava Chor (thief), whose statue appears on the pinnacle of the temple of Barolli, indicating the old enemy of [725] the Pandus, who robbed them of their kingdom. Close to the armoury is an apartment called the Rajloka, or for the ladies ; but here tradition is at fault, since with the exception of Kunti, the mother, Draupadi alone shared the exile of the Pandavas.