The Early History of the Deccan (Parts I–XI) v2.c16.20

Language: English

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Now studying the monuments themselves, we may note that although some archaeologists have connected the style of the rock-hewn shrines of the Deccan with the architecture of the rock-hewn tombs of Egypt and Persia, yet the idea of dwelling in caves, in the primitive period for personal safety and later, in a stage of intellectual and spiritual advancement, for contemplation and enlightenment, has been inherent in man in the East as well as in the West. The natural caverns may have acquired sanctity as the abode of *rishis*, for whose comfort their devoted disciples may have removed the irregular features of the habitats of such pious *gurus* by dressing the walls and ceilings and levelling the floors. This process would have developed in course of time and a conventional style arisen of building shrines and replicas of tombs (*stūpas*) by cutting the rock. The cave temples of the Deccan are therefore indigenous in regard both to their origin and to their development and their architecture seems to have been copied from earlier, or contemporary, wooden or brick and stone structures. The influence of wood architecture is apparent not only in the shape of the pillars and their inward inclination,¹ but also in the presence of semi-circular rafters of wood in the ceilings of the early *chaitya*-caves at Kārle, Kondāṇe, and Ajanta, which are actually redundant in rock-hewn shrines but would have been an essential feature of the ceiling of a wooden building.

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Similarly, the beams and rafters of the *vihāra*-cave at Kondāṇe clearly show that they have been copied from the flat ceilings of structures built of bricks or of stone. Bricks of large size and of strong texture were made in the Deccan from quite early times, and in the excavations at Ajanta the bricks found at the base of the façade of cave X probably date from the second century B.C., for the inscription referring to the construction of the façade is in second century B.C. characters.² During the period extending from the first to the third centuries B.C., or going still farther back, the use of bricks for walls seems to have been quite common in the Deccan for both religious and secular buildings. Similarly, flat ceilings resting on wooden beams also came into vogue, although the majority of the dwellings were wooden structures with barrel-shaped or circular roofs. Some of these houses were of more than one story, and had, as we have noticed above, balconies and latticed windows opening on the front of the building. The bulk of the population lived in huts built of mud walls and straw roofs such as are seen in the villages today.

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The style of architecture, as shown by the archaeological monuments, or as represented in the early paintings of Ajanta, or the sculpture of the Buddhist caves, indicates no foreign influence as far as can be seen, except for the apsidal form of the *chaityas*, which bears a striking resemblance to the plans of the Roman basilicas, or to the still earlier Phoenician temples of Malta, although the latter have a semi-circular projection at both ends in the length of the structure. The Ka'ba, which according to the Muslim tradition was built by Abraham, has an apsidal extension at one end, called at the present time the *Hatim*. In studying the old Phoenician temples one notices that the square or rectangular part of the building was meant for housing the images of gods, and the semi-circular or circular projections were sacrificial pits for holding offerings to deities. Phoenicians were expert builders and wood-carvers in King David’s time, and he invited a party of Phoenician artisans to assist him in building the temple at Jerusalem.¹ Phoenicians were also great sea-traders, and references in the Old Testament to gold, spices, and peacocks, which are specially associated with the western coast of India, indicate that there was some sea-borne trade between the western part of the Deccan and the western Asiatic countries.

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There is thus some possibility that the apsidal plan of the house of God of the Phoenicians was copied in India as it was at Mecca, which was situated in the middle of the caravan route from Palestine to the Yemen. The form may indeed have sprung up independently here, for the offering of sacrifices would have required at the beginning a circular pit, which at a later period might have become a conventional form for the altar. But against the latter view are the facts that the apsidal form of the temples disappeared from India with the waning of the Buddhist religion, and that except in the case of one or two temples in South India this plan is not to be noticed among Brāhmanic temples elsewhere. The offering of sacrifices to gods was an essential feature of the Brāhmanic faith from the beginning, and if the apsidal form of temples had originated and developed in the Deccan or in India, it would not have been given up on the extinction of the Buddhist religion.