Page:A Handbook of Indian Art.djvu/96

52 Buddhist Church is revealed in the oldest group of monastic halls, Nos. XIII, XII, XI, and VIII, including the stūpa-houses IX and X, with their entrances north or north-east to exclude the sunlight, their plain octagonal pillars and the restraint in decoration characteristic of the Hīnayāna school. The second to the fifth centuries of the Christian era are represented by the adjacent group including the monasteries numbered XIV and XVIII and the splendid stūpa-house XIX. These occupy the centre of the crescent. On the western tip of the crescent are the monastic halls numbered I to VI, most of which belong to the seventh century; and on the other extremity of the bow, with their entrances turned towards the setting sun—the Saiva aspect—are the colleges numbered XX to XXV and the great stūpa-house XXVI, the last of the series. The architectural history of Ajantā thus begins about the same time as the Kārlē stūpa-house, and concludes with the death of the Emperor Harsha, the great patron of Mahāyana Buddhism, near the middle of the seventh century.

Possibly the Saiva movement which began in Southern India in the sixth century influenced the latest phase of architectural ritual at Ajantā.

Comparing the finest Assembly-halls—the Chapter-houses of the abbey of Ajantā—with that of Kārlē, it is not surprising to find that the distance of seven centuries which separates them has brought about a great change in Buddhist art and architecture. The Devas of Vedic India who looked down from the massive pillars of the Sangha of Kārlē have disappeared. Some of the principal motives of early Buddhist art, such as the Vedic railing, are missing; others, like the "Persepolitan" capital, are altered almost past recognition or reduced to mere accessories. The stūpa, from