Page:History of Indian and Eastern Architecture Vol 1.djvu/179

 CHAP. V. KARLE. 145 aisles ; each pillar has a tall base, an octagonal shaft, and richly ornamented capital, on the inner front of which kneel two elephants, each bearing two figures, generally a man and a woman, but sometimes two females, all very much better executed than such ornaments usually are ; behind are horses and tigers, each bearing a single figure. 1 The seven pillars behind the altar are plain octagonal piers, without either base or capital, and the four under the entrance gallery differ con- siderably from those at the sides. The sculptures on the capitals supply the place usually occupied by frieze and cornice in Grecian architecture; and in other examples plain painted surfaces occupy the same space. Above this springs the roof, semicircular in general section, but somewhat stilted at the sides, so as to make its height greater than the semi-diameter. It is ornamented even at this day by a series of wooden ribs, probably coeval with the excavation, which prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that the roof is not a copy of a masonry arch, but of some sort of timber construction which we cannot now very well understand. Immediately under the semidome of the apse, and nearly where the altar stands in Christian churches, is placed the Dagaba, in this instance a plain dome, on a two-storeyed circular drum, the upper margins of each section being carved with rail ornaments (Woodcut No. 70). Just under the lower of these are holes or mortices for woodwork, which may have been adorned with hangings, which some of the sculptured representations would lead us to suppose was the usual mode of ornamenting these altars. It is surmounted by a capital or Tee, the base of which is similar to the one shown on Woodcut No. 15, and on this still stand the remains of an umbrella in wood, some- what decayed and distorted by age. This canopy was circular and minutely carved on the under surface. 2 Opposite this is the entrance, consisting of three doorways under a gallery exactly corresponding with our roodloft, one lead- ing to the centre, and one to each of the side-aisles ; and over the gallery the whole end of the hall is open, as in all these chaitya halls, forming one great window, through which all the light is admitted. This great window is formed in the shape of a horseshoe, and exactly resembles those used as ornaments on the facade of this cave, as well as on those of Bhaja, Bedsa, and at Nasik described above, and which are met with everywhere at this age. Within the arch is a frame- Drawings of some of the pillars are Western India,' vol. iv. plate 13. given in ' Cave Temples of India,' plates ! ' Cave Temples of India,' p. 235, and 12 and 14, and ' Archaeological Survey of VOL. I. plate 13.