Page:History of Indian and Eastern Architecture Vol 1.djvu/452

 400 DRAVIDIAN STYLE. BOOK III. the curved form was devised to secure a flat rest on the wall and at the same time that the wall or roof above might have a flat plate on which to rest : and besides the outward curve afforded a better opportunity for supporting it upon brackets. The loss of the earlier structures that would have made all this clear is largely due to the Muhammadan raids in the beginning of the I4th century, when these iconoclasts spared no shrine they found on their marches. What escaped them was either " restored " beyond recognition by zealous Hindu princes and temple builders, or is now in the innermost enclosures, inaccessible to any European capable of judging of their style and age. The few old shrines at Conjivaram, noticed above, and some scattered and neglected ruins do remain, and are very instructive ; the desideratum is that adequate surveys of them are so slow in being published. VlJAYANAGAR. The dates above quoted will no doubt sound strange and prosaic to those who are accustomed to listen to the childish exaggerations of the Brahmans in speaking of the age of their temples. There is, however, luckily a test besides the evidence above quoted, which, if it could be perfectly applied, would settle the question at once. When in the beginning of the I4th century the Muham- madans from Delhi first made their power seriously felt in the south, they struck down the kingdom of the Hoysala Ballalas in 1310, and destroyed their capital of Halebid ; and in 1322 Orangal or Worangal, which had been previously attacked, was finally destroyed, and it is said they then carried their victorious arms as far as Ramnad. The Muhammadans did not, however, at that time make any permanent settlement in the south, and the consequence was, that as soon as the Hindus were able to recover from the panic, Bukka and Harihara princes it is said of the deposed house of Orangal, gathered around them the remnants of the destroyed states, and founded a new state in the town of Vijayanagar on the Tungabhadra. An earlier city it is said had been founded there about the beginning of the I2th century, but only as a dependency of the Mysore Raj, and there is consequently no reason for supposing that any of the buildings in the city (unless it be some of the small Jaina temples), belong to that period, nor indeed till the new dynasty founded by Bukka had consolidated its power, which was certainly not before the middle of the 1 4th century.