Page:History of Indian and Eastern Architecture Vol 1.djvu/474

 ( 420 ) BOOK IV. CHALUKYAN STYLE. CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY. CONTENTS. Chalukyan Architecture Dharwar temples Ittagi Gadag Kuruvatti Dambal Hanamkonda Kirtti Stambhas at Worangal Mysore Temples at Somnathpur and Belur Temples at Halebid. OF the three styles into which Hindu architecture naturally divides itself, the Chalukyan is neither the least extensive nor the least beautiful, but till about sixty years ago, it certainly was the least known. The very name of the people was hardly recognised by early writers on Indian subjects, and the first clear ideas regarding them were put forward, in 1836, in a paper by Sir Walter Elliot, in the fourth volume of the 'Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society.' To this he added another paper, in the twentieth volume of the ' Madras Journal ' : and since then numerous inscriptions of this dynasty and of its allied families have been found and translated, largely by Dr. J. F. Fleet, in the 'Indian Antiquary' and ' Journal of the Bombay Asiatic Society.' From all this we gather that early in the 6th century of our era, this family rose into importance at Badami, about 65 miles south of Bijapur in the Bombay Presidency 1 and spread eastwards as far as the shores of the Bay of Bengal between the mouths of the Krishna and Godavan, establishing the capital of an eastern kingdom at Vengi early in the 7th 1 It is sometimes incorrectly stated that Kalyan, in the Nizam's territory, was their early capital ; but it was not so before the middle of the loth century, and under the later Chalukyas. 'Indian Antiquary,' vol. v. p. 318.