Page:History of Indian and Eastern Architecture Vol 2.djvu/174

 140 NORTHERN OR INDO-ARYAN STYLE. BOOK VI. but the porch, which is three storeys in height, is constructively entire, though its details and principally those of its roof are very much shattered (Woodcut No. 339). An older temple is described by General Cunningham, 1 but, as it was used as a mosque, there is too little of the original structure left to show the character of the design. A mutilated inscription was dated in A.D. 1 108, and several Jaina images were found in the substructure. At the same place there is another, bearing the not very dignified name of the Teli-ka-Mandir, or Oilman's Temple (Woodcut No. 340). It is a square of 60 ft. each way, with a portico on the east projecting about 1 1 ft. Unlike the other temples we have been describing, it does not terminate upwards in a pyramid, nor is it crowned by an amalaka, but in a ridge of about 30 ft. in extent, which may originally have had three amalakas upon it. I cannot help believing that this form of temple was once more common than we now find it. There are several examples of it at Mamallapuram (Woodcut Nos. 185, 193, 194), evidently copied from a form common among the Buddhists, and one very beautiful example is found at Bhuvane^war, 2 there called Kapila Devi, and dedicated to 5iva. The Teli - ka - Mandir was originally dedicated to Vishnu, but there is no inscription or any tradition from which its date can be gathered ; on the whole, however, we may place it about the loth or nth century. 3 KHAJURAHO. As mentioned above, the finest and most extensive group of temples belonging to the Northern or Indo-Aryan style of architecture is that gathered round the great temple at Bhuvane^war. They are also the most interesting historically, inasmuch as their dates extend through four or five centuries, and they alone consequently enable us to bridge over the dark ages of Indian art. From its remote situation, Orissa seems to have escaped, to some extent at least, from the troubles that agitated northern and western India during the Middle Ages ; and though from this cause we have as yet few remains in Central India except the Chaturbhuj rock-temple at Gwaliar, to fill up the gap between Chandravati and Gwaliar, in Orissa the series is complete, and, if properly examined and described, would afford a consecutive history of the style from say 800 to iioo or 1 200 A.D. 1 Cunningham, ut supra, plate 90 and pp. 362, 363. 2 A view of this temple will be found in my ' Picturesque Illustrations of Indian Architecture,' plate 4. 3 Sir L. Griffin, ' Famous Monuments, 1 ut supra, pp. 62-69, an d plate 40.