Page:History of Indian and Eastern Architecture Vol 2.djvu/416

 354 FURTHER INDIA. BOOK VIII. exposing the arched construction behind it. An illustration of this can be seen in Plate II. of Yule's work, representing the Temple of Sembyo Koo (Tsulamani), where half of the applied decoration has fallen off the left hand side of the door- way. That which remains on the other side shows arched forms twisted into a variety of curves, which, like those of the window pediments of Nan Paya (Plate XXXIX.), have no con- structional value. The natural head of a niche sunk in the wall should either be a semicircular or pointed arch, but few of the niches in the corridors of the Ananda temple are thus terminated ; they are generally shapeless and in a few cases are quatrolobed. In fact the Burmese would seem to be the only people who, having discovered the constructional value of the arch proper and known how to build it with radiating voussoirs, not only never employed it as a decorative feature, but seemed to be ashamed of its invention, and endeavoured to hide or mask it. In the vaulting over of these corridors, which in the Ananda temple are from 7 to 8 ft. wide, the Burmese builders adopted a semi-pointed barrel vault, the section of which was similar to that of the flying buttress of a cathedral, except that it was rounded off at the top. This vault, which arose from the outer to the inner wall of the corridor, was a much stronger form than that employed by the Romans with their semicircular barrel vaults, though perhaps not of so agreeable a form. The adop- tion of the semi-pointed barrel vault (Woodcut No. 450) lessened the thrust, so that it is not surprising to find that nearly all these vaults exist down to the present day, suffering only from the percolation of rain and the growth of trees and shrubs on the top. Over the central corridors or vestibules of the Ananda temple a pointed arch barrel vault is employed of similar pitch to that shown in the woodcut (No. 453), represent- ing the section of the Thatpyinnyu temple. In a section given by Forchammer of the Dukkantein temple in Mrohaung, the upper chamber has a semicircular barrel vault, but there the walls were of great thickness. It has already been noticed that the roof of all these square temples was as a rule laid direct on the vault ; this was the case with the Lemyet-hna temple already mentioned, and in the Bebe temple, both in Prome, and also in the Patothamya temple in the province of Myingyan, the two latter ascribed to the loth century. The form of these vaults and roofs are shown in Woodcut No. 450. The two most interesting temples of this class are those at Nan Paya and Nagayon just south of Pagan ; the first is con- sidered to have been built by King Anaurahta about 1050 and the second by Kyantsittha in 1064. According to General de