Page:History of Indian and Eastern Architecture Vol 2.djvu/56

 34 JAINA ARCHITECTURE. BOOK V. a small square canopy over the images. 1 From this it would appear that with the Jains, the Mounts Girnar, Satrunjaya, Abu, r 1 281. Plan of Temple of Vastupala. (From a Plan by J. Burgess.) Scale 50 ft. to i in. etc., were not only holy places, but holy things, and that with them as with the Syrians the worship of high places was really a part of their religion. Some of the other temples at Girnar are interesting from their history, and remarkable from fragments of an ancient date that have survived the too constant repairs ; but without illustrating them it would only be tedious to recapitulate their names, or to attempt to describe by words objects which only the practised eye of the Indian antiquary can appreciate. Forty miles south from the hill, however, on the sea-shore, stands the .Saiva temple of Somnath, historically perhaps the most celebrated in India, from the campaign which Mahmud of Ghazni undertook for its destruction in 1025, and the momentous results that campaign had eventually on the fate of India. As will be seen from the annexed plan (Woodcut No. 282) the temple itself never could have been remarkable for its 1 These are the forms in which stupas are now represented by the Jains. vol. ii. p. 170, and plates 33, 34. The Gujarat! Samosan and Prakrit Samo- sarana, Professor Barnett informs me, are represented in Sanskrit by Sama- vasarana " session " or " assize," and in popular language indicates a ' ' meeting place." Cunningham, ' Archaeological Reports,' vol. xi. pp. 170-171. The Samayasarana proper, commemorates the Tirthankara's first sermon, and is thus analogous to Buddha's " turning the wheel of the law," in the Deer Park at Benares.
 * Archaeological Survey of Western India,'