Page:The Kama Sutra of Vatsyayana.djvu/11



I. When "Each is Both"—

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II. From the Temple of Surya—

With the exception of Number VI the remainder of the reproductions are of stone sculptures from the Temple to Surya (the Sun-God) at Konarak, a small village on the coast of Orissa, and 19 miles north-east of the city of Puri. All of this temple, except the Jagamohan or Audience Hall, is in unrecoverable ruin. Various suggestions as to why worship in it was given up have been offered. One is founded in a native legend that the priests deserted it after mariners had profaned it by stealing a great lode-stone which rumor had set in the Vimana, (tower over the sanctuary), alleging the lode-stone drew their vessels irresistibly toward the shore. Others have blamed earthquakes, lightning, sinking of the foundations in the sandy soil, etc. And, there is a record in the Temple at Puri of an attempt by invading vandals to destroy it. It is certain that its neglect began in the first half of the 17th Century when the tower, which was 174 feet high, gave way. Its deterioration continued unchecked until the opening of the 20th Century when the British Archaeological Survey came to it. They drove the snakes away, excavated, replaced what they could, cleaned off the overgrowing vegetation, and filled the Audience Hall with stones and sand, their method of preventing its threatened collapse. . . . It is from the Audience Hall that the subjects of these reproductions come. Though the interior was quite