104 BULLETIN 148, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Architecture is the dominant art of India; sculpture and painting 

 have been chiefly developed as accessories to it. As India is "the land 

 of religions," and the life of its people is in all its aspects governed by 

 religious motives, its art is essentially religious and associated with 

 buildings dedicated to the service of religion. 



None of the architectual and sculptural monuments of importance 

 which survive in India antedates the third century B. C. In the 

 early architecture of India wood was almost exclusively employed. 

 It was about the middle of the third century B.C. that the Buddhists, 

 under King Asoka, who had raised Buddhism to the position of state 

 religion in India, introduced stone as building material for important 

 structures. Many features of Hindu architecture point to the general 

 previous use of wood, being to a large extent imitations of wooden 

 models. 



There does not seem to be any fundamental distinction, from the 

 point of view of art, between a temple devoted to the worship of 

 Vishnu or to that of Siva — ^the two chief gods of the Hindu popula- 

 tion. It is only by observing the images or emblems worshiped, or 

 by reading the mythological stories represented in the sculpture with 

 which the temple is adorned, that the deity to whom it is dedicated 

 can be determined. 



The essential part of every temple is the shrine or cell called vimana^ 

 in which dwells the god with the attendant priest, and the vestibule 

 (antarala), which receives the worshipers, with a preceding porch 

 (jagamahan) . This actual temple is not always the principal element 

 in the composition. It is very often of small dimensions and is over- 

 shadowed by the subsidiary parts, such as courts, gateways, tanks, 

 dwellings for the priests, and numerous other buildings designed for 

 the convenience of the pilgrinis, or for the purpose of producing the 

 impression of mass and dignity. The Hindu temple is not designed 

 to serve as a meeting place of worshipers for the recital of common 

 prayers, or the performance of a public ritual. The Brahman cult 

 is not congregational, but individual. The worshiper walks round 

 the temple a set number of times, alv,'ays with his right side next 

 to it, then enters the fiont chamber, rings a bell to call the attention 

 of the god, presents his offerings of flowers, fruit, rice, etc., either 

 makes a prostration or raises his hands to his forehead, mutters his 

 inaudible short prayer, gets a glimpse of the god, and leaves. 



The general characteristics more or less common to all Hindu 

 styles are the pyramidal stepping of the dominant parts and the 

 placing of temples on platforms or terraces, features which may 

 have been borrowed from Babylonia by way of Persia. The dome 

 is horizontal, taking a form more or less conical or pointed, and its 

 decoration is usually likewise horizontal; that is, the ornaments are 

 ranged in concentric rings, one above the other, instead of being 



