1^6 AN ACCOUNT OF THE SCULPTURES 



The monuments he means to defcribe, appear to be 

 the remains of fome great city, that has been ruined 

 many centuries ago ; they are fituated clofe to the fea, 

 between Cove long and Sadras, fomewhat remote from 

 the high road that leads to the different European fettle- 

 ments. And when he vifited them in 1776, there was 

 fiill a native village adjoining to them, which retained 

 the ancient name, and in which a number of Bramins 

 relided, that feemed perfectly well acquainted with the 

 fubjects of moft of the Sculptures to be feen there. 



The rock, or rather hill of ftone, on which great part 

 of thefe works are executed, is one of the principal 

 marks for mariners as they approach the coafi;, and to 

 them the place is known by the name of the Seven Pa- 

 godas, poffibly becaufe the fummits of the rock have 

 prefented them with that idea as they paffed : but it 

 muft be conferled, that no afpeet which the hill aflumes, 

 as viewed on the fhore, feems at all to authorize this 

 notion; and there are circumftances, which will be 

 mentioned in the fequel, that would lead one to fufpect, 

 that this name has arifen from fome fuch number of Pa- 

 godas that formerly ftood here, and in time have been 

 buried in the waves. But, be that as it may, the ap- 

 pellation by which the natives diftinguim it, is of a 

 quite different origin : in their language, which is the 

 Tamulic, (improperly termed Malabar,) the place is 

 called Mavalipuram, which, in Shanfcrit, and the lan- 

 guages of the more northern Hindoos, would be Mahd- 

 balipur, or the City of the great Bali. For the Tamu- 

 lians, (or Malabars,) having no A in their alphabet, are 

 under a neceffityof fhortening the Shanfcrit word Maha, 

 great, and write it md* They are obliged alfo, for a 

 fimilar reafon, to fubftitute a v for a b, in words of 

 Shanfcrit, or other foreign original, that begin with that 

 letter; and the fyllable am, at the end, is merely a ter- 

 mination, 



* They do indeed admit a substitute, but the abbreviation is 

 most used. 



