1835.] Ruins at Chdrdwdr in Assam. 195 



cross-wise upon it ; of these, the eighteen upper ones are in six rows, 

 three of a row, and each in a separate compartment, while the centre 

 figure is much more elevated than its fellows : they represent male 

 and female divinities, twenty inches high; among them I recognized 

 Hanuman. Another image has a fish's tail, and represents, I think, 

 the Maehh Avatar or first incarnation of Vishnu, who is recorded to 

 have appeared in the form of a fish to Satyavruta, to warn 

 him of the great flood. Several other figures are playing on stringed 

 instruments, and the three lower ones are merely busts, with hands 

 elapsed over the breast. The lowest compartment embraces three 

 images, of whom Siva occupies the middle place, and is provided with 

 a venerable flowing beard ; he stands thirty inches high, and on each 

 side of him are females, twenty-six inches high: one has been destroy- 

 ed, but the other is playing on a stringed instrument, and her ears are 

 strung with a pair of enormous circular rings. Over this compart- 

 ment are two groups of dwarf figures, six inches high, in a sedentary 

 posture, and the whole sculpture bears evident marks of having been 

 mutilated by a barbarian hand. 



No quarries were discovered, to indicate that the stones were dis- 

 embowelled from the hills; but quantities of chips were seen in places: 

 and once I came upon pillars and altars in an unfinished state, shaped 

 from blocks of granite, on the surface of the earth ; and there seems 

 no question that all the material employed on the fabrics was similar- 

 ly procured from the masses of rock that cover the hills in great abun- 

 dance. Once or twice only I fell in with well-burnt bricks ; they were 

 smooth and thin, of rather a large size, but not badly shaped. Great 

 part of these extensive ruins are buried or have sunk into the earth, 

 and they cover altogether four or five acres of land. I have 

 been thus particular in noticing them, because there are not, so far 

 as I know, any architectural remains in Assam, that can challenge a 

 comparison with them for durability of material and magnitude of 

 design ; and it is certain, from the prodigious number of ruinous and 

 deserted temples, all of which appear to have been dedicated to Siva, 

 being within the circuit of a few miles of Po?a (I discovered twelve 

 or fifteen in as many days on the hills and highlands at their feet), 

 that this spot must have been the capital of a sovereign Prince, or 

 a principal seat of the Hindu religion, and enjoyed a large share of 

 prosperity at some remote period*. 



* The records of Assam, which I consulted, mention, that Chu Cheng Ph a', the 

 seventeenth sovereign of the Ahom dynasty, in a direct descent from Chu Ka Pha', 

 the conqueror and founder of the kingdom, heing stung with remorse for the 

 c c 2 



