176 



DESCRIPTIVE REMARKS ON 



It is now a mere shell, having been completely gutted of an 

 inner skin or lining of brickwork, of which a few traces remain, 

 and the debris of the bricks and mortar are spread on the shelves 

 of rock to the south and south-west, and at the base of the rock 

 on the west side, amongst which a lingam stone is to be seen, 

 that may once have stood in its shrine. 



This temple is interesting, as it shows the inner and usually 

 concealed side of the outer casing of stone. It displays very 

 rude workmanship, the big stones (running to 6' or 8' long, 

 2' or 3' high, and one or two thick) are quite undressed or 

 squared except on their outer face and edges, but are set up in a 

 hard concrete, in which whole shells were mixed. One peculi- 

 arity is that the masons' splitting holes are rounded or conoidal, 

 whereas they are nowadays made more square or pyramidal. 



The door way is to the west in the centre of a shallow portico- 

 projection ; the jambs of the entrance are formed by two two- 

 armed Dvarapal (warders), who face one another (looking north 

 and south), and lean on their spiked maces. They wear tall caps 

 with big pendent flaps, like others to be seen here on the 

 monoliths and excavations. 



As elsewhere in this locality traces of a coating of plaster over 

 the sculptured portions are to be seen. The four corners of this 

 temple and the north-west and south-west salient angles of the 

 projecting portico on the west side, are adorned by rampant lions, 

 like those at the Shore temple ; the Simha, indeed, is one of the 

 principal sculptured ornaments throughout the " Seven Pagodas," 

 and is common to the monoliths, the excavations, and the 

 structural buildings. 



The temple stands upon a basement of rather uncommon form, 

 The bare rock on which it is laid does not seem to have been level, 

 but the foundation stones have been laid upon it as it was, and 

 a flat surface produced by a course or two of large blocks rudely 

 fitted together and dressed on their outer face and upper 

 surface, so as to give a level surface at from 3' to 5' above 

 the live rock, 30' east-west x 26' north-south. Above this, 

 after a couple of slightly projecting flat courses of small stones, 

 comes a bold projecting cornice of single (convex) curvature 



