1871.] 
The Ruins at Kopari. 
249 
up on tlie edge of a tank, probably for purposes of Bralimanical 
worship; the other two niches are overgrown with trees, an 
ancient tamarind in one, and a still more ancient pipal in the 
other have twisted their roots and stems in and out of the stones 
so as to render restoration impossible. This building I suppose 
to have been the original Buddhist temple, and the altar probably 
sustained an image of Buddha of gigantic size, the mutilated 
remains of which have been set up in the village temple and are 
now worshipped as Baladeva. From this ruin stretches a grove of 
trees on a long ridge, formed evidently artificially, by heaping earth 
on the laterite rock to a height of four or five feet. On the northern 
edge of the grove is an old square stone well hewn through the 
rock and lined with huge cut stones. In the middle of the grove 
is the building marked A, an oblong platform of hewn stone, with 
the capitals of some large pillars lying on and around it. Going 
still westwards over a space encumbered by half-buried debris, we 
come to B, the 1 best preserved portion of the whole. I give a 
sketch of this building from the south. 
It is a long narrow hall with a sort of propykeum on the eastern 
side, surrounded by pillars, most of which are still standing, though 
battered and worn by rain so much that their original design is 
almost untraceable. It can be seen, however, that they were 
octagonal, with a capital consisting of a double round beaded fillet 
as in the marginal illustration. 
To the north of this is a small nearly square tank with steps 
leading down to it, the whole hewn with immense labour through 
the solid rock to a depth of 6 feet, and always full of water even 
in the driest seasons. To the west of the hall just mentioned is 
a scarcely distinguishable small building marked C, whereon are a 
few fallen pillars and capitals. 
The inscription on the back of the image of Mayadevi would 
refer the building in which it was found to the tenth century A. D., 
unless, as is highly probable, the image was dedicated after the 
erection of the temple. The huge size of the stones, some four feet 
long by two or three deep, and the general rudeness of the archi¬ 
tecture, would incline me to place the date of its construction much 
earlier. The grove leading to A, B, and C, with its artificial soil 
32 
