22 Ancient Javanese Remains. [No. f, 
the work generally, appeared tome to fall off towards the top, as if the 
builders had wearied of their work. 
Among the architrave ornaments both here, at Mundot, and at 
Brambanan, I observed frequent repetitions of the monstrous grinning 
head, suspending festoons of beads and bells, which is so common in 
ancient Indian buildings from Assam and Benares to Ceylon, and 
which is also so common in the ancient Burmese temples at Pagan> 
probably nearly coeval with Boro Bodor. Mr. Crawfurd on the 
authority of an ambassador of the king of Bali, concludes this to 
represent Siva. But 1 believe this is utterly unfounded. It is, what¬ 
ever the symbol may have meant, (if it meant anything more than 
a lion’s head on a Greek entablature,) one of the most ancient forms of 
ornament in Indian buildings, probably older than the worship of 
Siva. 
The construction of the small dagobas encircling the apex is 
very peculiar. They are hollow cages or lattices of stone, each con¬ 
taining a patient Buddh immured, who is visible through the diamond¬ 
shaped openings in the dome. Each of these openings is formed by 
the apposition of two hour-glass-shaped stones. Each of the stones 
has been cut with tenon and mortice attaching it to its neighbours ; 
and an elaborate system of morticing and dove-tailing appears to run 
through the whole construction, but which has been lamentably 
insufficient to keep the joints together in that volcanic region, 
(Figs. 4, 5). The larger dagoba forming the apex is thoroughly 
shattered, and will not last much longer. It is said to have been 
first opened by the English in ]812. 
Mr. Crawfurd describes the Boro Bodor as being merely a shell of 
masonry round a natural nucleus of hill. Iliad regarded this merely 
as a conjecture. But we found an excavation that had been made 
(lately as it seemed) in the interior of the chief dagoba. And this 
appeared to show that there was no solid nucleus of masonry. The 
sides of the pit appeared to be a rubble of earth and stone only. 
Mr. Eergusson, who gives a good account of the Boro Bodor in his 
Handbook of Architecture, considers it to be a kind of representation 
of the great Buddhist monasteries, which are described in the 
Ceylonese writings as having been many stories high, and as contain¬ 
ing hundreds of cells for monks. In Tennent’s Ceylon (Vol. II. p. 588) 
there is a wood-cut of a singular pyramidal building at Pollanarua, 
