series of monastic halls or chapels rises in three stories above the cloisters.[1] This was never completed, but the intention was to cut right through to the upper surface of the rock so as to form a skylight in the top story.
The great bathing-tank, which is a striking feature in many other popular Indian shrines (see Pl. XXIII, b), is wanting at Ellora, because the pilgrims performed their necessary ablutions at the water-fall or in the stream which flows at the foot of the hill.
Probably this marvellous temple remained the chief centre of Saiva worship in the Dekhan until the thirteenth century, when the Muhammadans, having conquered the greater part of Hindustan, broke through the great barrier of the Vīndhya mountains and forced the Brahman monks and temple craftsmen to seek the protection of the Hindu courts farther south. But the design of the Kailāsa at Ellora remained for all time the perfect model of a Sivālaya—the temple craftsman's vision of Siva's wondrous palace in His Himālayan glacier, which no mortal can ever reach, where in His Yogi's cell the Lord of the Universe, the Great Magician, controls the cosmic forces by the power of thought; the holy rivers, creating life in the world below, enshrined in His matted locks; Parvati, His other Self—the Universal Mother, watching by His side.
Whenever a Siva temple is found crowned by Vishnu's sikhara, instead of by the pyramidal stūpa-tower, it is either because a Vaishnava temple has been appropriated by the Saiva cult, or because in that temple Siva is worshipped in his Sattvic aspect—i.e., as Vishnu the Preserver. This frequently occurs in Northern India, but it is very rarely the case in the Dravidian or southern country, the great stronghold
- ↑ See Pl. XXVII, on the right.
