Page:History of Indian and Eastern Architecture Vol 2.djvu/115

CHAP. I. INTRODUCTORY. who adopted this style, they are ten times more frequent in Gujarat, Rajputana and the A valley of the Narbada than in the valley of the Ganges, or in Aryavarta, properly so called. The first and most obvious explanation of this fact must be that the last-named country has for 600 years been occupied by a Muhammadan empire, and they, hating idolatry and idol temples, have destroyed them wherever they were so absolutely in possession of the country as to be able to do so with impunity. My impression, however, is that it does not correctly represent the whole state of the case. That the Moslims did ruthlessly destroy Jaina and Hindu temples at Ajmir, Delhi, Kanauj, and elsewhere in northern India, is quite true, but it was, partly at least, because their columns served so admirably for the construction of their mosques. The astylar temples of the followers of Siva or Vishnu could have served principally as quarries, and stones that had been previously used in Hindu temples have not been traced to a large extent in Moslim buildings. But admitting that at Delhi or Allahabad, or any of their northern capitals, all Hindu buildings have been utilised, this hardly would have been supposed the case at such a provincial capital as Faizabad, once Ayodhya, the celebrated capital of Da^aratha, the father of Rama the hero of the Ramayana, but where little besides a few pillars in Babar's mosque can be discovered that belongs to any ancient building. 1 The most crucial instance, however, is the city of Benares, so long the sacred city, par excellence, of the Hindus, yet, so far as is known, no vestige of an ancient Hindu temple exists within its present precincts. James Prinsep resided there for ten years, and Major Kittoe, who had a keener eye than even his great master for an architectural form, lived long there as an archaeologist and architect. They drew and measured every- thing, yet neither of them ever thought that they had found anything that was ancient ; and it was not till Messrs. Home and Sherring 2 started the theory that the buildings around the Bakanya Kund were ancient Buddhist or Hindu remains, that any one had discovered any traces of antiquity in that city. But the buildings about the Bakanya Kund were erected by 1 'Gazetteer of Oudh' (1877), vol. i. p. 7. Salar Mas'ud Ghazi, the nephew of Mahmud of Ghazni, passed through Ayodhya in 1033, and would hardly have failed to display his iconoclastic zeal. Gen. Cunningham attempts to identify the various mounds at this place with those described as existing in S&keta by the Buddhist Pilgrims. 'Ancient Geography of India,' pp. 401 et seqq. ; ' Archaeological Reports,' vol. i. pp. 293 et seqq. The truth of the matter, how- ever, is, that neither Fah Hian nor Hiuen Tsiang were ever near the place. The city they visited, and where the Tooth- brush-tree grew, has not been identified. 2 ' Sacred City of the Hindus,' London, 1868, pp. 271 et seqq. ; 'Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal,' vol. xxxiv pp. I et seqq.