History of Indian and Eastern Architecture

by James Fergusson

From a very early period in the world’s history a great group of civilized nations existed in Central Asia between the Mediterranean and the Indus. They lived apart, having few relations with their neighbours, except of war and hatred, and served rather to separate than to bring together the Indian and European communities which flourished beyond them on either hand.

Alexander’s great raid was the first attempt to break through this barrier, and to join the East and West by commercial or social interchanges. The steady organisation of the Roman empire succeeded in consolidating what that brilliant conqueror had sketched out. During the permanence of her supremacy the space intervening between India and Europe was bridged over by the order she maintained among the various communities established in Central Asia, and there seemed no reason why the intercourse so established should be interrupted. Unsuspected, however, by the Roman world, two nomade nations, uninfluenced by its civilization, hung on either flank of this great line of communication, ready to avail themselves of any moment of weakness that might occur.

The Arabs, as the most impetuous, and nearest the centre, were the first to break their bounds; and in the course of the 7th century Syria, Persia, Egypt, and the north of Africa became theirs. Spain was conquered, and India nearly shared the same fate. Under Muawiah, the first Khalif of the Ommiahs, two attempts were made to cross the Indus by the southern route—that which the Scythians had successfully followed a short time before. Both these attempts failed, but under Walid, Muhamed Kasim, A.H. 99, did effect a settlement in Scinde. It proved a barren conquest, however; for though a Mahomedan dynasty was established there, it soon became independent of the Khalifat, and eventually died out.

The supremacy of the Khalifat was as brief as it was brilliant. Its hour of greatest glory was about the year A.D. 800, in the reign of Haroun al Rashid. From that time decay set in; and after two centuries more the effeminacy and corruption inherent in Eastern dynasties had so far progressed as to encourage the Northern hordes to move.

During the course of the 11th century the Tartar hordes, who were hitherto only known as shepherds pasturing their herds on the steppes of Northern Asia, first made their appearance south of the Paropamisan range as conquerors; and for six centuries their progress was steadily onwards, till, in the year A.D. 1683, we find the Turks encamped under the walls of Vienna, and the Mogul Aurungzebe lord paramount of the whole of India Proper, while Egypt and all the intervening countries owned the rule of sovereigns of Turanian race.

The architecture of the nations under the Arab Khalifat has already been described, and is of very minor importance.[481] The ruling people were of Semitic race, and had no great taste for architectural magnificence; and unless where they happened to govern a people of another stock, they have left few traces of their art.

With the Northern hordes the case was widely different; they were, without an exception, of Turanian blood, more or less pure, and wherever they went their mosques, and especially their tombs, remain to mark their presence, and to convey an idea of their splendour. In order to understand what follows, it is necessary to bear in mind that the Semitic conquest, from Mecca as a centre, extended from the mouths of the Guadalquivir to those of the Indus, and left but little worthy of remark in architecture. The Turanian conquest, from Bokhara and Balkh as centres, extended from Constantinople to Cuttack, and covered the whole intervening space with monuments of every class. Those of the west and centre have already been described in speaking of Turkey and Persia; the Eastern branch remains to be discussed, and its monuments are those of which this division of the work purports to be a description.

The Saracenic architects showed in India the same pliancy in adopting the styles of the various people among whom they had settled which characterised their practice in the countries already described. It thus happens that in India we have at least twelve or fifteen different styles of Mahomedan architecture: and if an attempt were made to exhaust all the examples, it would be found necessary to enumerate even a greater number. Meanwhile, however, the following thirteen divisions will probably be found sufficient for present purposes:—

1. The first of these is that of Ghazni, which, though not, strictly speaking, in India, had without doubt the most important influence on the Indian styles, and formed in fact the stepping-stone by means of which the architecture of the West was introduced into India, and it long remained the connecting link between the styles of the Eastern and those of the Western world. It would consequently be of the greatest importance in enabling us to understand the early examples of the style in India Proper, if we could describe this one with anything like precision, but for that we must wait till some qualified person visits the province.

2. Next to this comes the Pathan style of northern India (A.D. 1193-1554), spreading over the whole of Upper India, and lasting for about three centuries and a half. After the death, however, of Ala ud-dîn (A.D. 1316) the central power was at times so weak, that the recently conquered outlying provinces were frequently enabled to render themselves independent, and when this was the case, exhibited their individuality everywhere, by inventing a style of architecture expressive of their local peculiarities.