At one time some were inclined to connect this remarkable local distribution with the comparative proximity of the west side of India to the rock-cutting Egyptians and Ethiopians. But the coincidence can be more simply accounted for by the existence in both countries of rocks perfectly adapted to such works. The great cave district of western India is composed of horizontal strata of amygdaloid and other cognate trap formations, generally speaking of very considerable thickness and great uniformity of texture, and possessing besides the advantage that their edges are generally exposed in perfectly perpendicular cliffs. No rock in any part of the world could either be more suited for the purpose or more favourably situated than these formations. They were easily accessible and easily worked. In the rarest possible instances are there any flaws or faults to disturb the uniformity of the design; and, when complete, they afford a perfectly dry temple or abode, singularly uniform in temperature, and more durable than any class of temple found in any other part of the world.
From the time of Asoka, who, two hundred and fifty years before Christ, excavated the first cave at Rajagriha, till the great cataclysm in the 8th century, the series is uninterrupted; and, if properly examined and drawn, the caves would furnish us with a complete religious and artistic history of the greater part of India during ten or eleven centuries, the darkest and most perplexing of her existence. But, although during this long period the practice was common to Buddhists, Hindus, and Jains, it ceased before the Mahomedan conquest. Hardly any excavations have been made or attempted since that period, except, perhaps, some rude Jaina monoliths in the rock at Gualior, and it may be one or two in southern India.
Behar Caves.
As might be expected from what we know of the history of the localities, the oldest caves in India are situated in Behar, in the neighbourhood of Rajagriha, which was the capital of Bengal at the time of the advent of Buddha. There is, indeed, one cave there which claims to be the Satapanni cave, in front of which the first convocation was held B.C. 543. It is, however, only a natural cave very slightly improved by art, and of no architectural importance.
42.
Nigope Cave, Sat Ghurba group.
The most interesting group is situated at a place called Barabar, sixteen miles north of Gaya. One there, called the Karna Chopar, bears an inscription which records the excavation of the cave in the nineteenth year of Asoka (B.C. 245).[137] It is very simple, and, except in a doorway with sloping jambs, has no architectural feature of importance. A second, called the Sudama or Nigope cave ([Woodcut No. 42]), bears an inscription by Asoka in the twelfth year of his reign, the same year in which most of his edicts are dated, 260 or 264 B.C., and, consequently, is the oldest architectural example in India. It consists of two apartments: an outer, 32 ft. 9 in. in length, and 19 ft. 6 in. in breadth, and beyond this a circular apartment, 19 ft. in diameter, in the place usually occupied by the solid dagoba;[138] in front of which the roof hangs down and projects in a manner very much as if it were intended to represent thatch. The most interesting of the group is that called Lomas Rishi, which, though bearing no contemporary inscription, certainly belongs to the same age. The frontispiece is singularly interesting as representing in the rock the form of the structural chaityas of the age. These, as will be seen from the woodcut (No. [43]), were apparently constructed with strong wooden posts, sloping slightly inwards, supporting a longitudinal rafter morticed into their heads, while three small blocks on each side are employed to keep the roof in form. Between the pillars was a framework of wood, which served to support five smaller rafters. Over these lies the roof, apparently formed of three thicknesses of plank, or probably two of timber planks laid reverse ways, and one of metal or some other substance externally. The form of the roof is something of a pointed arch, with a slight ogee point on the summit to form a watershed. The door, like all those of this series, has sloping jambs[139]—a peculiarity arising, as we shall afterwards see, from the lines of the openings following, as in this instance, those of the supports of the roof.
