There are in the Western Ghâts in the Bombay Presidency five or six important chaitya caves whose dates can be made out, either from inscriptions, or from internal evidence, with very fair approximate certainty, and all of which were excavated, if I am not very much mistaken, before the Christian Era. The oldest of these is situated at a place called Bhaja, four miles south of the great Karli cave in the Bhore Ghât. There is no inscription upon it, but I have a plan and several photographs. From the woodcut (No. [45]), it will be perceived that it is a chaitya hall of the usual plan, but of no great dimensions, being only 60 ft. from the back of the apse to the mortices (a a), in which the supports of the wooden screen once stood. From the woodcut (No. [46]), taken from one of these photographs, it will be perceived that the pillars of the interior slope inwards at a considerable and most unpleasing angle. The rood-screen which closes the front of all other caves of this class is gone. In all other examples it is in stone, and consequently remains; but in this instance, being in wood, it has disappeared, though the holes to receive its posts and the mortices by which it was attached to the walls are still there. The ogee fronton was covered with wooden ornaments, which have disappeared; though the pin-holes remain by which they were fastened to the stone. The framework, or truss that filled the upper part of the great front opening, no longer exists, but what its appearance was may be judged of by the numerous representations of itself with which it is covered, or
46. Façade of the Cave at Bhaja.
(From a Photograph.)
47. Front of a Chaitya Hall.
(From a Bas-relief at Buddh Gaya.)
from the representation of a chaitya façade from the contemporary rail at Buddh Gaya ([Woodcut No. 47]), and there are several others on the rail at Bharhut, which are not only correct elevations of such a façade as this, but represent the wooden carved ornaments which—according to that authority—invariably adorned these façades. The only existing example of this wooden screen is that at Karli, but the innumerable small repetitions of it, not only here but in all these caves, shows not only its form, but how universal its employment was. The rafters of the roof were of wood, and many of them, as may be seen in the woodcut, remain to the present day. Everything, in fact, that could be made in wood remained in wood, and only the constructive parts necessary for stability were executed in the rock.
It is easy to understand that, the first time men undertook to repeat in stone forms they had only been accustomed to erect in wood, they should have done so literally. The sloping inwards of the pillars was requisite to resist the thrust of the circular roof in the wooden building, but it must have appeared so awkward in stone that it would hardly be often repeated. As, however, it was probably almost universal in structural buildings, the doorways and openings naturally followed the same lines, hence the sloping jambs. Though these were by no means so objectionable in practice, they varied with the lines of the supports, and, as these became upright, the jambs became parallel. In like manner, when it was done, the architects could hardly fail to perceive that they had wasted both time and labour in cutting away the rock to make way for their wooden screen in front. Had they left it standing, with far less expense they could have got a more ornamental and more durable feature. This was so self-evident that it never, so far as is known, was repeated, but it was some time before the pillars of the interior got quite perpendicular, and the jambs of the doors quite parallel.
There is very little figure-sculpture about this cave; none in the interior, and what there is on the façade seems to be of a very domestic character. But on the pillars in the interior at g and h in the plan ([Woodcut No. 45]), we find two emblems, and at a, e, and f three others are found somewhat rudely formed, but which occur again so frequently that it may be worth while to quote them here. They are known as the trisul, or trident, the central point being usually more important than here shown, the shield, and the chakra, or wheel. The two first are generally found in combination, as in Woodcut No. 33, and the wheel is frequently found edged with trisul ornaments, as in the central compartment of Woodcut No. 38 from Amravati. The fourth emblem here is the trisul, in combination with a face, and the fifth is one which is frequently repeated on coins and elsewhere, but to which no name has yet been given.