REMAINS at DINÁNG'AN, or RÁNDU GÚNTING.
Taking the road from Brambánan to Yúgya kérta, a little beyond the seventh furlong, you arrive at an angle bearing nearly south-west. At this angle, about sixty yards off the road to the left, a very large statue is conspicuous, standing close to the corner of the village of Dináng'an, which is behind it. Searching about I found the broken scattered remains of five other images exactly similar to it. Twenty yards in the rear of the erect image, and just to the westward of the village, a very extensive heap of blocks of hewn stone (particularly large hollow cylinders intended to hold the water used in ablution in India) intermingled with earth, points out the site of what must once have been a spacious temple, long since prostrate. The principal image is called by the Javans Béga Mínda.
CHÁNDI KÁLI SÁRI, or TEMPLE of KÁLI SÁRI.
Returning to the angle of the road which I had left to inspect Béga Mínda and his maimed and headless brethren, and proceeding along the high-road, at a distance of little more than two furlongs further, I crossed the small stream now called Káli Béning, formerly Káli Búhus. A hundred and twenty yards beyond this, having the village of Káli Sári, which gives its name to the temple, close to the right hand, you turn up a path between two hedges in that direction, and at the south-western side of the village, about two hundred yards off the road, you come upon the south-east angle of a large and lofty quadrangular building, having much the appearance of a two-story house, or place of residence of a Hindu Raja. It resembles a temple in no point of view even externally. It is an oblong square, regularly divided into three floors, the ground-floor having in front a large door between two windows, and on the sides two windows corresponding to the others. The first floor appears to have three windows in front, and two in the depth, answering to the apertures below, and through the foliage which decorates and destroys this monument of grandeur, may be seen several small attic windows at intervals, seemingly on the slope of the roof: these, however, are false, as the structure has but the two floors and no other.
The external appearance of this edifice is really very striking and beautiful. The composition and execution of its outer surface evinces infinite taste and judgment, indefatigable patience and skill. Nothing can exceed the correctness and minute beauties of the sculpture throughout, which is not merely profuse, but laboured and worked up to a pitch of peculiar excellence, scarcely suitable to the exterior of any building, and hardly to be expected in much smaller subjects in the interior of the cabinet. It originally stood upon an elevated terrace of from four to six feet in height, of solid stone. The exterior dimensions of this building are fifty-seven feet and a half by thirty-three and a half, measured along the walls just above the terrace or line of the original basement, which is divided obviously enough into three parts, by the centre projecting nearly a foot, and the general correspondent composition or arrangement observable in each. The door in the centre is four feet eight inches and a half wide, surmounted with the wide-gaping, monstrous visage, before described at Chándi Séwu, from which runs round each side of the portal a spiral-fluted chord, ending near the bottom in a large sweep or flourish, inclosing each a caparisoned elephant in a rising posture; the space left over its hinder quarters being filled with the face of a munnook, or human being, all in the usual style of relief. At either side of the door the original coat of stone has fallen, as far as the extremities of the vestibule, which covered the whole central compartment of the east or front of the building. In the middle of each of the other divisions is an aperture or window, nearly a square of eighteen inches, having a very deep and projected double resemblance of a cornice beneath, resting on the upper fillet of the terrace, while the same single projection crowns the top of the window, surmounted with a more lofty and elegant device of two elephants' heads and trunks, embellished and joined in a most tasteful way, with a profusion of other devices. On either side of the windows is a small double pilaster, having a space between for the figure of a small garúda, an effigy well known by the Hindus, which is human down to the waist, and has the body, wings, and talons of an eagle. Beyond the second pilaster, on each side of the windows, is a large niche rising from the terrace to the cornice or division between the upper and lower story. The niche is sunk in the wall about four inches, and is formed by the adjoining pilasters rising straight to their capitals, whence the top of the niche is formed by a very beautiful series of curved lines, leaving the point clear in the centre, which I can hardly compare to any thing but rounded branches of laurel, or some such foliage. This is crowned with a square projecting fillet, which reaches the central cornice dividing the two floors. Beyond the last pilaster of the niches, a single stone brings you to the angle of the building, which is covered from top to bottom with the running arabesque border, most delicately executed. On entering the building, the mind of every one must be fully satisfied that it was never constructed for, or dedicated to, mere religious purposes. The arrangement is entirely adapted to the domestic residence of a great Hindu chieftain or raja.
The whole building, within and without, was originally covered with a coat of very fine chunam, or lime, about one-sixth of an inch thick, of surprising tenacity.
CHÁNDI KÁLI BÉNING.
Pursuing the high-road from the spot at which you leave it to visit the palace of Báli Sári, at the distance of about three furlongs and a half, a lofty, massy pile is seen, about one hundred yards off the road to the left. This ruin is of the same general form and appearance as the larger temples at Chándi Séwu and Lóro Jóngran, but on a closer examination is found to be superior to the whole, in the delicate and minute correctness of execution of all its decorative parts. It is a cross, with the intermediate angles projected to give space to a large central apartment, which is entered from the east side only. The building is about seventy-two feet three inches in length and the same in breadth. The walls are about thirty-five feet high; and the roof, which appears to have fallen in to the extent of five feet, about thirty more. Only one front or vestibule is perfect.
On the south face is seen a small door, five feet seven inches high, and three feet five inches and a half wide, situated in a deep niche, which also receives in the recess above the door a small figure of Síta, (as the Sepoy called it) in a sitting posture. Beyond the door a small projection contains probably more various elaborate specimens of the best sculpture, than were to be found any where within a small compass, and on similar materials. A very large and well defined monster's head projects over the door, surrounded with innumerable devices of excellent workmanship. I know not how to describe them, nor the niche beneath, containing Síta, which, amongst other accompaniments is supported by two small pilasters, the capitals of which are upheld by the small naked figures before described, under the generic term of munnook. The central compartment of this southern limb (which is formed by the niche and door below, and the gorgon head above) terminates at the top in a point, by a gradual elliptical slope upwards on both sides. These sides of the slope are filled, on either hand, with a succession of small naked munnook figures, all seated on various postures on the steps formed for their reception, along the edges of this ellipse, and closed by a similar one above.
On either side of the door-way is a small niche, three feet high and six inches wide, supported by small pilasters, and filled with relievo figures of the fraternity of Gópias and their wives. That occupying the niche to the right, my Cicerone recognised to be Krésna. He was peculiarly happy to find Síta seated over the door, which he declared to be a decisive proof of the sense and devotional excellence of the founders of this superb temple, which he very justly extolled, as far excelling in sculptural beauty and decorations, any thing he had ever seen or heard of in India, or could possibly imagine had existence any where. This surprise and admiration at the superiority of the Javan architecture, sculpture, and statuary, over those of India, was manifest in every Sepoy who saw them. Nothing could equal the astonishment of the man who attended me throughout this survey at every thing he saw; nor did he fail to draw a very degrading and natural contrast between the ancient Javans, as Hindus and artists, and their degenerate sons, with scarce a remnant of arts, science, or of any religion at all.