Year: 1876

A Magnificent Specimen Of Hindoo


Architecture.


In Mr.. James Fergusson's History of
India aud Eastern Architecture is the fol-
lowing description of one of the most
remarkable temples in India:


If it were possible to illustrate the
Hullabid temple to such an extent as to
render its peculiarities familiar, there
would be few things more interesting or
more instructive than to institute COM |
parison between it and the Parihenon at
Athens. Not that the two buildings are
at all like one another; on the contrary, !
they form the two opposite poles-the
alpha and omega of architectural de-
sign; but they are the best examples Of
their class, and between these two ex-
tremes lies the whole range of the art.
The Parthenon is the best example We
know of pure refined intellectual power
applied to the production of an archi-
tectural design. Every part and every
effect il calculated with mathematical
exactness, and executed with a mechani-
cal precision that never was equalled.-
All the curves are hyperbolas, parabol-
as, or other developments of the highest
mechanical forms-optical defect is
foreseen and provided for, and every
part has relation to every other part
in so recondite proportion that we feel
inclined to call it fanclful, because .e
can hardly rise to its appreciation. The
sculpture is exquisitely designed to aid


the perfection OF the masonry-seyere
and godlike, but with no condesce3sion


to the lower feelings of humanity.


The Hullabid temple is the opposite


of all this. 1t is regular, but with


studied variety of outline in plan, and


even greater variety in detail. All the
pillars of the Parthenon are identical


while no two facets of the Indian temple


are the same; every convolution of every


scroll is different. No two canopies in


the whole building are alike, and every


part exhibits joyous exubersnce of


fancy sco-niDg every mechanical re-
straint. All that is wild in human faith


or warm in human feeling ia found por-


trayed on these walls; but of pure hu-
man intellect there is little-less than
there is OF human feeling in the Parthe-
non.


: 1t would be possible to arrange all the
buildings in the world between these
two extremes as they tended towards
d the severe intellectual purity of the one
or to the playful exuberant fancy of the
other; but perfection, if it existed
D would be somewhere near the mean
t My own impression is that, if the SO


called Gothic ar,hitects had been able tc


maintain for 200 or 300 years more th'


rate of progress they achieved between
i the eleventh and fourteenth century
y they might have hit upon that happ,
II mean between severe consecutive prop
! riety and playful decorative imagining
a which would have combined into some
is thing more perfect than the world ha
e yet seen. The system. however, as
IT have endeavored to point out elsewhere
e broke down before it had acquired til
e requisite degree Of refinement, and tha


hope was blIghted never to be revived
| Tf in
,e onward path, it will not be by leanin
re too strongly towards either of the ez
is tremes just named, but by graspin


somewhere the happy mean between tn
e. two.


b. For our present purpose, the grei
es value of the study of these Indian e,
,s, amples is that it widens so immensel
ut our basis for architectural criticism.
ut is only by becoming familiar with form
h. so utterly dissimilar from those we ha,
he hitherto been cohrersant with that v
n perceive how narrow is the purview tn
at is content with one form or one passir
k fashion. By rising to this wider ran,
IS we shall perceive that architecture is
ng many sided as human nature itself, al
zee learn how few feelings and how few g
it. pirations of the human heart and bra
ms there are that cannot be expressed by


means. On the other hand, it is only
ks taking this wide survey that we appr
Ter ciate how worthless any product
In architectural..art becomes which does n


honestly represent the thoughts al
d a feelings of those who built it, or t
i've height of their lofties aspirations.