STRUCTURAL DETAILS 579
rivers, in the market-places, and elsewhere. The Hindus also delight in placing these idols of stone under the shade of leafy trees especially of those reputed sacred, such as the aswatta, the alai, the vepu, & C. Some 1 of these idols
are placed in shrines, and others in the open air.
Most Hindu temples present a very wretched appearance, being more like barns or stables than buildings consecrated to the gods. Some of them are used as places of public assembly, courts of justice, or rest-houses for travellers. There are many, however, which as seen from a distance have an imposing effect and excite the admiration of the traveller. They recall to mind those ancient times when architects had an eye for posterity as well as for their contemporaries, and were much more intent on making their works durable than on securing elegance at the cost of solidity.
The structure of the large temples, both ancient and modern, is everywhere the same. The Hindus, devoted as they are to ancestral customs, have never introduced innovations in the construction of their public edifices.
Their architectural monuments, such as they exist to-day, are probably better examples of building as practised by ancient civilized nations than the ruins of Egyptians and Greeks, concerning which European scholars have so much to say.
The entrance gate of the great pagodas opens through a high, massive pyramidal tower, the summit of which is ordinarily topped by a crescent or half-moon. This gate faces the east, a position which is observed in all their temples, great and small. The pyramid or tower is called the gopuram.
Beyond the tower is a large court, at the farther end of
which is another gate, opening like the first through a pyramid of the same form, but smaller. Through this you pass to a- second and smaller court, which is in front of the shrine containing the principal idol.
In the middle of this second court and facing the entrance to the shrine, you generally see upon a large pedestal, or within a kind of pavilion open on all sides and supported
1
The Ficus religiosa, the Fie us indica, and the Mdia Azadirachta.
— Ed.