Part 13 (1/2)

As this is the only temple situated in the old capital, there can be very little, if any, doubt that it is the very same building which now exists. For as it is surrounded by water, it was, of course, quite safe amid the fire, which reduced the other buildings to mere ma.s.ses of quicklime.

Baron Hugel calls the Pandrethan edifice a ”Buddhist temple,” and states that there are some well-preserved Buddhist figures in the interior. But he is doubly mistaken, for the temple was dedicated to Vishnu, and the figures in the inside have no connexion with Buddhism.

Trebeck swam into the interior, and could discover no figures of any kind; but as the whole ceiling was formerly hidden by a coating of plaster, his statement was, at that time, perfectly correct.

The object of erecting the temples in the midst of water must have been to place them more immediately under the protection of the Nagas, or human-bodied and snake-tailed G.o.ds, who were zealously wors.h.i.+pped for ages through Kashmir.

Marttand.

Of all the existing remains of Kashmirian grandeur, the most striking in size and situation is the n.o.ble ruin of Marttand.

This majestic temple stands at the northern end of the elevated table-land of ”Matan,” about three miles to the eastward of Islamabad.

This is undoubtedly the finest position in Kashmir. The temple itself is not now (1848) more than forty feet in height, but its solid walls and bold outlines towering over the fluted pillars of the surrounding colonnade give it a most imposing appearance.

There are no petty confused details; but all are distinct and ma.s.sive, and most admirably suited to the general character of the building.

Many vain speculations have been hazarded regarding the date of the erection of this temple and the wors.h.i.+p to which it was appropriated.

It is usually called the ”House of the Pandus” by the Brahmins, and by the people ”Mattan.”

The true appellation appears to be preserved in the latter, Matan being only a corruption of the Sanscrit Marttand maartta.n.d, or the sun, to which the temple was dedicated.

The true date of the erection of this temple -- the wonder of Kashmir -- is a disputed point of chronology; but the period of its foundation can be determined within the limits of one century, or between A.D. 370 and 500.

The ma.s.s of building now known by the name of Matan, or Marttand, consists of one lofty central edifice, with a small detached wing on each side of the entrance, the whole standing on a large quadrangle surrounded by a colonnade of fluted pillars, with intervening trefoil-headed recesses. The central building is sixty-three feet in length, by thirty-six in width.

As the main building is at present entirely uncovered, the original form of the roof can only be determined by a reference to other temples, and to the general form and character of the various parts of the Marttand temple itself.

The angle of the roof in the Temple of Pandrethan, and in other instances, is obtained by making the sides of the pyramid which forms it parallel to the sides of the doorway pediment, and in restoring the Temples of Patrun and Marttand I have followed the same rule.

The height of the Pandrethan temple -- of the cloistered recesses, porch pediments, and niches of Marttand itself -- were all just double their respective widths. This agreement in the relative proportions of my restored roof of Marttand with those deduced from other examples, is a presumptive proof of the correctness of my restoration. The entrance-chamber and the wings I suppose to have been also covered by similar pyramidal roofs. There would thus have been four distinct pyramids, of which that over the inner chamber must have been the loftiest, the height of its pinnacle above the ground being about seventy-five feet.

The interior must have been as imposing as the exterior. On ascending the flight of steps -- now covered by ruins -- the votary of the sun entered a highly-decorated chamber, with a doorway on each side covered by a pediment, with a trefoil-headed niche containing a bust of the Hindu triad, and on the flanks of the main entrance, as well as on those of the side doorways, were pointed and trefoil niches, each of which held a statue of a Hindu divinity.

The interior decorations of the roof can only be conjecturally determined, as I was unable to discover any ornamented stones that could with certainty be a.s.signed to it. Baron Hugel doubts that Marttand ever had a roof; but, as the walls of the temple are still standing, the numerous heaps of large stones that are scattered about on all sides can only have belonged to the roof.

I can almost fancy that the erection of this sun-temple was suggested by the magnificent sunny prospect which its position commands. It overlooks the finest view in Kashmir, and perhaps in the known world, Beneath it lies the paradise of the East, with its sacred streams and cedarn glens, its brown orchards and green fields, surrounded on all sides by vast snowy mountains, whose lofty peaks seem to smile upon the beautiful valley below. The vast extent of the scene makes it sublime; for this magnificent view of Kashmir is no petty peep into a half-mile glen, but the full display of a valley sixty miles in breadth and upwards of a hundred miles in length, the whole of which lies beneath ”the ken of the wonderful Marttand.”

The princ.i.p.al buildings that still exist in Kashmir are entirely composed of a blue limestone, which is capable of taking the highest polish -- a property to which I mainly attribute the beautiful state of preservation in which some of them at present exist.

Even at first sight one is immediately struck by the strong resemblance which the Kashmirian colonnades bear to the cla.s.sic peristyles of Greece. Even the temples themselves, with their porches and pediments, remind one more of Greece than of India; and it is difficult to believe that a style of architecture which differs so much from all Indian examples, and which has so much in common with those of Greece, could have been indebted to chance alone for this striking resemblance.

One great similarity between the Kashmirian architecture and that of the various Greek orders is its stereotyped style, which, during the long flouris.h.i.+ng period of several centuries, remained unchanged. In this respect it is so widely different from the ever-varying forms and plastic vagaries of the Hindu architecture that it is impossible to conceive their evolution from a common origin.

I feel convinced myself that several of the Kashmirian forms, and many of the details, were borrowed from the temples of the Kabulian Greeks, while the arrangements of the interior and the relative proportions of the different parts were of Hindu origin. Such, in fact, must necessarily have been the case with imitations by Indian workmen, which would naturally have been engrafted upon the indigenous architecture. The general arrangements would still remain Indian, while many of the details, and even some of the larger forms, might be of foreign origin.