Forlong - Rivers of Life

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Rivers of Life, or Faiths of Man in all Lands.
result of this seams to be that either Hindooism or Boodhism. though both very
corrupt, thus founded a city here. The wonderful character of the temple’s structure
points to Grecian or Roman models; the architecture, says Fergusson, is a sort of
Roman Doric, the ornaments (bassi-relevi) are borrowed from the Ramāyana. and
Mahābhārata, and fade into Hindoo myths. The people are Indian, and the aborigines
are an abject race. Dr. Bastian says that local tradition “makes their ancestors
come from MYAN-ROM, or ROMA-VISEI, not far from TAX-CASILA, which Fergusson
thinks way be TAXILA, the first Aryan capital of Northern India, and about which Alexander
and his hosts long hung. Taxila, as already shown, was a Nāga capital for ages;
and Fergusson, quoting Wilford, says that the ancient people of Taxila came from a
country called Kamboja; their capital was Indra-prastha (Inthapata-poori) and Siam
became their Ayoodhia or Ayoodthya, or Oud. Kashmeer Hindoo-Naga temples,
were of Grecian Doric; and here in far East Kambodia, we see the later Roman Doric.
The rectangular walled enclosure of Nakon-Vat is 3240 feet by 3300 feet, and beyond
this is a “moat” said to be 690 feet wide. so that we have here a temple covering about
a mile of ground. The western moat is crossed by a causeway having pillars all along
the sides, and it leads up to a gateway with a façade of 600 feet, and five stories high.
Neither Kaldian nor Babylon, with their rude sun-dried materials, can compare with this.
The .second causeway is 1110 feet long, leading straight up to the temple platfor
m; of which the outer enclosure is 1950 feet by 1710 feet; and within this are two
other enclosures, one 15 and the other 20 feet higher. Each face has three portals with
double open verandas or peri-styles, each 10 feet wide. The pillars of these peri-styles
have elegant capitals, but no base. There are 400 to 500 pillars in the outer enclosure
alone, and the walls of this colonnade are sculptured from top to bottom for some
2000 feet in length. The men and animals here represented are probably 20,000.
On the pilasters there are numerous female, but no male statues. The pillars are
correctly proportioned with architrave, and frieze, and cornice—the ornament here is
most cases being the SEVEN-HEADED Serpent. A colossal statue of a lion lies close half
buried in sand, so that our artists must have seen these in Cingalese temples in Western
India, as no lions have, so far as we know, ever existed in these parts. The stone blocks
are enormous and exquisitely fitted and carved, and come from mountains some forty
miles distant. Older temples are said to be aIl around, so we have much yet to learn from
this sacred spot. Many battle-pieces on the walls are, as I have said believed to be from
the Mahābhārata, which possibly reached these parts in its present form in the 4th and
5th centuries A.C., but may have done so in an older form a thousand years sooner.
In some places a sage, supposed to be Boodha, is seen adorning the Serpent, so
we may be sure the workmen were Serpent-worshippers. There are war-chariots, such
as the Epic speaks of and the pillar ornaments like those of Rome. Now, turning
to my Chart, and remembering that Fetish-worship was the first worship, and to
a great extent is still the real faith of the great mass of the ignorant, especially about