PLACES

BALSANE

Balsane, a village 22.53 km. (14 miles) east of Pimpalner in Sakri taluka with in 1961, 2,078 inhabitants, has well preserved caves and a series of old temples in hemadpanti and Bahamani style. The chief temple of the style locally known as hemadpanti, though small is very graceful and both inside and outside is most richly carved from base to summit. In antiquity as well as in style it closely resembles the late Brahman caves at Ellora (725 A.D.). The figures are shapely and the rest of the carvings arc minute and delicate. The black stone walls look as if all their mortar had been picked out. But as in other hemadpanti temples the stones were probably carved one by one and put together without mortar. In front of the temple is a portion approached by six steps. The pillars at the top of the steps are 1.524 metres (5 ft.) apart and the whole portion is 3.657 metres (12 ft.) wide. The inner hall of the temple. 1.672 metres square (18 sq. ft.) with a doorway in each side, has pillars each about 3.048 metres (10 ft.) high and 0.232 square metres (1½ sq. ft.) at the base. Each pillar has for its capital a horizontal flat cross, with under each a cherub, the palms of whose hands are pressed together as in a prayer. The figures are remarkably perfect and singularly like similar figures in English cathedrals. Some of the other temples and buildings, though less striking are very beautiful. On a lintel in one of them is an inscription.

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