PLACES

KONDANE CAVES

Kondane (Karjat T. RS. Karjat 6 m; p. 368) about four miles south-east of the Karjat station, on the south-eastern branch of the Central railway and at the base of Rajmaci hill, has a group of early Buddhist caves (B.C. 250-A.D. 100). These caves were first brought to notice, about 100 years ago, by the late Vishnu Shastri, and soon after visited by Mr. Law, then Collector of Thana. [Dr. J. Willson's Memoir in Jour. Bom. Br. Roy. As. Soc. Vol. III. pt. 2. p. 46. They have also been fully described by Mr. W. F. Sinclair, C. S. Ind. Ant. V. 309, and in Fergusson and Burgess' Cave Temple of India, 220-222, from which the details in the text are taken.] They are in the face of a steep scarp hidden by thick forest. During much of the year water trickles over the face of the rock and has greatly damaged the caves.

The caves face north-west. The first to the south-west is a large temple or caitya, 66½feet from the line of the front pillars to the back of the apse, twenty-six feet eight inches wide, and twenty-eight feet five inches high to the crown of the arch. The nave is forty-nine feet by fourteen feet eight inches, and the relic shrine 9½feet in diamete. with a capital of more than usual height, the neck being, as at Bhaja, double the ordinary height, and representing two coffers, one above the other, carved on the sides with the Buddhist rail pattern. The fillets that covered this are decayed, as are also the whole of the lower part of the relic shrine, of the thirty octagonal pillars that surrounded the nave, and of one of the irregular pillars in front. The space between the front pillars seems once to have been filled by a wooden wall. There are remains of seven pillars on the left of the cave, and of six on the south, all with an inward rake, a proof of the early date of the work. [Fergusson, Ind. and East. Archit. 110.] The pillars behind the relic shrine, and six near the front, on the right side have disappeared. On the upper portion of one column, on the left, is a device something like a rudely canopied relic shrine. The arched roof has had wooden rafters as at Karle, but they are gone, and the only remains of the woodwork is a portion of the latticed screen in the front arch. The front bears a strong likeness to the front of one of the caves at Bhaja. On the left side, in relief, is part of the head of a human figure about twice the size of life. The features are destroyed, but the head-dress is most carefully finished. Over the left shoulder is one line of Mauryan characters, of perhaps the second century B.C., which has been translated ' Made by Balaka, the pupil of Kanha (Krsna)'.

Over the head of the figure, at the level of the spring of the great front arch, is a broad outstanding belt of sculpture. The lower portion of this belt is carved with the rail pattern; the central portion is divided into seven compartments, three of them filled with a lattice pattern, and four with human figures, a man in the first, a man and woman in the third and fifth, and a man with a bow and two women in the seventh. Over these com-partments is a band with the representations of the end of tie-beams or bars passing through it, and then four fillets, each standing out over the one below, and the upper half of the last serrated. The corresponding belt of carving on the right side of the front is much damaged by the falling of the rock at the end next the arch.

A little to the north-east is Cave II, a monastery or vihara, whose veranda front, except the left end, is totally destroyed. This veranda was five feet eight inches wide and eighteen feet long, with five octagonal pillars and two pilasters. In the end of this verandah is a raised recess, and under a horse-shoe arch is a small relic shrine in half relief, apparently the only object of worship. Inside, the hall is twenty-three feet wide by twenty-nine deep and eight feet three inches high, with fifteen pillars arranged about three feet apart and 3^1/2 feet from the side and back walls, but none across the front. The upper portions of these pillars are square, but about ½ feet from the top they are octagonal; the bases which were probably square have also gone. In imitation of a built hall the roof is panelled with beams, nine-teen inches deep by eight thick and 3½feet apart, which run through the heads of the pillars, the spaces between the beams being divided by false rafters, five inches broad by two deep. Though most of the front wall is broken, there are three wide doors into the hall, and on each side six cells, eighteen in all, each with a monk's bed and the first on each side with two beds. Over the doors of fourteen of these cells are carved horse-shoe arches, joined by a string course which stands out six or seven inches and is ornamented with the rail pattern. Cave III is a plain monastery six yards square with nine much ruined cells. It probably had three doors. Cave IV is a row of nine cells at the back of what now looks like a natural hollow under the cliff. Beyond them is a cistern, now filled with mud, then two cells under a deep ledge of overhanging rock, and, lastly, a small cistern. Most of the caves are now in very bad repair and the inscriptions have been erased so as to make them illegible. The caves are now in charge of the Archaeological department of the Government of Maharastra and are often visited by student parties.

TOP