Jainism in Rajasthan

Publisher: ZZZ Unknown

Page 26

IV, JAINA ART
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motion. There is a wonderful grace in these sculptures representing different gods and apsarās.
The Jaina temples of Godhās and Chaudharīs at Marotha claim to have been founded in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries respectively, These temples have undergone repairs from time to time but still some original portion of the structure in both the temples supports the date ascribed to them The decoration on the ceiling of the temple of Chaudharīs and the pillars of the temple of Godhās are of the type prevalent in the fourteenth century AD.
The Jaina temples of Bhāndāsara Chintāmaņi and Neminātha of Bikaner also belong to this age. The temple of Bhāndāsara was founded by a rich merchant named Bhāņdā. This temple is also known as Sumatınātha temple. Its shrine is round in form. It is surmounted by two storeys, each uspening into four balconies and interconnected by narrow stairs. Mandapa,
galleries and porches surround the shripe. At the top, there is the shrine datath its strings and upstrings of decorative small sıkharas and its gilded flag
aff The temple is built of yellow Jaisalmer stone. Both the motifs of Lajput and Mughal architecture are found beautifully mixed in the constrution of this temple.
From the artistic point of view, the Chintāmaņi temple is superior 12 that of Bhāņdāsara temple. It is also made of yellow Jaisalmer stone. Its construction work started in the time of Rāva Bīkā but it was completed wortly after his death in 1503 A.D Originally, the shrine and the chief mandapa
ere constructed. But thirty years later, it was enlarged by another hall and the open front porch and two small side porches. The substructure, the
lumns, the capitals, the domes and the pent roofs seem to have been imitated om Gujarātī temples, while the rich arbesques, floral decorations, lozenge
bamsa friezes panels and occasional elephant figures reveal a development hich had its origin in a renaissance of medieval Hindu architecture. The eaning of the pot and the foliage capitals of the multiple type is lost and too all carved brackets rise in a quite inorganic manner from the midst of the
The spire is short and heavy. When in 1583 A.D., Rājasimha the Jaina idols recovered from Sirohi booty in a vault in the i court, another Jaina temple of Ādinātha was built near it.