________________
A NOTE ON BRICK ARCHITECTURE
Jain Education International
T.N. Mishra
Wood, brick and stone are the main building materials used in Ancient Indian Architecture1. Wood being perishable very little of ancient wooden architecture has survived. Examples of only brick and stone have cone down to us3. Even a casual survey of these Indian architectural remains shows the precedence of brick over stone as building material, both with regard to antiquity and the extent and magnitude of the building activity. While the brick has been used both by the rich and poor, the stone may comparatively be regarded as the material of the king and rich. The ancient Indian civilization reached its higher stages of development primarily through cultivation, which was possible only in the alluival regions of the rivers where stone was more or less non-existent. Therefore, where the affluence of the society came to be expressed through the architecture it was the brick that played the major role, the use of the other materials as seen in the surviving architectural remains being very scare. A reading through the survey reports Sir Alexander Cunni ngham leaves the impression that the whole of Northern India was covered with building built of bricks, every ancient site exhibited remains of brick structures. The predominance of bricks contitues even in the const ruction of religious adifices, a history of which is traceable since very long A larger number of the stupas, chaitya halls, monasteries as well as temples were built with brick as the main building material 5, though in subsequent period religious buildings built under the royal patronage started a new tradition of stone architecture. But the brick architecture was bound to have its impress on the lithic monuments. In spite of the gradual increase in the popularity of stone as a building material brick continued to be used side by side perhaps more popularly as medium of construction apparently because of its being more economic, manageable and easily available. 6 However, of the innumerable monuments built in bricks very few have survived as due to handiness and reusabilities of the bricks, buildings built of the brick have been systematically and throughly revaged than those in store, and the ravage is still going or. The recorded sites still preserve such material which is likely to prove of great help and significarce for reconstructing a scientific history of ancient Indian briek architecture.
For Personal & Private Use Only
www.jainelibrary.org
