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YASASTILAKA AND INDIAN CULTURE
at royal courts, as it was believed to promote success in warfare. The temples and sculptures at Māmallapuram, which was essentially a royal foundation, prove the popularity of the cult of Durgā, probably for similar reasons, during the rule of the Pallavas in the south from the seventh century onwards. The Pallavas were supplanted by the Colas, and it is noteworthy that Vijayālaya, the founder of the line of the imperial Colas, built a Durgā temple at Tanjore after his conquest of the city about the middle of the ninth century A. D. It may be noted that about this time, in Northern
A small temple dedicated to the god Sambā (Śambhu) and Devi stands outside the village of Dighi, six miles dus east of Kajgaon Station in the East Khandesh District, a couple of miles from the frontier of Hyderabad (Deccan). "The temple consists of a porch in front, & mandapa on pillars with a bigh dome, an antaräla or passage leading to the sanctum or garbhagha and the sanctum or shirne itself.' The sanctum contains a small linga and 4 large standing image of Devi. A niche on the north wall of the mandapa contains a dancing figure of Cămundā. She has four hands and an emaciated body, but the scorpion usually to be found in her stomach is absent. She holds a trident, a skull-mace (khatvānga ) and a skull-cup (nara-kapāla). Progress Report of the Archaeological Survey of India, Western Circle, 1920, pp. 75, 99. Close to the island of māndhātă in the Narmada, a small ravine on the north bank of the river, popularly known as the Rāwana nalâ, contains a prostrate figure 18feet in length, rudely carved in bold relief on four basalt slabs laid end to end. It has ten arms, all hoiding clubs and pendent skalls, but only one head. On its chest is a scorpion, and at its right side & rat, while one foot rests on a smaller prostrate human figure. The huge image no doubt represents Cámundā or Mahākāli, and was evidently intended to be placed in a colossal temple which was never completed. The bed of the ravine is covered with huge basult rocks, slightly carved in some places, which doubtless had the same destination.' Imperial Gazetteer of India, Vol. IX, p. 296. Sastri: The Colas, Vol. I, p. 140. Temples of Durgā appear to have been built in different parts of medieval India. An inscription discovered in the village of Dirghāsi, four miles to the north of Kalingapatam in the Ganjam District, records the erection of a mandapa in front of a temple of Durgā at Dirgharăsi or Dirghäsi in the Saka year 997 (1075 A. D.), by a Brāhmaṇa chieftain named Ganapati in the service of the Eastern Ganga king Rājarāja I of Orissa (1068-1078 A, D.). R. D. Banerji: Histury of Orissa, Vol. I, p. 246. There is a ruined temple of Durgă of about the twelfth century, near the village of Balsana in the West Khandesh District of Bombay Presidency. Inside the shrine stands the mutilated image of the goddess. The temples at Balsana suffered badly at the hands of the Muslim invaders. An inscription on the stone lintel of a ruined temple bears a date corresponding to 1148 A. D. See Progress Report of the Archaeological Survey of India, Western Circle, 1919, pp. 46, 56. There is an old temple called the temple of Devi Hinglaj in the village of Baridelchi near Mehidpur Town in Indore State. The editice has been partially rebuilt, as the sikhara and the garbhagsha are modern, but the porch in front has four well-carved medieval pillars. Inside the shrine is an old image which is a very good representation of the killing of the buffalo demon by Durgā (Mahigamardini). Progress Report of ASI Western Circle, 1920, p. 102,
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