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To visit this famous temple you have to come nearly three hundred miles northeast of Bombay into territory belonging to H.H. the Nizam of Hyderabad. Archaeologists judge from the style of the work that it was probably cut out of the solid trap-rock of this hillside almost twelve hundred years ago; nine hundred years ago an Arabic geographer described the place as being then a celebrated place of pilgrimage. There are several temples here produced in the same general way, i.e., by cutting away the solid rock of the hill; some were apparently made for shrines to the Hindu gods, some for Buddhists, some for the Jains. This one was for Hindu gods.

It is hard to realize the extraordinary character of this monument. The very space in which you are standing now was all cut out of the solid rock. Each pillar and beam and cornice and panel that you see, each stair and platform and wall, is only a part of what was once a single, shapeless mass of trap-rock. Not a particle of the stone you see was cut separately and laid in its place, every inch was given its present form simply by chipping away the surrounding rock just as a statue is produced from a shapeless block by chipping away all but the desired forms and shapes. This big square column directly in front of you is likewise of "living rock," i.e., a continuous part of the rock under your feet and all around you. It was probably planned as an ornamental standard for a lamp of some sort.

Look at the native over there by the temple doorway and judge from his height about what are the dimensions of the marvellous shrine itself. It is, in fact, nearly ninety feet from the floor up to that elaborately ornamented roof.

(See Lady Dufferin: "Our Viceregal Life in India";  Karageorgeovitch: "Enchanted India"; etc. Fergusson's "Indian and Eastern Architecture" gives very interesting facts about the place.)

From Notes of Travel, No. 11, copyright, 1904, by Underwood & Underwood.

Beautiful temple cut out of the solid rock, Ellora, India.

Beau temple taillé entièrement dans un rocher Ellora, Inde.

Wunderbarer Tempel, aus einem Feltin gehauen, Ellora, Indien.

Bellisimo templo cincelado de la roca sólida, Ellora, India.

Vackert tempel, som uthuggits ur solida klippor, Ellora, Indien.

Замѣчательный храмъ, вйцѣченный изъ скалы Эллора, индiя.