Chapter 10 - The Selection of the Site (Bhūmiparīkṣā)

[Note: This chapter corresponds to Chapter 8 of the original Samarāṅgaṇa-Sūtradhāra]

From this chapter the treatment of the purely architectural subjects starts. The first thing in any architectural planning being the surveying of the region (the regional planning) and ascertaining the different points of the region or deśa into which the planning of the towns, capitals, forts, Kheṭas, villages, and other human habitations and establishments is to be done. This survey consisted of the examination of the different soils and soil conditions and their suitability or fitness for the constructions, thereupon, of human dwellings, as the selection of the sites forms the first pre-requisite in any planning. The text distinguishes between three broad divisions of the lands and the soils thereof Jāṅgala, Anūpa, Sādhāraṇa with the sixteen-fold varieties of the different kinds of the lands. After this examination, a vivid and beautiful, simply charming poetical description of the Bhūmis fit to be selected for the planning of the Janapadas, towns, Kheṭas, and Grāmas, etc. is made, After this, four kinds of lands suited to the building of four varieties of the forts is described. For the planning of the towns the lands of special qualities are again delineated upon (40-47). In ancient India the towns and villages were planned caste-wise (cf. Bāṇas’ description of Brāhmṇādhivāsa), the text, therefore, describes the different soils—fit for all castes and fit only for the Brāhmaṇas, Kṣatriyas or Vaiśyas and Śūdras. Thereafter the unfit lands are enumerated. The end of the chapter prescribes certain tests for the examination of the soil for the ascertainment of the suitability of the ground.

N.B.—Chapter XI. The Measurement (Hastalakṣaṇa) and chapters XII to XVI. (on Pāda-Vinyāsa) will be dealt with in a subsequent study—vide the next chapter—The Five Fundamental Canons of Hindu Architecture.