Chapter 31 - The Shrines (Āyatana-niveśa)

[Note: This chapter corresponds to Chapter 33 of the original Samarāṅgaṇa-Sūtradhāra]

This chapter requires a special notice. The Āyatana is a bit confusing. It should be taken here in the sense of a shrine the accepted meaning in the literature, though its earlier denotation of a house also was in vogue, By the time of Bhoja, Āyatana, I am sure, must have acquired a meaning of a shrine or temple as is evident from the last verse of this chapter (cf ‘Surabhavanāni’). My interpretation of the word Āyatana in the sense of a shrine is. necessitated by a confusing impression created by the contents as prepared by the learned editor Pt. T. Ganapati Sastri who takes this word in both the senses. If the word Āyatana is indicative of the royal houses or the accessory royal mansions, the separate treatment of the Palace architecture (inclusive of the accessory buildings and establishments like the queen’s chambers and the residences of the princesses and princes’ etc.) must not have been clone in two separate chapters (cf. 15th and 30th). According to my interpretation of the term, Āyatana this chapter deals with the shrine as got built by the devoted servants of the king and beloved members of his family in the same enclosure or compound in which the temples, the Prāsādas have been built by the king himself. This is evident from the very arrangement of this chapter in continuation to the Temple-Architecture.