Chapter 32-36 - Architecture of the Śālā-houses

[Note: These chapters corresponds to the following chapters of the original Samarāṅgaṇa-Sūtradhāra:

Chapter 32 (Ekaśāla) — Chapter 23,
Chapter 32 (Dviśāla) — Chapter 22,
Chapter 32 (Triśāla) — Chapter 21,
Chapter 32 (Catuśśāla) — Chapter 19,
Chapter 32 (Pancaśāla and other classifications up to Daśaśāla) — Chapter 25]

The contents of all these five chapters have been extensively utilised in the study of house-architecture the Śālā-houses and other buildings. Hence for brevity’s sake I will not repeat them here. It is enough to indicate here that the planning of human dwellings—the residential houses of the middle class people, the poor and the rich cannot be of the same quality, size, dimensions, and richness of material and ornamentation, as the means and purposes of the people belonging to different trata of society differ in planning a house. Again the house of an ordinary man, a king and a god must also differ. In all the texts this distinction between residential quarters of men of ordinary means and the ostentatious buildings like Harmya, Vimāna or Prāsāda are not maintained. Hence it is one of the chief contributions of the author of this work to present a very big variety of the śālā-houses from one-roomed accommodation to ten-roomed one, suited to the needs and means of all classes of residents. In these chapters not only the broad classifications of the ten types of Śālā-houses, one-roomed to ten-roomed, are made, but their manifold varieties and sub-varieties are also described in detail, together with some of the allied topics relating to the court-yards and other component parts of the residential houses.

It is enough here to indicate in brief the number of each type of śālā-houses:

1.	Ekaśāla	108	50	As given in the Aṣṭānga.
2.	Divśāla	52	500
3.	Triśāla	72	100
4.	Catuśśāla	256	841
5.	Pañcaśāla	1025
6.	Saṭśāla [Ṣaṭśāla?]	4096
7.	Saptaśāla	18176
8.	Aṣṭaśāla	65536
9.	Navaśāla	262[?]44
10.	Daśaśāla	1048576