From an architectural point of view, the rails were surpassed by the chaityas, or temple-caves, in western India.  These were cut in the solid rock.  Some one thousand different specimens are to be found.  The facades of these caves are perfect, generally in the form of an arch, executed in the rock with every variety of detail, and therefore imperishable without violence.  The process of excavation extended through ten centuries from the time of Asoka; and the interiors as well as the facades were highly ornamented with sculptures.  The temple-caves are seldom more than one hundred and fifty feet deep and fifty feet in width, and the roofs are supported by pillars like the interior of Gothic cathedrals, some of which are of beautiful proportions with elaborated capitals.  Though these rock-hewn temples are no larger than ordinary Christian churches, they are very impressive from the richly decorated carvings; they were lighted from a single opening in the facade, sometimes in the shape of a horseshoe.

Besides these chaityas, or temples, there are still more numerous viharas, or monasteries, found in India, of different dates, but none older than the third century before Christ.  They show a central hall, surrounded on three sides by cells for the monks.  On the fourth side is an open verandah; facing this is generally a shrine with an image of Buddha.  These edifices are not imposing unless surrounded by galleries, as some were, supported by highly decorated pillars.  The halls are constructed in several stories with heavy masonry, in the shape of pyramids adorned with the figures of men and animals.  One of these halls in southern India had fifteen hundred cells.  The most celebrated was the Nalanda monastery, founded in the first century by Nagarjuna, which accommodated ten thousand priests, and was enclosed by a wall measuring sixteen hundred feet by four hundred.  It was to Central India what Mount Casino was to Italy, and Cluny was to France, in the Middle Ages,—­the seat of learning and art.

It was not until the Mohammedan conquest in India that architecture received a new impulse from the Saracenic influence.  Then arose the mosques, minarets, and palaces which are a wonder for their magnificence, and in which are seen the influence of Greek art as well as that of India.  There is an Oriental splendor in these palaces and mosques which has called out the admiration of critics, although it is different from those types of beauty which we are accustomed to praise.  But these later edifices were erected in the Middle Ages, coeval with the cathedrals of Europe, and therefore do not properly come under the head of ancient art, in which the ancient Hindus, whether of Aryan or Turanian descent, did not particularly excel.  It was in matters of religion and philosophy that the Hindus felt most interest, even as the ancient Jews thought more of theology than of art and science.