Essay on the Architecture of the Hindu's

About the Author Ram Raz (1790-1830) was born in Tanjore. He wrote the remarkable "Essay on the Architecture of the Hindus" that was posthumously published in London by the Royal Asiatic Society in 1834.

He was born to a poor family but he mastered English serving as clerk in 1815 in the office of the English Military Auditor. As his abilities came to be known, he was first appointed head English master at the College of Fort St. George in Madras. Later he was appointed to the position of Judge and Magistrate in the Mysore state.

The foreword to the book by Royal Asiatic Society member Richard Clarke details the circumstances in which Ram Raz wrote the book.

Preface The Introduction to the European public of a Kasey on Him Architecture," and by a Finch, would seem to mark an epoch not only in the history of the science but also in that of the Finds themselves.

There palaces, there temples, the stupendous pyramidal gate ways leading to the latter, the colonnades and portions with which they are surrounded some of a thousand pillars," others equally remarkable for their elevations, richness, and grandeur of design, have for ages been the objects of admiration to the traveler in the East; and, though it had long been known, pro verbally, that the Finds possessed treatises on architecture of a very ancient date, prescribing the rules by which these edifices were constructed, it remained for the author of this essay to overcome the many, and almost insurmountable obstacles to the substantiation of the fact, and to the communication of it to the European world in a well known language of Europe.

The Royal Asiatic Society is chiefly indebted to one of its members, Richard Clarke, Esq., for the accomplishment of this Important and desirable object.

**Contents and Sample Pages**