Photo 212/3(3)

Inscription: Numbered '333' in the negative.

Genre: Architectural Photography

General view of the massive, richly-carved wooden temple car of the Vatapatrashayi Temple. The European figure posed by one of the wheels may possibly be Lyon himself. Lyon's 'Notes to accompany a series of photographs prepared to illustrate the ancient architecture of southern India' (Marion and Co., London, 1870), edited by James Fergusson, gives the following description of this photograph: '333 - Immediately opposite to the Tower is the Wooden Car, one of the largest and handsomest to be found in the South. It was built only about 25 years ago, by a rich native, who obtained permission from the priests to break up and remodel all the wretched small cars which at different epochs had been made and given to the temple, and thus the beautiful one now used was formed. It is 40 feet high, with a staircase inside by which access is obtained to the top, and here the god is placed at the yearly festival, when the whole population from all the neighbouring villages assemble from many miles around. The car on these occasions is beautifully decorated with flags and wreaths of flowers, the god literally covered with jewels, sparkling and glittering in the sun; the so-called musicians from the temple playing their different instruments; the dancing-girls, gorgeously dressed in the brightest colours, capering around, or throwing themselves into the most fantastic attitudes; thousands of men, women, and children, all dressed in every variety of colours, grouped together, yelling, gesticulating, and vociferating, - make a scene rarely to be equalled, - never to be forgotten; and when at last the enormous ropes, as thick as a man's leg, are attached to the car, and are seized by the countless thousands, the ponderous mass begins to move, the yelling is redoubled, and the dancing and the music increase in a tenfold degree. It is not to be wondered at, that many deluded beings were always to be found, whose senses being wrought into the highest state of fanatical excitement at such a sight, threw themselves on their backs on the ground, and opening their legs as the ponderous mass approached, joyfully awaited, and even welcomed such an awful death at such a moment Happily the Government have now given orders to the police no longer to permit these human sacrifices.' Other copies at Photo 1000 (2983) and Photo 1168/2 (18).