Mayamata

This Sanskrit treatise on architecture, written by an unknown author living in southern India, is one of the most comprehensive texts on buildings and settlements in classical India, particularly in Tamil and Malayalam countries. Combining technical, practical and religious considerations, the Mayamata indicates how to choose the site of a building according to the social class of its future occupants, what plan and orientation to adopt for a dwelling house, a palace or a temple to guarantee the well-being of its residents, and what construction techniques should be used in each of these cases. It details the ceremony to be performed at the laying of the foundation stone or when taking possession of the building, describes the furniture, the linga (symbolic phallic representation of Siva) and how to represent the gods in the buildings.

The present illustrated edition, which resembles an architect's notebook, includes extracts from the translation of the Mayamata, revised for the occasion by Bruno Dagens, with a lighter set of notes and a new commentary resituating this treatise from the historical and geographical points of view, but also in relation to the entire classical Indian tradition of writings on architecture and the art of living. 

This text was written in the 11th century AD.

Translated from Sanskrit and commented by Bruno Dagens
Illustrations and sketches by Benjamin Van Blancke

♦ In bookstores April 8, 2022