Description of Temples of the Jainas in South Bihar and Bhagalpur

Extract

The sect of Jain has in the division of Nawádá in South Bihar two places of pilgrimage. One is a tank named Nakhaur, about a mile and a half north from Nawádá, and which is of no great size, extending in its greatest length from east to west. It is choked with weeds, especially the nelumbium. The temple is on a small square island covered with a terrace of brick, and is a neat but inconsiderable building, covered with one dome. A very bad road with a rude bridge leads into the island. The temple contains two stones, on each of which is an inscription, and the representation of two human feet, the most usual object of worship among the Jainas of this district. The inscriptions are exactly the same: only the one is a year earlier than the other: I give therefore a copy only of the earliest, dated in Samvat 1676 (A.D. 1619). The object of worship is Gautama, whom the Jainas, as well as the orthodox and Bauddhas, claim as, of their sect; and the image was made by a certain Níháló, mother of Thákur Sangráma, son of Góvardhana dás, son of Góvardhana dás, son of Bimala dás, of the Chóprá tribe, descended of Mantrídal, all persons equally obscure.