The two principal viharas at Nassick, Nos. 3 and 8, are so similar in dimensions and in all their arrangements, that it is almost impossible to distinguish between their plans on paper. They are both square halls measuring more than 40 ft. each side, without any pillars in the centre, and are surrounded on three sides by sixteen cells of nearly the same dimensions. On the fourth side is a six-pillared verandah, in the one case with a cell at each end, in the other with only one cell, which is the most marked distinction between the two plans. The architecture, too, is in some respects so similar that we can hardly hesitate in assuming that the one is an intentional copy of the other. It is in fact the problem of the great cave at Kenheri, being a copy of that at Karli repeated here.[182] Only the difference in age between the two chaityas being five centuries, the degradation in style is greater than here, where it appears to be little more than two. The pillars in the verandah of cave No. 8 (Woodcut No. 79, p. 150) are so similar to those in the great Karli chaitya, that if it should turn out, as Justice Newton[183] supposes, that Nahapana was the founder of the Samvat era, 56 B.C., there would be nothing in the architecture to contradict such a date. According to Mr. West, “the pillars are shorter in proportion, and the human figures more rudely designed;”[184] but whether to such an extent as to justify an interval of nearly two centuries is not quite clear. On the other hand no vihara I know of on this side of India has a facade so richly ornamented as this. Those at Bhaja and Bedsa are quite plain, and those around Karli, though richer, are far inferior to this, so that on the whole the architectural evidence tends strongly to a date subsequent to the Christian Era. The inscription on this cave says, that it was excavated by Ushavadata, son-in-law of Nahapana, viceroy under King Kshaharatra,[185] evidently a foreigner, whose proper name has not yet been discovered, but for reasons given in the Appendix, there seems little doubt but that the Saka era (A.D. 78-9) dates from his coronation, and as some years must have elapsed before the son-in-law of the viceroy could have been in a position to undertake such a work as this, I presume A.D. 100 is not far from the date of the cave. [Illustration: 79. Pillar in Nahapana Cave, Nassick. (From a Photograph.)] [Illustration: 80. Pillar in Gautamiputra Cave, Nassick. (From a Photograph.)]