Posts Tagged ‘parvathi’

Feb

Kanchi Mathangeshwara Temple + Somaskanda Evolution Part 5

Today we are being treated to an excellent travelogue by Arvind - on a little known attraction in the well visited Kanchipuram environs. Arvind is a Software professional with a fanatic interest in sculpture and is currently working on bringing out an online catalogue of sculpture. He is a enthusiastic and voracious reader on sculpture apart from many other interesting passions…Read on…

Visiting Kancheepuram was a long pending item on my to do list. Though I made few visits in my school and college days, I had not visited this treasure trove for long.

The interest to visit was rekindled during my conversations with a good friend. Finally last week, made an impulsive decision to visit the place. I also gave myself the whole weekend to visit as many places as I could.
My good friend Gopinatha Srinivas readily accepted to join me for the trip.

As we were temple hopping, drunk in the beauty of the sculptures, battling the heat, we could cover Kailasandhar Kovil, Katchepawarar Kovil, Kamatchi Amman kovil and Ulagalantha Perumal Kovil on Saturday. We called it day then.

Next morning we wanted to cover as many as possible by the time the temples closed in the afternoon. We started with Ekkamabareswarar Kovil and moved on to Vaikunda Perumal Kovil. Ekkambareswarar Kovil, though huge did not have as many interesting sculptures proportionate to its size. While Vaikunda Perumal koil, was a riot. Every panel there is exquisite and was forcing us stay put.

Interestingly there are panels with Huang-San, replica of Mahabalipuram shore temple (in the Nandivarma Pallavamalla’s ascend to the throne). The panels on the praharas were filled with various coronations of the Pallava Kings. The priest there was kind enough to tell us the other temples we need to visit in the vicinity.

Mathengesawar Temple is just 200 meters away from Vaikundaperumal Koil. This should be the most well hidden temple I had come across.

The directions given to us was to take the 2nd right from where we had parked at Vaikunda perumal koil, the second right was a small lane, as we entered it, we could see a gopuram and our eagerness soared, but there was no approach from the lane we had taken. We reversed and went the next right, which happens to be a main road. As we moved along the road looking for the temple, it never came to our sight. We parked our car and started to walk back to check again, if we had missed the temple.

As we retraced our route, we caught the little ASI board and an adjacent narrow lane, which was the entrance to the temple. This lane is about 30 feet, leading to open clear space. The whole temple complex should be less than 4000 sq.ft. There is single shrine which is well elevated from the ground level. There is a nandhi opposite to the shrine and a banyan tree adjacent to it. From the looks of it the Banyan tree attracts more visitors than the temple.

10 steps lead to the corridor of the shrine, which are quiet steep.

Central shrine houses the linga with a backdrop of Somaskanda panel, which is exquisite. Which styling is this?

The three walls of the the shrine on the outer has some brilliant sculptures, the sandstone had lent itself for some intricate carvings.

Small and very beautiful temple, the sculptures here stays in my eyes now, and hope it would for ever. If not, I can go back to these photographs or back to Kancheepuram to see the beauty again.

Wait for part 2 - for more beauties from here and more history about it….

Tracking the evolution of the Pallava Somaskanda - Part 2

In the previous post, we saw stylistically the earliest and latest somaskanda images.

Today, we are going to see why the Somaskanda Panel in the Dharmaraja Ratha is the earliest available panel of this form.

Lets take a look again at the Somaskanda panel from the Dharamaraja Ratham and the sketch.

To compare it with say a typical Rajasimha style Somaskanda - we have a beautiful almost perfect specimen from the Rajasimeshwara Temple in the shore temple complex ( the shore temple is a complex shrine comprising of an earlier Vishnu shrine buttressed by two shiva shrines - the Rajasimeshwara and Kshatriyasimeshwara shrines - the Kshatriyasimeshwara too has a Somaskanda but we will see that in a subsequent post)

A sketch to assist you in finding the differences. Lets see if you can point out the characteristic differences between the two Somaskandas.

A further twist to the various puzzles that abound in Mallai, the Ramanuja Mandaba is the most complete of the structures but due acts of vandalism - its like a slate that’s been wiped clean. Someone has chiseled out the door guardians, the three relief panels inside as well.