| | | Khajurâho
खजुराहो
UNESCO World Heritage Site : 1986
Khajurâho (India)
| | | | The Khajuraho Group of Monuments in Khajuraho (Hindi: खजुराहो), a town in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, located in Chhatarpur District, about 620 kilometres (385 mi) southeast of New Delhi, are one of the most popular tourist destinations in India. | | Khajurâho : Virtual tour |  | 16 sections and 104 items |
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Khajurâho : Guide (1)
Khajurâho : Place(s) of worship (15)
|  | Shanti Nath Temple (1)
East group
approx. between 1900 and 1910
The Shanti Nath temple was only built around a century ago but contains many components from older temples. It has a 4.5m high statue of Adinath which dates from around 1028 A.D.
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|  | Chitragupta Temple (7)
West group
Chandela dynasty - approx. between 1002 and 1017
This temple closely resembles the Devi Jagadamba temple and consists of a sanctum without an ambulatory, a vestibule (antarala), a maha mandapa with lateral transepts and an entrance porch (ardha mandapa).
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|  | Kandarîya Mahadeva Temple (19)
West group
approx. between 1025 and 1050
This temple, built between 1025-1050, is the largest and loftiest of the monuments of Khajuraho, and is dedicated to Shiva. It is the first of a set of three temples on a common platform.
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|  | Varaha Temple (2)
West group
Chandela dynasty - approx. between 900 and 925
Facing the large Lakshmana Temple are these two small shrines. The Varaha Temple, dedicated to Vishnu's boar incarnation or Varaha avataar, faces the Matangesvara Temple.
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|  | Vishvanath Temple (26)
West group
Chandela dynasty - near 1002
The Vishvanath Temple, believed to have been constructed in 1002, has the same five-part layout of the larger Kandariya Mahadev, with the addition of two of the four subsidiary shrines of the panchayatana design still standing. It shares a common platform with the shrine to the Bull Nandi opposite, and the steps up to this terrace are guarded by lions to the north and elephants to the south.
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| | Khajurâho : Description | |
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Khajuraho has the largest group of medieval Hindu and Jain temples, famous for their erotic sculpture. The Khajuraho group of monuments has been listed as a Unesco World Heritage Site, and is considered to be one of the "Seven Wonders" of India.
The name Khajuraho, ancient "Kharjuravāhaka", is derived from the Sanskrit words "kharjura" meaning date palm.
Architecture
The temples are grouped into three geographical divisions: western, eastern and southern.
The Khajuraho temples are made of sandstone. The builders didn't use mortar : the stones were put together with mortise and tenon joints and they were held in place by gravity. This form of construction requires very precise joints. The columns and architraves were built with megaliths that weighed up to 20 tons.
Khajuraho temples, constructed with spiral superstructures, adhere to northern Indian shikhara temple style and often to a Panchayatana plan or layout. A Panchayatana temple had four subordinate shrines on four corners and the main shrine in the center of the podium, which comprises their base, with a graded rise secondary shikharas (spires) cluster to create appropriate base for the main shikhara over the sanctum. Kandariya Mahadeva, one of the most accomplished temples of the Western group, comprises eighty-four shikharas, the main being 116 feet from the ground level. These shikharas - subordinate and main, attribute to the Khajuraho temples their unique splendor and special character. With a graded rise of these shikharas from over the ardhamandapa, porch, to mandapa, assembly hall, mahamandapa, principal assembly hall, antarala, vestibule, and garbhagraha, sanctum sanctorum, Khajuraho temples attain the form and glory of gradually rising Himalayan peaks.
Chronology
The temples have been assigned the following historical sequence by Dr. Kanhaiyalal Agrawal.
1 - Chausath Yogini - 64 Yoginis
2 - Brahma - Brahma
3 - Lalgun Mahadev - Shiva
4 - Matangeshwar - Shiva
5 - Varaha - Varaha
6 - Lakshman - Vaikuntha Vishnu
7 - Parshvanath - Adinath
8 - Vishvanath - Shiva
9 - Devi Jagadambi - Parvati (initially Vishnu)
10 - Chitragupta - Surya
11 - Kandariya Mahadeva - Shiva
12 - Vamana - Vamana
13 - Adinath - Jina
14 - Jawari - Vishnu
15 - Chaturbhuja - Vishnu
16 - Duladev - Shiva
17 - Ghantai - Jina
Statues and carvings
Not ashlars or stone blocks, but neatly carved and emotionally charged handsome men, charming women, gods, apsaras, kinnaras, gandharvas, vidyadharas, yakshas, yakshis, ganas, dikpals, nagakanyas, shardulas and other mythical and celestial beings, engaged in singing, dancing, playing on musical instruments, embracing, kissing, or making love, carry these temples to their shikhara heights. Here stone, endowed with exceptional plasticity, melts into a wondrous world of emotions and passions, yielding forms and figures and rhythm and song, and there are now sensuous lovers, exalted dancers, enthused singers, maidens engaged in shringara, mothers caressing kids, and many more who breathe life into the stone and now there is all of man and all of nature except the lifelessness which the stone symbolizes, or a single piece of stone, which has the face of stone. This unique transformation has made each stone sing, dance, blow trumpets, yearn in love, doze in slumber, eject from drowsiness, languish in passion, and burst with youthfulness, and now the stone not only has a soul within but also pours it out. It reveals dreams and realities of man and music of divines; and, thus, each temple becomes the festival of love and life representing their unbroken continuity.
Some of the temples that have two layers of walls have small erotic carvings on the outside of the inner wall. There are many interpretations of the erotic carvings. They portray that, for seeing the deity, one must leave his or her sexual desires outside the temple. They also show that divinity, such as the deities of the temples, is pure like the atman, which is not affected by sexual desires and other characteristics of the physical body. It has been suggested that these suggest tantric sexual practices. Meanwhile, the external curvature and carvings of the temples depict humans, human bodies, and the changes that occur in human bodies, as well as facts of life. Some 10% of the carvings contain sexual theme. Those reportedly do not show deities, they show sexual activities between people. The rest depict the everyday life of the common Indian of the time when the carvings were made, and of various activities of other beings. For example, those depictions show women putting on makeup, musicians, potters, farmers, and other folk. Those mundane scenes are all at some distance from the temple deities. A common misconception is that, since the old structures with carvings in Khajuraho are temples, the carvings depict sex between deities.
Another perspective of these carvings is presented by James McConnachie. In his history of the Kamasutra, McConnachie describes the zesty 10% of the Khajuraho sculpture as "the apogee of erotic art": "Twisting, broad-hipped and high breasted nymphs display their generously contoured and bejeweled bodies on exquisitely worked exterior wall panels. These fleshy apsaras run riot across the surface of the stone, putting on make-up, washing their hair, playing games, dancing, and endlessly knotting and un-knotting their girdles ... Beside the heavenly nymphs are serried ranks of griffins, guardian deities and, most notoriously, extravagantly interlocked maithunas, or lovemaking couples."
Outside wall of one of the temples
While the sexual nature of these carvings have caused the site to be referred to as the Kamasutra temple, they do not illustrate the meticulously described positions. Neither do they express the philosophy of Vatsyayana's famous sutra. As "a strange union of Tantrism and fertility motifs, with a heavy dose of magic" they belie a document which focuses on pleasure rather than procreation. That is, fertility is moot.
The strategically placed sculptures are "symbolical-magical diagrams, or yantras" designed to appease malevolent spirits. This alamkara (ornamentation) expresses sophisticated artistic transcendence over the natural; sexual images imply a virile, thus powerful, ruler.
Between 950 and 1150, the Chandela monarchs built these temples when the Tantric tradition may have been accepted. In olden days, before the Mughal conquests, when boys lived in hermitages, following brahmacharya until they became men, they could learn about the world and prepare themselves to become householders through examining these sculptures and the worldly desires they depicted.
While recording the television show 'lost worlds' for the history channel at Khajuraho Alex Evans, a contemporary stone mason and sculptor gave his expert opinion and forensically examined the tool marks and construction techniques involved in creating the stunning stonework at the sites. He also recreated a stone sculpture under 4 feet that took about 60 days to carve in an attempt to develop a rough idea how much work must have been involved. Roger Hopkins and Mark Lehner also conducted experiments to quarry limestone which took 12 quarrymen 22 days to quarry about 400 tons of stone. These temples would have required hundreds of highly trained sculptors.
Landscape
The Khajuraho temples are now set in a parkland landscape. When India gained independence from Britain in 1947 the landscape setting was semi-desert and scrub. The archaeological park now has something of the character of an English public park, with mown grass, rose beds and ornamental trees. This may be popular with visitors but has no relationship with the historic landscape at the time the temples were built.
The development of landscape archaeology as an academic discipline raises questions concerning the earlier landscape of Khajuraho and the original relationship between the temple complex and the surrounding area. There are no records of what the original landscape might have been, but it is known that a large community of priests used the temple complex and that Indian gardens in the tenth century were predominantly tree gardens. They did not have lawns or herbaceous flowering plants.
Tourism
Khajuraho temple complex offers a well made light and sound show every evening. The first show is in English language and the second one in Hindi. The show is about an hour long and covers the history, philosophy and the art of sculpting of these temples. It is held in the open lawns in the temple complex.
The Khajuraho Dance Festival, held every year in February/March, is an opportunity for visitors to experience various classical Indian dances set against the backdrop of the Chitragupta or Vishwanath Temples.
Recent discovery
The Archaeological Survey of India has recently started digging on a mound where perhaps the largest underground temple in Khajuraho has been unearthed. The dig will take at least a couple of years to conclude.
From Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khajuraho_Group_of_Monuments
Text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Text_of_the_GNU_Free_Documentation_License | | Khajurâho : History | |
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In the 27th century of the Kali yuga, the Mlechcha invaders started attacking North India. Some Bargujar Rajputs moved eastward to central India; they ruled over the Northeastern region of Rajasthan, called Dhundhar, and were referred to as Dhundhel or Dhundhela in ancient times, for the region they governed. Later on they called themselves Bundelas and Chandelas; those who were in the ruling class having gotra Kashyap were definitely all Bargujars; they were vassals of Gurjara - Pratihara empire of North India, which lasted from 500 C.E. to 1300 C.E. and at its peak the major monuments were built. The Bargujars also built the Kalinjar fort and Neelkanth Mahadev temple, similar to one at Sariska National Park, and Baroli, being Shiva worshipers.
The city was the cultural capital of Chandela Rajputs, a Hindu dynasty that ruled this part of India from the 10-12th centuries. The political capital of the Chandelas was Kalinjar. The Khajuraho temples were built over a span of 200 years, from 950 to 1150. The Chandela capital was moved to Mahoba after this time, but Khajuraho continued to flourish for some time. Khajuraho has no forts because the Chandel Kings never lived in their cultural capital.
The whole area was enclosed by a wall with eight gates, each flanked by two golden palm trees. There were originally over 80 Hindu temples, of which only 25 now stand in a reasonable state of preservation, scattered over an area of about 20 square kilometres (8 sq mi).
Today, the temples serve as fine examples of Indian architectural styles that have gained popularity due to their explicit depiction of sexual life during medieval times. Locals living in the Khajuraho village always knew about and kept up the temples as best as they could. They were pointed out to an Englishman in late 19th century but the jungles had taken a toll on all the monuments. | | Khajurâho : More pictures | |
| | | | Related article(s) | |
Tantra
Tantra (Sanskrit: तन्त्र "loom, warp" - hence "principle, system, doctrine", from the root tan "stretch, extend"), anglicised tantricism or tantrism or tantram, is an esoteric current of Hinduism.
Kama Sutra - Kamasutra
The Kama Sutra (Sanskrit: कामसूत्र) is an ancient Indian Hindu text widely considered to be the standard work on human sexual behavior in Sanskrit literature written by Vātsyāyana.
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