Temple Architecture and Sculpture

Written and reviewed by Subhra Gupta, Humanities faculty at UniDrill (M.A. Sociology, University of Delhi · 7 years teaching Humanities). Based on NCERT Fine Arts Class XI (An Introduction to Indian Art Part I), Chapter 6.

Why do temples in Odisha and Madurai look nothing alike?

Stand in front of the Sun temple at Konark and then in front of the Meenakshi temple at Madurai. Both are Hindu temples, both have a sanctum for the deity, and yet one is a single tall curving tower on a high base while the other is a courtyard ringed by gateway towers. The difference is not accident. It is the difference between two architectural orders, Nagara in the north and Dravida in the south, and between dozens of regional styles inside them. This is the largest chapter in the unit and the most reliable source of single line factual questions, so the best strategy is to learn the vocabulary once and then hang each site on it.

Most surviving art and architecture of ancient and medieval India is religious, mainly because homes and everyday objects were made of wood and clay, which perished. Local shrines for village and forest cults were also not made of stone, so they have vanished too.

The parts of a temple

An early Hindu temple was simple: a veranda, a hall and a shrine at the rear. The shrines were of three kinds: sandhara (with a circumambulation path, the pradakshinapatha), nirandhara (without one) and sarvatobhadra (open from all sides). Temples were decorated with images, and Puranic myths became part of the visual story. Every temple had a principal image of a god.

As temples grew more complex, builders added more and more projecting, symmetrical walls and niches. This is called additive geometry. It gave more surfaces for sculpture without changing the basic plan of the shrine.

Where each sculpture sits

The study of images through their symbols and myths is called iconography. The meaning of a deity may stay the same for centuries, while the way it is used in one place can respond to local conditions. Placement is planned, which is why NTA can ask "where would you find this figure".

Nagara and Dravida side by side

Two views. For the exam: there are two broad orders, Nagara and Dravida, and Vesara is the hybrid style of the Deccan. Another reading: some scholars regard Vesara as an independent style formed by the selective mixing of the two orders, while others see the buildings of the Deccan as distinctly either Nagara or Dravida. Answer with the three names, but know the argument.

The Nagara order and its three shapes

The most common Nagara shikhara is the latina or rekha prasada, square at the base with walls that curve inward to a point. The phamsana is broader and shorter, with a roof of several slabs that rise on a straight incline to a single point. Many North Indian temples use phamsana for the mandapa and latina for the garbhagriha. The valabhi is a rectangular building with a vaulted, wagon shaped roof, a form that echoes the long apsidal halls of Buddhist chaitya caves. Later latina temples grew into clusters of smaller towers rising to the tallest one above the sanctum.

Central India: from Deogarh to Khajuraho

Temples of Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan share a visible trait: they are of sandstone. The oldest surviving structural temples of the Gupta period are modest. Each has four pillars supporting a small mandapa in front of a tiny garbhagriha. Two survive, one at Udaigiri near Vidisha, part of a Hindu cave complex, and one at Sanchi near the stupa. The Sanchi temple is the first with a flat roof, which shows that similar developments were taking place in both religions.

Deogarh (Lalitpur district, Uttar Pradesh) was built in the early sixth century, about a hundred years after those small shrines, and is a classic late Gupta temple. It is a panchayatana temple: a main shrine on a rectangular plinth with four smaller shrines at the corners, five in all. Its tall curvilinear latina shikhara marks it as an early classic Nagara temple. It faces west, which is less common because most temples face east or north. The doorway is grand, with Ganga on the left and Yamuna on the right.

The temple shows Vishnu in many forms, so it was assumed that the four corner shrines held his avatars and it was mistaken for a dasavatara temple. In fact, nobody knows to whom the corner shrines were originally dedicated. Three main reliefs of Vishnu are on the walls.

Khajuraho shows how far Nagara architecture travelled in about four hundred years. The Chandela kings built these temples in the tenth century. The Lakshmana temple, dedicated to Vishnu, was built in 954 by the Chandela king Dhanga. It stands on a high platform reached by stairs, has four smaller temples at the corners, and all its towers rise in a curved pyramidal fashion, ending in an amalaka topped with a kalasha. It has projecting balconies and verandas, which Deogarh does not.

The Kandariya Mahadeo temple is the epitome of Central Indian temple architecture, a massive structure that gathers all the features the region is known for. Khajuraho's sculpture is stylised and in almost full relief, cut away from the stone, with sharp noses, prominent chins and long slanting eyes and eyebrows. The temples include mithuna sculptures. Erotic expression is given equal importance with spiritual pursuit in human experience and is seen as part of a larger cosmic whole, and embracing couples are considered auspicious, placed at entrances, on exterior walls or between the mandapa and the main shrine. Khajuraho also has Jain temples and the Chausanth Yogini temple, earlier than the tenth century, made of small square shrines of roughly hewn granite, each for a goddess linked to the rise of Tantric worship after the seventh century. Yogini temples were built between the seventh and tenth centuries across Madhya Pradesh, Odisha and as far south as Tamil Nadu, but few survive.

Pause and predict: a guide at Deogarh calls it a dasavatara temple because Vishnu appears in so many reliefs. Is she right?

Check your answer: No. The reliefs are of Vishnu, but it is not known who the four corner shrines were dedicated to, so the label rests on an assumption. What you can safely say is that it is a panchayatana temple with three main Vishnu reliefs.

Pause and predict: you see a temple on a high stone platform with no compound wall, a tall curving tower, and Ganga and Yamuna carved beside the sanctum door. Nagara or Dravida?

Check your answer: Nagara. A platform with no boundary wall, a curving shikhara and the river goddesses at the sanctum door are all northern features. A Dravida temple would have a gopuram, a stepped vimana and fierce dvarapalas.

West India

Temples in Gujarat, Rajasthan and western Madhya Pradesh use stone ranging from common sandstone to grey or black basalt in some tenth to twelfth century sculptures. The most famous medium is soft white marble, seen in the Jain temples of Mount Abu (tenth to twelfth century) and the fifteenth century temple at Ranakpur. Samlaji in Gujarat is an art historical site where an earlier regional tradition mixed with a post Gupta style. Many sculptures of grey schist, dated between the sixth and eighth centuries, have been found there.

The Sun temple at Modhera was built in 1026 by Raja Bhimdev I of the Solanki dynasty. In front of it is a massive rectangular stepped tank, the surya kund, perhaps the grandest temple tank in India, with 108 miniature shrines carved between its steps. A huge ornamental arch, a torana, leads to the sabha mandapa, which is open on all sides, as was the fashion in western and central India. The lavish carving shows the influence of Gujarat's woodcarving tradition. The walls of the small central shrine are left plain, because the temple faces east and at the equinoxes the sun shines directly into it.

East India

Eastern temples include those of the North East, Bengal and Odisha, each with its own style. Because many old buildings in the North East and Bengal were renovated, what stands now is often later brick or concrete. Terracotta was the main medium of building and moulded plaques in Bengal until the seventh century.

The Odisha plan is square and becomes circular in the crowning mastaka, so the spire looks almost cylindrical. The deul is vertical almost to the top and then curves sharply inward. The exteriors are richly carved, the interiors generally bare, and the temples usually have boundary walls. Main sites are in ancient Kalinga: Bhubaneswar, Puri and Konark.

The Sun temple at Konark was built in stone around 1240 on the shore of the Bay of Bengal. Its colossal shikhara, said to have reached 70 m, was too heavy for its site and fell in the nineteenth century. The jagamohana (dance pavilion) survives, though no longer open, and is said to be the largest enclosed space in Hindu architecture. The whole temple is made to look like a giant processional chariot of the Sun god, with twelve pairs of enormous wheels and, at the entrance stairs, seven horses. A massive Surya in green stone stands on the southern wall. Three such images in different stones are said to have faced different directions, while the fourth wall held the doorway through which the sun's rays entered the garbhagriha.

The Hills

In Kumaon, Garhwal, Himachal and Kashmir a distinct style grew. Kashmir was close to Gandhara sites such as Taxila and Peshawar, so Gandhara influence was strong by the fifth century CE and then blended with Gupta and post Gupta traditions from Sarnath, Mathura and even Gujarat and Bengal. Hill builders had their own wooden pitched roof tradition. Many hill temples therefore combine a latina garbhagriha and shikhara with a mandapa of older wooden form, and some are pagoda shaped.

The Karkota period is the most significant for Kashmir. The Pandrethan temple (eighth and ninth centuries) stands on a plinth in the middle of a tank, is a Hindu temple possibly for Shiva, and has a peaked roof suited to snow. It is lightly ornamented, with only a row of elephants at the base and a decorated doorway. At Chamba, the Lakshana Devi temple has images of Mahishasuramardini and Narasimha that show post Gupta influence and the metal sculpture tradition of Kashmir. The yellow colour of the images is possibly due to a zinc and copper alloy. An inscription says it was built in the reign of Meruvarman in the seventh century. In Kumaon, the temples at Jageshwar near Almora and Champavat near Pithoragarh are classic Nagara examples.

The Dravida order

The Dravida temple has a compound wall, a central gateway (gopuram) in the front wall, and a stepped pyramidal vimana. A tank is common, and subsidiary shrines are either inside the main tower or separate small shrines. The northern idea of clustered towers was unpopular in the south.

Why the garbhagriha tower is often the smallest. At some of the most sacred southern temples, the tower over the sanctum is among the smallest, because it is the oldest part. As a temple town grew, a taller wall with loftier gopurams was built around it. The Srirangam temple at Tiruchirapalli has seven concentric rectangular enclosures, with the outermost the newest and the central tower over the sanctum the oldest.

Temples became the focus of town life. Kanchipuram, Thanjavur, Madurai and Kumbakonam were the great temple towns of Tamil Nadu, where in the eighth to twelfth centuries temples were rich administrative centres controlling vast areas of land. Dravida temples have five shapes: square (kuta or caturasra), rectangular (shala or ayatasra), elliptical (gaja prishta or vrittayata, elephant backed, with a horse shoe nasi facade), circular (vritta) and octagonal (ashtasra). The plan and vimana were matched to the nature of the consecrated deity, and shapes could be combined.

Pallava, Chola and the Deccan

The Pallavas were active in the Andhra region from the second century CE and then settled in Tamil Nadu. Their history is best documented from the sixth to eighth century. They were mostly Shaivite, though some Vaishnava shrines survive, and their links with South East Asia were strong. Early buildings were rock cut and later ones structural, although structural building was known even when caves were being cut. Mahendravarman I, a contemporary of the Chalukya king Pulakesin II, is linked with the early buildings. Narasimhavarman I (Mamalla), who acceded around 640 CE, expanded the empire and began most of the works at Mahabalipuram, which is named Mamallapuram after him.

The Shore temple at Mahabalipuram was probably built under Narasimhavarman II, Rajasimha (700–728 CE). It faces east towards the sea but houses three shrines: two for Shiva facing east and west, and a middle one for Vishnu as Anantashayana. Having three areas of worship is unusual, so it was probably not planned that way and shrines may have been added over time. Nandi sculptures line the walls, and salt laden sea air has badly eroded the carvings.

The Brihadeeshwara (Rajarajeswara) temple at Thanjavur, completed around 1009 by Rajaraja Chola, is the largest and tallest of all Indian temples. Its pyramidal, multi storeyed vimana rises about 70 m and is topped by a monolithic, octagonal, dome shaped stupika. Here, for the first time, two large gopuras with a planned sculptural programme appear along with the temple. Large Nandi figures stand at the corners of the shikhara, and the kalasha is about three metres high. Hundreds of stucco figures decorate the vimana, though some may have been added in the Maratha period. The main deity is Shiva as a huge lingam in a two storeyed sanctum, and the walls around it carry mythological narratives in murals and sculpture.

The Deccan produced mixed styles. After about 750 CE the Rashtrakutas took control from the early western Chalukyas. Their greatest achievement is the Kailashnath temple at Ellora, the culmination of a rock cut tradition of at least a thousand years. It is a complete Dravida building, with a Nandi shrine, a gopuram like gateway, cloisters, subsidiary shrines, staircases and a vimana rising to 30 m, all carved out of living rock from one monolithic hill. Its sculpture is dynamic, with figures often larger than life.

Further south, in Karnataka, the early western Chalukyas, established by Pulakesin I around Badami in 543, produced the most experimental hybrid (Vesara) buildings. The Ravana Phadi cave at Aihole is probably the earliest and is known for a Nataraja surrounded by the saptamatrikas, three on Shiva's left and four on his right. At Pattadakal, the Virupaksha temple was made in the reign of Vikramaditya II (733–44) by his chief queen Loka Mahadevi, and the Papanatha temple is one of the best early Dravida examples. The Mahakuta temples near Badami and the Swarga Brahma temple at Alampur show more northern influence. The Durga temple at Aihole has an apsidal shrine like a Buddhist chaitya hall, a later veranda and a shikhara like a Nagara one. The Lad Khan temple at Aihole looks inspired by wooden roofed hill temples, but in stone.

The Hoysalas and Vijayanagara

As Chola and Pandya power waned, the Hoysalas of Karnataka rose, with Mysore as their centre. About a hundred temples survive, of which three are most discussed: Belur, Halebid and Somnathpuram. Their hallmark is the stellate plan: angular projections out of a square plan make a star shape. They are made of soft soapstone, so the sculptors could carve very fine detail, especially the jewellery of the gods. The Hoysaleshvara temple at Halebid, built in 1150 and dedicated to Shiva as Nataraja, is a double building with a large mandapa for music and dance and a Nandi pavilion before each building. Its towers fell long ago. In its lowest frieze of a procession of hundreds of elephants, no two are said to be in the same pose.

Vijayanagara, founded in 1336 and meaning "city of victory", drew foreign travellers whose accounts survive, among them Niccolo di Conti, Domingo Paes, Fernao Nuniz, Duarte Barbosa and Abd al-Razzaq. Its architecture combines the Dravida tradition with styles seen in neighbouring sultanates, and its sculpture consciously recreates Chola ideals.

Buddhist and Jain developments

Hindu, Buddhist and Jain building went hand in hand. Ellora has monuments of all three, while Badami, Khajuraho and Kannauj have remains of two religions side by side.

In Bihar and Bengal (Magadha), the Palas rose in the eighth century and Dharmapala built an empire. Bodhgaya, where Siddhartha attained enlightenment, is the pre eminent Buddhist site. The first shrine by the Bodhi tree is said to have been built by Ashoka, the railing is thought to be post Mauryan, about 100 BCE, and many niche sculptures date to the Pala period. The Mahabodhi temple as it stands is largely a colonial period reconstruction of the old seventh century design. It is strictly neither Nagara nor Dravida: it is narrow like a Nagara temple, but rises straight without curving, like a Dravida one.

Nalanda is a mahavihara, a complex of many monasteries, of which only a small part is excavated. Much of what is known comes from the records of Xuan Zang, according to which Kumaragupta I laid the foundation of a monastery in the fifth century. Theravada, Mahayana and Vajrayana teachings were all taught, and monks came from China, Tibet, Central Asia, Sri Lanka and South East Asia and carried back small sculptures and illustrated manuscripts. The Nalanda school, formed by the ninth century from the Sarnath Gupta idiom, the Bihar tradition and Central India, is known for precise, ordered, uncrowded, three dimensional sculpture with detailed back slabs and delicate ornament. Early images show Mahayana deities such as standing Buddhas and Avalokiteshvara, while in the late eleventh and twelfth centuries Vajrayana deities dominate, and crowned Buddhas appear commonly only after the tenth century.

Sirpur in Chhattisgarh (550–800) has Hindu and Buddhist shrines and resembles Nalanda in iconography and style. Odisha's major Buddhist monasteries are Lalitagiri, Vajragiri and Ratnagiri. The port of Nagapattinam was a Buddhist centre until the Chola period, with tenth century Chola style bronzes and stone sculptures.

Jain temple builders were as prolific as Hindu ones. The oldest Jain pilgrimage sites are in Bihar, and important Jain sites are at Ellora and Aihole in the Deccan and Deogarh, Khajuraho, Chanderi and Gwalior in Central India. At Sravana Belagola in Karnataka stands the granite statue of Bahubali, known as Gomateshwara, 18 m (57 ft) high, described as the world's tallest monolithic free standing structure, commissioned by Camundaraya, the General in Chief and Prime Minister of the Ganga kings. The Mount Abu Jain temples were built by Vimal Shah and are noted for plain exteriors with exuberant marble interiors, where deep undercutting gives a lace like effect and each ceiling has a unique pattern. Palitana in the Shatrunjay hills of Kathiawar, Gujarat, is a great pilgrimage site with scores of temples clustered together.

Two sculptural masterpieces

Mahabalipuram: the great relief. This sculptural panel is nearly 30 m long and 15 m high, one of the largest and oldest known. A natural cleft in the rock was used as a channel for water to flow down to a tank in front. Figures are slender, linear and animated, with naturalistic birds and animals, notably well modelled elephants and a pair of deer under the shrine. A cat standing on its hind legs in penance, surrounded by rats that cannot disturb it, is a witty symbol of the strength of the penance of the figure above.

Two views. For the exam: the panel is a famous Pallava relief with a standing ascetic and Shiva giving a boon. Another reading: some scholars read the story as the descent of the Ganga from heaven, with the ascetic as Bhagirath. Others read it as Arjuna's penance (Kiratarjuniya, a work by Bharavi popular at the Pallava court), where the aim is to obtain the pashupata weapon from Shiva. A third reading sees the whole tableau as a prashasti praising the Pallava king, who would have sat in the tank before this backdrop. Know that the identification is debated.

Ravana shaking Mount Kailasha. The most noteworthy version of this theme is on the left wall of the Kailashnath temple (Cave 16) at Ellora, of the eighth century, a colossal masterpiece. In the lower tier the many faced and many armed Ravana shakes the mountain with ease. His body is angular, with one leg pushed inwards, and the deep carving of his hands creates a three dimensional chamber. In the upper half, divided into three frames, Shiva and Parvati are at the centre. Parvati, frightened by the commotion, moves close to Shiva in a twisted pose that makes a dramatic play of light and shade. Ganas act busily, and celestial beings above watch in frozen movement.

Beyond the textbook. For the exam: temple sculpture is studied as stone, brick, terracotta and bronze. In reality: sculptures were often painted, and pigments rarely survive centuries of weather. The pale or dark stone you see today is not what worshippers saw. Why it matters: when a description says "richly carved", picture the carving once coloured as well.

Beyond the textbook. For the exam: the Mahabodhi temple at Bodhgaya is remembered through its seventh century design. In reality: the monument has layers. The first shrine by the Bodhi tree is said to be Ashokan, the railing is thought to be post Mauryan (about 100 BCE), many niche sculptures date to the Pala period, and the temple as it stands is largely a colonial period reconstruction of the old design. Why it matters: when a question gives a date for Bodhgaya, ask which part of the monument it refers to.

Site finder

Key people and dynasties

Exam traps

60-second revision

Where this chapter connects

• Previous: Later Mural Traditions covers the paintings that decorated several of these temples, such as Brihadeswara.
• Next: Indian Bronze Sculpture shows the metal images worshipped inside South Indian temples such as Thanjavur.
• Earlier chapter: Post Mauryan Trends in Indian Art and Architecture explains the chaitya halls and stupas that Valabhi and apsidal temples recall.
• Later in the unit: Some Aspects of Indo Islamic Architecture picks up the same cities after the thirteenth century.