Encyclopaedia of Jaina Studies Vol 01 Jaina Art and Architecture

SR No.: 006774
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Sagarmal Jain, Others
Publisher: Parshwanath Vidyapith
Publication Year: 2010
Total Pages: 726
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 51 MB

Page 118

Encyclopaedia of Jaina Studies
a pair of dvärapälas. The inner face of the jamb is Virabhadra. carved with two Udadhikumāras (water divinities) riding The garbhagrha doorway is similar to that of the on crocodiles. The doorsill shows a large central mandapa, but it carries figures of human, bird, projection carved with lotus stalks entwining paired Vidyadhara, Suparņa-mithunas, nāga-mithunas, an Kinnaras, elephants representing Diggajas, a pair of elephant and an acrobat fighting a lion on the outer devotees and large sejant lion. The door-lintel shows jamb, Sarasvati and Vidyādevi on two ends of the lintel, a figure of Cakreśvarī on the lalāta and two registers and eight standing robeless Jinas on the architrave. of small rathikās.
Inside the sanctum are only three pillars and six The interior of the mandapa has plain walls and plain pilasters on the east and south sides as the threeshows two longitudinal rows of four pillars each, forming fourth rock-ceiling in the north-west is securely supported a square large bay at the centre and a small rectangular on the walls of the sanctum. The mulanāyaka image one on the front and the back. The pillars are similar is missing; instead, there is a medieval image of Jina to those of the entrance porch. The lintel and architrave installed on a high pedestal. are decorated with a band of chequer pattern, two rows On the grounds of style and the palaeography of of tiny rathikās, and a frieze of triangular leaves. The inscriptions engraved as labels below Jaina Yakşas and central ceiling is composed of four circular courses of Yaksis, the temple is datable to c. A.D. 850-875. kolas; the one in the front bay is identical to that of KHAJURAHO the entrance porch (Pl. 24); and the ceiling in the back Khajuraho is situated about 29 miles east of bay is flat and decorated with two rows of small square Chhatarpur district headquarters in Madhya Pradesh. It panels depicting Vidyādhara couples, while its central has now become an important tourist place linked both part is carved with kola.
by airways and roadways. It is almost midway between The wall of garbhagsha (sanctum sanctorum) is Satna and Harpalpur Railheads connected by good also dvi-anga and shows a rathikä on each bhadra and metalled road. The region around Khajuraho is well karna, and on the lateral wall enclosing the antarāla covered with trees and shrubs and watered by tanks. in front of sanctum. The south bhadra-niche contains Geologically, it forms a part of the Vindhyan range a seated figure of Jina, and one karna-niche that of which provides fine-grained sandstone of various shades, Cakreśvari. The ambulatory is entered on each side by used largely in the construction of the temples of a doorway of three jambs decorated with patravalli (an Khajuraho. abstract form of naga), patravalli and bevelled lotus. Khajuraho had never been a religious or political The basal part of jambs shows a river-goddess flanked centre before the 9th century A.D. It first came into by a pratihāra (door-keeper). The door-lintel in the importance when the Candellas (c. A.D. 850-1200) of southern doorway shows a figure of Garuda (mount of Jejākabhukti made it their religious capital by adorning Cakreśvari) on the lalata, and the architrave surmounting it with beautiful temples, tanks and gardens. According it has four registers of rathikās crowned by udgama to the local tradition, the Candellas built eighty-five pediments, the lowermost depicting eleven figures of temples at Khajuraho. Of these, twenty-five temples standing Jinas with two female devotees, the second still stand in various stages of preservation, while the having figures of four Jinas, and the upper two left remaining ones may be traced in the ruins that have vacant, but the rathikās in the northern doorway harbour now turned into mounds. Topographically, the extant Saptamätņkās (Cāmundä, Indrāņi, Vārāhi, Vaişnavī, temples are divisible into four groups, viz. Western, Kaumäri, Maheśvari and Brahmäņi) with Gaņeśa and Eastern, South-eastern and Southern. The Western Group
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