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SVASTI – Essays in Honour of Prof. Hampa Nagarajaiah
reach Paudanapura. Instead, he should shoot an arrow at the largest boulder on the top of the larger hill. Cāmunda-Rāya does this the next day. Small rocks and rubble fall down with much noise, and Cāmunda-Rāya recognizes the contours of Bāhubali. He calls his stonemasons and has them complete the granite structure.* On Sunday, March the thirteenth, 981,' the image is festively installed. Shravana Belagola thus probably had the first temple with an image of Bāhubali, as previously only depictions of the Tīrthankaras had been usual. This and the founding of a monastery (matha) made the remote and inhospitable, beautiful yet wild place, which had all the qualities that are conducive for a monk to renounce his material existence, to a small town for the first time, which at first was called "Gommatapura".? The attractiveness of Shravana Belagola as a holy place grew further, and the heads of the monastery (bhattārakas) gained in influence in the religious and social life of the Jainas in Karnataka and in adjacent regions. Also in the middle ages Shravana Belagola remained in the focus of reigning kings; the rulers of the Ganga, Rashtrakuta and Hoysala dynasties' expanded the temple sites of Shravana Belagola, added many further images and temples, increased the wealth of the sacred place through gifts of land, and lended patronage to poets and scholars. Especially the Wodeyar dynasty of Mysore gave great importance to having the largest and most important ritual of Shravana Belagola, the Mahāmastakābhiseka, performed with their patronage. Since India became independent, Shravana Belagola, like all prominent Indian holy places of archeological significance, is under the supervision of the Archeological Survey of India. The government for the state of Karnataka financially supports the Mahāmastakābhiseka, which nowadays, also due to reasons of prestige and touristic economy, is among the main rituals of a site that by itself already is of great importance. The immense treasure of ancient stone inscriptions and of manuscripts that have been preserved for centuries, now kept in the library of the National Institute of Prakrit Studies and Research, at Shravana Belagola, are among the most important sources for the study of south Indian cultural history. The present head of the monastery (mathādhipati) is Jagadguru Karmayogi Charukeerthi Bhattāraka Swāmiji, who has occupied this position since 1970.
* Cf. Settar, p. 18f.
Sangave, p. 81. * Settar, p. 2. 7 The matha was probably founded by Cāmundarāya already in the 10th century. The first historical evidence of a Cärukirti-Bhattāraka (head of a matha) dates from 1131. Settar, p. 59. Settar, p. 2. Sangave, p. 3. 10 Published in Epigraphia Carnatica, Volume Two. Institute of Kannada Studies, University of Mysore: Mysore 19732. According to Settar, 523 inscriptions have been published. 271 of them are found on the small hill, 172 on the large hill, and the oldest can be dated to roughly 600 CE. The oldest bit of writing in the Marathi language is found on a sculpted termite hill at the foot of the Bāhubali image. Settar, inner cover, chapter "Inscriptions".
