July 18, 2022. After a good night sleep, we woke up early, fresh & energetic. We bathed, got ready and had a light breakfast near Durga temple complex junction. Our plan for the morning was to explore Aihole hill starting with the ancient quarry with an bathing place, then see the Jaina Basadi, the prehistoric megalithic tombs, Meguti Gudi, Boudha Chaitya and nameless temples on the hill. We drove straight to the Jaina Basadi which is on the western side of the hill and parked our car, got the cameras, a backpack with snacks & water and locked the car. This is my third or fourth visit to this spot, every single time this place has been peaceful. Behind me is the Basadi..
This Basadi is a special one because it's monolithic, like
Ravalaphadi which is a kilometer from here. BTW, locals call this Myanada Basadi. Myanada means "made of wax" in Kannada. Ancient sculptors hacked this cone-shaped boulder, making it partially hollow inside. While we were here, a canine watched us from the boulder top...it was curious about tourists coming this early.
I wanted to spend a few minutes here so that Pushpa could see this shrine created in VII or VIII Century CE i.e. during the early Chalukyan times. This is the fifth rock-cut shrine in this trip, the earlier ones being the four rock-cut temples of Badami. Straight ahead in this picture is the western slope of Aihole hill. On the slope are natural shelters, a few suitable for humans and a number of smaller caverns which could be inhabited by wild animals. In a few shelters paintings dating back to the Neolithic times can be seen. The lower part of the slope is a former quarry, signs of quarrying activity can be seen even to this day. Do read my earlier post on
Ravalaphadi & ancient sandstone quarry.
The temple has two sections; inner and outer. The outer section is a rectangular hall with Jaina motifs on the ceiling, and on the walls are relief sculptures of Parshvanatha and Bahubali. One portion of the ceiling art has a maze of Swastika & Kamala. The inner section is a larger hall with three sanctums i.e. Garbhagudi. Only the south-facing sanctum has a deity i.e. a life-size idol of Mahaveera. The sanctum is flanked by guards holding lotuses. All inner doorways feature pairs of sculpted pillars. A huge relief sculpture occupies the entire ceiling of the inner hall. The sculpture features five lotuses, four forming a square and the fifth at the point where the diagonals meet. It's a pretty complex piece of work showing floral motifs, a pair of human faces, and imaginary creatures. One could spend hours studying these amazing works of arts.
After spending about 15 minutes in the Basadi, we moved on to see the ancient quarry. I wanted to see the bathing spot and show it to Pushpa. Though I had seen it earlier I missed it as we passed by it. It was Pushpa who spotted it. Here we are, the showering place with a natural water source. The sculptors have made a groove to channelize the water and a small cavity at the edge of the vertical face. There's some engineering in the groove & cavity design to handle different rates of flow.
The vertical face seen here seems like a combination of natural and manmade. If you look closely, a outline of a pillar can be seen. Possibly the sculptors had planned some aesthetic touches. Just above the horizontal band are two inscriptions which seems to be two different names. These are two of the many other inscriptions here.
In the picture below, see the chisel marks along the curved edge. A good portion of this rock has been cut away systematically. Ancient stone workers were expert geologists, with the knowledge they possessed they cut & shaped stones as though they were wax. There are plenty of such quarried rocks on this side of the hill.
Close to the bathing place, we found this rock with series of vertical bars. These sets of bars as I understand is sculptor's work log, may be the master sculptor's log. Probably each bar denotes a week or a day. We had seen similar 'logs' and also names inscribed at Badami cave temples site.
We decide to move on. Next on our list was the prehistoric megalithic tombs site for which we had to get on the hill. The hill top is a 640m long sloping plateau, of I may call it that. During my previous visit here, we had counted 70+ tombs of various sizes, all of them made of slabs sourced locally. Meanwhile, the curious canine had become our friend and tagged along. Somewhere in the vicinity was another canine which was little shy, it followed us but at a distance.
This is one of the first tombs we see as we head in the northerly direction. Each of these tombs is a simple assembly of five slabs; four vertical slabs forming a four-walled chamber and a capstone. Most of these tombs have been vandalized by treasure hunters. That's the reason why most of these tombs seem like assemblies of three or four slabs. In this picture, the slabs lying on the ground must've been a demolished tomb. Since we are looking at tombs, one might wondering about the burial.
This is another badly damaged tomb, two of the walls have been removed which has exposed the innards which is a mass of red dirt. I'm trying to imagine the burial process. First the four walls are positioned to create a open chamber. Next a bed of soil is prepared, the corpse is placed on the bed and then covered with more soil until the chamber is completely packed. Then the much heavier capstone is placed thereby sealing the chamber making it scavenger proof. Neolithic period in India is starts 6500 BCE and ends 1400 BCE. These structures remained undisturbed for thousands of years but the present day humans simply can't leave things alone.
Of the 70+ tombs, this particular structure is probably the biggest and the best preserved. I'm not sure is each tomb was meant for one body or more. The larger the tomb, the more I wonder how the ancient people handled these heavy slabs. What kind of tools did they use to cut & shape them? So many questions..
This region, part of present day Bagalkot district, was very active during the Neolithic times. There were hundreds of such sites here and surrounding districts however many have been lost over time. Ancient humans here became expert at stone crafting. Their deep interest evolved the designs, technology, skills and talents. The products of that evolutionary process are rock-cut temples, structural temples and other ancillary structures like stepped wells, shelters and arches. Apart from structures stone workers also produced utility tools like ladders, water troughs, grinding stones, etc.
All the walking and climbing had worked up our appetite. We decided to take a break and snack. We had madkikaal sprouts (bean sprouts), banana chips and water. Our canine friends won't eat sprouts, we could only offer them chips.
The next item on the list was Meguti Gudi which was a stone's throw away. As we walked towards Meguti we scanned the area between this hill and Malaprabha where there are several temples, both individual and groups. Below is a snapshot of Google Maps of the area we focused on. I've marked the place where we stood (X) and the four temples with A, B, C & D. A is Boyar Gudi and the remaining are nameless temples, may be the villagers have names for them, need to check during the next visit.
Here's a collage of the four temples. While pictures A, C and D were shot in this trip, B was shot way back 2011. I had seen Boyar Gudi (A) and B in 2011. Here's a short blog post of
Boyar Gudi & Huchappayyana Mata. There are close to 125 individual temples in Aihole. For the ancient temple builders Aihole was a laboratory where they experimented different designs. One can find permutations & combinations of various aspects of a temple like orientation of sanctum / entrance; number of sanctums / entrances; pillar designs; vestibule, halls & portico designs; and so on. With so much to see, one cannot really justify one visit to Aihole, it has to be several visits.
We reach the fort like wall around Meguti Gudi. Locals have made a small 'breach' in the wall which serves as a short cut. This is a view of the wall from the gap. This wall runs along the edge of the hill, to be clear this enclosure is situated at the northern end of the hill.
The north-facing Meguti Gudi, positioned almost at the center of the enclosure. Meguti is corrupted form of Megudi ~ Meline Gudi meaning upper temple. Most temple names here are derived from their location or the family / individual who had occupied it before ASI took charge. Going by archaeological findings, this is a Jain Basadi. On the left side wall of this temple is a Kannada inscription dated 634 CE. The inscription praises Chalukyan king Pulakeshi II for his support for this temple construction.
Meguti Basadi as seen through the gateway. Behind me is a long flight of steps which goes down to the base of the hill. About 20 to 25 steps down, is a Buddhist shrine.
This is the two-storey Boudha Chaitya dating back to the VI Century CE. This shrine is a combination of rock-cut & structural i.e. the façade is structural while the inner portion is rock-cut. The square section columns seem simple but they feature some clever designs. Directly opposite to this side of the hill are two temple groups- Mallikarjuna and Jyotirlinga and in a distance are Huchimalli Gudi and Ravalaphadi.
This image of a meditating Buddha is on the ceiling of the upper portico.
On the northern slope are four smaller temples, of which one is a rock-cut temple. Sadly these temples have been neglected, the surroundings are filthy, and moreover in rainy season its better not to go there. One of the objectives of this visit was to closely see the rock-cut temple but I had to drop it. Here's a collage of the hill slope, two temples are visible and the rock-cut shrine in the inset. These pictures were shot from the road on the following morning as we said bye to Aihole. As I know Aihole has four rock-cut shrines, there could one or two more in any of the groups.
This building in the foreground is a Desai Vaadae. I think during one of the earlier visits with two of my uncles, we had been inside that complex. Besides the Vaadae is Tryambakeshwara group and across the road is Charantimath complex. A decade ago I'd heard about a plan to relocate all residents and make Aihole a exclusive tourist center. However due to technical hurdles the plan is on the backburner. I try to imagine a decluttered Aihole, like how it was between VI and XII Centuries.
Having covered Aihole hill we head back the way we came. Our canine friends were still with us but sadly we did not have anything to treat them with.
This is the southern end of the hill, Pushpa is seen coming out from the gap between the rocks. This spot is almost behind the rock-cut Jaina Basadi we saw in the beginning of this post. I think this is the 'official' ancient entrance to the megalithic site. In fact the ground has stones which are more or less like steps, very convenient - I feel those stepping stone arrangement is manmade.
We were kind of tired because of the humid weather, when its cloudy it feels stuffy and uncomfortable. After a 5-minute rest we loaded our stuff into the car. Just before getting into the car I happened to notice a triangle shaped stone, I picked up out of curiosity and realized it was a stone axe. Wow! I just found an implement made by a prehistoric man. Most likely a man's work, because women were engaged with children and gathering food. This collage shows both sides of the axe head. Its around 10 cm long, 5.5 cm wide and 3 cm thick, very nicely shaped, surely an expert has made it. In the left hand side image, see the top edge which had been sharpened. I think this axe was well used. This finding made my morning!
The next item on our list was Ramlingeshwara group of temples and Galaganatha temple complex, both situated on Malaprabha right bank. This article will continue in the following post...
A tour of Vatapi Chalukyan realm - part4.
.........
No comments:
Post a Comment