Fort Devanahalli

Bengaluru is surrounded by several forts, to its north are 8 forts and Devanahalli fort is the closest and the only fort on plain land. Somehow, I visited Devanahalli fort after having done with the other seven forts.

October 16, 2013
Our day started with a challenging trek to Maakalidurga. Weather wasn't in our favor, the climb was tough and we lost our way while descending.. finally we made it back to where we started. After a hearty lunch at a mess, we headed towards Devanahalli - this fort was pending for a very long time. So, here we are looking at the west facing main entrance, well built masonry walls and a narrow gateway of Fort Devanahalli.

Close to the entrance is a signage with some useful info.
Devanahalli, located at a distance of 35 kms towards north of Bangalore is a fast growing suburb having an antiquity right from pre-historic times down to the period of Tipu Sultan. It was part of Gangawadi and later came under the rule of Rashtrakutas, Nolamba, Pallavas, Cholas, Hoysalas and the Vijayanagara rulers. During the rule of Vijayanagara rule, one Malla Baire Gowda of Avati, a feudatory constructed the fort in 1501 AD with the consent of Devaraya at Devanadoddi - the earlier name of Devanahalli. Subsequently, in 1747 AD the fort passed into the hands of Wodeyars of Mysore, which was conquered many times from the Marathas and later came under the control of Haider Ali and Tipu Sultan. The presentfort is ascribed to Haider Ali and Tipu Sultan, and it was the favorite hunting place for Tipu Sultan which incidentally was his birth place as well. The roughly oval east-oriented veneered with dressed masonary has as many as 12 semi-circular bastions at regular intervals. A spacious battlement is provided towrads the inner side of the fortification. The fort is provided with entrances at east and west decorated with cut plaster work. The bastions are provided with gun points built in brick and lime.
It's not a simple entrance but a gateway complex with raised platforms flanking the passage. Its pretty dim inside with limited visibility.

Unlike the curved or zigzag entrances of north Karnataka, Devanahalli fort entrance is straight - easy for enemies forces to barge in. To my right is a small canal emerging from the rampart wall's base.

That's the canal; the passage below the wall is a secret entrance called as water gate. During emergencies when the fort is secured within, water gate would be known only to trusted subjects. The passage opens out to the moat around the fort.

Here's a rough plan of Devanahalli fort showing the gateway, rampart walls, bastions and the moat. As you see the fort is west-facing.

Tour of the rampart wall starts at the north-western side. In the picture here, portion of the fort has a huge gap.. another gateway had to be here which has disappeared completely. Anyway, coming to the surviving wall; its pretty wide..

..and has two levels. The overall thickness of the wall is anywhere between 25' to 28' and overall height could be 30'. Notice how the inner side of the wall is lined with layers of bricks to prevent the wall from collapsing.

Bastions are circular, about 40' diameter, having two sentry chambers at the ends.

Notice the sentry chamber design- an arched doorway and a domes roof.

View through a notch. Bricks are placed on sides rather than on their backs. I guess this is done for better waterproofing. The moat pit is dry.. imagine how it would be some 250 years ago.. filled with water infested with hungry crocodiles looking for a prey.

Another informative signage:
This fort is a good example of 18th century military architecture in the Mysore region.
Have you noticed how this fort has been built for defense? Its thick rubble and stone masonry walls were made to withstand cannon fire. A moat surrounded the fort, with a drawbridge across it. You can still see the pulleys that operated the drawbridge in the wall above the fort's gateway. In case of an attack, the drawbridge would be drawn up to keep enemies out. Infantrymen would stand on the banquette, or firing step, that runs along the parapet. From here, they could shoot over the fort walls at the enemy and then step down to safely reload their guns. Others would fire the small holes in the parapet, called loopholes. In the bastions, soldiers would keep watch on the grounds while others worked the cannons. But a fort is as good as its men. In 1791, when the British captured Bangalore fort from Tipu Sultan, courage failed Devanahalli's soldiers: they abandoned the fort. When the British came a week later, they took Devanahalli without a fight.

This must be the third bastion from the left; a sentry chamber with a touch of art.

This part of the rampart is slanting inward.. perhaps the idea was to have a wider base. The bastion seen ahead is the north-eastern corner.

At the north-eastern corner, on the inside is a square based bastion 10' taller than the circular bastions. That would be ideal for a command post.

Looking back towards the northern wall.

The third signage describes the construction technology:
A fort must hold out against enemy soldiers, but must also survive constant attack from Nature!
What does this fort have in common with Krishnaraja Sagar (KRS) dam at Mysore? Both use surkhi, a mixture of lime and soarsely powdered bricks. The KRS dam is built entirely with surkhi. In Devanahalli, this traditional material was used for water-proofing. You can still see traces of it on the floors of the bastions and ramparts. The small channels that you can see along the inner fort walls allowed water to drain out of the ramparts, thus reducing seepage into the structure.
Do you see how the bricks in the small structures in this bastion have been laid diagonally? Each successive layer underneath will have bricks placed crosswise to the layer above it - another simple, traditional method of improving strength and waterproofing capacity.

view from the command post

Just like the front portion, wall at the rear has also disappeared. Folks say there was a gateway here when the wall existed here - that's possible because its normal for a fort to have at least two entry points.

The command post walls and entrance. Perhaps the structure has a shelter which might have been used as an office.

Within the fort are two temples with tall Gopuras and many houses. While most houses are modern few ancient crumbling structures can also be seen here. I heard, inside the temple seen here are many ancient sculptures worth seeing.

Having done with Devanahilli fort we move towards the monument marking the birthplace of Tippu Sultan the tiger of Mysore.

birth place of Tipu Sultan

Hyder Ali and Tipu Sultan believed in strength of forts, hence every fort occupied by them were renovated and strengthened with the help of French engineers. Similarly, Chatrapati Shivaji too believed in the power of forts, small or big. At one point of time Shivaji had 365 forts under his control. I wonder what system was in place to manage men and material.

.........

Fort Makalidurga

Makalidurga was on my mind for almost 3 years. The fort is situated north of Doddaballapur town, on the southern tip of Makali hills. Its a hill range 8 kilometers in length with multiple peaks. The hill is a mix of dirt and rocks, covered by woods. Bangalore - Hyderabad railway line runs parallel to the range.

October 16, 2013
Vivek and I left Bangalore early morning in a cab. Sky was heavy with dark clouds, between Yelahanka and Doddaballapur it rained, what started as a light shower became a heavy shower and it stopped abruptly. We went around Doddaballpur and took Hindupur road. Country side was green and fresh, it had rained the previous night. At Ghatisubramanya cross we stopped for breakfast, hot thatte idli and tea. As we drove further the sky was still cloudy and Makali hills came into view; it was covered in a thick veil of mist. We went past Makali Railway Station and located the dirt road leading to a Hanuman temple at the base of Makali hills, its situated very close to the railway tracks. For few seconds there was a gap in the misty screen and through it I could see the hill top.. towering high and seemed unreachable. With that glimpse of the hill top I knew the climb would not be an easy one.

We asked our cabby Siddaraju to wait for us, we should be back in 3 or 4 hours. It was barely 7-30 AM when we hit the trial, it was cold and damp. We found the temple and a small house, few dogs started barking. I was hoping to find someone so that we get proper directions but the only other creatures we saw were few chicken. Folks must still be sleeping.. who would want to leave their warm beds in such weather. We saw a path going up behind the temple, we followed it. A minute later we were at a fork.. right or left? We decided to go right, we followed the path which was getting steeper, wilder and wetter.. let's 'keep climbing' was our mantra for the time being.

Half an hour later, we were lost, no trial in view and mist would not go. Our trousers were wet with dew and to add to our misery it started raining! Luckily we had umbrellas, which prevented us from being completely drenched. The rain lasted some 10 minutes. The tall wet grass just got wetter and Vivek said he feels as though he's walking in water. We checked our position in Vivek's Samsung Galaxy; we were barely 100 meters north of the fort on the map but those 100 meters in reality would be some 300 meters steep climb. We took a real steep and narrow path hoping to reach the fort but we hit a hurdle. We could have climbed up the hurdle but climbing down that hurdle would be too risky. We trace back the way down and took another path, here we found a trial of different sort - fallen grass - it was like some creature has walked though the grass, moving uphill. Good we found something to follow :)

We tried to check our position but mobile signal was too weak. We kept following the trial of fallen grass.. another vertical hurdle in our path. This time we decided to go up, no matter what. The 15 feet was really tough we got over and voila there was a small wall. Ash, we are close. Through the mist we could see the outline of the walls.

Here grass was even more taller and denser. We had to feel every step before placing our foot. 10 minutes later the fort wall within reach. We did it! The climb was one helluva challenge. Vivek is looking for an entrance.. I was skeptical of finding a gateway here.

A short distance away, we found a crumbling wall, we clambered up the heap of stones and gained entry to the fort. This spot has been marked in line diagram of the fort's plan. This is the northern part of the fort.

Here's the rough plan of Makalidurga, no particular shape to it. There's an outer fort and an inner fort.

The base to fort route we took is not the regular one, it a round about route. On the way we definitely had cut across the regular path without even realizing it :( 3 hours climb, it was 10-30 AM.

We took left and followed the path on the wall. That's one of the bastions.

We reach a corner, northern most corner of Makalidurga. That domed structure (marked B in plan) must have been a sentry post, looks like it was built during Tipu Sultan's rule. We inspected the structure from outside, it was used as a camp few days ago, was littered with plastic bottles and paper. The wall turned right here.

Looks like raw material for this wall was sourced from this hill itself. Perhaps we walked through ancient quarries during the ascent.

Small gap in the misty screen gives a glimpse of foot hills. Looks like guards here had tough time carrying out their duty while mist and fog played around the hills.

I let Vivek lead the way to the fort's center. Those walls ahead are marked C in the plan. This fort is said to have history going back to the times of Vijayanagara. After the fall of Hampi, the fort would have come under other rulers before Tipu took control.

One of many ponds, water has turned green because of lack of maintenance.

the eastern wall

Kote Devastana ~ fort temple dedicated to Shiva. Architecture seems like Vijayanagara. The deities are damaged. Looks like folks from surrounding villages perform rituals during important festivals. Close to the temple is a 6' tall rough cut granite pillar.

We go exploring the southern tip of the fort but tall grass and hunger forces us to cut short the plans.

looking towards the temple

That bastion at the farthest point would be the southern most tip.

Past noon mist clears off. Our cab parked in shade partly visible. A small group of people alighted from the white WagonR.. looks like there are here to climb. Glimpse of the railway track at the bottom-right corner of the picture.

From the fort we looked down the slopes and planned a route, we decided to leave the well tread path at one point and turn right thinking that would be a short cut to the base... the railway crossing. However, I abandoned the plan and instead followed the well tread path.. looks like this is a cattle route. Vivek mentioned few times that we were heading opposite direction but I told him that we it might turn right somewhere..

The path descended to the plains but our attempt to search a short cut put is trouble, we ran into a area full of thorny bushes.. those curved needle like thorns tore into my skin through fabric too.. menacing little thorns they were. Sun was bright, we were warm, re ran out of water and our tummies were growling. Aagh our plight was pitiable. Luckily we found a man grazing cattle who told us we were on the other side of the hill. He pointed at a dirt path and asked us to follow it until we reached a village.. I think the village name was Basavanahalli. From there we'll have to go to Thondebhavi and hit Hindupur road. Now, the solution to our problem would be to call Siddaraju and ask him to drive down to Basavanahalli.

We hoped for some clean water as we walked and lo, we found this boy in his fields. He was a good host; let us rest in his hut's shade and offered water. Our friend Laxman, told us its not 'Makalidurga' as most people say, the correct spelling is 'Maaklidurga'. He then he took us to his fields where his three sisters were harvesting groundnuts. Laxman handed us a bunch each.. that would appease our tummies for time being. Laxman gave us directions, we thanked him and bid bye.

Fifteen minutes later we in the car driving back towards Doddaballpur via Thondebavi village. It was 2-30 PM. For lunch I asked Siddaraju to go find a mess where buses do not stop. On the state highway we stopped for a minute to capture this view of Maakli Gudda and Kote.

Maaklidurga perched atop Maakli Gudda

We found a mess on the bypass road next to a petrol/diesel bunk; it was 4 table eatery offering home made lunch. We relished the meal- chapati, palya, anna, saru, hapla and mosaru. Aah, felt great. Back in the cab, we sank into the seats while Siddaraju took us towards Devanahalli.

.........