Photo 212/7(29)

Genre: Architectural Photography

Close view of the base of richly-carved gopura in the Ramalingeshvara Temple. Another copy of this print at Photo 1000 (3167). Lyon's 'Notes to accompany a series of photographs prepared to illustrate the ancient architecture of Southern India' (Marion and Co., London, 1870), edited by James Fergusson, gives the following description of this photograph: '519 - At about a quarter of a mile from this temple the banks of thePanpugny - 'guilt removing' - river, are reached, which, rising in Mysore, after a course of 130 miles, passes this village on its way to join the North Pennár, just below it. The temple illustrated in this and the following Photographs is built on its very banks, and must once have been one of the very finest in India, but about eighteen years ago the river rose to such an extent that the temple was submerged 18 feet, and the force of the current was such that it is said the two brick pyramidal towers fell, and the temple was otherwise seriously injured. It is nearly deserted now, worship seldom performed, though the sanctuary is still kept closed. The temple itself is not remarkable, but its two Gopuras are richer and more elaborate in detail than any other of their class to be found in India. That on the north, shown in Photographs 519 and 520, may have been finished, though its pyramid is now in a very ruined state. The southern Gopura, Photographs 521 to 526, was probably never carried higher than we now see it; but what exists of it is still more elaborate than the other. These two, it will be observed, differ from all other examples illustrated in this series of Photographs, from being covered with elaborate carving from the ground to the springing of the pyramid. In all the others, the perpendicular part is comparatively plain, and the ornament reserved for the upper part. These gateways are said to have been erected by Krishna Deva, who ascended the throne of Vijianuggur in 1524. They are therefore contemporary with the temple of Witoba in that city, the difference in detail between these two examples being accounted for by the difference of material in which they are erected. These gateways would thus also be about a century earlier than those of Trimul Nayak at Madura (266). Their date therefore accords perfectly with the progress of the style.'