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Published: March 28th 2006
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To war
War cries echo on the friezes in Hampi, where one of the greatest empires of India rose and fell. On a moonlit night in Hampi, rocks assume mysterious shapes, like clouds. They fly past the window as the bus winds out of the erstwhile Vijayanagara, the city of victory. An ancient sculptor might have wandered amid these gigantic shadows before Vijayanagara emperors raised their famed capital out of the limestone boulders. Hewn or not, these stones ignite imagination.
A day is too short to explore the 26-square kilometre World Heritage Site. Earlier in the morning, I was besieged by guides with coloured maps as soon as the bus from Hospet stopped in the middle of the town. Natives of a medieval capital struggle to capitalise on past glory. Guides hunt for tourists while vendors sell coconut and flowers to pilgrims visiting the legendary temples.
Temples are the only living monuments in Hampi. The Virupaksheswara temple towers over Hampi's bazaar of curio shops and dilapidated lodges. The architects were so enterprising that they devised a photographic technique that prints an inverted image of the Dravidian temple tower on an alcove inside the temple. An old man notifies the hidden wonder and expects a fee for the service.
The path round the temple leads to the Tungabhadra. Visitors in
Lessons in geometry
A former royal pond in Hampi and the aquaduct which kept it alive groups bathe in the river. Newlywed women are brought to be blessed by the river, the mother. They dip in the river and follow the rituals as directed by older women in the family. Tourists cruise the river in coracles amid submerged Shiv lingas and Nandi statues. The river would rise and swallow its rocky confines when the Hospet dam opens its shutters in mid-August.
Following a signpost to the waterfalls, I walk through a moderate settlement. A farmer, a tribeswoman and an Englishman give me directions. After treading through banana plantations and paddy fields I found myself lost in a maze of rocks. I can't even trace the river. Only chameleons and mynahs around. As I venture further, a whisper that grows into the unmistakable music of the falls. But all I could see is the vast expanse of rocks hemmed by hillocks. But the droning is so near.
Then I saw the waterfalls, beneath my feet. The river flows furiously under a canopy of rocks before leaping into a depression. A subterranean waterfall. I abandon the search for the advertised waterfall. Upstream the river is more composed, trapped in rocky circles.
Tungabhadra and the granite
Lake placid, rock majestic
The Tungabhadra river hidden in a rock fortress meanders around Hampi cliffs formed a natural fortress on the north for the Vijayanagara capital. The empire resisted all onslaughts till 1565 when the then Vijayanagara commander Rama Raya was defeated by a confederation of Muslim kings and the capital city ransacked. After the disastrous battle of Talikota, the last dynasty of Vijayanagara moved down south to Chandragiri. Hampi never recovered.
But two centuries of artistry is not easy to erase. The ruins stand testimony to the medieval magnificence and archaeologists are still digging away for the priceless stones.
On the western side of the Virupakshewara Temple stands the Matunga hillock, where scores of rock structures stand testimony to four dynasties of Vijayanagara rulers. Most of the temples are without an idol. And many idols are strewn over the rocky expanse, where natives defecate every morning. Even gods become mundane when found aplenty.
Signposts lead to Lakshmi Narasimha, the fourth incarnation of Vishnu. The 6.7-metre-high monolith is mutilated like most of the sculptures here. The roof of the shrine is missing. So are the four arms of the man-lion deity. Even his consort, which originally sat on his left thigh, is missing. The right hand of Lakshmi embracing her husband
Stone charmer
The restored Krishna temple inside the heritage site of Hampi at the back suggests the sculpture is Lakshmi Narasimha and not Ugra Narasimha the ferocious.
If Lakshmi Narasimha was commissioned by poet-king Krishna Devaraya in 1528, a year before his death, the nearby Badavi Linga Temple owes its legendary origin to a poor woman. The 3-metre-high Shiv linga and its pedestal (yoni peetha) were carved out of a single rock in situ. It stands in a pool covered by a tiny damaged shrine.
Vijayanagara was founded in 1336 by two brothers Harihara and Bukka, former prisoners of war in Delhi. Sultan Mohammed-bin-Tuglak sent back the brothers to restore order when his southern provinces began to rebel. But the brothers, waiting for a chance since the Chalukyan kingdom of Kampili near Hampi fell, were more ambitious than the Sultan could sense.
The empire grew round the city till it threatened almost every contemporary southern kingdom and, of course, Delhi. The city was well-connected with roads and aqueducts. Remnants of granite craftsmanship still span the site, like building blocks assembled by an impatient brat.
The site throws up many surprises. Architectural style transforms to Indo-Islamic inside the Zanana Enclosure. Apart from the 16th century Lotus Temple, there are
At your elements
Remains of aqueducts and parlours are strewn all over the heritage site of Hampi the treasury, queen’s palace and elephant stable. Islamic to Dravidian, layers of Indian architectural traditions are present in Hampi. The site has Buddhist statues and Jain temples. Arab and Portuguese merchants are represented in the many stone reliefs. Much of the Vijayanagar lore comes from Portuguese chroniclers Domingo Paez and Nuniz.
Hazararama Temple is dedicated to Rama, the most revered of Vishnu’s avatars. The friezes depict the epic Ramayana, Rama’s journey. Hampi has a place in mythology. Across Tungabhadra there lies Kishkindha, where Rama the sojourner murdered the monkey king Vali and helped sibling Sugriva enthrone. Sugriva kept his word and sent his army of monkeys led by Hanuman with Rama to reclaim his wife Sita from Ravana, the Lord of Lanka.
Inside the royal complex, also called Mahanavami Dibba, tourists have an audience with acres of demolished glory. The ground is marked by bases of once majestic structures and strewn with parts of sculpted forms. Baths are aplenty in this ruined stone polis. Water tanks and aqueducts were key to the glory of the vast capital. The innovative irrigation ensured the spread of civilization on the banks of the Tungabhadra.
Today, Hampi is a city lost
As moving as a rock
No single work of art represents the medieval mastery as the single-stone chariot inside the Vithala Temple complex. in history. Enlightenment seekers throng the ancient city, where yoga gurus are aplenty and meat and alcohol a strict no. But villages along the 12-kilometre drive to Hospet are more materialistic. Krishna Devaraya’s former subjects revel on roads cutting through sugarcane plantations. They block traffic to play their peculiar game starting at a village off Hampi. A stone ball is flung in the direction of Hampi. Whoever covers the four-kilometre distance with minimum throws wins the game. Playing dice with muscles.
Vijayanagara’s lost glory culminates in Vitthala Temple, commissioned by Devaraya II (1422-46). The temple’s most outstanding features were added at the empire’s heydays, when Krishna Devaraya (1509-29) was sending his armies up to the seas in the west and the east. The monolith chariot in the temple courtyard has been notifying Hampi in tourism literature in many lands. At many places, the royal structures are leaning against prosaic granite braces built by the Archaeological Survey of India.
Exhausted before the vastness of history, the spectators leave the heritage to night. Another day, perhaps.
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