An incomplete guide to Hoysala temples ;-)

From the preface of the “Complete Guide to Hoysala temples” by Gerard Foekema: “For me,
enjoying Later Calukya and Hoysala temples is one of the great pleasures of life. I love these
temples because their plans are so logical and natural, because their architecture is so
ingenious, and because their execution is so rich…"

We did this very interesting trip over the weekend of 28th, 29th & 30th March 09.
The route map:

* Map not to scale.

Total distance on the odo, from start to stop : 826kms.

Background:
Due to some commitments getting postponed, we suddenly had a 3 day weekend coming up (we
had taken off on Monday 30th) and no plans on hand.

A Belur-Halebid trip was long overdue anyway and this seemed to be a good opportunity to do
it. While researching into the history and significance of the Belur-Halebid temples, I came
across quite a few interesting websites, including the superb travelogue by a TBHPian @akbaree

@akbaree had recommended a book titled ‘A complete guide to Hoysala Temples by Gerard
Foekema’ which is a good and comprehensive source of information on Hoysala temple
architecture. Unfortunately I could not buy the book since it was out of stock in the shops I
checked with. However, significant portions of the book are available via Google-books. [The
maps and some sections are not available online]

To quote from the book: “More than a hundred of Hoysala temples survive today, and I think
more than 10 of them to be of interest to the average tourist. The most important message I have
to convey is that the large temples in Belur and Halebid give a marvelous impression of Hoysala
sculpture, but only a poor impression of Hoysala architecture, because they are seriously
incomplete. Visiting a few other villages in the neighborhood of Belur and Halebid is very
rewarding, because there smaller but complete temples can be found. Several of these small and
modest temples perfectly show the logic and beauty of Hoysala architecture…”

The thought of covering all the temples listed in the book was quite appealing. I looked up these
places in the Eicher & TTK road maps and found that not all of them are marked. I filled in the
gaps by looking up these places on G-maps, Mapmyindia and also by reading up directions to
these places on different websites.

Slowly the route started to take shape. Of the places mentioned in the book, we dropped
Amritapura & Basaralu since they would involve too much of a deviation from our route plan.
[which is why my log is titled 'an incomplete guide to...']

13 out of the 15 places from the book were penciled in. Also, there are several other places,
which also have beautiful Hoysala temples, but are not mentioned in the book… added in a
couple of those as well, ending up with a list of 17 places to be covered.

The list of places we visited over the three days:

Day 1

 Turuvekere
 Aralaguppe
 Arsikere
 Haranhalli

(Overnight stay at Halebid.)

Day 2

 Halebid
 Hulikere
 Belvadi
 Javagallu
 Belur
 Dodda Gadduvalli
 Koravangala

(Overnight stay at Hassan)

Day 3

 Mosale
 Nuggehalli
 Govindanahalli
 Kikkeri
 Hosaholalu
 Somanathapur

Belur temple gopuram, in 1895 – in 2009…

Somanathpur temple, in 1865 – in 2009…

Somanathpur temple, in 1865 – in 2009…

Somanathpur temple, in 1865 – in 2009…

Belur, in 1865 – in 2009…

Halebid temple, in 1856 – in 2009…

Halebid temple, in 1868 – in 2009…

Halebid temple, in 1865 – in 2009…

Halebid temple, in 1856 – in 2009…

* Old pics courtesy British Library – ASI.

The Belur Temple originally had a gopurum on top, which collapsed / was taken down sometime
later. The small ‘add-on’ shrine (seen in the center of the old photo) + the steps (in front of the
add-on shrine) which were attached to the temple by someone after the Hoysala period were also
taken out during some renovation exercise…
Who were the Hoysalas?
In a chronological context, Karnataka was ruled over by the following kingdoms:

 Pre-historic age.
 Early years Satavahanas
 325 A.D.- 540 A.D. Kadambas of Banavasi
 325 A.D.- 999 A.D. Gangas of Talkad
 500 A.D. – 757 A.D. Chalukyas of Badami
 757 A.D. – 973 A.D. Rashrakootas
 973 A.D. – 1198 A.D. Chalukyas of Kalyan
 1198 A.D. – 1312 A.D. Yadavas of Devagiri
 1000 A.D. – 1346 A.D. Hoysalas
 1336 A.D. – 1565 A.D. Vijayanagara Kings
 1347 A.D. – 1527 A.D. Bahamani Kings
 1490 A.D. – 1686 A.D. Sultans of Bijapur
 1500 A.D. – 1763 A.D. Nayakas of Keladi
 1399 A.D. – 1761 A.D. Wodeyars of Mysore
 1761 A.D. – 1799 A.D. Hyder Ali and Tippu Sultan
 1800 A.D. – 1831 A.D. Wodeyars of Mysore (Under British Empire)
 1831 A.D. – 1881 A.D. British Empire
 1881 A.D. – 1950 A.D. Wodeyars of Mysore
 1956 Present day Karnataka is formed.

To quote from the Wikipedia:

The Hoysala Empire was a prominent South Indian Kannadiga empire that ruled most of the
modern day state of Karnataka between the 10th and the 14th centuries. The capital of the
Hoysalas was initially located at Belur but was later moved to Halebidu.

The Hoysala rulers were originally hill people of Malnad Karnataka, an elevated region in the
Western Ghats range. In the 12th century, taking advantage of the internecine warfare between
the then ruling Western Chalukyas and Kalachuri kingdoms, they annexed areas of present day
Karnataka and the fertile areas north of the Kaveri River delta in present day Tamil Nadu. By
the 13th century, they governed most of present-day Karnataka, parts of Tamil Nadu and parts of
western Andhra Pradesh in Deccan India.

The Hoysala era was an important period in the development of art, architecture, and religion in
South India. The empire is remembered today primarily for its temple architecture. Over a
hundred surviving temples are scattered across Karnataka, including the well known
Chennakesava Temple at Belur, the Hoysaleswara Temple at Halebidu, and the Kesava Temple
at Somanathapura.

The Hoysala rulers also patronized the fine arts, encouraging literature to flourish in Kannada
and Sanskrit.
Wikipedia also has a good write-up about Hoysala architecture:
Hoysala architecture - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

More than a 1000 temples were probably built during the Hoysala period. However only a few
have survived relatively intact to this day. Some were just abandoned and disintegrated over the
centuries; some were renovated and rebuilt to an extent that they no longer resemble their
original design.

Of the temples that survived, around 20 temples are recommended as ‘must see’ for anyone
interested in Hoysala architecture. Our trip was planned to cover most of these temples…

The planning:
[1] First we listed down the places to cover and the temples to see at each place.
[2] Charted out the places on a rough map to give us an idea of the order in which to cover these
places.
[3] We decided that our first night-halt would be at Halebidu and the second night-halt would be
at Hassan.

As you start seeing the pics, you might feel that many temples look quite similar… yes, they do.
While the overall architecture might follow some standard patterns, what differentiate the
temples are the carvings on the walls, the level of intricacy in the design etc. So each temple is
different if you observe it from close quarters.

Most of these temples either have guides, caretakers or priests who can walk you through the
temples and explain the significance of each.

The trip:
Day 1 We planned to make an early morning start, but both of us could wind-up only close to
11pm the previous evening and by the time packing is done and we fall asleep, it is around 2am.
So, we wake up at 6.30am and finally start off at around 7.30am.

Saturday morning traffic was light and we reached Nelamangala without any trouble and took
the right turn towards Kunigal. On our previous drive along this road we had seen that there are
some good hotels after Kunigal where we could stop for breakfast.

I will not delve into the specifics of the route since the map should give you a good idea about
the location of each place and we did a lot of ‘stop-and-ask’ throughout the trip to find our way
around.

Spotted this scenic archway along the way…

The route to Turuvekere, our first place to see…

TURUVEKERE

We enter Turuvekere!

In Turuvekere we covered three temples, the Chennakesava temple, the Moole Shankara temple
and the Gangadhareeshwara temple.

Chennakesava temple…
Next we headed towards the Moole Shankara temple and found that it was locked. We asked
around to see who had the key and were directed towards a nearby house. After enquiring about
where we were from and our interest in the temple, they offered us some coffee and snacks and
then just handed us the keys to the temple!
The Moole Shankara temple…

Hmmm… This is the first time we unlocked a temple!

We spent some time here, locked the temple again, handed over the keys and proceeded towards
the Gangadhareeshwara temple…

The Nandi, which is around 7ft tall…

A unique ‘Stone bell’! You can actually strike it with a stick and it sounds like a normal bell!
ARALAGUPPE

After Turuvekere, we proceeded towards Aralaguppe, though we knew that it was somewhere
around, we asked some locals to guide us and they mentioned the route options and suggested
the best route that would be kind on the Xing…
One ‘unique’ experience I had at this temple was being stung on my hand by a wasp. Nothing
serious though…

The Keshava temple at Aralaguppe…

It was close to 2.00pm by the time we ready to leave from Aralaguppe, we would be driving
through Tiptur on the way to our next destination, so lunch stop was at Tiptur.

ARASIKERE

After a lunch break at Tiptur, we reached Arasikere at around 4.00pm and proceeded towards the
‘Shivalaya’. This is a live temple on the outskirts of the town.
After spending around 45 mins at the Shivalaya, we headed out towards our next stop;
Haranahalli, which is around 8 kms from Arasikere.
HARANAHALLI

We covered two temples here, the Lakshminarasimha temple and the Someshwara temple.

The Someshwara temple…

The Lakshminarasimha temple…

Another locked temple, found the priest’s house and got him back to open the temple for us…
It was quite late by the time we were ready to leave from Haranahalli, so we decided to drive to
Halebidu, stay overnight there and track back towards Belavadi and Javagal the next day. [We
drove through Javagal and passed the Belevadi diversion on our way to Halebidu.]

HALEBIDU

We walked towards the Halebidu Hoysaleswara temple the next morning…

Autos waiting near the temple to whisk you around town…
Our next stop would be the Kedareshwara and the Jain temples which are a couple of kilometers away
from the Hoysaleswara temple and then onward to Hulikere.
A word of caution, the map we found on the hoarding (in the post above) gives an idea about the general
directions of the places to visit, but the distances are absolutely not to scale and Dodda Gadduvalli is
shown on the wrong road, it is actually on the Belur – Hassan road. We were a little confused since my
map differed from the hoarding map… finally we checked with the best GPS system in these areas; a
shared Auto driver! Who confirmed that we were indeed on the right track.

The Kedareshwara temple…

The Parsavanatha and Shantinatha Basadis. The main idols in these temples are 18 ft tall!
Saw this owl watching us watching him…
[in the crevasse under the Myna]

HULIKERE

Our next stop was Hulikere, which is a couple of Kms from Halebid. No temple here… just a small but
beautiful Kalyani…
This frog swam up to us to say hi!
Spent some time here and drove back through Halebid towards Belavadi & Javagal.

BELAVADI

Belavadi is a few Kms away from Halebidu and there is a huge Veeranarayana temple complex here.
Since there was no power supply, the priest used a solar lantern to show us around the dark insides of the
temple…
The Utsava-murthys…
JAVAGAL

After Belavadi we headed towards Javagal, which is again a few Kms away.

The Lakshminarasimhaswamy temple at Javagal. This again was a temple which was locked when we
reached there and we had to trace the priest’s house and call him to open the door for us.
The priest was kind enough to give us a bunch of bananas to munch upon and also a bottle full of great
tasting teertha. This was a life-saver since it was lunch time and we were really hungry!

After spending some time here, we headed back towards Halebidu and onwards to our next destination;
Belur.
BELUR

Once we reached Belur I troubled Sangeetha by making her walk round and round the temple with a
compass in hand trying to find the exact locations from where the 1850′s, 1860′s black-and-white pics
were taken… "Where is the north west face?", "Where is this view from south?"…
Ancient wooden wheels from the temple chariot…
Intricate carvings…
One last pic of the temple’s dwaja-sthambam…
We headed on towards our next stop, Dodda-Gadduvalli, which is around 25kms from Belur, on the
Hassan-Belur road.

DODDA GADDUVALLI

Found this map on a hoarding on the way, which gave us a good idea about the directions of the places we
intended to cover and helped reconfirm our maps…
The Lakshmi temple…
The eerie looking Betalas carved inside the temple…
The temple is located on the banks of a river/lake…
Spent about 45 mins here and headed on towards Hassan. We had planned to stay overnight at Hassan,
but since there was still quite a bit of daylight left, we decided to cover Koravangala, which is around
10kms away from Hassan.

KORAVANGALA

The route that we took to Koravangala lead us directly to the temple and went along a tank bund…

The Koravangala Bucheswara temple…

The Govindeshwara temple which lies in ruins in front of the Bucheswara temple…
Reconstruction was started sometime in the past, only to get mired in a court case and was stopped
midway through…
The temple Kalyani, which apparently never runs dry…
The kalasha and the Hoysala symbols (A man slaying a lion) on the Bucheswara temple are still intact.
These symbols were once carved on almost all Hoysala temples, but have collapsed or were taken down
over the centuries…
The rotating Nandi! The Nandi idol is placed on a pivot and can be rotated 360 degrees. The legend was
that once upon a time the Nandi would turn on its own to indicate the success of your prayers or wishes.
However these days you have to turn it yourselves and the ease with which it turns is supposed to indicate
the difficulty level in your chosen task. Thanks @akbaree for noting this unique Nandi in your log, I was
eagerly looking forward to seeing this in Koravangala.

We headed back towards Hassan and enquired at a few hotels that we came across and found that the
room rates were almost uniform. We settled down at a place called ‘Jewel rock’, where the rooms had
been recently renovated. They charged us Rs.600 per night for a standard double room.

We freshened up and headed out to get some dinner before logging off for the day.

MOSALE

Hassan, at 6.00am, it was quite exceptionally foggy…

We checked out of the room and were on our way to Mosale by around 6.30am. There are two temples to
be covered here, Chennakesava and Nagareshwara.
Close to Mosale…

Temples in the mist…

Drove through the village, parked in front of the temple and while I was taking pics, Sangeetha went in
search of the temple priest. This was turning out to be a routine to find temples locked when we reached.
Sangeetha would track down the person who had the keys…
It is supposed to be auspicious to look at the Shivaling from between Nandi’s ears, i.e. as close as you can
get to Nandi’s perspective…

The priest of the adjacent Chennakesava temple was a small kid, ‘Srinivas’, who was chanting all the
shlokas quite clearly and walked us in and around the temples…
NUGGEHALLI

After completing Mosale we drove back to Hassan and took the road towards CR Patna. Stopped for
breakfast at a Kamat Upachar enroute and proceeded towards Nuggehalli. We intended to cover the
Lakshminarasimha and the Sadashiva temples.

The Sadashiva temple…

The temple was being used for conducting some school exams. I remember going to a temple prior any
important exams, this was one step ahead, write exams in a temple!
Oh God! Please let me remember what subject is this?… I don’t remember attending this class at all…
must have slept through all the sessions…
The Lakshminarasimha temple…
The stone which talks about the history of the temple…
GOVINDANAHALLI
Govindanahalli was a little difficult to track down; somebody pointed us towards a route that went to a
‘Govinahalli’, which sounds quite similar. However we were lucky to find this board along the way, which
indicated that Govindanahalli was actually a different place, but it was nearby.

After driving through a narrow mud road for about a kilometer, we reached Govindanahalli and found the
Panchalingeshwara temple. As usual, it was locked!

Same old story here too… temple locked, found priest/caretaker’s house, he was not at home, a lady from
his house cae along to open the temple for us.

The Panchalingeshwara temple…

This is quite a big temple, with 5 garbagrihas, 5 lingas, 5 Nandis, 5 gopurams, all in a line, inside the same
structure…
Took some pics, walked around the complex and then headed off towards our next destination Kikkeri.

KIKKERI

Kikkeri is on the main Hassan-Mysore road. The Brahmeshwara temple here is special because it has
carvings of Madanikas (Dancing girls) like in Belur, however many of them are in pristine condition. The
few missing ones are supposedly in some museums abroad. This is a good place to see some intact
examples of exquisite Hoysala sculptures.

The temple is located on the banks of a river / lake…

Ok, same story… temple locked… Sangeetha tracked down the person who had the key, whose house was a
few 100 mts away from the temple… There was some difficulty in opening the temple since there was a big
bunch of similar looking keys, finally we were in!
Ok, looks like the board indicating that this is a protected monument needs some protection…
As mentioned earlier, the intact Madanika statues…
Took some pics outside the temple…
We got directions to our next destination Hosaholalu and headed off…

HOSAHOLALU

Hosaholalu is around 2 Kms from KR Pet. There is a Lakshminarayana temple here that was on our list.

The Lakshminarayana temple…

We were also given suggestions to visit a place called ‘Kallhalli’ which is supposed to have an exquisite 18ft
tall Varahanarasimha idol. However there was some confusion about the route and distance etc. So we
dropped it.

Since it was around 2.30pm by the time we wound up from Hosaholalu, we had lunch in KRpet and
headed off towards Mysore/Srirangapatna and onwards to our last destination for this trip;
Somanathapura.

SOMANATHPURA

The route from near Srirangapatna to Somanathapura is not in such a great condition and our average
speeds were down to the 40s / 50s.

We expected that Somanathapura temple would be open till late evening, however the temple shuts down
at 5.30pm and we reached the place at 4.15pm. That gave us a little more than an hour to walk around.
We were probably the last visitors to walk out of the temple that day and headed back towards Mysore
road. Reached Bannur and took the road to Maddur.
Spotted this sign on the way… As it flashed past us, I thought I had read it wrong, so reversed and drove
back to the sign to see that it indeed said ‘New York’!

I have seen a Singapura near Davanagere, a Timbuktoo on the way to Hyderabad… and now I found a
‘New York’ around 7 Kms from Maddur on the Bannur road…
We reached the Bangalore-Mysore road and turned towards Bangalore. Reached the Kamat Lokaruchi by
around 7.45pm and stopped for a delicious dinner, before returning home.