The pit temple next to the river is said to be ancient Shiv temple of Bijbihara mentioned by Kalhana as Vijeshvara. The sculptures found at Bijbehara are considered the earliest ones done in distinct Kashmiri style of sculptures. A lot of material from Bijbehara was moved to SPS museum in around 1898 by Captain Godfrey.
“Brashib” in Kashmiri or the Taurus. A Lion actually. John Siudmak calls it influenced by Gandhāra style and dated around 5th century A.D.
Although lot of old fragments can be found in the pit, Siudmak mentions that this standing Ganesha is the oldest and from around early 7th century AD. Although, Siudmak had seen it in late 1980s, in his book “The Hindu-Buddhist Sculpture of Ancient Kashmir and its Influences” (2013), he reports the statue to be missing. [Is above the same one?]
fragments in the wall
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20th Feb, 2016
As I stood photographing, some security men came to check up on me. They asked some basic questions and left me alone. Then a young boy came asking. He belongs to the muslim family that now takes care of the temple. He mentioned that no one told him to expect a visitor, otherwise he would have made some preparations for tea. It seems the visiting Pandits always come after making pre-arrangements. I could see a dilapidated hut in a corner.
Much through the 80s the site was a regular victim of religious strife. People would break in and vandalize. Soon, a dozen more security men arrived. It was not normal. The security was on extra alert. Sensing that I was a pandit, these men started mentioning their own woes. “It is freezing cold here. We don’t ask for much, just a proper toilet.” I looked at the open pit in which the guards took dump. A pit dug in the ground with some jute rugs around as walls. They persisted, “Don’t pandits have any organization that takes care of these spots. Inform someone. Have a toilet built. Look as this.”The snow in the pit was melting.
Later in the day, there was a terrorist attack on a government building at Pampore about 30 Kilometer from the place.
The new temple built by Maharaja Ranbir Singh in 19th century.
Laxmivasudeva seated on Garuda Probable 10th or 11the century Siudmak however places it in 15th or 16th century [which would mean Hindu sculptures were still getting made in late Islamic era of Kashmir?]
The pit Temple of Bijbehara. Believed to be the original site of ancient Shiv temple of Bijbehara mentioned by Kalhana
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“Brashib” in Kashmiri or the Taurus. A Lion actually. John Siudmak calls it influenced by Gandhāra style and dated around 5th century A.D. These form the earliest distinct Kashmiri style of sculptures. A lot of material from Bijbehara was moved to SPS museum in around 1898 by Captain Godfrey.
For centuries, no old chronicle of Kashmir, not even the later Persian ones, was complete without having a section on the ‘supernatural’ things witnessed at various places in Kashmir. In the photograph from 1970s (via Huntington Archive of Buddhist and Asian Art at The Ohio State University) can be seen the famous ‘Kah-Kah’ Pal (Eleven-Eleven Stone) of Vijeshwer Shiv Temple, Bijbehara. The green coloured conch shaped stone weighing roughly 60 kilograms, it was claimed could be lifted by eleven people using their index finger chanting ‘Kah’ (Eleven). The stone went missing in the 90s.
‘Kah-Kah’ Pal (Eleven-Eleven Stone) of Vijeshwer Shiv Temple, Bijbehara. Extract from a docu made in August 1977 on Gopi Krishna.
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Similar stone lifting practice among South-Asian Muslims and Tibetans:
Buniyar Temple, about two miles above Rampur, situated along the Baramula-Uri road on the bank of the Vitasta, is often described as the “best preserved” specimen of Kashmiri architecture. Although unlike most Kashmiri temples which are made of limestone, this one (beside the one at Wangat) is made of granite.
This is the story of the temple at Bhaniyar/Buniar/Bhavaniyar/Bunair/Boniar/Boniyar/Buniyar.
On my way back from Uri, I decided to check the ancient temple whose roof is visible from the road. A military man walked me from the main road, past the security gate and into the military camp which now surrounds the temple. On way to the temple, the man, someone from mainlands, claimed the temple was build by ‘Pandavas’. When I told him that I am ethnically Kashmiri Pandit, the man happily said that it all belongs to me.
In 1868, when Henry Hardy Cole arrived at the temple along with photographer John Burke for his ‘Archaeological Survey of India report, ‘Illustrations of Ancient Buildings in Kashmir’ (1869), a local Hindu Fakir who lived in the temple told him that the temple was build by ‘Pandus’.
The temple had recently been excavated on the orders of Maharaja Ranbir Singh. Before that, the temple had been claimed by mountain and the trees, which might explain why it survived vandalisation and remained untouched for a long time.
Burke’s Photograph [via British Museum]
The ruins of this temple had earlier been noticed by Karl Alexander A. Hügel (1835) and G.T. Vigne (1837). Hügel mistakenly described it as a well preserved Buddhist temple, while Vigne called it a Hindu ruin on the road.
An attempt to study the temple was first made by Alexander Cunningham in November 1847. He noticed that the Pandits called the place ‘Bhawaniyar’. And assumed it to be a ‘Bhawani’ temple. Cunningham couldn’t examine the temple properly as it was half-buried under snow at the time. Using a telescope he tried to see beyond the thick foliage if the inner wall of the temple had a colonnade.
First proper detailed note of the temple came in 1865 when that summer W.G. Cowie visited the temple that had been recently excavated revealing 13 sq.ft. interior), walls supported on a basement of 4 ft.sq, a cloistered quadrangle measuring 145’x120′. The findings were given in ‘Notes on Some of the Temples of Kashmir’ (Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal > Volume XXXV, Issue II, 1867). Te local Pandits told him that the temple was built by one Bonadutt, hence the name of the place. The brother of this man had built a temple at Venapora beyond Sopor. About the granite used in the temple he wrote:
“The material of which the buildings are constructed, is a pale, coarse granite, of which there seems to be no quarry within reach on the left bank of the Jhelum. This circumstance is remarkable, considering the enormous size and weight of some of the stones employed. Mr. Drew, a geologist in the service of H, H. the Maharajah, thinks that the blocks of granite must have been carried down some of the valleys on the opposite side into the river bed, whence they were brought for the construction of the temple.”
He also suggests that the central temple was probably surrounded by water (just like Cunningham had suggested for Martand) as he found two old wells also near the temple. He also noticed that near upper base of the temple, is the spout of a channel which carried off the washings of the image. He wrote it looked like a snake or some similar animal.
Later some addition notes were added by James Fergusson in around 1876. He noticed that the colonnade was Gandhara inspired.
Final clear description about the temple was given by R.C. Kak in Ancient Monuments in Kashmir (1933):
The gateway is a double-chambered structure faced on each open side by a trefoil arch surmounted by a steep pediment. The lintels of the closed arches are supported on pairs of columns which were originally fluted, though the weather has now left no trace of flutes. They have a double capital, the upper one being voluted on all four sides. The walls are externally surmounted by a cornice of kirti- mukhas, alternating with miniature trefoiled niches. Upon this rests the first course of the pyramidal roof.
The flights of steps-on the eastern and western sides respectively afford entrance to and exit from the entrance chamber. The one on the roadside is buried underground, but the inner stair has been excavated. It consists of seven steps flanked by sloping rails and upright side walls. Between this stair and the temple is a small stone platform which formed the lowermost course of the stepped base of a column (most probably a Garudadhvaja).
The priest in charge of the temple has now placed in it a small stele of very crude workmanship and late date, which he has painted with vermilion. Another similar stele, still standing in the position in which it was found, is seen in front of the temple stair.
The temple itself stands on a double base, which is in every respect similar to other structures of its kind in Kashmir. A lofty trefoil arch, standing upon advanced pilasters and enclosing a rectangular entrance originally surmounted by an ornamental trefoil and steep pediment, gives access to the sanctum. The jambs of the entrance are adorned with half-engaged columns. The interior is a square of 14 feet. The pedestal of the image is placed on a broad platform. The original image, which seems to have been of Vishnu, is now replaced by small Siva-lingas originally brought from the bed of the river Narbada. The walls are covered with a coat of modern whitewash. The string course from which the ceiling springs is still visible, but the ceiling itself which Bishop Cowie saw in 1865 and described as domical, has since either fallen down or been removed. It was, no doubt, similar to the ceilings of the larger temples at Wangath.
Externally the only decorations are the trefoils of the recesses, their pediments, and the cornice of kirtimukhas and miniature trefoils from which the roof sprang.
The quadrangle measures 145′ by 119 1/2′, and consists of fifty- three cells and the gateway. They are rectangular, 7′ long by 4′ broad. Each cell has a single trefoiled entrance enclosed in a high- pitched pediment resting on half-engaged columns. These ranges of cells are preceded by a noble colonnade which stands on a base similar to that of the temple. A transverse beam connects the capitals of the columns with the roof of the cells. Over these beams rises the entablature, only one course of which, namely the frieze of miniature trefoils, is extant.
In the centre of each range of cells, except, perhaps, the one in which the gateway stands, is an apartment of larger dimensions preceded by a pair of taller columns which are advanced about 4′ from the rest of the peristyle.
The top course of the cells is also decorated in the same way as the frieze above.
On the south side, projecting from the cornice of the upper base of the temple, is the spout of the channel which carried off the washings of the image. It seems to have been shaped originally into a makara, or crocodile’s head. Immediately below it is a huge water trough carved out of a single block of stone.
The rain-water in the courtyard is carried off by a drain which runs under the south-eastern corner of the peristyle.
In cell No. 11 of the north range, beginning the reckoning from the corner nearest the gateway, is the side entrance, which was then, as now, closed with a wooden door. The monotony of the external face of the western wall is partially relieved by rows of small square projections. In its two corners are two cells opening outwards.
Immediately outside the side-door mentioned above is a square structure built of plain blocks of stone. The middle portion of each of its four walls has fallen down, and the gaps have been filled in with small chips of stone built in mud. It is difficult to surmise what was its original purpose.
The temple is now often described as Vishnu temple dating back to 8th-12 century A.D.
In 1947 war, some Dogra soldiers were holed up in the temple and attacked by the raiders. The place is now a military camp with the temple getting reshaped by aesthetics of military men.
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Photograph from ‘Our summer in the vale of Kashmir’ (1915) by Frederick Ward Denys.
This is now worshipped as Shiv Ling
A postcard from 1920s.
Sketch of Colonnade from ‘Notes on some of the temples of Kashmir, W.G. Cowie, 1865
The walls of the colonnade now have crude murals of Hindu deities.
Photograph from article ‘Behind the shutters of a Kashmir Zenana’ by Marion Whiting for Harper’s Magazine, Volume 129, 1914.
Village Martand (Mattan) figures mostly in this travelogue and as suggested by the title of the writing, focuses on women.
Among other things, she gives us description of Muslim New year being celebrated by the villagers at ruins of Martand temple:
That evening the new moon rose as advertised, and the New-Year celebrations began. But we were not prepared for what was to follow. Dinner was over, and we were lazily sitting in our comfortable camp-chairs warming ourselves in front of a huge bonfire. Presently the sound of singing came up from the village below, and soon it grew louder and louder. Then, emerging from the darkness into the light of our camp-fire, appeared what proved to be the entire population of Martand. First came a crowd of men and boys, and directly behind them women, singing, as they walked, a low, monotonous sort of chant. Close to the ruins of the temple they stopped, just near enough for us to make out in the firelight the outlines of their long, white scarfs and loose-hanging smocks. The singer arranged themselves into rows facing each other, each woman placing her hands on the shoulders of the woman next to her. Meanwhile the men had squatted on the ground in a circle around the performers, their knees up under their chins, their shawls wrapped tightly around them in a fashion peculiar to the Kashmiri. All the while the women were singing the same chant, over and over again, swaying back and forth in rhythm with the music. First one row would take the air, and then the other would respond in a sort of cadence, with always the same theme repeated again and again. The scene, so unexpected, was wonderful, the firelight illuminating the figures, the tall columns of the old temple rising behind, and the black night enveloping everything beyond. Our Kashmiri factotum was called upon to explain what it all meant.
“They come to the old temple to sing to Mohammed. they tell the story of his life. They tell his wanderings and his preachings, and then they tell long stories of what the Koran say must do. How the women must obey their husbands, how fathers must teach their sons, and how they all must worship the great God Allah!”
“Do they often come to the temple to sing?” we asked.
“Only at the New-Year,”he answered.
“And do the men never join in the ceremony?”
“no. Only the women; they do the singing.”
“But this was originally a Hindu temple,” we persisted. “Why do Mohammedans come here?”
“It is the custom,” he answered, vaguely, shrugging his shoulders.
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An interesting photograph by Howard Sochurek in from 1951 for Life Magazine. We can see a group of people dancing in front of Martand Temple.
Praying at Bhaniyar Temple [Bunair/Boniar/Boniyar [now, in Bandi Brahamana, Baramulla[Lat 34° 8′. Long. 74° 13′]]].
A postcard from 1920s. Temple is by the Jhelum river on the road between Uri and Naushera. At one time it was said to be the best surviving specimen of Kashmiri architecture.
Stein’s edition of the Sanskrit text of Rājataraṅgiṇī appeared in 1892 and his two volume annotated translations in 1900. It was his monumental contribution to study of Kashmir, a place which meant much to him.
Over the next few decades, many more people added their own findings to the study of Rājataraṅgiṇī.
In 1920s, in light of new findings, the idea of publishing an updated and corrected new edition of Rājataraṅgiṇī took root in Steins mind. But this was going to be an even more ambitious undertaking. Over the next two decades, Stein planned and worked on his ‘Illustrated Rājataraṅgiṇī’.
In his various letters, he talked about this work:
“The desire here expressed for providing by graphic reproduction an important aid for the student of the Chronicle has been a special inducement to me for undertaking this re-issue of my work. The illustrations of ancient sites, ruined structures, etc., which figure in Kalhana’s narrative, have with a few exceptions been reproduced from photographs I was able to take myself on a tour from October-November 1940. Apart from the pleasure it afforded me of revisiting familiar scenes in surroundings and climatic conditions exceptionally favoured by nature, it offered the welcome opportunity of testing the accuracy of impressions and surveys dating back in many places to close on half a century.”
But then in 1943, Stein died and the fate of this mammoth work of human diligence was unknown and uncertain. It was believed to be unfinished and lost.
Then in 2011, while going through the Stein archives kept in western Manuscripts Collection of Bodleian Library at Oxford, Luther Obrock, came across the almost final draft of ‘Illustrated Rājataraṅgiṇī’. Among other things, the document provided an incomplete handwritten list of photographs to be included in the final book. Obrock was able to trace the photographs in the Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences in Budapest and the Bodleian Library at Oxford.
‘Marc Aurel Stein: Illustrated Rājataraṅgiṇī’ was now possible.
In foreword to the work, Obrock writes:
“This book reproduced those photographs with the title mentioned in the dated list. I was able to trace the vast majority of the photographs mentioned, however it must be noted that Stein’s photograph list contained in the Western Manuscripts collection of the Bodleian is incomplete. Stein merely listed some place names as “take” or left the space next to a page number blank. Perhaps another more complete list of the photograph exists, but I have been unable to locate it in either Budapest or Oxford. I have listed the untraced and unspecified photographs or sites in an appendix. I have further decided to include only those photographs Stein positively identified with references in order to give an approximation of his vision of an Illustrated Rājataraṅgiṇī. “
In the book, the photographs occur in the sequence in which the various places are mentioned in Kalhana’s work. Not only places, in most of the photographs you can see how people (unknown, unidentified) were interacting with the places too. Stein’s work had had an impact on Kashmiris too, a lot of these places were getting reclaimed.
Some photographs from the book:
First five are from Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and the last one is from British Academy and the Bodleian Library, The University of Oxford.
Nilanaga
Kapateshvara, Papasudana Naga
Samdhya, Sundabrar, spring
Bhedagiri, Budabrar Naga
Sarada; Sharada temple
Vitastatra, Vitastatra Nag
Huskapura, Linga, Ushkur
“To me as a historical student it affords satisfaction to think that my work may help to preserve a record of varied aspects of Kasmir’s intellectual and cultural heritage which, like the country’s climate and other physical features, have markedly distinguished it from the rest of India in the past but are laible to being effaced more and more in future. In a personal way I have more reason to feel gratified that now after the lapse of decades I can still offer these volumes as a token of gratitude for the benefits a kindly Fate has allowed me to derive from the favours with which nature has so richly endowed this alpine land”, Aurel Stein, Cap, Mohand Marg, September 14, 1941.
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Marc Aurel Stein – Illustrated Rājataraṅgiṇī
Together with Eugen Hultzsch’s Critical Notes and Stein’s Maps
Edited by Luther Obrock in Collaboration with Katrin Einicke
Studia Indologica Universitatis Halensis, Band 6
2013
248 pages with 82 photographs and 2 folding maps
78,00 €
[Buy here]
A great way to celebrate 150th birthday of the great man.
“The following day was spent in exploring the Bawan caves and the massive temple ruins of Martand.
The first cave I entered with much inward trepidation lest our touchwood torches should go out or loose stones be showered on us from the roof. We were shown the recess where a devotee of old lived his strange life and left his bones. A few yards beyond this further progress, except by crawling, was stopped by a recent fall of stones, and so we sought the entrance and made our way to the last and largest cave, which contains what is, perhaps, the very earliest Kashmiri temple. The porch has been cut out of the solid rock, and thence a gloomy passage leads to a flight of steps ascending to the little temple itself. A climb up the hill bought us to the plateau where the grand ruins of Martand stand sentinel, as they have done through countless ages. “
~ Photograph and text: ‘A walking tour in Kashmir by Miss. A.V. Stewart. Nursing sister in the Indian Army.’ For ‘World Wide Magazine. Volume 10. 1902.
Photograph of the Meruvardhanaswami temple at Pandrethan near Srinagar in Jammu and Kashmir, taken in 1868 by John Burke. Pandrethan, now mostly in ruins, is one of Kashmir’s historic capitals, said by Kalhana in his poetical account of Kashmiri history called Rajatarangini to have been founded by king Pravarsena in the 6th century AD. Its name thus derives from Puranadishthana or ‘old town’. The small stone Shiva temple in the picture dates from the mid-10th century, reputedly erected by a minister named Meru. It was set in a spring-fed tank and its plinth is now submerged. This general view of the temple is reproduced in Henry Hardy Cole’s Archaeological Survey of India report, ‘Illustrations of Ancient Buildings in Kashmir,’ (1869), in which he wrote, ‘The small village of Pandrethan is situated on the Jhelum, about a mile and a half to the south-east of Srinagar…The Temple is close to the village, and stands in the centre of a tank of water…At the time of my visit, the water was about two feet over the floor of the Temple, and I had to obtain a small boat to enable me and my surveyors to take measurements. The stone ceiling is elaborately carved in bas-relief figures, and it is one of the most perfect pieces of ancient carving that exists in Kashmir…The pyramidal roof is divided into two portions by an ornamental band. The corner pilasters are surmounted by carved capitals, and the pediments of the porches appear to have terminated with a melon-shaped ornament. The ceiling is formed of nine blocks of stone; four resting over the angles of the cornice, reduce the opening to a square, and an upper course of four stones still further reduces the opening, which is covered by a single block decorated with a large lotus.’
The above image and description is easily available at British Library. What I am actually sharing is something inside the temple. The design that could be seen on the ceiling.
The design on the ceiling was first copied by Alexander Cunningham in around 1848 after a tip-off by Lord John Elphinstone. When Cunningham visited the temple, there was evidence that one time the ornamentation, the designs and the figures of the temple must have been profusely plastered over to cover its naked idol beauty.
Inside, he found figures on the walls plastered as also the ornamentation on ceiling. He gives it as the reason why George Trebeck didn’t notice any figures or any designs on the ceiling when he became the first European to enter the temple in around 1822.
Alexander Cunningham had the plaster removed and the figures on the ceiling appeared.
Cunningham’s copy of the design Essay on the Avian Order of Architecture by Alexander Cunningham Journal of Asiatic Society of Bengal (1848)
“The ceiling is formed of nine blocks, four of which rest over the angles of the cornice, and reduce the opening to a square, which is just one half of the size of the other. The same process is again repeated with an upper course of four stones, by which the opening is still further narrowed to a square of 4 feet ; and lastly, this opening is covered by a single stone decorated with a large expanded lotus, surrounded by a beaded circle. The smaller angles are occupied by naked human figures, something similar to those of the Payach ceiling, but without wings. These figures besides have only one leg and one arm outstretched, which affords more variety than the other treatment at Payach. Each of the larger angles is filled with two figures holding out a garland, which falls in a graceful loop between them. The whole rests upon a cornice supported by brackets, which were so much decayed that I found it impossible to trace their decorations or even their exact shape. The spaces between the brackets were also much injured ; but they appeared to have been filled with some kind of ornamental drapery hanging in curved folds.”
The winged figures noticed by him on the ceiling of Payach:
A much more detailed (lesser know) copy of Pandrethan ceiling prepared by one R.T. Burney was presented by W.G. Cowie in his 1865 paper ‘Notes on some of the Temples of Kashmir, especially those not described by General A. Cunninghan’ (Journal of The Asiatiic Society of Bengal Volume 35, Part 1. 1866)
W.G. Cowie states: “General Cunningham’s drawing of the ceiling of the temple is not quite complete. From the accompanying very accurate sketch made by Mr. R. T. Burney of the Civil Service, (Plate XVIII.), it will be seen that the angles of the square in which the beaded circle is, are occupied by naked human figures, as well as the angles of the other squares. These innermost figures have both arms outstretched, like those at Payach seeming to hold up the circle. They have drapery about their shoulders, resembling light scarfs. The brackets supporting the cornice were once ornamented, and show marks of great violence having been used to destroy the carving. Each appears to have represented a human head ; for on several of them there still remains on both sides what looks like plaited hair. The pediment pilasters project 5 inches beyond those supporting the trefoiled arches. The corner pilasters of the building are 1 foot 10 1/2 inches thick. I found what I took for mortar in all parts of the building.
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