Halebeedu Temple
Lord Hoysaleshwara and Shantaleshwara
Halebeedu Temple
Sri Hoysaleshwara
About Haledeedu Temple
Halebeedu is a small town in Hassan District , Karnataka , located about 210Kms from Bangalore. On the way from Hassan to Belur, take a right turn at the road that leads to Halebeedu Temple. Halebeedu was initially called “Dwarasamudra” mainly because of the large man made water reservoir situated adjacent to the temple. Dwarasamudra used to be the regal capital of the Hoysalas from 11th century for 300 years before it was plundered by the Delhi Sultanate in 14th century. The plundering destroyed Dwarasamudra and it came to be know as Halebeedu which in regional language means the ransacked town.
A number of temples were built during this time, the most notable among them being the ornate Hoysaleshwara temple, Kedareshwara temple, Jain Basadi temples, as well as the Hulikere step well (kalyani). All these sites are within a kilometer of each other.
A beautiful aerial view of the temple can be seen on the website of Karnataka Tourism at https://www.karnatakatourism.org/tour-item/halebeedu/
The temple is under the maintenance of Archeological Survey of India and they have done a very good job of proving a beautifully maintained lush green lawn around the temple . While the ASI permits photography at Belur and Halebeedu, they expect the photographers to respect the monument by refraining from the use of Tripod or flash.
You can see the lush green lawn and the movement of clouds in the video below.
The Halebeedu temple has two shrines … one that of Hoysaleshwara and the other Shantaleshwara. While the two shrines face East, the main entrance to the temple are from North and South. The tourists today enter from the North entrance while the designated Main Entrance to the temple is from the South.
At all the entrances and the entrance to the Nandi Pavilions there are two mini shrines complete with Vesara and kuta roof. The temple is built on a Jagati which is an elevated platform about 3 meters wide and 1.6meters above the ground. Before you climb on to the jagati from South , there is a beautiful Ganesha idol on the left and a Hoysala emblem to the right.
Halebeedu Temple Interiors:
When you enter the temple from the East entrance, you come across the sanctum of Lord Hoysaleshwara. The hoysaleswara temple is dedicated to Lord Shiva in contrast to the Belur temple which is based on Lord Vishnu. However both the temples were sponsored by King Vishnuvardhana of the Hoysala empire.
The construction of the temple started in 1121 and was completed in 1160. King Vishnuvardhana moved from Belur to Dwarasamudra . It is believed that a honest minister called Ketamalla in Dwarasamudra constructed the Dvikoota (2 shrines) temple designed in transept architecture . Kettamalla dedicated the Dvikuta temple of Shiva to his King Vishnuvardhana and the Queen Shantaladevi in the form of Hoysaleshwara and Shantaleshwara.
A circular raised platform with four pillars on its perimeter is located in front of Lord’s sanctum. This is called the Nritya Mantapa . It is believed that the queen used to perform classical dance forms in respect to the lord. The Nritya Mantapa has raised pavilions all around where the people used to sit and watch the performance.
Similar Nritya mantapa exists in front of Shantaleswara sanctum too. A small Nandi statue is built on the Nritya Mantapa facing the lord. It is believed that there were beautiful statue of Madanikas at the top of the pillars. These statues were destroyed by the Mughal plunderers and a few of them were taken by the British during their rule . These statues can now be seen in British museums. The roof throughout the temple is rich with beautiful carvings.
There are that support the roof throughout the temple interior. The pillars are lathe turned and beautifully carved.
In these pictures , I have shown the view of the pillars with the diffused perforations in the wall. The light through these perforations forms forms a nice bokeh and provides a very interesting composition for a photograph. These picture are difficult to take due to low light condition inside the temple.
Halebeedu Temple exterior:
When you come out of the sanctums on East side, you can see the Nandi pavilion opposite to each of the sanctums. The Nandi in front of the Hoysaleswara sanctum is about 9 feet tall and that of the one in front of Shantaleshwara is about 8 feet tall. The two Nandis are 6th and 7th biggest in India but the best ornate Nandis in India.
The Nandi pavilions were built with 16 round and hexagonal pillars initially and a few more pillars were added as extra support to the cracking beam.
Nandi is considered to be the celestial vehicle of Lord Shiva and the position of the pavilion shows each of them calmly parked in front of their owner’s abode. Both the Nandi’s are highly decorated with carvings of jewellery consisting garland , bells and other forms of embelishments that is used to normally decorate the animal . The carvings are homolithic . The quality of the stone have improved over time and one can still still the smooth shiny surface of the Nandi.
Behind the Nandi pavilion is a small shrine that houses an idol of Sun god . The shrine is very dark from inside and hence difficult to photograph. The idol is carved with intricately carved attire and jewellery. One can see the Sun god holding lotus in each of the hands. The pedestal is beautifully carved with the Seven horse chariot which is the celestial vehicle of Sun god.
The temple exterior walls are highly decorated with carvings from the Ramayana and Mahabharata
The external wall of the main hall raises above the Jagati platform. It runs all around the temple. It consists of 9 layers of friezes . The area above the friezes is perforated to allow light and air into the main hall. The first layer consists of a line of elephants walking towards the corner. There are in excess of 1500 elephants all around and it is said no two elephants are similar.
The layer above the elephants consists of horses with soldiers on top . The other layers have foot soldiers, lions, creepers, mythical beasts like ‘Makara’ and swans. The sixth layer has stories from Ramayana and Mahabharata.
In another frieze called Sapta Sala Bheda … it shows Rama killing Vali from behind seven trees. The story goes that when Rama approached Sugreeva the Monkey King for help to retrieve the abducted Sita … Sugriva agreed to help Rama but requested Rama to first help him regain his lost kingdom from his brother Vali.
Vali was blessed by a boon from lord Brahma that whoever stands in front of him to fight him, his strength will automatically become twice his opponents strength. So there was no way Rama could have won the battle fighting face to face with Vali. The frieze shows Rama standing behind Sapta (seven) trees and killing Vali with a poisonous arrow (depicted by the snake ) shot through the seven trees at Vali.
The ninth layer consists of beautiful dancers in a frame that projects out of wall.
The area above the 9 layers consist of about 340 individual friezes distributed across the temple. Some of these friezes are highly decorated carvings of gods and some show detailed carvings depicting heroic acts of the lord showing victory of good over bad.
Some of the beautiful corners of Halebeedu. They are so extensively carved one wonders about the skill of the artisans who had to work without the modern tools to either cut stones or to lift them to those heights.
The view of the external walls of the Dwikuta seen when standing on the Western side of the temple is amazing. One can really witness the grand scale of the temple and perhaps get a sense of of the engineering, artistic and managerial skills of the people who were involved in such massive projects over a period of more than 100 years to deliver the end state.
In this statue the artist has skilfully depicted the story of Lord Shiva wearing the elephants skins.
The mythology states that a demon attacked Shiva in the form of an elephant with the intention of killing him. However Shiva recognised the demons ploy and entered the demon elephant and started dancing inside. Eventually Shiva killed the elephant by ripping it open and then wearing its skin. The sculptor has very skillfully shown Shiva’s nail ripping the elephants skin open with one hand while pushing the two legs apart with the other two hands.
This idol is named Gaja Charamambharadra.
Well I started driving from Bangalore at 6:00 am and started shooting the Halebeedu Temple grandeur at 10:00 am . It was 1:00 pm when I thought that it was well past the time the light would be conducive for good photography . So I had to stop and return back for lunch . There are still many friezes that are located above the 9 layered foundation that I could not photograph. These friezes tell very interesting stories. But the friezes were not within the range of the lens that I was carrying for the day and the harsh light was directly falling on them.
So I know I will be returning once again very soon with the right lens to continue to capture the grandeur of this temple under softer light.
Until then obrigado and adios ….. stay safe !
Cheers,
Credits: A significant part of the narrative text is sourced from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoysaleswara_Temple