Being devoted to the Hindu sun god Surya Konark Surya Mandir is imagined as a goliath stone chariot with 12 wheels. It is the most popular of a couple of sun sanctuaries worked in India. The word name ‘Konark’ is a mix of two words, ‘Kona’ and ‘Arka.’ ‘Kona’ signifies ‘Corner’ and ‘Arka’ signifies ‘Sun,’ so when consolidated, it becomes ‘Sun of the Corner.’
Here is a detailed overview of Konark Surya Mandir!
Know about Konark Surya Mandir
Here are some of the facts about the Konark Surya Mandir that you should definitely know about.
Sun Temple: Origin
The historical backdrop of Konark Surya Mandir goes as far back as the nineteenth century BC. The Konark Sun Temple was underlying in the thirteenth century. Konark Surya mandir was worked by King Narasimha Deva I in 1244 to venerate Surya, the Sun God.
Konark was picked as its place of development since it has been depicted as the sacred place of Surya in different old texts.
Samba Purana, an ancient text devoted to Surya, tells the legend of how Samba, son of Lord Krishna, revered sun god and constructed the temple.
As the legend goes, it’s believed that Samba assembled a sun sanctuary in the nineteenth Century BC to worship lord Surya and towards the finish of his 12-year long love of the Sun at Maitryeavana. This love relieved him of the infection that he was experiencing.
The wheels of the sanctuary are sundials that can be utilized to represent time precisely to a moment, including constantly.
UNESCO World Heritage Site
The sanctuary in its current state was pronounced by UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1984 CE through archaeological survey, and many segments are presently in ruins; what survives from the temple complex keeps on drawing tourists as well as Hindu explorers as a place of worship.
Konark remains as an exemplary illustration of Hindu temples engineering, complete with a goliath construction, models, and work of art on bunch subjects. The entry prompts the holy place of the god Surya, made of chlorite stone.
The dividers of the temple complex are enhanced with reliefs – multifaceted carvings of different sculptures including Hindu divine beings, pictures of the human daily life activities, birds, creatures, and that’s only the tip of the iceberg. The temple architecture additionally has sensual sculptures on its shikhara, having a place with the tantra custom.
The wheels of the sanctuary can be utilized as sundials and can foresee the time. The hypothesis goes on concerning the reason for the obliteration of the sanctuary. Early speculations expressed that the sanctuary was never finished and imploded during development. This is gone against literary proof and proof from carvings.
The Kenduli copperplate engraving of 1384 CE from the rule of Narasimha IV is carved to show that the sanctuary was finished as well as a functioning site of love. One more engraving on the wheel states that different gods in the sanctuary were blessed, likewise recommending that the development of the sanctuary had been finished.
Various sonnets, stories, and books have been expounded on Konark, a large portion of which investigate or extend, or rethink the misfortunes intrinsic in the legends and stories around the sanctuary. Most as of late, Mohanjit’s book of sonnets, Kone Da Suraj, which centres around Konark, won the Kendra Sahitya Akademi Award (one of the top honours for writing in India) for the Punjabi language.
The Architecture of Konark Sun Temple
The temple follows the Kalinga of Odisha style of engineering in Konark Surya mandir, which is a subset of the nagara style of Hindu temple design. The Odisha style is accepted to exhibit the nagara style in the entirety of its virtue.
The temple architecture in nagara style includes a square ground plan containing a get-together lobby (mandapa) and dance hall. As far as height, there is an immense curvilinear pinnacle or tower (shikhara), slanting inwards and covered. Notwithstanding the way that Orissa is located in the east, the nagara style was taken on.
This could be because of the way that since King Anantavarman’s spaces remembered numerous regions for northern India too, the style pervasive there unequivocally affected the building plans of the temples that were going to be inherent Odisha by the lords.
Carvings of Konark Surya Mandir
The Konark Surya Mandir, constructed completely in stone, is as a giant chariot with twelve sets of extravagantly ornamented wheels, drawn by seven lavishly caparisoned, dashing horses. The wheels have been cut against the sides of the “chariot”.
The origination of this sanctuary as a chariot has principally to do with Hindu convictions in regards to Surya or the god of dawn ascending in the east and bridging the sky that he is generally found on a chariot pulled by seven horses. Hence, the portrayal of a chariot perpetually turned out to be essential for any imaginative creation connected with the sun god in India.
The 12 sets of wheels address the year. Konark Surya Mandir is the acknowledgement of the stunning dream of an aggressive and powerful king.
Indeed, even in the safe-haven, the holiest spot in any Hindu sanctuary, models in magnificence portray mainstream subjects; the sculptures, with a solitary exemption where an evangelist-like figure is seen situated in reflection, focus on the existence of a lord in the royal residence.
A gigantic icon of Surya is standing in the center of the southern half of the temple is a trademark figure of this sanctuary. It is likewise one of the not many sculptures in India which show Surya wearing boots and standing on a chariot being driven by seven horses.
This can be ascribed to Central Asian impact on Indian workmanship, attributable to the rule of Scythian-beginning traditions of antiquated India.
The sun god is seen wearing a short lower article of clothing (Antalya) in the cabinet style (one finish of the piece of clothing drawn between the legs and wrapped up the midriff at the back) and many decorations. These incorporate support at the abdomen, an accessory of five beaded strings with a focal fasten, armlets, earrings, and a crown.
These have been cut with such unpredictability that each dab and theme is noticeable. A corona is seen around the head, with tongues of blazes distending outwards.
He holds lotus stalks in the two of his hands and is encircled by a few orderly figures, including goddesses and the gods offering deference sidebar his family.
The reason for the annihilation of the Konark sun temple is indistinct yet stays a wellspring of contention. Konark Sun Temple is portrayed on the opposite side of the Indian money note of 10 rupees to imply its significance to the Indian social legacy.
Between the wheels, the plinth of the Konark Surya Mandir is altogether carved with reliefs of incredible lions, artists and musicians, and sexual gatherings. In the same way as another Indian temple, the Sun Temple contains a few particular and efficient spatial units.
The Sun Temple is straightforwardly connected with the thought and conviction of the embodiment of the Sun God, which is adumbrated in the Vedas and traditional texts.
The Hindu Sun god is embodied as a heavenly being with a set of experiences, parentage, family, spouses, and offspring, and accordingly, assumes an exceptionally noticeable part in the fantasies and legends of creation. The upper levels and porch of the Konark Surya Mandir contain more huge things of beauty than the lower level.
These form pictures to represent musicians and fanciful stories as well as models of goddesses, remembering Durga for her Mahishasuramardini angle killing the shape-moving bison devil (Shaktism), Vishnu in his Jagannath temple(Vaishnavism), and Shiva as a (to a great extent harmed) Linga (Shaivism).
A portion of the better-safeguarded friezes and models were taken out and moved to exhibition halls in Europe and significant urban communities of India before 1940.
Materials Utilized
The Konark Surya Mandir was produced using three kinds of stones. Chlorite was utilized for the entryway lintel and walls as well as certain models. Laterite was utilized for the center of the stage and flights of stairs close to the establishment.
Khondalite was utilized for different pieces of the Konark temple. As per Mitra, the Khondalite stone climates quicker over the long run due to humidity in the air, and this might have added to disintegration and sped up the harm when portions of the temples were annihilated.
None of these stones normally form close by, and the modelers and craftsmen more likely than not secured and moved the stones from far-off sources, presumably utilizing the waterways and water channels close to the site. The artisans then, at that point, made ashlar, wherein the stones were cleaned and gotten done to make joints barely apparent.
Hindu Sun God
Sets of animals were likewise made to monitor the three flights of stairs of the patio in various bearings and are viewed as magnum opuses of the sculptural craft of the Odisha area.
These animals incorporate two widespread lions remaining on hunkering elephants in the east, merrily embellished and saddled elephants toward the north, and two perfectly caparisoned warhorses toward the south.
The elephants and horses have since been re-introduced on new platforms, a couple of meters far off from the first areas, and presently face the patio. The lions-on-elephants presently lie to the front of the eastern steps of the Bhoga-Mandapa or hall.
However covered with mortar, the first shade of these sculptures was dull red patches of which are as yet noticeable. The connected stage was known as the Pida Deul, comprised of a square mandapa with a pyramidal rooftop.
Black Pagoda
Konark Surya Mandir was called Black Pagoda, credited to its dull veneer by the Europeans who involved it for the route for their boats. It is said that the Konark Surya Mandir could attract boats to the shore because of its magnetic powers.
One of the surviving figures is of a champion remaining close by one of the horses. Presently headless, he sports a casing down his back while a quiver loaded with bolts is seen attached to the seat.
The horse is seen pounding one figure under his hooves while one more lies beneath his body. Indeed, even in the middle age time frame, Konark had turned into a renowned temple architecture, and references are found in scholarly works.
Alongside the Jagannath temple, it filled in as a milestone for mariners cruising the Bay of Bengal. The early Europeans crossing this ocean alluded to the Jagannath temple as the ‘White Pagoda’ inferable from its white mortar (presently eliminated after rebuilding) and the Konark sun temple as the ‘Dark Pagoda’.
Features of Konark Surya Mandir
On the east side of the Konark Surya Mandir, at the entry of the sanctuary, stands a Nata Mandir. This is the place where the sanctuary dancers used to perform moves in tribute to the Sun god. Found in the picture is a figure of a lady in a moving posture. (lit. Dance temple). It remains on a high, complicatedly cut stage.
The help on the stage is comparative in style to that found on the enduring dividers of the temple. According to chronicled texts, there was an Aruna stambha (lit. Aruna’s point of support) between the principal temple and the Nata Mandira. However, it is no longer there since it was moved to the Jagannath at Puri at some point during the pained history of this temple.
According to Harle, the texts recommend that initially, the temple was encased inside a tower 865 feet (264 m) by 540 feet (160 m), with doors on three sides.
Spouse of Surya: Mayadevi
Mayadevi Temple in Konark is situated in the Sun Temple complex. This sanctuary is otherwise called the Chayadevi Temple since it is accepted to be devoted to Goddess Chayadevi. The sanctuary involves a sanctum or deul and a yard or Jagamohana that stands on a raised stage.
A significant factor in the intricate is devoted to Mayadevi – the spouse of Surya is carved and is more seasoned than the Sun sanctuary worked around the eleventh century. Its sanctum houses a Nataraja, and different offices of the Konark sun temple have icons of Surya with Vishnu, Vayu (air god), Agni (fire god).
The Konark Surya Mandir was considered by some as one more sanctuary made to love the sun god, yet a couple accepted that it was devoted to the spouse of Surya.
History and Destruction of Temple Parts
The explanations behind the destruction of the deul and the shikhara at the Konark Surya Mandir are not at this point known. It is accepted that it happened because of ‘the subsidence of the establishment, while others discuss a seismic tremor or lightning; yet others question assuming the Konark Surya Mandir was at any point finished’.
The primary conviction leading to the disintegration of Konark Surya mandir progressively is, as the utilization of low-quality chondrite prompted the ruins. History says it was destroyed by Islamic trespassers. The picture of the directing god or Surya carved has likewise never been found, and subsequently, it isn’t known concerning what shape, structure, or size it initially was.
The history encompassing it again gives voice to numerous convictions, including its annihilation or expulsion to the Jagannath temple. The deficiency of the divinity made the sanctuary be ignored, in the long run causing its rot. The limits of the assigned property envelop the characteristics important to represent the Outstanding Universal Value of the Sun Temple, Konark.
Inside the recorded and safeguarded degree of the structure, its enduring constructions and models, as well as the remaining removed parts, protected in-situ, address its quintessential characteristics of the structure, plan, and sculptural help.
Distinguished and expected dangers to the honesty of the property incorporate advancement pressure: modernization and metropolitan development influencing the climate of the landmark; ecological strain: deforestation because of tornadoes and human exercises, saline breeze and sand impacting, vehicular developments, and microbiological development; the travel industry pressure: 40% increment in the number of vacationers; catastrophic events: flood and typhoons; and neighborhood populace development.
The constructed site limits and the cushion zone around the property via land securing have been suggested for the better administration of the site. Also, the disintegration of metal issues supporting the design because salt air has in the previous brought about some harm.
Location of Konak Surya Mandir
Today, this site isn’t just famous with sightseers and explorers, yet additionally fills in as a setting for social celebrations, traditional Indian dance exhibitions, and so forth. Accordingly, even today, the Sun Temple keeps on assuming its part in protecting and promoting India’s colossal social legacy.
Konark Surya Mandir is arranged in Konark, a town in the locale of Puri in Odisha. It is around 60 km from the capital Bhubaneswar and 35 km from Puri. Konark is a popular vacationer location attributable to the Sun Temple, and in this manner, it is all around associated with Puri and Bhubaneswar via trains, transports, and taxicabs.
