Odisha Temple Architecture

Odisha Temple Architecture

Subject – Art and Culture

Context – Conceived in 2016, the Puri Heritage Corridor Project was unveiled in December 2019 to transform the holy town of Puri into an international place of heritage.

Concept –

• The main architectural features of Odisha temples are classified in three orders, i.e., rekhapida, pidhadeul and khakra.
• Most of the main temple sites are located in ancient Kalinga—modern Puri District, including Bhubaneswar or ancient Tribhuvanesvara, Puri and Konark.
• The temples of Odisha constitute a distinct substyle within the nagara order.
• In general, here the shikhara, called deul in Odisha, is vertical almost until the top when it suddenly curves sharply inwards.
• Deuls are preceded by mandapas called jagamohana in Odisha.

• The ground plan of the main temple is almost always square, which, in the upper reaches of its superstructure becomes circular in the crowning mastaka.
• The exterior of the temples are lavishly carved, their interiors generally quite bare.
• Odisha temples usually have boundary walls.

Sun temple

• At Konark, on the shores of the Bay of Bengal, lie the ruins of the Surya or Sun temple built in stone around 1240.
• The Sun temple is set on a high base, its walls covered in extensive, detailed ornamental carving.
• These include twelve pairs of enormous wheels sculpted with spokes and hubs, representing the chariot wheels of the Sun god who, in mythology, rides a chariot driven by seven horses, sculpted here at the entrance staircase.
• Its shikhara was a colossal creation said to have reached 70m, which, proving too heavy for its site, fell in the nineteenth century.
• The vast complex is within a quadrilateral precinct of which the jagamohana or the dance-pavillion (mandapa) has survived, which though no longer accessible is said to be the largest enclosed space in Hindu architecture.
• On the southern wall is a massive sculpture of surya carved out of green stone.