Jaina Tradition of the Deccan: Shravanabelagola, Mudabidri, Karkala
Standing at the summit of Vindhyagiri, the colossal gommateshvara sculpture dominates the town of Shravanabelagola in Karnataka with quiet authority. India's largest figural monolith, it dates to the 10th century and remains the foremost pilgrimage site for Jains across southern India, drawing enormous crowds every twelve years for the celebrated Mahamastak Abhisheka festival. Comparable statues from later periods stand at Karkala and Venur, each carrying its own architectural and devotional character. Add Mudabidri to the picture, and you have a cluster of sites rich with basadis (Jaina shrines built in distinctly regional styles) that house remarkable collections of stone and metal tirthankara figures. Julia A. B. Hegewald, whose scholarly focus centres on Jaina architecture and ritual, brings real depth to this subject. Paired with specially commissioned photography by Surendra Kumar, the book opens with a solid grounding in Deccan Jainism, its history, beliefs, and living practices. It then takes readers along the granite hillside paths of Shravanabelagola and Karkala, through the basadis and past the gommateshvara images, before moving through the towns themselves to examine shrine collections in detail. The murals found within the maths at both Shravanabelagola and Mudabidri also receive thoughtful coverage. Whether you're a first-time visitor, a postgraduate researcher, or simply curious, it's a genuinely useful and well-constructed companion to these singular monuments.
- Author: Julia A. B. Hegewald
- Publisher: Jaico Publishing House
- Genre: Architecture
- ISBN: 978-9390166923
- Pages: 128 pages