Tanjore, or rather, the Brahadishwara Temple

We spent the bulk of our time in Tanjore at the Brahadishwara Temple, a UNESCO World Heritage Site ... and I hope these pictures give you a sense of why.

Here is the main layout of the temple complex - with Nandi the bull facing towards the temple's inner sanctum. Our guide explained that the temple layout was designed to signify the God in repose. Here is my interpretation of his description.

Nandi (sacred bull, Shiva's transport), carved out of a single rock, at the entrance measuring about 16 feet long and 13 feet high.

Along the outer walls of the temple there were some beautiful frescoes, like this one depicting the goddess Durga defeating the demon Mahishasura. This story is a little too good not to share (shout out to bad-ass, demon-killing, females in Hindu mythology).

From Wikipedia:

According to a narrative in the Devi Mahatmya story of the Markandeya Purana text, Durga was created as a warrior goddess to fight anasura (an inhuman force/demon) named Mahishasura. He had unleashed a reign of terror on earth, heaven and the nether worlds, and he could not be defeated by any man or god, anywhere. The gods went to Brahma, who had given Mahishasura the power not to be defeated by a man. Brahma could do nothing. They made Brahma their leader and went to Vaikuntha — the place where Vishnu lay on Ananta Naag. They found both Vishnu and Shiva, and Brahma eloquently related the reign of terror Mahishasur had unleashed on the three worlds. Hearing this Vishnu, Shiva and all of the gods became very angry and beams of fierce light emerged from their bodies. The blinding sea of light met at the Ashram of a priest named Katyan. The goddess Durga took the name Katyaayani from the priest and emerged from the sea of light. She introduced herself in the language of the Rig-Veda, saying she was the form of the supreme Brahman who had created all the gods. Now she had come to fight the demon to save the gods. They did not create her; it was her lila that she emerged from their combined energy. The gods were blessed with her compassion.

It is said that upon initially encountering Durga, Mahishasura underestimated her, thinking: "How can a woman kill me, Mahishasur — the one who has defeated the trinity of gods?" However, Durga roared with laughter, which caused an earthquake which made Mahishasur aware of her powers.

And the terrible Mahishasura rampaged against her, changing forms many times. First he was a buffalo demon, and she defeated him with her sword. Then he changed forms and became an elephant that tied up the goddess's lion and began to pull it towards him. The goddess cut off his trunk with her sword. The demon Mahishasur continued his terrorizing, taking the form of a lion, and then the form of a man, but both of them were gracefully slain by Durga.

Then Mahishasur began attacking once more, starting to take the form of a buffalo again. The patient goddess became very angry, and as she sipped divine wine from a cup she smiled and proclaimed to Mahishasur in a colorful tone — "Roar with delight while you still can, O illiterate demon, because when I will kill you after drinking this, the gods themselves will roar with delight".When Mahishasur had half emerged into his buffalo form, he was paralyzed by the extreme light emitting from the goddess's body. The goddess then resounded with laughter before cutting Mahishasur's head down with her sword.

Durga is therefore called Mahishasuramardini (literally the slayer of the buffalo demon)

After the Brahadishwara temple, we saw the Saraswathi Mahal Library, originally the royal library of the Nayak Kings of Thanjavur who ruled 1535 - 1675 AD, but is now open to the public. They had an amazing assortment of historical texts (books!), but one of the highlights was seeing the palm leaf manuscripts (pictured below). The writing was minuscule (the width of the palm leaf in some cases being no more than a couple of fingers).

Source

Last but not least was the Palace Art Gallery, which had an amazing collection of Chola-period bronze work.

The Nataraja, Shiva in his cosmic dance of destruction

From Wikipedia:

Chola period bronzes were created using the lost wax technique. It is known in artistic terms as "Cire Perdue". The Sanskrit Shilpa texts call it the Madhu Uchchishtta Vidhana.

Beeswax and kungilium (a type of camphor) are mixed with a little oil and kneaded well. The figure is sculpted from this mixture fashioning all the minute details. This is the wax model original.

The entire figure is then coated with clay made from termite hills until the mould is of a necessary thickness. Then the whole thing is dried and fired in an oven with cow-dung cakes. The wax model melts and flows out, while some of it vapourises.

The metal alloy of bronze is melted and poured into the empty clay-mould. This particular bronze alloy is known as Pancha Loham. When the metal has filled all crevices and has settled and hardened and cooled, the mould is broken off. The bronze figure thus obtained is then cleaned, finer details are added, blemishes are removed, smoothened, and polished well. Hence each bronze icon is unique and the mould cannot be used to create copies.

The images that were created by this technique were quite stunning.

I feel that we learned so much on this trip about Hindu iconography, architecture, and south Indian aesthetic that I hope it will stay with us for a long time.

So that was the end of our little south Indian adventure. Richard is now safely back in Kentucky, Allen is happily working with leather workers in Banaras (fingers crossed for a post soon), and I'm spending a couple weeks in Bangalore helping out at an NGO that looks data (!!!!) on Bangalore and India's infrastructure and makes policy recommendations. Fun fun!