"James Burgess and Henry Cousens were the first archaeologists to properly survey the temple. They noted images of solar deities outside and inside, and identified it as a Sun temple. According to them, the structure had originally all the parts of a first-class temple, was built according to injunctions of the shilpa shastras, in good proportions, and richly decorated. They stated that the shikhara was blown up, The Muhammadans, not content with defacing the figure sculptures of this Modhera temple, are said to have placed bags of gunpowder in the underground shrine, and blew it up with the upper cell, destroying the Sikhara or tower .... The shrine is now a wreck: nothing but the bare walls remaining ... this must have been of two storeys... The floor separating them, with part of the roof, had fallen into the pit. On clearing out of the debris, the seat of the image of Surya was found in the middle of the floor, with other blocks connecting it with the side walls. On the front of the seat are carved seven horses (the saptasva-vahana) of the god, their fore-quarters projecting and prancing forward ..."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Burgess and Cousens 1903: 74ff). quoted from Jain, M. (2019). Flight of deities and rebirth of temples: Espisodes from Indian history. 173ff.
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Sun_Temple%2C_Modhera
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Sun Temple, Modhera
3 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Sun Temple, Modhera →
Related Quotes
"Colonel Monier-Williams, a military official, was the first to notice the temple in the course of his duties as Surve…"
"Thereafter, in 1856, British administrator A.K. Forbes wrote of the temple and the evidence of Muslim vandalism, It r…"
"After the 1857 Indian Mutiny/Great Rebellion, European belief in their religious superiority became racial too. After…"
"Now hereafter are written the endowments (vithi), a garden for the god of gods, who wears the war-disc, which (endowm…"
"Jajja, who long carried the burden of the varga, together with a committee of trustees (goshtijana), built a large te…"
"However, it was during the reign of Sikandar Butshikan (1394-1417), that the wind of Muslim proselytization blew the …"
"Militants damaged 127 temples and 16,000 houses of Kashmiri Pandits in the Valley between 1986 and 1992, according to…"
"The Kashmir Samiti has produced a report titled Riots in Kashmir, listing 85 temples destroyed in the valley, and cla…"
"The original Shiva Lingam in the temple, along with over 300 precious idols of Gods and Godesses therein and other st…"
"The British army explorer, Francis Younghusband (1816- 1942) pronounced the (Martand) temple as “... the finest struc…"