The Religious Imagery of Khajuraho

The Religious Imagery of Khajuraho PDF Author: Devangana Desai
Publisher:
ISBN: 9788190018418
Category : Decoration and ornament, Architectural
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Illustrations: 101 colour plates and 125 b/w illustrations Description: The book offers a closer view of the divinities and their configurations, particularly in the major Hindu temples of Khajuraho. It concentrates on the iconic schemes and patheons of two magnificent temples, one a rare preserved shrine of Vaikuntha-Vishnu and the other dedicated to Siva. It highlights the important cult of the Yoginis and the syncretic role of Surya in Khajuraho's pantheon. In the process of viewing the temple as a whole and its images within a well-integrated scheme, several earlier non-specified images could be seen in their proper context and for the first time identified and interpreted. The images of planetary divinities on the podium around the Lakshmana temple, or the Sveta-dvipa scene (Back Cover) are some such new interpretations offered in the book. The book presents an account of the topography of this medieval sacred centre, its patrons, the Chandella rulers, and erudite court culture. The elite's love for double-entendre is revealed in the sculptural art as well as poetic stanzas of their inscriptions on temples. The language of puns and enigma (sandhya-bhasha helps us in understanding the significance of erotic sculptures which apparently are sensual figures but actually conceal a deeper symbolism.

The Religious Imagery of Khajuraho

The Religious Imagery of Khajuraho PDF Author: Devangana Desai
Publisher:
ISBN: 9788190018418
Category : Decoration and ornament, Architectural
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Get Book Here

Book Description
Illustrations: 101 colour plates and 125 b/w illustrations Description: The book offers a closer view of the divinities and their configurations, particularly in the major Hindu temples of Khajuraho. It concentrates on the iconic schemes and patheons of two magnificent temples, one a rare preserved shrine of Vaikuntha-Vishnu and the other dedicated to Siva. It highlights the important cult of the Yoginis and the syncretic role of Surya in Khajuraho's pantheon. In the process of viewing the temple as a whole and its images within a well-integrated scheme, several earlier non-specified images could be seen in their proper context and for the first time identified and interpreted. The images of planetary divinities on the podium around the Lakshmana temple, or the Sveta-dvipa scene (Back Cover) are some such new interpretations offered in the book. The book presents an account of the topography of this medieval sacred centre, its patrons, the Chandella rulers, and erudite court culture. The elite's love for double-entendre is revealed in the sculptural art as well as poetic stanzas of their inscriptions on temples. The language of puns and enigma (sandhya-bhasha helps us in understanding the significance of erotic sculptures which apparently are sensual figures but actually conceal a deeper symbolism.

Hinduism and the Religious Arts

Hinduism and the Religious Arts PDF Author: Heather Elgood
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 0826498655
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 261

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Book Description
The roots between the Hindu religion and the wider culture are deep and uniquely complex. No study of either ancient or contemporary Indian culture can be undertaken without a clear understanding of Hindu visual arts and their sources in religious belief and practice. Defining what is meant by religion - no such term exists in Sanskrit - and what is understood by Hindu ideals of beauty, Heather Elgood provides the best synthesis and critical study of recent scholarship on the topic. In addition, this book offers critical background information for anyone interested in the social and anthropological roots of artistic creativity, as well as the rites, practices and beliefs of the hundreds of millions of Hindus in the world today.

Cross-Cultural Issues in Art

Cross-Cultural Issues in Art PDF Author: Steven Leuthold
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 113685455X
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 334

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Book Description
This book provides an engaging introduction to aesthetic concepts, expanding the discussion beyond the usual Western theorists and Western examples.

Khajuraho

Khajuraho PDF Author: Devangana Desai
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 140

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Book Description
This Book Is Primarily An Introduction To The Magnificient World Of The Khajuraho Temples, Their History, Patronage, Court Culture, Religion, Iconography And The Distinctive Features Of Sculptures And Architecture.

Chandella Art

Chandella Art PDF Author: Suśīla Kumāra Sullere
Publisher: Aakar Books
ISBN: 9788187879329
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 56

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Book Description
S.K. Sullerey Is Professor And Head, Department Of Post Graduate And Research In Ancient Indian History, Culture And Archaeology At Rani Durgavati Vishwavidyalaya, Jabalpur (M.P.).

Receptacle of the Sacred

Receptacle of the Sacred PDF Author: Jinah Kim
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520273869
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 406

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Book Description
In considering medieval illustrated Buddhist manuscripts as sacred objects of cultic innovation, Receptacle of the Sacred explores how and why the South Asian Buddhist book-cult has survived for almost two millennia to the present. A book “manuscript” should be understood as a form of sacred space: a temple in microcosm, not only imbued with divine presence but also layered with the memories of many generations of users. Jinah Kim argues that illustrating a manuscript with Buddhist imagery not only empowered it as a three-dimensional sacred object, but also made it a suitable tool for the spiritual transformation of medieval Indian practitioners. Through a detailed historical analysis of Sanskrit colophons on patronage, production, and use of illustrated manuscripts, she suggests that while Buddhism’s disappearance in eastern India was a slow and gradual process, the Buddhist book-cult played an important role in sustaining its identity. In addition, by examining the physical traces left by later Nepalese users and the contemporary ritual use of the book in Nepal, Kim shows how human agency was critical in perpetuating and intensifying the potency of a manuscript as a sacred object throughout time.

The Art of Khajuraho

The Art of Khajuraho PDF Author: Professor Ram Nath
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
This monograph studies the Art of Khajuraho from a new perspective: Architecture vis a vis its ornament, mainly the non religious Devangana Sculptures including the 'Mithuna', on the basis of Sanskrit texts. 'Mithuna ' is the most debated and also the most widely misunderstood phenomenon of Indian Art. Too much sacred, esoteric and metaphysical significance has been attached to the Indian Art and this aspect has been explained without any textual support, on fanciful conjectures.Indian Art is sacred in the sense that it is only through the religious media that it has expressed itself; otherwise as the study of the Silpa texts, classical works of Poetry and Drama and, more specifically the works on Poetics shows it has grown and developed formally and independently of any religious injunction. The key to its understanding lies in these texts. This is a classical problem and it is with the textual support of the classical literature of the same age that the author has ventured to solve it. In essence, it is a study of Indian Aesthetics based on Sanskrit texts, about 100 of which have been quoted in original . The temples of Khajuraho have been dealt with stylistically. The work attempts to study Indian Art in general and Art of Khajuraho in particular, in its formal aspect, over and above the much professed and generally superfluous esoteric, metaphysical and ritualistic interpretation thereof and as such it is the first work of this type.

The Routledge Handbook of Hindu Temples

The Routledge Handbook of Hindu Temples PDF Author: Himanshu Prabha Ray
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000785815
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 688

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Book Description
This handbook is a comprehensive study of the archaeology, social history and the cultural landscape of the Hindu temple. Perhaps the most recognizable of the material forms of Hinduism, temples are lived, dynamic spaces. They are significant sites for the creation of cultural heritage, both in the past and in the present. Drawing on historiographical surveys and in-depth case studies, the volume centres the material form of the Hindu temple as an entry point to study its many adaptations and transformations from the early centuries CE to the 20th century. It highlights the vibrancy and dynamism of the shrine in different locales and studies the active participation of the community for its establishment, maintenance and survival. The illustrated handbook takes a unique approach by focusing on the social base of the temple rather than its aesthetics or chronological linear development. It fills a significant gap in the study of Hinduism and will be an indispensable resource for scholars of archaeology, Hinduism, Indian history, religious studies, museum studies, South Asian history and Southeast Asian history. Chapters 1, 4 and 5 of this book are available for free in PDF format as Open Access from the individual product page at www.routledge.com. They have been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.

The Hegemony of Heritage

The Hegemony of Heritage PDF Author: Deborah L. Stein
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520968883
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 338

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Book Description
A free ebook version of this title is available through Luminos, University of California Press’s Open Access publishing program. Visit www.luminosoa.org to learn more. The Hegemony of Heritage makes an original and significant contribution to our understanding of how the relationship of architectural objects and societies to the built environment changes over time. Studying two surviving medieval monuments in southern Rajasthan—the Ambika Temple in Jagat and the Ékalingji Temple Complex in Kailaspuri—the author looks beyond their divergent sectarian affiliations and patronage structures to underscore many aspects of common practice. This book offers new and extremely valuable insights into these important monuments, illuminating the entangled politics of antiquity and revealing whether a monument’s ritual record is affirmed as continuous and hence hoary or dismissed as discontinuous or reinvented through various strategies. The Hegemony of Heritage enriches theoretical constructs with ethnographic description and asks us to reexamine notions such as archive and text through the filter of sculpture and mantra.

Material Culture and Asian Religions

Material Culture and Asian Religions PDF Author: Benjamin Fleming
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135013721
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 414

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Book Description
Traditionally, research on the history of Asian religions has been marked by a bias for literary evidence, privileging canonical texts penned in ‘classical’ languages. Not only has a focus on literary evidence shaped the dominant narratives about the religious histories of Asia, in both scholarship and popular culture, but it has contributed to the tendency to study different religious traditions in relative isolation from one another. Today, moreover, historical work is often based on modern textual editions and, increasingly, on electronic databases. What may be lost, in the process, is the visceral sense of the text as artifact – as a material object that formed part of a broader material culture, in which the boundaries between religious traditions were sometimes more fluid than canonical literature might suggest. This volume brings together specialists in a variety of Asian cultures to discuss the methodological challenges involved in integrating material evidence for the reconstruction of the religious histories of South, Southeast, Central, and East Asia. By means of specific ‘test cases,’ the volume explores the importance of considering material and literary evidence in concert. What untold stories do these sources help us to recover? How might they push us to reevaluate historical narratives traditionally told from literary sources? By addressing these questions from the perspectives of different subfields and religious traditions, contributors map out the challenges involved in interpreting different types of data, assessing the problems of interpretation distinct to specific types of material evidence (e.g., coins, temple art, manuscripts, donative inscriptions) and considering the issues raised by the different patterns in the preservation of such evidence in different locales. Special attention is paid to newly-discovered and neglected sources; to our evidence for trade, migration, and inter-regional cultural exchange; and to geographical locales that served as "contact zones" connecting cultures. In addition, the chapters in this volume represent the rich range of religious traditions across Asia – including Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Shinto, and Chinese religions, as well as Islam and eastern Christianities.