Imperial temple architecture and the ideology of kingship in Odisha

Abstract

The main concern of the chapter is to correlate the rise of architectural monumentality in Odisha with state formation and kingship ideology. Particular attention is paid to the hitherto largely ignored competition of the Odia dynasties of the Somavamsa and the Gangas and their monumental temples with the imperial “Reichstempels” of the Cholas. Their foundation at Tanjavur and Gangaikondacholapura and the political iconography were directly associated with the rise of the “imperial Cholas” in the first half of the eleventh century. The foundation of Odisha’s three monumental temples, the Lingaraja at Bhubaneswar, the Jagannath temple at Puri and the Surya temple at Konarak in the eleventh to thirteenth centuries depict a reflection of the same ideology during three phases of Odisha’s rise in eastern India. The height of the Odishan temples clearly reveals their ideological significance. The Lingaraja, Odisha’s first monumental temple of the mid-eleventh century, reaches significantly nearly exactly the height of the Gangaikondachola temple which was constructed by Rajendra Chola. The Puri Jagannatha temple even surpassed the imperial temple of the Cholas at Tanjavur by a few meters and thus became even India’s highest temple. It was constructed after Anantavarman, a relative of the Cholas with the telling title Chodaganga, had finally been able to establish his Ganga dynasty in Kalinga and Odisha as the dominant power of eastern India. The height of Puri was again surpassed by Konarka’s Surya temple in the mid-thirteenth century during the final decline of the Cholas. Under its founder, king Narasimha, and his father Ananagabhima the Gajapati kingship ideology of these “Lords of the Elephants” reached its climax. They ruled under the divine order (adesa) of Jagannatha’s overlordship (samrajya). As the height of Konarak most likely had reached, before the collapse of its vimana, the height of the Qutb Minar at Delhi, it suggests that Konarak was Narasimha’s ‘Pillar of Victory’ (jayastambha), too, thus challenging the samrajya of the Delhi Sultanate.