Arasavalli: The Sun Temple That Is Still a Temple

The interesting question at Arasavalli is not why this temple survives. It is why so few others did.

Surya's position in the earliest layer:

• Surya is a major deity in the Rigveda, with hymns addressed to him directly
• The Gayatri mantra, the most widely recited mantra in Hinduism, is addressed to Savitr, the solar deity, and is recited at sunrise and sunset by every initiated person following the tradition
• Sandhyavandanam, the daily practice of the twice born, is structured around the sun's positions
• Surya Namaskar takes his name
• The Aditya Hridayam in the Ramayana is addressed to him, and is what Agastya teaches Rama before the final battle

So the Sun is not a marginal deity in the textual tradition. He is close to the centre of daily practice.

The Saura sect. There was, historically, a distinct sect for whom Surya was the supreme deity, alongside the Shaiva, Vaishnava, Shakta and Ganapatya traditions. The standard list of five or six sects, the Panchayatana or Shanmata grouping, includes them.

What happened to it. The Saura tradition as an independent sect essentially dissolved, and the reasons are several.

• Absorption. Surya was folded into the Panchayatana puja as one of five deities worshipped together, which preserved him but removed the need for a separate tradition
• Vaishnava absorption specifically. Surya was increasingly identified with Vishnu, and the deity at Arasavalli is called Suryanarayana, which is exactly that identification in a name
• The Navagraha. Surya became the chief of the nine planets, which are propitiated as a group, and a deity in a group of nine is worshipped differently from a deity who is supreme
• Loss of patronage. The great Sun temples were royal foundations, and when their dynasties fell the temples had no independent base
• Destruction. Multan's great Sun temple, one of the most famous in the subcontinent, and Martand in Kashmir were destroyed, and Konark's decline has more than one explanation

The Maga Brahmins. There is a further strand worth knowing.

The Bhavishya Purana and other sources describe priests brought from Shakadvipa, understood as an Iranian region, to serve the Sun temples, and their descendants are the Maga or Shakadvipi Brahmins, communities that still exist in Bihar, Bengal, Odisha and elsewhere and that have historically served as Sun priests and as astrologers and Ayurvedic physicians.

That suggests a genuine historical contact between Indian Sun worship and Iranian solar practice, which is one of the more intriguing threads in Indian religious history and is not fully resolved.

What survives now. Sun worship in India today is real but distributed rather than concentrated.

• Chhath, in Bihar, eastern UP, Jharkhand and Nepal, is one of the largest Sun festivals anywhere
• Ratha Saptami, Makar Sankranti and Pongal are solar observances
• Sandhyavandanam and the Gayatri continue daily
• Surya is propitiated in Navagraha practice, particularly on Sundays
• A handful of temples, of which Arasavalli is the most active, continue the direct worship

The solar alignment at Arasavalli is the temple's most quoted feature and deserves to be described accurately.

What happens:

• On specific dates, generally given as around the middle of March and around the middle of October, the rays of the rising sun enter through the eastern gateway and the doorways of the temple
• They pass along the axis and reach the feet of the deity in the sanctum
• The event lasts a short time at sunrise
• Devotees gather for it

Why those dates. The mechanism is straightforward once you think about where the sun rises through the year.

• The sun rises due east only at the equinoxes, around 21 March and 23 September
• At other times it rises north or south of east, moving between the solstice extremes
• A temple aligned on a fixed axis will receive the rising sun along that axis only on the two dates each year when the sunrise azimuth matches the axis
• The two dates are symmetric about the solstice, which is why they come in pairs

The dates at Arasavalli fall near but not exactly at the equinoxes, which is consistent with an axis very slightly off true east.

What this tells you about the builders. They knew where the sun rose on a chosen day and built a doorway to admit it, which is a precise piece of observational work, done without instruments of the kind we would use.

That is not unique. Similar alignments are found at:

• Konark, whose whole conception is solar
• Modhera, where the equinox sunrise is said to reach the sanctum
• Numerous smaller temples across India
• And, worldwide, at sites from Newgrange to Chichen Itza

The honest caveats:

• Alignment claims are often stated loosely, with dates that drift and with the effect described more dramatically than it appears
• Buildings settle, doorways are rebuilt, and modern structures block sightlines
• The Gregorian dates shift slightly over centuries because of precession and calendar reform, so a medieval alignment does not fall on the same modern date it once did
• Some claimed alignments at Indian temples do not survive checking

On Arasavalli specifically. The event is well attested locally, devotees attend for it, and the geometry is entirely plausible. If you want to see it, ask the temple for the exact dates for the year rather than relying on a general statement, and be there before sunrise.

Why alignments were built at all. It is worth being clear that this is not merely a display of skill.

A temple aligned to the sun makes the deity's arrival visible and datable. On the appointed morning, the sun does what the tradition says it does, in front of witnesses, on time.

That is a very powerful thing for an institution to be able to demonstrate, and it is the same instinct that produced calendars, panchangs and the whole apparatus of timekeeping that Indian religion carries.

Ratha Saptami is the temple's principal festival and the main Sun observance in the Hindu calendar outside Chhath.

When. The seventh tithi of the bright fortnight of Magha, generally late January or February.

What it marks:

• The Sun's chariot turning toward the northern hemisphere, marking the movement into the northern course
• It is treated as the Sun's birthday in some traditions
• It falls shortly after Makar Sankranti, and the two belong to the same seasonal transition

What is done:

• Bathing before sunrise, traditionally with arka or jilledu leaves placed on the head, shoulders and knees, seven leaves for the seven horses of the Sun's chariot
• Arghya, the offering of water to the rising sun, made standing facing east
• Recitation of the Aditya Hridayam, the Surya Ashtakam or the Gayatri
• At Arasavalli, large numbers come for the pre dawn bathing and darshan
• Surya Namaskar, which many perform on this day specifically

Sunday observances. Sunday is Surya's day, and the associated practices are widespread.

• Fasting on Sundays, often with a single meal taken before sunset
• Avoiding salt or oil in the meal, in some observances
• Offering arghya at sunrise
• Red flowers, red cloth and wheat as offerings
• Charity, particularly of wheat, jaggery and red cloth

What Surya is asked for. The traditional associations are worth knowing since they shape who comes to a temple like this.

• Health, particularly of the eyes and the skin, and general vitality
• Recovery from illness, and Arasavalli has a strong reputation for this specifically
• Authority and standing, since Surya is associated with the father, with kingship and with position
• Clarity, in the sense of seeing a situation as it is

Eyes specifically. Devotees come to Arasavalli with eye conditions, and this is one of the temple's best known associations.

The connection is old and runs through the tradition. Surya is the eye of the cosmos, the Aditya Hridayam is given to Rama when his sight and strength are failing at the end of the battle, and the sun is what makes seeing possible at all.

A note on health claims. Devotees come to this temple with real conditions, and the tradition offers them a practice, a discipline and a place to bring what they are carrying. That is worth respecting.

It is also not treatment. Eye disease needs an eye doctor, and the two are not alternatives. Anyone using the temple should be using the hospital as well.

Surya images follow a distinct iconography that differs from every other major deity, and once you know it you will spot Surya panels in temples all over India.

The standard features:

• Standing, not seated, which is unusual for a principal deity
• A lotus in each hand, held at shoulder height, which is the defining mark
• Boots. Surya is the only major Hindu deity shown wearing footwear, generally high boots
• A belt or girdle, the avyanga, around the waist
• A halo or nimbus
• Sometimes a coat or upper garment covering the body

The boots and the coat. These are the details that make Surya iconography historically interesting.

• Hindu deities are otherwise shown barefoot
• The boots, the belt and the northern style dress point to Central Asian or Iranian influence on the Surya image
• This fits with the Maga Brahmin tradition of priests brought from Shakadvipa
• The earliest Surya images in this style appear in the Kushana period in the north west

The attendants:

• Usha and Pratyusha, dawn deities, often shown shooting arrows at the darkness
• Danda and Pingala, attendants
• Aruna, the charioteer, who is Surya's own brother and is shown legless in the tradition
• Chhaya and Sanjna, his consorts, and at Arasavalli the arrangement includes Usha, Chhaya and Padma

The chariot:

• Seven horses, for the seven days, the seven colours, or in other readings the seven metres of Vedic prosody
• One wheel, in many descriptions, representing the year
• Driven by Aruna

Where to spot Surya elsewhere. Once you can recognise the lotuses and the boots, Surya turns up constantly.

• In Navagraha panels at the entrance of south Indian temples, always in the centre
• On the outer walls of north Indian temples, in the standard niche programme
• At Konark and Modhera, where the whole building is his
• In Osian, Khajuraho, Konark and hundreds of other temples as a wall image
• In Jain and Buddhist contexts too, since the Sun crosses those boundaries

The lesson. Learning to read one iconographic scheme changes how a temple looks. Instead of a wall of figures, you see a programme in which each figure has a place, and Surya, standing with his lotuses in his boots, is one of the easiest to start with.

Getting there

• Arasavalli, near Srikakulam town, Srikakulam district, Andhra Pradesh
• About 1 km from Srikakulam town, so it is essentially in the town
• Srikakulam Road railway station is about 15 km, on the Chennai to Kolkata main line
• Visakhapatnam airport is about 110 km
• Autos run from Srikakulam

Timings

• The temple opens very early, before sunrise, which matters here more than at most temples
• It runs through the day with a midday break. Check current timings

When to go

• Ratha Saptami, in Magha, generally late January or February, which is the principal festival
• The alignment dates, around mid March and mid October. Confirm the exact dates with the temple for the year
• Sundays, when Surya worship is concentrated
• October to February for weather
• Sunrise, on any day, since this is a Sun temple and the morning is when it makes sense

What to do there

• Arrive before sunrise and be present as the light comes
• Offer arghya if you know the practice
• Take the darshan and look at the image properly, noting the lotuses, the boots and the attendants
• Sit for a while. It is a small temple and unhurried

Practicalities

• Traditional dress is appropriate
• The temple is modest in scale and facilities are basic
• Srikakulam town, a kilometre away, has food and accommodation

Combining the visit

• Srikurmam, about 15 km, the only Kurma avatar temple in India, which pairs naturally with this one
• Salihundam, about 20 km, the Buddhist site above the Vamsadhara
• Sri Mukhalingam, about 50 km, with its three superb Eastern Ganga temples
• Kalingapatnam, at the river mouth
• Visakhapatnam, Simhachalam and the Araku valley to the south
• Odisha to the north, with Puri, Konark and Bhubaneswar within a few hours

Arasavalli and Konark together. If you are travelling this coast, do both, in either order, and hold them against each other.

Konark is one of the greatest buildings in India, a chariot in stone, conceived at a scale that still stops people, and it is empty. There is no deity. Nobody worships there. It is preserved, ticketed, photographed and dead.

Arasavalli is architecturally modest, would not appear in any survey of Indian art, and has a priest performing the same rite that has been performed there for a very long time, to a deity who is present, for people who came with something to ask.

Which of those is the more important building is not a question with an obvious answer, and the two of them together, a hundred and fifty kilometres apart on the same coast, put it better than any argument could.