Belur: The Temple Where the Sculptors Signed Their Work

The temple's origin connects directly to two other places, and knowing the connection makes the building legible.

Vishnuvardhana:

• Hoysala ruler in the twelfth century, originally named Bittideva
• He defeated the Cholas and took Talakadu, after which he assumed the title Talakadugonda
• He converted from Jainism to Sri Vaishnavism, in a change traditionally associated with Ramanuja, who was then in the Hoysala country
• He took the name Vishnuvardhana on that conversion

What the temple commemorates. Belur's Chennakeshava is generally understood to have been built in connection with the victory at Talakadu, and its commissioning belongs to the same moment as the ruler's change of allegiance.

So the building sits at the meeting point of three things:

• A military victory that established Hoysala power in the region
• A religious change by the ruler, from one tradition to another
• A statement of legitimacy, made in the most durable and most public medium available

What this tells you about temple building generally. Great temples are almost never built simply out of piety, and reading them as pure devotion misses most of what they were doing.

A temple of this scale is:

• A declaration that a dynasty has arrived and can afford this
• An employer, supporting sculptors, masons, priests, musicians, dancers, cooks and administrators for generations
• An economic institution, holding land and revenue
• A statement of which tradition the state now backs

None of that makes it less religious. It means the religious and the political were not separate categories, and Belur is where you can see one act doing all of it at once.

The bracket figures under the eaves are what most visitors remember, and they repay close attention.

What they are:

• Madanika or shilabalika figures, celestial women, carved as brackets supporting the eaves
• Around forty of them around the building
• Each is a distinct subject, not a repetition
• They are carved almost in the round, attached at few points, which is technically very difficult

Some of the best known:

• The Darpana Sundari, the woman with a mirror, the most famous of them
• The huntress, with a bow
• A woman with a parrot
• A woman removing a thorn from her foot
• A dancer, in a posture that has been read against the Natyashastra's descriptions
• A woman with a monkey pulling at her clothing

What they are doing there. This is worth being clear about, because visitors sometimes find them puzzling in a temple.

• Celestial women are a standard element of temple sculpture across India, not an anomaly
• Their presence signifies abundance, auspiciousness and the fullness of life, which is what a temple is understood to enclose
• The temple represents the whole cosmos, and a cosmos without beauty, desire and ordinary human activity would be an incomplete one
• They also perform a structural function as brackets, which is why they are where they are

On the attribution to Shantaladevi. It is often said locally that the madanikas were modelled on Shantaladevi, Vishnuvardhana's queen, who was a noted dancer and patron.

This is a tradition rather than a documented fact, and it is unlikely that forty distinct figures represent one person. What it does record is that the queen was remembered as a dancer of sufficient standing for the association to be made, which is itself worth knowing.

The most historically unusual thing at Belur is easy to miss and is genuinely rare in Indian art.

What is there:

• A number of sculptures carry inscribed names, cut into the stone beside or below the work
• The names identify the sculptor, sometimes with his place of origin
• Names recorded at Belur and at Hoysala sites include Dasoja of Balligavi, his son Chavana, Malliyanna, Nagoja and others
• The legendary figure Jakanachari is attached to Hoysala work in popular tradition, though the historical record is a separate matter

Why this is remarkable. Indian sculpture is overwhelmingly anonymous.

• The great works of Indian art, from the Gupta period onward, almost never carry a maker's name
• Inscriptions record patrons, kings, ministers, merchants and donors, and often in great detail, including what they gave and what they expected in return
• The people who actually made the object are usually invisible

What Hoysala practice changes. At Belur, and at Hoysala sites generally, the sculptors are named. They sign specific pieces. In some cases a sculptor's signature appears on his best work and not on his routine work.

What that implies:

• Individual sculptors had reputations that were worth recording
• They were sufficiently valued, or sufficiently confident, to claim their work
• There were workshops and lineages, with fathers and sons working together
• The idea that Indian craftsmen were anonymous by temperament, or because the tradition disapproved of individual claims, is not supported here

This is a small thing to look for and it changes how the building reads. Somewhere on those walls a man cut his own name next to a figure he was proud of, nine hundred years ago, and it is still there.

Hoysala carving is finer than almost anything else in Indian architecture, and the material is a large part of the reason.

What they used:

• Chloritic schist, commonly called soapstone, quarried in this region
• It is soft when freshly quarried, soft enough to be worked with fine tools in a way granite never permits
• It hardens on exposure to air over time
• It takes an extremely fine finish and holds undercut detail

Why that matters. Compare it to what else was available:

• Granite, used across the Tamil country by the Cholas, is extremely hard. Chola temples are monumental, architecturally magnificent, and their sculpture is bold rather than fine, because granite will not permit anything else
• Sandstone, used across north and central India, is workable and allows good detail, but weathers faster
• Marble, as at Dilwara, permits extraordinary fineness and is expensive and less structurally versatile

Soapstone lets a sculptor do things that are simply impossible in granite. The pierced screens, the jewellery carved as separate strands standing free of the body, the individually rendered fingernails, the chains that hang clear of the stone behind them, all depend on the material.

The trade off. Soapstone is soft, and softness cuts both ways.

• It is vulnerable to weathering, and the outermost detail has suffered in places
• It is easy to damage by touch, and the oil from many thousands of hands wears it
• It is easy to vandalise, and there is scratched graffiti on Hoysala temples

This is the practical reason for the rule at Belur and Halebidu. Do not touch the carvings. It is not a formality about respect for a monument. The material is soft enough that hands genuinely wear it away, and nine hundred years of survival can be undone by a few decades of everyone touching the same figure.

Getting there

• Belur, Hassan district, Karnataka, on the Yagachi
• About 40 km from Hassan and roughly 220 km from Bengaluru, by road
• Hassan is the nearest railway station, and Bengaluru and Mangaluru are the airports
• Halebidu is 16 km away and the two are always done together

Timings

• The temple is open through the day, with the sanctum following worship timings including a midday closure
• The site is under the Archaeological Survey and the temple is in active worship, so both sets of rules apply

When to go

• October to March for comfortable weather
• Early morning, both for the light on the sculpture and to be ahead of tour groups
• Vaikuntha Ekadashi and the temple's annual car festival bring crowds and are worth seeing if you want the building in use
• Avoid weekends and holidays if you want to look at anything properly

How to see it

• Walk the exterior completely before going in, at least twice. Once for the overall rhythm and once for detail
• Look for the madanika brackets under the eaves, and pick out the named ones
• Find the sculptors' signatures. Ask a guide to show you, since they are easy to miss
• Inside, look at the turned pillars and the ceiling of the navaranga
• Take darshan in the sanctum
• Allow two hours minimum at Belur, and a similar amount at Halebidu

Guides

• Licensed guides are available at the entrance and are genuinely worth taking here. The iconography is dense, the narrative panels reward explanation, and a good guide will find you things you would not see in a day of looking

Practical notes

• Do not touch the carvings. The stone is soft and hands wear it
• Remove footwear at the appropriate point. The platform gets hot at midday
• Photography is generally permitted outside the sanctum. Check current rules
• Carry water

Combining the visit

• Halebidu, 16 km away, with the Hoysaleswara temple and its even denser carving
• Shravanabelagola, roughly 80 km, with the great monolithic Jain image on the hill
• Somanathapura, the third of the World Heritage Hoysala ensemble, near Mysuru
• Chikmagalur and the coffee country, an hour beyond Belur

A closing thought. Belur is famous for its carving, and the carving is as good as anything in the world. The thing worth carrying away is smaller. Somewhere among all that ornament there are men's names, cut by the men themselves, in a tradition that almost never allowed it, on the work they thought was worth signing.