1st Edition
The Routledge Handbook of Hindu Temples Materiality, Social History and Practice
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.
Introduction: Hindu temples: social histories
Section I: The temple and royalty
1. Introduction to temple and royalty
Salila Kulshreshtha
2. The sacred geography of a medieval capital: Hampi-Vijayanagara – a case study
Anila Verghese
3. Beyond the king–brahmana–temple paradigm: mapping the socio-cultural landscape of Hindu temples in central India (c. 4th–6th century CE)
Ashish Kumar
4. Constructing temple, constructing power: temple reconstruction process in 10th-century Tamil-speaking South with a special emphasis on Govindapputtūr
Valérie Gillet
Section II: Temple rituals
5. Introduction to temple and rituals
Salila Kulshreshtha
6. The stepwell as gift of water: Danadharma
Kirit Mankodi
7. Medieval food as deity worship: the elaboration of food offerings in Chola-era ritual practice
Andrea Gutiérrez
8. Social history of the Western-Himalayan temple: rituals and priests
Mahesh Sharma
Section III: Temple as social space
9. Introduction to temple as social space
Uthara Suvrathan
10. Methods for murals: temple painting in southeastern India
Anna Lise Seastrand
11. Tirthas, temples and the architecture of Hindu pilgrimage
Crispin Branfoot
12. Amour and upahāra in the garbha-gṛha: the temple as social space in the Kathāsaritsāgara
Tara Sheemar Malhan
Section IV: Temple landscapes
13. Introduction to temple landscapes
Uthara Suvrathan
14. Temples of Swat: the Śāhi archaeological landscape of Barikot
Luca M. Oliveri
15. Shared spaces: cultural landscapes and early Hindu temples in peninsular India
Himanshu Prabha Ray
16. Sacred spaces and local places: temples and shrines in the religious landscape of Tekkalakota
C.M. Manohar, V. Ashok Abkari and Namita Sanjay Sugandhi
Section V: The temple and beyond
17. The temple and beyond
Himanshu Prabha Ray
18. Movement across the divine threshold in medieval Tamil Nadu: dynamics and interactions in the space of the temple and beyond
Leslie C. Orr
19. Monasticism and the Hindu Temple
Himanshu Prabha Ray
20. Building belonging: Shaiva temple communities in South and Southeast Asia
Elizabeth A. Cecil
Section VI: The colonial interlude
21. Introduction to the colonial interlude
Himanshu Prabha Ray
22. Symbiotic sacred spaces: an indexical study of premodern Malabar
Percy Arfeen
23. From the forest to the valley: temple architecture, landscape and history in Goa
Pedro Pombo
24. The afterlife of temples: western India
Susan Verma Mishra
25. The remaking of Ramtek Hill under the Yadavas and Bhosles of Nagpur
Cathleen A. Cummings
Biography
Himanshu Prabha Ray is Research Fellow at Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies, Oxford, UK. She was the first Chairperson of the National Monuments Authority, Ministry of Culture in New Delhi, India, from 2012 to 2015, and former Professor at Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University. Her research interests cover Archaeology of Religion in Asia, Maritime History and Archaeology of the Indian Ocean. Her recent books include Coastal Shrines and Transnational Maritime Networks Across India and Southeast Asia (2021), Archaeology and Buddhism in South Asia (2018), Buddhism and Gandhara: An Archaeology of Museum Collections (ed. 2018), The Archaeology of Sacred Spaces: The Temple in Western India, 2nd Century BCE to 8th Century CE (with Susan Verma Mishra, 2017), The Return of the Buddha: Ancient Symbols for a New Nation (2014) and The Archaeology of Seafaring in Ancient South Asia (2003).
Salila Kulshreshtha is Visiting Assistant Professor of History and Art and Art History at New York University Abu Dhabi. She secured her PhD degree in history from Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, and is the author of From Temple to Museum: Colonial Collections and Uma Mahesvara Icons in the Middle Ganga Valley (2018). She has worked on issues of urban heritage and heritage education with the Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH) (2004) and with the Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Mumbai City Museum, Mumbai (2011–2012). She has taught Art history, History and Humanities in Mumbai at Rizvi College of Architecture and Indian Education Society’s College of Architecture (2012–2013) and in the USA at the Old Dominion University and Virginia Wesleyan College (2005–2007). She is currently based in Dubai. Her research interests include religious iconography, colonial archaeology and museum collections.
Uthara Suvrathan completed her MA and MPhil degrees in Jawaharlal Nehru University and her PhD degree in University of Michigan. She works at the intersection of archaeology and history to examine the organization of polities and places on the margins of larger states and empires in premodern South Asia. She is also interested in archaeological approaches to landscape studies and in issues of premodern trade and contact across the Indian Ocean. In addition, she works on issues of museum education, public outreach and the digital humanities, with a particular interest in the sharing of information among researchers, and between academics and the wider public. She is currently Assistant Professor at Aziz Premji University, Bengaluru, India.
