aihole, cradle of indian temple architecture

Posted on January 12, 2026 by Rama Arya

Indian temple design did not arrive at in a day. Surprised? 🙂

More surprising is where its evolution took place.

The floor-plans and superstructures one takes so much for granted today took shape in a tiny village in north Karnataka over a period of two hundred years of vigorous, yet brazen experimentation.

Known as the ‘cradle of Hindu temple architecture,’ Aihole, the first capital of the Early Chalukya Kingdom [6th to 8th Century] served as a laboratory for the construction of sacred sites.

From rock-cut cave temples to apsidal-shaped monumental structures to one akin to a cozy homely hut. From the ‘northern’ high curved Nagara-style and ‘southern’ pyramidal stepped Dravida-style superstructures to the hybrid ornate Vesara model typical of the Deccan. They all came into being here.

There are 15 prototypes of sandstone standalone and rock-cut cave temples in Aihole’s over 125. Each a masterpiece built by architects 1,500 years ago who designed fearlessly and were ready to break stereotypes.

It was a feat made possible by the prevailing rulers’ openness and willingness to experiment as they reigned over the Deccan, a region sandwiched between the north and south of the Indian subcontinent.

Currently on the UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List for its role in temple architecture evolution, many of Aihole’s edifices owe their names to a more recent and lax naming ceremony. Durga Temple is not dedicated to the goddess, but refers to a later Durg or watchtower built on its roof. Lad Khan temple, Aihole’s oldest temple, is so named because when discovered by the Archaeological Survey of India, it was known as where a Mr. Lad Khan once lived. A gentle reminder of Indian plurality. 🙂 And the Ravana Phadi rock-cut cave temple has less to do with Ravana and more to do with Shiva.

Next time you walk into a Hindu temple, surrounded by a familiar standardized floor-plan and superstructure, just remind yourself it is a design which won the lottery and got pushed into the future. There were many others in the original basket where these came from. And if you are curious about them, here are some of the candidates.

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travel diaries: four caves, a lake, a seeker and badami

Posted on December 29, 2025 by Rama Arya

One of Badami Cave Temples’ most impressive sculptures: Shiva as the 18-armed Nataraja doing the Tandava Nritya—the cosmic dance of creation, preservation, and destruction.

One is never far from the gods in India. They are everywhere. Carved out of living rock. Carved into living rock. As far back as even 578 CE.

It is just after lunchtime, and I am at the foot of a gigantic red sandstone escarpment. Hundreds of school-children are racing down the steep uneven steps hewn into the cliff’s face. Their teachers shout behind them to slow down. Not that their wards pay any attention to the ominous warnings. Dressed in shiny tracksuits, they run in and out of the cavernous halls, doubled over in unstoppable giggles.

Slicing their way through this human avalanche are staid family groups. Their elderly matriarchs stomping ahead, undeterred by limps or wobbly canes.

“Aaj bahut bheed hai [It is very crowded today],” I observe to the security guard at the gate. “Roz aisa hai. Season hai na aaj kal [It is like this every day. It is the season nowadays],” he smiles back happily.

In a few months these cliffs will be deserted again, first under the scorching summer sun and then because of the monsoons which would make the stone steps a veritable death trap.

Yet such ominous weathers rarely affected pilgrims in the distant past. 1,400 years ago.

Portrait of a man in Ancient India. Ancient Hindu temples, by virtue of their depiction of both the sacred and secular, offer a fascinating insight into the then prevailing norms and societies.

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global travel shot: the pagan temple that became a christian country’s favourite

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When I walked into Garni Temple’s Cella one October morning there was a 2,000-year-old UNESCO-listed duduk performance taking place inside the stone confines to the unbridled joy of a rapt audience. Once the show was over, I somehow managed to get the temple all to myself for a few long moments.

Garni Temple is the only one of its kind in all of Armenia and [now defunct] Soviet Union. The fact that it still stands—a rare pagan Greco-Roman remnant in the world’s first Christian country despite wars, religious upmanship, atheism, and even an earthquake—is a miracle.

Two thousand years old, scholars differ on its exact purpose and age. Is it a temple to the Zoroastrian sun god Mihr built in 77 AD by the Romanized Armenian King Tiridates I or a Roman tomb of the 2nd Century? Either way, its soaring 24 basalt Ionic columns reaching out to a ceiling draped in reliefs of grapes and vine leaves, perched above nine 12-inch-high steps is an evocative magnificent otherworldly sight.

Seated on the stone floor by the empty altar, it was just me and the echoes of those who had passed through the sanctuary two millennia ago. And that remote yesterday from the distant annals of time, briefly became my today.

Welcome to my Armenia series, dear Reader. ❤

travel shorts: kazakhstan’s bronze age gallery with 5,000 petroglyphs

Posted on October 7, 2024 by Rama Arya

In search of the Arpauzen petroglyphs in southern Kazakhstan.

I wish I had some form of 360-degree vision and could see nature’s entire spread around me at the same go. On one side, the Prisyrdarya Karatau Mountains‘ dark craggy peaks encircled the isolated silent valley swathed in wild tulips and golden heather. On the other, colossal black chunks of rock glistening in the afternoon sun cascaded down the slopes. Pinch me, I whispered to myself. Is this really for real!

But this was all just half its magic …

“Come, look here. There are etchings of two double-humped Bactrian camels and a hunter with a bow and arrow.” My guide, Islam’s excited voice broke into my reverie, and the otherwise pin drop silence punctuated with the sound of our footsteps on crackling sun-dried tangled gorse, and neighing of wild horses grazing a mere stone’s throw away. Continue reading →

persian herat and its hidden wonders

Posted on January 8, 2024 by Rama Arya

Right at the very end of the battered and bruised road, cutting across the country from east to west, is the Persian historical city of Herat. Not many travellers come this far. It is way too out, perched near Afghanistan’s western border with Iran. Yet, it has always been of great importance, as is revealed by its architectural and cultural treasures to those who take the trouble to reach it.

Herat’s been around for a long time; 6th Century BC records describe it as a Persian city which went by the name Aria. Yes, the same pronunciation as my surname. 🙂

Its strategic location on the Great Silk Road and the banks of the Hari River made it particularly appealing to conquerors and rulers. Alexander the Great defeated Herat’s Persian Achaemenids in 330 BC and put up a majestic citadel to celebrate his victory. He was followed by the Abbasid Caliphs in the 8th Century, Ghurids in 1175, the Mongol Genghis Khan who destroyed everything in 1221, the Kartids who then rebuilt it, and the Timurid Tamerlane who destroyed it once again in 1380.

When Tamerlane’s favourite son Shahrukh Mirza decided to move his capital from Samarkand to Herat, he was determined to make Herat the grandest city in the region. A vision shared by his wife Gawhar Shad and later descendent Husayn Bayqara.

The result was a city of much beauty and grace whose praise was extolled far and wide. Of its many buildings, 830 ‘cultural sites’ are still believed to survive today, warranting it a place in UNESCO’s tentative list in 2004.

It is a difficult combination. War and conservation. However, despite all the odds, both UNESCO and the Aga Khan Trust for Culture have consistently worked on Herat, ensuring its treasures, hidden from the world at large, manage to survive.

Come along with me on a virtual tour of Timurid Herat, the city on the Hari River, to see why it was called the ‘Pearl of the Khorasan’ for the longest time! Continue reading →

the complete travel guide to balkh: ancient bactria and silk road’s fabled city

Posted on December 4, 2023 by Rama Arya

Of all the cities that has survived the annals of time, Balkh, the capital of ancient Bactria [6th Century BC to 6th Century AD] in northern Afghanistan, is perhaps the most evocative.

Volumes have been written on its wars when it was the capital of Bactria, and thereafter, a part of post-Bactrian empires. Art and literature have had a constant muse in its colourful personalities, Alexander the Great and Roxanna, and their marriage which paved the course of history. One of the oldest religions in the world, Zoroastrianism, was founded by one of Balkh’s very own citizens, Zoroaster.

But its greatest claim to fame, and subsequently its greatest legacy, came from its simultaneous role as Silk Road’s fabled city. For 1,600 years, from 130 BC – 1453 AD, Balkh was not just a confluence of commodities, but also of religions, ideas, and knowledge. Continue reading →