Narasimha temples, Ahobilam

The Imperial Gazetteer of 1908 describes the temple of Ahobilam as “the most sacred Vaishnava shrine in the District”.¹ It has three parts:¹

• the Diguva (lower) Ahobilam temple at the foot of the hills¹
• Yeguva (upper) Ahobilam, about four miles higher up¹
• a small shrine on the summit¹

The unfinished mandapa

James Fergusson’s revisers described the lower temple in 1910.² They began: “About fifty miles still further east, at a place called Diguva Ahobalam, in Karnul district, there is a large unfinished mantapam”.² In plan and design it is very like the temple of Vithoba (Vitthala) at Vijayanagar, but “its style and details are much more like those of the Nayyaks”.²

Local tradition gave the hall to Prataparudra (Pratapa Rudra) about 1300.² The revisers answered that traditions usually refer to the original shrine.² Judged by its style, they thought it “could hardly have been erected before the destruction of that capital in A.D. 1565”, that is, of Vijayanagara.²

They added that the inscriptions “have not yet been examined, but seem mostly to belong to the latter part of the 16th century”.² They judged that, “whoever may have built it,” the hall was “a fine bold specimen of architecture”.² See Vijayanagara.

What the inscriptions record

The inscriptions of Lower Ahobilam were copied in 1915, and V. Rangacharya summarised them.³ They run from the reign of Achyuta Raya.³ A record of Saka 1453 (1531; Saka is an Indian way of counting years) registers land given to the temple of Ahobalesvara, and one of 1536 is cut round the base of the central shrine.³

Several records belong to the reign of Sadasiva:³⁴⁵

• a record of 1547 that provides offerings during a festival³⁴⁵
• one of 1550, cut “round the platform of the huge pillar jayastambha” (pillar of victory) of the temple³⁴⁵
• another recording that a chief “set up the Garudastambha in the street opposite to the temple”³⁴⁵
• others recording halls (mantapas) on the processional ways of Upper Ahobilam³⁴⁵

The Garuda pillar record placed the management in the hands of the temple trustees and of the representative “of the Mahamandalesvara Aliya Ramarajadeva-Maharaja”.³⁴⁵ See Aliya Rama Raya.

The recovery of the temple

Two slabs of 1584 and 1585 belong to Sriranga I and Venkatapati, “ruling at Penugonda”.⁶⁴ They record that the grandfather of the chief Venkataraja had driven out “the Muhammadan chief Vibhuramu (Ibrahim II of Golconda)”.⁶⁴ This chief “had occupied the temple of Ahobalam for seven years in alliance with the Handevaru (chiefs)”.⁶⁴ The family received privileges in the temple for restoring it.⁶⁴ See the Ahobilam inscription of 1584.

Footnotes

1. Imperial Gazetteer of India: Madras, Vol. I (1908), p. 424 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵

2. James Fergusson, History of Indian and Eastern Architecture, Vol. I, revised by James Burgess (1910), p. 404 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸

3. V. Rangacharya, A Topographical List of the Inscriptions of the Madras Presidency, Vol. II (1919), p. 969, Kurnool Nos. 569–572 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹

4. Rangacharya, Topographical List, Vol. II (1919), p. 973, Kurnool Nos. 584–589 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰

5. Rangacharya, Topographical List, Vol. II (1919), p. 974, Kurnool Nos. 590–594 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶

6. Rangacharya, Topographical List, Vol. II (1919), p. 972, Kurnool No. 584 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴