Martand Sun Temple – Know Your Motherland

The temple of Martand is situated at a distance of 5 miles from the town of Anantnag. Like most medievel temples in Kashmir, Martand consists of a courtyard with the principal shrine in the middle and a colonnaded peristyle. The latter is 220 feet long and 142 feet broad and contains eightyfour fluted columns facing the courtyard.

“The entrance or gateway stands in the middle of the western side of the quadrangle and is of the same width as the temple itself. This proportion is in accordance with the idea of Hindu architectural grandeur; for the rules laid down by them as quoted by Ram Raz. On each flank of the gateway, the pediment was supported by massive fluted pillars 17.5 feet in height, or eight feet higher than those in the quadrangle. One of these is still standing to the south of the entrance. The walls of the gateway are profusely decorated internally and externally, the chief motif of decoration being rows of double pedimented niches alternating with rectangular panels. Most of the pedimented niches contained single standing figures of gods. Each of the two large niches in the side walls of the inner chamber of the gateway contains the tall figure of a three-headed Vishnu standing between two attendents.” – [R.C.Kak quotes from Archeological Survey of India Reports & Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal]

”The Martand temple proper is 63 feet in length and 36 feet in width at the eastern end and only 27 feet width at the western end.

”The Martand temple proper is 63 feet in length and 36 feet in width at the eastern end and only 27 feet width at the western end. It contains three distinct chambers, of which the outermost named ardhamandapa or ‘half temple’, answering to the front porch of classical fanes is 18 feet 10 inches square; the middle one called antarala or ‘mid-temple’ corresponding to the pronoas of the Greeks is 18 feet, 4.5 inches; and the innermost called garbhagriha or ‘womb of the difice’, the naos of the Greeks and the cella of the Romans is 18 feet 5 inches by 13 feet 10 inches. The walls of the temple itself are 9 feet thick and its entrance chamber only 4.4 feet thick, being respectively one half and one fourth of the interior width of the building. Among the images carved on the walls of the antarala and the antechamber, we notice on the left wall of the former a well executed image of the river-goddess Ganga, standing upon her vehicle, the crocodile which is looking up towards her. A female attendent on her right holds an umbrella over her head and a chauri-bearer is on her left. The statues on the western walls of the antechamber are undoubtedly representations of Vishnu and what Mr Fergusson mistook for hoods of snakes are in reality points of their coronets. Such was once the magnificient mass of building dedicated to the worship of the Sun, a mass 75 feet in height, 33 feet in length and the same in width including the wings. Entrance was gained by a wide flight of steps which are now covered by ruins.” – [R.C.Kak quotes from Archeological Survey of India Reports & Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal] R.C.Kak says: The roof of the temple seems to have been of the pyramidal type common in the temples of Kashmir. There is some uncertainty regarding the exact ascription of this temple, owing to the ambiguity of Kalhana’s statement. But the most probable assumption, which is strengthened by the architectural style, is that the temple as it exists today was built by King Lalitaditya in the middle of the eighth century AD. The courtyard of the temple was excavated recently and a vast quantity of debris and stones was removed. Among other movable antiquities which the excavation yielded, the most noteworthy are a number of large earthen jars found embedded in the courtyard. Removal of the accumulated debris of centuries from the base of the temple has also brought to light a very important fact that previous to the construction of the present temple, there existed another temple of somewhat smaller dimension at this site. When the new temple was built, the older temple base was not demolished but was enveloped by a new base of larger dimensions, as is borne out by the existence of both bases side by side, one within the other, on the east side of the temple. The older temple was probably the one built on this site by Ranaditya.

Brigid Kaneen in his ‘Travels in Kashmir’ adds: Of all the temple ruins to be found in Kashmir today, the most dramatic date from the reign of the next great king after Ashoka, was Lalitaditya Muktapida who came to the throne, a long time later in AD 725. Lalitaditya, the third ruler of the Karkota Dynasty was a soldier king who expanded the frontiers of Kashmir through the surrounding hill kingdoms and down to the plains of the Punjab. But when he was not marching, he was building, and it is for his great temple at Martand that he is remembered. The temple at Martand was built on a plateau above the present-day town of Mattan which is on the road to Pahalgam. Earthquakes, iconoclasts and vandals long ago reduced Martand to ruins, but nonetheless it is still most impressive, and in its prime it must have been breathtaking. The temple, which had a sanctuary, a choir and a nave stood in a large quadrangle with eightyfour carved stone pillars making a gracefulcolonnade around it. The western entrance, a magnificient archway was approached by a wide flight of steps, and there were various side-chapels. Arthur Neve calculated that the massive temple roof cannot have been less than seventyfive feet high. Unfortunately, the rubble from the collapsed roof has tended to confuse the site. The temple’s simplicity of outline, the proportions of its pillars and colonnade, the triangular pediments above the doorways, are all strikingly classical and must have been inspired by Greek architecture, via Alexander the Great’s conquests in north-western India. Even its site on a high plateau is rather Parthenon-like. Sir Francis Younghusband, who was British Resident in Kashmir in the early years of the twentieth century, wrote: ‘No temple was ever built on a finer site. It is one of the most heavenly spots on earth …. there is about it a combination of massiveness and simplicity, and of solidity combined with grace, which has earned it fame for a thousand years.’

The temple is said to have been completely destroyed on the orders of Muslim ruler Sikandar Butshikan in the early 15th century, with demolition lasting a year.

The Government of India has developed the site as an important tourist site with facilities. The Archaeological Survey of India has declared the Martand Sun Temple as a site of national importance in Jammu and Kashmir. The temple appears in the list of centrally protected monuments as Martanda (Sun Temple).

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Sources – Travels in Kashmir by Brigid Keenan; Ancient Monuments of Kashmir by R.C.Kak; Wikipedia