Through lucid visual analysis, accompanied by drawings, this book will allow readers to appreciate the concepts underlying designs that at first sight often seem bewilderingly intricate. The book will be divided into six parts that cover the history and development of the design and architecture of Indian temples.

This volume examines the multifarious dimensions that constitute the workings of the Hindu temple as an architectural and urban built form. Eleven chapters reflect on Hindu temples from multiple standpoints - tracing their elusive evolution from wayside shrines as well as canonization into classical objects; questioning the role of treatises containing their building rules; analyzing their prescribed proportions and orders; examining their presence in, and as, larger sacred habitats and ritua...

This book presents an analysis of the foundations organised by the Birla family in India. Several generations were involved in the renovation and establishment of sanctuaries, temples and other sacral buildings. As a result, between 1933 and 1998, nineteen Birla Mandirs were established, mainly in northern and central India. All the temples have the capacity to surprise with their various decorative motifs, not seen in other places, which – apart from their aesthetic function – above all bear important symbolic content. Therefore, is it possible to treat the Birla Mandirs as a specific medium – the carrier of a particular message that is not only religious, but with a significance that permeates other layers of social and political discourse. This message, as the authors of the book claim, have a bearing on the socio-political thought of India – supported by the creation and propagation of ideas related to identity and a national art. It also conveys the idea of hierarchical Hindu inclusivism which, although considering all religions as equal, treats Hinduism in a unique way – seeing within it the most perfect form of religion, giving man the opportunity to learn the highest truth. The book also examines whether the temples founded by the Birla family and the religious activities undertaken therein apply the concept of “inventing” tradition, and whether traditions created (or “modernised”) in contemporary times are a way of enhancing the appeal of the message conveyed from temple to society. “The Vastness of Culture” is a series of publications presenting cultural studies and emphasizing the role of comparative research and analyses that reveal similarities, differences and intercultural influences. In our publications, cultures and civilizations are in a state of constant flux, engaging in dialogue, creating new understandings, competing for meaning under the influence of global content, without any clear boundaries, but with a vastness that forces questions to be raised.

This book takes the reader through the centuries and gives a rich insight into India's heritage and architecture. For years the preserve of scholars, this is a presentation of the myrad forms, school and styles of architecture in an informative yet reader-friendly manner focusing on aspects of Indian aesthetics, principles of engineering, history and philosophies, replete with brilliant visuals and illuminating perspectives.

This book is a systematic overview of the temple architecturebuilt in eastern India between the ninth and sixteenth centuries.Spanning eight hundred years, it defines the tradition of TempleArchitecture of eastern India and examines the traits of continuityand of disruption in the tradition.In the absence of many extant examples of temples in the regionduring this whole period, the study uses the architectural fragmentsand votive shrines housed in various archives and museumsof the world. The study locates and identifies more than fortytemples of the period up to 1500 CE, and goes on to documentand analyse them in order to develop an understanding of a regionaltype of nagara temple. The study identified the presence ofall three modes called latina, phamsana and valabhi of the northIndian nagara tradition of temple architecture.Another significant feature of the study is the analysis of there-use of earlier Hindu-Buddhist architectural fragments in laterIslamic structures in order to develop an understanding of theearlier architecture and to show how the re-use of such fragmentsinfluenced the architecture of the Sultanate period in a major way,forming the basis of an architectural vocabulary.In the concluding part, the origin and development of the Mughalperiod temples characterized by the chala, bangla and ratna typesis explained, while emphasizing the continuities and elements ofdisruptions that had taken place since the beginning of the ninthcentury.The foreword of the book is written by Dr. George Michell whohave earlier edited two best known books on the architecture ofthe region: Brick Temples of Bengal (From the Archives of DavidMcCutchion) PUP, Princeton, New Jersey, 1983 and IslamicHeritage of Bengal UNESCO publications, Paris, 1984.