Alampur temple architecture
TEMPLE ARCHITECTURE is primarily a demarcation of `sacred space' with respect to the functional needs of communication with the supernatural. In making these sacred spaces into temples or places or geographical regions --- people regulated them by meaning so that the intended communication would be manifested in the form. Viewing the historic contexts of temple architecture like Alampur kshetra temples in Andhra Pradesh, the understanding of underlying principles in the sacred space and temple architecture attain more importance. The main rationale behind this study is to enquire how the underlying principles are manifested in the form of a language extending the meaning of these concepts in the kshetra teertha, devalaya, etc.
It is stressed that these meanings are not always hierarchical from kshetra to temple only.
In certain cases, the already existing kshetras and teerthas were given identity with the establishment of temples.
And in another case, the places were made into kshetras or teerthas.
The present study is aimed at interpreting the manifested meanings of sacred space in temple architecture with reference to Alampur kshetra and its temples of the 7-11 centuries A.D.
G.S.V. Suryanarayana Murthy,
School of Planning and Architecture, New Delhi
(This paper was accepted in an international
South-East Asian Conference held in University of Lund, Norway, this year.)
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Karnataka
Chennai
Coimbatore
Hyderabad
Madurai
Tiruchirapalli
Vijayawada
Visakhapatnam
