Monday, July 5, 2010

Mahabalipuram: the Five Brothers

These events take place Sunday, July 4th. We have quit Pondicherry in search of adventure and find ourselves in Mahabilipuram.

We drove to Mal by a different road than the one that took us to Pondy. This was a surprise because it's between The resort town and Chennai. We passed it on the eway in fact. But the change was pleasant as the road was pastoral and flirted with bodies of water the whole way. We smiled and nodded and before we knew it, we were at the first site to see: the Five Rathas.
Our driver (whose name is "Money" incidentally, how cool is that? I think it's actually Muni or Many or something, but it sounds like "money". The first time I called him by name, I misremembered and called him Cash. Oh brother) pointed where to by the tickets and I set out to pick them up.
On the way I was intercepted by this gentleman:

He approached and asked if we needed a guide. I asked him a few questions to gauge his English and personality and he seemed suitable so we agreed on a price and set out.

So, here are the Five Rathas. These are monolithic temples; all carved from single stones rather than assembled. Rathas means Chariot, but the place is also called the Five Brothers, which of course in Hindu points to the Pandavas, the heros of the Mahabarata. Each temple dedicated to one of the characters. Our guide starts into the story, this one is for their wife Draupadi, this one is for Arjuna. Our guide's English is good, but here and there it's not clear and he needs a words repeated. Arjunathearger he says. Hunh? The archer I fill in excitedly. Next is Bhima, he is very fat. I frown, he's strong I add. The guide gives me a look and says "Yes, you know everything". My trainer instinct kicks in and I realize I'm stepping on his gig. After that I let hm do his thing and tell the story his way.
So, these data back to the 7th century. They are made out of pink granite. The story seems to take their meaning a little away from pure Panduva. For example, the Draupadi temple is dedicated to Durga. She's shown on a lotus, but her lion is out front. That's the sculpture you see there. The Arjuna one has sculptures of Indra and Nandi on it. It makes it hard to understand the connections. The one for Yudishthira has Krishna on it. Shouldn't he be with Arjuna? Maybe the Panduva are metaphoric on different levels than the ones I saw before. Maybe Joseph Campbell's on to something and one Strong Woman archetype is the same as the others. Once again, I know only that I don't understand it at all.


You can see the beginnings of the Dravidian style here. If you look at the roof of the far temple in the snap above it looks a lot like the temples you see on the side of the roads here today.

1 comment:

  1. Very cool. It's back to the books for me -- so much to know!

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