Hampi.... the silent marvel !

Bangalore – Hospet : 350 Km

Hospet – Hampi : 13 Km

District : Bellary

Hampi is located in Karnataka State in southern India. Hospet is the nearest major town to Hampi. Mumbai to Hampi distance about 700km. Hampi is about 380km southwest of Hyderabad. Bangalore to Hampi is about 365km


Background: The Indus Valley civilization, one of the oldest in the world, dates back at least 5,000 years. Aryan tribes from the northwest invaded about 1500 B.C.; their merger with the earlier Dravidian inhabitants created the classical Indian culture. Arab incursions starting in the 8th century and Turkish in the 12th were followed by those of European traders, beginning in the late 15th century. By the 19th century, Britain had assumed political control of virtually all Indian lands. Indian armed forces in the British army played a vital role in both World Wars. Nonviolent resistance to British colonialism led by Mohandas GANDHI and Jawaharlal NEHRU brought independence in 1947. The subcontinent was divided into the secular state of India and the smaller Muslim state of Pakistan. A third war between the two countries in 1971 resulted in East Pakistan becoming the separate nation of Bangladesh. Despite impressive gains in economic investment and output, India faces pressing problems such as the ongoing dispute with Pakistan over Kashmir, massive overpopulation, environmental degradation, extensive poverty, and ethnic and religious strife.

Places:

The saying goes thus - " If dreams were ever made of stone, it would be hampi." The erstwhile capital of one of the greatest Hindu empire's in southern India , the mighty Vijayanagara empire, transports you to a different time. Equally fascinating is the story of a place that has transformed from a cradle of a flourishing civilization to one of the most wonderful ruins of modern times. It was 1565, in the battle of TALIKOTA, that began the end of the Vijayanagara empire. It resulted in the rout of Vijayanagara at the hands of Deccan sultanates. Two Muslim divisions of the mighty Vijayanagara army turned against their king, Ramaraya, which resulted in his defeat and the capital Vijayanagara was reduced to ruins.

Amidst the ruins of Vijayanagara, is the town of Hampi – a UNESCO world heritage site. Surrounded by the TungaBhadra river on one side and rocky mountains on the rest, Hampi forms a unique landscape. Some of the rocks are so precarious and neatly arranged (one upon another) that you would be forgiven to think that someone neatly placed them there.

Famous temples here include the Virupaksha temple and the Vittala temple. One can find a mix of traditional Vijayanagar style architecture as well as Indo Islamic style architecture. The Virupaksha temple architecture resembles the temples in Tamil Nadu whereas the lotus mahal is a mix of Indo – Islamic architecture. The temples have a main sanctum having the statue of the main god and surrounding it would be smaller structures having statues of other gods associated with the main god. The lower part of the temples are made of granite and the upper part(Gopura) is made of bricks. Most of the carvings on the bricks have been destroyed.The carvings in each of the temples show the creativity and hardwork of the artisan's. Each and every pillar in each of the temples had carvings telling a story. I just couldnt help but wonder the amount of work that must have been put in to build these magnificent structures.

What to see?

There are a lot of places of interest here. Its a 25 Km circle and one can chose to cover the important places by renting a bicycle, bike or by auto. The heat is unbearable and that is one factor to watch out for before renting a bicycle or a bike.

Hampi Map

Sasivekalu Ganesha : A monolithic statue of Ganesha built by a sasivekalu (mustard) trader .

Sasivekalu Ganesha

Kadalekalu Ganesha : Called so because the belly of the Ganesha resembles a bengal gram (Kadalekalu).

Krishna Temple : The temple was built to celebrate the conquest of udayagiri (Orissa) by Krishnadevaraya. The Idol of krishna was brought from udayagiri but now is displayed in a museum in Chennai.

Badavi Lingam : A monolithic Shiv Linga believed to have been built by a poor Woman.

Lakshmi Narasimha Statue : The large monolithic statue of Narasimha, the fourth avatar of Vishnu, with large bulging eyes and seated on adishesha (sacred snake) is just majestic.

Lakshmi Narasimha

Underground temple : Also called prasanna virupaksha temple, it is dedicated to Shiva.

  
Zenana Enclosure - Lotus Mahal : 2 storeyed structure built in Indo Islamic style meant to serve as the palace of the queen. The top view of this structure resembles a lotus and hence the name. Elephants stable : A very strong structure consisting of 11 Dome shaped chambers to house the royal elephants. There is also a concealed staircase providing access to the roof in the central chamber.

Lotus Mahal

Elephant Stables

Queen's bath : Admire the designs on the ceiling as each one is different from the other.

Hazara Rama temple : Dedicated to vishnu in his avatar as lord Rama. This temple has carvings depicting the entire story of Ramayana!!!

Mahanavami Dibba : One of the ceremonial structures used by the royal family. It is a 3 tiered stone platform and each tier has sculptures carved on them. The cold breeze and the quiet atmosphere was very relaxing. A little further is a Pushkarini. There is a very long stone structure to carry water into the pushkarini.

Mahanavami Dibba

Stone Chariot

Also of interest is the cave, believed to be the home of sugriva.

Sugriva Cave

King's Balance is also located near the Vittala temple. It was at this place that the king was weighed and the equivalent amount of gold or grain was distributed among the people.

Kings Balance

About: Hampi and Jog, the two famous iconic things in karnataka state. It's been six years since I am in this state and I had not visited both, but always wanted to. In order to materialize that we set forth to Hampi last weekend. Myself,two of my roomies and another friend who was a last minute entry, got into the rajahamsa from Udupi to Hospet on saturday night. Reached at Hospet KSRTC bus stand around 7 in the morning, and from there itself we got the bus to Hampi. 

From that moment everything was different, There were red heads, blondes, blacks and mandarin people in the bus along with us Indians in that bus, giving a sense of a distant place. After a splendid view of boulders and some ruins,we reached Hampi bus stop in 20 minutes. Hampi Bazaar is adjacent to the bus stop. Going somewhere as a pack of guys has its own advantages, we can wander like lost souls without any planning. The minute there is a girl in the pack, we need to be more responsible and to some extend we require some planning. So we bunch of boys saw a comfort station at Hampi bazaar and got ready from there to explore Hampi- cheap and best! The eateries at Hampi bazaar are nothing fancy and all look like greasy spoons but, most of them serve delicious food. We gorged on some hot idlis and pooris. The uncle at the hotel lead us to a place where we could hire bikes/ cycles etc. We chose two kinetic honda plus 2 liter fuel for each, Totally it came up to Rs 540/- . We bought a map from a local book store and set forth to Hampi. Time was 8:30 AM IST. Weather was sunny and no dark clouds.

Hampi was a part of Kishkinda and the capital of the Vijayanagara empire. These empire was build by two brothers in-order to resist the Muslim invaders in India that time, and for that reason Vijayanagara is famous for its artileries and defence mechanisms. Hampi is filled with a number of temples, but these were not exactly places of worship as commonly misunderstood. All the structures were build at strategic points with speed and elegance. Most of the temples, various types of craftsmen like goldsmiths, weavers, architects used to work and stay, and the deity was installed as a part of the hindu culture. Exuberant architecture in Hampi range from monolithic ganeshas to ganeshas inscribed on small Ivory pieces. You can find a lot of influence of Ramayana on the inscribing on the temples and palaces. Interestingly other epics are not much protrusive in Hampi. 

Most of the people start their Hampi exploration from Virupaksha temple, But in the spirit of riding Kinetics after a very long time, we pushed Virupaksha to the end. We started from kadlekalu ganesha to queen\'s bath to Zanana enclosure to Vittala temple to the tungabhadra river to the monolithic bull and finally to Virupaksha temple. In between we came back to Hampi bazaar to have one of the most delicious lunch. Out of the 38 places shown in map we could cover only 21 places in our limited time of one day. But it was worth the trip. Hampi altogether has a different feel from other historic sites. People are very friendly, A huge crowd of foreign tourists etc to name a few. But most of all when you ride or walk through Hampi, you get the feeling of lost in some other world in some other century, and this exactly is the reason why Hampi is different. 

Throughout Hampi you can see a scarred empire,which was build with care but but could not stay up against the ferocity and fierceness of the wars. Standing on ruins one can actually imagine the feel of pride and the blood shed followed that. The buildings and stone structures which fell in defeat to the war are marvel to watch, as I told earlier the way you get lost in another world. The hotels at Hampi bazaar had another surprise to offer when we dropped in for tea in the evening. That was the time we had a proper look at the menu. Menu had items from Europe, Americas, middle east even from Vietnam. We gorged on one of the best pancakes, and few other special delicacies. 

Whatever is remaining in Hampi is well preserved. Lots of description about the history and importance of the places are placed all over as shown in the picture beside. But the heavy iron ore mining activities in the neighboring Bellary district posses a big threat to the feeble ruins. To enjoy Hampi you do not need to be a history buff, what you need is a love for traveling and some imagination. I have fallen in love with Hampi, it has many stories to tell and I will go there again to hear them all. We returned back Sunday night back to Udupi, all exhausted but content and glad and took back a lot of memories.....