The Chalukyan Architecture of the Kanarese Districts c25.s1.10

c25.s1.10

The record further tells us that the same person, the Daṇḍanāyaka Mahādēva, founded a temple of the god Viṣṇu as Nārāyaṇa, in memory of his father Nārāyaṇa.¹ Although the temple, in which this inscription slab is placed, looks like later work than the great temple, it is possible that it is the temple of Nārāyaṇa referred to. Being constructed in the harder and less easily-worked granite, it is severely plain and devoid of sculpture, and this, in itself, tends to give it a later appearance. It faces the north, the usual direction for Vaiṣṇava shrines. The central shrine cell at the back may have contained the image of Nārāyaṇa, while the ten others possibly held those of the ten avatāras. It occupies very much the same position with regard to the main temple as the Vaishṇava shrine of Narasimha does to the temple of Siddhēśvara at Haveri.