Mediaeval Temples of the Dakhan c9.s1.2

c9.s1.2

This great temple of Goṇdeśvara, outside the town of Sinnar on the north-east, is the largest and most complete of its class in the Dakhan. It is a pañchāyatana temple, that is, a group of five shrines dedicated to five deities—Śiva, Viṣṇu, Gaṇapati, Sūrya and Devī, the central main temple being dedicated to the first and the four small surrounding shrines to the others. Before the main entrance stands the Nandi pavilion. The buildings stand upon a long rectangular platform, the main temple in the centre and the four smaller around it, one at each corner. The whole group has been surrounded by a wall, now mostly destroyed, with two entrance porches or gateways—one on the south and one on the east—enclosing a large and ample courtyard. The great temple faces east, and the shrine contains the usual Śaivite liṅga. It is built of the ordinary amygdaloidal trap rock of the locality, and this has not weathered well in respect of the smaller carvings, the softer particles having disintegrated, leaving the surfaces of the exposed portions rather honeycombed.