Bhubaneshwar is often called the city of temples . It is impossible to know exactly how many temples there are, but it has been estimated that there might be over 700 temples in the city. This number, while impressive, is just a fraction of the original number, which, sometime in the 13 th century, would have been about 7000. Wikipedia has a page dedicated to the Hindu temples of Bhubaneshwar , where 93 temples are listed. All these are ancient temples, built between the 7 th and 13 th centuries CE. Bhubaneshwar was once known as Ekamra Kshetra , the sacred mango grove. We know this name from an inscription at the Ananta Vasudeva temple, which mentions the name of the place, and the main temple (that we now know as the Lingaraja temple) in the mango grove. Ananta Vasudeva Temple, with a sculpture of Trivikrama in the niche It is extremely interesting to note that the Ananta Vasudeva temple is the only temple to Lord Vishnu in this city. Varaha, Ananta Vasudeva Temple Located v...
A bull which drove away invaders , three buffaloes said to be demons, a lake once said to have been filled with ghee and a temple once covered in lime to protect it – we couldn’t help but smile as we listened to these stories about Achalgarh. We had a day free at Mount Abu and were in the mood to explore, so we headed out for the tourist circuit, trusting our driver to take us to some interesting places. Achalgarh turned out to be the first on his list, and as we headed along roads with farms interspersed between the mountains, with scarcely a person to be seen anywhere, I wondered about the place we were going to. I had heard a bit about Achalgarh before we started, and knew that it had once been the capital of the area. The name indicated the presence of a fort, but our driver told me that there was no fort there. “ Bas, mandir hai, Madam ” he said. ”There is only a temple there.” I felt my enthusiasm droop at the idea of visiting yet another temple, but we had al...