The Kailasanatha temple stands on the western edge of the modern city of Kanchi (Kanchipuram) in Tamil Nadu, South India. A royal project, it is the largest and most important temple constructed during the era of the Pallavas (ca. third to ninth century). Its main structures were sponsored by King Narasimhavarman II (“Rajasimha,” ca. 700–725), while other components of the temple were built by members of the Pallava court before and after Rajasimha's reign. Richly carved with exuberant, sensuous figures of deities, animals, yogis, and celestial attendants, the Kailasanatha is a tour de force that elevates the courtly to the level of the divine.
Opening Kailasanatha is the product of Padma Kaimal's thirty-five-year love affair with this monument. It began with her interest in its royal portraiture and expanded into an in-depth analysis of the correspondences between its sculpture, architecture, and inscriptions as a “coordinated system of meaning” (p. xiii). Whereas some scholars have sought singular meanings, Kaimal argues that multiple themes and interpretations comfortably coexist within the space of the temple.
Unlike the dozens of other Pallava- and Chola-era temples in Kanchi, the Kailasanatha has received extensive scholarly attention. Kaimal uses epigraphic and archaeological reports, together with more recent secondary literature, to fortify her study of the temple's material form. She works to reimagine how the temple may have been experienced—“how the monument lived” (p. 15)—in the eighth century. Kaimal relies heavily on meticulous work by scholars Emmanuel Francis, Valérie Gillet, Charlotte Schmid, and Leslie Orr, even calling them coauthors (p. xii). She also uses this book as an opportunity to revise some of her own earlier conclusions, in particular the role of goddesses and queens in sacred imagery (p. 14). Kaimal aspires to address the temple in its entirety—from its architectural plan, to the inscriptions and sculptures, to the superstructure—seeing it as an evolving monument that is continually being transformed. Kaimal's unique contribution is that she reveals patterns that are more or less consistent across every carved surface and throughout the temple compound.
This book will be useful and gratifying for students of art history and scholars working on temple architecture, iconography, Shaivism, and premodern South Asia more broadly. The work celebrates the value of the long look—the benefits of repeated visits to a site at different times of day and in different seasons.
Chapter 1 presents an extended overview of the temple's built components. Kaimal relishes in descriptions of sculptured bodies. Temple architecture is energetic, it comes to life, not only through the people who used it, but through the form and fabric of its composition. The second chapter turns in greater depth to sculptures facing south and north. Kaimal argues that what may appear to be conflicting forms of divine energies are instead tightly woven pairs that charge the space between them. She categorizes these qualities in terms of mangalam and amangalam powers, loosely translated as auspiciousness (dwelling in the north, south-facing) and inauspiciousness (dwelling in the south, north-facing).
In chapter 3, Kaimal offers a compelling reading of the compound that analogizes the main structures to the families of Shiva and the king. Here, she argues that the repeated subjects of Shiva dancing and Gangadhara found in sculptures facing east and west are particularly associated with Pallava kingship.
Chapter 4 investigates the ways in which inscriptions and sculptures could lead devotees to circumambulate in clockwise (conventional) and counterclockwise (esoteric) directions. Delving deeper, chapter 5 explores the esoteric meanings of Rajasimha's vimana, particularly ideas, teachings, and practices associated with Shaiva Siddhanta in the eighth century. Here, Kaimal weaves together her arguments about directionality and kingship as she defines the relationship between sculptures and inscriptions in terms of metaphor and symmetry (p. 158). After the five main chapters, four appendices compile previously translated inscriptions and add Kaimal's own interpretations.
One of the strongest elements of the book is the architectural metaphor between the temple compound and the icon Somaskanda (Shiva and Uma with their baby Skanda between them). Most succinctly stated in chapter 5, “Mahendra's vimana interposes itself, Skanda-like, between architectural emblems of his progenitors, the vimana built by his father and the row of vimanas built by Pallava queens” (p. 175). However, the open mandapa between Rajasimha's vimana (Shiva) and that of his son Mahendra (Skanda) muddies the metaphor. I wonder whether the open mandapa—a structure that predates the rest of the temple—could represent the Pallava ancestors, perhaps specifically Mahendravarman I, whose granite pillars support its roof.
It is surprising that Kaimal limited the scope of this book to the stone-structured temple compound without engaging the integral role of the surrounding landscape. She chose not to actively consider that the Kailasanatha belonged to a much larger urban center. Even the nearby pond and gardens (as well as the stone Nandi mandapa) receive only brief mentions. How can we fully reimagine the life of this temple in the eighth century without speculating about the many temporary materials that would have been a constant presence inside its compound and around the property (textile canopies, bamboo scaffolds, wooden houses, etc.)? Ultimately, the book treats the Kailasanatha as a self-contained world without considering the influence of its surrounding environment. In other works, Kaimal has contributed to the growing body of scholarship that addresses larger temple landscapes.Footnote 1 She is adept at identifying networks and correspondences among features of natural and built environments—especially the role of water—and it would have been exciting to see a chapter in which she situates this temple with the same expansiveness.
