Place · Bhanja capital & temple site · India
Khiching
Also known as Khiching, Kichakeshwari, Khijjinga Kotta, Bhanja
The Bhanja dynasty's capital in Mayurbhanj, where the Kichakeshwari temple stands built entirely of dressed chlorite blocks laid without mortar — dismantled and rebuilt stone by stone in the 1920s from its own collapsed material. It is the best surviving monument of northern Odisha's own architectural line.
- Function
- Sacred site & pilgrimage
- Confidence
- Established / referenced
- Location
- 22.030, 86.180
Worth knowing
The site's sculpture, now partly in a small museum beside the temple, includes some of the finest Odishan work outside Bhubaneswar, and the goddess is claimed in local tradition as the family deity the Mayurbhanj rajas took with them when they moved their seat to Baripada. Khiching then simply stopped.
Connections (1)
- AnalogueKonark Sun Temple
Khiching in Mayurbhanj and Konark on the coast are the northern and the classical ends of Odishan temple building. Khiching is dry chlorite masonry laid without mortar and was dismantled and rebuilt from its own fallen stones in the 1920s; Konark is Ganga-dynasty sandstone whose main tower fell and was never rebuilt. Restoration and collapse, in the same regional tradition.
On these journeys
Sources
Wikipedia, “Khiching”. Archaeological Survey of India, Bhubaneswar circle records; K.C. Panigrahi, Archaeological Remains at Bhubaneswar, on the Odishan temple sequence.
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