Place · Buddhist monastic complex · India
Lalitgiri
Lalitgiri on the hills of Cuttack district forms, with Ratnagiri and Udayagiri, the Diamond Triangle of Odisha Buddhism — three Mahayana and Vajrayana monastic universities excavated between the 1st century BCE and the 13th century CE. The 1985 excavations here recovered a steatite reliquary with the first archaeologically authenticated corporeal relics of the Buddha found anywhere in Odisha, deposited inside a large stupa overlooking the Birupa river. A chaitya with four colossal standing Buddhas, a monastery with 48 cells and a horseshoe-shaped shrine make it the oldest of the three sites and the clearest surviving ground plan of a Mahayana monastic university in eastern India.
- Function
- Religious institution & practice
- Patron dynasty
- religious
- Confidence
- Established / referenced
- Location
- 20.598, 86.240
Connections (2)
- Site adjacencyRatnagiri (Odisha)
Lalitgiri, Ratnagiri and Udayagiri are the three monastic hills of the Diamond Triangle in Cuttack and Jajpur districts, within fifteen kilometres of each other on the Birupa and Kelua rivers. The three operated as a single Mahayana and Vajrayana university complex between the fifth and the thirteenth century. Lalitgiri is the oldest of the three, with 1st-century BCE foundations; Ratnagiri is the largest. The 1985 recovery of corporeal Buddha relics at Lalitgiri confirmed that all three sites were living pilgrim centres as late as the Pala period.
- Site adjacencyUdayagiri (Odisha)
Lalitgiri and Udayagiri (Odisha) are two of the three Diamond Triangle monastic complexes of Odisha Buddhism, with Ratnagiri. Udayagiri is the largest of the three in excavated area; Lalitgiri is the oldest and the site of the stupa with authenticated Buddha corporeal relics. The three were operated as a single teaching network under the Bhaumakara and later Somavamsha patronage. Their decline in the 13th century coincides with the Jagannath cult's rise at Puri, which absorbed Buddhist iconography into the triad of Jagannath, Balabhadra and Subhadra.
Sources
Standard reference.
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