Place · Shaiva temple complex · India
Naranag
The 8-10th century Kashmir Shaiva temple complex at Naranag in Ganderbal district, Jammu and Kashmir, at 2,200m in the Himalayan foothills on the trek route to Gangabal Lake — the surviving Karkota and Utpala dynasty Shiva temple complex. The complex preserves eight Shiva temples (now partly ruined but with intact plinths and partial superstructures), built between the 8th and 9th centuries under Lalitaditya Muktapida (724-760) and the Utpala king Avantivarman (855-883). The temples are built in distinctive Kashmir-valley stone architecture — massive dressed limestone with trefoil arches, pyramidal roofs and Hellenistic-Buddhist iconographic influence. Naranag is a transit camping ground for the Gangabal Lake pilgrimage and the Shiva-Sati Himalayan trekking circuit. ASI protection since 1911.
- Function
- Sacred site & pilgrimage
- Tradition
- Kashmir and Himalayan architectural history
- Confidence
- Established / referenced
- Location
- 34.250, 75.300
Connections (1)
- Architectural modelPandrethan
Pandrethan and Naranag are the small and the remote ends of the same architecture: a single cella with a pyramidal roof standing in water, and a group of massive block-built temples in a high side valley. Between them they preserve the Kashmiri plan better than Martand does, because neither was important enough to be systematically quarried.
On these journeys
Sources
Wikipedia, “Naranag”. Archaeological Survey of India and State Archaeology monument records, and the standard regional literature.
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