Place · sand-buried temple town · India
Talakadu
The historic town on the Kaveri in Mysuru district, Karnataka, 45 kilometres from Mysuru, with 30 temples (10 Shaiva, 5 Vaishnava, 15 Jain) spanning the Ganga dynasty (4-11th c.) and Chola conquest periods, now mostly buried under sand dunes. The Vaidyanatheshwara temple, the Kirtinarayana temple and the Chennakeshava temple of Belur-style have been partly excavated by the ASI since the 1990s. The sand dunes that cover the ancient city, formed by the Kaveri's course shift in the 15th century, are attributed in local lore to the curse of the Chola princess Alamelamma after her 1612 suicide — she had cursed the Wodeyars that Talakad would become sand (talakadu kadu agali), Malangi a whirlpool, and the Mysore royal line extinct in the female line, all three predictions widely cited as fulfilled.
- Function
- Religious institution & practice
- Confidence
- Established / referenced
- Location
- 12.180, 77.030
Connections (1)
- AnalogueSrirangapatna / Srirangapattana
Talakadu and Srirangapatna are forty kilometres apart on the same river and both are attached to the same Wodeyar curse story, said to have been pronounced by Alamelamma after the Wodeyars took Srirangapatna in 1610. One is buried under sand the Kaveri laid over it and the other was reduced by an assault in 1799; the legend is the region's own way of narrating both.
On these journeys
Sources
Wikipedia, “Talakadu”. Archaeological Survey of India and State Archaeology monument records, and the standard regional literature.
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