Itagi
| Author:Laxman Burdak, IFS (R) |
Itagi (इटागी) is a village in the southern state of Karnataka, India. It is located in the Khanapur taluk of Belgaum district in Karnataka.
Variants
Origin
History
Itagi is the site of Narayan Swami temple. This temple was built in the 12th century and houses a beautiful and tall Narayan Swami statue. Itagi is related to the history of Channamma kittur. In history of kittur it is one of the main business centre of locals and British. Britishers held one treasury office also, Rayanna and his followers took that.
Itagi has a popular lake; Itagi Lake is of 56 acres in area. And Itagi has the oldest Demmavva or Gramdevi temple and shri Kalameshwar temples. One beautiful Paraswanath Jain temple was constructed recently. It has two masjids.
Note: The following content is from the book - History And Legend In Hyderabad, Department of Information and Public Relations, 1953,pp.112-114
Ittagi: Ittagi is a small village in Raichur district some three miles to the south of Bennikoppa railway station between Koppal and Gadag. The Mahadeva temple situated
[p. 114]: in this village is one of the finest Chalukyan temples and fully justifies the title ‘emperor among temples’ (devalaya chakravarti) given to it by the founder.
The plan of the temple comprises a shrine with an ante-chamber, a closed hall with porches on either side of it towards the north and south, and a pillared hall which is open at the sides. The temple faces east, and the great open hall at this end was originally supported upon sixty-eight pillars.
The slabs of the ceiling of the middle apartment of the hall have been carved into a rich arrangement of hanging arabesque foliage and makaras which spring from the jaws of a kintimukha mask. The convolutions of the design with their circling excrescences and bwildering whorls form a most luxuriant pattern.
Beautiful wreaths of filigree are repeated as ornament in the recessed panels of the walls below and in two places, one on either side of the shrine, serve as window-frames, the spaces between the rolls forming the lights. The three principal niches on the shrine walls, boldly accentuated by their deep projecting cornices, are now empty, their images having disappeared.
The beautiful inscription in flowing Kannada verse set up in a hall adjacent to the temple states that this temple was built in A.D. 1112 by Mahadeva, a general (Dandanayaka) of the Western Chalukya king, Tribhuvanamalla Vikramaditya VI of Kalyani.
This temple is almost unrivalled in this part of the country both in the magnificence of its architectural style and its luxuriant decorative detail.
इट्टागी
विजयेन्द्र कुमार माथुर[1] ने लेख किया है ...इट्टागी (AS, p.79) कर्नाटक राज्य के रायचूर ज़िले में बेनी-कोप्पा से चार मील दक्षिण में स्थित ग्राम है जिसमें एक चालुक्य कालीन मन्दिर है, जिसे कल्याणी नरेश त्रिभुवनमल्ल विक्रमादित्य षष्ठ (1076-1126 ई.) के सेनापति महादेव ने 1112 ई. में बनवाया था। यह सूचना एक कन्नड़ शिलालेख से मिलती है, जो मन्दिर के समीप एक प्रकोष्ठ पर उत्कीर्ण है।
मन्दिर को इसके निर्माता ने देवालय-चक्रवर्ती नाम दिया था, जो वास्तुकला, मूर्तिकला तथा तक्षण कला की दृष्टि से एक सार्थक अभिधान जान पड़ता है। मंदिर के अंगों को संतुलित और सुडौल अनुपात और अलंकरणों की व्यवस्थित संरचना को देखते हुए यह मन्दिर अपने ढंग का सर्वोत्तम वास्तु नमूना कहा जा सकता है। इससें पूर्व-पश्चिम की ओर गर्भगृह, गलियारा, मण्डप के अतिरिक्त सामने की ओर चौसठ स्तम्भों का मण्डप है। यह स्तम्भ-मण्डप अपने आप में भव्य कल्पना है। बीच में चार स्तम्भों पर टिकी छत के प्रत्येक कोने में त्रिभुजाकार कोने हैं। जिनमें जाली का अत्यन्त महीन काम है।
स्तम्भों और द्धार शाखाओं के अलंकरणों के सामने सोने-चाँदी की नक़्क़ाशी फीकी लगती है। मण्डप और विमान के बाहय भाग में अन्य मन्दिरों की तरह ही प्रचुर मात्रा में अलंकरण हुआ है। इसी प्रकार शिखर भी अलंकृत हैं। यह मंदिर होयसल मन्दिरों के अत्यधिक निकट है। वर्तमान में भी यह मन्दिर सुरक्षित अवस्था में है।