TEMPLES IN MORENA
Kakanmath Temple in Morena
Kakanmaṭh is a ruined 11th century Shiva temple located at Sihoniya in Madhya Pradesh, India. It was built by the Kachchhapaghata ruler Kirttiraja. Only a part of the original temple complex now survives. Some of the sculptures from the site are now located at Morena.
'Beejamandal' at Khajuraho is near the Chaturbhuj temple. It was opened to visitors in 1999.
History
The Kakanmath temple was commissioned by Kachchhapaghata ruler Kirttiraja (r. c. 1015-1035 CE).This can be inferred from a Kachchhapaghata inscription found at the Sas-Bahu Temple. The inscription states that Kirttiraja built an extraordinary temple devoted to Parvati's lord (Shiva) at Siṁhapānīya (modern Sihoniya).
According to a folk legend, the temple was named "Kakanmadh" after Kakanavati or Kakanade, who was the queen of one Surajpala. The historicity of this legend is doubtful. One possibility is that the name of the temple derives from the kanak (gold) and maṭha (shrine).
Bateshware Temples in Morena
Bateshwar Hindu temples (or Batesara, Bateśvar) are a group of nearly 200 sandstone Hindu temples and their ruins in north Madhya Pradesh in post-Gupta, early Pratihara style of North Indian temple architecture.They are dedicated to Shiva, Vishnu and Shakti - representing the three major traditions within Hinduism. The site is within the Chambal River valley ravines, on the north-western slope of a hill near Padavali known for its major medieval era Vishnu temple. The Bateshwar temples were built between the 8th and the 10th-century.The site is likely named after the Bhuteshvar Temple, the largest Shiva temple at the site. It is also referred to as Batesvar temples site or Batesara temples site.
The temples as they now appear are in many cases reconstructed from the fallen stones in a project begun by the Archaeological Survey of India in 2005.
History
According to Madhya Pradesh Directorate of Archaeology, this group of 200 temples were built during the reign of Gurjara-Pratihara Dynasty.According to Michael Meister, an art historian and a professor specializing in Indian temple architecture, the earliest temples in the Bateshwar group near Gwalior are likely from the 750-800 CE period.
The temples were destroyed after the 13th century; it is not clear if this was by an earthquake, or Muslim forces.The site was visited and its ruins reported by Alexander Cunningham in 1882 as a "collection of more than 100 temples large and small to the southeast of Paravali [Padavali]]", the latter with a "very fine old temple".Bateshwar was notified by Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) as a protected site in 1920. Limited recovery, standardized temple numbering, ruins isolation with photography, and site conservation effort was initiated during the colonial British era. Several scholars studied the site and included them in their reports. For example, the French archeologist Odette Viennot published a paper in 1968 that included a discussion and photographs of the numbered Batesvar temples.
