"But is it Architecture???"

View from one of the rock-cut chamber tombs at Eyyal near Thrissur

For the last 3 years that I have been investigating megalithic monuments for any clues to the possible astronomical knowledge of their builders, a lot of "learned architectural academicians" have been smirking and commenting - "But that is not architecture..."

In fact, one worthy who claims that he was the "only doctorate in architecture for several square kilometers around Manipal" even went so far as to state that megaliths do not constitute architecture - "they are only ugly stone remains..."

So, dear readers, what exactly is architecture..? Looking back at the hoary origins of this noble profession, when can one say that "Architecture starts NOW"? Most textbooks on the history of architecture cursorily deal with "prehistoric architecture" in a paragraph or two and then go on to early examples of more glamorous buildings like temples and palaces. By now, having tramped over many a hill and vale, and having seen examples of many structures that archaeologists tell us were erected in the Iron Age (but which I have reason to believe were erected much earlier - more on that later), I think I have earned the right to say a few things I believe about early architecture. And that shall be the content of this post...

A kudakkal at Kudakkal Parambu, Thrissur

A few dolmens of the Central Group at Hire Benkal, Karnataka

Look at the above pictures - the top one is a kudakkal (lit. umbrella stone) at Thrissur in Kerala, the lower picture shows some of the dolmens at Hire Benkal, north of Hampi in Karnataka. Both are associated with burials - the kudakkals are sepulchral, i.e., they are erected over the remains of deceased persons, while the dolmens are probably memorial in function. The kudakkals consist of 4 clinostats (inclined stones) forming the lower portion with an almost hemispherical capstone forming the top portion. Being made of a soft stone - laterite, that is predominant in the region, the builders could sculpt the stone finely into these curved shapes. The dolmens are made of the much harder granite and consist of 4 orthostats (vertical stones) arranged in a sort of swastika pattern to prevent inward collapse, surmounted by a capstone. There is also a circular or semicircular "port-hole" in many of the dolmens to make the chamber "face" any one direction.

Now, what is remarkable about such structures? Is it architecture???

The human race seems to be unique in the way it responds to death - how the mortal remains of the dead are disposed, how they are remembered and, sometimes, venerated. Burial of the dead arose probably early in the history of primates - marked burials are known even among the Neanderthals. In the prehistory of peninsular India, the dead were buried within the premises where they lived, often in the floor of their dwellings, in the Stone Age and the Bronze Age. It is only in the Iron Age that we find a separate area for the dead - a separate "graveyard" emerging. And megaliths... The prominent surface markers of stone that caught the attention and imagination of the early workers in this field.

We do not know exactly what these monuments meant to the people who built them. And we probably never will... But notice the way the kudakkal and the dolmen have been conceived. How the laterite pieces were crafted into the curvilinear shapes of the clinostats, how the heavy capstone was fashioned and detailed (with a circular notch on the lower flat face for the top ends of the 4 clinostats to fit in). Or how well the thin stone slabs of the dolmen were made. And imagine how these were wrestled into place, especially the heavy capstone. Even if we cannot guess today what exactly did these structures mean to the people of the Iron Age, we can safely conclude that it must have been of sufficiently great importance for them to undertake such awesome engineering feats and invest so much time and labour in.

And isn't that what architecture is? Man, not just building for shelter, not just building for functional needs, but going far beyond that... Trying to find a form to express a belief system he has developed. And going to great lengths to do that...

Rock art at Onake Kindi near Chikka Rampur (I am thankful to Dr. U. S. Moorti of AIIS Gurgaon and Dr. Sundara, Shringeri, for calling my attention to this rock art site and painting and to the work of Erwin Neumayer on this)

Near Hire Benkal is a small village called Chikka Rampur close to which is a small amphitheater of rock shelters where one finds several rock art sites, presumably belonging to the same cultural phase as the megalith builders. Most of the rock art depict everyday scenes - cattle, dancing figures etc. But on a small overhang in one of the shelters is a symbolic painting showing what can only be a burial - showing a body, burial goods etc. But there are also other depictions of what may be Sun and Moon symbols (at the periphery), a river (?) and bridge (?) across it, stones of the boulder circle surrounding the burial etc. Since the only "texts" that we have for these prehistoric monuments are these rock art examples and the monuments themselves with all associated material goods, this is one of the media through which prehistoric man is "talking" to us.

Thus it is evident that the megalith builders had a philosophy that they were trying to express through the forms and orientation of their structures. Now isn't that architecture???

And all that this study attempts is to understand how/when different practices such as orienting structures to the direction of the rising (or setting) sun emerged, were any of the structures set up to function as a time-keeping device of any sort, what were the knowledge systems that existed during the period when the megaliths were built as evident from the structures themselves..?

Most of these megalithic sites are set in remote locations and trekking through the dramatic natural landscapes that they are embedded in and viewing the remarkable natural rock formations and the interplay of sunlight and shadow with these, it is not difficult to imagine how the architects of the megaliths could have drawn inspiration from them. I shall just stick to showing a few images of the natural landscapes and the structures built by prehistoric man for you to ruminate on.

A natural jumble of rocks that resembles a stacked pile near Hire Benkal

A natural "dolmen" on the way to Sidilephadi near Badami

Interplay of sunlight and rock forms near Sidilephadi

The environs of Sidilephadi - an ancient Stone Age rock shelter near Badami

Light filters in through the openings atop the rock shelter at Sidilephadi - believed to have been formed by lightning

A rock shelter chamber - one of the earliest megalithic typologies

A view from inside one of the dolmens at Hire Benkal

It is really strange to what lengths people would go to defend their hidebound outdated views, even in the face of obvious logic. Once, in a public discussion, the above-mentioned worthy was trying to prove that megaliths "are not architecture". Red in the face, he hissed that megaliths were mostly burials and burials could not be called architecture. When I gently reminded him that the Egyptian pyramids are burials too, he spat out, "So what? Pyramids are not architecture..." Someone in the audience found it prudent to add, "The Taj Mahal is also technically a burial." "So what???" thundered the worthy, "The Taj Mahal is also not architecture."

What do they know of architecture, who only architecture know??? (With apologies to Rudyard Kipling!)

Two menhirs framing the setting sun on winter solstice at the megalithic site at Nilaskal

The Manipal I've come to love...

Bali Kunja raises its head proudly over the valley wreathed in mist

It's not the worst of times, but it's not the best of times either... (With apologies to Charles Dickens!)

Just that the past few days I've been seriously harboring thoughts of leaving Manipal. I don't want this blog to be in serious danger of abounding in cribbing posts, so I'll spare you the petty details. I have many a grouse against this place, but when I think of leaving, the proverbial lump rises in the throat... I don't think I'll miss MIT much, may not even miss teaching should I decide to bid goodbye to teaching forever. But I will miss the Manipal I have come to know and love in these years I have spent here. A few shots of these reasons for the lump in my throat follow (not in any particular order).

Beautiful Swarna...

Sunrise over the hills

My weather station...

I'll miss the cricket a lot...

Amme Mookambike! Kollur has been a very good retreat away from Manipal

I've never tired of trekking to Kodachadri

Malpe and St. Mary's island

A storm brews off Kaup

Hanging bridge near Kallianpur

The magic of Koodlu...

A dash of local culture: the recent kambala at Manipal

Matanga Lila - an interlude at Ernakulam!

It's utsavam time at the Ernakulam Siva Kshetram

The 5 days I spent at Ernakulam recently were among some of the heavyweights (literally!) of the pachyderm scene in Kerala. The occasion was the annual festival of the Ernakulam Siva Temple - which had been an integral and exciting part of my childhood, and which I had not attended for the last 10 years. I have been increasingly realizing that all the efforts I have been putting into teaching here at Manipal for more than a decade is nothing but a jalarekha - a line drawn on water. Indifferent students and an indifferent system are not exactly chicken soup (or even kaadi vellam!) for a teacher's soul...

Cheriya Chandrasekharan takes a quick shower

Cherplasserri Sekharan, however, gets a thorough going over..!

It is indeed high time that I took my mind off unrewarding activities and concentrate on all those that give me joy! So there I was, all worries about design reviews and recalcitrant students thrown to the winds (of change!), taking in the sights, sounds and smells of the fairground at the Ernakulam Siva Temple. Spending hours beside each of the elephants tied up at the Ernakulathappan grounds, re-living those early childhood aspirations of one day becoming a mahout; watching the elephants have their daily bath; then the decking up with Nettipattam and the rest of the works; and of course, the kazhcha shiveli every day culminating in the grand ezhunnellippu of 11 elephants on the day of the pakalpooram. This time the pakalpooram featured elephantine stars like Tiruvambady Sivasundar, Guruvayoor Valiya Kesavan, Tiruvambady Cheriya Chandrasekharan, apart from the other elephants that were on duty throughout the festival - Cherplasserri Sekharan, Puthuppally Kesavan, Devaswom Gireesan, Madhurappuram Kannan, Shenoy Chandrasekharan, Tirumala Devaswom Gajendran, Ganesan and Babu.

Gireesan daydreaming at the Ernakulathappan grounds

Shenoy Chandrasekharan (in foreground) and Sekharan get decked up

The caparisoned elephants go in through the western gate of the temple

Devaswom Gireesan and Cherplasserri Sekharan with their mahouts Venu Chettan and Unni Chettan

The elephants await the arrival of the "big three"

The colourful umbrellas for the kudamaattom

The aalavattomThe big three arrive: Tiruvambady Sivasundar maneuvers into position

The big three! (Valiya Kesavan, Sivasundar and Cheriya Chandrasekharan)

The lamp that is lit in front of the elephants during ezhunnellippu

Pantham...

Let's heed their plight too...

I was sorry as hell when it all came to an end and I had to head back...

After the festival: the fairground on the morning after the pakalpooram

An oasis of calm... in this world of storm...

Oasis of Calm: Relaxing by the Ganges at Gangotri

Another semester has begun and already feeling a bit low... I mean the mundane rituals of class committee meetings and course plans and the rest; maybe ten years of teaching is a bit too much."We all need oases of calm in a world of storm," said Paul Brunton in his classic book A hermit in the Himalayas. I find my oasis of calm in the memories and photographs of last two summers among the Himalayan giants. Especially, last year at Tapovan - the quiet and peace of that lovely meadow above the Gangotri Glacier, with herds of bharal that graze close by and mighty Mount Shivling looming benevolently above us all the time.

First Glimpse of Mount Shivling from Gaumukh

A bharal silhouetted against the skyline at Tapovan

I remember the trek to the Advance Base Camp of Shivling with Shivraj - the walk on the ridge of the lateral moraine separating Tapovan from the Meru Glacier, the patch of crystalline snow that was our furthest point from camp, Point Shiv-Kumar - my very own (!) little summit on Baby Shivling (the rocky summit near Mt. Shivling). I remember the effects of altitude too - the nausea, the exhaustion, how I refused to attempt another minor summit that needed 45 minutes more of climbing in spite of Shivraj's urging...

Mount Shivling with Point Shiv-Kumar in the foreground (centre of pic)

Shivraj on the ridge between Tapovan and the Meru Glacier

Meru Glacier with Mount Meru as the backdrop

Sudhakara feels that we should return to Tapovan this coming summer and attempt to summit Baby Shivling. Perfectly fine, I guess... At least for the moment. We have been going over maps of the region and every week it's been a different plan - Rudragaira; Satopanth; Kedar Tal; across Kalindi Khal from Tapovan and Nandanvan to Badrinath...

Mount Shivling and Baby Shivling - future destination..?

One thing is for sure - as far as possible, we want to do one more Himalayan trek this coming summer... And whichever trek we might end up going on, it doesn't really matter.

In a thousand ages of the gods I could not tell thee of the glories of Himachal...


What a minuscule portion of these glories can we hope to cover in a few years???

In a thousand ages of the Gods, I could not tell thee...

My friend S. A. Hussain

S. A. Hussain (1944 - 2009)

I came to know of my friend S. A. Hussain's demise while on a field trip yesterday. It took a while for the news to sink in. As I was travelling down to Tirthahalli from Hosanagara, it began to hit me. I would never hear his jolly voice over the phone again, never hear that hearty laugh again... In the last 10-odd years that I have been in Manipal, he has been a friend, mentor and guide, ever available for advice and I can't remember a single occasion where he failed to cheer me up when I was down.

I met him for the first time at the Mangalore railway station, where both of us had come to greet a common friend - J-P Puyravaud, who was arriving from Pondicherry to deliver a lecture at my institute. I don't know how we became friends, but in no time we were calling each other regularly and meeting up whenever Hussain Sa'ab was passing by Manipal. I worked out the design for eco-tourism facilities for Harike Lake in Punjab for him, though finally the project did not see light of day. Later we collaborated on the project to rejuvenate Anekere Lake at Karkal.

Through it all, I developed tremendous respect for a man who lived life on his own terms, had great love and affection for friends and humanity in general and could teach you a lot without seeming preachy. I still remember an incident when we were inspecting a farm-house in Jarkal as a model for our Harike project. The owner, whom Hussain Sa'ab knew, was away and we were moving around in the property when two of the guard dogs rushed us, snarling ferociously. While I was terrified, Hussain told me in a low, confident voice not to run, but to stand my ground and not look them directly in the eye. Sure enough, the dogs stopped just short of us, growling. Slowly, they sniffed us over, then decided that we were ok! They didn't trouble us after that, but my heartbeat rate was a lot faster than prescribed!

On another occasion, he demonstrated his sharp understanding of bird behaviour - by slapping his thighs to imitate the display of dominance among cocks by flapping their wings. The cock in question immediately perked up and started flapping its wings and crowing, trying to intimidate its unseen rival. I remember that he could also do a good imitation of the call of a langur.

I last met him about a month ago, when he dropped by with his nephew. I had been waxing eloquent about a new fish joint at Manipal and he wanted to test it out. We had a nice lunch together, with prawns and anjal fry and we parted happy. There were plans afoot that Hussain Sa'ab, Shiva and I would go to Sikkim in February, where he would stay at the forest rest houses we were to camp in, while Shiva and I would go trekking.

Once when I was particularly depressed with the happenings at work, I had told him that I was considering quitting. "Don't you go off without telling me," he'd admonished me. And now he has gone off without telling me... There is a recollection I have about a conversation we had long ago about migratory birds during one of his visits. I remember him saying that he once spent some time with some American who was studying bird migration. He said that, unlike most of our perceptions, most bird migrations don't happen in large groups. The American had found that a large number of migratory birds travel singly and at night, from his studies using radar. Intriguingly, he found large numbers of birds that travel in the reverse direction too. This piece of information, though it didn't strike me as remarkable then, started fascinating me later. I always meant to follow it up with him sometime, maybe work it into a story that I was planning... Somehow, that didn't happen, there was too much for us to discuss whenever we met. And now, sadly, it will never happen.

Goodbye Sir, dear Hussain Sa'ab... I will miss you badly. May your soul rest in peace. I am sure that whichever heaven you find yourself in, there will be plenty of your feathered friends to keep you busy!

Baise, Araga Gate and a dog named Gunda!

A motley crew at Baise!

I'm back from another field trip. The ending of the field trip, otherwise fulfilling, was on a tragic note - I came to know that S. A. Hussain - my close friend and mentor, had passed away in the early hours of December 31, 2009. I will post a separate entry on Hussain Sa'ab after this.

This trip was to photograph the winter solstice sunset at Baise - after last winter's spectacular pictures at Nilaskal, I wanted to repeat the feat at Baise. These sites contain 'menhirs' - free standing single stones, that were thus far assumed to be erected in no particular pattern. Early on, I had a hunch that they were arranged in a particular pattern and after a survey of the site at Baise (there are fewer stones there and so, easier to survey!) and the photograph of winter solstice sunset at Nilaskal, I wanted to furnish photographic proof of the alignments I had predicted at Baise.

I went with some goodies for my team of young surveyors at Baise - Santosh, Nagesh, Subrahmanya and Sudhakara - the kids who had helped me last year as well as provided a wonderful environment with their constant enthusiastic chatter. They were thrilled to see me and I was pleasantly surprised to see that even Gunda - their ferocious dog, gave me a warm welcome. In fact, when I sat down to take off my shoes, Gunda ran up to me and licked my face! The kids also took me to Bhootada Gadde - one of their 'secret places' near a stream and a waterfall. It was lovely - the place, the camaraderie and the company of the little ones.

Gunda is made to pose for a pic!

My young friends at the stream

The sad part was that the sunset was clouded out - the best I could get was a shot of the sun several degrees above the horizon near the alignment that I was planning to shoot - between the largest menhir under a tree that the locals worship as bhootaraya and the prominent stone no. 1 in my survey. I spent some time teaching the little ones to take readings on my prismatic compass.

The sun sets behind Bhootaraya

Little Nagesha tries his hand at surveying!

I spent the night at a lodge at Hosanagara and woke up at 4am to catch sunrise at Nilaskal. More disppointment was in store for me - it was misty and cloudy and there was no hint of the sun's presence anywhere in the sky even by 9am. I consoled myself by taking a few bearings of some of the alleged sight-lines and then headed back.

Sharpie - one of the menhirs of Nilaskal against the cloudy sky

On the way back, I remembered that on one of the crazy wanderings with Kailash, we had met an old man (Dharmanna of Hosuru, near Agumbe) who talked about what could only be menhirs at a place called Araga Gate. Since my route was through Araga, I decided to enquire around - but nobody there knew anything about "old stones". By that time I had got word about S. A. Hussain's passing away and I was feeling very upset. So when I saw a promising stone in a plantation off the highway, I didn't stop the car. But when I spied a flash of black granite deeper in the plantation, I got excited. Afer all, Hussain Sa'ab would've wanted me to finsih whatever I'd started. Upon inspection, there were 8 stones inside the plantation in a similar pattern to Baise and Nilaskal.

The largest menhir of the site at Araga Gate

One of the menhirs of the Araga Gate site, showing clear N_S orientation

This region is richer in prehistoric remains than anyone had ever suspected. There is plenty more to seek, plenty more to explore. Already, plans for the next trip are taking shape - Dharmanna had talked about what could only be prehistoric rock art at Hosuru...