Following river routes and artistic transmissions in medieval central India

Abstract

This essay examines the ways in which travel routes facilitated the transmission of architectural knowledge across central India, not only in major urban centers but also in remote rural places. It focuses on Kadwa¯ha¯, a village in Madhya Pradesh, which emerged as a major temple town during the ninth, tenth, and eleventh centuries. As a group, Kadwa¯ha¯'s temples reveal a heterogeneity of architectural and sculptural forms that speaks to its status as a key stopping point on the road between Narwar and Chanderi¯. This essay highlights three ways in which artistic ideas may have been transmitted across vast geographic distances. First, it examines categories of mode and style, traceable through plans and elevations, which likely point to decisions made by architects and patrons. Second, it shows how sculptors experimented with and transformed ornamental and iconographic features brought from other regions. Third, it turns to religious iconography as a way of mapping the movement of religious practitioners.