Lakshminarasimha Temple, Javagal

Lakshminarasimha Temple
Hindu temple
Lakshminarasimha temple (1250 A.D.) at Javagal in Hassan district
Country	India
State	Karnataka
District	Hassan District
Languages
• Official	Kannada
Time zone	IST (UTC+5:30)

The Lakshminarasimha temple at Javagal (also called Javagallu) is an example of mid-13th century Hoysala architecture. Javagal is located about 50 km from Hassan city and about 20 km from Halebidu in Karnataka state, India. Halebidu is historically important as the erstwhile capital of the Hoysala empire. The temple, whose main deity is Narasimha (a form of the Hindu god Vishnu), was built in 1250 A.D. by the Hoysala Empire King Vira Someshwara. This temple is a protected monument under the Karnataka state division of the Archaeological Survey of India.

The temple plan is simple and commonly found in other Hoysala temples. It is a trikuta (three shrined), though only the middle shrine has a superstructure (tower or shikhara) and a sukhanasi (nose or tower over the vestibule) The three equal size shrines are all square in plan and are connected by a common closed hall (mantapa). The closed hall is preceded by an open porch. The lateral shrines are connected directly to the hall while the middle shrine has a vestibule that connects the sanctum (cella) to the hall. Since the lateral shrines have no tower over them and are directly connected to the hall without a vestibule and its corresponding tower like projection, they do not appear like shrines at all from the outside. Rather, they appear absorbed into the walls of hall. The central shrine on the contrary is highly visible from the outside because of its tower, and the sukhanasi that projects prominently from the tower. The lower part of the shrines (below the roof) have five projections per side, these projections being visible on three sides in the case of the central shrine but only on one side in the case of the lateral shrines.