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In Nepali language 'Shanti' means peace that why this pagoda style stupa,lying at an altitude of about 1100m above the sea level is also called peace pagoda. Built by monk,Nochidastu Fuji under instruction of his guru Myohoji in 1973 the stupa is about 5km up the hill both from southern edge of Phewa lake and Chorepatan.The majestic stupa has four diferent statutes of Lord Buddha in each direction installed by Japan,Nepal, Srilanka and Thailand. The pinnacle of the stupa is from Srilanka.
To reach Shanti stupa the visitors have two options either by boating to southern edge of Phewa lake followed by hiking or from Chorepatan or Phumdibhumdi on a cab, bike or half an hour walk up the hill. Lovers of wilderness and solitude perfer to scale the hill from the Phewa lake as the journey goes through dense forest accompanied by songs of birds and circkets.On reaching the top of the hill, eye soothing view of Mount Annapurna and Fistail, Phewa lake,unending landscapes and green lush forest magnetises the visitors.Towering Pagoda style Peace stupa, and its surrounding garden,like its name fills the visitors with spiritual ecstasy and jubilant mood.The stupa is not just a Buddhist pilgrimage but also a palce for Hindus to worship that why it also exihibits quintessence of religious tolarance in Nepal.
contact : bhuiyanbashar1@gmail.com
connected with my facebook : www.facebook.com/Bashar.BH/
+++++++ From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia +++++++++
"Khajuraho"
UNESCO World Heritage Site
Location Madhya Pradesh, India Edit this at Wikidata
Coordinates 24°51′08″N 79°55′20″E
Criteria Cultural: (i), (iii) Edit this on Wikidata[1]
Reference 240
Inscription 1986 (10th Session)
Khajuraho Group of Monuments is located in India
Khajuraho Group of Monuments
Location of Khajuraho Group of Monuments
[edit on Wikidata]
The Khajuraho Group of Monuments is a group of Hindu and Jain temples in Madhya Pradesh, India, about 175 kilometres (109 mi) southeast of Jhansi. They are one of the UNESCO World Heritage Sites in India.[2][3] The temples are famous for their nagara-style architectural symbolism and their erotic sculptures.[4]
Most Khajuraho temples were built between 950 and 1050 by the Chandela dynasty.[5] Historical records note that the Khajuraho temple site had 85 temples by the 12th century, spread over 20 square kilometers Of these, only about 25 temples have survived, spread over 6 square kilometers.[3] Of the various surviving temples, the Kandariya Mahadeva Temple is decorated with a profusion of sculptures with intricate details, symbolism and expressiveness of ancient Indian art.[6]
The Khajuraho group of temples were built together but were dedicated to two religions, Hinduism and Jainism, suggesting a tradition of acceptance and respect for diverse religious views among Hindus and Jains in the region.[7]
Contents
1 Location
2 History
3 Description
3.1 Architecture of the temples
4 Construction
5 Chronology
6 Arts and sculpture
7 Tourism and cultural events
8 See also
9 References
10 Further reading
11 External links
Location
The Khajuraho monuments are located in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, in Chhatarpur district, about 620 kilometres (385 mi) southeast of New Delhi. The temples are near a small town also known as Khajuraho,[8] with a population of about 20,000 people (2001 Census).
Khajuraho is served by Civil Aerodrome Khajuraho (IATA Code: HJR), with services to Delhi, Agra, Varanasi and Mumbai.[9] The site is also linked by the Indian Railways service, with the railway station located approximately six kilometres from the entrance to the monuments .
The monuments are about 10 kilometres off the east-west National Highway 75, and about 50 kilometres from the city of Chhatarpur, which is connected to the state capital Bhopal by the SW-NE running National Highway 86.
The 10th century Bhand Deva Temple in Rajasthan was built in the style of the Khajuraho monuments and is often referred to as 'Little Khajuraho'.
History
The Khajuraho group of monuments was built during the rule of the Chandela dynasty. The building activity started almost immediately after the rise of their power, throughout their kingdom to be later known as Bundelkhand.[10] Most temples were built during the reigns of the Hindu kings Yashovarman and Dhanga. Yashovarman's legacy is best exhibited by The Lakshmana Temple. Vishvanatha temple best highlights King Dhanga's reign.[11]:22 The largest and currently most famous surviving temple is Kandariya Mahadeva built in the reign of King Vidyadhara.[12] The temple inscriptions suggest many of the currently surviving temples were complete between 970 and 1030 CE, with further temples completed during the following decades.[7]
The Khajuraho temples were built about 35 miles from the medieval city of Mahoba,[13] the capital of the Chandela dynasty, in the Kalinjar region. In ancient and medieval literature, their kingdom has been referred to as Jijhoti, Jejahoti, Chih-chi-to and Jejakabhukti.[14]
Khajuraho was mentioned by Abu Rihan-al-Biruni, the Persian historian who accompanied Mahmud of Ghazni in his raid of Kalinjar in 1022 CE; he mentions Khajuraho as the capital of Jajahuti.[15] The raid was unsuccessful, and a peace accord was reached when the Hindu king agreed to pay a ransom to Mahmud of Ghazni to end the attack and leave.[14]
Khajuraho temples were in active use through the end of 12th century. This changed in the 13th century; after the army of Delhi Sultanate, under the command of the Muslim Sultan Qutb-ud-din Aibak, attacked and seized the Chandela kingdom. About a century later, Ibn Battuta, the Moroccan traveller in his memoirs about his stay in India from 1335 to 1342 CE, mentioned visiting Khajuraho temples, calling them "Kajarra"[16][17] as follows:
Until the 12th century, Khajuraho was under Hindu kings and featured 85 temples. Central India was seized by Delhi Sultanate in 13th century. Under Muslim rule, some temples were destroyed and the rest left in neglect. Ruins of some old temples (Ghantai temple above) are still visible.
...near (Khajuraho) temples, which contain idols that have been mutilated by the Moslems, live a number of yogis whose matted locks have grown as long as their bodies. And on account of extreme asceticism they are all yellow in colour. Many Moslems attend these men in order to take lessons (yoga) from them.
— Ibn Battuta, about 1335 CE, Riḥlat Ibn Baṭūṭah, Translated by Arthur Cotterell[18]
Central Indian region, where Khajuraho temples are, remained in the control of many different Muslim dynasties from 13th century through the 18th century. In this period, some temples were desecrated, followed by a long period when they were left in neglect.[7][10] In 1495 CE, for example, Sikandar Lodi’s campaign of temple destruction included Khajuraho.[19] The remoteness and isolation of Khajuraho protected the Hindu and Jain temples from continued destruction by Muslims.[20][21] Over the centuries, vegetation and forests overgrew, took over the temples.
In the 1830s, local Hindus guided a British surveyor, T.S. Burt, to the temples and they were thus rediscovered by the global audience.[22] Alexander Cunningham later reported, few years after the rediscovery, that the temples were secretly in use by yogis and thousands of Hindus would arrive for pilgrimage during Shivaratri celebrated annually in February or March based on a lunar calendar. In 1852, Maisey prepared earliest drawings of the Khajuraho temples.[23]
Nomenclature
The name Khajuraho, or Kharjuravāhaka, is derived from ancient Sanskrit (kharjura, खर्जूर means date palm,[24] and vāhaka, वाहक means "one who carries" or bearer[25]). Local legends state that the temples had two golden date-palm trees as their gate (missing when they were rediscovered). Desai states that Kharjuravāhaka also means scorpion bearer, which is another symbolic name for deity Shiva (who wears snakes and scorpion garlands in his fierce form).[26]
Cunningham’s nomenclature and systematic documentation work in 1850s and 1860s have been widely adopted and continue to be in use.[23] He grouped the temples into the Western group around Lakshmana, Eastern group around Javeri, and Southern group around Duladeva.[27]
Khajuraho is one of the four holy sites linked to deity Shiva (the other three are Kedarnath, Kashi and Gaya). Its origin and design is a subject of scholarly studies. Shobita Punja[28] has proposed that the temple’s origin reflect the Hindu mythology in which Khajuraho is the place where Shiva got married; with Raghuvamsha verse 5.53, Matangeshvara honoring ‘’Matanga’’, or god of love.
Description
Sections and orientation of Khajuraho temples.
The temple site is within Vindhya mountain range in central India. An ancient local legend held that Hindu deity Shiva and other gods enjoyed visiting the dramatic hill formation in Kalinjar area.[27] The center of this region is Khajuraho, set midst local hills and rivers. The temple complex reflects the ancient Hindu tradition of building temples where gods love to play.[27][29]
The temples are clustered near water, another typical feature of Hindu temples. The current water bodies include Sib Sagar, Khajur Sagar (also called Ninora Tal) and Khudar Nadi (river).[30] The local legends state that the temple complex had 64 water bodies, of which 56 have been physically identified by archeologists so far.[27][31]
All temples, except[27] one (Chaturbhuja) face sunrise - another symbolic feature that is predominant in Hindu temples. The relative layout of temples integrate masculine and feminine deities and symbols highlight the interdependence.[28] The art work symbolically highlight the four goals of life considered necessary and proper in Hinduism - dharma, kama, artha and moksha.
Of the surviving temples, 6 are dedicated to Shiva and his consorts, 8 to Vishnu and his affinities, 1 to Ganesha, 1 to Sun god, 3 to Jain Tirthankars.[27] For some ruins, there is insufficient evidence to assign the temple to specific deities with confidence.
An overall examination of site suggests that the Hindu symbolic mandala design principle of square and circles is present each temple plan and design.[32] Further, the territory is laid out in three triangles that converge to form a pentagon. Scholars suggest that this reflects the Hindu symbolism for three realms or trilokinatha, and five cosmic substances or panchbhuteshvara.[27] The temple site highlights Shiva, the one who destroys and recycles life, thereby controlling the cosmic dance of time, evolution and dissolution.[28]
The temples have a rich display of intricately carved statues. While they are famous for their erotic sculpture, sexual themes cover less than 10% of the temple sculpture.[33] Further, most erotic scene panels are neither prominent nor emphasized at the expense of the rest, rather they are in proportional balance with the non-sexual images.[34] The viewer has to look closely to find them, or be directed by a guide.[35] The arts cover numerous aspects of human life and values considered important in Hindu pantheon. Further, the images are arranged in a configuration to express central ideas of Hinduism. All three ideas from Āgamas are richly expressed in Khajuraho temples - Avyakta, Vyaktavyakta and Vyakta.[36]
The Beejamandal temple is under excavation. It has been identified with the Vaidyanath temple mentioned in the Grahpati Kokalla inscription.[37]
Of all temples, the Matangeshvara temple remains an active site of worship.[28] It is another square grid temple, with a large 2.5 metres (8.2 ft) high and 1.1 metres (3.6 ft) diameter lingam, placed on a 7.6 metres (25 ft) diameter platform.[27]
The most visited temple, Kandariya Mahadev, has an area of about 6,500 square feet and a shikhara (spire) that rises 116 feet.[10][27]
Jain temples
Main article: Jain temples of Khajuraho
The Jain temples are located on east-southeast region of Khajuraho monuments.[38] Chausath jogini temple features 64 jogini, while Ghantai temple features bells sculptured on its pillars.
Architecture of the temples
The layout plan of Kandariya Mahadeva Temple. It uses the 64 pada grid design. Smaller Khajuraho temples use the 9, 16, 36 or 49 grid mandala plan.[39]
Khajuraho temples, like almost all Hindu temple designs, follow a grid geometrical design called vastu-purusha-mandala.[40] This design plan has three important components - Mandala means circle, Purusha is universal essence at the core of Hindu tradition, while Vastu means the dwelling structure.[41]
The design lays out a Hindu temple in a symmetrical, concentrically layered, self-repeating structure around the core of the temple called garbhagriya, where the abstract principle Purusha and the primary deity of the temple dwell. The shikhara, or spire, of the temple rises above the garbhagriya. This symmetry and structure in design is derived from central beliefs, myths, cardinality and mathematical principles.[42]
The circle of mandala circumscribe the square. The square is considered divine for its perfection and as a symbolic product of knowledge and human thought, while circle is considered earthly, human and observed in everyday life (moon, sun, horizon, water drop, rainbow). Each supports the other.[29] The square is divided into perfect 64 sub-squares called padas.[40]
Most Khajuraho temples deploy the 8x8 (64) padas grid Manduka Vastupurushamandala, with pitha mandala the square grid incorporated in the design of the spires.[39] The primary deity or lingas are located in the grid’s Brahma padas.
Khajuraho temples use the 8x8 (64) Vastupurusamandala Manduka grid layout plan (left) found in Hindu temples. Above the temple’s brahma padas is a Shikhara (Vimana or Spire) that rises symmetrically above the central core, typically in a circles and turning-squares concentric layering design (right) that flows from one to the other as it rises towards the sky.[29][43]
The architecture is symbolic and reflects the central Hindu beliefs through its form, structure and arrangement of its parts.[44] The mandapas as well as the arts are arranged in the Khajuraho temples in a symmetric repeating patterns, even though each image or sculpture is distinctive in its own way. The relative placement of the images are not random but together they express ideas, just like connected words form sentences and paragraphs to compose ideas.[45] This fractal pattern that is common in Hindu temples.[46] Various statues and panels have inscriptions. Many of the inscriptions on the temple walls are poems with double meanings, something that the complex structure of Sanskrit allows in creative compositions.[26]
All Khajuraho temples, except one, face sunrise, and the entrance for the devotee is this east side.
An illustration of Khajuraho temple Spires (Shikhara, Vimana) built using concentric circle and rotating-squares principle. Four spires (left) are shown above, while the inside view of one Shikara ceiling (right) shows the symmetric layout.
Above the vastu-purusha-mandala of each temple is a superstructure with a dome called Shikhara (or Vimana, Spire).[41] Variations in spire design come from variation in degrees turned for the squares. The temple Shikhara, in some literature, is linked to mount Kailash or Meru, the mythical abode of the gods.[29]
In each temple, the central space typically is surrounded by an ambulatory for the pilgrim to walk around and ritually circumambulate the Purusa and the main deity.[29] The pillars, walls and ceilings around the space, as well as outside have highly ornate carvings or images of the four just and necessary pursuits of life - kama, artha, dharma and moksa. This clockwise walk around is called pradakshina.[41]
Larger Khajuraho temples also have pillared halls called mandapa. One near the entrance, on the east side, serves as the waiting room for pilgrims and devotees. The mandapas are also arranged by principles of symmetry, grids and mathematical precision. This use of same underlying architectural principle is common in Hindu temples found all over India.[47] Each Khajuraho temple is distinctly carved yet also repeating the central common principles in almost all Hindu temples, one which Susan Lewandowski refers to as "an organism of repeating cells".[48]
Construction
The temples are grouped into three geographical divisions: western, eastern and southern.
The Khajuraho temples are made of sandstone, with a granite foundation that is almost concealed from view.[49] The builders didn't use mortar: the stones were put together with mortise and tenon joints and they were held in place by gravity. This form of construction requires very precise joints. The columns and architraves were built with megaliths that weighed up to 20 tons.[50] Some repair work in the 19th Century was done with brick and mortar; however these have aged faster than original materials and darkened with time, thereby seeming out of place.
The Khajuraho and Kalinjar region is home to superior quality of sandstone, which can be precision carved. The surviving sculpture reflect fine details such as strands of hair, manicured nails and intricate jewelry.
While recording the television show Lost Worlds (History Channel) at Khajuraho, Alex Evans recreated a stone sculpture under 4 feet that took about 60 days to carve in an attempt to develop a rough idea how much work must have been involved.[51] Roger Hopkins and Mark Lehner also conducted experiments to quarry limestone which took 12 quarrymen 22 days to quarry about 400 tons of stone.[52] They concluded that these temples would have required hundreds of highly trained sculptors.
Chronology
The Khajuraho group of temples belong to Vaishnavism school of Hinduism, Saivism school of Hinduism and Jainism - nearly a third each. Archaeological studies suggest all three types of temples were under construction at about the same time in late 10th century, and in use simultaneously. Will Durant states that this aspect of Khajuraho temples illustrates the tolerance and respect for different religious viewpoints in the Hindu and Jain traditions.[53] In each group of Khajuraho temples, there were major temples surrounded by smaller temples - a grid style that is observed to varying degrees in Hindu temples in Angkor Wat, Parambaran and South India.
The largest surviving Saiva temple is Khandarya Mahadeva, while the largest surviving Vaishnava group includes Chaturbhuja and Ramachandra.
Kandariya Mahadeva Temple plan is 109 ft in length by 60 ft, and rises 116 ft above ground and 88 ft above its own floor. The central padas are surrounded by three rows of sculptured figures, with over 870 statues, most being half life size (2.5 to 3 feet). The spire is a self repeating fractal structure.
Temples, religious affiliations and consecration years
Sequence Modern Temple name Religion Deity Completed by
(CE)[27][54] Image
1 Chausath Yogini Hinduism Devi, 64 Yoginis 885 Khajuraho,Chausath-Yogini-Tempel2.jpg
2 Brahma Hinduism Vishnu 925
3 Lalgun Mahadev Hinduism Shiva 900 India-5696 - Flickr - archer10 (Dennis).jpg
4 Matangeshwar Hinduism Shiva 1000 India-5772 - Flickr - archer10 (Dennis).jpg
5 Varaha Hinduism Vishnu 950 India-5595 - Flickr - archer10 (Dennis).jpg
6 Lakshmana Hinduism Vaikuntha Vishnu 939 India-5679 - Flickr - archer10 (Dennis).jpg
7 Parshvanatha Jainism Parshvanatha 954 Le temple de Parshvanath (Khajuraho) (8638423582).jpg
8 Vishvanatha Hinduism Shiva 999 India-5749 - Visvanatha Temple - Flickr - archer10 (Dennis).jpg
9 Devi Jagadambi Hinduism Devi, Parvati 1023 Khajuraho Devi Jagadambi Temple 2010.jpg
10 Chitragupta Hinduism Sun, Chitragupta 1023 India-5707 - Flickr - archer10 (Dennis).jpg
11 Kandariya Mahadeva (Largest temple) Hinduism Shiva 1029 Temple at Khajuraho, Madhya Pradesh, India.jpg
12 Vamana Hinduism Vamana 1062 Khajuraho Vaman Temple 2010.jpg
13 Adinath Jain Temple Jainism Adinatha 1027 Adinath Jain Temple Khajuraho 12.jpg
14 Javeri Hinduism Vishnu 1090 Javari Temple, Khajuraho.jpg
15 Chaturbhuja Hinduism Vishnu 1110 Khajuraho Chaturbhuja Temple.jpg
16 Duladeo (Duladeva) Hinduism Shiva 1125 Khajuraho Dulhadeo 2010.jpg
17 Ghantai Jainism Adinatha 960 A ruin, pillars at Khajuraho, India.jpg
18 Vishnu-Garuda Hinduism Vishnu 1000
19 Ganesha Hinduism Shiva 1000
20 Hanuman Hinduism Hanuman 922[55] Hanuman Inscription at Khajuraho.jpg
21 Mahishasuramardini Hinduism Mahishasuramardini 995 Khajuraho India, Lakshman Temple, Sculpture 10.JPG
22 Shantinatha temple Jainism Shantinatha 1027 Jain group of temples - Khajuraho 09.jpg
Arts and sculpture
Khajuraho temples are famous for their erotic arts. These constitute about 10% of total art displayed at the monuments.
Erotic sculptures
The Khajuraho temples feature a variety of art work, of which 10% is sexual or erotic art outside and inside the temples. Some of the temples that have two layers of walls have small erotic carvings on the outside of the inner wall. Some scholars suggest these to be tantric sexual practices.[56] Other scholars state that the erotic arts are part of Hindu tradition of treating kama as an essential and proper part of human life, and its symbolic or explicit display is common in Hindu temples.[6][57] James McConnachie, in his history of the Kamasutra, describes the sexual-themed Khajuraho sculptures as "the apogee of erotic art":
"Twisting, broad-hipped and high breasted nymphs display their generously contoured and bejewelled bodies on exquisitely worked exterior wall panels. These fleshy apsaras run riot across the surface of the stone, putting on make-up, washing their hair, playing games, dancing, and endlessly knotting and unknotting their girdles....Beside the heavenly nymphs are serried ranks of griffins, guardian deities and, most notoriously, extravagantly interlocked maithunas, or lovemaking couples."
Over 90% of the art work at the temple is about daily life and symbolic values in ancient Indian culture.
The temples have several thousand statues and art works, with Kandarya Mahadeva Temple alone decorated with over 870. Some 10% of these iconographic carvings contain sexual themes and various sexual poses. A common misconception is that, since the old structures with carvings in Khajuraho are temples, the carvings depict sex between deities;[58] however the kama arts represent diverse sexual expressions of different human beings.[59] The vast majority of arts depict various aspects the everyday life, mythical stories as well as symbolic display of various secular and spiritual values important in Hindu tradition.[3][6] For example, depictions show women putting on makeup, musicians making music, potters, farmers, and other folks in their daily life during the medieval era.[60] These scenes are in the outer padas as is typical in Hindu temples.
There is iconographic symbolism embedded in the arts displayed in Khajuraho temples.[6] Core Hindu values are expressed in multitude of ways. Even the Kama scenes, when seen in combination of sculptures that precede and follow, depict the spiritual themes such as moksha. In the words of Stella Kramrisch,
This state which is “like a man and woman in close embrace” is a symbol of moksa, final release or reunion of two principles, the essence (Purusha) and the nature (Prakriti).
— Stella Kramrisch, 1976[29]
The Khajuraho temples represent one expression of many forms of arts that flourished in Rajput kingdoms of India from 8th through 10th century CE. For example, contemporary with Khajuraho were the publications of poems and drama such as Prabodhacandrodaya, Karpuramanjari, Viddhasalabhanjika and Kavyamimansa.[61] Some of the themes expressed in these literary works are carved as sculpture in Khajuraho temples.[26][62] Some sculptures at the Khajuraho monuments dedicated to Vishnu include the Vyalas, which are hybrid imaginary animals with lions body, and are found in other Indian temples.[63] Some of these hybrid mythical art work include Vrik Vyala (hybrid of wolf and lion) and Gaja Vyala (hybrid of elephant and lion). These Vyalas may represent syncretic, creative combination of powers innate in the two.[64]
Tourism and cultural events
Temples layout map – Khajuraho Group of Monuments.
The temples in Khajuraho are broadly divided into three parts : the Eastern group, the Southern Group and the Western group of temples of which the Western group alone has the facility of an Audio guided tour wherein the tourists are guided through the seven eight temples. There is also an audio guided tour developed by the Archaeological Survey of India which includes a narration of the temple history and architecture.[65]
The Khajuraho Dance Festival is held every year in February.[66] It features various classical Indian dances set against the backdrop of the Chitragupta or Vishwanath Temples.
The Khajuraho temple complex offers a light and sound show every evening. The first show is in English language and the second one in Hindi. It is held in the open lawns in the temple complex, and has received mixed reviews.
The Madhya Pradesh Tourism Development has set up kiosks at the Khajuraho railway station, with tourist officers to provide information for Khajuraho visitors.
See also
List of megalithic sites
Jain temples of Khajuraho
Ajanta Caves
Badami Chalukya architecture
Western Chalukya architecture
Hindu temple
Madan Kamdev
Hemvati
Kama Sutra
Kamashastra
References
"World Heritage Day: Five must-visit sites in India".
Khajuraho Group of Monuments UNESCO World Heritage Site
Philip Wilkinson (2008), India: People, Place, Culture and History, ISBN 978-1405329040, pp 352-353
Gopal, Madan (1990). K.S. Gautam, ed. India through the ages. Publication Division, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India. p. 179.
Devangana Desai (2005), Khajuraho, Oxford University Press, Sixth Print, ISBN 978-0-19-565643-5
James Fergusson, Norther or Indo-Aryan Style - Khajuraho History of Indian and Eastern Architecture, Updated by James Burgess and R. Phene Spiers (1910), Volume II, John Murray, London
"Census of India 2001: Data from the 2001 Census, including cities, villages and towns (Provisional)". Census Commission of India. Archived from the original on 2004-06-16. Retrieved 2008-11-01.
Khajuraho airport AAI, Govt of India
G.S. Ghurye, Rajput Architecture, ISBN 978-8171544462, Reprint Year: 2005, pp 19-24
Sen, Sailendra (2013). A Textbook of Medieval Indian History. Primus Books. ISBN 9789380607344.
Devangana Desai 2005, p. 10.
also called Erakana
Mitra (1977), The early rulers of Khajuraho, ISBN 978-8120819979
J. Banerjea (1960), Khajuraho, Journal of the Asiatic Society, Vol. 2-3, pp 43-47
phonetically translated from Arabic sometimes as "Kajwara"
Director General of Archaeology in India (1959), Archaeological Survey of India, Ancient India, Issues 15-19, pp 45-46 (Archived: University of Michigan)
Arthur Cotterell (2011), Asia: A Concise History, Wiley, ISBN 978-0470825044, pp 184-185
Michael D. Willis, An Introduction to the Historical Geography of Gopakṣetra, Daśārṇa, and Jejākadeśa, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Vol. 51, No. 2 (1988), pp. 271-278; See also K.R. Qanungo (1965), Sher Shah and his times, Orient Longmans, OCLC 175212, pp 423-427
Trudy King et al., Asia and Oceania: International Dictionary of Historic Places, ISBN 978-1884964046, Routledge, pp 468-470
Alain Daniélou (2011), A Brief History of India, ISBN 978-1594770296, pp 221-227
Louise Nicholson (2007), India, National Geographic Society, ISBN 978-1426201448, see Chapter on Khajuraho
Krishna Deva (1990), Temples of Khajuraho, 2 Volumes, Archaelogical Survey of India, New Delhi
kharjUra Sanskrit English Dictionary, Koeln University, Germany
vAhaka Sanskrit English Dictionary, Koeln University, Germany
Devangana Desai (1996), Chapter 7 - Puns and Enigmatic Language in Sculpture in The Religious Imagery of Khajuraho, Project for Indian Cultural Studies, Columbia University Archives
Rana Singh (2007), Landscape of sacred territory of Khajuraho, in City Society and Planning (Editors: Thakur, Pomeroy, et al), Volume 2, ISBN 978-8180694585, Chapter 18
Shobita Punja (1992), Divine Ecstasy - The Story of Khajuraho, Viking, New Delhi, ISBN 978-0670840274
Stella Kramrisch, The Hindu Temple, Vol 1, Motilal Banarsidass, ISBN 978-81-208-0222-3
Ibn Battuta in his 1335 CE memoirs on Delhi Sultanate mentioned the temples to be near a mile long lake, modern water bodies are much smaller and separate lagoons; Director General of Archaeology in India (1959), Archaeological Survey of India, Ancient India, Issues 15-19, pp 45-46 (Archived: University of Michigan)
The number 64 is considered sacred in Hindu temple design and very common design basis; it is symbolic as it is both a square of 8 and a cube of 4.
Brahma temple is 19 feet square; Kandariya Mahadev has a four fused square grid; Matangeshvara temple is a 64 grid square; etc. See G.S. Ghurye, Rajput Architecture, ISBN 978-8171544462, Reprint Year: 2005, pp 19-25; and V.A. Smith (1879), "Observations on some Chandel Antiquities", Asiatic Society of Bengal, Vol. 48, Part 1, pp 291-297
D Desai (1996), The religious imagery of Khajuraho, Project for Indian Cultural Studies, ISBN 978-8190018418
Desai states that Khajuraho and Orissa Hindu temples are distinctive in giving erotic kama images the same weight as others and by assigning important architectural position; in contrast, surviving sculpture from temples of Gujarat, Maharashtra and Mysore show that there kama and sexual images were assigned to insignificant parts of the temple; Meister suggests that this aspect of eroticism in temple design and equal weight reflects evolution of design ideas among Hindu artisans, with temples built in later medieval centuries placing equal weight and balance to kama; see Meister, Michael (1979). "Juncture and Conjunction: Punning and Temple Architecture". Artibus Asiae. 41 (2–3): 226–234. JSTOR 3249517. doi:10.2307/3249517.
Edmund Leach, The Harvey Lecture Series. The Gatekeepers of Heaven: Anthropological Aspects of Grandiose Architecture, Journal of Anthropological Research, Vol. 39, No. 3 (Autumn, 1983), pp 243-264
Bettina Bäumer, A review, Artibus Asiae, Vol. 59, No. 1/2 (1999), pp. 138-140
Cunningham, Alexander (1880). Report of Tours in Bundelkhand and Malwa in 1874-75 and 1876-77. 8 Hastings Street, Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing. p. 22. Retrieved 8 May 2017.
James Fergusson, Jaina Architecture - Khajuraho History of Indian and Eastern Architecture, Updated by James Burgess and R. Phene Spiers (1910), Volume II, John Murray, London
Meister, Michael W. (April–June 1979). "Maṇḍala and Practice in Nāgara Architecture in North India". Journal of the American Oriental Society. 99 (2): 204–219. JSTOR 602657. doi:10.2307/602657.
Meister, Michael (1983). "Geometry and Measure in Indian Temple Plans: Rectangular Temples". Artibus Asiae. 44 (4): 266–296. JSTOR 3249613. doi:10.2307/3249613.
Susan Lewandowski, The Hindu Temple in South India, in Buildings and Society: Essays on the Social Development of the Built Environment, Anthony D. King (Editor), ISBN 978-0710202345, Routledge, pp 68-69
Stella Kramrisch (1976), The Hindu Temple Volume 1, ISBN 81-208-0223-3
Meister, Michael W. (March 2006). "Mountain Temples and Temple-Mountains: Masrur". Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians. 65 (1): 26–49. JSTOR 25068237. doi:10.2307/25068237.
Meister, Michael W. (Autumn 1986). "On the Development of a Morphology for a Symbolic Architecture: India". RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics. Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology (12): 33–50. JSTOR 20166752.
Devangana Desai, Khajuraho, Oxford University Press Paperback (Sixth impression 2005) ISBN 978-0-19-565643-5
Rian et al (2007), Fractal geometry as the synthesis of Hindu cosmology in Kandariya Mahadev Temple, Khajuraho, Building and Environment, Vol 42, Issue 12, pp 4093-4107, doi:10.1016/j.buildenv.2007.01.028
Trivedi, K. (1989). Hindu temples: models of a fractal universe. The Visual Computer, 5(4), 243-258
Susan Lewandowski, The Hindu Temple in South India, in Buildings and Society: Essays on the Social Development of the Built Environment, Anthony D. King (Editor), ISBN 978-0710202345, Routledge, Chapter 4
V.A. Smith, "Observations on some Chandel Antiquities", Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, Volume 48, pp 290-291
"Lost Worlds of the Kama Sutra" History channel
"Lost Worlds of the Kama Sutra," History Channel
Lehner, Mark (1997) The Complete Pyramids, London: Thames and Hudson. ISBN 0-500-05084-8. pp. 202–225
Will Durant (1976), Our Oriental Heritage - The Story of Civilization, ISBN 978-0671548001, Simon & Schuster
From inscription or estimated from other evidence
Cunningham in Archaeological Survey Reports noted that one of two Hanuman statues bears an inscription of 868 CE
Rabe (2000), Secret Yantras and Erotic Display for Hindu Temples, Tantra in Practice (Editor: David White), ISBN 978-8120817784, Chapter 25, pp 434-446
See:
Heather Elgood (2000), Hinduism and the Religious Arts, ISBN 978-0304707393, Bloomsbury;
Stella Kramrisch, The Hindu Temple, Volume 1, ISBN 81-208-0223-3, pp 92-96;
Alain Danielou (2001), The Hindu Temple: Deification of Eroticism, ISBN 978-0892818549, pp 101-119
"Khajuraho". Liveindia.com. Retrieved on 2014-07-14.
Alain Danielou (2001), The Hindu Temple: Deification of Eroticism, ISBN 978-0892818549
George Michell, The Hindu Temple: An Introduction to Its Meaning and Forms, University of Chicago Press, ISBN 978-0226532301, pp 117-123 and pp 56-58
L. H. Gray, Journal of American Society, Vol. 27
H.M. Woodward (1989), The Lakṣmaṇa Temple, Khajuraho, and Its Meanings, Ars Orientalis, Vol. 19, pp. 27-48
Smith, David (1 January 2013). "Monstrous Animals on Hindu Temples, with Special Reference to Khajuraho": 27–43. doi:10.1558/rosa.v7i1-3.27. Retrieved 9 February 2015.
The Lakṣmaṇa Temple, Khajuraho, and Its Meanings, Hiram W. Woodward, Jr., Ars Orientalis, Vol. 19, (1989), pp. 27-48
Tourists to Khajuraho will now have an audio compass The Times of India (25 August 2011)
Khajuraho Festival of Dances
The size of a 40.000 year old tooth from the Denisova cave indicates a very tall individual, and artefacts found tell about
an unbelievable modern technology - including high speed drilling. The first kings of Egypt were called Gods, but they lived with the people and helped them to develop their civilisation. Many of the granite and basalt artefacts found in Egypt can only have been done by high speed drilling. Were these divine kings in fact Denisova hominins? Did they underestimate how fragile the eco-balance of our environment is, did they trigger a worldwide catastrophe that "capsized" the Earth and wiped them out?
Remnants of a previously unknown hominin, distinct from both early modern humans and Neanderthals,
were a few years ago found in the Denisova cave of southern Siberia: Denisova hominins. The bones and also artefacts excavated at the same level were carbon dated to around 40.000 BP. The scientists say these Denisovans had "modern technology and ornaments, including a very beautiful bracelet". Our archaic cousins the Denisova Hominins
A catastrophe in form of a flood that, according to the legends wiped out the Egyptian civilization that was developed by divine kings (Gods), shall have taken place more than 30.000 years ago. The finger bone, the large tooth and the artefacts found in the Denisova cave in the north-east Altai Mountains region are also dated to be more than 30.000 years old. The small bone belonged to a very young girl. A small bracelet of polished stone was also found, and since it was found in the same layer and dated to the same age; it might have belonged to her.
We can only speculate why the young girl was in the cave. Could it be that she was seeking shelter from a coming catastrophe, might be brought there by her mother or father? Or that she was washed into the cave by the raging wave of a tsunami - even if the cave today is 600 meters above sea level?
It seems that the first rulers of Egypt had a technology that was even more advanced than we have today; we are in fact unable to replicate many of the artefacts found. And it still is an open question how they managed to construct the Great Pyramid with its incredible precision and up to 70 ton's stones.
The archaeologists say that the ancient Egyptians used simple tools like bronze chisels and stone hammers but many of the items found, like basalt jars and also the so called sarcophagus in the Great Pyramid, cannot be made without high speed drilling with drill-bits harder than basalt and granite. The artefacts found in the Denisova cave, the bracelet with pendant, the eyed needles and other ornaments, also witness of a superior technology - and believe it or not: They had used hight speed drilling!
Not us homo sapien sapien
We do not know how the Denisova hominines looked but as mentioned: A tooth found in the cave was very large, so they might have been very tall. We know that people in the area surrounding the Altai Mountains in the 6th to 3rd centuries BC had a very advanced technology; a race of white skinned, blond, blue eyed and very tall people with Caucasian features and long skulls.
The divine kings, the "Gods", of Egypt were often depicted as white skinned, blond, blue eyed and very tall people with Caucasian features and a long skull. Were the "Gods" of the ancient Egyptian king-lists in fact Denisovans? Not us homo sapien sapien but our archaic cousins the Denisova Hominins?
We do not yet know what the Denisova hominins looked like but a Denisovan tooth found in the cave is the largest archaic homo species tooth found. Were the Denisovans the giants of the legends all over the world? Where they the first kings of Egypt - the divine Pharaohs? Did they have an advanced technology that later got lost, might be together with the Denisovans themselves, in a world wide catastrophe?
Global warming
Professor Gregory Ryskin at Northwestern University in Illinois, USA, has found that the long-term changes in the Earth's main magnetic field are possibly induced by our oceans' circulation. We know that global warming already has raised the temperatures of the oceans of the world and some scientists have proposed that this could disrupt thermohaline circulation (THC), which is a massive, worldwide system of ocean currents. We have already seen a change in some ocean currents, so a change in our Earth's magnetic field might already be happening! Might be this is why our magnetic poles are moving much more rapid than before! Scary stuff - because this could also mean a change in the Earth's gravity - and changes in gravitational forces will certainly affect the tectonic plates and with the continents on them. Might be this is the reason why we also experience more earthquakes than before?! Might be we should take Hapgood's conclusions and Heyerdahl's warning serious?
Did the Egyptian "capsize" the world - did they have technologies that could contribute to a sudden and rapid polar change? Might be because of and a change in the Earths gravity and/or magnetic field? Well, some say that the ancient Egyptians used the pyramids to create a unique form of energy. That they by paying special attention to celestial events, they could have used natural forces like static electricity, the Earth's magnetic field, and lightning.
Electric phenomenon
Sir William Seimens, a famous German born English inventor, travelled to Egypt and visited the Great Pyramid. While they were standing on the top, the guide remarked that when he raised his hand with his fingers spread, it caused an intense ringing noise in his ears. Sir William ventured a few tests, one by raising his arm with his index finger pointing, which he claimed caused a prickling sensation. He then drank some wine from a metallic cup which gave him a distinct shock. He was convinced he was witnessing some sort of electric phenomenon and instantly put this to the test by assembling a makeshift Leyden Jar, an apparatus for the storage of static electricity, by wrapping moistened newspaper around the wine bottle. The static charge at the peak of the pyramid was so high that sparks began to stream from the bottle. The guide was so shocked that he accused Sir William of witchcraft and tried to grab the bottle, but an electrical jolt knocked him unconscious.
A power plant?
Master craftsman and engineer Christopher Dunn argues that based on his measurements of Egyptian monuments, ancient stonecutting achieved a high-precision accuracy surpassing modern accuracy standards in building. He asked himself what was the power source that fuelled such a civilization and after twenty years of research, Dunn reveals that the Great Pyramid of Giza was actually a electrical power plant. Based on the technology of harmonic resonance, he claims that the pyramid was a large acoustical device! By its size and dimensions, this crystal edifice created a harmonic resonance with the Earth and converted Earth's vibrational energies to microwave radiation. He shows in his books and articles how the pyramid's numerous chambers and passageways were positioned with the deliberate precision to maximize its acoustical qualities.
Inventor Michael F. Praamsma partly agrees but he says that the Great Pyramid at Giza was "a sophisticated acoustical sound chamber that was used as a technique to generate natural sounds to create an elevated frequency environment confined to a single resonant physical cavity". He claims that the Great Pyramid was systematically and competently sealed, and that this was "a sign it was decommissioned and intended to be of use again at a future day, when the awakened humanity would restore it competently to its rightful function, unfortunately history went another way."
A California researcher, Peter Grandics, has shown how an antenna, modeled on the Great Pyramid of Giza, can transfer the power of atmospheric electrostatic discharge impulses into a resonant circuit that converts the random impulses into an alternating current as a potential source of renewable electric power. Thousands of terawatts of power are generated in the troposphere by thunderstorms and a pyramidal structure, with its optimal geometry and construction, can act as a suitable charge sink, capturing this electric.
A biological engineer named John Burke argues that the movement of underground water in limestone aquifers below monuments produces an electric current via friction and the rich magnetic dolomite content of the stone. Burke measured positive ground current at Silbury hill in England, an ancient pyramidal mound composed of chalk and clay that lies on top of such limestone bedrock riddled with zig zagging aquifers filled with rainwater. Such tunnels and water caverns lie beneath the Giza plateau as well. Abd'El Hakim Awyan, a native Egyptian archaeologist, attests to swimming in such tunnels during his youth on the Giza plateau.
Electric torches?
Another alternative theory is that the pyramids were wireless power plants used to generate electricity and for wireless communication. On the internet you will find a video where it is speculated that the Great Pyramid may have been powered by the Ark of the Covenant. The person behind the video is saying that murals inside tombs and temples show that the ancient Egyptians were using handheld electric torches powered by cable free power sources. It is believed that the so called sarcophagus inside the Great Pyramid has the exact dimensions, according to the Christian bible, to house the Ark of Covenant: That the pyramid with a capstone of gold and the covenant in place was a kind of super capacitor the could produce and store electric energy. It is also theorized that Moses stole the Ark of Covenant from the pyramid and took it with him out of Egypt. This should be the main reason for the downfall of the Egyptian pharaohs; without the electrics power their own power dwindled. This should have happened at the time of the pharaoh Ramses II.
Three engineers; Erica Miller, Sean Sloan and Gregg Wilson all agree on one theory: That the Great Pyramid acted as a huge nuclear breeder reactor, which produced Plutonium fuel by mediating uranium isotopes in water. Supposedly, the King's Chamber was flooded with a water pump, and the sarcophagus was packed with uranium ore.
Frenchman Antoine Bovis stumbled upon dead cats and mice that had been disposed of in the trash cans inside the Great Pyramid, and they were perfectly mummified - apparently automatically, without putrefying or giving off a stench. When Bovis returned to France he built a scale model of Khufu's monument, deposited a dead cat inside - and the Giza phenomenon repeated itself, the cat mummified without rotting. Karl Drbal of Czechoslovakia researched this further and said that this was due to the pyramid's special cavity that resonated with cosmic microwaves concentrated in the earth's magnetic field. He also hypothesized that the same concept would work for rusted shavers, and claimed the sharpness of the tools returned after lacing them in a scale model of the pyramid. Stanford Research Institute, however, carrying out experiments in the Great Pyramid, and found that biological samples deteriorated at normal rates within the structure.
Energy grid
Some researchers say that it not by chance that the Great Pyramid was built where it was. They propose that the Earth has a planetary energetic grid that operates through geometric patterns called Sacred Geometry. Grids meet at various intersecting points forming a grid or matrix. These grid points shall be found at some of the strongest power places on the planet. A planetary grid map outlined by the Russian team of Goncharov, Morozov and Makarov has an overall organization anchored to the north and south axial poles and the Great Pyramid at Giza.
It is said that the ancient people, including the Egyptians, knew that wherever the earth's energy gathered into a vortex was a sacred place. Very simular is the theory that the Earth has as net of electromagnetic lines, and that the intersecting points of the network, the knots, are influenced by underground veins of water as well as magnetic forces emanating naturally from the Earth. The ancient Egyptians are said to have been able to move and/or anchor the energy lines by pushing metal rods into the ground before they built a temple or pyramid - they shall have called it "piercing the snake".
Also what is called lay lines seems to be connected to an ancient grid of a form. According to Wikipedia; "Ley lines are hypothetical alignments of a number of places of geographical interest, such as ancient monuments and megaliths." Archaeologists have documented that the alignments are existing but it is not proved that the ley lines and their intersection points resonate a special psychic or magical energy or that they have electrical or magnetic forces as some writers claim.
Pyramid fortex using a Tesla coil
In addition to all this it is also said that we have high energy spots on the Earth called vortices - and they shall be linked ley lines. A Vortex (plural: vortices) is usually a spinning, often turbulent, flow of fluid but some also include a kind of spinning Earth energy due to its electromagnetic field. Such vortices can be volcanoes, high mountains, hot springs, mineral deposits, deep gorges, rock outcroppings and even in deserts like the Sinai. Ancient sites can also be vortices, like the pyramids of Egypt. Dr. Dee J. Nelson has taken a so called Kirlian photograph of energy spiralling out of the top of a pyramid using a Tesla Coil.
Nikola Tesla - Earthquake Machine
The Tesla Coil was invented by Serbian-American engineer Nikola Tesla (1856 - 1943), one of history's greatest scientists. His coil is an electrical resonant transformer circuit, used to produce high-voltage, low-current, and high frequency alternating-current electricity. Yes, he is best known for inventing the alternating electrical current (AC) used all over the world today, but his patents and theoretical work helped form the basis for radio comunication and many other inventions.
Nikola Tesla was an electrical genius, but he also was responsible for a number of mechanical devices. One of these was his "Earthquake Machine" also known as the Tesla Oscillator. The machine which Tesla tested was no larger than an alarm clock but it is said that when he started to twiddle the machine's frequency-controller in his lab: blocks around chaos reigned as objects fell off shelves, furniture moved across floors, windows shattered, and pipes broke. When the police arrived they found the inventor smashing the resonator to bits with a hammer: "Gentlemen, I am sorry. You are just a trifle too late to witness my experiment. I found it necessary to stop it suddenly and unexpectedly in an unusual way, he said calmly to the astonished officers.
Tesla was convinced that by finding the correct frequency, any structure can be destroyed (an obvious example is the wine glass shattered by an opera singer). He later told a friend that he could split the Earth with one of these devices: "I could set the earth's crust into such a state of vibration that it would rise and fall hundreds of feet, throwing rivers out of their beds, wrecking buildings, and practically destroying civilization".
Tesla and coils
Tesla claimed that the laws of electromagnetics were connected to gravity, and one of his patents was on a flying machine without wings or propellers but based on what he called electrogravitics. Tesla also was working on a generator that basically worked by harnessing the electricity from the air and the ground. He used the natural conductivity of limestone aquifers to generate electrical power. The power ran up the ground into the Tesla coil tower above, which in theory should channel wirelessly transmitted power over great distances. Since Telsa wanted the distribution of the energy to be free, the inventor's sponsor pulled out from funding the scientist's machine before it was completed. Tesla died a poor and disillusioned man.
His research station for transmitting power at Colorado Springs might have a link to the Great Pyramid - a notable harmonic association between the latitude positions of both sites. Coral Castle - 9-ton gate that moves with just a touch of the finger.
Edward Leedskalnin - Coral Castle
Another person that was interested in gravity and electromagnetism was Edward Leedskalnin (1887-1951) - an eccentric Latvian emigrant to the United States. He built the extraordinary monument known as Coral Castle in Florida. Leedskalnin single-handedly and secretly carved and displayed over 1,100 tons of coral rock, the heaviest stone weighing 35 tons. It is a mystery how the tiny man could move all the heavy stones. He claimed to have discovered the secrets of the pyramids, and had found out how the Egyptians and the ancient builders in Peru, Yucatan, and Asia, with only primitive tools, raised and set in place blocks of stone weighing many tons! But he did not want to show
"I have discovered the secrets of the pyramids, and have found out how the Egyptians and the ancient builders in Peru, Yucatan, and Asia, with only primitive tools, raised and set in place blocks of stone weighing many tons!"
- Edward Leedskalninanybody how it was done and worked mostly at night-time. A group of young witnesses claimed to see coral blocks floating through the air "like hydrogen balloons" and another time one of Ed's neighbours found him singing to the stones with his hands placed on their surface as if he were somehow making them lighter.
Ed Leedskalnin disputed contemporary science and believed that "all matter consists of magnets which can produce measurable phenomena, and electricity." Ed would say he had "re-discovered the laws of weight, measurement, and leverage," and that these concepts "involved the relationship of the Earth to celestial alignments."
Researchers have speculated that Ed Leedskalnin learned the secret of levitation and one theory in particular caught the imagination of many. The planetary grid hypothesis postulates that the earth is covered by an invisible web of energy which is concentrated at points of telluric power, the convergence of which create unusual phenomena. Leedskalnin moved the complex from Florida City to Homestead and some suggest this was because Ed realized he had made a mathematical error in his original positioning and moved to an area with greater telluric force.
The famed American psychic Edgar Cayce (1877-1945) said during his readings that the Great Pyramid "was erected by the application of those universal laws and forces of nature which cause iron to float. By the same laws, gravity may be overcome, or neutralized, and stone made to float in air. The Pyramid was thus built by levitation, abetted by song and chanting". He also said that the Great Pyramid was built was built as a hall of initiation around 10,500BC by those who originally came from the civilization of Atlantis.
Levitation by sound
Metal rods that caused the stone to levitate
The current estimates of mainstream science contends that it took a workforce of 4,000 to 5,000 men 20 years to build the Great Pyramid using ropes, pulleys, ramps, ingenuity and brute force. But the 10th century Arab historian, Abul Hasan Ali Al-Masudi had written a 30-volume history of the world and he wrote about how the great stone blocks of the pyramid were transported. First, he said, a "magic papyrus" was placed under the stone to be moved. Then the stone was struck with a metal rod that caused the stone to levitate and move along a path paved with stones and fenced on either side by metal poles. The stone would travel along the path, wrote Al-Masudi, for a distance of about 50 meters and then settle to the ground. The process would then be repeated until the builders had the stone where they wanted it.
An ancient legend tells that The Great Pyramid was built from year 10,490 to 10,390 B.C. That the god Ra made studies of the terrain and took great care in figuring the geometrical location in relation to the Sphinx and the four cardinal points of the compass. The Pyramid was then built by levitation, abetted by song and chanting.
Well, we do not have any proof that the ancient Egyptians could make the huge stones fly through the air but levitation is no longer only a party-trick by magicians with quick fingers. We have high speed trains that levitate by the help of magnetic power and in an incredible move for modern medicine; scientists are using sound waves to help levitate droplets of drugs to make them with less side effects.
A kind of Swiss knife
The Great Pyramid is very different to other pyramids, in Giza or else. Most alternative researches conclude that it was some kind of machine; most possibly a power station. We have seen that it would be impossible to use the Great Pyramid as a tomb for a pharaoh and that dating of seashell tells that it much older than the other pyramids. The nearby sphinx has been re-dated to be at least 5000 years old because of the erosion from water, but it might be much older. The same will go for the Great Pyramid. Some speculate that the Great Pyramid was a kind of Swiss knife - a gigantic multipurpose tool. The world "pyramid" means "fire in the middle" - so if it was a kind of power station with the power source situated in what is called Khufu's sarcophagus the some researches in one way might be correct when that speculate that the pyramid also was built as a gigantic ram water pump - inside the base of the pyramid. Yes, it could have been a power-station with a water cooling system! We have seen that some say that the power source was the ark of covenant from the Christian bible and some say
The King's Chamber with the stones above
King's Chamber and large stones
that Moses was the person who stole it from the pyramid. That the pharaohs' rapid decline took place because with no more energy, in form of electric power, then their advanced civilisation could no longer exist!
A gigantic Tesla coil?
Or might be the Great Pyramid was a kind of a gigantic Tesla coil? That the huge granite stones, highly polished on the underside and placed above the so called Kings chamber, made it possible to harness electricity from the ionosphere - just like Nikola Tesla wanted to do it?
About 20 minutes drive from the Great Pyramid is the site of Abu Ghurab, the "Place of Osiris". The ruined stepped pyramid once had an alabaster platform on the top and on the platform it had been standing an obelisk ("sun stick"); most likely, the total height was between fifty and seventy meters. It had looked like a pyramid with a flat top, just like Great Pyramid! Is it possible that the Great Pyramid once had an obelisk standing on it's flat top - and not a capstone? The legends says that spirit of the sun god entered the obelisks at certain periods…
Could it have been like this - an obelisk on top of the Great Pyramid?
Can it have been like this?
Tesla viewed the Earth as a negative electric pole and the sun as a positive pole of an electrode; so an obelisk standing on top of a pyramid would to him be a solar-electric diode! If the under ground part of the pyramid was a pump that brought water up to the Kings Chamber then we would have a capacitor with a very good earth ground. Yes, the Great Pyramid could have been an extremely powerful kind of solar-panel!
Might be Tesla got the idea of harnessing the ionosphere from the Egyptians? Might be they had made the strongest power station ever but that something went terribly wrong; a technical fault or a construction-fault? Or might be extra strong solar activity? Stephen A. Reynods of New Zealand has done research showing that changes in the ionosphere caused by strong solar activity can cause changes in the Earth's internal magnetic field and through telluric current induced in the Earth's crust trigger earthquakes. So might be it happened that instead of harnessing high voltage that could be stored and used, the pyramid send the current into the ground and
The God Ptah with a Djed pillar
Ptah and pillar
triggered a gigantic earthquake that literally shook the whole Earth and caused geological catastrophes worldwide? Might be the changes to the internal magnetic field was so fast and so strong that the outer crust slipped - just like professor Charles H. Hapgood once suggested (but not due to imbalance of the polar ice)?
Interesting enough; one of the oldest and most important symbols to the ancient Egyptian was the "Djed Pillar". Take a look at the image to the right of the God Ptah holding a Djed pillar. The pillar looks very simular til the set-up of the stones above the Kings Chamber - and also a homemade Tesla coil! You might also have noticed a Djed pillar in picture of what could illustrate an electric lamp in an ancient Egyptian temple, higher up in the article!
Very advanced technology
In the Palermo, Turin and Manetho king lists, there are names of eight god kings that ruled Egypt in the beginning; Ptah, Ra, Geb, Osiris, Set, Horus, Thoth and the female god Ma'at. Even if they sometimes were represented in a variety of forms on murals, often with human body and animals/birds heads, these gods seemed to be something else than imaginary gods living in a theological heaven. They lived on earth, were married with children, and had duties they performed. They also helped the ordinary people to develop. We have seen that Ptah made the Nile-delta liveable after the great flood and Thoth is credited as the author of all works of science, religion, philosophy as well as magic and he is said to have been married with the female god and ruler Ma'at.
Pharaoh Can it be that the first kings of Egypt were called Gods because they came from a far away place and looked a bit different to the other humans in ancient Egypt? The word "God" comes from "shining/bright" and murals picturing the first pharaohs/gods show that they had so white skin that the must have looked very bright compared to other people! Were they also called devine because they had much better mental capabilities and a very advanced technology?
www.sydhav.no/giants/denisova_giants_egypt.htm
Dendera light
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The dendera light
The dendera light is a motif in the Hathor temple at Dendera in Egypt. A fringe theory interpretation of the reliefs is that they depict some form of ancient Egyptian lighting technology, similar to an arc lamp or cathode ray tube.
The temple contains several reliefs depicting Harsomtus, in the form of a snake, emerging from a lotus flower which is usually attached to the bow of a barge. The so-called dendera light is a variation of this motif, showing Harsomtus in an oval container called hn, which might represent the womb of Nut.[1][2][3] Sometimes a djed pillar supports the snake or the container. A closely related motif is "god resting on the lotus flower".
Contents
1Depictions and text
2Similar motifs
3Fringe interpretation
4See also
5References
6External links
Depictions and text
Each of the three objects consists of two reliefs. One half (a) of each pair is in south crypt 1-C (crypte 4), the other half (b) in room G (chambre V) of the temple.[3]
Object
(location)
TextRelief
Object 1(a)
(Crypt 1-C, south wall)
Speaking the words of Harsomtus, the great God, who dwells in Dendera, who is in the arms of the first in the night-barge, sublime snake, whos Chentj-statue carries Heh, whos crew carries in holiness his perfection, whos Ba caused Hathor to appear in the sky, whos figure is revered by his followers, who is unique, encircled by his forehead-snake, with countless names on the top of Chui-en-hesen, the symbol of power of Re in the land of Atum (Dendera), the father of the Gods, who created everything.
Gold his metal, height: four handbreadths
(left)
Object 2(a)
(Crypt 1-C,
south wall)
Speaking the words of harsomtus, the great God, who dwells in Dendera, the living Ba in the lotus flower of the day-barge, whos perfection is carried by the two arms of the djed-pillar as his Seschemu-image, while the Kas on their knees bend their arms.
Gold and all precious stones, height: three handbreadths
(right)
Object 3(a)
(Crypt 1-C,
north wall)
Speaking the words of harsomtus, the great God, who dwells in Dendera, who emerges out of the lotus flower as a living Ba, whos completeness is elevated by the Kematju-images of his Ka, whos Seschemu-image is revered by the crew of the day-barge, whos body is carried by the djed-pillar, underneath his Seschemu-image is the Primal and whos majesty is carried by the companions of his Ka.
Gold, height: one cubit
Denderah. Grand temple. Crypte no. 4 (NYPL b16461786-1548062) (lower).jpg
Object 1(b)
(Room G,
south wall)
Harsomtus in the hn-container of the night-barge that contains four figures. The figure of heh is in front of him, whereas this flower is behind him, the water beneath him.
Gold his metal, height: four handbreadths.
Denderah. Grand temple. Chambre V (NYPL b16461786-1547977) (lower).jpg
Object 2(b)
(Room G,
north wall)
Harsomtus on his barge
Gold and all precious stones, height: three handbreadths
(left)
Object 3(b)
(Room G,
north wall)
Harsomtus of Upper- and Lower Egypt, the Sata-snake, that emerges from the flower, which contains the hn-container, who is flanked by four figures with human faces, under his head the figure of Heh on the Serech on the bow of his barge. The Juf-monkey with the face of a toad, armed with knives, is in front of him, as are the two figures that carry the front part of this flower.
(right)
Similar motifs
Denderah. Grand temple. Chambre V (NYPL b16461786-1547977) (upper).jpg
Denderah. Grand temple. Crypte no. 4 (NYPL b16461786-1548061) (Harsomtus).jpg
Denderah. Grand temple. Chambre V (NYPL b16461786-1547978) (upper).jpg
Denderah. Grand temple. Crypte no. 1 (NYPL b16461786-1548026) (harsomtus).jpg
Denderah. Grand temple. Chambres de la terrasse. Osiris du sud. Chambre no. 3 (NYPL b16461786-1548166) (cropped).tiff
NaqaLionTempleApedemakSnake.jpg
Fringe interpretation
In contrast to the mainstream interpretation, a fringe theory proposes that the reliefs depict Ancient Egyptian technology, based on comparison to similar modern devices (such as a Cathode-ray tube, Geissler tubes, Crookes tubes, and arc lamps). J. N. Lockyer's passing reference to a colleague's humorous suggestion that electric lamps would explain the absence of lampblack deposits in the tombs has sometimes been forwarded as an argument supporting this particular interpretation (another argument being made is the use of a system of reflective mirrors).[4] Proponents of this interpretation have also used a text referring to "high poles covered with copper plates" to argue this,[5] but Bolko Stern has written in detail explaining why the copper-covered tops of poles (which were lower than the associated pylons) do not relate to electricity or lightning, pointing out that no evidence of anything used to manipulate electricity had been found in Egypt and that this was a magical and not a technical installation.[6]
Archaeologist and debunker Kenneth Feder argued that if ancient Egyptians really had such advanced technology, some light bulb remains (glass shards, metal sockets, filaments...) should have been discovered during archaeological excavations. By applying Occam's razor, he instead highlighted the feasibility of the aforementioned reflective mirrors system, and also that the notion of adding salt to torches to minimize lampblack was well known by ancient Egyptians.[7]
See also
Egyptian mythology
References
"Dendera Temple Crypt Archived 2010-04-25 at the Wayback Machine". iafrica.com.
Wolfgang Waitkus, Die Texte in den unteren Krypten des Hathortempels von Dendera: ihre Aussagen zur Funktion und Bedeutung dieser Räume, Mainz 1997 ISBN 3-8053-2322-0 (tr., The texts in the lower crypts of the Hathor temples of Dendera: their statements for the function and meaning of these areas)
Waitkus, Wolfgang (2002). "Die Geburt des Harsomtus aus der Blüte Zur Bedeutung und Funktion einiger Kultgegenstände des Tempels von Dendera". Studien zur Altägyptischen Kultur. 30: 373–394. JSTOR 25152877.
Press, The MIT (15 May 1973). The Dawn of Astronomy | The MIT Press. mitpress.mit.edu. MIT Press. ISBN 9780262120142. Retrieved 2020-10-06.
Bruno Kolbe, Francis ed Legge, Joseph Skellon, tr., "An Introduction to Electricity". Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner, 1908. 429 pages. Page 391. (cf., "[...] high poles covered with copper plates and with gilded tops were erected 'to break the stones coming from on high'. J. Dümichen, Baugeschichte des Dendera-Tempels, Strassburg, 1877")
Stern, Bolko (1998) [1896]. Ägyptische Kulturgeschichte. Reprint-Verlag-Leipzig. pp. 106–108. ISBN 978-3826219085.
Feder, Kenneth H. (2014). Frauds, Myths, and Mysteries: Science and Pseudoscience in Archaeology. New York: McGraw-Hill. ISBN 978-0-07-803507-4., pp.225–7
External links
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Dendera light.
The Dendera Reliefs, Catchpenny Mysteries.
Frank Dörnenburg, Electric lights in Egypt?. 2004.
Mariette, Auguste (1870) - Dendérah: description générale du grand temple de cette ville (II: 48, 49; III: 44, 45)
Coordinates: 26.141611°N 32.670139°E
Categories: EgyptologyOut-of-place artifactsPseudoarchaeology
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en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dendera_light
The ancient Egyptian Dendera Light "protective magical energy in liquid form" is the evaporative cooling fog. The fact that the Dendera Light is made of liquid water that transforms itself in a magical way, is exactly what are describing ancient Egyptians themselves : [About the snake inside the Dendera Light Bulb] "The field surrounding Ra’s snake form is referred to in ancient Egyptian literature as protective magical energy in liquid form that all gods and pharaohs possess (Faulkner 1970*)." ahotcupofjoe.net/2016/11/dendera-light-bulb-and-bagdad-ba...
*I'm not sure, but the excerpt might be from "The ancient Egyptian book of the dead / translated by Raymond O. Faulkne ; edited by Carol Andrews, 1972."
www.milleetunetasses.com/blog/the-great-pyramid-of-khufu-...
Evaporative cooling for the sodium carbonate manufacturing
My study is based on 2 key elements : the first one is the cold production inside the horizontal passage of the Great Pyramid ; and the second one is the production of sodium carbonate (pure natron), as suggested by the Red Pyramid.
The ammonia still present inside the Red Pyramid, indicates that they were using a sodium carbonate process identical or very close to the ammonia-soda process known as the Solvay process, developed into its modern form in the 1860s in Europe.
In the Solvay process, the ammonia only has a minor role ; but inside the Red Pyramid, my guess is that they didn't control the temperature of the different chemical reactions inside the Solvay towers. They couldn't cool down the towers.
That is the reason why they engineered the visible part of the Great Pyramid : to produce cold inside the horizontal passage, store it inside the Queen's chamber, and transfer it to the sodium carbonate production towers, passing through the Queen's chamber shafts.
Roc de l'Areny, Canillo at early sunrise. Carretera de Montaup, Canillo, Vall d'Orient, Andorra, Pyrenees
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Laos is blessed with some of Asia’s nicest rivers, and many of them are mellow. Children spent the day at school, and by the afternoon they were doing the chores required of them…building a fire for the kitchen, sweeping the leaves into a pile, or caring for the young siblings strapped to their back …young boys and girls from the age of seven or eight attentive to the baby’s every need. Amongst this was the laughter of children playing in the river. But sometimes they skip their days at school, going fishing and collecting snails from the river, or using long bamboo poles to knock crickets from the trees. They eat the crickets live or drop them into bottles and take them home for lunch or dinner.
Photo taken nearby the Tad Lo waterfall near the little town Kieng Than Lei - Laos. These ragged little urchins spend most of their days not at school, but fishing and collecting snails from the river. School is important for ethnic minority kids, they should attend and complete primary education in order to overcome rural/urban, ethnic in the area of literacy and education. But it isn't that easy. The reason to skip school are the family economic considerations, involvement in family maintenance and subsistence tasks, the lack of perceived benefits from education. While poverty and lack of access are issues. In addition to these, ethnic minority kids have to face further barriers to education, including the distance from school facilities, their extreme poverty, and additional cultural barriers and the lack of fluency in the national language, Lao. The ethnic kids speak their own language. About 32% of all Laotians are related to Ethnic groups. Totally 160 ethnic groups and speak 82 distinct living languages.
...an old lady washing her clothes in the river gave us a beautiful smile; the Laos people are so friendly. Kids have a great time running on the rampart, swimming in the Sexet river at the Tad Lo waterfall, taking boat rides along the river and playing. A bit futher south men washing their elephants in the river. Lao seems a bit like heaven, the laughter is often & sincere, the rivers are cool and clean and not a speck of modern civilization in sight. In my perspective it is some of the best Laos can offer.
Dante stained glass window Dante between Beatrice and Matelda (19th century) by Giuseppe Bertini - Pinacoteca Ambrosiana, Milan
Bangladesh remembers the martyrs of language movement.
International Mother Language Day (IMLD) is a worldwide annual observance held on 21 February to promote awareness of linguistic and cultural diversity and to promote multilingualism. First announced by UNESCO on 17 November 1999,[1] it was formally recognized by the United Nations General Assembly with the adoption of UN resolution 56/262 Multilingualism in 2002. Mother Language Day is part of a broader initiative "to promote the preservation and protection of all languages used by peoples of the world" as adopted by the UN General Assembly on May 16, 2007 in UN resolution 61/266, which also established 2008 as the International Year of Languages.[2][3][4][5][self-published source] The idea to celebrate International Mother Language Day was the initiative of Bangladesh. In Bangladesh 21 February is the anniversary of the day when Bangladeshis fought for recognition for the Bangla language.[6]
Source: Weekipedia
but danielle has been on of my closest friends since we were in the third grade. this makes me want to take intimate portraits of all of my close friends and family. i want to keep a piece of them with me forever. i want to shoot them the way that i see them.
Hindeloopen is an old city on the North of the Netherlands on the IJsselmeer. Hindeloopen received city rights in 1225 and in 1368 it became a member of the Hanseatic League. Since the 12th and 13th century, shippers of Hindeloopen undertook journeys to the North and Baltic Sea Coasts. The strong overseas connections with foreign countries and infrequent contact with the hinterland were probably the reasons for the developing of the Hindeloopen language; a mixture of West Frisian, English, Danish, and Norwegian. The shipping trade brought the population of Hindeloopen a great prosperity. The 17th and 18th century were especially golden times. At that time, the people of Hindeloopen spent a lot of money in Amsterdam on precious fabrics and objects, which were supplied through the Dutch East India Company. The rich town developed in those days her own costume and a completely individual style with colorful painted walls and furniture. In the small streets some sea captains houses remind of this time of glory.
Good morning Sunshine. Good morning Soul. Good Morning Earth. Good Morning Mist.
A peaceful morning, woken up by the sounds of the birds chirping and the cold breeze passing above the sleeping bag; the warm body within shudders awakened with a cold kiss of morning due. Taking in the first mountain breath; breathing in fresh air witnessing the rest of the world awakened from a distance.
- Honest Mini Rambling
An old lady sat right in front of me, by a window side of a train compartment. She wore aristocracy like no other; around 75-80 years old, travelling alone from Kolkata. Her son would receive her from the station. She was communicating with her son over the cell phone. She was on the edge of her mood, at times relaxed and sometimes fidgety, as the train was running late. She was an expressive woman, as her gestures reflected her mood. She was ignorant about everything happening in the compartment, as she was eager to reach the station on time. I took a few shots of her gestures with my cell phone camera, secretly. They turned out to be pretty productive, as natural documentation of one’s body languages.
Charminar built in 1591 AD, is a landmark monument located in Hyderabad, India. The two words Char Minar of Urdu language are combined to which it is known as Charminar (English: Four Towers). These are four ornate minarets attached and supported by four grand arches, it has become the global icon of Hyderabad and is listed among the most recognized structures of India. The Charminar is on the east bank of Musi river. To the northeast lies the Laad Bazaar and in the west end lies the granite-made richly ornamented Mecca Masjid.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charminar
Last Sunday I visited Charminar with my friends in day time found weather was good and have taken some captures.No Post processing done for this upload.
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This column, the second highest structure in the Afrikaans Language Monument, represents South Africa and the declaration of the Republic of South Africa in 1960. Its placement in the pool is to symbolise the idea of the language as a living, growing entity, which needs sustenance for its survival.
The Afrikaans Language Monument (Afrikaans: Afrikaanse Taalmonument) is located on a hill overlooking Paarl, Western Cape Province, South Africa. Officially opened on 10 October 1975, it commemorates the semicentenary of Afrikaans being declared an official language of South Africa separate from Dutch. Also, it was erected on the 100th anniversary of the founding of Genootskap van Regte Afrikaners (the Society of Real Afrikaners) in Paarl, the organisation that helped strengthen Afrikaners' identity and pride in their language.
The monument, surprisingly post-modern for the product of an authoritarian right-wing state, consists of various tapering structures of a convex and concave nature, symbolising the influences of different languages and cultures on Afrikaans itself, as well as political developments in South Africa, as follows:
* three columns symbolise the European heritage of the language. The columns are from high to low to illustrate Europe’s diminishing influence on Afrikaans.
* three convex mounds on a podium symbolise the African influences on the language
* a wall on the stairway symbolises the influence of the Malay language and culture, placed between the curves of Western Europe and Africa as a separate entity. Yet it forms a unity with the two forces of Western Europe and Africa that merge to form the bridge that symbolically depicts the roots of Afrikaans.
* the highest column (about 57m high) symbolises the growth of Afrikaans and is open at the top. The other writer that inspired the architect, CJ Langenhoven, wrote that Afrikaans grows like a “fast-rising arch”; the second very high column represents South Africa and the declaration of the Republic of South Africa in 1960.
There is also an open stadium at the bottom of the structure where concerts and events are held.
This description incorporates text from the English Wikipedia and the official Afrikaanse Taalmuseum & -monument website.
Urban Chronicles ~ Notre Dame de Paris ~ MjYj
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“Eyes speak a universal language, and no interpreter is needed” - Steve McCurry
Thirty-four miles from Siem Reap is the rural fishing village of Kompong Khleang along Tonle Sap Lake.
On the way to the village I stopped at a local outdoor market to pick up some food and of course photograph the local culture.
As I walked around the market I was met with huge smiles although I spoke no Khmer (outside of just hello, goodbye, yes, no and thank you). I notice this little boy hiding behind a pole and peeking a glance at me. With his big eyes, bright shirt and funny gestures (he kept trying to pull his shirt over his head), I couldn’t help but make a photograph of him.
I took about three shots and then showed him the back of my LCD screen. He had a big smile on his face (I wish I took a photo of that) and then ran off to join his friends.
I mentioned before that Cambodia is a “Land of Smiles” in spite of their tragic history. Under the regime of the Khmer Rouge communist party, from 1975-1979 two million people perished due to the genocide.
The Cambodia of today stands strong. With one eye looking back at its sad history and the other full of optimism.
Merry Christmas my friends!
Check back for more of my adventures in Cambodia! One more photo in the comment section.
Happy Travels!
Text and photo copyright by ©Sam Antonio Photography
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St. Patrics Cathedral on 2016 Christmas Eve.
New York’s First Cathedral: The Basilica of St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral
Written by Joyce Mendelsohn, 2001
Edited and updated by James E. Garrity, 2015
The Basilica of St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral is the original Cathedral of the Archdiocese of New York. Since its construction 200 years ago on the corner of Mott and Prince, it has stood as the heart of old New York; a beacon for the Catholic faithful and an American symbol of religious freedom. Originally the center of a once impoverished Irish community, St. Patrick’s has expanded to serve a diverse community of Catholics from Italian, Hispanic, Asian, and various other origins. Today, our Basilica of St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral remains a vital force in the community which proudly unites Catholics through worship, social groups and spiritual guidance.
The History of Catholicism in New York
The history of our city's Catholicism begins in the 17th century with French-born Fr. Isaac Jogues, a Jesuit who landed in New York State. Fr. Jacques was one of the North American Martyrs sent as missionaries to the Quebec Hurons in the early 1640s. He escaped capture and torture by an Iroquois war party in 1643 with the help of Dutch Calvinists who smuggled him by boat to New Amsterdam (later renamed New York) where he was warmly welcomed as “a martyr of Jesus Christ” by Willem Kieft. Father Jogues sailed back to Europe upon learning that 18 different languages were spoken among the settlement population numbering some 500, described as having “the arrogance of Babel.” He later returned as an Iroquois missionary though he was seized and murdered in 1649 by a member of the Mohawk tribe. His canonization was in 1930 by Pope Pius XI.
Peter Stuyvesant proceeded Kieft with openly hostility to public worship by religions other than the Dutch Reformed Church which remained even after the British gained control in 1664 of what became New York. The small Catholic population only gained esteem in 1674, when King James II (a Roman Catholic convert) granted religious liberty to the province which still lacked a its own place of worship. In 1683, King James II appointed an Irish Catholic Colonel Thomas Dongan to govern New York under his “Charter of Liberties and Privileges” which granted religious freedom to all Christians. However, the fall of the Catholic Stuarts in England due to the Protestant “Glorious Revolution” of 1688 drove Dongan from his post, ending the brief religious liberty in the province and ushering in a law in 1700 that prohibited Catholic priests from entering the city as per the provincial assembly. Despite these restrictions, Jesuit Ferdinand Steenmayer snuck into the city to celebrate Mass in secret on several brave occasions.
Upon the anti-Catholic law being repealed (1784) in the now sovereign state of New York, an Irish Capuchin friar Charles Whelan arrived in the city to help organize what would become the first Catholic parish in the independent United States. New York’s Catholic community numbered less than 1,000 of the total 230,000 populating the land from French, Spanish, Portuguese, German, and Irish descent. Nevertheless, the Roman Catholic Church in the City of New York was incorporated in 1785, led by the French consul and largely financed by a donation from King Charles III of Spain. Construction then commenced on the first Catholic house of worship in the city - St. Peter’s Church.
Opening Mass was celebrated on November 1, 1786, in the small, Georgian- style building located on the corner of Barclay and Church streets in lower Manhattan. Severely damaged in the Great Fire of 1835 (a conflagration that raged for three days and destroyed 674 buildings), the original wood frame building was replaced in 1840 by the present monumental granite structure, designed in the classicaltradition.
Pierre Toussaint And Mother Elizabeth Ann Seton
Two extraordinary parishioners are connected with St. Peter’s Church: Pierre Toussaint, who is being considered for canonization, and Mother Elizabeth Ann Seton, the first native-born American saint.
Toussaint, born in Haiti in 1766, was brought as a slave to New York in 1787. When his owners fell upon hard times, he became a successful hairdresser, at the same time quietly waiting on and supporting the household. After the death of his owners, the former slave purchased his wife’s freedom and became a leader of the free black community in New York.
Pierre Toussaint devoted his life to aiding the poor and the sick—opening his home to black orphans, raising funds to support a Catholic orphanage and school, and entering quarantined zones to nurse victims of epidemics that ravaged the city.
Toussaint worshiped at St. Peter’s Church for sixty-six years and was buried in the cemetery of St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral in 1853. In 1989, his remains were removed and brought to St. Patrick’s Cathedral uptown as the first step in the cause for his beatification. Within St. Peter’s Church is a life-size marble statue of Elizabeth Ann Seton, who was born in New York in 1774 into a devout Episcopalian family. At age nineteen, Elizabeth Ann Bayley married wealthy businessman William Seton. They raised a family of five children in a gracious home at 7 State Street facing Battery Park, which is now the Shrine of Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton. As a young wife and mother who became deeply involved in assisting the poor, Mrs. Seton was widely known as the “Protestant Sister of Charity.” After her husband’s death, the widow—always deeply spiritual—was drawn to Catholicism and in 1805 was received into the Catholic faith at St. Peter’s Church.
Elizabeth Ann Seton turned for guidance to BishopJohnCarroll. He had been appointed as the first Bishop in the United States in 1789 and in Baltimore presided over America’s first diocese— encompassing all of the thirteen original colonies. At Bishop Carroll’s urging, she moved her family to Baltimore in 1808 to open a Catholic girls’ school—marking the beginning of the Catholic system of parochial schools in the United States. Mother Seton founded the Sisters of Charity—the first Catholic religious order in America. Her order was successful in establishing orphanages and hospitals and developing the parochial school system. Mother Elizabeth Ann Seton died at age fifty- two in 1821 and was canonized by Pope Paul VI in 1975.
Father Antony Kohlmann
In response to the needs of a growing number of Catholic immigrants, Pope Pius VII established the Diocese of New York in 1808, which included all of New York State and a portion of northern New Jersey. Archbishop Carroll chose Alsatian-born Father Antony Kohlmann, along with several of his fellow Jesuits, to organize the new diocese. When Father Kohlmann arrived in the new diocese, he described the Catholic population as consisting “of Irish, some hundreds of French and as many Germans; in all according to the common estimation of 14,000 souls.” A parcel of land on Mott Street on the comer of Prince Street was chosen for the construction of New York’s first Cathedral. It was to rise on land that had been purchased in 1801 and 1803 by St. Peter’s Church for a burial ground. (The graves were removed to another site.) At the time, Canal Street was the northern boundary of the built-up portion of Manhattan. The Cathedral, erected in the midst of meadows, hills, and woodlands, was referred to as the “new church out of town.” (It was still a rural area in 1820 when a fox was caught in the churchyard!) Funds for construction came from large numbers of poor Irish immigrants—at considerable personal sacrifice—and from several wealthy Catholic laymen, including Andrew Morris (an Irish immigrant) —the first Catholic ever to be elected to public office in New York State to serve on the Common Council—and Cornelius Heeney (another immigrant from Ireland), a business partner of John Jacob Astor. On June 8, 1809, Father Kohlmann officiated before an assembled crowd of 3,000 at the laying of the cornerstone for St. Patrick’s Cathedral—the second Roman Catholic Cathedral in America (Baltimore’s Cathedral was the first) and the second Catholic church in New York (after St. Peter’s).
The new Cathedral was the first house of worship in the United States to be dedicated to Ireland’s patron saint, Saint Patrick, who organized the Irish Church in the fifth century. Known as the Apostle of Ireland, Patrick was consecrated as Bishop circa 432. He traveled tirelessly throughout Ireland, preaching, writing, and teaching, converting chiefs and bards, gathering followers, establishing churches and schools, building monasteries, and performing miracles. Since specific rules for canonization were not set down until the tenth century, local veneration of St. Patrick evolved into his sainthood.
The new Cathedral was designed by Joseph Mangin, a French-born architect and engineer, who arrived in New York in 1745 and soon established a reputation as a skilled architect and builder. In 1802, Mangin, along with native- born architect John McComb Jr., won the competition for the design of New York’s present City Hall (completed in 1812) with their plans for an exquisite French Renaissance exterior and a splendid Federal-style interior.
Mangin designed a grand and magnificent structure for St. Patrick’s Cathedral—proclaiming the strength and presence of the Catholic community as a force within the city. At the time of construction, it was the largest church building in the city—over 120 feet long and 80 feet wide and rising to a height of 75 feet with an 85-foot inner vault. The Cathedral—with its massive rough-cut stone facade punctuated by niches for statuary, pointed-arch doorways, and a large tracery-ornamented gable window—was one of the first Gothic Revival churches in America. The interior space was marked by tall, clustered iron columns that divided the body of the church into three naves surmounted by Gothic arches. Painted wall surfaces and natural light streaming through tall windows added to the spiritual quality of the interior. The Cathedral formally opened on Ascension Day, May 4, 1815, with a crowd of 4,000 worshippers and dignitaries, including Mayor DeWitt Clinton, and a greater number overflowing into the streets.
The first Bishop appointed to the diocese was Irish-born Richard Luke Concanen.The Napoleonic Wars prevented him from reaching New York and he died in Italy in 1810. The work of governing as administrator of the diocese continued to be carried out by Father Kohlmann, who devoted himself to fund raising and overseeing construction of the Cathedral. He maintained those responsibilities until the arrival in November 1815 of the second Bishop, sixty-five-year-old John Connolly, an Irish Dominican theologian who was held in high repute by both Pius VI and Pius VII. Bishop Connolly directed the construction of several new churches in the diocese and founded an orphanage in a wood-frame building at 32 Prince Street, across from the Cathedral, that was staffed in 1817 by three Sisters of Charity sent to New York by Mother Elizabeth Ann Seton. Pierre Toussaint, a leading financial supporter, generously contributed funds to the orphanage for close to forty years.
The Sisters established St. Patrick’s School in 1822. The original orphanage and school building was replaced in 1826 by the present red-brick convent and school designed in the Federal style and distinguished by an exquisite doorway of the period. For more than 180 years, the Sisters of Charity continued their tradition of service— first in the orphanage and then in St. Patrick’s School. The school had educated generations of Irish, Italian, French, Hispanic, Chinese, and German children. St. Patrick’s School boasted a distinguished roster of graduates—leaders in business, film, theater, arts, teaching, and the full spectrum of vocations and professions. The school (which had been New York’s oldest surviving parochial school) was forced to close in 2010 due to insufficient enrollment. In 1823, Bishop Connolly invited Cuban-born Fr. Felix Varela to New York to start a pastoral ministry among poor Irish immigrants, who made up the majority of the 35,000 Catholics living in the city. Father Varela—a social activist and advocate of Cuban independence—served as pastor in several diocese churches and is best remembered for his staunch support for the Irish in the face of growing anti-Catholic sentiment.
Bishop Connolly’s entire episcopacy was plagued by a severe shortage of priests. He brought Fr. Michael O’Gorman (who he ordained in Ireland before leaving for New York) with him from Ireland, and in 1820, he ordained Fr. Richard Bulger (another Irishman) to the priesthood. Father Bulger thus was the first priest to be ordained in New York City. Fathers Bulger and O’Gorman regularly traveled to New Jersey, to upstate New York, and to Brooklyn on Long Island to celebrate Masses for the Catholics there, since there were no resident priests in those locations at that time. Both Father Bulger and Father O’Gorman became ill in November of 1824 as a result of tending to the sick and dying of the diocese, and they both passed away within a week of each other at their residence on Broadway. They had been living in the same residence as Bishop Connolly, and when they died, the Bishop, who officiated at both of their burials, caught a bad cold and he died a few months later in February of 1825. Fathers O’Gorman and Bulger (and other early priests of the diocese) were buried in the courtyard in front of the church. A commemorative bronze plaque was placed upon the gravesite in 2010.
At the time of Bishop Connolly’s death, the diocese was composed mainly of working class Irish parishioners. The appointment of his successor, Fr. John Dubois—a French educator and missionary—was viewed with disappointment by the Irish community. Forced out of France in 1791 by the French Revolution, Father Dubois arrived in America with letters of introduction from the Marquis de Lafayette to James Monroe and Patrick Henry. Father Dubois settled in Virginia, where he built a church and opened a school in Emmitsburg, Maryland, that became Mount St.Mary’s College. In 1826, when he was consecrated the third Bishop of New York, there were twelve churches in the diocese for a Catholic population of about 150,000, served by only eighteen priests. By 1837, the numbers had grown to thirty-eight churches and forty priests. Plagued by ill health, Bishop Dubois requested a coadjutor. In 1838, the Rev. John Joseph Hughes was elevated to the episcopy as Bishop of Basileopolis at St. Patrick’s Cathedral and was then appointed coadjutor bishop to Dubois. In the following year, he was made administrator-Apostolic of New York. Bishop Dubois died in 1842 at the age of seventy-eight and is buried in front of the Cathedral, as he had personally requested.
St. John Neumann
Six years before his death, Bishop Dubois had welcomed a twenty- five-year-old theological student named John Neumann to the diocese. Neumann—who was canonized by Pope Paul IV in 1977 as America’s first male saint—was born in Bohemia (now the Czech Republic) and attended seminary in Prague. Since his ordination had been delayed by the government, Neumann came to New York as a missionary. The young man was ordained to priesthood at St. Patrick’s on June 28, 1836, and sent to upstate New York to work among German-speaking Catholics. Renowned for his outstanding mission and pastoral work and for his holiness and charity, Neumann was appointed the fourth Bishop of Philadelphia in 1852, where he died in 1860.
The multitudes of Irish Catholics who arrived in New York in the 19th century were mainly uneducated peasants leaving behind an impoverished existence in their native homeland due to harsh British colonial rule. And, after 1845, they were also fleeing from the Great Hunger—the potato famines that killed more than one million Irish and drove some two million more to America. The new immigrants lived in squalor, crowded into rotting structures and wretched tenements, eking out a miserable living, and suffering from disease and extreme poverty. These Famine Irish turned in large numbers to the church for solace.
The fourth Bishop of St. Patrick’s, who succeeded Bishop Dubois in 1842, was himself the son of poor Irish farmers and weavers. In 1817, at age twenty, John Joseph Hughes (born in Annaloughan, County Tyrone)emigrated to the United States and briefly settled in Pennsylvania before entering Mount St. Mary’s College, where he was ordained to the priesthood in 1826. Father Hughes spent the next twelve years in Philadelphia serving as pastor of several churches and was widely admired for his skillful management, strong leadership qualities, and outspoken defense of the church. Arriving in New York in 1838, Father Hughes served first as coadjutor and later administrator-Apostolic of New York. He was appointed a bishop in 1842—the first prelate to be consecrated at St. Patrick’s Cathedral. Bishop Hughes faced two daunting challenges—presiding over a diocese that was experiencing unprecedented growth and protecting Catholics and their churches from the growing hostility of native-born Protestants.
Beginning in the 1830s, the city had experienced several outbreaks of violence led by nativists against Catholics. In 1831, the tiny, wood-frame structure of St. Mary’s Church (the third Catholic church in New York, organized in 1826) on Sheriff Street was burnt to the ground by arsonists. (A substantial stone church, still standing, was built to replace it in 1833 on Grand Street.) The burning of St. Mary’s Church compelled the Trustees of the Cathedral to approve the construction of the brick wall— which surrounds the church—in 1834. Frequent brawls and street riots between Protestants and Catholics led to the founding in 1836 of the Ancient Order of Hibernians (Latin for “Irish”) as a mutual benefit society and self- defense group. In the following years, nativist mobs had advanced on St. Patrick’s several times but were turned back after receiving reports that armed Irish defenders— posted by Bishop Hughes—were stationed along Prince Street and behind those brick walls which had been specifically constructed to protect the Cathedral.
In 1844, James Harper (of the famed Harper publishing family) was elected Mayor of New York as the candidate of the anti-immigrant American Republican Party. At the same time, Protestants and Irish Catholics in Philadelphia clashed in rioting that claimed the lives of some thirty Irishmen and resulted in the burning of Catholic churches and convents. Bishop Hughes vigorously defended the rights of Irish Catholics against this rising movement of bigotry and bloodshed. He organized thousands of Irish men to defend the Cathedral. As a massive anti-Catholic torchlight parade gathered in City Hall Park, ready to march up the Bowery to the Cathedral, he stationed sharpshooters on the protective walls surrounding the building. Bishop Hughes sent a letter to Mayor Harper warning that if any harm came to a single Catholic person or Catholic church, the city would be turned into “a second Moscow” (referring to the burning of Moscow during Napoleon’s invasion in 1812). The Bishop’s powerful message and forceful actions are credited with averting the anticipated violent anti-Catholic outbreak in New York.
In 1851, young men from the neighborhood around the Cathedral organized a militia regiment, known locally as the Second Regiment of Irish Volunteers. It was officially accepted as part of the New York State Militia and designated as the Sixty-Ninth Regiment. Commonly called the “Fighting Irish,” its green insignia was composed of a decorative shield flanked by two Irish wolfhounds standing on a ribbon inscribed with the Regimental motto, “Gentle When Stroked, Fierce When Provoked.” The Sixty-Ninth Regiment served in every campaign from Bull Run to Appomattox during the Civil War and fought in the Spanish-American War and the Mexican Border Campaign. Legendary hero Colonel William “Wild Bill” Donovan, chaplain Father Francis P. Duffy, and poet Joyce Kilmer were with the Regiment in bitter fighting in France during World War I. The “Fighting Sixty- Ninth” has been a fixture in the United States Army ever since and last saw action in Iraq and Afghanistan. Since 1907, the Regiment has been a unit of the New York Army National Guard.
Bishop Hughes was consecrated as Archbishop of New York in 1850 and continued a vigorous mission of building churches, schools, and hospitals. In 1842, when appointed bishop, he presided over a diocese of fifty churches, forty priests, and 200,000 Catholics. At his death in 1864, the numbers had increased to eighty-five churches, 150 priests, and a population of over 400,000 Catholics.
In a far-seeing move that many ridiculed at the time as “Hughes’ Folly,” the Archbishop proposed the construction of a new Cathedral in an undeveloped area far uptown on Fifth Avenue between 50th and 51st streets. Andrew Morris and Cornelius Heeney had purchased the rural property in 1810 on behalf of Father Kohlmann for the sum of $11,000 for the use of the Jesuit boys’ school that he had started downtown. In 1812, he established a school for girls near the boys’ school, run by the Ursuline nuns. The schools were no longer in existence when Archbishop Hughes laid the cornerstone for the new Cathedral on August 15, 1858.
During the Civil War, Archbishop Hughes served as the envoy of President Lincoln on a successful overseas mission to dissuade European countries from supporting the Confederacy. In gratitude, Lincoln petitioned Pope Pius IX to name Archbishop Hughes as America’s first Cardinal. But the death of this indomitable leader in January 1864 came before that honor could come to pass. His memory was honored by tributes from President Lincoln and other statesmen and his body viewed by over 200,000 common people who solemnly came to worship in the Cathedral. He was entombed in the crypts below the Cathedral and remained there until the “New” Cathedral was completed uptown—his remains were then removed to a crypt there in 1883. The Cathedral uptown holds the remains of all of the archbishops and cardinals that have served the Archdiocese since the death of Archbishop Hughes.
Archbishop Hughes’ successor in 1864 as the second Archbishop of the diocese was Bishop John McCloskey. He was born in Brooklyn in 1810 to Irish immigrant parents (his parents are both interred in the cemetery surrounding the Old Cathedral) and, at age eleven, entered Mount St. Mary’s College in Emmitsburg, distinguishing himself as an outstanding student. After graduation, the fifteen-year-old returned to New York with the intention of pursuing a career in law. But after a near-fatal accident in 1827, the young man decided instead to study for the priesthood. Young McCloskey was under the guardianship of Cornelius Heeney (who dedicated his fortune to the care of poor children at the end of his life), and the young man was taught Latin by Thomas S. Brady (buried in the crypts below the Cathedral). He was taught proper English elocution by Charlotte Melmoth, the first Shakespearean actress to come to America, who opened a school in Brooklyn when her acting career ended. (She was buried in an unmarked grave in the churchyard cemetery surrounding the Cathedral.) McCloskey returned to Emmitsburg as a seminarian and later taught Latin at the college. In 1830, he was ordained to the priesthood at St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral and remained until 1834 before taking a leave to study in Rome. Upon his return, Father McCloskey was instrumental in starting a seminary in Nyack under Bishop Dubois. (The seminary was destroyed by fire just prior to its opening in the 1830s. Arson was suspected, but the case was never investigated fully.) Father McCloskey became the first president of St. John’s College (later renamed Fordham University), founded by Archbishop Hughes in 1841.
Reverend McCloskey served as coadjutor bishop of New York from 1844–1847 and first Bishop of Albany from 1847 to 1864 before his appointment as Bishop to the New York diocese. Later raised to archbishop, he was highly respected as a pioneer in Catholic education and a clergyman of great spiritual strength and humility. During the tenure of Archbishop McCloskey, a disaster of tragic proportions struck on the night of October 6, 1866, when a catastrophic fire destroyed all but the outer walls of the Old Cathedral.
The five-alarm fire began in the packing room (filled with straw and wood shavings) of a porcelain dealer at 44 Crosby Street and quickly spread to nearby buildings. Showers of sparks fell on the lath and plaster roof of St. Patrick’s, which was soon a blazing inferno. As huge fragments of the burning roof crashed down into the sanctuary, filling the building with flames and smoke, a crowd of parishioners, led by Fathers McGeehan and Mullen, rushed inside to remove precious religious articles. They were successful in rescuing the Blessed Sacrament, vestments, several vessels, a number of oil paintings, and silver candlesticks just moments before the entire structure was engulfed by fire.
Archbishop McCloskey resolved to rebuild the Cathedral and commissioned architect Henry Engelbert (known for his designs of the College of Mount Saint Vincent in Riverdale) to reconstruct St. Patrick’s. Engelbert designed a severely plain facade of smooth brown stucco, facing Mott Street, lacking the detail and grace of the original exterior. The splendid interior, however, was rebuilt with a ceiling of ribbed vaults and arches carried on clustered piers. An altar screen of carved figures, representing the Apostles, is surmounted by a pointed arch stained-glass window above a painting of the figure of Christ. Completed in less than two years, the Cathedral was rededicated by Archbishop McCloskey on the Feast of St. Patrick—March 17, 1868.
The foremost ecclesiastical event in the history of St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral took place in the restored structure on April 27, 1875, with the investiture of Archbishop McCloskey as the first American to be named Cardinal. Several Papal emissaries, seven archbishops, twenty bishops, hundreds of priests, and thousands of laymen attended the ceremony of solemnity and celebration. After its construction was completed, His Eminence John Cardinal McCloskey moved his seat uptown to the magnificent new St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Fifth Avenue, which was formally dedicated on May 25, 1879. The historic St. Patrick’s downtown then became a simple parish church.
Since that time, the church has remained the heart of an active parish with an ever-changing population. (Parish boundaries run from Wooster Street to the Bowery, between Hester Street and East Fourth Street.) Beginning in the 1880s, Italian immigrants poured into the area centered on Mulberry Street that came to be known as Little Italy. (Earlier in the 1800s, Lorenzo Da Ponte, who had written librettos for several of Mozart’s operas, lived on Spring Street, and his opulent Funeral Mass took place in the Cathedral in August of 1838.) Large numbers of Hispanic and Chinese newcomers to America make up a significant portion of the present population. Recent years have seen the transformation of previously commercial areas, such as SoHo and NoHo, into residential communities largely populated by people in the arts and media. Currently, many young people are making the entire area their home. Their youthful energy has breathed much life into St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral parish.
As the 200th anniversary of the laying of the cornerstone of the Old Cathedral approached, Msgr. Donald Sakano, who had been appointed pastor of the venerable church in 2007, began to plan for what would be a six-year Bicentennial Celebration (since it took six years for the church o be completed in the early 1800s). Monsignor Sakano marshaled the assistance of historians familiar with church and city history as well as people in the parish community for the purpose of putting together a celebration that would highlight the great history of the church.
A slogan for the Bicentennial Celebration (which we are currently in the midst of) was selected: “Embracing the future as we celebrate our past.”
The Bicentennial Celebration of St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral began with a Mass celebrated by His Excellency, Timothy M. Dolan, Archbishop of New York, held in the Old Cathedral on June 7, 2009, commemorating the 200th anniversary of the laying of the church’s cornerstone. Various church and civic leaders attended Mass and the related events. A parade was held in which, among other events, (a) the Ancient Order of Hibernians, or “AOH,” marched to the church and stood shoulder-to-shoulder around its perimeter wall in commemoration of the AOH’s defense of the church against physical attack by the nativist, anti-Catholic “Know-Nothings” at the request of then-Bishop (later Archbishop) “Dagger John” Hughes and (b) the April 1861 parade of the famed “Fighting 69th” regiment—a unit of the Irish Brigade—as it marched off to the Civil War was re-enacted.
At that same June 7, 2009, Mass celebrating the laying of the cornerstone of the church, Archbishop Dolan announced from the pulpit that an application would be made to the Holy See requesting that St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral be awarded basilica status. This honor is bestowed upon churches that have historical or other kinds of significance for the Catholic Church and which affords certain ceremonial privileges for a church so honored.
It did not take a long time for the application to be honored; His Excellency Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan announced from the altar of the “new” Cathedral at the annual St. Patrick’s Day Mass on March 17, 2010, that His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI had awarded Basilica status to the Old Cathedral, effective (fittingly) on March 17, 2010.
All of the people who have had connections over the years with the Old Cathedral are rightfully proud to learn that this wonderful old church has been so honored by His Holiness Pope Benedict. Old St. Patrick’s is the only church within The Archdiocese of New York to have ever attained Basilica status—a fitting honor for such a historically and ecclesiastically significant edifice within the great City of New York.
Deeply rooted in the community, The Basilica of St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral continues its tradition of providing for the spiritual needs of Catholics of all ages. In 2013, the Basilica once again became a place where Roman Catholics could be buried on the island of Manhattan. A columbarium was erected early in the year for the purpose of accepting the cremated remains of parishioners and friends of the Basilica, and more columbaria are in the building stages as of this writing. Once again, Old St. Patrick’s Cathedral is an honored burial place for the faithful departed of New York City—the exact purpose that the pioneer Catholic community of New York City had originally intended for the land when it was purchased in 1801.
A little excerpt from my favourite piece of music. Bach's Chaconne for Classical Guitar. And yes, it is as difficult as it looks.
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Helluva Shot contest winner 20th November
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আন্তর্জাতিক মাতৃভাষা দিবস
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21 February
International Mother Language Day
Bangladesh
Humble tribute to all language martyrs
Shaheed Minar (Martyr Monument) commemorates the 21 February 1952 Bengali Language Movement demonstration.
DOGGIE LANGUAGE, THE BOOK!
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