Saturday, September 18, 2010

Standing tall through tough times.

Bangalore fort:

The name Bangalore stems from Bengaluru, in a reference to it in a Ganga inscription, circa890AD, found near the Begur temple, Begur. Kempegowda, a fuedatory of the Vijayanagar empire, built and fortified the city in 1537AD, and gave it its name, The city was leased to the mysore king chikadevaraya by the Mughals, in 1689AD. He expanded the existing fort to the south and build the Sri Venkataraman temple within its boundaries.

Hyder Ali secured Bengaluru as jagir in 1758, further expanded, and strengthened it by 1761AD.

Lord Cornwallis captured the fortified city in 1791AD., but handed it back to Tipu Sultan a year later as per the Srirangapattana Treaty.

The original fort was a oval in plan, with round bastions and huge gateways at importnant places. Delhi bagilu and yelahanka bagilu in the North, Ulsur bagilu in the East, Kanakanahalli Bagilu and Mysore Bagilu n te south and kengeri Bagilu in the West. Remnants of these are still in existence. It was surrounded by a dry moat.

Only one part of thefort now remains intact, consisting of a dungeon and a small ganesha temple. The three successive gateways, linked the Royal enclosure to the civilian arean. The granite walls are sloping with beautifuk stucoo carvings. A tablet embedded on the wall indicates that this was where Lord Cornwallis breached the fort, when he took posession of it.

The dungeon bears witness to the confinement of Sir David Braid and other Englishmen, prior to 1785AD, on a tablet placed there.

Information source: ASI text at the location

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Saturday, September 11, 2010

Happy Ganesha Festival


                               वक्रतुंड  महाकाय सूर्यकोटि  समप्रभा
                              निर्विघ्नं  कुरु  मे  देवा सर्व  कार्येशु  सर्वदा

Wednesday, September 8, 2010

Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Monday, September 6, 2010

Sunday, September 5, 2010

Saturday, September 4, 2010

Thursday, September 2, 2010

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

Saturday, August 28, 2010

Friday, August 27, 2010

Sunday, August 15, 2010

Saturday, August 14, 2010

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Mirror image

The two statues are on opposite pillars. Amazing accuracy by the sculptor.

Monday, August 2, 2010

Sri Ranganatha swamy


A nice calm getaway, 60kms from bangalore,
SriRanganathaswamy at Rangasthala, chikaballapur is the second of the three Ranganathaswamy idols. The other two are in SriRangapattana,Mysore and SriRangam, TN.
The temple was built during vijayanagara empire.

Monday, July 26, 2010

Saturday, July 24, 2010

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Thursday, June 10, 2010

Monday, May 31, 2010

Saturday, May 29, 2010

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Friday, May 21, 2010