29th December 2019.
This visit to this cave was a part of Temples and Hero stones
Visit around Vaniyambadi in Tirupattur District, scheduled on 29th
December 2019. This happened to be the
last heritage Visit of this year. It is believed that this cave was once
occupied by the Jain monks and a school was functioning. Also this hill was
called as ”Arumpavi malai”, which got corrupted to the present name of
Armamalai. The paintings and this cave was
identified during 1960’s- 70s. The same was recorded in the Tamil Nadu
Archaeological Department web site also.
On reaching the Village Malayambattu, we didn’t know the path to
the cave. A school boy came to our rescue and he took us to this cave. It was
about 2 KM walk on the bunds of the fields, to reach the foot hills. Few steps
are cut on the rock and few steps are constructed to reach the Cave situated
about 50 meters from the ground level. The cave is about 80 meter in length and
10 meter wide. The cave was divided in to three parts. The first part is empty
and the surface is flat and there is no beds found. We found a Lotus pedestal
with 10th to 11th Century Tamil inscription. There is also three pieces of a Dwarapalaka’s
bas-relief carved on a flat stone.
The second part of the cave, rooms are constructed with
mud and unbaked bricks. The walls are raised up to the ceiling about 3 meter
high. The rooms are small and difficult to live within.
The third part of the cave’s surface is not
uniform. The ceilings has the patches of
paintings similar to Sittannavasal and Bagh Caves. Only few patches are recognizable like,
flowers, leaves, lotus, a man, a bird etc..
The Colours like, red, green, blue, black and white are used.
The cave is now being used as a cattle shed and Bar
by the drunkards.
After seeing the cave I have my own doubts.
- How the cave was identified as Jains Cave ?.
- Only with the two fragments of Sculptures, is it possible to judge a monument existed in that cave ? ( No other structures are found )
- May be the paintings can be compared with Sittannavasal. But this may not be a proof to come to a conclusion that the cave belongs to Jainism.
Experts are requested to throw some light on this.
HOW TO REACH:
The Cave is in a Hill called as Arma malai about 2 KM from the
Village called Malayambattu.
Malayambattu is about 10 KM from Vaniyambadi, 11 KM from Ambur
and 8.3 KM from Vinnamangalam.
---OM SHIVAYA NAMA---
What does the inscriptions on the broken square stone with lotus carved on it reveal ?
ReplyDeleteThats what experts has to explored..
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