Purushottama Jagannatha and His Temple
Contents: Preface. 1. Antiquity of the Purushottama Kshetra. 2. Historians on the date and builder of the temple of Purushottama-Jagannatha. 3. Yamanika Tirtha and the first wooden form in Sri Purushottama Kshetra. 4. Date of the construction of the temple of Purushottama-Jagannatha. 5. Chodaganga and Purushottama Kshetra. 6. Sri Purushottama and Sri Jagannatha. 7. Anangabhima III and Purushottama Jagannatha Temple. 8. Worship of Balabhadra in the Purushottama Jagannatha Temple. 9. Art and architecture of the Jagannatha temple. 10. Navakalevara and Ratha Yatra in the Purushottama Kshetra. 11. Gita Govinda of Jayadeva and the Temple of Purushottama-Jagannatha. 12. Kingship of Purushottama-Jagannatha. 13. The management of the Temple of Purushottama-Jagannatha. 14. Repair and conservation of the Jagannatha Temple. 15. The establishment (the priests) in Jagannatha Temple. Appendices. Bibliography. Index. Plates.
In this volume an attempt has been made to provide a connected account of the origin and development of the Kshetra of Purushottama Jagannatha and it is the outcome of my sustained researches on the cult of Jagannatha from 1980s to 2024. Some of the views were earlier published in Odia and English journals and they are now being used with sufficient revisions and elaborations. It is based on a reinterpretation of traditional narratives in literary and Puranic texts and epigraphic records. It describes the origin and development of Purushottama Kshetra on the seashore of Puri. It also presents an essay on the construction of a gigantic temple for Purushottama Jagannatha and the installation of the deities (in the form of Chaturddha Daru Murtti-Jagannatha, Balabahdra, Subhadra and Sudarshana) on the basis of an interpretation of epigraphic and literary narratives. Last but not the least it contains several other aspects like the repair and conservation of the temple, pilgrims, the nature of Madalapanji, the famous chronicle of Jagannath temple and the management of Jagannath temple in the colonial phase.
