Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Inside Kumbhalgarh's walls

Ancient temples are scattered across the landscape inside the walls of the fortress.  According to Wikipedia there are 300 Jain, and over 60 Hindu temples, some of them still in use today.    

This young girl is returning to her village with a bundle of green leaves that is larger than herself.  She had been out gathering to feed the cows they keep.

Some of the temples were of a different variety than we see in Tamil Nadu, this one had some very intricate lattice type carvings. 


As we started our short climb up to the top of the hill, we passed through another set of imposing gates, complete with some very wicked looking spikes mounted on it's face.
The Royal palace that sits on top of the hill is the most recent construction, as each succeding ruler built on top, or added to what had been built by the previous kings.  The result is a maze of passages and stairways, some of which was intentional to confuse any invading forces. 


Former residences were abandonded as the Maharajas continued to build up to the sky. 
 It is interesting to note the stones projecting out from the side of the stairs.  We saw these scattered about and concluded they must have been used for holding torches.

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