Aruna Stambha (Sun Pillar) is a sixteen-sided tall monolithic chlorite stone Pillar having the idol of Aruna (Charioteer of

Sun The Sun is the star at the centre of the Solar System. It is a massive, nearly perfect sphere of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core, radiating the energy from its surface mainly as visible light a ...

) on the top. It is about away from the Singhdwara (Lion Gateway) of

Jagannath Temple The Jagannath Temple is a Hindu temple dedicated to the god Jagannath, a form of Vishnu in Hinduism. It is located in Puri in the state of Odisha, situated on the eastern coast of India. As per temple records, King Indradyumna of Avanti (reg ...

in Puri.

It is an important Landmark of

Puri Puri, also known as Jagannath Puri, () is a coastal city and a Nagar Palika, municipality in the state of Odisha in eastern India. It is the district headquarters of Puri district and is situated on the Bay of Bengal, south of the state ca ...

and the pilgrims and devotees worship it with great reverence. The Stambha has a magnificent base carved with military scenes and other figures. Its Capitol is ornamented by a series of lotus petals. The monolithic shafts nearly in circumference is sixteen sided. Above this are two gradually diminishing square slabs surmounted by the idol of Aruna in the act of praying to the god Sun. The column is about in height. The whole Stambha is a monument of great beauty.

History

According to

Madala Panji The Madala Panji is a chronicle of the Jagannath Temple, Puri, Odisha, India. It describes the historical events of Odisha related to Lord Jagannath and the Jagannath Temple. The ''Madala Panji'' dates from the 12th century. However other scholars ...

, Chronicle of Jagannath Temple, mentioned that the Aruna Stambha was brought from the

Konark Konark is a medium-sized town in the Puri district in the state of Odisha, India. It lies on the coast by the Bay of Bengal, 65 kilometres from the state capital Bhubaneswar. It is the site of the 13th-century Konark Sun Temple, Sun Temple, also ...

(Sun temple) during the reign of Bhoi king ''Dibyasingha Deva II'' by the

Maratha The Marathi people (; Marathi: , ''Marāṭhī lōk'') or Marathis (Marathi: मराठी, ''Marāṭhī'') are an Indo-Aryan ethnolinguistic group who are native to Maharashtra in western India. They natively speak Marathi, an Indo-A ...

guru 'Brahmachari Gosain' and erected here in front of Singhadwara. In 1815 the artists of

Colin Mackenzie Colonel Colin Mackenzie (1754–8 May 1821) was a Scottish army officer in the British East India Company who later became the first Surveyor General of India. He was a collector of antiquities and an orientalist and an indologist. He sur ...

preparing a sketch of the Pillar at Puri on 26 April. The Pillar seems to have been removed to Puri in the last quarter of the 18th century. From the Vedic times, Surya is taken to be identical with

Vishnu Vishnu (; , , ), also known as Narayana and Hari, is one of the Hindu deities, principal deities of Hinduism. He is the supreme being within Vaishnavism, one of the major traditions within contemporary Hinduism, and the god of preservation ( ...

. Hence it was quite appropriate to place in front of the temple of Vishnu-Jagannath at Puri.

References

{{reflist, refs= {{cite book , author=Behera, Karuna Sagar , year=1996 , title=Konarak: Religion, history, and architecture , url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OfDVAAAAMAAJ&q=aruna+stambha , publisher=Aryan Books International , isbn=978-81-7305-074-9 {{cite book , author=Das, J.P. , year=1994 , title=Diurnal Rites and Other Poems , publisher=Sahitya Akademi , isbn=978-81-7201-533-6 , page=6 , url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8xA9JTM3C2EC&pg=PA6 {{cite book , author=Manti, J.C. , date=22 August 2014 , title=The Saga of Jagannatha and Badadeula at Puri (Story of Lord Jagannatha and his temple) , publisher=Vij Books India Pvt Ltd , isbn=978-93-82652-45-8 , page=51 , url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QweqCQAAQBAJ&pg=PA51 {{cite book , author=Das, Suryanarayan , year=2010 , title=Lord Jagannath , publisher=Sanbun Publishers , isbn=978-93-80213-22-4 , page=56 , url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gFn8wSDfSxEC&pg=PA56 {{cite book , author=Behera, Karuna Sagar , year=2005 , title=Konark – The Black Pagoda , publisher=Publications Division Ministry of Information & Broadcasting , isbn=978-81-230-2997-9 , page=119 , url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aNuSDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT119 {{cite book , title=Bonding with the Lord: Jagannath, popular culture and community formation , date=18 November 2019 , publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing , isbn=978-93-88414-53-1 , page=206 , url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XN7FDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT206 Jagannath Temple Complex Archaeological monuments in Odisha History of Odisha Puri Surya temples