Nilachala, also rendered Niladri is a region corresponding to

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 ...

, in the Indian state of

Odisha Odisha (), formerly Orissa (List of renamed places in India, the official name until 2011), is a States and union territories of India, state located in East India, Eastern India. It is the List of states and union territories of India by ar ...

Description

According to the

Skanda Purana The ''Skanda Purana'' ( IAST: Skanda Purāṇa) is the largest '' Mukhyapurāṇa'', a genre of eighteen Hindu religious texts. The text contains over 81,000 verses, and is of Shaivite literature, titled after Skanda, a son of Shiva and Parv ...

, King Indradyumna of

Avanti Avanti (in Italian, meaning 'ahead', 'forward', or 'before', and also an unrelated Sanskrit name) may refer to: Vehicles * Studebaker Avanti, a model of automobile built by Studebaker * Avanti II, a successor model made by Avanti Motor Corporati ...

is said to have dreamt of the deity Nilamadhava. The king is regarded to have dispatched many priests and messengers in the search of this elusive deity, regarded as a form of

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 ( ...

. Finally, Vidyapati, one of the priests of Indradyumna, located the

image An image or picture is a visual representation. An image can be Two-dimensional space, two-dimensional, such as a drawing, painting, or photograph, or Three-dimensional space, three-dimensional, such as a carving or sculpture. Images may be di ...

of Nilamadhava at Nilachala, at the sacred region of Purushottama Kshetra, and took the news back to the king. The image of the deity vanished before Indradyumna's arrival. After being propitiated,

is stated to have offered instructions for the construction of the

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 ...

of Puri, also in Nilachala.

Hypotheses

Hypothesis 1

Indologist Indology, also known as South Asian studies, is the academic study of the history and cultures, languages, and literature of the Indian subcontinent, and as such is a subset of Asian studies. The term ''Indology'' (in German, ''Indologie'') is ...

and Jagannath cult researcher, Heinrich von Stietencron in "''The Advent of Vishnuism in Orissa: An Outline of its History According to Archaeological and Epigraphical Sources from the Gupta Period up to 1135 AD.''" in A. Eschmann et al., The Cult of Jagannath and the Regional Tradition of Orissa, Delhi: Manohar, pp. 1–30, hypothesizes the actual existence of a mountain at Puri in the past and said:

Hypothesis 2

Another hypothesis regarding the naming of Puri as 'Nilachala' has been advanced by the noted historian, Dr. Krushna Chandra Panigrahi, in his "''History of Orissa''", pp. 338–339. It has been argued that no mountain existed at the Jagannath shrine, and:

""Then the Bhaumas came from
Assam Assam (, , ) is a state in Northeast India, northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra Valley, Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . It is the second largest state in Northeast India, nor ...
in the first part of the eighth century A.D., ruled over
Orissa Odisha (), formerly Orissa ( the official name until 2011), is a state located in Eastern India. It is the eighth-largest state by area, and the eleventh-largest by population, with over 41 million inhabitants. The state also has the thir ...
, obtained the shrine from the Savaras, got the temple built on the spot and gave it the name Nilachala, which was the name of the famous shrine of
Kamakhya Kamakhya (), a mother goddess, is a Shakta Tantric deity; considered to be the embodiment of '' Kama (desire)'', she is regarded as the goddess of desire. Her abodeKamakhya Temple is located in the Kamarupa region of Assam, India."Seated on ...
in their homeland of
Assam Assam (, , ) is a state in Northeast India, northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra Valley, Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . It is the second largest state in Northeast India, nor ...
."."

References

Sources

*
Shri Jaganath Temple at Puri
*Das, Bikram: Domain Of Jagannath - A Historical Study, BR Publishing Corporation. *Das, Suryanarayan: Jagannath Through the Ages, Sanbun Publishers, New Delhi. (2010

*Eschmann, A., H. Kulke and G.C. Tripathi (Ed.): The Cult of Jagannath and the Regional Tradition of Orissa, 1978, Manohar, Delhi. *Hunter, W.W. Orissa: The Vicissitudes of an Indian Province under Native and British Rule, Vol. I, Chapter-III, 1872. *Kulke, Hermann in The Anthropology of Values, Berger Peter (ed.): Yayati Kesari revisited, Dorling Kindrsley Pvt. Ltd., (2010). *Mahapatra, K.N.: Antiquity of Jagannath Puri as a place of pilgrimage, OHRJ, Vol.III, No.1, April, 1954, p. 17. *Mishra, K.C.: The Cult of Jagannath, Calcutta, 1971. *Mishra, Narayan and Durga Nandan: Annals and antiquities of the temple of Jagannath, Sarup & Sons, New Delhi, 2005

*Panigrahi, K. C.: ''History of Orissa'', Kitab Mahal, Cuttack, 2nd ed. (1981) *Patnaik, H.S.: ''Jagannath, His Temple, Cult and Festivals'', Aryan Books International, New Delhi, 1994, . *Patnaik, N.: ''Sacred Geography of Puri : Structure and Organisation and Cultural Role of a Pilgrim Centre'', Year: 2006, *Starza-Majewski, Olgierd M. L: ''The Jagannatha temple at Puri and its Deities'', Amsterdam, 1983. *Starza-Majewski, Olgierd Maria Ludwik: ''The Jagannatha Temple At Puri: Its Architecture, Art And Cult'', E.J. Brill (Leiden and New York). 993

*Stietencron, Heinrich von: "''The Advent of Vishnuism in Orissa: An Outline of its History According to Archaeological and Epigraphical Sources from the Gupta Period up to 1135 AD.''" in Eschmann, A. et al., The Cult of Jagannath and the Regional Tradition of Orissa, Delhi: Manohar, pp. 1–30 Jagannath Hinduism in Odisha {{DEFAULTSORT:Nilachala

Description

Hypotheses

Hypothesis 1

Hypothesis 2

See also

References

Sources