Notes on Vellore

Here is a link to the history of Vellore and the fort.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vellore

Apparently, Vellore was the site of the a sepoy mutiny in India(in 1806). This was news to me.

The details of the mutiny are pretty similar to the later one in 1857, though much smaller in scale. The same pattern repeats :English officers unaware or insensitive to their soldiers concerns, Religious differences, local rulers stepping in to provide nominal leadership, brutal violence and reprisals.

And I thought that 1857 was the first (and only) sepoy rebellion. There was an earlier (and somewhat smaller) rebellion in Vizag in 1780.

The temple is built in the Vijayanagara Style, and the fort has been controlled by the Nayaks, the Sultan of Bijapur, the Marathas, the Arcot Nawabs and the British. The temple is quite nicely maintained. I walked around the fort walls, and unfortunately, they are not as clean as they could be. There were some cleaning efforts going on, hopefully they have been completed.

There is also a small musuem in the fort complex. The musuem has some interesting displays. It has some Veerakkals dating from the chola periods. Veerakkals are stone steles that commomerate the death of a hero. I forgot to take photographs of these, unfortunately.

There are also some bronze swords, dating to about 3000 years ago and some more modern swords (tulwars, a couple of patas, and tulwar-sized khukri. There are some paintings and sculptures dating from the pallava era to the chola era. There was an interesting display showing the differences between the different sculptural styles.

The Musuem at Vellore Fort

This is a chart I found at the musuem that points out the salient differences between the sculptures of the Chozhas, the Pallavas and the Vijayanagara kings. The writing is in Tamil, though :-)




These bronze swords were apparently evacuated from the locality. They are from about 1000 BCE apparently.




This was a collection at the musuem.
Just to give an idea of size, the walking-stick sword is about 2.5 ft tall.
The fifth sword from the right (third from left) is a pata sword. This is a characteristically Indian gauntlet sword(The grip is perpendicular to the blade). Pretty funky looking, I wonder how they were used..
Also visible are some standard tulwars and some tulwars with firangi blades (straight european swords fitted with tulwar hilts).
There was no information on the provenance of these swords.

A summary of the sculptures at the Jalakanteswara Temple

Weapons
The weapons in these sculptures have been most interesting.
We have
- The katar - carried by the footsoldier under the second horseman
- The Straight Sword with a tulwar grip (a Khanda?) - Carried by the second horseman
- A dagger - Carried by multiple people.
These are standard south-indian weapons and might be expected in sculptures of this era and region.

We also have some really curious weapons here.
- The sword carried by the first horseman looks curiously like a yataghan, a Turkish sword.
- The recurved swords carried by the footsoldiers in the second picture couldn't be identified.
- The guy riding the lion in the second picture seems to be carrying a khukri.

This is interesting. Are these representations of Indian warriors who carried these weapons or is it their equivalent of fantasy swords (Let's stick these sculptures with those weird swords that that trader dude is always talking about:)).

Clothing/Armor

The horsemen are wearing a kulavi (a traditional headdress of the Vijayanagara Period). A curious thing about the horsemen is that while they seem to be carrying weapons, they are wearing no armor. In fact, one can even see the folds of the dhoti on the horsemen's legs. I don't think that anyone would be dumb enough to wear no armor, if they were going into combat. So, either it must be a sculptural convention or some kind of parade is being depicted.
The foot soldiers on the second pictures seem to be wearing some kind of lamellar armor.

One more horseman

This horseman is pretty much a mirror image of the previous horseman. The only difference is that his swords are the standard khandas : straight swords with tulwar hilts.
The warrior under the horse in front is armed with a katar in his left hand and whatever remains of a sword in his right hand.

Three guys with funky swords

These three men are interesting because they hold weapons not normally associated with South India. The little guy on the lion holds a khukri, and the two men are holding recurved swords. The two men are wearing what seems to be lamellar (scale) armour reaching down to their knees.
The characteristic indian 'tulwar hilt' (tight-fitting hilt with a disk pommel) can be seen on all these weapons. For whatever reason, this seems to be the most favored hilt-type in India, if the sculptures and pieces in musuems are any indication.

Three men and the tiger

This is a close-up of the tiger(or maybe a leopard)-killing scene under the sculpture of the horseman. Three men are attacking the tiger. The man closest to the camera has just stuck one sword through the tiger and we can actually see the tip coming out of the tiger's flank. The other hand holds what seems to be a katar which is also in the tiger. The man in the center has a short spear and the third man (hidden from view) is also attacking the tiger.

I wonder if this is a simple depiction of a tiger hunt or if it commomerates the story of the founder of the Hoysalas. The Hoysalas ruled much of South India prior to the Vijayanagara Empire and the founders of the Vijayanagara Empire (Harihara and Bukka) were commanders under the last Hoysala king. . Hoy Sa'la meaning "strike Sa'la!", were the words spoken to Sa'la ( legendary head of this dynasty) to kill the tiger. Then again, if that were the case, it would probably show just one guy killing the tiger, to further enhance his heroism. So, in all probability it is just a simple tiger hunt.

The Horseman at the Jalakanteswara Temple, Vellore

This sculpture is in the mandapam of the Jalakanteswara Temple inside the Vellore Fort.
The fort and the temple were built by the Nayak ruler of the area in the early 16th century.

This horseman has a dagger, a short bow in a bow-quiver, and a long sword along the side of the horse. This kind of armament (bow for long-range skirmishing and sword for close-range) has been the standard equipment for light cavalry across the world. The sword is, interestingly enough a recurved sword(like the gurkha khukri or the turkish yataghan) and not the khanda style straight sword shown most commonly in Indian sculpture. The soldier under the horse's foot is armed with an identical sword and a targe of some sort.

The headgear is similar to the headgear of the Vijayanagara kingdom (the kulavi). That is not too surprising since the nayak kings were chieftains who ruled on behalf of the Vijayanagara kings.

That is all I have from this particular sculpture. Any further details are welcome :-)

I took another picture of the three men attacking the tiger, and that will be discussed in the next post.