The Devunigutta Temple ("God’s hill" in Telugu) or Shiva Temple, Kothur is a Hindu temple near Kothur village in the Mulugu District, Telangana, India, some 60 km east of Warangal. Located in a remote forested plateau, it was probably built c. 6th century CE by the Vakatakas. It was first recorded in 2012, in an abandoned state, by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI); however, it did not come to wider attention until images were posted on social media in 2017.
The temple now consists of a square sanctuary with a shikhara or vimana tower, with the sanctuary open to the interior of the tower, and a low wall enclosing an entrance court. An unusual profusion of relief sculptures, though very worn, are located both inside and outside. Visiting international scholars, as well as local people, have expressed concern about the condition of the building. Local voluntary groups cleared the vegetation growing on the actual structure, although by 2020 much had regrown. In late 2019 the Archaeological Survey of India was ready to restore the temple, but was awaiting permission from the local authorities.
An image of Narashima was installed after 2012, and the temple is in informal worship.
Rediscovery
Although apparently reported to the ASI in 2012, the temple attracted little attention until photographs were posted on social media in 2017. An Assistant Director of Archaeology and Museums for Telangana state visited the temple in August 2017, and "submitted a report stressing the need to conserve the temple", but as of early 2019 no action had been taken.
A German art historian, Corinna Wessels-Mevissen, who saw the temple in 2018, said “The temple is a unique blend of styles visible in Udayagiri and Scandagiri in Odisha and also a bit of Amaravati like (Andhra Pradesh) architecture.”
A British expert, Adam Hardy, who visited the temple in 2019, described it as "a unique temple with a rare architecture full of imagery and a depiction of a heavenly vision in sculpture", though he dismissed claims of resemblance to Angkor Wat, saying Devunigutta was in any case older, probably from the 6th century. He was reported as saying "It’s high time the Archaeological Department take the necessary steps to protect the temple which is beginning to collapse."
Corinna Wessels-Mevissen gave a brief report on the temple to a conference in Naples in 2018, and she and Adam Hardy published a paper on it in 2019. Laxshmi Greaves, a colleague of Hardy at Cardiff University, visited the temple separately in 2018, and published an account.
Architecture
The temple has a single enclosed space, about 6 metres square, and now 7 metres high; it is missing the kalasha urn or amalaka that would once have topped it. It is built of blocks of sandstone that have eroded considerably. The blocks are closely fitted, but there are traces of mortar, and a few of reddish stucco, which probably originally covered all the reliefs, and may have been painted. Apart from erosion of the stone, the temple seems generally well-preserved, apart from damage above the entrance and a "long vertical cleft" running down the west wall, which has disrupted the left side of the exterior relief panel with Ardhanarishvara (illustrated). The low wall marking an enclosure in front of the temple is probably not original, and is rather crudely constructed of similar blocks, perhaps originally used for another structure.
A very unusual feature in Hindu temple architecture is that the sanctuary has no ceiling, and visitors can look straight up inside the corbelled shikara/vimana. This is a feature shared with the Gop Temple of about 550 on the other side of India in Gujarat. Usually the flat and unornamented ceiling of the sanctuary is an essential part of the "cave and mountain" architectural metaphor of a Hindu temple. This may relate to apparently wooden temples with octagonal towers seen in some Buddhist reliefs. Wessels-Mevissen and Hardy conclude the temple's "unique architecture provides a missing link between early timber structures and the Dråvida tradition".
The tower has four tiers, "defined by relief-encrusted string courses", which on the upper tiers are "divided rather haphazardly into bays by plain pilasters". The tower is topped by a low corbelled dome. There is a central projection or bhadra extending across most of each face of the tower. At the lowest level each side except for the east entrance has "a spectacular mythological panel" above a simple moulding. Pilasters make a number of small aedicules, and there are gavakshas at many places, often with faces inside them.