The International Jaina Style? Māru-Gurjara Temples Under the Solaṅkīs, throughout India and in the Diaspora

Introduction

The spatial layout of Jaina temples generally follows a common approach to structuring sacred and ritual space, which is not unique to a specific geographical region or period, but typical of Jaina sacred architecture as a whole.[1] In the surface decorations of façades and other building elements, however, the edifices usually reflect the local style prevalent during a given period and utilize locally available building materials.

While this is the general rule, there are some noteworthy exceptions where styles characteristic of a certain period or locality have consciously been reemployed elsewhere to establish deliberate references to the past—usually to what are regarded as particularly glorious periods—to influential patrons and to especially well-known sacred sites. These examples allow us to draw important conclusions about the significance of and the meanings attached to architectural idioms and reiterate that architecture, and above all styles, carry meanings and transmit messages to those seeing and using the edifices.[2] A particularly remarkable and widespread case of such a mobile set of architectural features is represented by the Māru-Gurjara or Solaṅkī style of architecture.[3] It first evolved in what are today the modern States of Rajasthan and Gujarat, during the period spanning from the tenth to thirteenth century. Art historians have regularly described this phase as the or at least one important high point of Jaina temple building. Fascinating for our enquiry is the special appeal and the religio-political associations, which this style appears to have for Jainas themselves.

This can be examined especially well when the style has been employed outside its original “home” territory. This is, for instance, the case in the sacred structures, which Jainas raised in the east of India when large sections of the community started returning to the region from the sixteenth century onward as well as in Jaina temples constructed in trading towns in central and southern India in recent centuries. The late medieval and modern temples raised by the Śvetāmbara Jaina community throughout the subcontinent recurrently employ a version of the northwestern Indian Māru-Gurjara style, despite the fact that the East, the central area and the South have their own distinct architectural traditions and prominent surviving ancient Jaina structures.[4]

One may argue that this is due above all to the mobility of the Mārwari Śvetāmbara Jaina community, who as merchants moved into these new territories and took with them the medieval style of their home region. However, also when Jainas went abroad, to Kenya, to Great Britain, to Belgium and to North America, they—and this is then usually a conglomerate of Śvetāmbara, Digambara and non-image worshipping Jaina groups—frequently construct temples imitating the style of architecture employed during Solaṅkī patronage. In many instances, a direct link to Gujarat and to north-western Indian craftsmen too can be established. In others, it is local workmen aiming to convey a distinct Māru-Gurjara impression.

The following discussion will stress the significant role that styles of architecture play in shaping identities and establishing ties with the past and with one’s home area (even if this is a perceived mythical home) and as such succeed in transgressing regional, national and temporal boundaries.