Hoysala dynasty

From hill chiefs to kings

The Hoysalas began as chiefs in the Western Ghats and rose under Chalukya overlordship, becoming independent in the twelfth century under Viṣṇuvardhana, who took much of southern Karnataka from the Cholas. Their capital was at Dvārasamudra, modern Halebidu.

Viṣṇuvardhana's conversion from Jainism to Śrī Vaiṣṇavism under the influence of Rāmānuja is recorded in the tradition and is emblematic of a wider shift; the dynasty nonetheless continued to patronise Jain establishments, and his queen Śāntalā remained a Jain.

The temples

Hoysala temples are built in chlorite schist, a stone soft enough when quarried to be worked almost like ivory and hardening afterwards. The results are without parallel: star-shaped plans on raised platforms, walls carried on horizontal bands of elephants, horsemen, foliage and narrative friezes, and pillars turned on a lathe to a polish.

The Chennakeśava temple at Belur, the Hoysaleśvara at Halebidu and the Keśava at Somanathapura are the principal survivors. Their sculptors signed their work — an unusual practice — and names such as Malitamma and Dāsoja recur across sites.

The Hoysala period was also decisive for Kannada literature and for Śrī Vaiṣṇava theology; Rāmānuja spent years in Hoysala territory after leaving the Chola country.

End

Alauddin Khalji's general Malik Kafur raided Dvārasamudra in 1311 and it was sacked again in 1327 by Muhammad bin Tughlaq's forces. Ballāla III spent his last years resisting the Sultanate of Madurai and was killed by it in 1343.

The Hoysala collapse is the immediate context for the founding of Vijayanagara: the officers and territories of the Deccan Hindu kingdoms, faced with Sultanate expansion, reorganised around a new centre on the Tungabhadra.