While tourists flock in large numbers every month to the Chennakeshava Temple of Belur and the Hoysaleshwara Temple of Halebid, there are exquisite Hoysala era temples in hundreds of villages scattered around Karnataka that receive few or no visitors. The Hoysala Empire was extremely prosperous and the kings and rich individuals across the empire commissioned stone temples that have survived invasions and the ravages of time. In 1978, Dutch professor Gerard Foekema visited Karnataka for the first time. Over the next few years, through repeated trips, he was able to thoroughly document every Hoysala era temple still surviving. While there are some 100 temples or temple ruins still in existence, for the tourist, a visit to a dozen or so of these temples will prove interesting. But to understand Hoysala temples, we need a bit of background on the Hoysalas.
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| Sculptures on the exterior of the Lakshminarayana Temple, Hosaholalu |
