I would have thought it was a temple. Especially the Goupuram structures at the top.
Are the newer Mosques built the same style or do they have Middle East look to them?
Nope. The rise to prominence of Saudi backed
Salafi and
Wahhabi ideology means that all new mosques have completely eschewed traditional mosque architecture & are being made to ape middle eastern designs or Mughal architecture.
Same with the churches too, huge towering structures aping European cathedrals most costing
8-12 crore INR to make. Luckily the
innocent believer pays for everything so
god can reside in luxury. !
Caught in this rat race for "
who's god has the best crib" now even the Hindus are feeling the heat. Since the temple structures are ancient and distinctive enough to be tampered with, they now focus on building peripheral structures around the main temple premises and buying up more land.. Signboards like
"Help Bhagwan to get some land to rest in !" (cringe) are a common site in Kerala now.
That looks like a British building. Is it really 1000 years old? Very impressive architecture whatever the origin.
Climatically
Britain, of all European nations has the
climate closest to that of Kerala -
Perpetual rain, dampness and cloudy skies. Of course the downpour in UK isn't as intensive as in Kerala. SO it is natural that the
architectural styles would evolve to survive that climate -Sloping roofs etc.
View attachment 73838
That's what would be described as a Victorian era house. See any
similarities?
The
similarities start and end at the shape of the roofs. While the British roof is likely
a single slab of concrete, the Kerala roof is made of
small mud bricks called("od") , which are
laid on a wooden frame . Concreting technologies in Kerala at the time weren't strong enough to withstand rain and prevent leaking . Metal was avoided on roofs because of
high chances of rusting .
With this style , any of the individual bricks could be easily replaced (in case of wind/rain damage) without disturbing the whole roof . The roofs were not designed to withstand rain , but
to be easily repaired after rains. The poorer houses had thatched roofs made of coconut leaves. Again , they followed the same school of thought .
The Victorian era would coincide with British rule in India, so there may well be a crossover of architecture, either from Britain to India or the other way round.
Have a read of this :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Architecture_of_Kerala
Due to the unique I of
Kerala W.R.T to the rest of the Southern states (
we were isolated by the western Ghats) , our Architecture is very different from the
typical Dravidian Architecture of south India that is the ancestral style. Also
having trade with Arabs, Chinese and Europeans for a long time DID influence our architectural designs.
But
Kerala was never ruled directly by the Brits . We were always 3-4 princely states that paid taxes etc to whichever bigger power that ruled the SC, thus
keeping our autonomy . So apart from a few cities, where the brits set up
trading posts (
Fort Kochi, Calicut, Tellicherry aka Thalassery -
The place of origin of black pepper) the
british constructed next to nothing here compared to British Raj areas like
Kolkata, Mumbai or Madras.
You go to places like
Kochi and Tellecherry you can clearly see the
British designs and building which are clearly victorian era or later. Even
Present day Kochi was originally built by the Portugese and then ceded to brits. So in terms of architectural influence the
Syrians, Portugese and Dutch have more influence over Kerala than the Brits .
Yeah you clearly pinched your architecture designs from the Brits.
Truthfully, this temple looks like two separate structures. Seems like the old temple has had the roofing bays added as a design taken from buildings during the era of the British Raj.
In the UK we have been referring to this type of design as Victorian era for over a century. I'm sure if it was Indian origin then you would have claimed it a long time ago.
Can't you ever accept the possibility that
both styles could've evolved independently over 1000-1500 years ,
depending on the uniqueness of their climate ??
The architecture here was advanced enough to have indigenous solutions to our weather.
The roof was built as a separate structure to specifically solve this problem. So even under torrential rainstorms only the roof would get damaged/leaked and it enabled easy repairs.
The base was always stone and concrete, which wouldn't collapse.
Earthquakes were rare in Kerala, so we could make the base super heavy and strong .
"Vasthu Shastra" aka ancient Hindu techniques of architecture (from the mohenjodaro era) was a
highly advanced science back in the day , especially
in Kerala.
Even today houses and places of worship on Kerala are built to comply with certain "Vasthu" techniques.
Even the
Mosques and Churches of the period were Vasthu compliant,
many Muslims and Christians here continue to build Vasthu Compliant houses .. It is a shame that this once advanced science has been subverted these days by mindless superstitions. The essence of its science has been long lost .
The British have contributed a lot to our country, but claiming anything with a sloping roof as "Stolen from the Victorian design" is as petty as claiming
anything with a minaret as "mughal architecturee" ..
May be you are right.The original base of the temple is calculated to be 1200 years old, while the current structure came into being 400 years back.This Temple was honoured with the UNESCO Asia-Pacific Heritage Award for Cultural Heritage Conservation.
The original base was built with carved stones and some kind of ancient variant of concrete. If you have visited the place, you'll see the temple is supported by
huge diameter pillars which are marvel of that era's architecture. The wooden structures in the temple including the frames of roofs, have withstood rotting for centuries, without modern day polishing.
The roof coverings, as I have explained above, would deteriorate over time and be replaced with freshed mud tiles. So the
age could only be calculated with the bottom structure which was stone.
It's not like the Mallus built one kind of roof and then once they saw the British roofs they went "Macha , lets change this style-ah : . "
