File:An 18th century Bundela architecture temple in Bilhari, Madhya Pradesh.jpg

English: The above monument is an abandoned Bundela style Hindu temple in Bilhari, built in the 18th-century. It was restored in the early 20th-century. Bilhari has numerous surviving temples and monastery ruins, dated from from 8th-century onwards.

Background

Bilhari – also referred to as Pushpavati, sometimes Vilvavapi in historic texts – was a major Hindu and Jain temples, Shiva monastery, fort and palace site in pre-13th century central India. It is now a village about 14 kilometers southwest of Katni, Madhya Pradesh.

According to Krishna Deva – a historian and scholar of Indian temple architecture, the surviving parts of original Bilhari temples are from the 8th century, the large Shiva monastery and its temple were built by queen Nohala between 900–950 CE as evidenced by inscriptions found here, and all other temple remains range between the 8th and 11th-century. This was once a very large ruins site, and many panels from the lost temples and damaged monastery were retrieved and used in construction of village houses and buildings during the colonial era. (Source: Encyclopedia of Indian Temple Architecture North India, Vol 2, Part 1, pp. 161–166)

Bilhari was destroyed in Sultanate invasions of this region. It has been one of the source of numerous post-Gupta through Kalchuri era Hindu and Jain artwork. Its historic fame is from the legend of Madhavanala and Kamakandala – a love story found in Hindu texts, also in Jain and Muslim versions. The story is the subject of several Mughal era paintings.