heritage/jaisalmer.jpg · 1200×800Jaisalmer Fort was founded in 1156 CE by Rawal Jaisal of the Bhati Rajputs, and the Jain merchants who traded along the desert routes built their temples inside its walls. Seven temples of honey-coloured sandstone went up between the 12th and the 16th centuries, joined by corridors and stairs: Parshvanatha, Sambhavanatha, Shitalanatha, Shantinatha and Kunthunatha, Chandraprabha and Rishabhanatha, with an Ashtapada shrine added by the Chopra family.
The Parshvanatha temple is the largest, its black image hooded by a many-headed serpent and ringed by 52 small shrines. The Chandraprabha temple was built in 1509 CE, and the Sambhavanatha temple, founded by Askaran Chopra of Merta, carries inscriptions of 1440. Soft sandstone lets carvers work like jewellers, and brackets, torana arches and rows of dancers, elephants and riders cover almost every surface of wall and pillar.
Below the Sambhavanatha temple lies the gyan bhandar, known after Acharya Jinabhadra Suri. It holds about a thousand manuscripts, among them palm-leaf books of the 12th century with painted wooden covers, and texts written on birch bark. Sanskrit and Prakrit scriptures, commentaries and astrological charts have survived here that are hard to find elsewhere, helped by the dry desert air. In 2013 the fort was inscribed by UNESCO among the Hill Forts of Rajasthan.
