ఆంధ్ర గుహాలయాలు/భైరవకోన గుహాలయాలపై అభిప్రాయాలు
(Views on the Cave-Temples of Bhairavakona)
While writing about the Bhairavakona cave temples K.R.Srinivasan observes: "..... On either bank of Krishna... cave temples of Eastern Chalukyan authorship show individualistic characters in their lay-out, iconography and the scheme of the cella. They partake in some respects of the neighbouring Pallava modes, apart from their Parental Chalukyan and northern inheritance. The remarkable feature of this series of cave-temples is the occurance of a rock-cut pedestal socket at the base of the rear wall of the cella denoting the object of worship, whether it be the linga form of Siva, or a sculptured stele bearing the image of other God inserted into the socket. In Bhairavakonda the socket is cut in a sunken recess on the wall over the pedestal to take in the linga, or image.....the cave-temples of the Eastern Chalukyas... practically all the cave-temples are Saiva, or are dedicated to other deities of the Saiva pantheon. The only exception is the aberrent Undavalli cave-temples which is dedicated to Vishnu. The Nandi in Saiva cave-temples is rock-cut as in the Pandyan axamples farther south. In point of time the Akkanna- Madanna...cave at Vijayawada in its present form comes first. It is ascribable to the middle of the seventh century, and is closely followed by caves I to iv of Mogalrajpuram, the lower cave-temple at Vijayawada, the Undavalli and other caves in a series (p.81)... ending with the Bhairavakonda group (are) datable to the middle of the eighth century. The lost, if not of direct Eastern Chalukyan vintage, can at best be of Telugu-Choda authorship...."
The... dancing Siva and Harihara... The eight cave-temples... The first four shrine excavations...and...The second group... having an outer mandapa with... pillars and... fully formed kopota with kudus (are) as in Mamall-style cave-temples... The pillars are...in... Chalukyan pattern as found in the cave-temples on the banks of Krishna... some...are...in the Mamalla-style... Shrineentrances are plain... These mixed characters and other features as also the presence of relief sculptures of Brahma and Vishnu in the Mandapa, provision for a linga in the shrine, and the presence of other sculptures like Chendesa and Ganesa, and the rock-cut Nandi, would indicate their non-Pallava origin and their date as being the middle of the eighth century.
S.K.Sarasvati observes: "...Pallava rulers... imbibed and carried on the traditions of the earlier Vengi school. Mahendravarman Pallava (C.A.D 600-630)... in the south... excavated many cave shrines which seem to represent an innovation... Mahendra proudly described his cave-temples as composed without bricks,mortar, metal or timber (anishtakem asudham alauham nirmapitam) in the Mandagapattu inscription." Again Sarasvati says: "The pallavas inherited the less severe repertory of elegant and attenuated forms of the later phase of Vengi style which lingered till the fourth century, and possible even later. But... the pallava sculptors could not ignore entirely the rock-cut idiom of the deccan and the reliefs of Bhairavakonda, distinguished each by a heavy physiognomical form, bea the impress of the contemporary Deccanese tradition. The contribution of the Vengi school, however, principally determined the character of the Pallava style."