Hayagriva Madhava Temple is situated on the Monikut hill. The hill is situated in Hajo of Kamrup District in Assam, India. Which is around 30 km to west of

Guwahati Guwahati (, ; formerly rendered Gauhati, ) is the biggest city of the Indian state of Assam and also the largest metropolis in northeastern India. Dispur, the capital of Assam, is in the circuit city region located within Guwahati and is the ...

. The Kalika Purana composed in the 11th century CE in Kamarupa talks about the origin of this form of

Vishnu Vishnu ( ; , ), also known as Narayana and Hari, is one of the principal deities of Hinduism. He is the supreme being within Vaishnavism, one of the major traditions within contemporary Hinduism. Vishnu is known as "The Preserver" withi ...

and his final establishment in the hill of Monikut, where the present temple is located. The present temple structure was constructed by the King Raghudeva Narayan in 1583. According to some historians the King of Pala dynasty constructed it in 10th century. It is a stone temple and it enshrines an image of

Hayagriva Hayagriva, also spelled Hayagreeva ( sa, हयग्रीव IAST , ), is a Hindu deity, the horse-headed avatar of Vishnu. The purpose of this incarnation was to slay a danava also named Hayagriva (A descendant of Kashyapa and Danu), wh ...

Madhava. Some

Buddhist Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...

s believe that the

Madhava temple, best known in the group of

Hindu Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...

temples, is where the

Buddha Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha, was a wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism. According to Buddhist tradition, he was born in L ...

attained Nirvana. At this imposing temple, the presiding deity is Vishnu, worshipped in the sanctum sanctorum as an idol carved of black stone. Four other stone idols are also in worship as subsidiary deities. A most striking feature of the temple is the continuous row of elephants carved on the lowest level of the temple walls - a structure akin to the stone cut temple of Ellora. The outer walls of the shrine is also covered with relief figures of the ten incarnations of Vishnu, devotees in procession and episodic scenes from the

Ramayana The ''Rāmāyana'' (; sa, रामायणम्, ) is a Sanskrit literature, Sanskrit Indian epic poetry, epic composed over a period of nearly a millennium, with scholars' estimates for the earliest stage of the text ranging from the 8th ...

and the

Mahabharata The ''Mahābhārata'' ( ; sa, महाभारतम्, ', ) is one of the two major Sanskrit literature, Sanskrit Indian epic poetry, epics of ancient India in Hinduism, the other being the ''Ramayana, Rāmāyaṇa''. It narrates the s ...

. There is a big pond known as Madhab Pukhuri near the temple. Doul, Bihu and Janmastami festivals are celebrated every year in the temple. Sayani, the first wife of Kalia Bhomora Borphukan donated a family of paiks and also a plot of land for their maintenance to the Hayagriva Madhava temple during the reign of Ahom king Kamaleswar Singha. The lamps in the sanctum sanctorum are never put off (akhanda deep) ever. Oil flows into the big earthen lamps through a simple tube connected to the oil tin.

References

{{coord missing, Assam Hindu temples in Assam Hindu temples in Kamrup district