A Study of Navagraha Iconography in the Temples of India with Reference to Navagraha Kṛtis of Muttusvāmi Dīkṣitar

Abstract

This paper examines the visual and symbolic vocabulary of Navagraha sculpture in Indian temples alongside the Navagraha Kṛtis of Muttusvāmi Dīkṣitar. It sets out to show how the iconographic conventions governing the nine planetary deities — as recorded in temple sculpture — are echoed, and at points clarified, by the Sanskrit sāhitya of Dīkṣitar's compositions. Treating the kṛtis as a form of musical documentation, the study argues that they function as a secondary, oral record of temple iconography and ritual tradition, and it further asks how regional variation in temple layout is reflected in the structure of the compositions. Dīkṣitar's oeuvre, it is suggested, extends well beyond the purely musical: his kṛtis regularly preserve sthala purāṇam (temple foundation legend), particulars of the presiding deities, references to devotees, and the rivers or tanks associated with a given shrine.