Chausath Yogini Temple, Khajuraho – The Temple

Chausath Yogini Temple, Khajuraho – The Temple

This Temple is built on a 5.4 m high platform to the south-west of the Shiva Sagar tank. It has a rectangular plan measuring 31.4 m x 18.3 m. It is considered as one of the historic Yogini temples across India. Many of these temples have circular plan but few were rectangular in plan. This Temple is rectangular in plan and the temples in Rikhiyan and Badoh are also rectangular. Like all Yogini temples, the Khajuraho temple is hypaethral, open to the air.

The temple is made of large, coarse granite blocks, with an open courtyard at the centre. The courtyard was originally surrounded by 65 shrine cells: 10 on the front (north) wall, 11 on the back wall, and 22 on each side. Only 35 of these 65 cells now survive; each has a small doorway made of two squared granite pillars and a lintel stone, and a curvilinear tower roof.

Above the lintel of the best-surviving cells is a triangular pediment. There is no surviving trace of a central shrine, whether to Shiva or the Goddess, as found in other Yogini temples. Apart from a single much larger cell for the deity, each of the 64 cells for yoginis is approximately 1 m high and 1 m deep. The large cell is located at the centre of the back wall and faces the entrance at the north.

It was probably a shrine of Durga. The other 64 cells presumably housed the statues of yoginis. There are no sculptures remain among the temple ruins except the three large idols of mother goddesses or Matrikas, are now in the Khajuraho museum. The goddesses have been identified as Brahmini, Maheshwari, and Mahishamardini.

The image of Brahmini has three faces; her vehicle is a hamsa (swan or goose). Maheshwari is depicted with a trident and a humped bull. The image of Mahishamardini has one foot on a buffalo that she has defeated; she is holding its legs, and in two of her eight arms she wields a sword and shield. These idols are among the oldest sculptures of Khajuraho.