01The silk weavers’ temple
A guild of silk weavers came from Lata, south Gujarat, to Dashapura and prospered. In the Malava year 493, 436 CE, under Kumaragupta I and his local governor Bandhuvarman, they built a temple to the Sun, and when it fell into disrepair they repaired it in Malava year 529, 473 CE. Their record, composed in polished Sanskrit verse by the poet Vatsabhatti, describes the town’s lakes and white houses, the weavers who turned to other trades, archery, astrology and story-telling, and ends with the temple standing ‘as long as the moon’. It is one of the finest Gupta inscriptions, and a picture of a working guild.
02Yashodharman and Pashupatinath
At Sondani, just outside the town, lie two great sandstone pillars of Yashodharman of the Aulikara line. Their inscription claims that he made Mihirakula, the Huna king, bow at his feet, and that his rule reached lands the Guptas had never held; a stone inscription of Malava year 589, 532 CE, from the town belongs to the same reign. In 1940 an eight-faced Shivalinga was found in the bed of the Shivna, and it was later installed in the Pashupatinath temple on the river bank. The British and the Holkars signed the Treaty of Mandsaur here in January 1818.
The life of this place
- 436 CE (Malava 493)The silk weavers’ guild builds a Sun temple at Dashapura.
- 473 CE (Malava 529)The guild repairs the temple; Vatsabhatti’s inscription records both dates.
- c. 532 CEYashodharman’s victory pillars at Sondani record his defeat of Mihirakula.
- January 1818Treaty of Mandsaur between the Holkars and the British.
- 1940The eight-faced Pashupatinath linga is found in the Shivna.
The Pashupatinath temple is on the Shivna bank in town; Sondani is 4 km away. Shravan Mondays draw the biggest crowds.
