Duladeo Temple

Duladeo (also Dulhadeo, or Kunwar Math) is a Shiva temple in the Southern Group at Khajuraho, close to the Khudar River. Built by the Chandelas sometime between 1000 and 1150 AD, it is counted as the latest of the town's temples. Its design draws on medieval Deccan and western Indian temple building while keeping the Khajuraho form.

The temple has no ambulatory passage (the nirandhara type) and follows a saptaratha plan of sanctum, vestibule and an octagonal maha-mandapa whose ceiling rests on twenty apsara brackets. Dancers, apsaras and erotic couples line the outer walls, and small spires cluster around the main shikhara. The sanctum linga, the Sahastra Lingam, is covered with 999 miniature lingas; one circuit around it is believed to count as a thousand. A figure of the goddess Ganga is also among the sculptures.