Siddheshwar Mandir, Palari

Siddheshwar Temple at Palari, Chhattisgarh, is a brick temple thought to date from the middle of the 7th century CE, judging by its style, which suggests it followed the Lakshmana Temple at Sirpur by some fifty years. It faces west from within a courtyard on a star-shaped plan, and only its doorway and a recent porch are of stone.

The doorway is the highlight. Life-size figures of Ganga and Yamuna flank it, with guardian deities of the directions above them and Indra on his elephant Airavata on the left jamb. The lintel shows a four-armed Lakulisha among four disciples, between Brahma on his swan and Vishnu on Garuda. Above runs a frieze of Shiva's wedding to Parvati, flanked by Shiva slaying an elephant-demon and fighting Andhaka. Lion-crowned gavakshas decorate the tower, and a life-size male figure on one courtyard pillar is the earliest known example of such figures on pillars.