Somapura Mahavihara is situated in Paharpur of Naogaon District, North-western part of Bangladesh. In 1985, declared as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Somapura Mahavihara is one of the main archeological interest in the Indian Subcontinent and known to all Buddhist viharas.History
In hundreds years ago, many monasteries grew up in Pāla period in old Bengal and Magadha. The Tibetan sources indicated that five awesome Mahaviharas emerged.
The unearthing at Paharpur and the finding of several seals engraving some names have distinguished the Somapura Mahavihara as worked by the 2nd Pala ruler Dharmapala (781–821) of Pāla reign. Tibetan sources along with Tibetan interpretations of Dharmakayavidhi, Madhyamaka Ratnapradipa, Taranatha's history and Pag-Sam-Jon-Zang, shows that Dharmapala's successor Devapala (810–850) established it after his victory of Varendra.
The Nalanda engraving of Vipulashrimitra shows that the cloister was devastated by flame in the eleventh century.
After that, Ratnakara Shanti , Atish's profound preceptor, served as a sthavira of the vihara, Mahapanditacharya Bodhibhadra served as an inhabitant friar, and different researchers spent some portion of their lives at the cloister, including Kalamahapada, Viryendra and Karunashrimitra. Numerous Tibetan ministers went to the Somapura between the ninth and twelfth hundreds of years.
Amid the guideline of the Sena line, known as Karnatadeshatagata Brahmaksatriya, in the second halve of the twelfth century, the vihara began to perish. One researcher said the remnants of the sanctuary and religious communities there don't bear any apparent characteristics of huge scale demolition.
Design
The quadrangular structure has 177 cells and a conventional Buddhist stupa in the inside. The rooms were utilized by the friars for settlement and contemplation.
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The site houses the structural stays of an immense Buddhist cloister; Somapura Mahavihara covers 27 sections of land. It was an essential scholar community for Dharmic Traditions- Buddhists , Jains and Hindus . The 21 section of land complex has 177 cells, viharas, stupas, sanctuaries and other auxiliary structures. The outside dividers with decorative terracotta plaques upheld the impact of these three religions.
Somapura was the biggest of the mahaviharas according to its land area. Its engineering was surprising. As one researcher portrayed, the complex was overwhelmed by a sanctuary, which was not common, and further, the sanctuary had "none of the trademark components of Indian sanctuary design, however is emphatically reminiscent of Buddhist sanctuaries of Burma, Java and Cambodia, imitating the cruciform storm cellar, terraced structure with inset chambers and step by step decreasing pyramid structure .The style of design significantly affected that of Burma, Java and Cambodia.
The discovered statues.
The statues are reserved in the museum there for display. Some statues are:
• 'Chamunda' Statue of Clay Stone
• Standing Statue of 'Seetala' (Red Stone)
• Broken Parts of 'Visnu' Statue of Krishna Stone
• 'Keerti' Statue of Clay Stone
• Damaged Statue of 'Haargouri'
• Laxmi Narayan of Krishna Stone ‘s Broken Statue
• 'Uma' Statue of krishna Stone
• 'Gouri' Statue( Clay Stone)
• 'Visnu' Statue( Clay Stone)
• Nandi Statue
• 'Visnu' Statue of Krishna Stone
• Sun Statue
• 'Mansha' Statue of Clay Stone
Epigraphic records proved that great Vihara’s cultural and religious lives were linked with the contemporary Buddhist centres at Bohdgaya and Nalanda. Apart from these, sevral Buddhist treatises were completed at Paharpur.
How to Go:
Location- Naogaon, Bangladesh
Type- Archaeological
Architectural era: Gupta, Pala
Elevation- 80 feet (24 m)
Built- 8th century AD
Built for- Dharama Pala
Naogaon is about 250km from Dhaka. You can go by air, or road. By road, it would take about 6 hours from Dhaka. If you want to go by air, you need to land in Rajshai and then you have go by bus from there to the site. It’s about 2 or 3 hours away from Rajshahi.
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