Humcha Temples

The Humcha temples stand in the Malenadu hills of Karnataka, the greatest southern centre of the cult of Padmavati, attendant of Parshvanatha. Tradition relates that the Jain prince Jinadatta Raya fled Mathura carrying her golden image and was told in a dream to found his capital where it rested. He established Pombuccapura, later Humcha, set up a Bhattaraka seat in the 600s or 700s, and made it the Santara dynasty's first capital.

Vira Santara raised the Padmavati temple in 1061. Chattaladevi built the largest monument, the five-shrined Panchakuta Basadi, in 1077, with its forty-foot pillar.

The Santaras made Humcha a feudatory centre of Vijayanagara and spread Digambara Jainism through the Tulu and Malenadu lands. An inscription of 1530 records a viceroy of Srirangapatna converting to Jainism here under the acharya Vidyananda.