Mundeshwari Temple

The Mundeshwari Temple crowns a hill of the Kaimur plateau in the Bhojpuri country of Bihar, with a rare octagonal stone plan, an example of Nagara architecture. It houses a four-faced Shiva linga while the presiding deity is Mundeshwari, a ten-armed Durga riding a buffalo; her Tantric worship marks this as an early eastern Indian centre of the goddess cult.

Local tradition and a religious trust claim a foundation in 108, but historians date the surviving sculptures and an inscription of the raja Udayasena to about 570 to 590, showing an important temple settlement from the 600s.

The shrine was probably built or rebuilt in the 1500s or 1600s from the doorways and mouldings of ruined seventh-century temples, and its tower has fallen. Rites continued without interruption, with pilgrims gathering for Rama Navami, Shiva Ratri and the Navaratra fair.