Hampi in light and stone | Landmark publication ‘City of Victory’ gets a new edition

Explore the updated edition of "City of Victory," a definitive visual and historical portrait of Hampi's Vijayanagara empire.

The Vijayanagara empire dominated the geopolitical landscape of the Deccan from the 14th to the 16th centuries before its destruction and abandonment. Vijayanagara, which means the City of Victory, continues into our times with the ruins at Hampi, now a World Heritage Site of immense cultural significance and newfound interest. The book City of Victory: Hampi Vijayanagara (Pictor), by archaeologists George Michell and John M. Fritz (with photography by John Gollings), is therefore not another architectural guidebook but a definitive visual and historical portrait of a city that was once the thriving capital of the most important Hindu kingdom in medieval South India.

The book is an updated presentation of the 1991 book by the authors. The older edition — with Michell’s lifelong work on Deccani architecture and its dissemination, alongside Fritz’s studies — was a landmark publication that brought early scholarly attention to Hampi. The new edition is designed for contemporary readers; Michell has reorganised the scholarship, updated the documentation work (that has continued since 1991), and published it in large format.

The book City of Victory: Hampi Vijayanagara

A few weeks ago, I had a chance to attend the photo exhibition that accompanied the book launch, at Bengaluru’s Venkatappa Art Gallery. To my luck, architectural photographer Gollings was on site for a walkthrough of the black-and-white photographs. Produced over 45 years, his lens captures buildings suspended in sweeping stone terrains, each shot a careful composition. One image was particularly arresting: the monumental 6.7-metre monolithic Lakshmi Narasimha at Hampi. Weathered, immense, and dignified even in ruin, it is among the most recognisable icons of Vijayanagara, commissioned by King Krishnadevaraya in 1528.

But something felt subtly unfamiliar. The deity, seated cross-legged in formidable calm, seemed familiar and yet altered. Gollings explained the shift. “In the 1980s, well-meaning conservators from the Archaeological Survey of India introduced a stone yogapatta — a supporting band across the knees — to stabilise the sculpture,” he said. “In doing so, they inadvertently transformed the iconography.” The original sculpture, once depicted with the goddess seated upon Narasimha’s lap, had long lost its form. With the addition of the band, the image was reinterpreted as Yoga Narasimha, the ascetic manifestation we recognise today.

It was a quiet revelation. What centuries had weathered and neglect had sustained, restoration had subtly redefined.