Vastu Shastra / Mayamata / Manasara
What it is
From roughly the sixth century CE onward, Sanskrit architectural canons such as the Mayamata and Manasara codified the Vastu Shastra tradition, mapping the Vastu Purusha mandala, a sacred geometric diagram, onto the layout of towns, temples and buildings. They prescribed cardinal orientation, modular proportion, the placement of gates and streets, and the zoning of districts and deities according to ritual and cosmological rules. The texts treat the built environment as an ordered reflection of cosmic structure. They functioned as practical manuals for architects and town-builders.
Why it matters
These canons provided the theoretical and ritual basis for the planning of Hindu temple-cities such as Srirangam and Madurai, and influenced later planned capitals like eighteenth-century Jaipur. They embed a durable tradition in which urban form expresses cosmological order.
Plans it shaped
- Mahabalipuram (Mamallapuram) (c. 7th–8th c.)
- Angkor (Khmer Empire) (c. 9th–13th c.)
- Vijayanagara (Hampi) (c. 14th–16th c.)
- Madurai (Temple City) (c. 16th–17th c.)
- Fatehpur Sikri (1571–1585)
- Shahjahanabad (Old Delhi) (1639–1648)
- Jaipur (1727)
- Varanasi Kashi Corridor Urban Plan (2019–)
- Borobudur and the Kedu Plain (Medang/Mataram) (c. 780–850 CE)
- Kanchipuram (Pallava Temple Capital) (c. 6th century)
- Gangaikonda Cholapuram (Chola Imperial Capital) (c. 1025)
- Warangal (Kakatiya Circular Capital) (c. 13th c.)