Ananda

Site common name	Ananda
Type of artwork	Architecture
Village	-
Province/City	Bagan
State	Mandalay
Country	Myanmar
Geographic Coordinates Decimal degree	Lat : 21.170833 Long : 94.8675

History of production	King Kyanzittha ordered to constructed this temple under the advises of monks who arrived from India and narrated him about the mythical cave Nandamula of Gandhamadana mountain. The temple was therefore conceived as the imitation of this mythical cave.
Art	Anada is the most significant example of the temple (Gu) in Early Pagan art. The temple was designed as four-sanctum-and-four-Madapa temple, hence cruciform plan. The central core is the solid core supporting the Shikhara spire. This kind of plan has been continued from several temples in Pala art, including Paharpur and VikramShila. The roof of the temple is characterized by the sloping roof with four-cornered Stupika supporting the main Shikhara spire. These identities can be compared to the temple built during the same reign, such as Nagayon. However, the absent of the windowed screen allowing the light to penetrate into the interior circumambulatory path is vey different from other earlier temple.
Period	Historical Period
Age	10th-13th century A.D.
Religion	Buddhism
Sect	Theravada
Related artwork	Ananda enshrines the colossal Buddha images at four directions, identified as the four previous Masters : Kakusandha (East), Konagamana (South) KAssapa (West) and Gotama (North).

Type of License	Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs (CC BY-NC-ND)
Rights	Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn Anthropology Centre
Date of record creation	2015-02-00
Record creator	Chedha Tingsanchali