Group of Monuments at Hampi

Hampi is a historic Indian city that has belonged since 1986 to the UNESCO world cultural heritage. Hampi lies in the middle of India in the state Karnataka and was, before approximately 800 years, the capital of the Hindu kingdom Vijayanagar and was inhabited by around 1 million persons. Through an invasion of Muslim soldiers, after several wars, the city was razed to ground. The inhabitants fled, and according to the legend, a Portuguese traveler should have reported to his king, "Here live only tiger".

oday the main temple and the Hampi bazaar streets have been put into new life by the local inhabitants and dealers from other states. In a area of 30 km² small temples and Hindu statues are scattered everywhere. The cultural monuments are embedded into an extraordinary rock landscape that is cut through by fruitful bananas plantations and rice fields. The region lives on the river Tunghabhadra. A prestigious project of the Indian government is the Tunghabhadra dam, through which electricity is supplied to the total vicinity of Hampi.