Hey guys, today I am going to show you some secret carvings that are hiding in plain sight.
What do you see?
Do you see a fish?
Our eyes are naturally attracted to the pillars and the giant doorway, but if we look at this
wall here.. we can see a fish carved on the wall.
Why is it carved here?
What could possibly be the reason for this?
The fish is not carved with great details, or polished, it is specifically carved vaguely
so it is not visible to casual visitors.
However, when we inspect it closely, it appears to be a fancy, ornamental fish, look at how
many fins are shown, including the tail fin.
Why did ancient builders carve it here?
Is it some kind of a symbol or signal, but why is it carved in a place where nobody will
look?
Here you can this beautiful monolithic pillar, and you can be easily be mesmerized by the
details on the warriors, but 99% of the visitors will miss this pair of kissing fish.
Why are they carved here?
Look at the details on these fish, they are simply fantastic.
But why would they be placed 20 feet above the ground, in a place where nobody is looking?
What is the meaning of this?
I am zooming in with my phone, look at the tail, this is a pair of exotic fish, this
carving is too pretty to be placed at such a height.
What is the need to carve fishes all over the temple in this way?
And why did ancient builders place them in a way that people will not notice these fish?
Look at this one, but you are probably not even seeing it now, because you are only human.
The fish are actually right there in front of you, but 99% of people will take a good
look at this, but will completely miss these fish.
It seems as though the ancient builders were masters of hiding things in plain sight by
exploiting basic human tendencies.
Now, forget about documenting the symbolism or finding the meaning behind them, it is
impossible even to find all the hidden fish carvings.
How can anyone possibly expect a visitor to observe this fish.
I have visited this temple so many times, that’s why you see me in so many different
outfits in the same temple.
I have even grown a beard now, but every time I come here, I will find more and more fish
carvings.
A lot of them are hidden in dark corners.
Why are there so many?
There must be some reason for this, right?
But there is one detail I find very interesting in some of the carvings.
You can see this raised rectangle, around the fish, is this rectangle just a border
for carving or is it an actual container that has the fish inside.
Is this a fish inside a glass container, like how you would find a specimen in a biology
lab to study its external morphology.
If you look at various types of fishes in a lab, this is probably how you would see
them.
You would see the fish, but you would also see the glass container around it.
And we can see this in many carvings in this area, especially with fish and other animals
or plants.
Were ancient Indians studying the types of fishes and classifying them, just like how
biologists study them today?
Today we see them put labels and arrows on them to point out some features.
Here, we can see Two fish, one following another, but there is an arrow mark, a triangle marked
between them.
I mean what is that?
The first fish’s tail ends here, but there is a triangle after that, like they are trying
to mark its tail.
And then there is another fish.
And again, everything is inside a raised rectangle like a bottle or a glass container in a biology
lab.
And here we can see this fish, it does not have eyes.
And it does not have any features at all.
Do you know there are several varieties of blind fishes in deep oceans and rivers?
Look at this blind fish, no eyes, very little scales or colors.
These are rare types that nobody can find unless you go deep into the water and research
them.
How could they carve a blind fish in this ancient temple?
Again, was it displayed in a glass jar, for scientific purposes?
Were they studying and documenting different type of fishes?
Here, you can see a carving of fish, it is so large, You can see all its features, various
fins, dorsal and pectoral fins and its mouth and tail.
In the next pillar, you can see another fish.
Perhaps you think it is the same kind, but there are some differences, its eyes are popping
out, unlike the previous one.
On the side of this pillar, again another fish.
At the back of the previous pillar, again another fish.
But why?
On the third side of this pillar, again another fish.
A very odd thing to carve.
Why would they just keep carving fish after fish in these pillars?
Why is each fish different?
I think they are showing us various species of fishes.
Look at this carving, this fish looks quite exotic, if we paint on it, they will look
really awesome.
This is like a pair of ornamental fish we buy for the fish tank at home.
In my mind, there is no doubt that the ancient builders were trying to document various types
of fishes, and show them to us, like how we watch a video today, about varieties of fishes
on animal planet.
But it is not just the classification of various types of fishes.
Depending on your inclinations, you can find other things, like behavior and psychology.
I think this why they carved one fish, closely following another fish.
Some of you may think, they are fighting, or the fish at the back is trying to hunt
and eat the fish in the front.
But look at the size of this fish, a smaller fish is pursuing a larger fish.
So they are not fighting, it is the opposite, this is called coupling, male fish will usually
follow the female, in a coupling ritual, for mating.
And it is precisely carved because the males are usually smaller and thinner while the
females are usually larger, and the males always pursue the females.
I mean this is just remarkable, how ancient builders must have studied all the little
details of these fishes.
And here you can another behavior, 2 fish kissing, right?
But it is actually the opposite, they are not kissing, here they are fighting.
When 2 fish are kissing, they are most probably showing territorial aggression, like two animals
fighting for their space.
Of course, we are only analyzing these carvings from kind of a scientific point of view.
If you are artistic, you will start looking at these carvings in a completely different
angle.
For example you can see two fish, but they are not kissing, they are doing something
else.
They are sharing one head.
If we hide one fish, we can pretend that this head belongs to the other fish, and we can
also do it the other way, it is an optical illusion.
Today, science, art, spirituality, they are all separate fields, but in ancient times,
everything was mixed together.
I hope you enjoyed this 1300 year old Wikipedia about fish.
Of course, we never decoded, why ancient builders carved some of these in weird places where
no one would look.
Why did they do that?
Please let me know your thoughts in the comments section, I am Praveen Mohan, thanks a lot
for watching, don’t forget to subscribe and I will talk to you soon.
Bye!