This special issue “On and beyond the surface: South Indian temple walls as text, object, and experience“ developed out of a panel that I organized at the American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting in San Antonio, TX, in 2016. Since that meeting, our group of panelists have been in continuous dialogue and are now delighted to present a collection of articles that propose fresh approaches to interpreting signs, murals, and inscriptions that are ubiquitous in South Indian religious spaces. The Hindu temple is a place of religious expression, experience, and exchange. Known as a home or palace for its god, or the god’s body itself, these structures feature accommodations fit for royalty. Grand stone temples built in the medieval period throughout southeast India boast long pillared halls, ornamental sculptures, and imposing gates that mark its entrances. In addition to soaring towers that punctuate its skyline, the South Indian landscape is also famous for being utterly packed with stone inscriptions, over a third of the total number of inscriptions known in India today. These tens of thousands of epigraphic “texts“ planted in the southern landscape have long been a rich field of study for historians of religion, politics, and economics in South Asia. Until the very recent past, inscriptions have been analyzed primarily if not exclusively for the denotative content of their texts as records of the past. In fact, most scholars of these sources encounter them as they are printed and published in the South Indian Inscriptions volumes produced by the Archaeological Survey of India. In this form, the inscriptions appear on a smooth page in blocks of text resembling narrative paragraphs. This type of reproduction erases a multitude of information that this special issue argues is essential to their interpretation. In situ, such texts might wrap around a slim slab of stone at the base of a shrine. They might be installed on a pillar set directly into the ground. In some cases, text is painted and illustrated. When these mostly stone writings are collected and printed on flat paper, unfortunately we scholars of inscriptions thereby inflict significant penalties on ourselves — erasures that are further replicated in these articles as we struggle with communicating the color, texture, and shape of billboards and murals in the virtual or printed form, which admittedly have their own aesthetic qualities. Over time, inscriptions and other temple texts have traveled and transformed in their material characteristics. Scholars who try to work back to the stone, to match printed inscriptions to their sites, are intently aware that over time combinations of renovations, cleanings, environmental forces, and preservation efforts have led to the damage and deterioration of sources. Some inscriptions have been relocated, recopied, buried, interrupted, or sandblasted away. In some cases, stone inscriptions are painted or lacquered over or have recently been hidden by hung signs. In the case of contemporary signs that appear in colorful plastic or painted wood, there is a sense of vividness and vitality that is generative, proposing future forms of devotion. Nevertheless, these billboards are also deeply tied to centuries of receipts and reports that are carved into the walls and incorporated into murals. These dynamic facets of the life of temple walls have led the authors of this issue to address the evident tension between visibility and legibility. In some case, neither are possible! Our collective discussion about the understudied relationship between text and image as it occurs in murals, in particular, drove each of us to revisit similar tensions between text and iconography in engraved inscriptions that are typically analyzed solely as text. Through the process of reconsidering legibility and visual meaning, we have aimed to develop more holistic interpretations of the inscriptions that include

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这个特刊“表面上和表面之外：南印度寺庙墙壁作为文本、物体和体验”是我在 2016 年在德克萨斯州圣安东尼奥举行的美国宗教学会年会上组织的小组讨论的发展。自那次会议以来，我们的小组成员一直在持续对话，现在很高兴展示一系列文章，这些文章提出了解释南印度宗教空间中无处不在的标志、壁画和铭文的新方法。印度教寺庙是宗教表达、体验和交流的场所。这些建筑被称为神的家或宫殿，或神的身体本身，拥有适合皇室的住宿。整个印度东南部的中世纪时期建造的宏伟石庙拥有长长的柱廊、装饰性雕塑、以及标志着其入口的雄伟的大门。除了点缀其天际线的高耸的塔楼外，南印度的景观还以充满石刻而闻名，占今天印度已知铭文总数的三分之一以上。这些种植在南部景观中的数以万计的碑铭“文本”长期以来一直是南亚宗​​教、政治和经济历史学家的丰富研究领域。直到最近，铭文的分析主要是为了分析它们作为过去记录的文本的外延内容。事实上，这些资料的大多数学者在印度考古调查局制作的南印度铭文卷中印刷和出版时都会遇到它们。在这种形式中，铭文以类似叙述段落的文本块形式出现在平滑的页面上。这种类型的复制删除了本特刊认为对其解释至关重要的大量信息。在原地，这样的文本可能包裹在神殿底部的一块细长的石板上。它们可能安装在直接插入地面的柱子上。在某些情况下，文本被绘制和说明。当这些主要是石头的文字被收集并印刷在平面纸上时，不幸的是，我们这些铭文学者对我们自己造成了严重的惩罚——在我们努力传达广告牌和壁画的颜色、质地和形状时，这些文章中进一步复制了擦除。虚拟或印刷形式，无可否认它们具有自己的审美品质。随着时间的推移，铭文和其他寺庙文本在其材料特征上发生了变化和变化。试图回到石头上，将印刷的铭文与他们的遗址相匹配的学者们清楚地意识到，随着时间的推移，翻新、清洁、环境力量和保护工作的结合导致了资源的破坏和恶化。一些铭文已被搬迁、重新复制、掩埋、中断或喷砂。在某些情况下，石刻被涂漆或涂漆，或最近被悬挂的标志隐藏。在出现在彩色塑料或彩绘木头上的当代标志的情况下，有一种生动和充满生机的感觉，提出了未来的奉献形式。尽管如此，这些广告牌还与刻在墙上并融入壁画的几个世纪以来的收据和报告密切相关。寺庙墙壁生活的这些动态方面促使本期作者解决了可见性和易读性之间明显的紧张关系。在某些情况下，两者都不可能！我们对出现在壁画中的文本和图像之间未充分研究的关系的集体讨论，特别是促使我们每个人重新审视雕刻铭文中文本和图像之间类似的紧张关系，这些铭文通常仅作为文本进行分析。通过重新考虑易读性和视觉意义的过程，我们的目标是对铭文进行更全面的解释，包括 寺庙墙壁生活的这些动态方面促使本期作者解决了可见性和易读性之间明显的紧张关系。在某些情况下，两者都不可能！我们对出现在壁画中的文本和图像之间未充分研究的关系的集体讨论，特别是促使我们每个人重新审视雕刻铭文中文本和图像之间类似的紧张关系，这些铭文通常仅作为文本进行分析。通过重新考虑易读性和视觉意义的过程，我们的目标是对铭文进行更全面的解释，包括 寺庙墙壁生活的这些动态方面促使本期作者解决了可见性和易读性之间明显的紧张关系。在某些情况下，两者都不可能！我们对出现在壁画中的文本和图像之间未充分研究的关系的集体讨论，特别是促使我们每个人重新审视雕刻铭文中文本和图像之间类似的紧张关系，这些铭文通常仅作为文本进行分析。通过重新考虑易读性和视觉意义的过程，我们的目标是对铭文进行更全面的解释，包括 促使我们每个人重新审视雕刻铭文中文本和图像之间的类似紧张关系，这些铭文通常仅作为文本进行分析。通过重新考虑易读性和视觉意义的过程，我们的目标是对铭文进行更全面的解释，包括 促使我们每个人重新审视雕刻铭文中文本和图像之间的类似紧张关系，这些铭文通常仅作为文本进行分析。通过重新考虑易读性和视觉意义的过程，我们的目标是对铭文进行更全面的解释，包括