Information on Gooty Fort (Anantapur, Andhra Pradesh) - History & Architecture

Gooty Fort is a magnificent hilltop fort built in the 7th century AD. This fort is constructed by the renounced stone art creators of the Kakathiya Dynasty. This is vast fort with many other forts inside a massive fortification. This fort is of historical and cultural importance in India. It is located in the Gooty town, Anantapur District of Andhra Pradesh in India.

Gooty Fort Architecture

Gooty Fort is the Kakathiya built fort. They are known for their great stone works, especially the monolith stone arts. This is the rarest fort built in India. This citadel mount is 350 meters above the sea level. This vast fortified area is filled with fifteen more forts inside with separate doors on it. The building materials used here is majorly the granite stones, fine stones, lime stones blended with fine mortars. This fortress, when viewed from long distance looks like shells. This fort stood as the most defensive fortress in this area. This fortress is the largest bastion area served in the war times of Gooty. It has one of the finest routes to reach the citadel mount on a stiff pathway. This is also known as the Mar Gooty There are many weaponing store place found here. There are also many granaries to maintain sufficient stock in times of crises. Inside this fort there are deep well which are sufficient to supply its water need. The important feature of this water resource is it has got a large pond named the Lakshmanan Thirtham. This pond never gets dried up in the summer season too. This pond is the main source of pure drinking water here. It is also beloved that these are very secretly accessed with a main stream line of waters which are still hidden in these hillocks. This fortress has many beautiful traditional temples built inside. These are famously known among the Hindu as Nageswara Swami Temple, Rama swami Temple and Lakshmi Narasimha Swami Temple. These temples are well carved in the Vedic model. It had got many monolith sculptures inside these temples. There are many tiny sculpture works found all around the temple's main outer areas. Inside these temples there are fines murals and stone carving arts found.

Gooty Fort History

Gooty Fort built by the Kakathiyas is well known for their empire building with vast structures on land. This fort is also the great stone works of its artisans. This palace was the beloved place for Morari Rao, who was the general in the Maratha defense under the British-India rule. He has got a fine stone made well polished seat here on the top of the citadel mount. This fort was in the aggressions with the Vijanagara Empire, the Qutub Shahi, s the Odhisa Gajapathis and many local wars happened here. This fort was the only bastion, which accommodated large number of civilians in the crises times. The Mysore kings dominated this fort for a century by the Hyder Ali and his son Tippu Sultan from 1773 AD. A dharga inside this fortress was built by these Mysore clans. In the 7th century AD this place was known as Gouthamipuri and latter on shortened to Gooty. This place is now spelt as Gutti in Telugu language in the recent days. Recently this fort received funds from the UNESCO for its renovation works.

Gooty Fort Tourism Importance

Gooty Fort is listed in the heritages sites in Andhra Pradesh. It is a protected monument by the government of India. This is the best place to visit, to see one of the Kakathiya stone art forms, which are still standing great. This place is a tourist spot for history and cultural values.