Temple Towns- Tamil Nadu

I have tried to write this blog entry several times, but there is too much to say and there are too many temples to show and the pictures don't do them justice. Oh well; here is a very brief look at what we saw traveling in Tamil Nadu- each town we visited we encountered more and more impressive architectual feats. When you added the cultural and religious backdrop (or maybe i should say front story), it was an even more amazing experience.

MAMALLAPURAM- port city built in 7th century by Pallava king- cut caves-Bhagiratha's Pennace



Also a monolithic(built out of one large rock)stone carved set of shrines called Panch Rathas (5 chariots). A school group was also visiting when we were there. They loved having their pictures taken. They were crawling all over these ancient pieces like they were playing at Chucky Cheese. i thought, they have no idea how much genius this elephant represents-how impressive these structures are.



Tres at Shore Temple another monolithic structure- right next to the Bay of Bengal



CHENNAI- Kapaleshvara Temple- largest temple in Chennai-Shiva temple- this was our first exposure to the colored temple- we were astonished and it was the first time we learned that we couldn't go into every area of the temple- the inner sanctum is for Hindus only. We also visited the Basillica of St. Thomas- St Thomas came to India way back in 1st century AD. There is a sizeable group of St Thomas christians in this area and Kerala. The crypt of St Thomas is here. The church was built in 1898.




(WE went to Pondicherry (now Puddicherry)and Auroville - there was a small temple there where we first recieved our elephant blessing, I will talk about our experience in Auroville later)

TRICHY- huge city, 3rd largest in the Tamil area. Here we saw the Ranganatha Temple; we were told that this is the largest temple in Southern India-i talked about it in the earlier blog about preparing for temple. It is dedicated to Vishnu started in 1371 and built on throughout the centuries by the Nayaka rulers. It made the colored temple in Chennai look like nothing. We also saw the Rock Fort, a fortress made out of a massive rock constucted by the Nayakas. We climbed the 400 plus steps to get to the top and look over the city.






TANJORE- We got to see this beautiful Brihadishvara Temple by night at first as part of a concert of traditional carnatic dance and music. in the morning our tour guide told us that the pyramind shaped structure that sits over the sanctum of this shiva dedicated temple built by Rajaraja Cholain AD 1010 weighed 80 tons and is 217 ft. high. The top (an octoganal shaped cupola)is made on of one granite stone that elephants dragged to the top using ramps!!! The engineering feat of many centuries. We got to go into the inner sanctum with the Hindus because this is an Inesco site. It was cool and moving being there with the Hindus and the priests. As you will notice this temple is not colored. They are keeping it natural (coloring didn't come into later) and are constantly renovating and cleaning the stucco where all the detailed sculpting work is done.





MADURAI- the biggest city in Tamil Nadu--Manakshi Sundareshvara Temple- the detail on the temple is amazing; built in 10th century and added onto by several dynasties between the 14th and 18th centuries. it has walls and tall pyramid-shaped gates everywhere; stores, a musuem, a lotus tank with what looks like bleachers and a pool for people to bathe, hundreds of carved pillars, painted ceilings, and i think more than 300 shrines within it. there was lots of activities and people praying, burning candles, hanging garlands, eating with family, etc.



Hope this gives you some idea.