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Remaking the past: Tamil sacred landscape and temple renovations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 January 2013

Crispin Branfoot
Crispin Branfoot*
Affiliation:
SOAS, University of London
*
cb68@soas.ac.uk
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Abstract

This article explores the repeated renovation of south Indian temples over the past millennium and the conception of the Tamil temple-city. Though the requirement for renovation is unremarkable, some “renovations” have involved the wholesale replacement of the central shrine, in theory the most sacred part of the temple. Rather than explaining such radical rebuilding as a consequence of fourteenth-century iconoclasm, temple renovation is considered in this article as an ongoing process. Several periods of architectural reconstruction from the tenth to the early twentieth centuries demonstrate the evolving relationship between building, design and sacred geography over one millennium of Tamil temple history. The conclusion explores the widespread temple “renovations” by the devout Nakarattar (Nattukottai Chettiar) community in the early twentieth century, and the consequent dismay of colonial archaeologists at the perceived destruction of South India's monumental heritage, in order to reassess the lives and meanings of Tamil sacred sites.

Keywords

South IndiaTamilArchitectureTempleConservationRenovationCholaNayakaNattukottai Chettiar
Type
Articles
Information
Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , Volume 76 , Issue 1 , February 2013 , pp. 21 - 47
Copyright
Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies 2013

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References

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4 ARE 64 of 1916, p. 126. Inscription nos. 35–117 of 1916 were recorded from this temple.

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6 This important point has been demonstrated by Eaton, Richard in “Temple desecration and Indo-Muslim states”, in Gilmartin, David and Lawrence, Bruce B. (eds), Beyond Turk and Hindu: Rethinking Religious Identities in Islamicate South Asia (Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida, 2000), 246–81Google Scholar. The wider issue of temple destruction and desecration in the context of the Sultanate expansion has been explored in Flood, Finbarr B., Objects of Translation: Material Culture and Medieval “Hindu-Muslim” Encounter (Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2009)Google Scholar.

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14 The Kallapirāṉ temple, Srivaikuntam has an uncertain foundation date: two inscriptions at the entrance to the manimaṇḍapa are dated 1236 and 1249 (ARE 439–40 of 1961/62) but there was probably a temple on the site a century or more earlier. Little survives of this Pandyan foundation, however, for the vimāṇa was substantially rebuilt in the sixteenth/seventeenth century.

15 Following the absence of Naṭarāja from Chidambaram for nearly 38 years from 1648 to 1686, to Kudumiyamalai and Madurai, the shrine for this deity was rebuilt – which is clear from the surviving architecture – and Naṭarāja reinstalled in the 1680s. See Natarajan, B., Tillai and Nataraja (Madras: Mudgala Trust, 1994), 119–20Google Scholar.

16 ARE 523–6 of 1958–59 are dated 1224, 1216, 1215 and 1232. See Mahalingam, T.V., A Topographical List of Inscriptions in the Tamil Nadu and Kerala States (New Delhi: Indian Council for Historical Research and S. Chand & Company, 9 volumes, vol. 9, 1985–95), 182–4Google Scholar.

17 ARE 75–6 of 1905, 329–35 of 1918.

18 ARE 137 of 1903 and 478–85 of 1958–59.

19 Rajarajan, R.K.K., Art of the Vijayanagara-Nayakas: Architecture and Iconography. 2 vols. (Delhi: Sharada Publishing House, 2006)Google Scholar, 129 notes the absence of this temple from some lists of divyadeśas. Cf. Murali, Jī. S., Tamiḻaka Tirumāl Talaṅkaḷ (Chennai: Satura Patippakam, 1998), 423Google Scholar.

20 ARE 229–55 of 1916 are all from the Nityeśvara temple at Srimushnam. ARE 231 and 233 of 1916 are on the main shrine, dated Kulōttunga year 30 and 31 (c. 1100/01).

21 ARE 352 of 1958–59 in Mahalingam, Topographical List vol. 2 (South Arcot District), 82.

22 ARE 254 of 1916 in the gopura's entrance dated Ś. 1383 (=1461/62) in the reign of the Vijayanagara Devarāya Mallikarjuna records the construction of the mahāmaṇḍapa in the temple of Tirumuṭṭamuṭaiya-nāyaṉār (“the Lord of Tirumuṭṭam”). Given their stylistic similarity, the gopura, goddess shrine and second prākāra were all undoubtedly erected during the same period in the 1460s.

23 ARE 256–73 of 1916. The remaining two are damaged Tamil inscriptions with stones missing, dated Ś. 1355 (1433/34) and Ś. 139[3](1471/72) in the reign of the Vijayanagara rāya Virūpākṣa hinting at the earlier temple at the site that was completely replaced in the 1580s.

24 Rabe, Michael D., “Royal temple dedications”, in Lopez, Donald S. (ed.), Religions of India in Practice (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995), 235–43Google Scholar. On the cave see Srinivasan, K.R., Cave Temples of the Pallavas (New Delhi: Archaeological Survey of India, 1964), 47–51Google Scholar.

25 On Sembiyan Mahādevi's patronage of temple architecture see Venkataraman, B., Temple Art under the Chola Queens (Faridabad, Haryana: Thomson Press, 1976), 16–46Google Scholar; Barrett, Douglas, Early Cola Architecture and Sculpture (London: Faber & Faber, 1974), 90–111, 128–30Google Scholar; Kaimal, Padma, “Early Cola kings and ‘Early Cola temples': art and the evolution of kingship”, Artibus Asiae 56/2, 1996, 33–66CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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27 Barrett, Early Chola Architecture, 98; ARE 357 of 1907.

28 On Tiruvadigai see Meister, Michael and Dhaky, M.A. (eds), Encyclopaedia of Indian Temple Architecture: South India, Lower Dravidadesa 200 B.C.–A.D. 1324. 2 vols. (New Delhi: American Institute of Indian Studies and Oxford University Press, 1983), 100–01 and pls. 71–4Google Scholar. Balasubramanyam mentions the eleventh-century Narasiṃha temple at Ennayiram near Villupuram as being made from brick above the 1.2 metre high adhiṣṭhāna: Balasubramanyam, S.R., Middle Chola Temples: Rajaraja I to Kulottunga I (Faridabad: Thomson Press (India) Limited, 1975), 155Google Scholar.

29 ARE 51 of 1914. For one example of Pandyan re-engraving of an inscription see ARE 48 of 1927 dated Vikrama Pāṇḍyadeva year 7 from the Nellaiyappar temple at Tirunelveli.

30 ARE 14, 18 of 1920 are dated to c. 894 and 898; ARE 92 of 1895 (= SII vol. 5, no. 652) to c. 1013. See Mahalingam, Topographical List vol. 8 (Tiruchchirappalli District), 369–75 for all the pre-1300 inscriptions. Barrett, Early Cola Architecture, 54; Balasubramanyam, S.R., Early Chola Art: Part One (Bombay: Asia Publishing House, 1966), 131–2Google Scholar.

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32 Balasubramanyam, S.R., Later Chola Temples: Kulottunga I to Rajendra III (1070–1280) (Faridabad: Mudgala Trust, 1979), 403–4Google Scholar.

33 Years 5, 25, 28, 49, 50: ARE 278, 280–2, 284 of 1912.

34 ARE 289 of 1912.

35 Balasubramanyam, Later Chola Temples, 178–9.

36 S.R. Balasubramanyam, Early Chola Temples, 56–8 citing SII vol. 7 nos. 502–29.

37 The earliest inscription on the central shrine dates to 1117, in the reign of Kulōttunga I (ARE 124 of 1932–33). This inscription and many others dated into the early thirteenth century are damaged and suggest later major renovations of the main shrine (ARE 127 of 1932–33 dated 1133 ad, 128 of 1932–33 dated 1159, 129 of 1932–33 dated 1172, 123 of 1932–33 dated 1177, 121 of 1932–33 dated 1203, 153 of 1932–33 dated 1208). The earliest recorded inscription on the first prākāra (ARE 178 of 1932–33 dated 1104) pre-dates that on the main shrine and thus the shrine may have been built slightly earlier than 1117.

38 One inscription on the south wall of the Kūṭal Aḻakar temple's attached maṇḍapa does mention the supply of stone for the new construction (ARE 557 of 1911), but there is no reference to the re-use or recopying of other inscriptions onto the new shrine.

39 Paramasivan, T., Alakarkoyil (Madurai: Madurai Kamarajar University, 1989)Google Scholar, 275 and ARE 25 of 1931–32.

40 The expression is adapted from Nicola Coldstream's discussion of innovation and commemoration in European medieval architecture: Medieval Architecture (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), 175Google Scholar.

41 “Correspondence regarding preservation of the temple of Rameswaram in the Madras Presidency”, Office of the Director General of Archaeology in India, 1907 (Archaeology), file no. 89 lists thirty-three temples that had been subject to major renovations in recent decades. Further temples subject to radical renovations by the Chettiar community in this period have been identified from the published Annual Report on Epigraphy and Annual Progress Report of the Archaeological Survey of Madras and Coorg (later Southern Circle from 1905), unpublished documents in the Tamil Nadu State Archive, Chennai, and through field surveys.

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43 Annual Progress Report of the Archaeological Survey of Madras (Madras: Government Press, 1904–05), 31Google Scholar.

44 Archaeological Survey of India Annual Report, 1907/8, 6.

45 Letter to the Government of Fort St George dated 6 July, 1912 in Government Order 1074, Public Department, Proceedings of Fort St George, 29 August 1912. One result of the Chettiar enthusiasm for temple renovation was the impetus given to the Archaeological Survey of India to record temple inscriptions across south India before they were destroyed or misplaced.

46 Barrett, Early Cola Architecture, 92; ARE 130–59 of 1895 and ARE 193–313 of 1907. Summaries of all the inscriptions are fouund in Ayyar, P.V. Jagadisa, South Indian Shrines (Madras: Vest, 1922), 300–13Google Scholar, and Mahalingam, Topographical Lists vol. 7 (Tanjavur District), 123–61. Heitzman, James, Gifts of Power: Lordship in an Early Indian State (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1997)Google Scholar, 100–07 and 182–201 analyses this temple's network of landholding and donations through the Chola period.

47 Second gopura: ARE 310 of 1907; third gopura, ARE 313 of 1907 = c. 1286 (the latest clearly dated inscription).

48 ARE 27 June 1907, 7, notes that the temple at Tiruvidaimarudur had been undergoing repair since December 1906, and the inscriptions were ordered to be copied immediately.

49 ARE 199 of 1907 is dated Parakesari (Uttama Chola) year 4.

50 Meister and Dhaky (eds), Encyclopaedia of Indian Temple Architecture: South India, Lower Dravidadesa, pl. 217; pl. 83 in Balasubramanyam, Early Chola Art; pls. 5 and 6 in Barrett, Douglas, “Two lost early Cola temples”, Oriental Art 17/1, 1971, 39–44Google Scholar.

51 Barrett, “Two lost early Cola temples”. In 1907 only inscriptions from parts of the temple to be destroyed imminently were recorded.

52 Balasubramanyam, Early Chola Temples, 197 and Later Chola Temples, 368–9. All of the recorded inscriptions (in Tamil) are listed in Jagadisa Ayyar, South Indian Shrines, 271–81 and correspond to ARE 371–85 of 1907. ARE 372 of 1907 (= Epigraphia Indica, vol. 10, 134) refers to the existence of a shrine for and gift of land to the goddess called Tirupaḷḷiyaṟai Nācciyar (goddess of the bedchamber) in the temple of Tirumayiladuturai Nāyanār in the fourteenth year of Rājarāja III (c. 1229/30). None give a clear date for the temple's foundation (cf. Epigraphia Indica, vol. 10, 130); all date to the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries and, although some are in fragments, record land grants.

53 Rajarajan, R.K.K., Art of the Vijayanagara-Nayakas: Architecture and Iconography. 2 vols. Delhi: Sharada Publishing House, 2006, 66–68Google Scholar.

54 Branfoot, Crispin, Gods on the Move: Architecture and Ritual in the South Indian Temple (London: Society for South Asian Studies, 2007), 208–42Google Scholar, and Crispin Branfoot, “Dynastic genealogies, portraiture and the place of the past in early modern South India” in Artibus Asiae 72/2 (forthcoming 2013).

55 Barrett, Early Cola Architecture, 105–6.

56 Durga illustrated in Balasubramaynam, Early Chola Temples, pl. 277; Siva as Ānandatāṇḍava and Ālinganacandraśekhara in Barrett, Early Cola Architecture, pls. 69 and 70.

57 Examples of the reuse of Chola-period sculpture in niches or as free-standing sculpture at other Chettiar renovations from 1900–10 include the Svarnapuriśvara at Alakapputtur and the Darukavaneśvara at Tirupparatturai.

58 “Conservation of ancient monuments”, Government Orders 95–96, 8 February 1909, Public Department, Proceedings of Fort St. George.

59 Rao, T.A. Gopinatha, Elements of Hindu Iconography (Madras: Law Printing House, 1914–16Google Scholar), is dominated by south Indian sculpture; cf. Jouveau-Dubreuil, Gabriel, Archeologie du sud de l'Iinde (Architecture and Iconography). 2 vols. Paris, 1914Google Scholar.

60 Archaeological Survey of India, Annual Report 1903–04 (Calcutta: Government of India, 1906), 233–5Google Scholar and Ali, Daud, “Royal eulogy as world history: rethinking copper-plate inscriptions in Cola India”, in Inden, Ronald, Walters, Jonathan and Ali, Daud (eds), Querying the Medieval: Texts and the History of Practices in South Asia (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 165–229Google Scholar.

61 The Annual Report on Epigraphy for 1907–8, 6, mentions that the goddess shrine of the Kūṭal Aḻakar (here named the Varadarāja Perumāḷ) had been pulled down recently. The shrine's destruction is cited again in the Annual Progress Report of the Archaeological Survey Department, Southern Circle 1910–11 (Madras: Government Press, 1911), 4Google Scholar. The discarded inscriptions were placed in the nearby Madana Gōpāla temple, also under renovation in this period. The recorded inscriptions confirm the Pandyan date of the earliest: ARE 502–505 of 1907 are in Vaṭṭeḻuttu characters, 506–7 of 1907 date to around the thirteenth century with the Pandyan dynasty's crook and fish symbol, 510 of 1907 includes a Vijayanagara genealogy dated Ś.1468 (1546/7).

62 Norman Brown of the Philadelphia Museum of Art understood the maṇḍapa to have come from the Kūṭal Aḻakar temple, but recent research by Darielle Mason (personal communication) has concluded that it came from the Madana Gōpāla instead. (Brown, W. Norman, A Pillared Hall from a Temple at Madura, India. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1940CrossRefGoogle Scholar).

63 Leslie Orr has noted the absence of the Sanskrit term jirṇoddhāra (transformation, “rescuing what is worn out”), often used in north India for renovations, from contemporary Tamil inscriptions (personal communication). Leslie Orr and I plan to expand on this issue in a forthcoming article “Building temples and building histories in South India”.

64 Parker, Samuel K., “Unfinished work at Mamallapuram or, what is an Indian art object?”, Artibus Asiae 61, 53Google Scholar.

65 Parker, “Unfinished work”, 71. Michael Meister has similarly noted the repeated remaking of temples in Rajasthan: Babb, Lawrence A., Cort, John and Meister, Michael, Desert Temples: Sacred Centers of Rajasthan in Historical, Art-Historical, and Social Context (Jaipur: Rawat Publications, 2008), 63Google Scholar.

66 Davis, Lives, 51–87 and 252–6.

67 Sharma, I.K., Parasuramesvara Temple at Gudimallam: A Probe into Its Origins (Nagpur: Dattsons, 1994)Google Scholar.

68 “Conservation of ancient monuments”, Government Order 95–96, 8 February 1909, Public Department, Proceedings of Fort St. George.

69 Both Waghorne and Muthiah date the temple to the period of the Portuguese tenure in their fort and trading centre at “Santomé de Meliapor”: Waghorne, Joanna, Diaspora of the Gods: Modern Hindu Temples in an Urban Middle-Class World (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), 85CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Muthiah, S., Madras Rediscovered (Chennai: EastWest, 2008), 218Google Scholar.

70 The earliest inscription from the site on two slabs still in temple is dated to Pandya Varaguṇa Mahārāja (Varaguṇa II) year 13 = c. 875: Pillai, J.M. Somasundaram, Tiruchendur: The Sea-shore Temple of Subramanyam (Madras: Allison Press, 1948), 17–8Google Scholar.

71 Peterson, Indira Viswanathan, Poems to Siva: The Hymns of the Tamil Saints (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1991), 12–13Google Scholar.

72 Shokoohy has suggested that the Sultanate capital was at Tirupparankundram rather than Madurai, six kilometres away: Shokoohy, Muslim Architecture of South India, 28.

73 Orr, “Identity and divinity”, 29.

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75 Shulman, Tamil Temple Myths, 353–4.