Chidambaram

Chidambaram is a town and municipality in Cuddalore district in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, on the banks of the Vellar River where it meets the Bay of Bengal. It is the headquarters of the Chidambaram taluk. The town is believed to be of significant antiquity and has been ruled, at different times, by the Pallavas until ninth century, Medieval Cholas, Later Cholas, Later Pandyas, Vijayanagara Empire, Thanjavur Nayakas, Marathas and the British. The town is known for the Thillai Nataraja Temple and Thillai Kali Temple, and the annual chariot festival held in the months of December–January (In the Tamil month of Marghazhi known as "Margazhi Urchavam") and June to July (In the Tamil month of Aani known as "Aani Thirumanjanam").

Quotes

• Sages such as Sri Aurobindo who have meditated on Hindu iconography, and savants such as Ananda Coomara-swamy, Stella Kramrisch, and Alice Boner who have studied the subject, assure us that the forms and features of Hindu icons have a source higher than the normal reaches of the human mind. The icons are no photocopies of any human or animal forms as we find them in their physical frames. They are in fact crystallizations of the abstract into the concrete, of the infinite into the finite. They always point beyond themselves, and a contemplation of them always draws us from the outer to the inner. Hindu Šilpašãstras lay down not only technical formulas for carving holy icons in stone, and metal, and other materials. They also lay down elaborate rules about how the artist is to fast, and pray, and otherwise purify himself for long periods before he is permitted, if at all, to have a psychic image of the God or Goddess whom he wants to incarnate in a physical form. It is this sublime source of the Šilpašãstras which alone can explain a Sarnath Buddha, or a Chidambram Natarãja, or a Vidisha Varãha, to name only a few of the large assembly of divine images inhabiting the earth. It is because this sublime source is not accessible to modern sculptors that we have to be content with poor copies which look like parodies of the original marvels.
  • S.R. Goel, Defence of Hindu Society, Chapter 5

• The Chidambaram temple is dedicated to Nataraja, dancing Shiva. It is also one of the five important places of pilgrimage that represents one of the five elements. Chidambaram represents space. This is why when we enter the inner temple for darshan we can see that to the right of the image of Nataraja in the sanctum is a circular arch under which there is no image but from which hangs a string of golden vilva leaves which represents Shiva as akasha, or the element of air or ether... According to the Puranas, this temple is where Lord Shiva exhibited his cosmic (Paramanantha, very joyful) dance to many demigods and sages thousands of years ago. After the dance, the sages Patanjali and Vyagrapada requested him to accept worship and exhibit his dance forever in this place for the good of his devotees. Thus, Shiva granted their request for the benefit of the world. Though the present temple was built in the 10th century C.E., the history of this place dates back much further.
  • Knapp Stephen, Spiritual India Handbook (2011)

• This temple has played a great part in the lives of many saints and poets of the past. Sri Chaitanya also visited this temple nearly 500 years ago. Chidambaram is where you can see how the people of India find harmony and peace in a world full of changes. The people are usually friendly and enthusiastic for sharing what they get in their abandonment for the soul. Here, or in any holy city of India, the people know why they are in this world, how they fit into it, and who they are. They may have much less than most Westerners have, materially speaking, but they have much less to worry about as well and are often happier. I actually felt quite at home here.
  • Knapp Stephen, Spiritual India Handbook (2011)

• Here he heard that in Brahmastpuri there was a golden idol, round which many elephants wore stabled. The Malik started on a night expedition against this place, and in the morning seized no less then two hundred and fifty elephants. He then determined on razing the beautiful temple to the ground – ‘you might say that it was the Paradise of Shaddad which, after being lost, those hellites had found, and that it was the golden Lanka of Ram,’ – ‘the roof was covered with rubies and emeralds’, - ‘in short, it was the holy place of the Hindus, which the Malik dug up from its foundations with the greatest care… and heads of the Brahmans and idolaters danced from their necks and fell to the ground at their feet,’ and blood flowed in torrents. ‘The stone idol called Ling Mahadeo which had been a long time established at that place and on which the women of the infidels rubbed their vaginas for [sexual] satisfaction, these, up to this time, the kick of the horse of Islam had not attempted to break.’ The Musalmans destroyed all the lings, ‘and Deo Narain fell down, and the other gods who had fixed their seats there raised their feet, and jumped so high, that at one leap they reached the fort of Lanka, and in that affright the lings themselves would have fled had they had any legs to stand on.’ Much gold and valuable jewels fell into the hands of the Musalmans, who returned to the royal canopy, after executing their holy project, on the 13th of Zi-l Ka’da, AH 710 (April 1311 AD)...
  • About Malik Kafurs' conquests in the reign of Sultan ‘Alau’d-Din Khalji (AD 1296-1316) in Chidambaram (Tamil Nadu). Elliot and Dowson, History of India as told by its own Historians,Vol. III, p. 90-91. Amir Khusrow: Khazainu’l-Futuh.

• Brahmastpuri is Chidambaram- — There are three places that figure in this campaign frequently, ' Bir Dhul,' ' Kandur,' and * Jalkotta.' Any identification of all these, from the nature of their names as given by Amir Khusru, must turn upon the identification of the great temple Brahmastpuri, which Malik Kafur plundered. According to the description given there, it was a temple roofed over with gold, set with gems. It contained both the Linga, emblematic of Siva (Ling Mahadeo), and Vishnu (Deo Narain). These indications give sufficient lead to identify the place with Chidambaram. Chidambaram is popularly known as Kanakasabha or Ponnambalam (golden hall) from Pallava times. That was because the whole of the inner shrine of the temple was roofed over with gold, and that was renewed two or three times under the great Cholas.
  The later members of this dynasty from Kulottunga I onwards, if not from Kajendra I, were specially devoted to this temple, and seem to have always completed the ceremony of coronation in the capital Gangaikondasola- puram by a visit to this temple.
  Hence at the time it must have been one of the richest temples in this part of the country. The name Brahmast- puri is apparently the slightly modified Brahmapuri, which is the sacerdotal (agamic) name given to Chidambaram as a whole in Saiva literature. There is one temple dedicated to Siva, which goes by the specific name Brahmapuri, and the name of the deity itself is Brahmapurlsvara, and is known ordinarily as Tirukkalancheri, the northern part of Chidambaram, and this particular temple received a gift of ... gold pieces annually for certain festivals, etc., from Kulottunga III. Hence there is little doubt that the Brahmastpuri of Amir Khusru is Chidambaram.
  • Krishnaswami Aiyangar Sakkottai. 1921. South India and Her Muhammadan Invaders by S. Krishnaswami Aiyangar. Oxford: University Press. 108ff