Thanks for this article... really I was not aware of this place until this morning. The photos were very nice, that too the first intro photo to that temple is beautiful.
We have seen many rock cut shrines and structures in india, but not many outside china know about this magnificent rock cut Buddha - the largest in the world
In an earlier post we saw how Hanuman came out alive from a Crocodile's belly. Now, we are going to see another such feat.
Darasuram has some amazing miniature story board like freezes. One such depicts the Periapuranam legend of Saint Sundarar, by his infinite devotion to Lord Shiva, making a crocodile regurgitate a boy.
next time you go to coimbatore visit avinashi where this sundarar and the croc incident took place. behind the main temple there is an accesory shrine for sundarar. the vahanam is a huge crocodile of stone
Hi Vijay your turnover is prolific( olungaa office poringalaa?)
have i missed the article in your blog on a cambodian statue of natarja with karaikal ammaiyar? karaikal ammaiyar is strictly a local phenomenon and I dont think we can find traces of her north of kalahasti. does your cambodian Peyar indicate a stronger tamil influence than east indian in cambodia? or is it a freakish one time phenomenon like a girafee in khajraho
Mount meru was the inspiration for Angkor Wat... it could have been the same for Masroor too. I do not know of any contact between north-india and the combodians - did any link exist? If not it could be just coincidence that two different people undertook two efforts based on Mount mahameru.
Could you comment about the period of angkor wat and masroor please?
(I have posted this as a comment on your blog, but am writing here so that I can get responses in my mail box)
One more comment is that in a blog topic about about masroor, you title it mentioning angkor wat, but not masroor - I think it would be good if masroor is mentioned in the topic (and the web page title). Would do justice to the main topic, and would also help show up in searches about masroor better. Just my two cents worth.
Mr Ashok my photographer friend came up with a set of amazing sculptures from Tirukurungudi, one look a them and i decided inorder to do justice to the mastery of these beauties, the right person to write about them would be Mr Kannan. Grateful to him for agreeing to do so and come up with such a great post in such a short duration. Read on and enjoy ..
yes but i thought it was kajraho and in after thought wont a giraffee be out of place in kajraho.
we have discussed it in the archives. i always imagine one african slave boy. kidnapped from etosha or some place where he has vivid memories of these animals- brought as a slave to west coast of india. trained as a sculptor and works on konarak..... Hi thats letting my imagination run aint it?
dear Venkatesh, I don't really know the deep background of much I've seen, have just had the great good fortune to travel all over India, and have excellent books with old spotty photos of intriguing places.
The temple is well preserved today because of the efforts of the TVS Group. Their founder, Sri.TV Sundaram Iyengar was born here, and their family still owns a large house in the village (in fact, the initial T in TVS stands for Thirukkurungudi). Besides this temple, the TVS group has liberally contributed to renovation of several other temples (particularly the nava-thirupathis) around the region. They have also been actively sponsoring many social initiatives undertaken by NGOs here.
The Nava Thirupathis got a new lease of life becuase of the involvement and support of Sri. Venu Srinivasan and the TVS group. I was told that the temples were virtually unapproachable 20 years ago. Thirumangai Azhwar attained 'Moksham' in Thirukurungudi. Sampath
I have been very fortunate to have been under the tutelage of many great souls, who lovingly embraced me and took it on themselves to educate and encourage me. Their list is long and in that long list the forerunner is Mr .Dhivakar. A master story teller and author of three superb works of historical fiction in tamil - Vamsadhara, Thirumalai Thirudan and Vichitra Chitan, i invite him to give us a history authorâs perspective to sculpture.