With varalaaru.com being a monthly issue and we are already on a big back-log on the 'Payana pattom' section, I thought I would update the group with my recent explorations over the weekend thro' a short email.
Triggered by the discussions in the group I visited the "someshwara Temple" in Ulsoor (bangalore). I was surprised at the big Gopura Vaayil. It has disguised itself from the heart of the city. I was expecting more as I crossed the "nayak period" Gopuram. The fairly big temple has a big mandapam with lotsa sculptures in the pillars. But, all of them I feel are nayak period. The outer walls of the mukha mandapam (or is it artha mandapam?) contain lot of scultptures but again not one of them could be related back to the mighty cholas. The thiruchutru has the 63 nayanmar statues. I was hoping that the main shrine would date back to the cholas. Unfortunately the walls of the vimana are covered with smooth, expensive, glittering, well polished granite which makes it impossible to guess the age of the temple. With the current available info, itz tough to name this structure as the oldest structure in bangalore.
My second temple visit over the weekend was more of a serendipity. I was attending my friend's engagement near Vellore. Little did I know about the place which had the fortune of being sung by the esteemed quartet ala appa, sundarar, sambandhar and manickavasagar. I was in a place called Thiruvalam, a thondai mandala devarasthalam. As usual the front mandapas are of later regime while the main vimaana is a beautiful middle chola structure. Unfortunately, a roof has been built to cover the space between the thruchutumaaligai and the vimaana and hence prevent any light coming into the structure. I did manage to locate a rajaraja inscription and also an inscription of his esteemed successor. The temple has some beautiful sculptires. I spent several minutes looking at the a beautiful dakshinamurthy and a vishnu sculpture. There are some interesting miniatures on the pilasters as well as makara thoranams. Since I was with a big group and we were rushing back to bangalore, I could spend less than 30 minutes in the temple. I'm sure, it is a temple worth doing research. Our first step would be to find if somebody has worked on this temple and figure out if the inscriptions are copied.
I'm sure the devara sthala experts like R.venkatesh could throw more light.
> My second temple visit over the weekend was more of a serendipity. I was attending my friend's engagement near Vellore. Little did I know about the place which had the fortune of being sung by the esteemed quartet ala appa, sundarar, sambandhar and manickavasagar. I was in a place called Thiruvalam, a thondai mandala devarasthalam. As usual the front mandapas are of later regime while the main vimaana is a beautiful middle chola structure. Unfortunately, a roof has been built to cover the space between the thruchutumaaligai and the vimaana and hence prevent any light coming into the structure. I did manage to locate a rajaraja inscription and also an inscription of his esteemed successor. The temple has some beautiful sculptires. I spent several minutes looking at the a beautiful dakshinamurthy and a vishnu sculpture. There are some interesting miniatures on the pilasters as well as makara thoranams. Since I was with a big group and we were rushing back to bangalore, I could spend less than 30 minutes in the temple. I'm sure, it is a temple worth doing research. Our first step would be to find if somebody has worked on this temple and figure out if the inscriptions are copied.
the thiruvallam temple is on the banks of ponnai river a tributary of palar the other name of the river is niva
the legend is lord shiva said nii vaa( you come) and the river sprang forward so similar to the vaigai story
this temple has the sthala purana .a traditional story of a cow coming and raining milk on a snake hill in a vilva forest. the snake hill is washed of in the milk and the lingam is revealed
and the original goddess Thiikaali ambal was pacified by adhi sankara
Forgot to add a few more interesting tit-bits I gained from talking to Dr.Kalaikkovan.
The endowments to thiruvalanchuzhi udaiyar given by Rajaraja is given from Thiruvallam (which was then called theekaalivallam). This temple is very close Arinjaiya-eeswaram. There are a couple of temples near Thiruvallam (including arinjaya's pallipadai) built by Rajaraja withing 5-6 km radius, in a place now known as mEl-paadi.
Venkatesh,
I heard many many local legends yesterday from the experts in the temple;-). The temple's lord is facing east and interestingly enough his vaahana nandhi (infact 2 nandhi's one small and one huge) are also facing east. The legend is that, as usual, lord shiva grants some boon to an arrogant arakkan who in turn starts trying his trick against Shiva himself. In order to protect the lord from trouble from the arakkan, the nandhi is facing east, keeping an eye on who is approaching:-)
the tirumullaivoil temple is also famous for the "kodiyidai nayagai" ........
people are more familiar with the name of the temple as kodiyidai amman temple similar to the famed "thyagrajaswami " koil in tiruvottiyur better known as "vadivudaiamman" koil by the general public... there is also a new temple known as "vaishnavi " koil at tirumullaivoyal right on MTH Road, that is gaining prominence..
the third temple in the series is "thiruvudai amman" temple at Melur near ponneri....
thiruvallam nandi fought with a asura named kanjan( nice name) who refused to give water to the temple so nandhi went and beat him up. and places where his body parts fell are all named after it wherever his blood drops fell a lingam came up people still reportedly find lingams when digging along the kanchangiri hill near lalapet on that hill on chitra pournami a mystical light forms and dissapears claim the locals
10 km away a hilltop cave temple called vallimalai is fantastic and a must see also i forget a temple in which ganeshas grow out from the soil i have seen both
the place which had the fortune of being sung by the esteemed quartet ala appa, sundarar, sambandhar and manickavasagar. I was in a place called Thiruvalam, a thondai mandala devarasthalam.
Dear Ram
your line should have read "being sung by one of the esteemed quartet" for only sambanthar has sung about thiruvallam.
very simple devaram
stanza ends like
gangaiyai thaal sadai mel viriththavan vedangkal veru veru theriththavan uraividam thiruvallame
The notice board in the temple claimed that it was sung by all 4 members of the esteemed quartet. I made the mistake of believing it without verifying, thanks for throwing light.
Hai ram temples where all three ( appar , sambandar and sundarar) have sung devaram itself is rare and sanctified( iso2004 mark maathiri) they only number 44.
where all four have sung much more rare - perhaps only a handful