Ninra Narayana Perumal Temple, Thiruthangal

According to the Virudhunagar district administration, the temple in its present form is believed to have been built by a Pandya king, Devendra Vallabha, and it has three inscriptions in two rock-cut caves, two of them dating from the 8th century. The district site and Wikipedia add that later Pandya rulers, the Vijayanagara kings and the Nayaks made significant additions. The Sivakasi municipal corporation describes the temple as built during the early Pandya period and gives the town's historical name as Thangal.

Local tradition gives several explanations for the name. In one, Ranganatha of Srirangam, travelling to Srivilliputhur to marry Andal, stopped (thangal, 'stay') here for the night, so that the hill came to be called Thalagiri. In another, recorded by Wikipedia, a banyan tree that had lost a dispute with Adisesha did penance here and was promised that Vishnu would rest upon it. A third tells of the Pandya prince Devendra Vallabha meeting a tiger that had been a king in a previous birth, which gave the nearby rock its name, Puliparai. These are legends, not historical records.

Architecture and sacred features

The temple is built on a granite hill about 100 feet (30 m) high and is enclosed by a granite wall that contains all its shrines and water bodies. Sources describe it as lacking the tall, tapering rajagopuram typical of South Indian temples. The shrines rise in tiers: according to Wikipedia, the standing image of Ninra Narayana faces east on the third tier, with Sridevi and Bhudevi, and the sanctum images are made of stucco, so they are not given the usual ritual bath. The vimana over the sanctum is called the Somachandra Vimana.

The goddess's shrine, with her festival image Shenbagavalli, is on the second tier; unusually, she is shown standing, and worship is offered to her first. On the lowest tier, a cave shrine with traces of Pandya-period art houses Pallikonda Perumal, the reclining form of Vishnu, attended by Sridevi and Bhudevi.