Written by london swaminathan and uploaded on 14th October2011 on to his other blog.

Why did they send Meenakshi’s pendant to Queen Victoria of England?
Why did Madurai temple pillars go to the Philadelphia Museum in USA?
Why did an English collector present gold shoes to Goddess Meenakshi?
Why did Victoria and Albert Museum in London hang a Meenakshi curtain?
Why does the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford have Madurai pillar replicas?
Why does the India office Library keep pictures of Madurai Temple?
How did the Houston (USA) Meenakshi temple receive a Madurai idol even after the plane crashed?

Read now for the answers:

I was walking through the streets of London in 1991 thinking about the answers for the BBC listeners’ questions. My Question and Answer programme was judged the best among non-current affairs programmes of the BBC World Service in that year because it attracted 19,000 letters of appreciation from the listeners around the world. I was working as the producer of the BBC Tamil Service known as ‘Thamizosai’. The BBC in house magazine ‘Ariel’ published my photo and a write-up about my programme. So I took much interest in answering the questions. When I entered a book shop on the high street my eyes were searching for good books in the shelf and found out ‘Wonders of the World’ published by Automobile Association, UK. When I flipped through the pages for information for listeners’ questions, I was surprised to see Madurai Meenakshi Temple listed as one of the world wonders. Madurai was my home town. When the Indians failed to recognise it as a world wonder, a London book had recognised it as a world wonder in 1991! When I saw big campaigns in Tamil news papers twenty years after this to support Meenakshi temple as one of the modern wonders I was laughing. Better late than never!

(A word of advice: If you visit any temple and want to enjoy the art treasures, forget the gods. If you go to the temple just to worship god, forget the art treasures. You can’t mix both.)

MADURAI is the second largest city in Tamil Nadu, India. It is 300 miles south of Chennai/Madras.

Madurai Meenakshi Temple is an architectural wonder. When one climbs to the top of the South Tower to have a bird’s eye view of Madurai, one can’t but wonder about the engineering skills of our forefathers.

Meenakshi temple’s old pictures or objects can be seen in India Office Library, London, Ashmolean Museum, Oxford and Houston Meenakshi Temple, Texas, USA.

The pillars of one of the Madurai temples, “Madana Gopala Swamy Kovil” are in Philadelphia Museum of Art, USA. A lady from Philadelphia visited Madurai in 1930s and got interested in the temple pillars .They were just lying there without any care. She knew the value of art work in the pillars and shipped them to USA. Now a mandap/hall is reconstructed with those pillars in the museum. The temple was built in the fifteenth century in Madurai.

Queen Victoria wanted to see one of the jewels of Goddess Meenakshi. It was a pendant with ten big sapphire stones. It went to London and came back to Madurai to decorate the goddess.

British collector of Madurai Rose Peter, Shipping merchants Scotch Brothers and East India Company –all donated gold and jewels to goddess Meenakshi.

India Office Library, London has a haunting series of glass plate photographs of Pudu Mandapam opposite the temple taken in the 1850s by Captain Edward Lyons.

Ashmolean Museum at Oxford has the copper copies of some of the pillars of Madurai Pudumandapam.

Victoria and Albert Museum in London has a curtain where in Meenakshi temple’s daily activities are painted.

Picture of curtain in V&A Museum, London

Scholars who have studied Angkor Watt temple in Cambodia, the largest Hindu temple in the world and the Mayan temple at Tikal in Guatemala , a Central American country have found out some similarities with Madurai temple.

· The Meenakshi Sundareswarar (Lord Shiva is called the beautiful one Sundara +Eswara) temple is in the centre of the town Madurai in South India. The streets are arranged in squares within squares- a beautifully planned city keeping the temple at the heart of the city. Ancient Tamil literature compared this plan to a lotus flower

· Each street carries the name of a Tamil month. That means goddess idol will be taken through that street during that particular month. Now it has slightly changed.

· Temple occupies fourteen acres. There are twelve towers, big and small. The tallest of the four major towers (gopuram) is the south tower which is 161 foot – 52 meter high. Two of the small towers are covered with gold plates.

LADIES FIRST
· Contrary to the custom followed in all the major temples of Tamil Nadu Goddess Meenakshi (meaning fish eyed) is worshipped first by the devotees in this temple. In other temples the male deity will be worshiped first. Here Arti/Deeparadhana is done to Meenakshi first.
· Meenakshi was born with three breasts. The Pandya king and the queen, who were her parents, were told that the third breast will disappear when she sees the right man. This happened when she met Lord Sundareswarar (Shiva). Even today a statue with three breasts can be seen in Pudumandapam opposite temple.

· Though Srirangam temple is the largest temple in Tamil Nadu, Madurai temple is more famous than other temples and listed as one of the world wonders. One can see 33,000 statues on the towers and inside the temple.

· Lord Shiva in Nataraja form (Dancer) changed his balancing foot for the sake of a Pandya king. This place is called Silver Temple (Velli Ambalam). Four famous Natrajas in four other temples use a different foot. In Madurai he lifts his right foot and stands on his left foot.

64 MIRACLES
· Lord Shiva performed 64 miracles to save his devotees in Madurai which are known as 64 Divine Acts. So every week a festival is celebrated in the temple.

· Madurai temple is one of the 64 Sakthi kendras (centres).

· There is a beautiful 1,000 pillar Hall. Now it has got 985 pillars each with a different style or statue. It will take months to study all the sculptures.

It was erected in 1685 by Ariyanatha Mudaliyar who was the chief minister in Viswanatha Nayak time. Each pillar here will tell you a story. To mention a few, there is a nomad woman (kurathi) with four of her children. Even the basket she carries looks like a real one. There are lots of mythological stories carved out on pillars. Saraswati playing the Veena is a beautiful statue. Five headed snake, Rathi, Purusha Mirugam and the mythical animal Yali are other remarkable ones. Some of the stones like Rathi on swan emit musical notes when tapped.

(There are 1,000 pillar mandaps in Madurai, Tiruvannamalai, Chidambaram, Tiruvarur, Tiruvanaikka, Tiruvarangam and Tirunelveli. If all the seven 1000 pillar mandaps are to be rebuilt today it will cost us millions of rupees. Indians must realise the value of these world wonders and keep them intact for posterity. They are engineering marvels.)

Picture of musical pillars

MUSICAL PILLARS

· There are five musical stone pillars in the temple. One who knows musical notes can play on them with stones. A single pillar is separated in to columns or smaller tender pillars. When they are tapped or struck with stones they emit different musical notes like musical instruments.
(The other Tamil Nadu temples where musical pillars seen are Sucheendram, Thiruperundurai and Tirunelveli and Alwartirunagari (also Hampi in Karnataka, Tadpatri and Lepakshi in Andhra Pradesh)

· Just in front of the sanctum sanctorum of Sri Sundareswarar is the Kambathadi Mandapam. The monolith statues there are carved with very great skill. 25 forms of Lord Shiva are shown here. The statue of most famous wedding scene of Meenakshi and Sundareswara is located here. Like one enjoys Michael Angelo’s most famous Creation of Adam painting at Sistine Chapel of Vatican City where one hand reaches the other hand, minute carvings of fingers and hands of three figures-Meenakshi, Shiva and Vishnu on a monolith is really a wonder in stone.

Madurai temple mandap in Philadelphia,USA

BUTTERED FOR 700 YEARS

· Near that Kambaththadi Mandap are huge statues of Veera Bhadrar and Bhadrakali. Butter is applied by the devotees continuously for seven hundred years on this huge Kali statue. When a Muslim Fakir started building a mosque in temple land in spite of objection from the devotees, blood came out from the eyes of this Kali statue. Immediately the fakir stopped construction. Just to subdue the anger of Kali butter was thrown on her. This has been going on for centuries now.

· Madurai Meenakshi statue is made of a particular green colour stone called Maragatha Kal. But it is not the precious emerald. Hindus associate green colour with the planet Mercury (Bhudhan). Anyone who has got a weaker Bhudha in their horoscope come to Madurai to cure the evil effects of the planet. It is a Bhudha Kshetra.

· Meenakshi is also associated with the green colour bird parrot. It is in her hand. Till recently a lot of parrots were kept in a big cage inside the temple. Now they are all freed.

· Goddess Meenakshi’s influence is so great even the children born in Madurai are named after her. Even the lullaby the children hear is about Meenakshi.

· Recently a poem written like a drawing (Chiththira Kavi) is discovered inside the temple. The letters are in a circle. If one starts from the middle and read it like we add up numbers in magic squares, the poem will appear in full. This type of poem is called Chiththira Kavi meaning Picture poems or Drawing Poems. It may be squares or circles or pictures of flowers or chariots –anything one could imagine.

· The biggest festival of the temple is called Chitra festival which occurs in April/May every year. It attracts a million people from different parts of India. A big Chariot is pulled through the city by thousands of people. Idols from two other temples also join the God and Goddess.

ANIMAL MAGIC
· Of the 64 divine acts of Shiva a heron, a swallow, pigs, tiger and deer, an elephant, horses and foxes are involved. Shiva blesses not only human beings but also the birds and animals in Madurai.

· The temple precinct measures 850 feet by 730 feet. Though the temple was built in 12th century by Pandya kings, many of the towers date from the date of Tirumala Nayak (1623-1655). All credits go to the Nayak kings.

GOLDEN LOTUS TANK

· Inside the temple there is a tank where a Golden Lotus is floating. Thousands of years ago a merchant by name Dhananjayan saw Indra doing Puja with golden lotus flowers. In memory of this one golden lotus is floated in the tank. The lotus is the National Flower of India.

· Once the poets from the ancient Tamil (Sangam) Academy competed with one another to launch their books inside the temple. The legend is that it wouldn’t allow any unworthy poets to climb the Sangam float or board. It will throw them out. Tiruvalluvar launched his most famous Tamil book Tirukkural in the temple by boarding the Sangam float.

A SWEET WEIGHING OVER 18 KILOS
· There is big statue of Lord Ganesh inside the temple. This 6 X 4 feet statue was discovered when the Nayak king was digging the earth for sand and stones for the temple. A big (Mukkuruni) kozukkattai or modak made up of 18 kilo rice and several kilos of jaggery/sugar is offered to it every year on Ganesh Chathurthy day. Kozukkattai or Modak is a steamed rice offering inside which is Puranam made of coconut or other grains.

· Inside the temple there is a wedding hall (Kalyana Mahal) in which two huge circles-Bhugolam and Gagolam- are drawn. The geography of the world is drawn by a famous astrologer.

48 YEAR WONDER

· When Malikkaffur, the commander of the Delhi Sultan Alauddin Khilji, invaded Madurai region he plundered all the palaces and destroyed the temples. But the clever priests and administrators removed all the priceless idols and jewels to distant places like Kanyakumari and erected a fake sanctum sanctorum. Behind this was the real sanctum sanctorum (Garbha Griham). After Muslim rulers were driven away, the temple authorities opened the temple and the oil lamp was still burning there which was lit 48 years before. The flowers were still fresh. It was recorded in the temple record books called Seethala Puththakam.

· Vijayanagar Empire sent a commander by name Kampanna Vudaiyar who drove away the invaders. His brave wife Ganga Devi accompanied him to the battle field and wrote whatever she saw there in Sanskrit poems. The book is called Madura Vijayam. Her live reports from the battled field beat the modern day BBC and CNN war correspondents. She did it 700 years ago

· Float Festival in January: Every year in January a float festival is held in a near perfect square shaped tank called Mariamman teppakulam. It measures 950 X 1000 feet. In the middle of the tank is a Mandap.

· Palli Arai Deeparadhanai-Going to Bed room and saying Bye Bye for the day is done every night for the god. The god will enter Meenakshi’s bedroom at 10 pm in the night. A lot of people assemble to see this daily event.

AARTI TO MIRROR

· Lord Shiva blesses his devotees in three ways RUPA, ARUPA and RUPARUPA: Form, Formless and shapeless (form but not a shape – Linga). To express this principle there is a festival celebrated every year in Ani Uththiram (June) and Markazi Arudra day. The Nataraja idol is taken to a mandap and a circular mirror is placed in front of the idol. It reflects the idol. On that day Aarti/Deeparaadhana is done to Nataraja idol (RUPA), reflected image in the mirror (ARUPA) and the main god in Linga form in the sanctum sanctorum (RUPA ARUPA). A big principle is explained to the general public with demonstration. One feels like a science student attending a laboratory in the science class.

· Near the God’s Garba Griha is Six pillar mandap where in 108 dance gestures are depicted. In addition to the five musical pillars in the Adi Veethi , we have musical pillar in the Kampaththadi Mandap and 1000 pillar mandap. The sculptors had selected such type of stones to show their skills.

PRICELESS JEWELLERY
· The jewellery of Goddess Meenakshi is amazing. Each jewel has a story. This is one of the most expensive collections in India.

· There is an interesting story about one of the jewels of Goddess Meenakshi. Rose Peter (1812 to 1828) was one of the District Collectors appointed by the British. One day while he was sleeping there was a big thunder storm in Madurai. A little girl appeared before Rose Peter and asked him to get out of the building as soon as possible. When Rose Peter came out a big lightning struck and destroyed the building. His enquiries led him to identify the figure with Goddess Meenakshi. He was a devotee of Meenakshi. As a token of gratitude he made gem studded golden shoes and donated to Meenakshi. Each shoe weighs 28 tolas (A tola is approximately 11.5 grams). 412 red stones, 72 emeralds, 80 diamonds and cat’s eye, pearls, sapphires four each decorated the shoes.

· Pandya country was famous for its pearl industry. So we can see pearls, pearls nothing but pearls everywhere in jewellery. The biggest and rarest pearl is the size of a Jack fruit seed (in Tamil Pala Kottai). Muthu/pearl Cherukku, Pearl crown top, Pearl mango shaped crown, pearl gown (angi), pearl garland, Pearl kadivaalam, parrot made up of pearls.

· Coronation day (Pattaabisheka) Crown: 197 sovereigns,920 ruby stones,78 diamonds,11 emeralds,7sapphires,8 topaz stones. Donated by Appajirayar.

· Gem studded Sceptre: 98 sovereings,761 red colour stones (ruby and semi precious),74 cats eye(Vaiduryam),21 diamonds,269 emeralds,44 pearls.Donated by Tirumalai Nayak-greatest of the Nayak Dynasty.

· Kaasumalai/coin chain: 198 sovereigns,241 corals,439 pearl and ruby stones,6 sapphires and 2 topaz (Gomethakam).

· Pearl Mughal Crown: 164 sovereigns,332 pearls,red colour stones 474, Emeralds 27 and particular type (Palacha) of diamonds 158 stones.

· Thirimudi Chathu(For Hair decoration ):121 sovereigns 324,red stones , 114 diamonds , 3 sapphires , 2 emeralds, 694 pearls, 2 vaiduryam/cat’s eye stones).

· Golden basket 122 sovereigns, 76 diamonds, red colour stones 342.
· Pottukkaarai (1):77 sovereigns donated by Sivagangai king Sethpathi Katha Thevar 331 rubies and 44 emeralds.
· Pottukkaarai (2): 57 sovereigns 277 red stones, 38 diamonds, emeralds 81. Donated by Ramnad King Bhaskara Sethupathi.
· Coral Chain :16 sovereigns, 64 rubies, 25 pearls.
· Long Coral Chain : 62 sovereigns, 28 red corals.
· Vahana Pendants 2: 93 sovereigns with all the navaratnas ranging from 83 stones to 3 stones.

ROMAN GOLD COINS

· Chain of Roman God Coins: The coins are with Roman scripts.48 gold coins with gem stones in between.
· East India Company Gold Coin Chains: 73 coins with English letters.
· Coin chain donated by Nagarathar community weighing 66 sovereigns.
· Gold Sandal bowl with Telugu script on it: 71 sovereigns. Donated by Vijayaranga Chokkanathar.
· Goden statues for the Unjal (swing) festival: Shiva -470 sovereigns, Meenakshi-285 sovereign.

· Nagar waist belt (oddiyanam) 48 sovereigns with 113 rubies28 diamonds, 8 emeralds and 66 pearls.

QUEEN VICTORIA’S INTEREST

· Neela nayaka pendant: with ten big sapphires and 30 sovereigns.
This was sent to Queen Victoria and brought back. The East India Company sent it to her. The temple records did not throw much light on it.

· Shipping Merchants Scotch Brothers donated 38 kilo silver vessel.

· Two gold pots each weighing 2.3 kilos each.

· DIAMOND CROWN: The recent addition to Meenakshi is a diamond crown made in 1963. The height is 14.5 inches. Diameter is 20 inches.
It weighs 3500 gram with 3345 diamond stones and 4100 red stones and a big ruby.

· Seven kilo god kavacham was made in 1972 with the temple gold.
· A pearl ceiling with 71,755 pearls is used on the Kalyanam (annual wedding festival) day.
· A parrot made up of big pearls.
· A coronation crown for Somaskandar.
· A lot of silver vessels and silver ornaments for other gods and Vahanas are not included in the list.
(A SOVEREIGN IS EIGHT GRAMS OF GOLD.)

· There is a big grinding stone for making sandal paste inside the temple. The legend is that one Jain king prevented A Pandya king Murthy Nayanar from getting sandal for the God. Immediately Murthy Nayanar used his hands as sandal and rubbed it on the big stone. Thus the stone became a venerable object. Later he became the king.

PUDUMANAPAM

· Pudu Mandapam/Vasantha Mandapam is just opposite the temple. The annual Spring Festival (Vasantha Urchavam) used to take place in the hall. A lot of tailors, metal merchants and book sellers occupied this mandap. Now they are vacated and one could see all the marvelous sculptures without any hindrance. If anyone wants to know all the divine acts of Shiva, one can see it in sculptures here. Sculptures of nine Nayak Kings including the great Tirumalai Nayak are here. The dimension of this huge mandap/hall is 333 feet X 105 feet with 124 pillars. Ashmolean Museum has taken replicas of the pillars in copper

Replica in Ashmoleon Museum, Oxford, England

· No building higher than the temple is allowed in Madurai within the city. So the majestic towers can be viewed for miles from Madurai.

· Near the Kambathadi mandap there is a pregnant woman statue. Once Shiva helped a pregnant woman to deliver the baby when her mother was held up by a flash flood on the way. Shiva came as her mother. The statue reminds that anecdote. Women who are pregnant make it a point to worship this statue.

KADAMBA TREE
· Madurai was a forest full of Kadamba trees 2,000 years ago. There is one Kadamba tree still protected inside the temple, very near Durga statue. Kadamba tree was the temple tree in other towns like Thiruk kadambur, Kadambanthurai. We can see Kadamba trees growing in many other places. This has got many medicinal properties. A Tamil proverb goes as “udambai kadambaal adi“ meaning “Beat your body with Kadambu”. The hidden meaning is “Treat your body with Kadambu”.

· There are 44 epigraphs in the temple. In Kangasabhai next to Kadamba tree there is a musical inscription with Ragas and 35 Talas (Tune and Rhythm).

· In addition to separate shrine for the Navagrahas (nine planets), Navagrahas are carved on the ceiling as well.

· Tirumalai Nayak and his two wives are portrayed in two places inside the temple and outside the temple. But he has made his figures carved on the floor as well. This is just to get the dust of the devotees from their feet. Hindus believe God’s devotees are greater than Gods themselves. Several stories are there to show that God had asked his devotees to get the apologies from the devotees when they were hurt.

STORY ABOUT THE QUEEN

· One interesting story is about the chief minister Neelakanda Deekshithar of King Thirumalai Nayak. King had ordered the statues of his family. Great sculptors took the work and executed them to the minute details. But one flaw they couldn’t rectify. A chip from the thigh area of the queen kept on falling off. When it was reported to the chief minister Deekshithar, who was a great Sanskrit scholar and a devotee of Meenakshi came to know through his third eye that the Queen had a big mole in her thigh. He asked the sculptors to leave it as it was. When the king saw the statues consternation flared up instead of admiration. He suspected the integrity of the chief minister and sent his soldiers to arrest him immediately. When king’s soldiers went to his house he was doing final Aarti/ Deepa Aradhana to the God. The soldiers told him the reason for his arrest and he felt so upset and blinded his eyes with Aarti fire. When the king realised his mistake he apologised to the chief minister and gave him all the honours like land and cash. Deekshithar composed a long hymn on Meenakshi and regained his vision by her grace.

ANCIENT BOOK LAUNCHES
· Book Launches: Sacred books are always launched in a temple. According to this ancient custom, Tirukkural of Tiruvalluvar and Meenakshi pillaitamil of Kumara kurubarar were launched in this famous temple.

· Every temple is associated with some siddhas. Madurai temple was associated with Sri Kuzanthaiananda Swamikal and Sri Sundaranandar. One of the four great Saivaite saints Gnana Sambandhar did several miracles in Madurai. Sri Ramana Maharishi went to Tiruvannamalai from Madurai.

· The marvel of ancient engineers came to light when the plan showed that a straight line from the East tower is drawn to the West tower that line will pass through the main god Shiv Linga of the temple. If a line is drawn between the South and North towers that will divide the Gods sanctum sanctorum in to two halves. So precise is the plan.

HOUSTON MEENAKSHI
· When A Meenakshi temple was built in Houston, Texas, USA one of the statues was sent to Houston as a gift. The head priest from Madurai temple took it on the plane which crashed near Bombay. Though several people were killed in the accident, the head priest escaped without an injury. The idol was intact and sent to Houston for installation in 1982. The Houston temple follows the same rituals as in Madurai.

· The Pandya and later day Nayak kings ruled as representatives of Goddess Meenakshi. So every year the king will come to the temple and take the sceptre from the goddess in a ceremony and return it the next day. Nowadays they do it with the temple administrator instead of king. Sceptre is called Sengol in Tamil.

· The last and third Tamil Academy of ancient Tamil Nadu was held in Madurai. At that time 49 famous poets were there in the academy. All the 49 poets are sculpted and kept inside the temple room. On the northern bank of the Golden Lotus Tank Sangam poets are sculpted with books and stylus.

· God’s sanctum sanctorum (garba griha) was constructed as if it is born by 8 elephants, 32 lions and 64 ganas. Till 50 years ago the sun light was falling on the god exactly on Pongal (Major festival celebrated on Thai first corresponding to 14th January). But after the construction of several new buildings around the temple it did not happen.

· Shops inside: There are lots of colourful shops inside the temple selling from bangles to children’s toys.

· Visitors can enter by any of the four gateways in the temple. But locals always start from the eastern entrance. One will enter Ashta Sakthi mandap first where goddess is sculpted in her eight (Ashta) forms. Then they reach the area full of shops where a lamp holder has 1008 lamps made up of metal. It was donated by the freedom fighters Marudu Brothers who fought against the British.

· The temple has 16 pillar, 100 pillar, and 1000 pillar mandaps ,each explaining some principle according to the Vastu Shastras.

Falous sculpture of Meenakshi Wedding madu up of monolith (One stone).

Photos: Courtesy of Temple Kumbabhisheka souvenirs
Posted 14th October 2011 by Swaminathan