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Tuesday, September 15, 2020

Madurantaka Choleeswarar Temple, Thozhuthur – The Temple

Madurantaka Choleeswarar Temple, Thozhuthur – The Temple
The Temple is facing towards east with an entrance arch facing south direction. Nandi, housed in a mandapam, and Balipeedam can be found in the prakaram facing the sanctum. The Temple consists of Sanctum, Artha Mandapam and Maha Mandapam. Presiding Deity is called as Madurantaka Choleeswarar / Madurantaka Chozheeswara Mudaiya Nayanar and is facing east. He is housed in the sanctum in the form of Lingam.


Uchchhishta Ganapathy, Dakshinamoorthy, Lingodbhava, Durga and Brahma are the Koshta Idols located around the sanctum walls. Mother is called as Periyanayaki / Brihannayaki. She is housed in a separate south facing shrine. Her shrine is situated in Maha Mandapam to the right side of sanctum. She is having a third eye in her forehead like Lord Shiva.


There is a shrine for Vinayaga with a mango in his left hand in the temple premises. This shrine is frequented by students for scoring good marks in their education. There is a shrine for Lord Subramaniya Swamy next to Vinayaga Shrine. He is gracing the devotees along with his consorts Valli and Devasena. He holds bow, arrow, conch and discus apart from spear among his twelve hands.


Navagrahas are represented in the form of pits in this temple. It is a unique feature that can be seen only in this temple. There are shrines for Gajalakshmi, Surya, Chandikeswarar and Bhairava in the temple premises. Bronze idol of Nataraja of this temple is most beautiful and exquisite specimen of the Chola sculptural master piece. Snakes can be seen on either sides of his hair locks and presence of Gandharvas on Thiruvasi.

There is another bronze idol of Lord Murugan with Bala Dhandayudhapani on his spear. There are three inscriptions found in this Temple. All the three inscriptions were dated to Kulothunga Chola III. These inscriptions talks about the construction of this Temple and grants given to this Temple.