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This temple in Thanjavur was built by Rajaraja Cholan . It’s called as Thanjai Periya koil (big temple) . This temple is situated in Thanjavur 350kms south west of Chennai. It’s also called as Brihadeeswarar koil or Rajarajeswaram . This temple is dedicated to Lord Shiva .The lingam installed here is 12 feet height . The Brihadeeswarar temple stands as a supreme example of Chola’s architecture . The nandi here is huge carved out of a single stone and placed in front of the main diety . There are seperate shrines for Lord Vinayagar Goddess Brahmambigai Durgai Dakshinamurthy Chandikeswarar and Bhairavar. A widely held belief is that the shadow of the Vimana never falls on the ground . However, several photographs exist showing the shadow on the ground.  Today being the Kudamuluku, a ritual done after renovating (5.2.2020) of this temple my memories went a decade back , yes it has been a decade we saw this temple during our Trichy Thanjavur Nammakal and Kolli hills trip . I haven’t re...

We had an opportunity to visit this temple in January 2017 . It was a month before the Kudamuluku (kumbhabhishegam) a ritual done after renovating a temple . After reading Ponniyin selvan a book written by author Kalki who is famous in historical stories with fictional characters added to make it more interesting to read .Ponniyin selvan tells the story of “Arulmozhi” Varman later known as “Rajaraja Cholan”. Before reading this book I got a chance to see Brihadeeswarar temple . Waiting for next chance to visit that temple again . This temple is in Jayamkondan in Ariyalur district. This temple was built by King Rajendra Cholan , son of King Rajaraja Cholan who built Brihadeeshwarar temple ( Thanjai Periya Koil ) . Rajendra cholan was named as Gangai Kondan after his victory of Ganges . He shifted his capital to 70kms of Thanjavur and named it as Gangai konda Cholapuram . This temple dedicated to Lord Shiva is magnificent and has lingam of 13 feet with a huge Nandi in front . There are s...

This temple is dedicated to Lord Shiva named Ramanadeeswarar . This is one among the 276 Paadal petra Shivalayam and one among the 12 Jyothirlingams . Appar Sundarar and Thirugnana Sambandar has sung about this Lord . This temple is just 1km from Rameswaram railway station . We stayed in Hotel Tamilnadu run by our Tamilnadu tourism board . We reached Rameswaram by early morning and our rooms were near by the temple took a set of dress just brushed up our teeth and had coffee and left to the temple . The first ritual of Rameswaram yatra is to take bath in ” agni theertham ” in the eastern side of the temple . Here the sea is calm and clear without waves . Pithru tharpanam ( a ritual done for our ancestors ) are being done with the help of priests daily . It’s an auspicious event on thai (mid January to mid February) amavasai ( new moon day ) and aadi (mid July to mid August) amavasai day . Some collect sand here for Kasi yatra . We took holy dip in agni theertham and entered in to the t...