Places to Visit in Sirkazhi

In one Sirkazhi sanctuary Shiva is worshipped on three storeys at once — as a lingam, as a lord riding a stone boat, and as Bhairava above — in the town where the greatest of the Tamil poet-saints was born.

A cosmopolitan port-capital that traded with Rome and the far East, immortalised in Tamil epic and, by tradition, swallowed by the sea.

Nine Chola-era Shiva temples across the Cauvery delta, each tied to one of the nine celestial bodies, form Tamil Nadu’s most-walked planetary pilgrimage.

The 275 Shiva temples praised in the Tamil Tevaram hymns — what they are, the saint-poets who sang them, and the great shrines you can still visit.

Two days along the Nagapattinam–Mayiladuthurai coast — Velankanni’s basilica, Nagore’s dargah, Chola Shiva temples and the Danish fort at Tranquebar, in a workable route.

Where Carnatic music was born: the delta towns of the Trinity, the Tyagaraja Aradhana and the Thanjavur veena.

In the Cauvery delta near Sirkazhi stands a temple where Shiva is worshipped not as destroyer but as Vaidyanathar — the divine physician who cures disease. This is Vaitheeswaran Koil.