South Indian Temples series - Vettuvan Koil Temple

These are collated notes on Vettuvan Koil temple which means ‘Heaven of sculptors’ which was carved out from a single rock. located in Kalugumalai, a panchayat town in Thoothukudi district of Tamil Nadu

The specialty of this temple is that it is entirely carved out of one solid rock, just like the Kailasa Temple in Ellora Caves. Though this temple was constructed during the 8th century its speciality has been realised only a decade ago, that too when the government decided to popularise village tourism . It was in the year 2010 that this temple got registered as a heritage site with ASI

It is an unfinished Pandyan monolith Shiva temple having around 122 sculptures of Hindu Gods. It is believed that this monument was established during 8th century by Pandya Maranchadayan king

A little known rock cut temple carved out of single piece of granite stone and thousands of tons of rock was scooped out. Even today when we have diamond tipped cutting tools it’s one of most pesky job to cut granite. The amazing engineering effort done more than 1300years ago, to carve out the temple with finest details is unexplainable…

Backstory

The main deity Lord Siva is called here as Vettuvan (Watcher of Cattle). The following story depicts how this place got its name “Vettuvan Koil”. During ancient times, there was a huge forest with dense foliage that had many wild animals, including tigers. Suddenly Lord Siva appeared in front of the shepherds and asked them to build a temple for him. Since he appeared in the forest, he was given the name Vettuvan (Watcher of Cattle). The Lord agreed to protect the cattle from wild animals if they construct his temple. The thick forest was cleared by cutting all trees and bushes. The shepherds built his temple and yagna was performed by them to fulfill their promise to the Lord. Since then there were no more incidents of tigers killing cattle in that forest region and nearby villages
It is believed that the wild animals including lions and tigers were tamed and became very friendly with Vettuvan (Siva). So, they remained as guards around him. This belief has come true by not seeing lions or tigers inside his temple even today.