This article explores the repeated renovation of south Indian temples over the past millennium and the conception of the Tamil temple-city. Though the requirement for renovation is unremarkable, some “renovations” have involved the wholesale replacement of the central shrine, in theory the most sacred part of the temple. Rather than explaining such radical rebuilding as a consequence of fourteenth-century iconoclasm, temple renovation is considered in this article as an ongoing process. Several periods of architectural reconstruction from the tenth to the early twentieth centuries demonstrate the evolving relationship between building, design and sacred geography over one millennium of Tamil temple history. The conclusion explores the widespread temple “renovations” by the devout Nakarattar (Nattukottai Chettiar) community in the early twentieth century, and the consequent dismay of colonial archaeologists at the perceived destruction of South India's monumental heritage, in order to reassess the lives and meanings of Tamil sacred sites.

Abbreviations: ARE:Annual Report on Epigraphy:(Madras: Government Press); EI:Epigraphia Indica:(Calcutta: Government Press); SII:South Indian Inscriptions

I am grateful to the BSOAS editors and especially the two anonymous reviewers for their comments. The staff of the Bodleian Library, British Library, Tamil Nadu State Archives, Chennai and the ASI, New Delhi have all been of great assistance in the course of this research; particular thanks are due to Dr Gautam Sengupta and Dr Arundhati Banerji in Delhi, and R. Kumar, Nilavannan and Suresh in Chennai. Parts of this research were funded by the British Academy and the Leverhulme Trust. Earlier versions of this paper benefitted from the comments of audiences at the University of California, Berkeley, Delhi University and Jawaharlal Nehru University. Professor Leslie Orr has been the most generous critic of my work, and I am deeply indebted to her comments and enthusiasm for all things concerning Tamilnadu and temples.