Exploring a Colourful Past and Present: Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India

First Glimpse
That was the moment that I really felt I was back in India: when I caught sight – through the heavy and beautifully carved wood in a passageway – of one of the colourfully decorated roofs in the Kapaleeshwara Temple complex in Chennai.

India!

The heat, the crowds, the colours!

And, the intricately beautiful – and historic – architecture. All my previous forays into this vast and varied country have been in the north (see: Weekly Wanders India), where turbans and Mughal palaces and mausoleums are commonplace. In the south, French, Portuguese, and British influences are still much in evidence, and the Hindu temple architecture is representative of the complex Dravidian or South Indian style.

I was excited at the prospect of this trip: of getting back to the country after an almost ten year absence, and seeing a very different region. I had arrived into Chennai – “Gateway to South India” – late the night before and was now off on a tour of this eastern capital city on the Bay of Bengal … it even sounds exotic!

In the 1600s, the British called the city Madras – a shortened version of Madraspatnam, the name of the coastal fishing village where the British East India Company bought land and established a fort, factory, and trading post. But the history goes back much further, with prehistoric archaeological finds showing very early settlement, and written references to Tamil poets and kings dating to the first century. The French and Portuguese have also left their marks on the city.

Photography was disallowed or very restricted in many places. This is why I have no pictures from the soaring white Roman Catholic Basilica of San Thome Cathedral, originally built in the 16th century by the Portuguese, and rebuilt by the British in 1896. While we were there, a wedding was taking place (I think it was a wedding – it was in English, but I found the sermon hard to follow!), and local nuns were praying in a small chapel. We descended into the tomb where the Apostle St Thomas is purported to rest.

It is also why the only picture I’m sharing of the extensive property housing Government Museum and Art Gallery (or the Madras Museum) is an outdoor iPhone shot of the late-19th century British-built Museum Theatre. I cannot share with you any of the beautiful stone and bronze religious sculptures from across the Chola Dynasty (300s BCE – 1279 CE), and I would not want to show any pictures of the dusty, moth-eaten, taxidermied animals on display in the dark and worn Natural History rooms.

None of the inner temples or deities in the 16th-century Kapaleeshwarar Temple can be photographed – but there is so much going on outside in the courtyards that it is probably just as well!

Join me for a sampling of the historic buildings and bustling streets of Chennai, capital of Tamil Nadu.

The Museum Theatre
Located near the entrance to the Government Museum and Art Gallery, the theatre was built by the British in the late 1800s in the Italianate style of architecture.

Time for Church
Founded in 1639, Fort St George was the first English (later, British, and briefly French) fortress in India. Built inside its precincts between 1678 and 1680, St Mary’s Church is the oldest Anglican church in India.

Guard at the Gate
Finding people to photograph in India is always easy!

Inside St.Mary’s Church
This simple Anglican church is probably most noteworthy for the ‘number of funerary monuments, commemorative plaques, intramural tombstones and statues that dot its interior.’

Adjutant General Conway Statue
One monument in St Mary’s is to Thomas Conway, known as “the soldier’s friend”. His lifesize statue is by noted English sculptor John Ternouth (1796–1848).

Brigadier Malcolm McNeill
A soldier’s life was not always easy: this one died as a consequence of a Coup-De-Soleil, or sunburn.

Bangles and Beads
The streets are lined with small shops comprising a confusion of products and colours.

Flower Lady
People without shops simply work on a patch of mat in the streets.

Flower Lady and Shopkeeper
All of these flowers are for sale to take as offerings to the Hindu temple nearby.

Candy Colours on the Roof
Kapaleeshwarar Temple is dedicated to Lord Shiva, and stories about him and his consort Parvati, are represented in elaborate and colourful roof decorations.

The Main Tower
It is believed the temple, which is in the typical Dravidian architectural style, was built in the 7th century CE. Many elements, however, have been added much later.

Nandi
Shiva’s vahana (mount) Nandi is an Ongole bull – an old breed of Indian cattle. This sacred bull is depicted in multiple forms around the temple.

Shiva and Parvati
The details and colours around the temple are amazing. The stucco figures are painted every 12 years. Twelve years is the cycle of Jupiter, which is considered the most auspicious planet in Hindu Vedic astrology.

Friends
I love that visitors to the temple are quite happy to have their pictures taken.

Shiva and the Bulls
Hindu Gods are shape-shifters, appearing in multiple forms. While Shiva is usually depicted as svelte and handsome, here he takes a more rotund form.

Temple Drummer
Musicians were playing at the crowded entry to one of the inner temples.

Another Dome – Another Story

Peacocks on the Roof
Hindu Gods can take many forms: at this temple, Shiva’s consort Parvati is worshipped as Karpagambal. She came to Kapaleeshwara (Shiva) in the form of a peahen.

All Over the World …
No matter where you go, people connect to the world through their phones.

The Old Traditions
But, a few feet away, the old ways continue: this man was chanting ancient prayers from his book.

Offerings
Fire holds multiple meanings and functions in Hindu traditions. Agni, (fire), is the messenger between people and their God, and allows people to see the form of the deity. (iPhone12Pro)