Gangaikonda Cholapuram

The great monument at Gangaikondacholapuram, the Second Brihadisvara Gangaikkondacholesvara temple rears its head nobly and bespeaks the imperial dignity of the capital that Rajendra (1012-44)Cholan, the son of Rajaraja Colan, established after his victorious march to east India up to the river Ganga. The capital itself has disappeared: even the place where the emperor dwelt does not exist except in ruins marked by brick debris about 1.5 km away from the temple, at a place known as Ulkottai, where a mound even now called Maligaimedu, ‘palace-mound’, supplies bricks to the villages.

At the temple itself a ruined gopura greets the visitor: it is in the inner compound-wall of the temple, the outer and largest wall, with its gopuras, having been despoiled long ago. On entering through the gopura, one sees, beyond the bali-pitha a huge bull, which, unlike its counterpart at Thanjavur, is not monolithic.

The temple is 54.86 m high and in arrangement follows its Thanjavur predecessor. But while the latter is tall and stately, with its contour straight and severe , suggestive of strength, the present one is shorter and its contour more graceful and delicate and somewhat feminine in its lack of angularity.