Siting History in Sucindram's gopuram

Mural paintings that decorate the temples and palaces of southern India act in concert with the actions that occur in their midst: they depict the gods, kings, saints and donors associated with the place; they depict the festivals celebrated there; and they relate the histories of both historical and mythical individuals and traditions. Sometimes murals are found within gopurams, the tall, gracefully sloping towers that mark the entrances into and through South Indian temples that punctuate the landscape of the Tamil country. I have found over the course of my research that a number of temples possess gopuras with highly ornate interiors, all of which have fallen into disuse, and many forgotten.

The Tāṇumālayaṉ temple at Sucindram is a fascinating example of a decorated gopuram, and the latest one that I know to have been so adorned. Painted in the late 18^th or early 19^th century, the murals reflect the momentous changes in south India and in the broader world at the time: the decline of royal power in favor of colonial rule; the transformation of traditional arts and styles; and the introduction of new forms and technologies.  The Sucindram temple paintings indicate a world of new forms of media, layered, cross-referential, and interpenetrating. They suggest a world where multiple temporalities inhabit the same sacred space, where sacred histories and political narratives converge in novel ways.​