‘From all quarters of the Indian world’: The temple at Rameshvaram, Hindu kings and Dutch merchants

On Rameshvaram island in the south-east corner of India lies one of Hinduism's most important temples—the Rāmanāthasvāmi, one of the four dhams (‘holy abodes’) and the site of two Śiva-liṅgas said to have been consecrated by Rāma himself. A temple has existed here since at least the eleventh century, although most of the present temple dates to the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries when the island was protected by the Setupati rulers of nearby Ramnad. In several of the long corridors and halls for which this temple is famous are brightly painted life-sized standing images of over 100 male f... Mehr ...