Kanchipuram’s Sthalamāhātmyas as literary maps of the city’s sacred geography

Abstract

The South Indian temple city of Kanchipuram is characterised by a particularly
pluralistic religious landscape. Over 350 Hindu temples and shrines are densely
scattered across the city. This diversity is reflected by a number of glorifying texts on the
city, including a Śaiva, a Vaiṣṇava, and a Śākta Sanskrit text. These three Sthalamāhātmyas
refer to the same place, the historical city Kanchi, and present parallel, albeit diKerent,
views of a shared local sacred geography.
The descriptions in the texts essentially form literary maps of Kanchi: through
mythological stories, “maps” of Kanchi are drawn, portraying the city as sacred space
and numerous places within it that are considered significant.
In my talk, I look at the Śaiva, Vaiṣṇava and Śākta Sthalamāhātmya on Kanchi to discuss
the relationship between literary and geographical space. In addition, I will show how
the visualisation of their literary maps onto geographical maps provides deeper insights
into the conceptions of Kanchi as sacred space through the lens of the local textual
traditions of the three major Hindu traditions.