Thirupparamkunram Subramanya Swamy Temple

Deity

Subramanya with Deivanai, the rock-cut shrine

Where

Madurai, Tamil Nadu · 9.88N 78.07E

Usual hours

6 am – 12.30 pm, 4 pm – 8.30 pm — hours change with festivals and the season; check before travelling. Were these right when you went?

Grahas

Sevvai

Visited for

The first house, where Murugan married Deivanai; the wedding sthalam of the six. Panguni Uthiram is its day, and it is the classic temple for a delayed marriage.

The sthala purana has it that after the war with Surapadman, Indra gave his daughter Deivanai to Murugan, and that the marriage was held here. Thirupparamkunram is therefore the wedding house among the six, and the temple a family goes to when a marriage will not settle.

The hill itself is held to be one of the places Sivan is present without an image, and the old name of the town carries the word for a hill.

Thirupparamkunram is the first of the six places Nakkeerar’s Thirumurugatrupadai names, and the identification has never been in doubt.

The sanctum is not built but cut: it is a rock-cut cave shrine of the Pandya period, with the halls, the corridor and the gopuram added in front of it in later centuries.

The way in is a long pillared corridor and then a flight of steps, because the shrine is inside the rock and above the level of the street.

In the rock-cut cell, Subramanya with Deivanai is set in a line with Sivan, Vishnu, Vinayagar and Durga, all cut from the living stone. Seeing the five in one row is what most people remember of the place.

The Saravana Poigai tank is in the complex. The hill above carries other shrines, including a dargah at the summit, so the climb is used by more than one community.

Panguni Uthiram is the festival here, kept as the Thirukalyanam of Murugan and Deivanai, and the temple is at its fullest for it.

Skanda Sashti in Aippasi, Vaikasi Visakam and the Krithikai day of each month are the other days people come for.

Also called

Tirupparankundram, the first padai veedu

Period

Pandya-period rock-cut shrine, with later mandapams and gopuram in front

Reaching it

Thirupparamkunram is about 8 km south-west of Madurai city and is effectively a suburb of it. Tirupparankundram has its own railway station, and city buses run to the temple street.

• Meenakshi Sundareswarar Temple 7.1 km · Sakta (Amman)
• Kalamegha Perumal Temple, Thirumogur 17.2 km · Vaishnava
• Kallazhagar Temple, Alagar Koil 27 km · Vaishnava
• Pazhamudircholai Murugan Temple 27.6 km · Murugan
• Bhuminathar Temple, Thiruchuli 43.9 km · Saiva
• Sowmya Narayana Perumal Temple, Thirukoshtiyur 51 km · Vaishnava

Been to this temple? The things that change — whether the hours on this page were right, whether the sannidhi was open, how long the queue was on a Saturday — are exactly what no printed source keeps current, and what the next person travelling here needs.

• Were the hours right when you went?
• Is anything on this page wrong or out of date?
• A photograph of the gopuram, the tank, or the notice board

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