Stories 36
Tradition: Shaiva · clear
Brahma's fifth head and the skull that would not fall
Bhairava, born from Shiva's brow, cuts off Brahma's fifth head; the skull sticks to his hand and the sin of brahmin-killing follows him; he wanders as a beggar, kills Vishnu's gatekeeper, is fed blood from Vishnu's forehead, and is freed when the skull falls at Kashi.
How Shiva became half woman
Brahma makes a world of male beings that cannot multiply.
How Vishnu and Shiva became one body
Vishnu and Shiva merge into a single form — to end a dispute among devotees, to kill Guhasura whom neither could kill alone, or at Parvati's prayer to reconcile two serpent kings. Shiva is the right half, Vishnu the left, in every telling.
Kama burnt by the third eye
Taraka can die only to a son of Shiva, and Shiva sits in grief and meditation after Sati.
Kannappa gives his eyes
Thinnan, a hunter chief, finds a linga on the Kalahasti hill and is seized by love for it.
Markandeya and the noose of death
The childless sage Mrikandu is offered by Shiva a choice: a good son who dies at sixteen or a fool who lives long.
Nakkeerar disputes Shiva's poem
The Pandya king wonders whether the scent of a woman's hair is natural or from perfume, and offers gold for the verse that settles it.
Parvati wins Shiva
Sati is reborn as the daughter of Himavat and Mena and grows up loving Shiva.
Parvati's penance on the hill of fire
After the quarrel of Brahma and Vishnu the pillar of fire cools into the red hill of Arunachala.
Rama installs the linga at Rameswaram
Rama worships Shiva as a linga on the island of Rameswaram — before the bridge in the Ramayana, or after Ravana's death to expiate the killing of a brahmin in temple tradition, where Sita's sand linga and Hanuman's linga from Kailasa stand side by side.
Rama's linga at Rameswaram
Rama wishes to worship Shiva on the island before crossing to Lanka, or after killing Ravana, to be cleansed of killing a brahmin.
Ravana lifts Kailash
Flying home in the Pushpaka after beating Kubera, Ravana is halted by Kailash.
Saraswati's forty-eight letters found the Madurai Sangam
Saraswati lingers on the way to bathe in the Ganga and arrives late.
Shiva carries earth for an old woman's puttu
The Vaigai floods and the Pandya king orders every household to repair a stretch of the bund.
Shiva under the banyan at Thrissur
Parashurama asks Varuna for land and the sea draws back to make Kerala.
Shiva's sixty-four games in Madurai
The Tamil Thiruvilaiyadal Puranam turns Shiva into Madurai's own god, who walks into the city in disguise across the reigns of fifty-two Pandya kings.
The Sharanas' Shiva of the meeting rivers
Basavanna and the Kannada vachana poets addressed Shiva as their own personal lord, rejecting temple, caste and ritual, with the body itself as the shrine.
The antelope's horn at Pashupatinath
Shiva and Parvati, tired of the gods, wander the Kathmandu valley as an antelope and a doe.
The birth of Ayyappa
Brahma's boon to Mahishi — that only a child of Vishnu and Shiva can kill her — forces Vishnu to take the Mohini form; Shiva's desire for Mohini yields a son, found and raised by the king of Pandalam, who kills Mahishi and takes his seat at Sabarimala.
The birth of Kartikeya
Taraka can be killed only by a son of Shiva.
The burning of the three cities
The gods build Shiva a cosmic chariot with Brahma as charioteer and Vishnu as the arrow to destroy the three cities of Taraka's sons; the Shaiva prelude has Vishnu send a heretical teacher to strip the cities of merit, while the Bhagavata has Vishnu as a cow and Brahma as a calf drink the demons' reviving well dry.
The dance at Tillai and the contest with Kali
Two sages, the serpent Patanjali and the tiger-footed Vyaghrapada, ask to see Shiva's dance.
The fifth head and the skull that would not fall
Brahma grows a fifth head, and with it pride or a false word.
The girl with three breasts
The childless Pandya king Malayadhwaja and queen Kanchanamalai perform a sacrifice for a son.
The ketaki lie and the curse of no worship
Brahma and Vishnu argue over which of them is greater.
The lamp on the hill
On the Karthigai full moon, when the Krittika star rides with the moon, Tamil homes are lined with clay lamps.
The longest night: Arudra and Thiruvathira
In Margazhi, when the full moon stands with the Thiruvathirai star, the year's longest night is kept for Shiva.
The pillar of light
Brahma and Vishnu quarrel over who is greater; Shiva appears as a column of fire without end; Brahma flies up as a gander and Vishnu digs down as a boar; Vishnu admits failure, Brahma lies with the ketaki as witness and is cursed. Tamil tradition roots the pillar at Tiruvannamalai.
The race around the world
Shiva and Parvati must choose between their two sons.
The silent teacher under the banyan
Shiva sits under a banyan tree facing south, one foot on the dwarf of ignorance.
The sixty-four games of Shiva at Madurai
Indra, freed of a sin, worships a linga in a kadamba forest.
The so-called Trimurti cave at Mahabalipuram
Three Pallava shrines on one platform: Shiva in the centre, Vishnu on the right, and a disputed left shrine read as Brahma by Vogel but as Subrahmanya or Brahmasasta by later scholars; a Durga panel stands beside.
The spider, the snake and the elephant
A spider spins a web over the linga to shade it and, when a lamp sets the web alight, throws itself into the flame.
Tirupattur: Brahma rewrites his own fate
Brahma grows proud and Shiva takes away his fifth head and his power to create.
Two origins of the discus
The Sudarshana is either Shiva's gift at Kashi after Vishnu offers his own eye in place of a missing lotus, or Vishvakarma's work from the radiance shaved off the sun.
Vishnu and Rama as worshippers of Shiva
Vishnu offers a thousand lotuses and his own eye at Kashi; Rama raises a sand linga at Rameswaram before crossing to Lanka; the full record is I-10 in the interactions file.