Stories 8
Tradition: Shaiva · clear
Parvati wins Shiva
Sati is reborn as the daughter of Himavat and Mena and grows up loving Shiva.
Ravana loses the atmalinga
Ravana wins Shiva's own linga by fierce penance, to take home to Lanka.
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'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 Pandavas and the bull of Kedar
After Kurukshetra the Pandavas seek Shiva to be cleansed of the killing of kin.
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 sixty-four games of Shiva at Madurai
Indra, freed of a sin, worships a linga in a kadamba forest.