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Peraiyur, a Palmyra shaded fertile village contains a temple of great renown. The Naganathaswami temple is well known for Naga worship, and barren women have been making pilgrimage to this village for centuries and install stone image of Nagas. The stone images installed over the centuries now accumulated to give a breathtaking site.
Peraiyur is on the south bank of the Vellaru. Hand fans fashioned out of Palmyra fronds are an important product of this place. Men of the Isai Vellala or Melakarar community in the village make these hand fans.
Lord Shiva with his Royal Consort is here and known by the name Naganathar.
Peraiyur is about 15 km from Pudukkottai, which is just three kilometers from the Pudukkottai – Kuzhipirai - Ponnamaravathi bus route. Regular bus services and taxi facility is available from Pudukkottai.
Monument: Naganathaswami Temple
Peraiyur contains a temple of considerable interest. It is dedicated to Siva in his Naganathaswami (lord of the snake) aspect. A tall stone Nataraja dances at the entrance to the main shrine. The sculpture of Siva and Parvathi seated on their bull are excellent pieces.
The oldest extant portion of the temple is the western gopuram behind the sanctum. It is of the 10th century and is done in the Chozha style. The specific Chozha architectural features of the structure coupled with the presence of a Saptamatrika group in bas-relief on a single stone, and an inscription of Rajendra Chozha I (1012-44) on the rock near the tarn, show that the temple was originally a Chozha structure of the 10th century, but was later renovated in the 12th or 13th century. There are other Chozha and Pandya inscriptions belonging to the 13th century.
The present garbhagriham of the Naganathaswami is a Pandya structure of the 12th - 13th centuries. It stands on a moulded plinth with a vyala vari at the top and a curved kumudam in the middle. The pilasters are octagonal with rectangular base but without nagapadams. The palagais is large and square and the padmams has well defined petals. There are niches on the wall and contains images of Dakshinamoorthy, Lingodbhava and Brahma. The vimanam is a modern brick structure.
There is in the precincts a subsidiary shrine for Goddess Brahadambal said to belong to the close of the 15th or early 16th century, and is in the Vijayanagara architectural style.
The eastern main gopuram is a Pandya structure, but the brickwork above is modern. The other mandapam-s in the prakaram are modern. The temple bears renovations, the last of which took place in during the reign of Ramachandra Tondaiman (1834-1886).
The village is famous for the worship of Naga. People install stone images of snakes in order to remove barrenness in women. The shrine faces an oval tarn that is filled seasonally by rainwater. Along the edge of this tank is a plinth on which are found snake stones (nagakkals) row upon row. Each of these stones, one to two feet high, depicts, coiled five hooded cobra.
Some of them show the common motif of two inter wined snakes, one facing the other. These have been placed at the temple over the centuries as votive offerings and installed every time with suitable rites in the naga prathishta (snake installation) ceremony.
There is a baffling phenomenon noticed in the tank. The Gazetteer of Pudukkottai District reports: 'From the tarn a musical sound is said occasionally to rise. The warblings, reported to resemble the sound of both stringed and percussion instruments, are held by the faithful to be the accompaniment of an invisible worship of Siva by Adisesha (the serpent king). The musical emanations are heard for a day or two when the receding waters of the pond touch a particular level. At its loudest, the music is said to be audible even outside the temple walls.'
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