Kanchipuram, City of Thousand Temples

Kanchipuram

Tamil Nadu

India

Tamil, Telugu and English

September To March

+91-4112

Seat of the Shankaracharya and also famous for the pure silk sarees.

7857

The district of Kanchipuram is surrounded by various districts of Tamilnadu. While in the north it shares its borders with Chennai and Thiruvallur, in the south its has Villuparam and Thiruvannamalai districts and in the west has the district of Vellore. On the east it has 57 kms long the coast line of the Bay of Bengal.

Kanchipuram is one of the most sacred towns of India and known as the city of thousand temples. The other reason behind its importance is that it is the seat of Shankaracharya, the highest position in the Hindu priest heirarchy. It is said that this place used to have almost thousand temples which are built down the ages by different dynasties and their rulers. Today almost all of them have been whithered away with time and just a few remain, which too, are a whooping 125 temples in number!
Kanchipuram, has been a prominent city in the history of India. Facts prove that the city was ruled by the Chola dynasty as early as the 2nd century B.C. This was the city which also had trade of various articles from China in the olden days during the rule of Chola and the Pallava dynasty. The city today is famous for its beautiful silk sarees. One of the many items which were traded between China and Kanchipuram was Silk.
The temples of Kanchi have a typical Dravadian architecture which stand testimony to the wonderful cultural heritage of the Southern ruling dynasties.