Skandapurana 16.219

Īśvara said:
In the southeast corner from that, near Mārkaṇḍeya,
is a secret liṅga, O great goddess, renowned as Nīlakaṇṭha.

[It was] formerly worshipped by Viṣṇu, destroying all sins.

Whoever worships with devotion there that liṅga which releases from sin, / having sons, cattle, and wisdom, rejoices on the earth.

Thus, O great goddess, in the vicinity of Mārkaṇḍeyeśa, / the hermitages of the seers are seen here even today, O spirited woman.

Eighty-eight thousand seers of chaste conduct / dwell there near Mārkaṇḍeya's hermitage, O queen of gods.

And the caves of the seers endowed with holy austerities / dwelling in that hermitage are seen there, all furnished with liṅgas.

Whoever installs a liṅga there near Mārkaṇḍeśa, / having rescued a hundred ancestral lines, rejoices in heaven like a god.

All the worlds consist of Śiva; everything is established in Śiva. / Therefore, the wise person who desires his own prosperity should sacrifice to Śiva.

A king who is not a devotee of Śiva, but a devotee of other gods, / is just like a young woman who, abandoning her own husband, takes pleasure with others.

All the gods headed by Brahmā, the kings of great power, / men, and sages—all worship the liṅga.

Liṅgas marked with their own names were installed in their proper places / in turn by Indra and others, and by men in great numbers.

By the installation [of a liṅga], [such persons] were carried across the killing of a brahmin, the killing of an embryo, / and other great sins by the fiery power of Śiva.

In ancient times, Śakra, having slain Vṛtra, installed Śaṃkara as Māhendra, / and, freed from the mass of sins by the liṅga, went to heaven.

The Sun, having installed Śiva at the confluence of the Gaṅgā and the ocean, / became free from disease, as did Soma in Prabhāsa by the western sea.

And so too the Sun in Kāśī, and Garuḍa and Kaśyapa on the Sahya [mountain], / attained the highest status after installing the Lord of the universe.

Even Ahilyā, who had incurred famous reproach, was then cursed by her husband; / having installed Īśāna, she regained her womanhood and [obtained] excellent sons.

The women who bathe and behold Ahilyeśvara there even today, / and men as well, are freed from those sins; there is no doubt in this.

Having installed Īśvara on Śvetaśaila, Bali and Virocana / both became immortal, best among the strong.

[A liṅga] was installed according to the rules with devotion by Rāma on the shore of the ocean, the lord of rivers, / after slaying Rāvaṇa along with his army, that king of the thirty [demons].

Nowhere is the earth devoid of liṅgas—self-manifest, installed by seers, gods, and others. / Abandon all [mundane] pursuits and always worship Śiva; / [those who do not] seem near to arriving in the city of the God of Death.

O goddess, what is the use of speaking much and praising again and again? / The hermitage of Mārkaṇḍeya is indeed the essence of the sacred field of Prabhāsa.

Thus ends the two hundred and nineteenth chapter, entitled 'Description of the Māhātmya of Mārkaṇḍeyeśvara', in the first [part], 'Māhātmya of Prabhāsakṣetra', in the seventh [book], 'Prabhāsakhaṇḍa', in the Skanda Mahāpurāṇa consisting of eighty-one thousand verses.