A History of South India from Prehistoric Times to the Fall of Vijayanagar c20.20

c20.20

The work of the poet-saints of the Pāndya-Pallava period was continued in the age of the Cholas by a succession of poets and teachers of second rank. The Tamil hymns of the last age came to be treated as equal to the Veda and were collected and arranged in canonical books. Gradually they were regularly employed in the daily worship in temples, and their authors came to be regularly worshipped as manifestations of divinity. In fact the rise of the temple to an important place in the religious and social life of the land was the direct result of the revivalist movement. The age of the Imperial Cholas saw the construction of stone temples, great and small, in almost every town and village in their extensive empire. The great temples of Tanjore and Gangaikondaśolapuram were symbolic of the new age and, among many others, they were celebrated in hymns by contemporary poets.