Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu is where Dravidian civilisation ran longest and left its marks most legibly — in temples that have been in continuous use for two thousand years, in a classical music tradition that has never required revival because it never stopped, and in a cuisine that has been shaping the diet of Southeast Asia for a millennium.

The Tamil temple is the governing idea of this state, and its most extraordinary expression is the gopuram — the gateway tower at the entrance to every major shrine. At Madurai's Meenakshi temple, the gopurams reach 52 metres and are encrusted with thousands of painted stucco figures. The Brihadeeswarar at Thanjavur, built by Raja Raja Chola around 1010 AD, is the other pole — restrained where Meenakshi is exuberant, the single vimana tower rising 66 metres in a structural statement that India would not surpass for several centuries.

Chettinad, in the dry interior, is Tamil Nadu's most striking domestic architecture and its most complex regional kitchen. The Nattukotai Chettiars were merchant bankers who traded across Southeast Asia in the 19th century and brought back Italian tiles, Burma teak, and Venetian chandeliers for the mansions they built in their home villages. Most of these houses stand empty now, but they are still among the most astonishing domestic interiors in India. The food that emerged from these kitchens — spiced with a masala of thirty ingredients including kalpasi and marathi mokku — is the most complex in the state.

The Bharatanatyam dance tradition, systematised at the Tanjore court and performed at temple dedications since the medieval period, was nearly extinguished in the early 20th century and revived through the individual efforts of Rukmini Devi Arundale, who in 1936 founded the Kalakshetra academy in Chennai and restored the form to its classical roots. The annual Natyanjali festival at Chidambaram, where hundreds of dancers perform at the temple in gratitude to Shiva Nataraja, is the most complete expression of the relationship between performance and devotion available anywhere in India.