Tripurantakaत्रिपुरांतक

Tripurantaka (त्रिपुरांतक), the ender of the three cities, commemorates one of the great set-pieces of Shaiva myth: the destruction of Tripura, the triple fortress of the asuras, with one arrow. The story is told in the Mahabharata and elaborated in the Shiva Purana, and it furnished temple sculptors — above all in the Chola south — with one of their most dramatic subjects: the god as supreme archer, drawing a bow made of the cosmos itself.

The story

Three asura brothers, sons of Taraka, won from Brahma the boon of three flying cities — commonly described as gold, silver and iron, stationed in heaven, sky and earth — that could be destroyed only by a single arrow, and only in the rare instant when the three aligned. Secure in the boon, the asuras grew tyrannical. When the alignment came, the gods assembled a chariot from the fabric of the universe: the earth as the car, sun and moon as its wheels, Mount Meru as the bow, the serpent Vasuki as bowstring, and Vishnu himself as the arrow. Shiva loosed the shaft and the three cities burned. In a detail beloved of the tellers, some versions add that Shiva scarcely needed the apparatus — a smile of his was enough — the cosmic chariot being staged for the gods' benefit.

Iconography and meaning

Tripurantaka appears in bronze and relief as a poised archer, often four-armed, the bow drawn or held at rest; the form was a favourite of Chola royal patronage. Interpreters within the tradition have long read the three cities inwardly as the three impurities, or the three bodies and states that bind the soul, destroyed in one stroke by divine grace. The victory is remembered in the festival of Karttika Purnima, kept in the south as Karttikai Deepam, when lamps recall the burning of Tripura.