About Guruvayoor
Guruvayur also written as Guruvayoor or Gurupavanapuri is a municipal town
in Thrissur District, of Kerala State in India. It houses the famous
Guruvayur Sree Krishna Temple, the fourth biggest temple in India in terms
of the number of devotees per day. Guruvayur, according to the legends may
be 5,000 years old as the Guruvayur temple idol is. There are no
historical records to establish it. In the 14th century, Tamil literature
'Kokasandesam', references about a place called Kuruvayur is made. As
early as 16th century, many references are seen about Kuruvayur. In
ancient Dravidic, Kuruvai means sea, hence the village on the coast may be
called Kuruvayur. According to eminent historian Professor K. V. Krishna
Iyer, the Brahmins had begun to come and settle at Kodungallur during the
period of Chandra Gupta Maurya (321-297 BC).Guruvayur was a subordinate
shrine of Trikkunavay Shiva temple before the latter was destroyed by the
Dutch in 1755. Trikkunavay in the Guruvayur documents is the same as
Thrikkanamathilakam or Mathilakam mentioned in the Dutch and British
records. And this place was in between Guruvayur and Kodungallur. The
story of Pandyan King building a shrine here may be a reference to the
Azhavars, but they are all silent in their writing about Guruvayur. It was
Melpathur Narayana Bhattathiri's Narayaniyam through which the Guruvayur
temple got famous all over India.
