Kottiyoor: The Temple That Is Built Every Year and Then Taken Down

Kottiyoor is understood in the tradition as the site of the Daksha yaga, one of the foundational episodes in Shaiva mythology.

The story:

• Daksha, a prajapati, held a great yaga, a fire sacrifice
• He invited the gods but deliberately did not invite Shiva, his son in law, whom he despised
• His daughter Sati, Shiva's wife, went uninvited
• At the yaga she was insulted, and her husband was insulted in her hearing
• Unable to bear it, she gave up her body in the sacrificial fire
• Shiva, on learning of it, created Veerabhadra from his own hair, who destroyed the yaga and beheaded Daksha
• Daksha was later restored, in most tellings with the head of a goat
• Shiva carried Sati's body across the world in grief, and where parts of it fell became the Shakti Peethas

Why this episode matters so much. It is doing a great deal of work in the tradition.

• It explains the origin of the Shakti Peethas, the network of goddess shrines across the subcontinent
• It establishes Sati's return as Parvati, and the whole subsequent story of Shiva and the goddess
• It contains the tradition's most direct treatment of grief, since Shiva's response is not divine composure but a refusal to put the body down
• It is a story about a father who would not accept his daughter's husband, which is a domestic situation the audience recognises entirely

What Kottiyoor claims. The tradition places the yaga at this site, with the swayambhu linga at Akkare Kottiyoor marking it, and the surrounding features of the landscape identified with elements of the episode.

The festival is therefore not a celebration. It is the annual observance of a place where something terrible happened, and the tone of the whole thing follows from that.

The construction and dismantling of the Akkare shrine every year is the most unusual thing about Kottiyoor and is worth thinking about.

What happens:

• Before the festival, structures are built at the site out of bamboo, leaves, reed and thatch
• They are put up according to specification, by families holding hereditary rights to do it
• The festival runs for its twenty seven or twenty eight days
• Afterwards everything is removed, and the site is left as forest
• Nothing permanent is built, and this is deliberate

Why build something you will take down. Several things are being achieved at once, and none of them is accidental.

• The site is protected by being inaccessible for eleven months. A permanent temple would need permanent staff, permanent access and a permanent road through forest
• The building itself becomes an offering, since it must be made anew each year by people who take on the work
• The hereditary duties of the families involved are renewed annually rather than being held in the abstract
• Nothing accumulates. There is no treasury, no growing complex and no institutional expansion

The wider category. Temporary sacred structures are found across India and are more common than a visitor might think.

• Durga Puja pandals in Bengal, built elaborately and dismantled after the immersion
• Ganesh mandaps in Maharashtra, and the images themselves, made to be dissolved
• Festival structures at fairs across the country
• The tent cities of the Kumbh, built for a season on a floodplain and removed before the river returns

What they share. Each accepts that the structure is not the point, and each puts the effort in anyway.

A tradition that regularly builds beautiful things in the knowledge that they will be taken down is making a claim about permanence that its stone temples cannot make. Kottiyoor makes it every year, in forest, with bamboo.

The festival's observances are specific to Kottiyoor and give it its character.

Neyyattam:

• The offering of ghee, brought by devotees
• Devotees prepare it, carry it from home, sometimes over long distances, and offer it at the shrine
• It is one of the principal observances and involves a period of preparation and abstinence beforehand

Elaneerattam:

• The offering of tender coconut water
• An enormous quantity of tender coconuts is carried to the site and the water is poured over the linga
• The numbers involved are very large, and the carrying is done by devotees

Other observances across the days:

• Rohini Aradhana and Thiruvonam Aradhana, on their respective days
• Kalasattu and the sequence of rites that closes the festival
• Specific duties held by particular families and communities, exercised annually

The odapoovu. This is Kottiyoor's most distinctive object.

• It is a flower made from oda, a reed or bamboo, shaved so that the fibres curl outward into a bloom
• They are made at the site during the festival
• Devotees take them home, and an odapoovu in a Malabar household identifies someone who has been to Kottiyoor
• It is the prasadam of the place, and it is not food

Why that is a good object. Most temples send you home with something to eat, which is gone within the day.

An odapoovu is made of the same material the temple itself is built from, by hand, at the site, during the only weeks the site exists. It sits in a house for a year until the next one comes.

That is an unusually thoughtful piece of design for a souvenir, and nobody designed it.

The setting is not incidental, and understanding it explains most of the arrangement.

Where it is:

• In the Western Ghats foothills of Kannur district, in forest
• On the Bavali, a hill river
• The site is reached by road through hill country, and the last part of the approach is on foot
• During the festival the forest fills with people, and afterwards it empties completely

The season. The festival falls at the onset of the monsoon, which is the wettest and most difficult time of year in these hills.

That is a hard time to hold a festival in forest, and the choice is deliberate. The observance is tied to the calendar rather than to convenience, and the difficulty is part of what devotees are undertaking.

Kavus and forest shrines in Kerala. Kottiyoor belongs to a wider Kerala pattern.

• Kavus, sacred groves, are patches of forest attached to shrines and left uncut
• They exist across the state, from tiny household groves to substantial forest tracts
• They are among the most important surviving fragments of Kerala's original vegetation
• Their protection is religious, not legal in origin, and predates any conservation legislation by a very long way
• Serpent groves, sarpa kavus, are the commonest kind

What Kottiyoor adds to that. It is a shrine that is protected not by a rule against cutting, but by simply not being there most of the time.

That is arguably the most effective conservation instrument anyone has devised. There is nothing to maintain, nothing to expand, no permanent traffic and no permanent infrastructure. For eleven months the site is forest, because there is nothing else there.

One consequence worth stating. The festival itself brings very large numbers into a forest for a month, and the waste and pressure that generates is a real issue that the organisers and the forest department have to manage. A visitor's contribution to that is entirely within their control.

Getting there

• Kottiyoor, Kannur district, Kerala, in the Western Ghats foothills
• About 70 km from Kannur town and roughly 60 km from Mananthavady in Wayanad
• Kannur and Thalassery have railway stations, and Kannur has an airport
• Roads run through hill country. Special transport arrangements operate during the festival

When to go

• This is the whole question at Kottiyoor. Akkare Kottiyoor exists only during the Vaisakha Mahotsavam, from Swati in Edavam to Chithira in Mithunam, generally spanning May and June
• Outside that period there is nothing at the Akkare site, and entry is not permitted
• Ikkare Kottiyoor, the permanent temple on the near bank, is open through the year
• Confirm the festival dates well in advance, since they follow the asterisms and shift each year

During the festival

• Expect very large numbers over the twenty seven or twenty eight days
• The weather is hot, humid and wet, at the onset of the monsoon in forest
• The approach involves walking, and the ground will be wet
• Accommodation near the site is limited. Kannur, Thalassery and Mananthavady are the practical bases

Customary restrictions

• Kottiyoor has specific customary rules governing entry, including on particular days and for particular groups, and there are traditions about who may be present at which stage of the festival
• These are not always the same as at other Kerala temples
• Check locally before travelling, particularly if this affects anyone in your party. Do not assume, and do not plan a family trip without confirming

Dress and conduct

• Kerala temple rules apply. Men remove upper garments and wear a mundu
• Women should dress as required, subject to the point above
• Non Hindus are not permitted at many Kerala temples, and this should be checked
• Photography is restricted

Practical notes

• Carry rain protection. You will need it
• Footwear that copes with wet ground, and a change of clothes
• Carry water and any medication you need. Facilities are basic and crowded
• Take your waste out with you. This is a forest that has a month of very heavy use and then eleven months to recover, and litter is a genuine problem

Combining the visit

• Kannur for the theyyam season, which runs roughly from December to April and is one of the most extraordinary living performance traditions anywhere
• Thalassery and the north Malabar coast
• Wayanad, over the ghats, with Thirunelli and the wildlife sanctuaries

A closing thought. Almost everything in this series is about buildings that have lasted. Kottiyoor is about one that is not allowed to. Every year people build it, use it hard for four weeks, take it apart and walk away, and the forest closes over the spot until the next Swati in Edavam.