Mallikarjuna

After Ganesha was wed before him, Kartikeya, the elder warrior son of Shiva and Parvati, left Mount Kailash in anger. The Skanda Purana tells that Kartikeya had been promised that whoever circled the universe first would be married first. Ganesha, in his cleverness, had circumambulated his parents instead, declaring them his universe, and won the contest.

Kartikeya, feeling slighted, departed Kailash and travelled south, finally settling on a mountain in the Deccan called Krauncha (now Srisailam).

Shiva and Parvati, distraught at their son's absence, descended from Kailash to find him. They came to the mountain where Kartikeya had taken residence. But Kartikeya, still in his sulk, would not face them directly, he moved further away each time they approached.

So Shiva and Parvati installed themselves on the mountain, in a Jyotirlinga form, so they could remain near their son even when he refused to come close. They have been there ever since.

This is the unique theological premise of Srisailam: Shiva manifested here not as the cosmic destroyer or the meditating ascetic, but as a parent, a parent who positioned himself at his estranged child's doorstep and waited. Devotees who circumambulate the Mallikarjuna lingam are said to receive the love of Shiva-as-parent rather than Shiva-as-deity.

A second tradition layered onto this: at the same site, a princess named Chandravati was meditating on Shiva. She offered him jasmine flowers (mallika) every day. Pleased by her devotion, Shiva manifested in the lingam form she had been worshipping, and the lingam was named 'Mallikarjuna', Arjuna (white, brilliant) of the Mallika (jasmine) flowers.

The two narratives, the parental visit and the jasmine devotion, coexist in the temple's mythology.

The Bhramaramba Shakti Peeth shares the mountain. According to the Devi Bhagavata, Parvati took the form of Bhramari ('she who is bees') to defeat the demon Arunasura. After the demon's death, the form remained at this site as Bhramaramba.

The body part of Sati that fell here, by the Shakti Peeth tradition, is said to be the upper lip or neck (sources vary), with Devi installed as Bhramaramba and her companion Bhairava installed as Mallikarjuna himself, fusing the Jyotirlinga and Shakti Peeth into a single consecrated mountain.

Mallikarjuna's documented history extends further back than perhaps any other Jyotirlinga. Inscriptions from the 2nd century BCE, during the Satavahana dynasty, already reference the temple as an established religious site, suggesting active worship for at least 2,200 years.

The temple was patronized by successive dynasties of southern India: the Ikshvakus, the Pallavas, the Chalukyas of Badami, the Rashtrakutas, the Kakatiyas, and most prominently the Vijayanagara emperors.

The Vijayanagara period (14th-16th centuries) was Mallikarjuna's golden age. Emperor Krishnadevaraya (r. 1509-1529) made multiple pilgrimages here and personally funded the temple's massive eastern gopuram, the spectacular Mukhamantapa (front pavilion), and the temple's outer walls. His inscription survives at the temple.

The kalyanam (divine wedding) ritual that is performed daily at noon was institutionalized in this period, formalizing the unique parental-Shiva theme of the temple's worship.

Srisailam's relative remoteness, deep in the Nallamala forest, accessible only by difficult mountain paths until the 20th century, protected it from many of the destructions that other Jyotirlingas suffered. Unlike Somnath, Kashi, or Mahakaleshwar, Mallikarjuna was never demolished by an invader's army; the steep gorge of the Krishna river and the dense forest provided natural protection.

The modern history of Srisailam was transformed by the 1980s construction of the Srisailam Dam on the Krishna river, which submerged the original village of Srisailam at the foot of the mountain. The temple itself, atop the mountain, was unaffected, but the surrounding pilgrim infrastructure was rebuilt at higher elevations.

The current Srisailam Devasthanam (temple administration) was constituted under the Andhra Pradesh Charitable and Hindu Religious Institutions and Endowments Act, and manages the temple, the Bhramaramba shrine, the surrounding forest pilgrim trails, and the temple's substantial agricultural lands.