Masilamani templet, Tranquebar 2007
The oldest building in Tranquebar is the Masilamani Nathar temple, which was built in 1305 at behest of the Pandyan king Maravarman Kulasekaran. Today only a part of the temple remains, due to the continual coastal erosion, which has gradually immersed several streets of the town in the sea and has caused a large part of the temple to collapse. Further erosion has been halted by the boulders which have been placed as coastal protection after the tsunami which occurred in the Indian Ocean in 2004.
Tranquebar – or Tharangampadi – is a village on the Coromandel Coast of south India. A large part of the population in Tranquebar are fishers or working within business related to fishing. The language is Tamil and the majority of the inhabitants adhere to religious traditions of Hinduism, but there are also smaller communities relating to Christianity or Islam.
During India’s colonial period, Tranquebar functioned as a Danish trade station from 1620-1845. The place has a rich intercultural history, documented in historical buildings and rich archival sources as well as old and new ethnographic collections of material items, photos and accounts of everyday life.
