We sit with Neelakantha Gurukkal today to get the full Kamakshi amman ritual calendar and generally understand from him the practices of the temple. He gives us many insights, and seems especially happy with Arun’s presence as a curious young mind asking questions and learning. Most of what he tells us has gone into our ritual calendar for the temple. Some added detail:
The Meru Sri Chakram was installed in 1978 at the behest of the Kanchi Periyavar
The temple marks a spot on Parvati’s journey – Kamakshi’s penance was done here, here she stands while in Kanchipuram she sits. This is a Vajra shakti peetham, presumably where a piece of Sati’s bone fell (அடி பாகம்/adi, முதுகுப் பாகம்/mudhu). The bones fell in four places: Tiruvottiyur – Tirunindriyur – Tirukkarukavur – Vedapuri.
There is often mention of Krishna’s son - Sambali, praying to the lingam that became therefore Sambalisvarar. But this must be a folk /local interpretation because the term “Samba Koyil” has a different, colonial origin: The Jesuit Church of Notre-Dame de la Conception was also called “Saint-Paul Church,” after the fathers of Saint Paul or Paulists’ first seminary in Goa. “St Paul” soon became “San Paukoil” and then “Samba” in local Tamil colloquialism, and the Church complex, including the Vedapuriswara Koyil, would thereafter be loosely referred to as the “Samba Koyil.” In contemporary use, “Samba Koyil” can refer to the old Vedapuriswara or the Jesuit complex beside it or the current Immaculate Conception Cathedral/ Cathedrale de l'Immaculee-Conception de Pondichery (which is what the Jesuit Church became)--though the last is the most correct. I learned this also from Geetha Jerome Rajan nee Kondappa, whom I met in Chennai (February 8, 2025); she grew up in Pondicherry and insisted that they had always called the Church “Samba Koyil.”