One such small village is Pulipurakovil which has a temple for Siva called Vyaghrapurishwara. Inscriptions in this temple mention the name of this deity as Thiruppulippagava Nayanar and Thiruppulippagavar.
व्याघ्रा in Samskrit and puli in Tamil mean ‘tiger’. It is known that Sage Vyaghrapada who had the legs of a tiger, was a great devotee of God Nataraja in Chidambaram, along with another famous sage named Patanjali. Incidentally, there is one more temple with the name Vyaghrapurishwara in Thiruppulivanam near Uttiramerur which is about 30 km away.
The Vyaghrapurishwara temple in Pulipurakovil faces east with a small gopuram at the entrance. The wide outer prakaram (enclosure) has the bali-pitham, dvajastambham and a small mandapam for Nandi. Further inside is a Vijayanagara era mandapam, with sculptures of various deities, and modern sanctums for Ganesha and Muruga, leading to the main sanctum with a small Siva Linga worshipped as Vyaghrapurishwara.
Close to this shrine is the sanctum for Goddess Parvati called Balakuchambal. The mandapam immediately in front of the principal deity has the processional images of Nataraja and Sivakami with Patanjali and Vyaghrapada in front.
The central shrine is in an apsidal shape, called Gajaprishta aircraft in technical parlance. The outer walls have devakoshtas (niches) for Ganesha, Dakshinamurti, Vishnu, Brahma and Durga.
The inner prakaramaround the gajaprishta sanctum, has an image of Kala Bhairava and a small Nandi who sees the main Siva Linga through a hole in the wall. The outer prakaram has a samadhi for a Siddhar.
Several inscriptions have been found in this temple, mostly on the outer walls of the central sanctum. The earliest belongs to the reign of Maravarman Sundara Pandya.
Another epigraph which belongs to the reign of a chieftain named Rajanarayana Sambuvarayar who ruled vast areas in Tondaimandalam in the 14th century, mentions the taxes to be paid by the houses on the four streets surrounding the temple.
Stone records of the Vijayanagara rulers, Bukka Raya II and Virupaksha I (who both ruled for very short periods in the 15 th century) are also here.
There is an epigraph of the powerful Vijayanagara Emperor Deva Raya II (Prauda Deva Raya) who ruled from 1422-1446 AD.
It can be understood from these inscriptions that Pulipurakovil was called Pattur which was a northern part of Madhurantaka Chaturvedimangalam, situated in the geographical area called Kalattur Kottam, a subdivision of Jayamkonda Chola Mandalam
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