Parthasarathy Temple

Parthasarathy Temple in Triplicane is among the oldest structures in Chennai, with a Pallava-period core dating to the eighth century, making it a rare urban survival from the same building phase as Mahabalipuram's monuments. Its central image depicts Krishna as Parthasarathy, Arjuna's charioteer at Kurukshetra, one of very few representations to show Krishna moustached and armed rather than as a youthful cowherd. Vijayanagara-era rulers rebuilt and expanded the temple after earlier disruption, adding the present gopuram over the ancient sanctum. As one of the 108 Divya Desams and a rare Chennai-based entry on that pilgrimage list, it offers visitors a compact, historically layered Vaishnava counterpart to Mylapore's Shaiva Kapaleeshwarar temple nearby.