Cilappatikaram

"Let us briefly turn to the famous Tamil epic Shilappadikaram (second to sixth century AD), which relates the beautiful and tragic story of Kannagi and Kovalan ; it opens with invocations to Chandra, Surya, and Indra, all of them Vedic Gods, and frequently praises Agni, Varuna, Shiva, Subrahmanya, Vishnu-Krishna, Uma, Kàli, Yama and so forth. There are mentions of the four Vedas and of “Vedic sacrifices being faultlessly performed.” “In more than one place,” writes V. Ramachandra Dikshitar, the first translator of the epic into English, “there are references to Vedic Brahmans, their fire rites, and their chanting of the Vedic hymns. The Brahman received much respect from the king and was often given gifts of wealth and cattle.”"

"When Kovalan and Kannagi are married, they “walk around the holy fire,” a typically Vedic rite still at the centre of the Hindu wedding. Welcomed by a tribe of fierce hunters on their way to Madurai, they witness a striking apparition of Durga, who is addressed equally as Lakshmi and Sarasvati—the three Shaktis of the Hindu trinity. There are numerous references to legends from the Mahabharata, the Ramayana, and the Puranas. After worshipping at two temples, one of Vishnu and the other of Shiva, the Chera king Shenguttuvan goes to the Himalayas in search of a stone for Kannagi’s idol, and bathes it in the Ganges—in fact, the waters of Ganga and those of Cauvery were said to be equally sacred."