It is located in the town of Thirupparankundram, about 10 kilometres (6.2 mi) southwest of Madurai city, Tamil Nadu, India.

[3] Thirupparankundram Rock-cut Cave and Inscription is located in Thiruparankundram in its landmark hill that towers to a height of 1,048 feet (319 m) and has a circumference of over 2 miles (3.2 km).

A small Saptamatrika temple, a spring called Saraswati Tirtha, and the Thirupparankundram Rock-cut Cave and Inscription monument are found near the foot of the south face of the hill.

These are Bhairava with a his dog, a Vighneswara (Ganesha), and a few pre-8th century and post 5th-century Shaiva poet saints such as Appar, Sambandar and Siruthondar.

[3][1] There is another rishi, defaced and damaged, who is likely Vedavyasa, much admired over Indian history for his contributions to major Hindu texts.

The mandapam's northern wall has two badly damaged panels, both minimalist with no background ornaments or decorative reliefs, but with all the essential iconography.

Yet, it is dancing Shiva in the South Indian style, surrounded by the flaming tiruvasi (Hindu iconographic detail commonly found with a major god or goddess).

Some state that there was a Jain Tirthankara relief here which was chiseled out and transformed into Ardhanarishvara in the 8th century because of the creeper-like "pepal leaf" (Ficus religiosa) motif above.

[5] As more inscriptions about dynasties and Thirupparankundram monuments were discovered in Tamil Nadu, epigraphists starting with Robert Sewell, J.F.

[7][8] Beyond the technicalities associated with transforming a flat-chested Tirthankara into an Ardhanarishvara panel where the Parvati half is shown with a generous forward-projecting breast and the Shiva side is flat, other scholars have questioned why numerous other Jain caverns and Tirthankara reliefs near the Thirupparankundram Rock-cut Cave were left intact.

[9] Swamy, a scholar of Tamil texts and history, states that the Tamil literature such as the Tevaram, whose Shaiva saints are depicted on the outer walls of this temple, and one that includes stories about a single Shaiva poet-saint simultaneously debating and defeating 8,000 Jain scholars and thereafter Tamil Jains committing mass suicide after losing the philosophical debate, are mythical because the context of these Purana-style poetic legends is mythical.

[7] The inscription begins by invoking Vishnu with the Hindu goddesses Lakshmi and Bhumi Devi (earth), then Brahma and Saraswati, followed by allusions to Shiva who together help "virtues flourish in this world".

It then praises the four Vedas, lists the Sanskrit arts and literature, and six sub-divisions of the Shaiva tradition – Bhairava, Vama, Kalamukha, Mahavrata, Pashupata and orthodox Saiva.

Thereafter, it has a large section praising the family of Sundara Pandya and him, his conquests and compare him to the virtues of Vishnu in his generosity.