File:Small temple and swing at Bikampulli.jpg

English: Photographer: Tripe, Linnaeus

Medium: Photographic print Date: 1858

This photograph of a small temple and swing at Bikampulli was taken by Linnaeus Tripe in 1858 and published in an album entitled 'Photographic Views of Ryakotta and other places, in the Salem District...with descriptive notes, by J.A.C. Boswell, Esq., M.C.S.' (Madras, 1858). The volume is one of a series of publications issued in 1858 from Tripe's work as Government Photographer to the Madras Presidency. Descriptive notes accompanying the album read, 'The little village of Bikampulli is situated in the Denkenikotta Taluq and is about eleven and a half miles from Ryakotta. The small temple represented in the view, is dedicated to Mariyamma one of the inferior goddesses whose worship is particularly popular in the Salem District. It was erected about 20 years ago...The swing which occupies a prominent place in the foreground, was also erected for performance of a vow by which a woman named Balasami had bound herself in a time of severe sickness. On her recovery she erected the swing for the recreation of the goddess'. Tripe was in charge of one of the battalions of the 12th Madras Native Infantry, a regiment funded in 1824 and stationed in Madras. In 1855, Tripe was commissioned to take photographs for the British East India Company and the Madras Presidency which resulted in six albums, one of which was of Ryakotta.