Nandi : white bull, mount
(vâhana) of God Shiva. Nandi is represented as a magnificent
and mighty bull with a hump, many times sitting under a stone canopy and facing the main entrance of Shiva temples. He
is widely worshipped by everybody
Navagrahâ : the Nine Planets, which are considered as deities
in hinduism. They are : Sûrya, the Sun,
Chandra, the Moon,
Angaraka or Mangalam (Mars), Budha (Mercur), Brihaspati (Jupiter), Shukra (Venus),
Shani (Saturn), then the two demons of the eclipses, Râhu
and Ketu. The Navagrahâ are widely worshipped in south India, mainly Tamil Nadu; all these deities are
standing on a pedestal in the north-east temple corner, so that no one is looking at another. The worshippers use to make a
circumambulation nine times. Ganesh is sometimes associated with the Navagrahâ on rare ancient temple stone lintels.
One of the best set of Navagrahâ can be seen near the Sûrya temple in Konarak (Orissa)
Nayak : they took advantage of the
Vijayanagar decay, after they were defeated at the Tilacota
battle against the muslim armies, to take their place in Madurai, the
Pandya fief, in southern Tamil Nadu. Therefore, the Madurai
Nayak dynasty lasted from about 1565 to 1736, when they were overthrown. In fact, the British took the real power
from 1564 forward