Meenakshi is a goddess in the hindu pantheon who is worshipped mainly in the southern part of india. This goddess is believed to be an avatar of the goddess parvati, the wife of shiva. The most important temple dedicated to this goddess is the meenakshi amman temple in madurai, tamil nadu, india. In this temple, meenakshi is worshipped together with her husband, shiva, in his form as sundareswara. Meenakshis strong association with the city of madurai is related to the myth of her coming into being. Between the 4 th century bc and the 17 th century ad, one of the dominant powers in the southern part of india was the pandyan dynasty. For a great part of their rule, madurai served as their capital. One of the pandyan kings was the legendary malayadwaja pandya, who appears as a supporter of the pandavas in the mahabharata. According to legend, the king and his wife, kanchanamala, were not able to have children. The king prayed to various gods to grant him a child, and eventually his prayers were answered by shiva, though in a rather unexpected manner. The queen did not become pregnant, as was perhaps expected. As the king was making a sacrifice in the hope of getting a child, a three year old girl came out from the sacrificial fire. This child had three breasts, and it was foretold that the extra breast would disappear when she met a man worthy to be her husband. In addition, the girls eyes were shaped like fish, and hence she was given the name meenakshi. In the tamil language, meen means fish, whilst akshi means eyes meenakshi grew up learning the martial arts, and became a fine warrior who excelled particularly in archery and sword fighting. When meenakshi reached the age of 21, her father decided to invite all the neighboring kings and princes to madurai, in the hope of getting his daughter married. This was due to the prevailing custom of the pandyans that women were not allowed to ascend to the throne on their own.