The Devil of Calicut and the tiger-footed sage: misreading Vyāghrapāda in early European writing

Introduction: European encounter and the Devil of Calicut

In the early-16th century, European authors began to produce some of the earliest printed European descriptions of South Indian religious life through travel narratives and images that gained wide circulation in northern European print culture. ¹ Among the earliest such narratives is Varthema’s Itinerario (1510). ² Ludovico di Varthema, a Bolognese traveller, visited Kozhikode (Calicut, present-day Kerala, India) between 1503 and 1508 CE. At the time, Kozhikode was a major trading port on the Malabar Coast, where Arab, South Asian and European merchants intersected in what modern scholars have called a contact zone. ³ Varthema described what he believed to be a local deity, and his description would go on to shape European perceptions of South Indian sacred imagery in subsequent accounts and visual traditions. ⁴

Although this episode belongs to a pre-colonial historical moment, it reveals an emerging early-16th-century European mode of seeing in which unfamiliar sacred forms were interpreted through medieval Christian visual and theological frameworks. As Partha Mitter’s Much Maligned Monsters shows, early European responses to Indian art were shaped through medieval visual conventions and Christian demonology, through which hybrid bodies and unfamiliar iconography were understood as monstrous. Such readings demonstrate how religious imagery was actively reconfigured when encountered across cultural and geographical contexts.

This article explores how the so-called Devil of Calicut, first described by Varthema and later illustrated as a woodcut by an Augsburg-based artist Jörg Breu in 1515 CE, may reflect a European misrecognition of South Indian feline-human Shaiva imagery associated with figures such as Vyāghrapāda. Through a comparative visual analysis of Breu’s woodcut against sculptures in the temples of the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, it shows how unfamiliar iconography, early modern European visual frameworks, and linguistic inversion transformed sacred figures into demonic ones within the European imagination. This analysis developed through my encounters in October 2025 with sculptural figures across temple sites in Tamil Nadu, as similarities between tiger-footed sacred forms and the Devil of Calicut gradually emerged through comparison of temple sculpture, textual description and print imagery.

The first encounter took place at the gateway tower (gopuram) of the Thiruppudaimarudur temple in Tirunelveli district, Tamil Nadu, where I was studying mural and sculptural iconography. On the second floor of the gopuram, I noticed a figure with animal-like lower limbs, elongated features and a tiered crown, carved into the wooden pillar. The carving formed part of an ornamental wooden programme within the interior of the gateway tower, set within a dense visual field of mural paintings and carved panels depicting mythological imagery. Although the figure stood out, I could not identify it; its hybrid form did not correspond to any iconographic type with which I was familiar at the time. I consulted the mural artist Sasi Edavarad to ask whether the figure was familiar to him. He suggested that it might relate either to the Shaiva sage Vyāghrapāda or to Purushamrga (man-animal) traditions, prompting a closer examination of its feline features, posture and devotional associations. The presence of the mace initially appeared to support a Purushamrga identification. ⁵ Although a second figure was positioned opposite the sculpture, its identity could not be established with confidence, and the arrangement did not resemble the dynamic scenes characteristic of Bhīma-Purushamrga narrative imagery documented in Vijayanagara and Nayaka-period temple sculpture, in which Purushamrga is shown in pursuit of Bhīma. ⁶ Nor does Thiruppudaimarudur appear among the six Tamil Nadu temples identified by Branfoot in relation to Bhīma-Purushamrga imagery. ⁷ At this stage, the identification remained tentative, based on a single encounter and not yet supported by comparison across sites.

A second encounter occurred at the Subramanya Shrine of the Brihadeeswarar Temple in Thanjavur (also in Tamil Nadu), where a similar figure appeared in a different material and spatial context. Here, it was carved in granite as part of a pillar in the mandapa (pillared hall), emerging from the architectural surface. This time, I approached the figure with a degree of recognition shaped by the earlier encounter. The repetition of key features – tiger-like legs, curved claws, a tail and elongated ears – prompted me to reconsider the earlier identification. Unlike the more dynamic hybrid imagery associated with Bhīma-Purushamrga traditions, the Brihadeeswarar figure appeared markedly devotional in character, inviting closer comparison with representations associated with the Shaiva sage Vyāghrapāda. What had initially appeared as an unfamiliar and isolated figure gradually emerged as a recurring iconographic form. Around the same time, my reading of the literature on early European accounts of South Asian religious imagery, particularly Much Maligned Monsters, led me to a figure referred to as the ‘Devil of Calicut’. The resemblance between the sculptural forms encountered at Thiruppudaimarudur and Brihadeeswarar and the figure referred to as the ‘Devil of Calicut’ was striking, though not exact. What follows developed from this sequence of encounters and traces how interpretations change as images move across sites, materials and interpretive frameworks.

Tracing visual meaning across contexts: a practice-based approach

The encounters outlined above demonstrate how meaning emerges through situated processes of looking, comparison and identification that work through four linked practices: encounter, description, translation and visual reconstruction. Together, these four practices trace how meaning takes shape across different media and contexts. Encounter focuses on the conditions under which images are first seen and interpreted, particularly in moments of cross-cultural contact. Description considers how unfamiliar forms are rendered legible through language, while translation examines how meanings shift as descriptions move across linguistic and cultural frameworks. Visual reconstruction traces how these translated meanings are materialised into images through existing visual conventions.

In the case of Devil of Calicut, the figure is understood differently in each medium – wood and granite in temple sculpture, printed text in travel writing and woodcut images in early modern print. Reading across textual description, print imagery and sculptural form shows how images are reconfigured as they move between temple landscapes in South India and early modern European print culture.

Encounter and description: Varthema’s account

In his Itinerario, Ludovico di Varthema writes:

And the King of Calicut keeps this deumo in his chapel in his palace . . . The said devil has a crown made like that of the papal kingdom, with three crowns; it has also four horns and four teeth, with a very large mouth, nose, and most terrible eyes. The hands are made like those of a flesh-hook and the feet are like those of a cock; so that he is a fearful object to behold. ⁸

The initial moment of encounter is also one of interpretation, in which unfamiliar forms begin to acquire meaning. Following the encounters across temple sites outlined earlier, Varthema’s account can be read not as a neutral description but as an interpretive act shaped by unfamiliarity. His account of the figure he identified as the Devil of Calicut demonstrates how unfamiliar religious imagery was described and transformed within existing European frameworks. Elements such as the triple crown, horns and exaggerated facial features draw on Christian demonological imagery, transforming a sacred figure into a monstrous one. Description here operates as an interpretive act: unfamiliar forms are named and reshaped through comparison with known categories. The encounter with South Indian religious imagery was, thus, mediated through description which situated the figure within a framework that associated difference with monstrosity. This mode of description establishes the conditions under which misrecognition emerges, setting the stage for subsequent processes of visual translation and reconstruction. This account also reflects a broader pattern in which early modern European visual and textual practices interpreted such imagery within their own cultural frameworks. ⁹

Visual reconstruction: Breu’s woodcut

In 1515, the Augsburg artist Jörg Breu produced woodcut illustrations for the first illustrated German edition of Varthema’s text, translating the traveller’s description of the Devil of Calicut into visual form. Without direct knowledge of Hindu deities, Breu relied on Varthema’s descriptions and reworked them through familiar European visual frameworks, reconstructing South Indian religious practices within a European ‘horizon of experience’. ¹⁰

Breu’s image can, thus, be read less as a representation of an observed figure and more as a reconstruction shaped by the circulation of description across contexts. The resulting image translates unfamiliar religious forms into familiar visual codes, creating a form of misrecognition that reveals the limits of early modern European ways of seeing. Through expanding networks of print, both the account and its visual forms circulated widely across early-16th-century northern Europe, where they were repeatedly reprinted and incorporated into influential works such as Münster’s Cosmographia (Figure 1), ¹¹ with meanings reshaped across new cultural and spatial contexts. As Mitter argues, the image can be understood as a combination of European demonological imagery, especially since Breu had no access to any South Indian visual sources. While Breu’s original woodcut cannot be reproduced here, a later 16th-century woodcut attributed to Sebastian Münster is used (Figure 1) to illustrate the persistence of this visual construction.

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Figure 1.

Sebastian Münster, A god or ‘devil’ worshipped in Calicut (called Deumo), woodcut, c. 1550. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

The triple crown resembles the papal tiaras worn by evil popes in Dante’s descriptions of hell; the four horns, claws and prominent teeth resemble the apocalyptic dragon of Revelation and the shaggy, animal-like lower limbs reflect features common to medieval devils and classical satyrs. The result is a hybrid figure assembled largely through European visual forms. ¹² This composite image (Figure 1) demonstrates how early European artists such as Breu and Münster interpreted unfamiliar religious imagery through existing theological and visual categories. The woodcut is not a faithful representation of South Indian religious iconography but, instead, a visual construction shaped by Christian demonology. This visual misrecognition raises the question – which figure was being interpreted? The following section considers the possibility that the Devil of Calicut may have emerged through European encounters with unfamiliar South Indian sacred imagery.

Recontextualisation: Vyāghrapāda in temple space

The so-called Devil of Calicut can be re-situated within its original cultural and spatial context through an examination of South Indian Shaiva hybrid imagery, particularly forms associated with Vyāghrapāda. Meaning here is anchored in ritual practice, spatial setting and embodied forms of devotion. Vyāghrapāda, a Shaiva saint whose name literally means ‘tiger-foot’ (in Sanskrit vyāghra meaning tiger and pada meaning foot), is associated particularly with the Chidambaram tradition in Tamil Nadu, where he is described as a devoted worshipper of Shiva. He is blessed with tiger limbs that enable him to roam the forests and gather the finest flowers for daily offerings. This association with tiger imagery is further reflected in the alternative name of Chidambaram – Vyāghrapura (‘Tigertown’). ¹³

Representations associated with Vyāghrapāda appear in many South Indian temples. Here, I refer to two feline-human sculptural forms – a wooden carving in the four-storied gateway tower of the Thiruppudaimarudur temple at Tirunelveli, Tamil Nadu (Figure 2), and a granite carving in the Brihadeeswarar temple at Thanjavur, also in Tamil Nadu (Figure 3). Both forms display hybrid features including tiger-like legs, curved claws, elongated ears, tiered crowns and tails. The Brihadeeswarar figure, with its folded hands and composed devotional posture, invites closer comparison with established representations of the Shaiva sage Vyāghrapāda. Although certain features initially invited comparison with Purushamrga traditions, the absence of paired Bhīma imagery or narrative combat scenes, together with the exclusion of Thiruppudaimarudur and Brihadeeswarar from the six Tamil Nadu temples identified by Branfoot in relation to Bhīma-Purushamrga imagery, ¹⁴ aligns these sculptures more closely with Vyāghrapāda traditions.

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Figure 2.

Feline-human figure, Thiruppudaimarudur Temple, Tirunelveli, Tamil Nadu. Photo by Brinda Nair.

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Figure 3.

Vyāghrapāda, Brihadeeswarar Temple, Thanjavur, Tamil Nadu. Photo by Brinda Nair.

Within Shaiva visual culture, however, bodily transformations signify ascetic power, devotion and spiritual attainment, embodying a deep connection to nature. ¹⁵ In temple settings, these features are embedded in ritual practice and sacred architecture, shaping how they are interpreted and experienced by priests and devotees. By contrast, when encountered by early modern Europeans, the same forms were interpreted within entirely different visual and theological frameworks. Features that may have appeared monstrous or demonic to an unfamiliar viewer were, within their original context, markers of devotion and spiritual power.

Comparison of these forms highlights how meaning shifts when images are encountered outside the spatial and ritual contexts in which they take shape, illustrating that ‘monstrosity’ is not a stable visual category but a culturally contingent interpretation. Recognising this instability clarifies how South Indian sacred imagery, including forms associated with Vyāghrapāda, could be misrecognised as demonic in early modern European accounts.

Tracing correspondences: comparative visual analysis

A comparative analysis of textual description, print imagery and sculptural form makes it possible to trace how visual meaning emerges across contexts. When Breu’s woodcut of the Devil of Calicut is placed alongside Figures 2 and 3, a series of striking visual correspondences becomes visible. At this stage, the similarities remain only suggestive, emerging through comparison but not indicating a direct equivalence between the two figures. The comparison does not suggest a direct visual source for Varthema’s account but, instead, points to broader similarities within South Indian sacred imagery across different historical and regional contexts.

Varthema described the Devil of Calicut as having ‘the feet of a cock’, ¹⁶ a description shaped by his own cultural frame of reference. Vyāghrapāda, however, is literally ‘tiger-footed’, and both sculptures depict figures with strong feline legs and curved claws. Tigers were native to Asia, with their historical range extending from India through Southeast and East Asia into parts of Central Asia, but not into Europe. ¹⁷ Thus, Varthema likely had no direct knowledge of what a tiger looked like. Faced with unfamiliar animal limbs and sharp claws, he turned to the closest available visual reference: the cock’s feet familiar to him from both nature and medieval depictions of demons. The reference to ‘cock’s feet’ fits a standard medieval European pattern in which demons were pictured with bird-like talons. ¹⁸ The exaggerated nails on the hands of both figures further reinforce this overlap.

Additional similarities appear in bodily form and posture. Breu’s demon stands in a forward-leaning, animated stance. The hybrid sculptural figures discussed here appear in differing body postures, ranging from the more dynamic stance of the Thiruppudaimarudur carving (Figure 2) to the devotional pose of the Brihadeeswarar figure (Figure 3). The gesture of folded palms (Figure 3), known as anjali mudra (in Sanskrit) or the gesture of worship, ¹⁹ signifies devotion, reverence and humility, underscoring the figure’s sacred rather than monstrous character.

The crown introduces another point of resemblance. In Figure 2, the tall crown has three horizontal tiers, culminating in the fourth section on top, rising vertically above the head. Similarly, both Breu and Münster depict their demon with a crown made of three horizontal layers. Although the meanings differ, the formal resemblance could appear striking to a viewer unfamiliar with Shaiva iconography. The presence of a tail in both figures provides a further point of comparison. In Breu’s woodcut, the demon has a short, straight tail that hangs down from the lower stomach – a visual marker of the monstrous. In the Thanjavur sculpture (Figure 3), Vyāghrapāda also has a tail, integrated naturally into his hybrid tiger form and carved in low relief into the granite from which he appears to emerge.

Taken together, these similarities suggest that the demon depicted by Breu and Münster was shaped by European visual traditions rather than by direct knowledge of South Indian imagery. Familiar motifs were used to interpret unfamiliar forms, resulting in the misrecognition of hybrid sacred forms, including those associated with Vyāghrapāda through the visual language of Christian demonology. These comparisons show how visual meaning is reconfigured as images move across cultural and geographic contexts.

Linguistic translation and the production of misrecognition

This section examines the role of linguistic translation in shaping meaning, focusing on the slippage between daivam and deumo. Varthema was travelling through a Malayalam-speaking region, where the word daivam is commonly used to denote a god. The phonetic closeness between daivam and deumo, combined with Varthema’s limited knowledge of local languages, suggests that the term ‘deumo’ may reflect a linguistic and cultural misunderstanding in which ‘daivam’ was recorded as ‘deumo’. This linguistic shift further complicates the earlier identification, suggesting that what appeared as a stable figure was already being reshaped through translation. Mitter notes that Varthema himself suggested that the term deumo, which he interpreted as ‘devil’, might derive from deva, a term he understood to denote minor gods in the region. ²⁰ Mitter’s observation, together with the phonetic proximity between ‘daivam’ and ‘deumo’, points to a process of (mis)translation where unfamiliar religious terms were reinterpreted through the linguistic frameworks of distant societies.

This shift, however, was not merely semantic. By translating daivam into deumo, Varthema relocated a sacred figure into a Christian demonological framework. The woodcuts further fixed this misinterpretation within European print culture, reinforcing the tendency to interpret South Indian religious iconography through the lens of European demonology. ²¹ Linguistic translation and visual codification, thus, worked together to transform religious meaning as it moved across contexts, producing religious difference. These processes anticipate later colonial modes of representation in which indigenous sacred forms were systematically reconfigured within European epistemological and theological categories, reflecting what Cohn describes as the production of colonial knowledge through classification and representation. ²²

Misrecognition as interpretive practice

Misrecognition can be understood, not as an error, but as a situated interpretive practice that produces religious difference through processes of encounter, translation and visual reconstruction. The visual correspondences discussed in the preceding section show that Varthema’s account and Breu’s subsequent illustration were not accurate representations of a South Indian deity but were shaped through unfamiliar visual traditions and linguistic transformation. Although this depiction of the Devil of Calicut predates formal colonial rule, it reflects an emerging way of seeing in which indigenous sacred forms were reframed through European ideas of fear and fascination. The Devil of Calicut, therefore, is better understood as a European construction shaped by early modern visual and theological categories, within which unfamiliar bodies were made monstrous and religious difference was recast as visual otherness. These transformations anticipate later colonial discourses, demonstrating how meanings take shape through the cultural frameworks within which images are encountered. ²³

Conclusion

Tracing the movement of hybrid Shaiva imagery across contexts reveals how unfamiliar religious imagery was interpreted through European visual and linguistic categories, transforming a sacred form into a demonic one. By bringing together multiple sites of engagement – temple, text and print – this analysis shows how meaning changes across cultural and spatial contexts, rather than residing in any single form. More broadly, it positions comparative visual analysis as a practice of cultural geography, tracing how interpretation across language, image and space shapes the production and circulation of difference. This reading arises from particular encounters and comparisons, rather than claiming a definitive identification.