Frontiers of Architectural Research (2017) 6,96–107

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RESEARCH ARTICLE Visual perception on the architectural elements of the built heritage of a historic temple town: A case study of ,

K. Kiruthigan, K. Thirumaran

Department of Architecture, National Institute of Technology, , Tamilnadu 620015, India

Received 1 September 2016; received in revised form 22 October 2016; accepted 26 October 2016

KEYWORDS Abstract Visual perception; This paper aims to investigate the changes in the virtual perception on the built heritage at the Built heritage; traditional core settlement of Kumbakonam Town at Tamilnadu and to analyze their implica- Ordinal regression; tions. Specifically, the major objectives of the study are (1) to identify the architectural Architectural ele- elements that manifest the built heritage of Kumbakonam Town and (2) to assess the ments; contributions of these elements to the changes in the visual perception of the town. To Historic town achieve these objectives, this study adopts an empirical model that analyzes the architectural elements of the buildings in the study area. Direct observations and documentations of 373 buildings are collected to analyze those elements that contribute to the changes in the visual perception on the built heritage of Kumbakonam Town. An ordinary regression model is used to examine the characteristics of the built heritage across the chariot processional route of the town. Several architectural elements, including pilasters, horizontal cornices, arched windows, and ornamental parapets, improve the image of the town. These empirical findings support the policy framework that enhances the visual perception of Kumbakonam Town. & 2016 The Authors. Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

1. Introduction

Born out of their deep-rooted heritage, historic towns all over the world have evolved into spaces for immortals. Built nCorresponding author. heritage is more than stone and mortar; these spaces E-mail address: [email protected] (K. Kiruthiga). represent the lifestyles, cultures, and traditions that are Peer review under responsibility of Southeast University. being passed across generations. Most historic towns exhibit http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.foar.2016.10.002 2095-2635/& 2016 The Authors. Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Visual perception on the architectural elements 97 townscape qualities and a great scope for learning the insensitively modifying the heritage buildings beyond recog- planning concepts (Gast, 2007). The physical elements of nition can make these historic towns look identical. Sig- these towns, including their streetscapes and skylines, add nificantly changing these towns and their heritage only to their beauty, their history, and the sense of belonging of decay their transformation (Feilden and Jokilehto, 1998). their inhabitants (Lynch, 1960). Over the years, the history The historical town of Kumbakonam is no exception. This of these towns has become a symbol of their image, which town has colorful gopurams that point to the sky and serve generally reflects the elements of imperial architecture. as a reminder that Kumbakonam was previously considered Historical towns have confronted new challenges and a center of medieval South Indian power (Nanda, 1996). The changes over the last few decades. Their monuments, visual perception of this town is reflected in its architec- sacred precincts, processional streets, and public squares tural elements. Silva (2006) argued that given the limited are all endowed with moonstones and have remained in visual perception of historic towns, particularly on their obscurity. Increasing the number of ubiquitous buildings and physical elements, special preservation programs must be

0 500 0 100

Color Index Town Boundary National Highways Street Roads Railway Line 0 2 4 Water body Figure 1 (a) Tamilnadu State map showing District; (b) map showing Kumbakonam Town; (c) Kumbakonam Town map. 98 K. Kiruthiga, K. Thirumaran launched to improve the image of these areas. Therefore, The urban configuration of the town, such as its temples, an empirical study on the historic town of Kumbakonam tanks, civic buildings, religious institutions, Brahmin elite, must be performed to understand the significance of the arts, and crafts, contributes to the urban Tamil culture. The architectural elements of their built heritage. urban fabric of the town, including its temples, chattrams, This paper aims to examine the significance of the visual matams, agraharams, and paditorais, has made Kumbako- perception on the built heritage of Kumbakonam Town. The nam one of the best surviving ancient Tamil towns. Given its main objectives of this paper are (1) to identify the complex evolution, Kumbakonam Town has achieved an architectural elements that manifest the built heritage of esteemed position among other temple towns in India Kumbakonam Town and (2) to assess the contributions of (Nanda, 1996)(Figure 3). these elements to the changes in the visual perception of the The town has become a popular pilgrimage center over town. Direct observations and documentations of 373 build- the past centuries. The two holy tanks of Kumbakonam, ings are collected to analyze the architectural elements that namely, Mahamaham tank (Figure 4) and Pottramarai, are may contribute to the visual perception of the town. An recognized as the most sacred and beautiful tanks in India ordinal regression model is adopted to achieve the afore- and have been associated with Hindu mythology (Ayyar and mentioned objectives. This study also discusses various Jagadisa, 1920). Possibly the best sacred and ancient conceptions of visual perception, forecasts its significance, temple town in India, Kumbakonam is one of the few and suggests improvements in the current policy framework. remaining old settlements in the country where ancient This paper is divided into six segments. Section 2 describes rituals and traditions remain intact (Ring et al., 1996). The Kumbakonam Town and its heritage settings. Section 3 infrastructure of Kumbakonam Town can be traced back to presents the study area, the conceptual framework, and its Chola origins over a thousand years ago. The 15–17th the methodology for the empirical study. Section 4 presents centuries Vijayanagara Nayaka compilations as well as the the empirical study, highlights the significance of the ordinal 18th century Maratha intervention elegantly manifest the regression model, and discusses the dependent and indepen- dent variables. Section 5 presents and discusses the results. Section 6 concludes the paper.

2. Kumbakonam town

2.1. Profile

Located 101570N latitude and 791230 longitude, Kumbakonam Town is a river-edge settlement in Tamilnadu, India. Figure 1 shows a map of the town, its districts, and location. The town is bounded by two rivers, namely, the Cauvery River to the north and the Arasalar River to the south. Kumbakonam Town has a gentle slope from the north to the south. With more than 188 temples scattered throughout the area (Conversion of City, 2007), Kumbakonam Town also serves as a religious center in the region. The town is famous for its Mahamaham festival, which is celebrated Figure 2 Government Arts College, Kumbakonam. once every 12 years. Kumbakonam Town has large-scale agricultural, trading, and commercial activities. The town has a large silk weaving segment and is famous for its Thirupuvanam sarees. Since the ninth century, Kumbakonam Town has been famous for its crafts, including textiles, sculptures, bronze casting, brassware, and gold jewelry, which also contribute to its commercial prosperity (Hunter, 1908). The town has also become a center of scholarship and was previously called the “Cambridge of ” (Nanda, 1996). The bril- liance of its scholars has been widely acknowledged since the 20th century. One of the oldest educational institutions in Tamilnadu established in 1867 is also located in Kumba- konam Town (Figure 2).

2.2. Heritage and historic settings

Kumbakonam Town occupies a unique position in Hindu mythology because of its invaluable inscriptions, iconogra- phy, and religious architecture. The town highly articulates cosmic geography and idiosyncrasy in its urban structure. Figure 3 Porter Town Hall, Kumbakonam. Visual perception on the architectural elements 99 history and heritage of the town (Kathleen, 1981). Cholas, currently located at the town center, has 21 wells, and has Pandyas, Krishnadevaraya, and Nayakas ruled Kumbakonam an area extending to 6.2 acres. Among these wells, nine Town until the British colonization, and these periods have represent the Holy River that flows across India, while the considerably affected the heritage settings of the town. other wells are named after their associated deities. The divinity of the tank has been associated with the complex 2.3. Mahamaham festival mythology and creation myth of the town. strongly believe that taking a bath in this tank during the Mahama- ham Festival will absolve them of their sins (Gajarani, The Mahamaham Festival in Kumbakonam Town is similar to 2004). the Kumbha Mela Festival in North India. This festival happens once every 12 years in either February or March. The last festival was celebrated on 22 February 2016 2.4. Land use (Figure 5), during which 0.1 million people participated in the holy bath. The date of the festival is decided based on Kumbakonam is a special grade municipal town and the certain astrological positions, such as full moons, the second largest town in the Thanjavur district in terms of its conjunction of the sun in Aquarius with Jupiter, and the administrative status. The town comprises 45 wards and conjunction of the moon in Leo (the Mahamaham star), covers an area of 12.58 sq. km. The robust characteristics of which is considered very auspicious (Bansal, 2008). The this town have been regularly associated with the similarity origins of this festival can be traced back to the 13th in its land use or development patterns (Figure 7). Table 1 century. Figure 6 shows one of the earliest photos of the presents the land use pattern in Kumbakonam Town. The festival. During Nayaka, the Mahamaham tank was recon- land use in this area is generally residential, with the structed with 16 elegant pavilions and steps descending into commercial activities primarily located in the town center the water (Vriddhagirisan, 1995). The Mahamaham tank is and along the highways, Bazaar Street, TSR Big Street, Nageshwara Koil Street, and Mahamaham tank precincts. The public and semi-public zones are located in the tradi- tional core of the town along with temples, tanks, schools, and the town hall. The government offices and institution buildings are located to the east, where new buildings are also being developed. Architectural style, scale, mass, overall pattern, texture, building type, use, activity, and inhabitants that can be seen throughout Kumbakonam reflect the physical charac- teristics of the town. Most of the organized residential neighborhoods demonstrate the similar development pat- terns that can be seen in the traditional core of the town, including their street lights, lot sizes, building façades, and building scales. The architectural style, the similarity in land use patterns, and the arrangement of these character- istics in terms of their harmony, homogeneity, and order Figure 4 Mahamaham Tank with AbhiMukheswarar Temple. altogether improve the image of Kumbakonam Town.

Figure 5 Mahamaham Festival on 22nd Feb 2016. 100 K. Kiruthiga, K. Thirumaran

3. Methods and data Porthamarai Theertham and Mahamaham tanks (with the latter being famous for its Mahamaham Festival held every 3.1. Study area 12 years). Nanda (1996) showed that the sacred and royal configuration of Kumbakonam, as reflected in its royal The heritage areas of Kumbakonam Town comprise temples temples and holy tanks, has made this town one of the and sacred temple tanks. The temples include the Adi earliest settlements of the Chola kings. Kumbeswarar Temple, Sarangapani Temple, Someshwara The study area (Figure 8) connects two sacred tanks Temple, Nageswaran Temple, Kasi Vishwanath Temple, and (Mahamaham tank and Porthamarai Theertham) and acts as Chakrapani Temple, while the sacred tanks include the the major commercial corridor of the town. This stretch also serves as a processional route where chariots travel through to reach prominent temples. The major develop- ments and land use patterns in Kumbakonam have been observed along this stretch.

3.2. Conceptual framework

The rulers of Kumbakonam have conceived, or at least developed, an architectural paradigm that visually expresses their ambitions of creating an extensive and powerful state. Their structures are unprecedented in terms of scale and architectural clarity; the larger examples may be character- ized as truly imperial in style (Champakalakshmi, 1979). Therefore, the image of Kumbakonam and its elements reflects the character of the entire town. These elements have been undergoing a rapid transitional and disappearing process since the past few decades. Figure 9 shows the Figure 6 Thousands of people take the holy dip at the variations in the level of visual perception on the architec- Mahamaham tank at Kumbakonam in , India tural elements of the built heritage (BHVP)ineachstreet. during the Mahamaham Festival, known as the Kumbamela of Such continuous change in the townscape is inevitable. South India. Mahamaham is performed once in 12 years Figure 10 shows the conceptual framework and the (source: Wiele and Klein, Madras). identified architectural elements. The visual perception of

Legend Residential Commercial Educational Industrial Public and semi public 0 2 4 Water body

Figure 7 Land use in Kumbakonam town. Visual perception on the architectural elements 101 towns is subjected to various components. This study 3.3. Methodology proposes a conceptual framework by defining the visual perception level on the architectural elements of the built A total of 373 buildings were documented from the study heritage at the traditional processional route of area, which comprises 12 streets. Each building was photo- Kumbakonam Town. graphed for reference. The architectural elements of these This study reviews how some architectural elements, elements were identified and considered as primary sources such as entrance gates or doors, lean-to rooves, horizontal of information. The identified architectural elements were cornices, pilasters, arched windows, ornamental parapets, used as variables, and the study was followed with an and pot tiled roofing, influence the visual perception on empirical analysis. To check if the variables were related, the built heritage of Kumbakonam Town (Figure 11). the null hypothesis and the assumed relationship between The architectural elements of the buildings in all 12 the independent (X1–X7) and dependent (BHVP) variables selected streets are documented. were rejected. The analysis results describe the contribu- tion of each variable to the effects of the dependent variable. The empirical analysis is presented conceptually in Figure 12.

Table 1 Land use in Kumbakonam Town. 4. Empirical analysis S.no Land use type Area (in Ha) % of total

1 Residential 403.68 32.09 4.1. Variables 2 Commercial 34.61 2.75 3 Industrial 15.27 1.21 Seven variables were used to describe the contributions of 4 Public and semi public 81.48 6.48 the architectural elements to the visual perception of 5 Roads 125.44 9.97 Kumbakonam Town. The direct observations and documenta- 6 Vacant 17.18 1.37 tions of 373 buildings in 12 selected streets were used in the 7 Miscellaneous 17.75 1.41 analysis. Both dependent and independent variables were 8 Non-Urban areas 562.61 44.72 used to analyze the visual perception of Kumbakonam Town. Total 1258.00 100

Legend Pie chart represents the Land use in Study Area Residential 7% 5% 10% Mixed Residential Commercial Mixed Institutional 78% Commercial Temple Institutional Water body

1 Potramarai North Street 7 Nageshwaran East Street 2 Potramarai South Street 8 Post Office Road 3 Potramarai East street 9 Mahamahakulam North street 4 Potramarai West Street 10 Mahamahakulam West Street 5 Thanjavur Main Road 11 Mahamahakulam East Road 0 200 400 6 Nageshwaran North Street 12 Mahamahakulam South Street m

Figure 8 Land use of the study area in Kumbakonam Town along with the streets name. 102 K. Kiruthiga, K. Thirumaran

4.2. Dependent variable where BHVP denotes the level of visual perception on the built heritage in the processional route of Kumbakonam

BHVP depicts the visual perception level on the built Town, BHeritage denotes the number of buildings with a heritage of Kumbakonam Town. This dependent variable heritage value located along this route, and BTotal denotes can be calculated as follows: the total number of buildings along this route. The dependent variable was expressed as an ordinal BHeritage 100 BHVP ¼ ; ð1Þ number to account for the standard deviation of the mean BTotal of all observations. The selected streets were classified as follows according to their visual perception level (Figure 13): ) Low Medium High VP 90 Category 1: Streets with low visual perception. 80 Category 2: Streets with medium visual perception. 70 Category 3: Streets with high visual perception.

60

50 4.3. Independent variables used in the regression model 40

30

20 Entrance Gate or Door (X1): A decorated entrance, gate,

10 or door that marks the transition from the public exterior to the private interior space (Ernest, 2008). 0 123456789101112 Lean-To Roof (X ): A hipped roof with a gable end and

VISUAL PERCEPTION ON BUILT HERITAGE (BH 2 STREETS IN THE SELECTED STUDY AREA lean-to projection. This roof is added to an existing building to address a new need (Haneman, 1984). Figure 9 Graph showing the level of visual perception of the Horizontal Cornices (X3): A molded or decorated pro- study area of Kumbakonam Town. jection that forms the crowning feature of the top of a

KUMBAKONAM

ENTRANCE GATE or DOOR

VISUAL PERCEPTION ON BUILT HERITAGE LEAN TO ROOF

CORNICES (horizontal)

ARCHITECTURAL

ELEMENTS PILASTERS

ARCHED WINDOWS

ORNAMENTAL PARAPETS

POT TILES ROOFING

Figure 10 Conceptual framework of visual perception of Kumbakonam Town on its Built Heritage. Visual perception on the architectural elements 103

Figure 11 Building images with architectural elements. (a) and (b) at Mahamahakulam South Street; (c) and (d) at Mahamaha- kulam West Street; (e) and (f) at Mahamahakulam East Street; (g) Pottramarai North Street.

building wall or other architectural element by extending Arched Windows (X5): The bottom half of an “arched” or any similar crowning and projecting element. Cornices “radius” window is rectangular, while its top is an arch or also refer to any projection on a wall that throws a half circle. Arched windows bring a sense of softness to rainwater off the face of a building. a room and juxtapose the straight corners of rectangular Pilasters (X4): A partial pier or column, often with a base windows and walls for a contrasting effect. and capital, that is slightly projected and embedded on a Ornamented Parapets (X6): A low protective wall or flat wall (Ernest, 2008). railing that is placed as an architectural element above 104 K. Kiruthiga, K. Thirumaran

DATA COLLECTION

IDENTIFYING THE ELEMENTS

ASSIGNING THE VARIABLES

EMPIRICAL MODEL SELECTION

Rejecting the Null HYPOTHESIS TESTING Hypothesis

If p<5% then significant CHI SQUARE TEST association, If p>5% then no significant association.

INTERPRETE THE RESULTS

Figure 12 Schematic flow chart of the empirical analysis.

Legend Building with High Heritage value Building with Medium Heritage value Building with Low Heritage value

1 Potramarai North Street 7 Nageshwaran East Street 2 Potramarai South Street 8 Post Office Road 3 Potramarai East street 9 Mahamahakulam North street 4 Potramarai West Street 10 Mahamahakulam West Street 5 Thanjavur Main Road 11 Mahamahakulam East Road 6 Nageshwaran North Street 12 Mahamahakulam South Street 0 200 400 m

Figure 13 Level of visual perception in the study area of Kumbakonam Town. Visual perception on the architectural elements 105

cornices and along the edge of a raised platform, Table 2 Test of parallel lines.a terrace, bridge, roof, or balcony. These parapets are often decorated and incorporated into the existing Model 2 log Chi- df Sig. design (Ernest, 2008). likelihood square Pot tiles roofing (X7): The external covering on the top of the building that usually comprises wooden rafters, Null hypothesis 21.758 ––– pot tiles, or countryside tiles placed on pitched slopes or General 11.893b 9.865c 7 0.000 vertical built-up membranes for flat roofs. The null hypothesis states that the location parameters (slope coefficients) are the same across response categories. aLink function: Logit. bThe log-likelihood value cannot be further increased after 4.4. Selection of empirical model maximum number of step-halving. cThe Chi-Square statistic is computed based on the log- The relationship between the architectural elements and likelihood value of the last iteration of the general model. visual perception of Kumbakonam Town is assessed using an Validity of the test is uncertain. ordinal regression model in SPSS. An ordinal regression is performed to predict the dependent variable with “ordered” multiple categories and independent variables. 4.5. Model fitting information The regression facilitates the interaction of dependent variables (with multiple ordered levels) with one or more In statistics, the parallel lines assumption must be observed independent variables (Norusis, 2004). Previous studies have when using the ordinal logistic regression model. This examined how the sense of a place can be judged based on assumption posits that the regression coefficients are the its location. For instance, Boereback (2012) assessed the same for all corresponding outcome categories. If the parallel relationship between shopping locations and sense of place lines test fails, then the multinomial regression model can be in the Netherlands, while Minetos and Polyzos (2010) used as an alternative model. Table 2 presents the parallel discussed some applications related to change in land use lines test in which the assumptions of the regression coeffi- and urban sprawl. Both of these studies applied ordinal and cients are the same for all the outcome categories. The chi- multinomial regression models. square in this model is statistically significant (0.2540.05). Ordinal logistic regression can forecast or reveal how the Therefore, the assumption of parallelism cannot be rejected. changes in the independent variables can affect the dependent We maintain the null hypothesis that the local parameters variable (Frank and Harrell, 2001). This approach has been used are the same across different response categories. to analyze visual perception levels (low, medium, or high) when Table 3 shows the Pearson's correlation coefficients and these levels cannot be represented by a continuous variable or goodness-of-fit indices. A large number of empty cells was proxy. The ordinal logistic regression model can be constructed obtained because several continuous dependent variables were using five types of link functions based on the acceleration of used (the output of the model warned that 24 or 66.7% of the the cumulative probability of the response variable (Norusis, cells had zero frequencies). Therefore, we should not depend fi 2004). Given that the dependent variable in this study has an on these variables. Given the very low signi cance level in the γ equal category, the Logit link link j is applied. overall model test, the intercept-only model does not function The general ordinal regression models in the Logit link well with the predictors. However, when some cells have small function can be expressed as follows: observed and predicted counts, the overall model test is ! considered important because the change in likelihood demon- γ strates a chi-square distribution (Norusis, 2004). The pseudo γ ¼ j ð Þ link j log γ 2 R-square measures indicate the success of a model by describ- 1 j ing the variations in the data, which in turn signify the strength and of the association between the dependent and independent ! variables. As illustrated by the pseudo R-square values in Cox γ ð r Þ j ¼ P Y i j ¼ αj ðβ þ:::þβ Þ; ð Þ and Snell (0.354), Nagelkerke (0.437), and McFadden (0.262), log γ log ð 4 Þ 1X1i kXki 3 1 j P Yi j the values of pseudo R-square measures are always lower than theR-squareofalinearregressionmodel(Norusis, 2004). γ j Therefore, the selected model for the regression analysis where log 1 γ is the Logit link, the link index j denotes j rejects the null hypothesis H0, thereby indicating that the γ the visual perception level (low, medium, or high), j model is statistically significant. denotes the cumulative response probability up to and The confusion matrix in Table 4 shows the predictive ability of including Y=j, Yi denotes the response variable for observa- the empirical model. In the first category of low visual percep- tions i=1…n, k denotes the predictor variable associated tion, the model correctly assigned 100% of the cases. In the with the observed changes in the dependent variable, α is second category of medium visual perception, the model the intercept of the regression equation or threshold for correctly assigned 3 out of 4 or 66.7% of the cases. In the last each cumulative probability, and βk is the coefficient of the category of high visual perception, the model correctly assigned predictor variables or locations of the model. The threshold 1 out of 2 or 50% of the cases. Therefore, the confusion matrix α and the regression coefficient βk are unknown parameters that is obtained by the cross-tabulated rating of the predicted to be estimated using the maximum likelihood algorithm. response category is very high at the first and second categories. 106 K. Kiruthiga, K. Thirumaran

Table 3 Model fitting information.a

Model 2 log Likelihood Chi-square df Sig.

Intercept only 24.274 Final 21.758 2.516 7 0.000

Pseudo R-square Goodness-of-fit Cox and Snell 0.354 Chi-square df Sig. Nagelkerke 0.437 Pearson 46.139 30 0.000 McFadden 0.262 Deviance 37.714 30 1.000

aLink Function: Logit.

Table 4 Confusion matrix.

Level of Visual Perception Predicted response category Total

Low Medium High

Low N 60 06 % 100%a 0% 0% 100% Medium N 13 04 % 33.3% 66.7% 0% 100% High N 01 12 % 0% 50% 50% 100% Total N 74 112 % 58.3% 33.3% 8.4% 100%

aPercentage of correctly assigned cases by the model.

Table 5 Parameter estimates.a

Estimate Std.error Wald df Sig. 95% confidence interval

Lower bound Upper bound

Threshold BHVP [1] 5.952 0.8928 44.445 1 0.015 4.202112 7.701888 BHVP½2] 8.312 0.9974 69.450 1 0.001 6.3570 10.2669 Location

X1 1.052 0.2419 18.912 1 0.012 0.5778 1.5261 X2 0.621 0.1428 26.915 1 0.001 0.34112 0.9008 X3 0.373 0.1231 9.1812 1 0.022 0.131724 0.6142 X4 0.466 0.1072 4.3470 1 0.036 0.255888 0.676112 X5 0.332 0.1527 2.1741 1 0.061 0.032708 0.631292 X6 0.741 0.1333 5.5588 1 0.029 0.479732 1.00226 X7 0.742 0.1630 4.5460 1 0.038 0.42252 1.06148

aLink function: Logit.

5. Results and discussion The ordered logit coefficient indicates that for a one-unit increase in the independent variable, the dependent variable Table 5 presents the parameter estimates, standard errors, level is expected to change by its corresponding regression wald, significance levels, and lower and upper bounds of the coefficient in the ordered log-odds scale when the other 95% confidence interval. The threshold estimate for independent variables in the model are kept constant. The fi [BHVP =1.00] is the cutoff value between the low and medium positive signs of the regression coef cient indicate that those BHVP ; while the threshold estimate for [BHVP =2.00] is the streets with more architectural elements (X1, X2,.., X7)are cutoff value between the medium and high BHVP . The estimate more likely to present a high visual perception level. The represents the ordered log-odds (logit) regression coefficient. significance level of the seven architectural elements, except Visual perception on the architectural elements 107

for X5, has a positive regression coefficient and p-value (sig.) of References o0.05. Therefore, these architectural elements greatly affect the visual perception on the built heritage of Kumbakonam Ayyar, Jagadisa, P.V., 1920. South Indian Shrines Illustrated. Asian Town. The case summary of the model (Appendix A) describes Educational Services, New Delhi (ISBN 81-206-0151-3). the visual perception levels of the 12 streets in the study area. Bansal, Sunita Pant, 2008. Hindu Pilgrimage: A Journey Through the The low visual perception level of certain streets may be Holy Places of Hindus All Over India. Hindology Books, Delhi attributed to their lack of built heritage or prevalence of (ISBN 978-81-223-0997-3). Boereback, J.J., 2012. Sense of Place; Attachment to, Identity With modern construction without any architectural elements. and Dependence of Shopping Locations (thesis). Eindhoven Uni- versity of Technology, Real Estate Management and Development. 6. 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