and inscriptions mention the monumental compound shrine as the Thirukonamalai Konesar Kovil. Greek writer Strabo, quoting Eratosthenes and Onesicritus notes the island's proximity to the southernmost regions of India, next to the country of the "Koniakoi people," found south up to a coastal promontory on an eastern limit, and describes the island as extending towards Ethiopia and being home to elephants. The temple was constructed atop Swami Rock, also called Swami Malai or Kona-ma-malai, a cliff on the peninsula that drops 400 feet (120 metres) directly into the sea. Gokarna bay and Bhadrakali Koneswaram temple, Trincomalee The Trincomalee Harbour, a circular natural harbour which the temple crowns towards the north, is referred to in Sanskrit as Gokarna (Cow's Ear) and the deity's name Gokarneswara or Go—Natha. Pathmanathan offers the etymological link Thiru-Gokarna-Malai or Thiru-Gona-Malai based on this connection. The ethnographer Megasthenes writing in his Indica from 350 to 290 BCE, describes the island as being divided by a long river, productive of a large number of gold and pearls in one half and that the inhabitants of this country are called Paleogoni, meaning Old Goni in Tamil and Greek, who Pliny adds worshipped Hercules and Dionysus (Bacchus) like the Pandyans of Tamilakam. The Vayu Purana, written in 300 CE specifically mentions the tallest mountain peak of the great gold and silver rich mountain range Malaya on the island, and that "to the east of this island at the shore of the sea lies a great Siva temple in a holy place called Gokarna." Gokarna is also a place name in Karnartaka, India, Kalinga, Tamil Nadu and Nepal all associated with ancient Shiva temples and some with Ravana of the Ramayana, the former temple in Karnartaka – the Mahabaleshwar Temple – also earning praise in the Tevaram. A major shrine to the deity Bhadrakali exists within the Mahabaleshwar Temple complex, and similarly the Bhadrakali Amman Temple of Trincomalee, dedicated to the same deity and significantly expanded by Rajendra Chola I, stands on Konesar Road before the entrance to Swami Rock. Kailash of the South Heralded as "Dakshina Kailasam"/"Then Kailasam" (Kailash of the South) because it lies on exactly the same longitude as the Tibetan mountain Mount Kailash (the primary abode of Shiva), Koneswaram's early black granite rock-cut architectural style shared similarities to Kailasanathar Temples of the subcontinent. Its traditional history and legends were compiled into the Sanskrit treatises Dakshina Kailasa Puranam