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On the coast about 50 kms from Tambaram is the ancient town of Mahabalipuram or Seven Pagodas. Over a 1000 years ago it was known as "Kadal Mallai Talasayanam" in Tamil and "Mahamallapura" in Sanskrit. The monuments at the town were built around seventh century A.D. by the Pallava kings of Kaanchi, and Maamallapuram served as an important port. It was Narasimhavarman I who called himself Maha-mallan and it is believed that Maamallapuram was founded by him.

The famous Shore Temple is the oldest structural building in Tamilnadu and is built with slabs of "sandstone". The Five Rathas are even older but are cut out of a single rock and are called monoliths. The earliest monolith (hut-shaped) called Draupadi Ratha is in fact a temple for Kotravai. The other "rathas" are also believed to be ancient temples. The evolution of the gopuram (Madurai temple) and the Vimaanam is traced from those monoliths.

The Arjuna Ratha contains panels of beautiful human figures of high artistic quality. The large bas-relief called the Arjuna's Penance is supposed to have 150 separate animals belonging to 16 different species. Most of the monuments of Mahaabalipuram are at least 1200 years old and the solid rock has stood the weathering remarkably well. There are a few rock-cut temples, however, that were mercilessly defaced during the religious revivalism of the 13th century.

During the 15th century,  mandapams were built in front of panels such as Krishna Mandapam and Adivaraaha Temple. The kinds of dress worn by the common people and the royalty can be seen from these panels. One can easily spend a whole day at Maha$balipuram marvelling at the way in which the huge granite boulders were cut and shaped into such marvellous monuments.