Devotees of Shiva also pay homage to a group of sixty-three "slaves of the lord," figures analogous to the Christian saints. Historical figures who lived from the sixth through the tenth century, the saints were part of a popularizing movement known as bhakti, which valued intense devotion to an individual god above adherence to religious tenets or the performance of rituals. The saints traveled to sites in South India associated with Shiva and wrote poems and songs praising the Lord in the popular language of Tamil rather than the liturgical Sanskrit. Their poems figure prominently in the sacred canon of Shiva and are often sung in religious ceremonies.
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