Concept
Tamil literature
Related concepts (40)
Kural (poetic form)
The Kural is one of the most important forms of classical Tamil language poetry. It is a very short poetic form being an independent couplet complete in 2 lines, the first line consisting of 4 words and the second line consisting of 3. As one of the five types of Venpa stanza, it must also conform to the grammar for Venpa, the most difficult and the most highly esteemed of stanzaic structures in classical Tamil literature. The Tirukkuṛaḷ by Tiruvalluvar, one of the greatest philosophical works in Tamil, is a typical example.
Venpa
Venpa or Venba (வெண்பா in Tamil) is a form of classical Tamil poetry. Classical Tamil poetry has been classified based upon the rules of metric prosody. Such rules form a context-free grammar. Every venba consists of between two and twelve lines. The venpa meter is used in songs of the types neṭu veṇ pāṭṭu ('long song in venpa meter'), kuṟu veṇ pāṭṭu 'short song in venpa meter', kaikkiḷai "one-sided love," and paripāṭṭu 'song that is quite accommodative' and in satirical compositions (aṅkatac ceyyuḷ).
Tiruppavai
The Tiruppavai (திருப்பாவை) is a set of Tamil Hindu hymns attributed to the female poet-saint Andal. The Tiruppavai consists of thirty stanzas referred to as pasurams in praise of Perumal. It is a part of the Nalayira Divya Prabandham, a collection of the works of the twelve poet-saints called the Alvars, an important part of the devotional genre of Tamil literature. The Tiruppavai has also been translated into Telugu by Mullapudi Venkataramana as Melupalukula Melukolupu.
Tolkāppiyam
Tolkāppiyam, also romanised as Tholkaappiyam (தொல்காப்பியம் , lit. "ancient poem"), is the most ancient extant Tamil grammar text and the oldest extant long work of Tamil literature. The surviving manuscripts of the Tolkappiyam consists of three books (atikaram), each with nine chapters (iyal), with a cumulative total of 1,610 (483+463+664) sutras in the nūṛpā meter. It is a comprehensive text on grammar, and includes sutras on orthography, phonology, etymology, morphology, semantics, prosody, sentence structure and the significance of context in language.
Periyalvar
Periyalvar (9th century), also known as Vishnuchittar, was one of the twelve Alvar saints of South India who are known for their affiliation to the Vaishnava tradition of Hinduism. He was the foster father of Andal. Andal, also called as Kodhai, is the only female Alvar, and is considered to be the incarnation of Bhudevi according to Sri Vaishnavism. The verses of Alvars are compiled as the Naalayira Divya Prabandham and the 108 temples revered are classified as Divya Desam.
Tamil culture
Tamil culture is the culture of the Tamil people. Tamil culture is rooted in the arts and ways of life of Tamils in India, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Singapore, and across the globe. It has a long history of diversified heritage and cultural distinctions. Tamil languageTamil literatureSri Lankan Tamil dialects and Sri Lankan Tamil literature Tamils have a strong attachment to the Tamil language, which is often venerated in literature as "Tamil̲an̲n̲ai", "the Tamil mother".
Sangam landscape
The Sangam landscape (Tamil: அகத்திணை "inner classification") is the name given to a poetic device that was characteristic of love poetry in classical Tamil Sangam literature. The core of the device was the categorisation of poems into different tiṇais or modes, depending on the nature, location, mood and type of relationship represented by the poem. Each tiṇai was closely associated with a particular landscape, and imagery associated with that landscape—its flowers, trees, wildlife, people, climate and geography—was woven into the poem in such a way as to convey a mood, associated with one aspect of a romantic relationship.
Manimekalai
Maṇimēkalai (மணிமேகலை, jewelled belt, girdle of gems), also spelled Manimekhalai or Manimekalai, is a Tamil-Buddhist epic composed by Kulavāṇikaṉ Seethalai Sataṉar probably somewhere between the 2nd century to the 6th century. It is an "anti-love story", a sequel to the "love story" in the earliest Tamil epic Silappadikaram, with some characters from it and their next generation. The epic consists of 4,861 lines in akaval meter, arranged in 30 cantos.
M. Karunanidhi
Muthuvel Karunanidhi (3 June 1924 – 7 August 2018) was an Indian writer and politician who served as Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu for almost two decades over five terms between 1969 and 2011. He is popularly referred to as Kalaignar (Artist) and Mutthamizh Arignar (Tamil Scholar) for his contributions to Tamil literature. He had the longest tenure as Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu with 6,863 days in office. He was also a long-standing leader of the Dravidian movement and ten-time president of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam political party.
Mutharaiyar dynasty
The Mutharaiyar was a south Indian dynasty that governed the Thanjavur, Trichy and Pudukottai regions between 600 and 850 CE. The origin of the Mutharaiyar is shrouded in mystery. Historian T. A. Gopinatha Rao equates them with the Kalabhras as Suvaran Maaran, a prominent 8th century Mutharaiyar king of Thanjavur is styled KalavaraKalvan in one of his inscriptions. Few historians like Rao read the epithet it as KalabhraKalvan interchanging the letter v with b.