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Notes Notes to Introduction 1. No single English word captures the meanings and evocations of the Tamil word pªy. “Demon” conveys the supernatural aspect, but often also means “evil” which is not always applicable to the Tamil milieu. “Ghoul” captures the sense of the macabre and often connotes a being who haunts graveyards, but is also more limited than pªy. I consistently employ the untranslated Tamil word, but also substitute various English words to try and convey the range of meanings. 2. On the back cover of one of the Tiruvåla∫kå†u temple’s official history books is an upside-down picture of Mt. Kailåsa, which is the view Kåraikkål Ammaiyår had as she walked down from Mt. Kailåsa to Tiruvålå∫kå†u on her hands. 3. Mahalakshmi R, 37–40. See Khandelwal; her study of contemporary women renouncers reveals continuing complexities concerning gender and asceticism. 4. Karavelane, 96. See also Gros, 176. 5. Dr. Vijayalakshmy and I based our translations on the Tamil texts Kåraikkålammaiyår Pirapanta‰ka¬, Commentary by Íri ≈rumukattampiråÂ; Tiruvåla‰k円u Talavaralår¯ um Tiruppatika‰ka¬um; and Kåraikkålammaiyår Tirumur¯ ai, Commentary by Tiru. Vi. KalyåˆacuntaraÂår. We also consulted Karavalene and Ramachandran. Notes to Chapter 1 1. Tamil is the most ancient of the four major Dravidian languages spoken in South India. The two different types of Tamil, spoken and written, continue to characterize modern Tamil. The first detailed description of the three academies or ca‰kams is in Nakk¥rar’s eighth century commentary on I‰aiyaÂår’s Akapporu¬, a series of 60 short verses that forms an early classification of Tamil poetic conventions. The first ca‰kam took place in southern Maturai (TeÂmaturai) with 549 members and lasted 4,440 years; the second 145 146 Notes to Chapter 1 took place in Kapå†apuram with 59 members and lasted 3,700 years; and the third took place in northern Maturai, considered to be the current city of Maturai, with 49 members and lasting 1,800 years. This last academy may have a historical basis of some kind. For a detailed overview of the history of Tamil literature, including problems of dating and discussions about the oral and written properties of the poetry, see Zvelebil 1975, 1–130; 1974, 2–51; 1973, 1–171. See also Hart 1975, 7–158; Hart and Heifetz 1999, xv–xxxvii, 4–6; Ramanujan 1994, 97–108; 1985, ix–xv, 269–297; Nilakanta Sastri 1975, 104–117; Pillay 1979, 185–232; Buck and Paramasivam 1997, x–xiv; Kailasapathy 1968, 1–3; Subramaniam 1992, 11–17. The corpus of Tamil classical literature was superseded by devotional poetry beginning in the sixth to seventh century. Eventually the Ca∫kam literature was “forgotten,” and was rediscovered in the late nineteenth century primarily by the great Tamil scholar U. V´. Cåminåtaiyar, who edited the texts and wrote commentaries on them. The Fourth Tamil Ca∫kam was established in Maturai in 1901, which published texts and a journal, CentamiÒ. The rediscovery of lost works of literature partly inspired the connection made in the early twentieth century between two legends: the Ca∫kam legend describing the catastrophic loss of people and literature to oceanic floods, and the legend of the lost land of Lemuria, a land mass thought to have existed in the Indian Ocean. See Pillay 1979, 32–37; Sumathi Ramaswamy 2004, especially 97–136; Zvelebil 1975, 5–21; 1974, 7–8; Ramanujan 1999b; Cutler 2003a, 272–292; Parthasarathy 1993, 346–351; Selby 2000, 10. 2. Hart and Heifetz (1999, xxix–xxx) note that the pur¯ am anthology Pur¯ anå¶r -u includes eleven ti£ai, six of which overlap with the Tolkåppiyam list. It seems that the Pur¯ anå¶r -u poets are following a different classification system, but the poems still focus on kings and heroism. For a more detailed analysis of the ti£ai and characteristics of akam and pur¯ am poetry, see Zvelebil 1973, 85–110; Ramanujan 1985, 231–297; 1994, 97–115; 1999c; Hart 1975, 211–257; Hart and Heifetz 1999, xxviii–xxxi; Selby 2000, 26–61; Kailasapathy 1968, 1–54. There are numerous subcategories or themes subdividing each ti£ai; an example of an akam tur¯ ai is “the guarding of the millet” (Selby 2000, 19), and of a pur¯ am ti£ai is “the feasting and dancing of warriors after victory...

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