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kulaSEkhara aazhvaar

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V. Sadagopan • November 14, 1996 


Regarding Sri Mani"s Query :

In Kulasekhara's time , there was no KeraLa desam.
It was known earlier as Parasurama Kshetram,
since the land was recovered from the sea by Parasuramaa.
Hence there was no sharp division such as MalayALa desam and 
Tamizh nAdu as we know today. There were Chozha , 
Pandya and Sera NAdus . Pandya NAdu overlapped 
with Chera NAdu . TamiL was spoken there along with
Sanskrit by the Brahmins and KshatriyAs. The women and  
children spoke Prakrutham in those households . I have 
covered the country of Kulasekhara AzhwAr in my
translation of Mukunda maalai few years ago. AzhwAr was 
a chieftain of Kolli Naadu and the kingdom extended 
to the border of Mathurai ( Koodal ) and Srirangam ( Kozhi ).
He was not a special devotee of Sri Anantha Padmanabha
swamy of Thiruvananthapuram like the other kings 
of Kerala , who came later. Kulasekhara's unique 
attachment of Sri Ranganatha(Periya PerumAL )is well documented.  
Few decades after Kulasekhara's shaking his mortal coils ,
Seran Senguttavan , a king from the same same chera Desam 
a great Siva BhakthA ,wrote brilliant Tamil poetry
saluting Lord Nataraja . He went on a white elephant 
to Kailasam according to the legend. Sundara Murthy Nayanaar 
followed him on a white horse according to the same
legend.I am referring to this to point out that Tamil
was widely spoken in Chera Naadu.From Kanyakumari 
to Thiruvenkatam . Tamil was widely spoken in ancient times
innthese lands .Thirupathi was considered the northern border
of Tamil Desam .It may sound controversial . But, to me
MalayALam is a highly sanskritized TamiL .
Many Tamilians were settled later in regions like 
Palkaad , which is not too far from Coimbatore. 
People from Shenkotta were transplanted in Kannada
Desam and formed the group of Sankethis . There were 
so many " Brownian movements" inside the larger Tamil
Desam. I am sure there are other historical records,
if we want to dig deeper.Just to get the discussions going ,
I wish  to recall these points .

V.Sadagopan     

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RE:	kulaSEkhara aazhvaar

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Dear Divya Prabandha rasikas,

Is there any internal evidence in the
perumaaL tirumozhi for kulaSEkhara mahaaraaja
being "cEralar kOn" (king of kerala) as said 
in the taniyan? In the signature paasurams,
he calls himself kUdalar kOn (king of kUdal,
near madurai, right?), kozhikkOn (king of woraiyur,
near Srirangam), but never says anything about
cEra dESam. He also does not call himself
perumaaL, which is the family name of the kerala
dynasty.

Was kulaSEkharan really a Malayali? ;-)

Mani