Ettuthokai

Also called: Eight Anthologies · Topic: Sangam Age and Early South India · NCERT: Beyond NCERT

Meaning

Ettuthokai (also spelt Ettuttokai, "Eight Anthologies") is a set of eight collections of early Tamil poems from the Sangam Age. Some deal with akam (love) and some with puram (war, kings and public life) [1]. It matters because these poems are one of the main written sources on the chiefs, society and economy of early Tamilakam. No state archive or long list of kings survives from this period.

Explanation

Background: where it comes from

• Sangam literature is the earliest Tamil literary tradition and the oldest literature of south India. It is dated c. 300 BCE – 300 CE.
• Sangam comes from the Sanskrit word sangha, meaning "association". Here it means an assembly of poets [1].
• Tradition says the poems were produced in three literary academies (sangams) at Madurai [1].
• The poems were written by many poets over a long time. They were probably gathered into anthologies (collections) later than they were composed.
• The Sangam corpus has two main groups of anthologies:
• Ettuthokai: the Eight Anthologies.
• Pattuppattu: the Ten Idylls (ten long poems).
• Together they are known as the eighteen "major works" (Patinenmelkanakku).

The eight anthologies

• Narrinai: love poems (akam).
• Kuruntokai: short love poems (akam).
• Ainkurunuru: very short love poems (akam).
• Kalittokai: love poems (akam).
• Akananuru: 400 love poems (akam).
• Purananuru: 400 poems on war, kings, gifts and death (puram).
• Patirruppattu: praise of the Chera kings (puram).
• Paripadal: mostly hymns to gods, with songs on the Vaigai river around Madurai.

The two themes: akam and puram

• Akam is the "inner" theme. It covers love between man and woman, in union and in separation.
• Puram is the "outer" theme. It covers war, bravery, a king's generosity and public life.
• Britannica says this split is built into the collections. Love fills the first five collections, and heroism fills the next two [1].
• The poems also contain information about political organisation, social structures and economic activities, written "with great skill and delicacy".

What it gave historians

• The poems describe the chiefs and kings of Tamilakam:
• the Chera, Chola and Pandya houses [1]

• their battles, gifts to poets and capitals

• They describe daily life and the economy:

• farming in the river valleys

• trade, ports and goods such as pearls and pepper

• They also have limits:

• They are praise-poetry written for patrons, so they tend to exaggerate.
• Historians therefore check them against dated, outside and material evidence.

Time, place and evidence

• Period: the Sangam Age, c. 300 BCE – 300 CE (NCERT). Britannica gives a narrower date of the 1st to 4th century CE for the surviving poems [1]. For the exam, use the NCERT dates.
• Region: Tamilakam, the ancient Tamil country. It covered Tamil Nadu plus parts of present-day Andhra Pradesh and Kerala.
• Rulers named in the poems:
• Chera: Malabar Coast [1]
• Chola: Thanjavur and the Kaveri valley [1]

• Pandya: Madurai. The Pandyas are praised in the earliest Tamil poetry [1].

• Centre of the tradition: Madurai, the traditional seat of the three sangams [1].

• How historians check what the poems say:
• Ashoka's inscriptions name the Cholas, Pandyas, Keralaputras (Cheras) and Satiyaputras as peoples beyond his empire.
• Megasthenes, the Greek writer at the Mauryan court.
• The Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, a Greek merchant handbook from c. 40–70 CE. It names ports such as Muziris and Korkai (Colchi) [3][4].
• Excavations at Kodumanal, Adichchanallur [2] and Keezhadi in the Vaigai basin [5].

Don't confuse with

• Pattuppattu (Ten Idylls): the other main Sangam collection. It has ten long poems, while Ettuthokai has eight anthologies of mostly shorter poems.
• Tolkappiyam: a book of grammar and rhetoric [1]. It is not a collection of poems.
• Tirukkural: written by Tiruvalluvar on ethics and conduct. It belongs to the eighteen minor works (Patinenkilkanakku), not to Ettuthokai.
• Silappadikaram and Manimekalai: the Tamil epics. Each tells one long story. Ettuthokai is made up of separate short poems by many poets.

Prelims Hooks

• Ettuthokai = the eight anthologies of Sangam poetry [1].
• Akam = love poems. Puram = war and public life [1].
• Akananuru = akam (love). Purananuru = puram (war and kings). Both have 400 poems.
• Patirruppattu praises the Chera kings.
• Trap: Tirukkural, Tolkappiyam, Silappadikaram and Manimekalai are NOT part of Ettuthokai.
• Ettuthokai and Pattuppattu are the two main Sangam collections. Sangam comes from sangha, meaning an assembly of poets, traditionally at Madurai [1].

Mains Points

• Literature as history, and its limits.
• Ettuthokai is the main window on early Tamil chiefs, society and trade.
• But it is praise-poetry written for patrons.

• A good answer reads it together with Ashokan edicts, the Periplus and excavations at Adichchanallur and Keezhadi, so that literary claims are tested against outside and material evidence [2][4][5].

• A heritage that does not come from Sanskrit.

• The akam–puram division is a Tamil way of organising poetry, built into the very order of the collections [1].

• It shows that south India had its own literary culture in the early historic period. The south was not just a receiver of northern culture.

• A link to political history.

• Puram poems on the Chera, Chola and Pandya fit with Ashoka's naming of southern peoples beyond his empire.
• Together they show that Tamilakam had recognised kingdoms of its own outside Mauryan rule.

Related concepts

• Tamilakam
• Sangam age
• Sangam literature
• Tamil Sangams
• Akam and puram
• Tinai
• Akananuru
• Purananuru
• Pattuppattu
• Kapilar

Read more

• Tamilakam and its sources