 Agaththiar
I surrender unto you akhilANDESwari …
| Composition: |
SrI cakra rAja simhAsanESwari…. |
| Composer: |
agattiyar |
| mudrA: |
|
| (signature): |
none |
| rAgam: |
rAgamAlikai (senjcuruTTi
-janyam of harikAmbhOji, 28th mELam,
punnAgavarALi-janyam of hanumattODi, 8th mELam,
nAdanAmakkriyA-janyam of mAyAmALava gowLai, 15th mELam,
sindu bhairavi-janyam of nATakappriyA, 10th mELam) |
|
tALam:
|
Adi |
| ArOhaNam: |
varies with each rAgam |
| AvarOhaNam: |
varies with each rAgam |
Pallavi:
rAgam: senjcuruTTi
SrI cakra rAja simhAsanESwari SrI lalitAmbikE bhuvanESwari
Anupallavi:
Agama vEda kalAmaya rUpiNi akhila carAcara janani nArAyaNi
nAga kangaNa naTarAja manOhari
gnAna vidyESwari rAja rAjESwari (SrI….)
CaraNam:
1. rAgam: punnAgavarALi
palavidamAy unnai ADavum pADavum
pADik koNDADum anbar pada malar sUDavum
ulaga muzhudum unnai agamurak kANavum
oru nilai taruvAy kAnjci kAmESwari
(SrI….)
2. rAgam: nAdanAmakkriyA
uzhanRu tirinda ennai uttamanAkki vaittAy
uyariya periyOrgaL onRiDak kUTTivaittAy
nizhalenat toDar^nda mun Uzhk koDumaiyai nIngac ceidAy
nitya kalyANi bhavAni padmESwari
(SrI….)
3. rAgam: sindu bhairavi
tunbap puDattiliTTut tUyavanAkki vaittAy
toDar^nda mun mAyai nIkki piRanda payanait tandAy
anbaip pugaTTi undan ADalaik kANac ceidAy
aDaikkalam nIyE ammA akhilANDeSwari
(SrI…) |
Lyrics:
Ref. #1. Some words in the text in reference 1 contained transcriptional errors. I have taken the liberty of changing them to make contextual sense. I accept responsibility if my corrections deviated from the original text for which I do not have access.
Meaning:
Pallavi: This line is just a salutation to dEvi, also called lalitAmbikai and bhuvanESwari (one who rules the whole world).
Anupallavi: You are the manifestation of the religious scriptures and arts. You are the generator of all life forms in the universe. You are the beloved of
Lord Nataraja - who wears the
snake as an ornament on him (it could also mean that dEvi wears the snake as a 'kangaNam' i.e.,bangle). You are the repository of all learning and knowledge, Oh rAja
rAjESwari!
CaraNam 1: Please enable your devotees to sing and
dance your praise. Let those singing devotees offer flowers at your feet. Enable the whole world to visualise you in their hearts with deep understanding, Oh kAnjci
kAmESwari!
CaraNam 2: I was wallowing in sin. You made me a person of integrity. You helped me associate myself with great people. You eliminated the cruel fate, which followed me like a shadow. You are really great, Oh, bhavAni,
padmESwari!
CaraNam 3: You threw me into the crucible of misery in order to make me blemishless. You also removed the delusion that followed me in order to enable me to understand the meaning of my birth. You showered your love on me and made me see your glorious dance. I surrender unto you, akhilANDESwari!
General comments:
 While we have covered pure Thamizh songs and maNipravALam songs before in this series, this is the first time that we see Sanskrit verses in Pallavi and Anupallavi lines. However, the caraNam verses are pretty much pure Thamizh. It is interesting that agattiyar, who is credited with giving life to the Thamizh language including the infrastructure (in the work agattiyam, which is probably extinct to a large extent), chose to mix Sanskrit and Thamizh in this song.
 No one is sure if this song was composed by the original agattiyar, who was sent (according to religious lore) to the south when
Lord Siva's wedding with
Parvati took place in the
Himalayas and the resulting geo-physical imbalance made Lord Siva to instruct agattiyar to go south in order to equalise the load. This is how, it is thought, the Aryan culture was carried to the south. It may be that a descendant of the original agattiyar wrote the song since it is difficult to establish the writings of mythological figures.
It is not clear though whether the sense of the song reflects the experience and feelings of the composer or was intended for the average devotee to experience the grace of dEvi amidst all the daily grind of life.
Composer’s bio:
 The timeframe of agattiyar runs into the purANic ages and hence cannot be ascertained for sure. A created a treatise in Thamizh which described the division of the language into its three main segments: iyal (prose), isai (music) and nATakam (drama), collectively known as muttamizh.
agattiyar had 12 disciples of which tolkAppiyar was a prime disciple. tolkAppiyar wrote tolkAppiyam, the primal Thamizh grammar treatise on which all subsequent Thamizh works were based. tolkAppiyar is believed to have lived around 3rd century BCE. tolkAppiyam is still very much a standard text that is referred to in grammatical discussions of the Thamizh language.
Biographical information about agattiyar is scarce except what is gathered from religious literature.
References:
1. http://www.geocities.com/promiserani2/c1101.html
2. http://www.geocities.com/promiserani2/co1009.html
Note to readers: This article will be the last in the series. I attempted to cover a significant number of composers (each with at least one composition) and a variety of rAgams. It is fitting to end with Agaththiyar who is credited with giving 'life' to the Thamizh language. I consider my efforts to cover the landscape of Thamizh songs in the Carnatic music field as a very modest one and acknowledge any errors in the articles (either factual or in interpretation) to be my personal responsibility. In many instances I tried to correct them. I thank several of my Internet friends for helping me with lyrics and/or meanings. For various reasons I am not able to include more Thamizh composers. The omissions should not be construed as serious because they were due mainly to my inability to scour the entire landscape due to paucity of resources. I thank all the readers who sent comments to Chennaionline site as well as to me personally. Au revoir!
Sethuraman
Subramanian
subramaniansethu@hotmail.com | 
