Flowers in literature (Re: kaumudii)

[s. kalyanaraman]

     Satyanand Kichenassamy's notes on Tamil poetic, warrior tradition are 
     very important. The tradition of flowers in the Mundarica tradition is 
     equally profound. cf. Rev. Hoffman's Encyclopaedia Mundarica on the 
     flower festivals. The etymon puuja is also of significance in 
     exploring the ancient traditions of South Asia. Dr. S. Kalyanaraman.


______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________
Subject: Flowers in literature (Re: kaumudii)
Author:  indology at liverpool.ac.uk at INTERNET
Date:    27/02/1995 9:00 AM


This is in answer to Jakub Ceyka's query.

Regarding the subject of flowers in Indian poetical conventions,
one should mention the very original use of flowers in Tamil.
A quick search led me to the following references to 
monographs on the subject (all in Tamil, but I vaguely remember
that one of them contains pictures and Latin equivalents):

1) Elancheran, Kovai,
   Ilakkiyam oru pUkkAtu,
   Rockfort Publ., Cennai (=the Tamil name of Madras)
   1982, 767 pages

2) Tanammal, ILaTcumi,
   Canka ilakkiyattil malarkaL
   VAnati, Cennai, 1981, 

3) Ayiram malarkaL
   (several authors).

Some of the above are in Chicago, so I haven't looked at
them. There are other sources for some of the more important
flowers, on which I can post details if anyone is interested.

I hope that this helps.


                                Satyanad Kichenassamy
                                School of Mathematics
                                University of Minnesota
                                kichenas at math.umn.edu