Tamil Heritage

[Swaminathan Madhuresan]

--- nanda chandran <vpcnk at HOTMAIL.COM> wrote:
> If you want to make a meaningful argument please do not quote (at least in
> bits) from secondary authors. If you'd produced arguments to show that
> Ramayanam is later than Tamil literature which value chastity and also show
> that there's no pre Ramayanam literature which didn't value chastity, then
> the argument will be more effective.

   Notion of Chastity in Tamil sangam poems is of paramount importance:
Sangam poems mostly (> 90%) describe `interior landscape' (love) poems.
In the Tamil poetics of Tolkaappiyam, Life is divided into interior/love/akam
and exterior/puRam components.

   In Tamil "interior" poems, love is described with such a class and finesse.
Ladies' chastity is praised all the time. Not even one instance of
group orgies or a girl desiring several men - in direct contradistinction
to some poems from gAthasaptasati or vajjalakam.

   In Sangam poems, chastity is only for women, they sometimes
worry about men going to dAsis.

   Five centuries later, Thiruvalluvar places Chastity (kaRpu) as
common for both women and men.
     "orumai makaLirE pOlap perumaiyum
      tan2n2aittAn2 koNTozukin2 uNTu".
Later Kamban in his masterpiece of the Ramayana and Bharatiyar in this
century emphasize chastity for men too.

Regards,
SM








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