திங்கள், 13 ஆகஸ்ட், 2012
செவ்வாய், 13 மார்ச், 2012
வெள்ளி, 9 மார்ச், 2012
POTTER, KULALA, KUYAVAR, VELAR
| POTTER | |||||||||
| The potter in Tamil Nadu, as in most other parts of India, | |||||||||
| provides villagers with many of the containers and utensils for | |||||||||
| domestic use. In most south indian villages one street or section | |||||||||
| of huts is the home and workplace of a group of potter families. | |||||||||
| Potters in India are usually referred to by some variation of | |||||||||
| Sanskrit word kulala or pot - e.g. kummara (Telugu), kumbaro (oriya) | |||||||||
| kumbara (canarese), in tamil nadu potters are commonly called | |||||||||
| (by other groups) Kuyavar (kuyavar). This is the respectful form of | |||||||||
| Kuyavan from the sanskrit ku, "earth," and avan, "person." | |||||||||
| The government now officially refers to potter groups in | |||||||||
| Tamil Nadu as Kulala (kulala), again the respectful form, this term | |||||||||
| is also derived from sanskrit and has its origin, according to | |||||||||
| thurston (1909 : 112) in a legend about Kulalan, son of Brahma, | |||||||||
| who wanted to create and destroy things daily and so become a | |||||||||
| potter (small utensils of mud are often used only once and then | |||||||||
| broken). | |||||||||
| The term that potters used for their own group in Madurai | |||||||||
| District is velar (velar). Potters will be referred to in this way | |||||||||
| throughout this paper. Although both men and women work | |||||||||
| side by side when making pots. The making of mud figures and | |||||||||
| other work for the village temples seems to be men's work and | |||||||||
| thus the term velar will be used most often in reference to the | |||||||||
| male members of the group. | |||||||||
| Velars of Madurai District make fine Pots. Manamadurai a | |||||||||
| town southeast of Madurai in ramnad district, is renown, for the | |||||||||
| finest pots in the state. The bulk of the velar"s work consists of | |||||||||
| making common water and storage pots called Manpanai | |||||||||
| (manpanai) or simply panai. These are begun with the lip and | |||||||||
| upeer section thrown on a wheel and the bottom moulded | |||||||||
| by a hammer and anvil technique. Two types of wheel are | |||||||||
| commonly used : one wooden and spoked like a cartwheel and | |||||||||
| the other made of solid mud with a stone cone inset to turn on. | |||||||||
| Both wheels are driven by hand, sometimes with the assitance of | |||||||||
| lever-stick. A variety of hand techniques are used to make other | |||||||||
| common items such as country stoves and livestock watering | |||||||||
| troughs. More specialized items are the huge kulumai (kulumai), | |||||||||
| grain (Paddy) storage pots. And vilakkukutu (vilakkukutu), lamp | |||||||||
| covers for shrines. | |||||||||
| Many items are made according to demand at certain times | |||||||||
| of the year, such as the small dishes used as lamps at karttikai | |||||||||
| (kaarththikai), the tamil Dipavali (festival of lights). Various ritual | |||||||||
| pots, often painted or decorated, are made for annual celebrations, | |||||||||
| marriages, and festivals. Mud pots are sold in markets at cities and | |||||||||
| towns and account for only a part of the velars output. Many | |||||||||
| products are sold directly to local people or are bartered and traded | |||||||||
| with other craftsmen and farmers from the velar's front porch area, | |||||||||
| the place where the products have been made and stored. | |||||||||
| ARTIST | |||||||||
| Among most groups of velars there is a family or number | |||||||||
| of families carrying the traditional responsibility of making the | |||||||||
| mud images of gods and offerings for the village temple. In a | |||||||||
| village with a large community of velars. Several families may | |||||||||
| participate in this work (or a very large family occupying several | |||||||||
| households). A velar may make mud images for only part of his | |||||||||
| working life or only at special times during the year according to | |||||||||
| shifting responsibilities and requirements. A detailed consideration | |||||||||
| of these responsibilities and the full extent of the velar's art will | |||||||||
| be provided in the latter part of this study. | |||||||||
| PRIEST | |||||||||
| Very closely associated with the making of mud figures is | |||||||||
| the service of the priest of the village temples where the figures are | |||||||||
| installed (the use of the term "village temple" will be explained in | |||||||||
| the section under that heading). The priest who presides at the | |||||||||
| installation of mud figures and at subsequent puja or worship is | |||||||||
| often a velar from the family who made the figures and frequently | |||||||||
| he is the artist himself. | |||||||||
| There are explanations as to why velars of Madurai | |||||||||
| District enjoy the status that allows them to wear the sacred | |||||||||
| thread and perform the important religious tasks in the village. | |||||||||
| The velars feel that they are intimately associated with the life | |||||||||
| processes of their fellow villagers providing for their daily needs | |||||||||
| from birth, when the birth sac breaks (symbolized by a pot), | |||||||||
| until death, when a mud pot is broken at the funeral pyre by | |||||||||
| a close relative of the deceased. Until relatively recently, velars | |||||||||
| played a very important part in the ritual of south indian | |||||||||
| marriages. A popular south indian story tells of the descent of | |||||||||
| potters from a brahmin father and a sudra mother: the mother | |||||||||
| provided the occupational heritage and the father, the priestly. | |||||||||
| In south indian villages, as in most of rural india, the performance | |||||||||
| of religious rites is associated, at least in theory, with Brahmins. | |||||||||
| Another justification for velars conducting worship is | |||||||||
| explained through their legendary importance in the ancient | |||||||||
| kingdoms of south india. The velar prepared the utensils of daily | |||||||||
| use for the kings and queens and, most importantly, fashioned the | |||||||||
| large mud burial urns in which members of royalty were buried. | |||||||||
| Excellent examples of conceivably similar urns are on display at the | |||||||||
| tamil nadu state museum. The task of making these urns has been | |||||||||
| glorified in poetry of the cankam literature of ancient tamil nadu | |||||||||
| which is the foundation of tamil literature atleast as early as the | |||||||||
| first millenium B.C. tamils often refer to cankam literature as | |||||||||
| authoritative traditional history and as a guide to social morality, | |||||||||
| much as North Indians refer to the vedas, upanishads, and puranas. | |||||||||
| The name of common village priest is pucari (pucari), a | |||||||||
| word of sanskritic derivation used in many parts of india. Although | |||||||||
| pucaris of other than velar castes conduct worship, velar pucari is | |||||||||
| dominate in the area of my observations and therefore when | |||||||||
| reference is made to pucari it can be taken to mean velar pucari. | |||||||||
| The pucari has been described to me as the "official" of "permanent" | |||||||||
| priest (although this is not always the case), "servant of god." or | |||||||||
| more whimsically, "one who serves god all the time like a | |||||||||
| christian father" | |||||||||
| The actual ceremonial responsibilities of a pucari will be | |||||||||
| outlined in the section dealing with village festivals but we may | |||||||||
| now discuss the position itself. The privilege of being a pucari | |||||||||
| (Both advantages and disadvantages will become apparent) is | |||||||||
| hereditary. It is passed from father to son or other close relative | |||||||||
| and is inextricably tied to a particular village temple. The pucari | |||||||||
| and his family usually live in the village of the temple he serves | |||||||||
| or in a village nearby. His family should have long. Preferably | |||||||||
| "eternal." historical relationships with the temple. If a man has | |||||||||
| two sons, he may share the responsibilities between them: each | |||||||||
| son may take charge for six months or a year at a time. Male | |||||||||
| relatives of an extended family may also share the duties in many | |||||||||
| cases, a number of velar families share the responsibilities of | |||||||||
| pucari for particular temples, each taking their turn in successive | |||||||||
| years. Variations on this formula involving more sons families etc. | |||||||||
| are really endless and often disputes arise among relations | |||||||||
| claiming the privileges. | |||||||||
| Such disputes are resolved in a number of different ways. | |||||||||
| Some of the resolutions discussed here apply also in cases where | |||||||||
| there is no successor and a new family must be chosen from | |||||||||
| among the local velars. The people gather, often in the village | |||||||||
| temple, and some type of puja is offered. Names of qualified | |||||||||
| prospects or of disputing parties are written on small pieces of | |||||||||
| paper and are put in a basket before the god or the papers can | |||||||||
| also be scattered before the god. A small child, least likely to be | |||||||||
| influenced by prejudices that might alter the will of god, is coaxed | |||||||||
| to pick up one of the pieces of paper. As an added precaution the | |||||||||
| child may be blindfolded. In "older times," coloured petals or | |||||||||
| whole blossoms of different flowers were used as markers, rather | |||||||||
| than paper. I was told that identically wrapped packets containing | |||||||||
| various sub stances ( e.g. ash, vermillion powder ) were also used | |||||||||
| as tokens for selection; in any case, it was said that occasionally | |||||||||
| old men of the villate would make a judgment and "fairly choose | |||||||||
| the village priest." One factor limiting the actual need for such | |||||||||
| arrangements in Arappalayam and other villages that I frequented | |||||||||
| near madurai was that many velars living there had migrated from | |||||||||
| other places and were thus effectively barred forever from any | |||||||||
| consideration of service as a pucari in the local temples. | |||||||||
திங்கள், 30 ஜனவரி, 2012
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