‘I can explain this miracle.’ He then related the following story:
‘In the ancient town of Puhar, immortal capital of the Chola kings who wear the wreath of fig leaves, there lived a rich merchant named Kovalan. He dissipated his great wealth in the pleasures offered him by a dancing girl, expert in her art. He had a wife named Kannaki. With her he went to Madurai, the capital of the celebrated Pandya kingdom. In need of funds, he wished to sell her beautiful ankle bracelet, and went into the main bazaar looking for a buyer. There he showed the ankle bracelet to a goldsmith, who said: “Only a queen can wear such jewellery.” He suggested that Kovalan wait near his shop, and ran to the palace to inform the king that he had found the thief of the queen’s gold anklet. At that moment Kovalan’s hour of destiny had come. The king, who wears a wreath of margosa, did not bother to make an investigation, but simply ordered a guard to put the thief to death and bring back the queen’s bracelet. The wife of Kovalan found herself abandoned and shed abundant tears. She tore away one of her breasts, adorned by a string of pearls. By the power of her virtue, she burned down the great city of Madurai and called down upon the Pandya kings the anger of the gods. This is the woman, of great fame and rare virtue, of whom the hill-men have spoken’
Hearing these words, Prince Ilango asked:
‘Can you tell us in what mysterious way fate acts, as you claim it does?’
Shattan replied:
‘Listen, pious man! Once, in the town of Madurai, I was taking my rest at midnight under the silver porch of a temple called Manrappodiyil, consecrated to Lord Shiva, the god who wears a laburnum flower on his brow. I suddenly saw a genie, one of the guardians of the city, and before him stood the Devoted Wife, who seemed in great distress. The genie said to her: “Woman, fearful flames spring from your breast! The time has come for actions performed in past lives to bear their fruit. In a previous life, the wife of a merchant coming from Singapore, the immortal city, cursed you and your husband. Lovely creature with flowing hair! After fourteen days you shall again meet the man you love, no longer in his earthly appearance but in his celestial form!”
‘I heard these simple words, and thought that a poem should be written to illustrate three eternal precepts:
1. Divine Law (Dharma) takes the form of death when a king goes astray from the path of duty.
2. All must bow before a chaste and faithful wife.
3. The ways of fate are mysterious, and all actions are rewarded.
‘The truth of these three precepts was evidenced in the story of the ankle bracelet, hence our poem shall be titled The Lay of the Ankle Bracelet.
‘The moral lesson to be drawn from this story is important for the three kings who rule the three kingdoms. It appears, venerable saint, that you would be the one most qualified to write this great story.’
In answer to Shattan’s request, the saint, whose renown has remained unequalled, composed a poem in thirty cantos, the subjects of which are the following:
The Blessings. The Installation of a Home. A Description of Madhavi, Receiving from the King the Honours She Deserved for her Great Success on the Stage. The Evening’s Splendour. Indra’s Festival. The Joys of the Seashore. Songs on the Seashore. Madhavi’s Sorrow. The Desert’s Heat. A Description of the City and of the Forest. The Hunter’s Song. Kovalan and his Wife stay in the Suburbs. The Sights of Madurai. The Refuge found for Charming Kannaki. Kovalan’s Murder. The Dance of the Cowgirls. The Despair of People when the City was Burnt. The Town during the Conflagration. The Pleading of Kannaki before the King. The Revenge. Description of the Disaster. Secrets Revealed to Kannaki by the Goddess of Madurai. The Dance of the Mountain Girls. The Stone Bathed in the Sacred Ganga. The Consecration of the Image. The Offerings to the Goddess of faithfulness and the Blessings Obtained from her.
The great events told by Shattan, who belonged to the caste of grain merchants of Madurai, have been woven into a long poem, interspersed with songs, by Prince Ilango Adigal, to illustrate the three precepts stated in this preamble.
APPENDIX II
FOREWORD OF A COMMENTATOR
Uraiperukatturai
After these events, the Pandya kingdom no longer received the blessings of rain and was devastated by a famine, soon followed by fever and plague.
King Verrivercheliyan, who ruled from Korkai, was able to appease the new goddess of faithfulness by sacrificing thousands of goldsmiths and celebrating a festival in her honour. Rain came back, and, with it, peace and prosperity on earth. The kingdom was freed from misery and pestilence.
When he heard this story, Ilam-Koshar, king of Kongunadu, arranged a similar festival, and rains in abundance came to his country.
Then King Gajabahu, in his sea-girt island of Ceylon, built a temple consecrated to the goddess of faithfulness. In the hope that she might drive away all evils, he offered rich sacrifices before her altar every day; he also created a festival during the first month of the year. The rains came in time, and the fertile earth produced an abundant harvest.
The Chola named Perumkilli built in Uraiyur a sanctuary to this goddess of chastity. Each day new offerings were brought to her altar in the hope that she would grant her blessings and gifts to the country for all ages to come.
NOTES
viii V. R. Ramachandra Dikshitar: Translator and editor of the Oxford University Press (1939) edition of Shilappadikaram.
54 crush them as you walk: Nonviolence is one of the main virtues for the Jains; to kill an insect is a serious fault.
55 five sacred words: The sacred word of five syllables of the Jains is a-si-a-u-sa, standing for Aihat, Siddha, Acharya, Upadhyaya, and Sadhu, the five parameshthins (stages of perfection).
76 deadly course: King Kamsa sent a demon (asura) in the shape of a wheel that destroyed everything in its path. The child Krishna stopped it and broke it with his foot.
76 twin trees in the fields: An allusion to two celestial musicians changed into trees, which the child Krishna uprooted, thus liberating them.
154 eighteen years, eighteen months, and eighteen days: Respectively, the war of the gods and the demons, the war of Rama against Ravana, and the great Mahabharata war.
181 I followed him: Here finally the author, Ilango Adigal, himself speaks in the first person.
187 PREAMBLE: This Preamble is considered by the ancient commentators not to belong to the original text, whose contents it summarizes. We therefore give it only in an appendix.
190 King Verrivercheliyan: Successor to the Pandya king of the poem.
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