Govinda Pillai dates Ezuthachan to the fifteenth or sixteenth century.Kovunni Nedungadi dates Ezuthachan to the fifteenth century.Hermann Gundert dates Ezuthachan to the seventeenth century.William Logan (1887) dates Ezuthachan to the seventeenth century (he supports the dates given by Burnell).The deed relates to the date of the founding of the Gurumadhom of Chittur. He discovered the date from a title deed (found in a manuscript collection preserved in Chittur). Burnell (1871) dates Ezhuthachan to seventeenth century. Burnell was the first Western scholar to take an interest in Ezhuthachan.Įzhuthachan is generally believed to have lived around the sixteenth or seventeenth century. This locale can be historically verified. This was under the direction of Suryanarayanan Ezhuthachan (with support of the local chieftain). An inscription giving the details of the founding of the residence (agraharam), hermitage (mathom), and temples in Chittur.This lineage can be historically verified. An institutional line of masters or gurus, beginning with one Thunchaththu Sri Guru, is mentioned in one oral verse from Chittur Madhom.Quasi-historical verses referring to Ezhuthachan (from Chittur Madhom).Main historical sources of Ezhuthachan and his life are There is no completely firm historical evidence for Ezhuthachan the author. Harisharma (Kottayam: Sahitya Pravarthaka Co-operative). "Adhyatma Ramayanam" (1969) edited by A.Achyuta Menon (Madras: University of Madras). " Eluttaccan and His Age" (1940) by C.
The following two texts are the standard sources on Ezhuthachan. The first Western scholar to take an interest in Ezhuthachan was Arthur C. His other major contribution has been in mainstreaming the current Malayalam alphabet.
It can be said that Ezhuthachan brought the then unknown Sanskrit-Puranic literature to the level of common understanding (domesticated religious textuality). This work rapidly circulated around Kerala middle-caste homes as a popular devotional text. However, he is celebrated as the "Primal Poet" or the "Father of Malayalam Proper" for his Malayalam recomposition of the Sanskrit epic Ramayana. įor centuries before Ezhuthachan, Kerala people had been producing literary texts in Malayalam and in the Grantha script. Ezhuthachan's ideas have been variously linked by scholars either with philosopher Ramananda, who founded the Ramanandi sect, or Ramanuja, the single most influential thinker of devotional Hinduism. The school eventually pioneered the "Ezhuthachan movement", associated with the concept of popular Bhakti, in Kerala.
This institution probably housed both Brahmin and Sudra literary students. Later he or his followers shifted to a village near Palakkad, further east into the Kerala, and established a hermitage (the "Ramananda ashrama") and a Brahmin residence there. His success even in his own lifetime seems to have been great. Little is known with certainty about his life.
Įzhuthachan was born in the Thunchaththu home at present-day Tirur, northern Kerala, in a traditional Hindu family. The number and circulation of his texts far outdo that of any other poet of premodern Kerala. He was one of the pioneers of a major shift in Kerala literary production (the domesticated religious textuality associated with the Bhakti movement). He has been called the "Father of Modern Malayalam", or, alternatively, the "Father of Malayalam Literature", or the "Primal Poet in Malayalam". 16th century) was a Malayalam devotional poet, translator and linguist from Kerala, south India. Thunchaththu Ramanujan Ezhuthachan ( pronunciation, Tuñcattŭ Rāmānujan Eḻuttacchan) ( fl.