From: sp2@cec1.wustl.edu (Sundara Pandian)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.tamil
Subject: On achcham, madam, naaNam and payirppu
Date: 9 Oct 1992 18:27:36 -0500
Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway
NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.utexas.edu

    I like to give a few comments on the subject -  achcham,
madam,  naaNam,  payirppu  and  say a few words on what they
mean.
    acham, madam, naaNam and payirppu are considered as  the
four  feminine qualities in the Tamil tradition. This tradi-
tion dates back to the Sangam period of  Tamil  culture  and
when addressing the word `payirppu', Tamil grammar books say
`makatooukkvuNaNnaankinonRu' meaning `one of the  four  fem-
inine  qualities'.  `MakaLir' means `women' in Tamil and ac-
ham, madam, naaNam, payirppu are to be  taken  as  the  four
principal  qualities  of  women in the Tamil tradition. Some
readers have tried to incorporate `karpu'[ chastity] as  one
among  these  four  principal  feminine qualities. I like to
point out that these four feminine qualities applies to  all
women  - girls, monks, etc.,  and not necessarily to married
women. As one would see, `kaRpu' is implicitly contained  in
`payirppu'  when  it is applied to married women or virgins.
Also, the word `kaRpu' is essentially conjuncted  with  mar-
ried  women of good chastity. Tamil culture respects KaNNagi
as `kaRpukkarasi' but it views  MaNimEgalai  who  becomes  a
Buddhist  monk  when  she  is young itself   as a monk only,
though she is of very high chastity. These words may be  ir-
relevant  to  some  readers,  but I like to remind them that
`varaivin makaLir'[ prostitutes ] also held  a  position  in
the  ancinet Tamil culture and that they are no exception to
the four feminine qualities in the subject. Silappathikaaram
talks  about these `varaivin makaLir' in its first two parts
. It is my opinion that acham, madam,  naaNam  and  payirppu
applied  to  all  women in the ancient Tamil culture and not
just to chaste women.
    Regarding one  poster  which  commented  that  women  of
`payirppu' can't travel in a crowded Pallavan bus, I request
the author to wake up from our  male-dominant  society.  Not
all  traditions  are  followed  to the letter and we are not
living in the Sangam period when these four feminine  quali-
ties were put forth. We are living in `Bharati yugam' and we
witness many changes in our society - women  education,  one
among them. Bharati writes in one of his poems,

             Ettaiyum peNkaL thoduvathu theemaiyen
             Renni yirundhavar maayndhuvittaar
             VeettukkuLLE peNNaip poottivaippO menRa
             Vindhai manidhar thalai kunindhaar

    We see male chauvinism in the Sangam period itself.  Au-
vaiyaar of Sangam period says in his/her `aaththichchoodi',
                     "thaiyal sol kELeL."
                   [ Don't listen to women.]
[ Some Tamil scholars like  T.M.C.Raghunadhan  believe  that
Auvaiyaar  of Sangam period is the pseudonym of a male poet.
However, the Auvaiyaar, the court poet of Adhiyaman  is  be-
lievedly  a  female  poet. There are two Auvaiyaars in Tamil
literature! ] Bharathi changed this line to
                    "thaiyalai uyarvu sei"
                      [ Respect women.]
in  his  new  "aaththichcoodi".  Also  worth  mentioning  is
Bharathi's view regarding the much talked chastity of women.
Our Tamil poet says,

            kaRpu nilaiyenRu sollavan dhaariru
            katchikkumakthu podhuvil vaippOm
            [ People talk on women's chastity. Let us keep
              it common to both sides- men and women. ]

   A question that one might ask is what about  those  women
in the ancient days who didn't have the four feminine quali-
ties in the subject. How did  the  society  regard  them?  I
refer  to  the Kamba Ramayana to consider this question. The
scene is Rama and his younger brother Lakshmana walking with
the  rishi Viswamitra in the forest. They are encountered by
a demon Thaadakai, a woman, on their way. The  rishi  orders
the  young prince Rama to kill the demon, but the prince re-
fuses saying that he can't kill her as she is a woman.  Then
the  rishi  explains Rama that she is not a woman (!) and as
such, the prince is not committing evil by killing her. Also
we  see  the  `asura' woman SurppaNagai taking the form of a
beautiful woman in a later part of the same epic to  attract
Rama.  Kamba  describes  her walk towards Rama in a verse of
beautiful `sandham', the popular one beginning  `panchiyoLir
vinchukuLir..'. This verse posted first by Kathiravan Krish-
namurthy has been already discussed in the net  and  I  just
like  to point out that SurppaNagai exhibits the four femine
qualities in the subject outwardly to Rama,  though  she  is
evil  in  her heart.  Kamba concludes the verse reminding us
that she is a `vanchamakaL' , an evil woman.
   Having said that I like to say a few words on what do the
four  words  in subject mean, as the four feminine qualities
in Tamil tradition. All these are Tamil words and  they  are
not derived from any Sanskrit word to my knowledge.
 1.achcham : A common meaning for `achcham' is `fear'. Tamil
poet  Pattukkottai  Kalyanasundaram  writes  on  one  of his
movie-songs,
             "achcham enbathu madamiyadaa
              anchaamai dhraavidar udamaiyadaa.."
  Here he means `fear' when he uses the  word  `achcham'  in
his song.
  Can we take `fear' as the first feminine quality addressed
in  the  Sangam  culture?  I like to refer to the Tamil epic
Silappathikaaram and consider the}i case of KaNNagi  who  is
respected  as `KaRpukkarasi'[ the queen of chastity ].  When
she gets to know that her husband is executed by the  Pandi-
yan  king  for  a  crime he did not commit, she becomes very
furious and she walks to the court of Pandyan  king  with  a
boiling  anger  for the injustice committed her - the execu-
tion of her beloved husband. She has no fear at all  in  ad-
dressing  either  the  gate-keeper of the king's court or in
talking with the Pandya king. I can't take the  word  `achc-
ham'  meaning  `fear'  as a feminine quality. It means some-
thing else and for that we have to consider other meaings of
the  Tamil  word `achcham'. One of the meanings of `achcham'
is the tree `agaththi'. This tree is marked with  its  thin-
ness. It is easy to cut these trees. Actually,`thinness'  is
yet another meaning for `achcham'.  From  this  meaning,  we
deduce  that  `achcham' means `gentleness' as the first fem-
inine quality.

 2.  naaNam  :   `naaNam'  means  `shyness',  `delicacy'  or
`modesty'. We take `shyness' as the second feminine quality.
To quote a Tamil song with this word in usage, we  have  the
KaNNadasan's song in `aayiraththil oruvan',
             "naaNamO ? innum naaNamO ?
             indha jaadai naadagam enna ?.."

 3. madam : A  common meaning for `madam' is `monastery'. It
should  be  obvious  that this meaning can't be taken as the
third feminine quality. So we look for other meanings of the
Tamil  word `madam'. An another meaning for `madam'  is `ig-
norance'. This meaning, `ignorance', is the  third  feminine
quality  . That `madam' was considered as a feminine quality
indicates the primitiveness of the Sangam culture.

 4. payirppu : This word is not in usage and I don't know of
any  common  meaning  of  this  Tamil word. This word really
means `a state of uneasiness at the sight  or  hearing  any-
thing  offensive - abhorrent feelings'. We take this to mean
`delicacy' or `high chastity' or  `shrinking  from  what  is
mean or vile' as the fourth feminine quality.

                                         Thanks for reading,
                                          - Sundara Pandian.
                                     [  sp2@cec1.WUSTL.edu ]