Hey Kavya ,my grandkid,though you are a Britisher by your passport, know thou that you belong to a great and one of the oldest civilisations in the world,the Sanathana dharma or the modern Hindu civilisation.And you are blessed to be a Brahmin by the varnashram.Brahmin is the one who is supposed to study the Vedas and rituals,protect it,uphold and transfer it to the subsequent generation. His duty is the pursuit of knowledge.
The Tamil Brahmins -have many sub sects.,like the Iyers and Iyengars. And in the Iyer subsect also many subdivisions like the Choliyars,Vadamas,Mukanis,Ashtrasahasrams
the Brihatcharanam, etc etc.Its basically irrelevant other than as a social class concept destined to the dustbins of history.
Kavya! For statistical purposes you come under the Choliyars and to narrow it down to the subatomical level you come under the clan, the Munkudumi Marayavars who were based in the Tirunelveli district, in places like kadambodu vazhvu,Nanguneri,kalakkad,Vallanadu,Kongarayarkurichy,Keezhpavur,Srivakuntam Kadayanallur and nearby areas.
The main characteristics of the Chozhiya is his munkudumi(purvashika) ,like the Namboothiris,ie the malayali brahmin indigenous to Kerala,ie small tuft of hair in the front side of head where as the other Brahmins had it in the back of head . Originally the chozhias have migrated from north india and settled first in Tamilnadu under the patronage of Chola and Pandiya kings. They claimed themselves as clans from Chanakya and later as leniage from Adisankara' too. They were in charge of many temples in Chidambaram as saivites and also as vaishnavites like periyalvar,also many were temple priests in Tiruchendur .They were highly conservative and ritualistic.But after 17 th century they lost the patronage of the kings and fell into difficult times, which forced them to conduct ceremonies like marrige and death rituals to other backward communities and also participate in death rituals of other brahmin sects who viewed them in contempt resulting in isolating them down the ladder of brahmin communities .
Now let us concentrate on our clan in Chozhiya community the Munkudumi Marayavars,your great ancestors who migrated from kadamboduvazhvu near Nanguneri,Kalakkadu,srivaikuntam, Keezhpavur,Vallanadu,pazhavoor,Kongarayarkurichy,Kadayanallur near tenkasi.All of them have migrated to Kerala from late 19 th century to early 20 th century roughly from 1880 to 1915.What caused them to migrate to Kerala is not yet known.One might be, the patronage shown by erstwhile Travancore kings,or another one factor may be the recorded great famine in tirunelveli around 1885 or a plague epidemic somewhere around the time.,Malik Gafur which was much much earlier.
In this regard Kavya !! I stumbled up on a treasure in my father's documents after his death, a small book named family trees.This book contained family tree of our forefathers compiled by my grandfather Sri Kulathu iyer charting out four generations before him from kongarayar kurissy.Later my father Sri Krishna iyer updated it and finally landed with me in 2008 for sure and knowing the importance, it was under my safe custody for nother 12 years. Now thanks to the lockdown due to Corona pandemic, I had ample time to revisit the book and finding that the Time has started taking its toll on the pages ,and paper starting to disintegrate, I thought it's time for preservation of data for future generations.Thus with the help of my son a computer professional, I uploaded the data on web after updating it to the present generation, a total of 400 to 500 persons ,an extended family version.
Kavya ! You are supposed to know our leniage from around 1720s.My grandfather K.Kulathu iyer Krishna Iyer from Haripad (1902 to 1980) had reported four generations above him starting with one Sankara Iyer from Kongarayarkurichy near vallanad ,Athreya gothra. Kulathu iyer's mother' s side came from one Azhakappa iyer from Varkala ,sreevalsa gothram.Kulathu iyer's father's mother side came from one Srambikkal madom Cholanarayana iyer whose father was Vallanadu Sundara iyer,srambikkal madom, asritha Kashyapa gothra. Kulathu iyer's wife ie my grandmothers side through her paternal side came from Pazhavur near vallanad,Krishna Iyer,Bharadwaj gothram. Her maternal side from one Subba iyer ,Kadamboduvazhvu. My mother R.Lekshmi Krishnan's maternal side came from Thalavady Narayana iyer and her paternal side ie my maternal grandfather Sri A.Ramaswami Iyer(1900 to 1970), Kollam came from Sri Subba iyer,Vasakappaneri,with Perumal as kuladeivom ,Kasyapa gothra ,bodhayana. and belonged to Kadamboduvazhvu. My wife C.chellammal alias Ponni 's paternal side came from S.Chandramouleeswara iyer,son of Sreenivas iyer, great grandson of L.Subba Iyer , Vasakappaneri permal as kuladeivom,Kasyapa gothram,bodhayam and belonged to somewhere near Srivaikuntam.Her maternal side came from Seetharama iyer from Kadayanallur gramam.
So it's with data of this extended family and also other Chozhiya families whom I am related to also with the the help of my elderly family members that I am piecing the missing links of the above clan.Further this clan is a relatively closed tribe intermarriaging within itself that most are known to each other and somewhat related to each other.Roughly aroud 1000 to 2000 people distributed from Nagercoil,Trivandum,Varkala,Kollam,Haripad, Alleppey to Cochin. Most of them belong to rig Veda and yajur Veda.Majority being of the Kasyapa gothra,bhothayana and rest rigvedis .I belong to Aswalayana sutra of Athreya gothra of Rigveda. Majority have their kuladeivom of Leksminarayana Perumal of Vasakappaneri temple near Kadamboduvazhvu, some have Dharmasastha ,and ours are Chattanathaswami of Kongarayarkurichy near vallanad.
Most of these chozhiyas are ultraconservatives highly ritualistic and cling on to there acharas and anacharas equally. They , I mean our forefathers were least interested in Modern education or for that matter in careers and jobs. They married only within the Chozhiya community . Some of the notable first generation families were Azhagappa iyer family in
Nagercoil ,Vembu iyer family in Trivandrum Annavu iyer family in Kollam,Pitchu iyer family in Alleppey, Sreenivasa iyer family including Appaswamiiyer,Lekshmanaiyer,Chandramouliswara iyer families in Cochin.
Some common aspects in these early migrators were ,they were not versatile in sanskrit, not associated as purohits,or vedic scholars and Acharyas of any temple , nor were they engaged as brahmanas for any thevasom or any death rituals.They resided in agraharas near some temple of their ishta deivoms and some resided in independent madoms. These chozhiya
were nomadic in nature. They were interested in making assets and looked forwards to the Ceremonies ,whether it's marriage or poonals or such type to intermingle with the clan.Many of the notables chozhiyas in Kerala and Tamilnadu are many of the Nayanmars(saivaites like Sundarar,Thirujnana sambandar,vaishnavites like Periyalvar, Andal, the principle disciple of Adi sankara- Padmapadar,Chembai vaidyanatha bhagavathar,Sri Sri Krishnapremi swamigal,Sri Sri Ravishankar, famous writer Sundar Ramamaswami ,incidentally first cousin to my mother,Vittal Ganapathi etc etc.
Now regarding this clan of mine who landed in Kerala, most of the first generation had little education and were financiers(hundi business), cloth merchants and other businesses, few agriculturists . They never took up any jobs,unlike the Palghat Iyers( Vadamas) who were well educated and took up career jobs. But the first generation made money during 1st and 2 nd world wars in businesses, but around 1950s these businesses collapsed by infighting between these large extended families. Also they couldn't survive the dowry issues and marriage expenses of their daughters.Many of the agriculture based ones had to sell off their paddy fields for these marriages.A simple statistics tell me ,not even 2 percent of males made it to any college.But the next generation in the 1950s had learnt their lessons and started to go to work in private companies and banking sectors and became high executives. Now most of them were graduates and very few postgraduates say less than 3, 1 chartered accountant ,3 or 4 lawyers.Then by my generation career came to forefront and almost 80 percent were in to banks and other good jobs in private sector and the families began to thrive.Now the computer industry has arrived in Bangalore and the next generation took full advantage and now more than 90 percent are computer professionals in leading multinational companies all over India and abroad ranging from Australia,US,UK ,gulf.Now they are socially and economically forward and now many of the Brahmins coming to their homes for sraddhas and death ceremonies happen to be from other brahmin communities. Why I am saying this is that social and economical backwardness should not be the criteria among brahmin communities for segregation or isolation.Times are bound to change.
Another topic of interest in the first generation migrants is their routes from Tamilnadu to Kerala in the late 19 th century. The first trains from tirunelveli side to kollam started in 1904 from tenkasi and bus transport took another 15 years. So the only option for them would have been bullock carts via the shenkottai route to Kollam and from there ,South to Trivandrum and from Kollam to Cochin via Alleppey or Kottayam by waterways.Another option for them would have been from Tirunelveli to Nagercoil , Trivandrum to Kollam then northwards.Few of them could have come via pollachy ,Palghat passes to some Palghat villages like Chembai,Thrithamarai, Vengassery etc.
Paradoxically ,most of these chozhiyas have migrated from Kerala and are now settled in Tamilnadu,Bangalore and other north Indian states and some in foreign countries to live with their sons or daughters who have migrated for career reasons. As of now very few of them reside in Kerala. Now the youngsters are more liberals and aggressive in their attitude and dont cling to the past and they also don't want to leave their customs and culture. So the Jaithra Yatra continues. Kavya ! You have started to sleep now.
