Mapping the Chronology of Bhakti: Milestones, Stepping Stones, and Stumbling Stones

Starting around the sixth century of the common era, a new form of fervent religiosity seems to be discernible in the Tamil-speaking South that is often termed the “Bhakti movement”. The eleven essays gathered in this volume all deal with South Indian primary sources related to the various phenomena that can be grouped together under the head of “Bhakti”, which may be broadly defined as personal devotion between a devotee and his god. What characterized the early phase of this “movement”, which in subsequent centuries swept across the whole sub-continent and transformed popular religion in every place that it reached, was the emphasis placed upon the emotional aspect of the relation between the devotee and his chosen deity: the Tamil hymns regularly underline the message that salvation can be attained just through such devotion., The chronology of the appearance, growth and development of this transformative movement is riddled with uncertainties, whether we consider literary or archaeological evidence. Each of the contributions to this volume addresses some aspect of the history of this movement in the South, and so, drawing on a wide range of disciplines — linguistics, philology, epigraphy, archaeology — they together contribute, each in its own way, to the mapping of the chronology of Bhakti. This volume is dedicated to our esteemed colleague Pandit R. Varadadesikan, a specialist of the Tamil sources of Vaisnavism, who recently retired after dedicating forty-four years of his life to a career in the Pondicherry Centre of the EFEO working to further understanding of Tamil and Manipravalam literature.ContentsIntroductory Note (Valérie Gillet)Biography and Bibliography of Paṇḍit R. Varadadesikan (S.A.S Sarma) A Note on Time: Venkatanatha’s conception of time (Marcus Schmücker)Metres in Tamil Bhakti Literature and the Problem of their (occasional)Description in Treatises (Studies in Tamil Metrics-2) (Jean-Luc Chevillard)Royal and Local Bhakti under the Pallavas (Emmanuel Francis)Jivakacintamani’s Contribution to Periyapuranam (T.S. Gangadharan) Tracking Traces of Gods: the site of Tirupparankunram (Valérie Gillet)The Sacred Landscape of Tamil Saivism: Plotting Place in the Realm of Devotion (Leslie C. Orr) Life after Death: From Mortal Remains to Monuments (K. Rajan) The Edifice of Bhakti: towards an “archaeological” reading ofTevaram and Periyapuranam (Charlotte Schmid) Vaisnava Literature in Tamil (R. Varadadesikan)From Ancient Poetics to Applied Poetics: Continuance and Change in Tamil Bhakti Poetry (With special reference to Nammalvar’sakam poems) (G. Vijayavenugopal) Nammalvar as a Master of tinaimayakkam—Transposition Techniques in the akam Songs of the Tiruvaymoḻi (Eva Wilden)Srivaisnava Topoi: Constructing a South Indian Sect through Place (Katherine Young)