3.

A SUMMARY OF THE SILAPPATHIKARAM

The story goes like this: Kaveripoompattinam or Poompuhar as called now was then a busy port city of
the Chola kingdom ruled by the famous king Karikala and the native place of Kovalan, a rich merchant’s son
and the hero. By nature he is a connoisseur of arts and broad minded patron of the poor and the needy. He gets
married to Kannagi, another rich merchant’s daughter of the same place and the heroine. She is a fine young
lady bestowed with all the virtues of a sincere wife. One day Kovalan sees the dance performance of Madhavi, a
young and very beautiful Courtesan of the city.

He falls in love with her and started living with her completely forgetting Kannagi and his business. Day
by day, his fortunes get eroded and he develops misunderstanding with Madhavi after she bore a daughter to
him. An allegorical piece of song sung by Madhavi during a festive night creates suspicion in the mind of
Kovalan about her character and he leaves her once for all. When he returns home, the cordial welcome
afforded by Kannagi moves his heart and he decides to restart life afresh by moving out to some other place in
search of good fortune. So, both set on foot to Madurai, a prosperous business centre and the capital of the
Pandya king Nedunchezhiyan.

On the way, a Jain female renunciate joins them and guides them to Madurai. At the outskirts of the
city, kovalan leaves Kannagi to the custody of a shepherd lady and moves into the city with one of Kannagi’s
golden anklet to be sold to raise funds for starting a business. In the mean time, the golden anklet of the queen
gets stolen. The thief is none other than the Court ‘s Goldsmith. Unfortunately, Kovalan meets the same
Goldsmith in the market and requests him to evaluate Kannagi’s anklet.

Finding the similarities between the Queen’s anklet he already stole and the one with Kovalan, the
Goldsmith hatches a treacherous plan to make Kovalan the culprit and informs him that such a prized jewel can
be purchased only by the king and asks him wait at his own residence till he comes back after meeting the king
and rushes to the palace. A grand dance festival is going on in the durbar in the presence of the royal couple.
The lascivious gestures exchanged between the inebriated king and the dancing girls perturbs the queen and
hence she leaves abruptly in the middle under the pretext of a sudden head-ache. Realizing the situation after a
while, the king also started rushing to the harem to pacify her. Now, the goldsmith intercepts the king and
informs him that he has found the thief and kept under his custody.

The king also believes it immediately and hurriedly orders a soldier to accompany the goldsmith and kill
the thief and bring the anklet. Thus, Kovalan loses his life and the anklet gets confiscated without any enquiry.
Hearing this the bereaved Kannagi rushes to the court of the king holding the other anklet and questions him.
The king patiently explains that it is the duty of the king to punish the guilty as Kovalan was found with the
Queen’s stolen anklet. Kannagi refuted the allegation on the ground that her anklet has rubies inside. Then the
king responds that the queen’s stolen anklet has pearls inside and asks Kannagi to show hers. When Kannagi
throws her anklet, it breaks and the rubies scatter all over.

Immediately upon realizing his mistake and his miscarriage of justice which cost an innocent man’s life
and a young woman’s married life both took refuge under his rule, the benevolent king fell down from the
throne lamenting “ I am not the king and I am the thief of justice; hence my life be gone” and dies
instantaneously. The queen also follows suit stating that there can’t be any consoling substitute to a widow.
Even after all these in a bit of unquenched rage and grief Kannagi plucks out her left breast, curses the city be
consumed in fire leaving the Brahmins, righteous, women and children and throws it into the engulfing fire.
From there she started westwards and reached a hill in the Chera kingdom. Then she is taken to the heavens by
her husband.

The literary value of this work is inestimable. Though written by a Jain Renunciate supposed to be a
Prince of Chera dynasty, his impeccable description of the three contemporary ruling dynasties, their countries
and the culture of the people and the other religious faiths in vogue like Hinduism, Buddhism are unbiased. The
main characters have been depicted with natural human virtues and personal vices. Though Kovalan deserts
Kannagi, he is not a womanizer or a flirtatious.

Similarly, though Madhavi a courtesan her love to Kovalan was pure and that’s why she becomes a
renunciate after his separation. Kannagi though depicted as ferocious to cause the death of a king and burn a
city of injustice, she is shown as typical docile wife patiently bearing the wrongs of the husband. The king,
instead of entrusting the matter to a minister, just ordered a menial to do a work of utmost importance which
caused the havoc. The verses present a graphic presentation of the entire Tamilnadu as it should have been
centuries ago.

The impact of the story of Kannagi is that it revived the matriarchal worship prevailed before the advent
of the Aryans and Muslims. After the story of Kannagi, the Tamil ladies stopped wearing gold anklets.