The Theyyam or Theyyattam is a popular ritual dance of North Kerala, particularly now found in the traditional Kolathunadu, of the present Kannur and Kasargode districts. As a living cult with centuries old traditions, ritual and custom, it embraces almost all castes and classes of Hindu religion in this region. The term Theyyam is a corrupt form of daivam or God. It is a rare combination of dance and music and reflects important features of a tribal culture.The indigenous Theyyam cult under the influence of the great classical Indian tradition incorporated new ideas and legends. However its form and content did not change very much. The earliest Brahminic settlements like Payyanur and Perimchellur (Thaliparamba) in Kolathunadu where the Brahminic religion was propagated through the institutions of temples largely influenced the popular folk religion based on Theyyam and other tribal cults. According to the legendary Keralolpathi, Parasurama sanctioned the festivals like Kaliyattam, Puravela and Deivattam or Theyyattam to the people of Kerala. He assigned the responsibility of Theyyam dance to the indigenous communities like Panan, Velan and Vannan. These traditions explain how the indigenous cults like Theyyam were incorporated and metamorphosed under the religious supremacy of the Brahmanism. In the long historical process a social system evolved in Kerala in which the little culture like Theyyam belonged to the depressed castes and classes where as the temple oriented culture belonged to the dominant castes and classes. There were no violent confrontations between these two cultures as there was no total destruction of the indigenous culture. “There can be no doubt”, say Bridget and Raymond Alchin, ‘that a very large part of this modern folk religion is extremely ancient and contains traits which originated ruing the earliest periods of Neolithic , Chalcolithic settlement and expression (The Birth of Indian Civilization 1968 p.3039)Velan, on of the communities of Theyyam dancers, is referred to in the Tamil Sangam literature. According to Sangam tradition he was employed by the mothers of the love-lorn girls to exercise the malignant spirits from their daughters. He propitiated God Murukan to drive away the evils spirits by sacrificing a goat before a Kalam or Square made for this occasion. At the end of the ceremony he conducted a dance known as Velan Veriyatal with a spear in his hand and prophesied the future happiness of the girl. The works like Tirumurukattuppatai, give descriptions of Velan’s Kalam, offering of chekki and oleander flowers with sacrificial blood, locations of performance like Manram, Podiyil, estuary (thuruthu), groves, forest, riverbanks and Kadamba tree. The main characteristics of such performances are traced in the contemporary Theyyam cult. Now all such rituals as described in some of the Sangam works and their commentaries are being observed by Velan and other dancing communities in the cult of Theyyam. Now the Velan community is divided into two groups known as Anjutton and Munnutton in Kolathunadu. According to tradition this division is based on the character of their offerings to the deity. The Munnutton section committed only three offenses (such offerings are offences to Brahmins) namely killing of cock, goat and buffalo, and the Anjutton (five offences) namely killing of cock, goat, buffalo, elephant and human being. Some of the Theyyam ritual songs describe that earlier the priest or the dancer had even sacrifices human beings in favour of the deity. Ezhimala described in the Sangam literature and ruled by Udayan Venman Nannan is situated in Kolathunadu, near Payyanur. Therefore the Tamil Sangam culture with variations still continues in this region. The dance of Velan had taken new forms and developed into the present day cult of Theyyam over a period of 1500 years. This uninterrupted continuity of the Sangam tradition makes Theyyam a prominent religious system of north Kerala. As a religious and social institution it has significant place in the cultural history of region.
Common Heritage shared by All Indians of all Faiths
India is a great flow of cultures, faiths and colors.
This free flow of thought, life style from times immemorial has been taking its own course and the end result has been shaping the humanity and its evolution. India is the biggest and most ancient experiment where almost all racial and ethnic groups of the world have met and mixed.
We do have pure Mongolian races in North East, Australoids and Munda aborigines in Center and East, Mediterranean and Arabian in the North and West, Central Asian Turk-Mongols in North, Aryans in North.
These last form same stock with Aryans of Iran [Ayran], Aryavan [Azairbaijan] and other areas of Amu Dariya.
We also have Burmese, Cambodian, Viet, Thai, Malay and Javanese racial groups in India.
We also have Greek, Armenian, Turk, Slavic Russian, Georgian and even Mediterraneans, Semitic, Phoenicians, Berbers and Misri elements in India.
In past thousands of years, almost all racial and ethnic groups have passed through India - for it was the prime market of the world. Almost center of commerce and trade.
All trade routes including the fabled silk route ended in India.
India was the LAST stop in the global travelers itinerary.
India received almost all races like USA has done in past a few hundred years.
The US experiment is based upon imposing essentially a European society in the Americas whereas India has had flow of visitors from all corners of the world uninterrupted.
India is truly a universal nation.
It is a country of many nations and many ethnic groups.
It is a reality and it is working.
It may be anarchic on surface, it may be a bit dustier on the first impression, it may be overstocked with people apparently yet if we remove these first thin layers on Indian body, covered like a dusty, rustic piece of cloth, we find a coherent, consistent force of life, vibrant, organized, incredibly beautiful, extra ordinary spiritual, most colorful, covering all hues, shades, tones and styles, projecting deep within, a solid, stable, peaceful, soul of India......which collectively make India - a truly amazing and great place.
India's greatness can NEVER be blemished by zillion racial divisions, artificial man made caste systems, man made flimsy belief systems, blind faiths and all sorts of manipulations and fact twisting.
India has survived and will survive.
Life will go on in India... We all will die, burn, bury or cremate and some of us may or may not come back to Human life, but India will go on, always shaping itself, always making its own styles, its own spicy and zesty living, always improvising.
You can name natives of this amazingly changing and evolving society - Hindu Muslim Sikh Catholic Protestant Jew Buddhist Jain X Y Z or any combinations of words available in human memory system...........they all have something in common.
They all are born in the same land, share same sources of life, water, air, food and other ethereal stuff.
All these divisions are man made.
God is One unifying force.
It does not see any difference between green or white or brown or black. Its the overall picture which matters.
Its the big picture we are talking.
See India from a different angle and you will understand that life in India has a different meaning than any other country of the world.
Go beyond the known vocabulary of our blind faith and our self created walls of ignorance and divisions - apparently to protect ourselves from an unknown fear.. The truth is we all are afraid of being this or that when in reality this is nothing but a little file in our mind. Being a Hindu a Muslim a Sikh or a Christian is a state of mind.. it is a bit of an idea - which boils down to a single thought and all thoughts are nothing but archives or files stored in our mind which are like files of old paid or unpaid bills or like old forgotten pictures which we open time to time to laugh and cry.
Well coming back to India.
This is a country which keep reinventing itself in different forms.
You have to know deeper. You have to study the true history of people, life, things, materials, earth and cosmos and of course the meta physical stuff which is beyond anything you can touch or smell.
That beyond stuff is a world of spirituality where the physical bodies do not exist.
ONLY a tiny bit of light or flame of undefined color, which is very palpable, very living, very vibrating yet very unfelt and that is our soul.
Our collective soul makes India a great spiritual torch which has been showing light to the world - yes this little concrete world of ours including our silicon chips and stone oil's plastics - where we stand and sit for about 25,000 days [ei equal to 68 years and about 6 months].
We make so much noise, hear so much noise that the truth is never heard in this huge cacophony and most of these 25.000 days or less are lost in fighting with ourselves, with our neighbors, with our own friends, family and beloved ones.
What does a human being achieve in these days?
Ask yourself.
India does not need any of us.
We need India - to keep our grain size ego inflated as football - high, to keep ourselves busy fighting with each other.
I have a message for you.
India will continue.
We will be soon discontinued.
Our archives will be buried and cremated with our mind somewhere in the dust and that few pound of dust will one day blow and make a clean home dusty and someone will sweep or vacuum cursing the dusty winds of north............
