Iyers are an ethnoreligious community of Tamil-speaking Hindu Brahmins. Most Iyers are followers of the Advaita philosophy propounded by Adi Shankara and adhere to the Smarta tradition. This is in contrast to the Iyengar community, who are adherents of Sri Vaishnavism. The Iyers and the Iyengars are together referred to as Tamil Brahmins. The majority of Iyers reside in Tamil Nadu, India.
Hanumatodi, more popularly known as Todi, is a rāgam in Carnatic music. It is the 8th melakarta rāgam in the 72 melakarta rāgam system. This is sung very often in concerts. It is a difficult rāgam to perform in owing to its complexity in prayoga. It is called Janatodi in Muthuswami Dikshitar school of Carnatic music. Its Western equivalent is the Phrygian mode. Todi in Carnatic music is different from Todi (thaat) of Hindustani music. The equivalent of the Hindustani raga Todi in Carnatic music is Shubhapantuvarali. The equivalent of Carnatic Todi in Hindustani is Bhairavi thaat in terms of notes, but the two sound very different due to differing uses of gamakas.
Damal Krishnaswamy Pattammal, popularly known as D. K. Pattammal or DKP, was an Indian Carnatic musician and a playback singer for film songs in Tamil. Pattammal, along with her contemporaries M. S. Subbulakshmi and M. L. Vasanthakumari, are popularly referred to as the female trinity of Carnatic Music. This trio initiated the entry of women into mainstream Carnatic Music. She has been appreciated all over the world by Carnatic music lovers.
Presidency College is an art, commerce, and science college in the city of Chennai in Tamil Nadu, India. On 16 October 1840, this school was established as the Madras Preparatory School before being repurposed as a high school, and then a graduate college. The Presidency College is one of the oldest government arts colleges in India. It is one of two Presidency Colleges established by the British in India, the other being the Presidency College, Kolkata.
Chola Nadu is a cultural region of the Tamil Nadu state in southern India. It encompasses the lower reaches of the Kaveri River and its delta, and formed the cultural homeland and political base of the Chola Dynasty which ruled large parts of South India and parts of Sri Lanka between the 9th and 13th centuries CE. Uraiyur served as the early Chola capital, then medieval Cholas shifted to Thanjavur and later cholas king Rajendra Chola I moved the capital to Gangaikonda Cholapuram in Ariyalur in the 11th century CE.
Dewan Bahadur Sachivottama SirChetput Pattabhiraman Ramaswami IyerLL.D. D.Litt., popularly known as Sir C. P., was an Indian lawyer, administrator and statesman, acknowledged as the most powerful man in the Madras Presidency in the decades immediately prior to Indian Independence.
Vadama, meaning "Northerners", are a sub-sect of the Iyer community of Tamil Brahmins. While some believe that their name is an indication of the fact that they were the most recent Brahmin migrants to the Tamil country others interpret the usage of the term "Vadama" as a reference to their strict adherence to the Sanskrit language and Vedic rituals which are of northerly origin.
Thanjavur Marathi people, are a Thanjavur Marathi-speaking ethno-linguistic group, who reside in the central and northern parts of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. They are the descendants of Marathi administrators, soldiers and noblemen who migrated to this region during the rule of the Thanjavur Maratha kingdom. Thanjavur was a Maratha kingdom in Tamil Country, until the British East India Company dethroned the last Thanjavur Maratha king, Shivaji of Thanjavur. It was founded by Maratha Warrior King Chatrapati Shivaji's half-brother, Ekoji alias Venkoji Rajē Bhonsalē. The Kshatriyas use Maratha, while the Brahmins use the surname Deshastha.
Ganapathy Dikshitar Subramania Iyer was a leading Indian journalist, social reformer and freedom fighter who led the Triplicane Six in launching The Hindu, an English newspaper on 20 September 1878. He was proprietor, editor and managing director of The Hindu from 20 September 1878 to October 1898. The Tamil language newspaper 'Swadesamitran' was also founded by him in 1891.
Sir Amaravati Seshayya Sastri, or Sashiah Sastri, was an Indian administrator who served as the Diwan of Travancore from May 1872 to 4 May 1877 and as the Diwan of Pudukkottai from 1878 to 1894. He is credited with having modernized the city of Pudukkottai.
Brahacharanam is a sub-sect of the Iyer community of Tamil Brahmins. The word "Brahacharanam" is a corruption of the Sanskrit word Brhatcharanam. Many Brahacharanam follow the Advaita Vedanta philosophy propounded by Adi Shankara. Some Brahacharanam adhere to Shivadvaita. The Brahacharanams, along with the Vadamas, form the major portion of the Kerala Iyer community.
Tamil Renaissance refers to the literary, cultural, social reform and political movements that took place in the Tamil-speaking districts of Southern India starting in the second half of the 19th century and lasting to the culmination of the anti-Hindi agitations of the 1960s.
The Right Hon.Calamur ViravalliRunganada Sastri was an Indian interpreter, jurist, civil servant, polyglot, and social reformer, who was known for his mastery over Indian and foreign languages alike in both classical and vernacular forms, as well as his general erudition and command of jurisprudence. At his death, he is known to have mastered fourteen languages, and had a conversational command of at least two to four more.
The Indian independence movement had a long history in the Tamil-speaking districts of the then Madras Presidency going back to the 18th century.
Chetput Ramaswami Iyer Pattabhiraman was an Indian lawyer and politician from the Indian National Congress. He was the eldest son of Indian statesman C. P. Ramaswami Iyer. He served as a Member of Indian Parliament from Kumbakonam from 1957 to 1967 and as a Union Minister from 1966 to 1967.
The Mylapore Clique or oligarchy was a small coterie, amounting to a "handful" of politically moderate, elite Brahmins, primarily Tamil Brahmins, many of them noted lawyers, administrators, academics or educators, or industrialists, in the Madras Presidency, who 'wielded almost exclusive influence and patronage in the service and government appointments', 'controlled the flow of resources out of the institutions of the capital' and 'dominated the professional and political life of [the presidency].' Informal and exclusive, it was historically controlled by two extended families, the Vembaukum Iyengars, and the Calamur Viravalli-Chetpet Iyers, and took its name from the luxurious Madras City neighborhood in which many leading members kept mansions. The clique coalesced and began its dominance in the 1880s and 1890s under the headship of Sir V. Bhashyam Aiyangar and Sir S. Subramania Iyer, with R. Raghunatha Rao as a tertiary leader; while some argue that it reached its zenith between 1910 and 1920, others highlight its remarkable successes in ministry and magistracy continuing in the 1920s and 1930s, with Sir C. P. Ramaswami Iyer as leader.
The Calamur Viravalli family, inclusive of closely intermarried "merged" lines was one of the two preeminent Brahmin dynasties in the Madras Presidency who dominated the Mylapore clique, alongside the Vembaukum family. They were originally Vadama Iyers from Kalambur and nearby hamlets in North Arcot, who traced their ancestry to Appayya Dikshita, and before that, Deshastha movements from the North. They were traditionally by hereditary profession renowned Sanskritists, as with Anantharama, father of patriarch C. V. Runganada Sastri, Anantharama's father, and Anantharama's father's father, but rapidly adapted to the practice and administration of law and English-style governance, with many Calamurs coming to rank among India's most celebrated lawyers, jurists, administrators, and statesmen.
