The month of Thai, an auspicious Tamil month, begins. During this month last year, Tamil Nadu saw massive popular protests demanding the legalisation of jallikattu, a sport that involves the taming of bulls.
The scale and fervour of the protests caught many by surprise, leaving scholars fumbling for an explanation. One reason for the passion jallikattu invoked could be the long history of the sport, and its embeddedness in the cultural economy of the Tamils.
The earliest evidence of the sport comes from Kalithogai, an anthology of 150 poems, which is part of the corpus of Tamil Sangam poetry. M.L. Thangappa, who won the Sahitya Akademi translation award in 2012 for Love Stands Alone: Selections from Tamil Sangam Poetry, has translated the anthology, which I had the honour to edit and introduce.
Dating to the early centuries of the common era, Kalithogai poems are found in the section on ‘Mullai’ — poems set in pastoral land — and provide the earliest descriptions of an ancient sport called eru thazhuvuthal (literally, ‘embracing the bull’).
Attributed to poet Nalluruthiran, the five poems, totalling some 350 lines, conjure up the thrill, tumult and breathless pace of jallikattu. In the 14th century, the phenomenally erudite Nachinarkiniyar, praised as ‘star commentator among scholars’, provided glossary and elucidation — testimony that jallikattu was a continuing tradition.
From these nearly 2000-year-old poems and their medieval commentary, it is striking how little the sport has changed: the mad rush of the bulls into the ring, the enthusiasm of the young men out to tame them, the spilt blood as man meets bull, the honour and lives at stake, the egging on by spectators… perhaps only foreign tourists are missing!
Below is one of the translated poems, which tries to capture the drama of the original.
[The girl’s friend speaks]
The monsoon showers fall
and make the pasture lands cool.
The thorny pidavam puts forth
shoots
on the barren boughs
and the buds unfold.
The kodal clusters, swaying like a
drunkard,
bear bright red flowers
that look like flames from a fire drill.
And then there are the
sapphire-coloured
kaya flowers
and others too.
Cowherds deck themselves with
wreaths
and garlands made from these
flowers,
and gather in the open
throwing their formidable challenge.
The killer bulls are let loose into the
ring
whose sharpened horns shine
like Siva’s battle-axe.
Then come the beating drums
Sounding like thunder.
Smoke goes up and dust raised.
Maidens come and stand in a row.
Having worshipped their gods,
who dwelt besides the fords
and under the banyan and
maraamara trees,
brave young men desiring to win the
maidens’ hands
by subduing the wild-spirited bulls,
enter the arena.
Look at the silkworm-coloured bull
piercing his brave adversary with his
horns
and goring him!
He looks like the brave one who
broke open
the heart
of the ruffian who had laid his hands
on the hair of the gentle lady
and took his revenge in the midst of
his foes.
Here is the black-coloured one
with a bright white spot on his fore
head.
Look at him bearing down on his
challenger
piercing his stomach
and ripping out his intestines.
Doesn’t he look like the Supreme
One,
digging into the bosom of Death
and pulling out his intestines
to offer them as food for the ghouls?
And now to the white bull with red
spots.
His challenger is brave and unafraid
but the bull thrusts his horns
into his chest and disables him.
Looks like the one who avenged his
father
by twisting off his enemy’s head at
the dead
of night.
Listen to the flute played
by a shepherd in the evening,
which will bring you your young man
who wears a beautiful garland.
[She turns to the lover and speaks to
him]
‘Young man,
if you can overcome this bull,
angrier than a rutting elephant,
this girl will hold aloft the banner of
victory.
We will give our dark-haired girl in
marriage
to the young man who will tame
the killer bull that stands beside his
master —
the one with a garland,
playing a sad melody on his flute
and holds his staff against his
shoulder.’
[to her friend again]
‘Your young man who boasts of his
superiority
Over the other bullfighters
will marry you some day without fail
That is why we welcome him with
our eyes
most graciously.’
The bulls are tired.
The young men are injured.
And our girls wearing fragrant
flowers on
their hair
join their lovers
and go into the cool jasmine groves
with a desire to make love.