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Mailam Murugan temple |
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 The
Mailam Murugan temple is located 15 km from
Tindivanam, on a small hill on the slopes of which
are a number of houses and an institute dedicated to
the development of Tamil language and literature.
According to the name, bomma or bomme, derived from
brahmana. This was a village donated to Brahmans, as
is confirmed by the sthala purana in which
Bomayapalaiyam is also named Brahmapuram. The street
leading to the mutt is still called agrahara.
It is known from the private diary of Ananda Ranga
Pillai, the dubash under Dupleix, that Dupleix
visited, in 1744, the head of the mutt and offered
him a few yards of cloth and bottles of rose water.
In another passage, dating from 1746, Ananda Ranga
Pillai mentions that the swami of the mutt cities
three pontiffs during this twenty-four year period.
Be that as it may, of interest is what Ananda Ranga
Pillai has to say regarding the succession to the
swami. First, he states that a certain Turaiyar
Pachai Kandappaiyur, who was leading an ascetic life
in Palani, was installed as head of the mutt.
However, four days later, he corrects himself to say
that Turaiyur Pachai Kandappaiyur, who had come to
install the new pontiff of the mutt, desired to
visit Pondicherry before returning to Turaiyur. This
shows that Palani had control over the mutt. All the
heads of the Bomayapalaiyam mutt are named Sivanana
Bala Siddha, which calls clearly to mind that Palani
is a hill inhabited by siddha and devoted to Murukan,
or more specifically, to Murukan in his form of
ascetic and young (bala) god. These two aspects are
generally concomitant, probably on the basis of
their connotation of innocence and purity. |
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