Kamba Ramayanam- An introduction

Kamba Ramayanam- An introduction

By

P.R.Ramachander

      Without any doubt whatsoever  , the story of Rama was popularized by the Ramayana    written by Valmiki.  This has been translated   in to almost all the main languages in India. Kamban (who is supposed to have lived between 1180-1250 AD)  one of the greatest poets of Tamil Nadu translated it in to Tamil . He preferred to call it Ramavatharam(the  incarnation of Rama) . In this great job, he received the support of Thiruvennai nallur  Chadayappa vallal, a great philanthropist    who lived in Tamil Nadu at that time. Kamban who  admired this Vallal mentions his name once in 1000  verses in his book. Kamban did not do a literal translation of Valmiki Ramayana.  He condensed it a lot  , while adding  some portions of his own.  While Valmiki’s great epic consists of 24000  verses, Kamaban’s translation only  contains 12000 verses. Though he adopted the six book(Kandam)  concept of   Valmiki , he has not adopted the sargam concept of  Valimi. He   has divided the Kandas in to Padalams and his Padalams    are  not  direct translation of the Sargams of Valmiki. His book has only  123 Padalams  . Kamban also did not adopt  the story of Valmiki verbatim and made changes to the story. There is a folk story that  The entire Kamba Ramayanam was written by Lord Ganesa as per his dictation.

      I have    done this translation based on the great   commentary in Tamil   published  by the Kamban trust   by a  group of 16 experts  lead  by Professor Aa.Sa.Jnanasambandan in 8  volumes  . I am deeply indebted to this great trust and great author.