Thopputhurai, formerly known as Sethumadavapuram, is a

town A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in different parts of the world. Origin and use The word "town" shares an ori ...

on the south eastern coast of

Nagapattinam District Nagapattinam district is one of the 38 districts (a coastal district) of Tamil Nadu state in southern India. Nagapattinam district was carved out by bifurcating the erstwhile composite Thanjavur district on 19 October 1991. The town of Nagapatt ...

Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is a States and union territories of India, state in southern India. It is the List of states and union territories of India by area, tenth largest Indian state by area and the List of states and union territories of India ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

Location

Thopputhurai is near the east coast road of Vedaranyam-Nagapattinam, with a radius of approximately 23 km. A majority of people living in Thopputhurai are

Muslim Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abrah ...

s and

Hindu Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism.Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...

Origin

The name implies that the village has many plantations and harbors. From this village a salt lake mixes with others after running a distance of 4 km. In the early days of the village people used to trade using catamarans to board their goods in to steamers which trade with Malaysia, Singapore, Sri Lanka and other South East Asian countries. The people started calling them 'Marakalayar' and now they are called as 'Maraikayar'. They started trading by way of a barter system. The people take the goods in night by horseback and traded them in the markets in the daytime. These people are called 'Tatharkal', as the days passed they are now called as 'Iravuthur'. This name doesn't relate to a religion they are called so because of their trade. They are no longer called by that name now. Only few are now doing business, some have become agriculturists and the majority of the people are working in foreign countries.

References

{{reflist Villages in Nagapattinam district