Nāṉmaṇikkaṭikai ( ta, நான்மணிக்கடிகை) is a

Tamil Tamil may refer to: * Tamils, an ethnic group native to India and some other parts of Asia **Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka also called ilankai tamils **Tamil Malaysians, Tamil people native to Malaysia * Tamil language, nativ ...

poetic work of

didactic Didacticism is a philosophy that emphasizes instructional and informative qualities in literature, art, and design. In art, design, architecture, and landscape, didacticism is an emerging conceptual approach that is driven by the urgent need to ...

nature belonging to the

Eighteen Lesser Texts The Eighteen Lesser Texts, known as the Patiṉeṇkīḻkaṇakku ( ta, பதினெண்கீழ்கணக்கு) in the literature, is a collection of eighteen poetic works mostly created during the 'post Sangam period' (between 100 ...

(''Patiṉeṇkīḻkaṇakku'') anthology of

Tamil literature Tamil literature has a rich and long literary tradition spanning more than two thousand years. The oldest extant works show signs of maturity indicating an even longer period of evolution. Contributors to the Tamil literature are mainly from T ...

. This belongs to the 'post Sangam period corresponding to between 100 and 500 CE. ''Nanmanikkatigai'' contains one hundred songs written by the poet Vilambi Naganaar. This poetic work is famous for its clarity and easy readability and is often a prescribed text for schools in

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 ...

. The poems of ''Nanmanikkatigai'' are written in the

Venpa Venpa or Venba ('' வெண்பா'' in Tamil) is a form of classical Tamil poetry. Classical Tamil poetry has been classified based upon the rules of metric prosody. Such rules form a context-free grammar. Every venba consists of between two ...

meter. The poems of ''Nāṉmaṇikkaṭikai'' each contain four different ideas. The name ''Nāṉmaṇikkaṭikai'' denotes this fact comparing the four ideas to four well-chosen gems adorning each poem. The following poem describes four different groups of people who cannot sleep well at night, namely, a thief, a lovelorn person, someone who hankers after money and a person who wishes to guard his wealth: கள்வம்என் பார்க்குந் துயில் இல்லை, காதலிமாட்டு
உள்ளம்வைப்பார்க்கும் துயில் இல்லை, ஒண்பொருள்
செய்வம்என் பார்க்கும் துயில் இல்லை, அப்பொருள்
காப்பார்க்கும் இல்லை துயில்.

References

* Mudaliyar, Singaravelu A., Apithana Cintamani, An encyclopaedia of Tamil Literature, (1931) - Reprinted by Asian Educational Services, New Delhi (1983) * http://tamilnation.org/literature/ * http://tamilnation.org/literature/pathinen/pm0047.pdf ''Nanmanikkatigai'' eText at

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Sangam literature {{India-lit-stub