Karuppasamy Mantra

What the Karuppasamy Mantra is

The Karuppasamy mantra, also called the Karuppannasamy moola mantra, is the short Sanskrit formula used in the worship of Karuppasamy, the dark guardian god (kaval deivam) of Tamil villages, whom many clans also keep as their kula deivam, the family deity. It has no known author: it circulates anonymously, printed in Tamil script with Grantha letters. The text comes in two parts. A two-line dhyana shloka first pictures the god: two-armed, stout and dark, with tawny beard and hair, holding a mace and a sword, and addressed as Mahakala. The moola mantra then opens with Om and the seed syllable krum and names him through twelve epithets, each offered to him: dark-limbed, a hero of great valour, mace-bearer, smoky-eyed, fearsome with tusks, garlanded, clad in dark blue, remover of all sins and of all fears, son of Shiva, wrathful, and a store of compassion. It closes with svaha, the word that marks an offering.

Guardian of the eighteen steps

Karuppasamy has no single scripture of his own; his history is kept in temple legend and village song. The best-known account belongs to the Azhagar temple at Thirumalirumcholai near Madurai. According to temple tradition, a Chera king who coveted the image of Lord Azhagar sent eighteen men skilled in mantra and tantra to carry it away. They were caught and buried, one beneath each of the eighteen steps at the entrance. The guardian spirit who had come with them was so taken with the Lord's beauty that it offered to watch over the gate in return for the temple's night offering, and it has stood there since as Pathinettampadi Karuppannasamy. Local custom holds that an oath sworn before those steps is not broken lightly, and village disputes have long been settled there. A second tradition, from Maranadu in Sivaganga district, tells of a god whose power was sealed in a wooden box after a priest's curse; rains sent by Bhadrakali carried the box down the Vaigai until a village woman, Karuppayi, drew it out in trance. Other tellings make him the companion Shiva sent to Ayyappa, which is why a Karuppasamy shrine stands beside the eighteen steps at Sabarimala, where pilgrims make an offering before they climb.

The opening lines, in Tamil and English

Karuppasamy Mantra lyrics in full

A two-line dhyana shloka addressing the god as Mahakala, followed by the twelve-line moola mantra.

All 14 lines, in Tamil and English, each with its meaning. Choose a script:

The syllable people get wrong

In தம்ஷ்ட்ரா (daṃṣṭrā, tusk) the Tamil letter த stands for a voiced d, so the word is said daṃ-ṣṭrā, not 'tamshtra'; the ṣṭr cluster is retroflex, with the tongue curled back, and it runs straight on into karāḷāya, fearsome with tusks.

When the Karuppasamy Mantra is chanted

Festival. Masi Kalari festival at Maranadu

Questions