I have a small doubt as to how the panniru thirumurais were discovered by nambiandar nambi from the chidambaram temple. Moreover, after discovering them, how did the olai chuvadis get passed on to the future generations, i.e whether the original palmleaves were retained , or were they copied onto new palm leaves by some person. What was the year and period in which people were first aware of these gems in tamil literature.Any inscriptional evidence of the way they were discovered?
I also welcome the idea of a group trip to chidambaram,GKC and darasuram. This will help the new members get acquainted with the scholars in our group, and get enlightened.
check for RRC titled tirumurai kanda cholan, umapathi sivans tirumurai kanda puranam
legend is that, they were kept locked in a secret room in chidambaram - kept there for safe keeping by the appar, sambantar and manikkavasar ( am i correct). the chidambaram priests were given the responsibility to guard them. gradually over centuries they were almost lost with only a few fragments still remaining mainly due to the oral tradition. RRC wants to compile all of them and seeks the help of nambi andar nambi to retrive and compile...nambi seeks help from vinayagar ( after all even as a child he had made vinayagar appear in front of him and partake in his offerring) - vinayagar guides him to the location of the safe place inside the chidambaram temple. RRC tries in vain to retrieve the tirumurai from chidambaram, as the priests desisted his efforts saying that the three saints alone could come and get them back. ...rrc pulls a fast one on them, by organising a festival and making idols of the three saints and making them come infront of the priests and to open, the priest were in a catch 22 situ since they could not refuse by saying they were just idols and hence opened the door....but sadly a lot of the works were lost due to white ants - so much that rrc and nambi burst into tears on seeing the destruction - but rrc is supposed to hv heard a divine voice which told him whatever was left was enough for him to purport shivism.....RRC gathered what was av and had nambi compile them......and then organised them to be sung in temples via the oduvars.....this is what i heared....but again nothing about the cholas goes without arguements and counters...