Pancha Marapu

"Pancha Marapu" (Tamil: பஞ்சமரபு "pañcamarapu") is a 10th century Tamil treatise on musical theory, written by Aṟivaṉār. The work is one of the "isaittamiḻ" texts referred to in Atiyarkkunallar's commentary on the Silappadhikaram. Although it was long believed to be lost, a manuscript was discovered in the latter half of the twentieth century, and partially published in 1973. [cite book | last=Zvelebil | first=Kamil | authorlink=Kamil Zvelebil | title=Companion Studies to the History of Tamil Literature | publisher=Brill | year=1992 | location=Leiden | pages=83 | isbn=9004093656] A revised edition has since been published. [cite book | last=Sundaram | first=V.P.K. | title=Pancha Marapu | publisher=The South India Saiva Siddhantha Works Publishing Society | year=1991 | edition=2nd]

The text deals with the music, musical instruments and percussion instruments ("muḻavu") [cite book | last=Kuppuswami | first=T. V. | coauthors=T. K. Venkata Subramanian | title=Rhythm in historical cognition | publisher=Kalinga Publications | year=1993 | location=Delhi | pages=9-11 | isbn=8185163340] of that period, and ennumerates nine divisions of Tamil music, namely, "cindu", "cavalai", "tiripatai", "camapātaviruttam", "centuṟai", "veṇṭuṟai", "peruntēvappāṇi", "ciruntēvappāṇi", and "vaṇṇam". [cite book | last=Ramanathan | first=S. | title=Music in Cilappatikaaram | publisher=Madurai-Kamaraj University | year=1979 | location=Madurai | pages=57]

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