Ettaiyapuram

Ettayapuram is a panchayat town in Thoothukudi district of Tamil Nadu, India. It is the birthplace of Tamil poets Mahakavi Bharathiar and Umaru Pulavar. Muthuswami Dikshitar, one of the triad of Carnatic music was patronized in his final years by the ruler of Ettayapuram.HistoryEttayapuram was originally Ilasanadu, which was ruled by the Pandya Kings. After the Pandyas, Ettappan was appointed as Zamindar by Madurai Nayak dynasty under the supervision of Vijayanagara empire. After 150 years of rule by the descendants of Ettappan, Ilasanadu became Ettayapuram in 1565.Ettayapuram estateEttaiyapuram estate was a zamindari estate situated in the Ottapidaram taluk of the erstwhile Tinnevely district. The estate covered an area of 570sqmi and 374 villages and in 1901, had a population of 154,000. The headquarters of the estate was the town of Ettaiyapuram.The estate was ruled by the Telugu Nayak dynasty whose ancestors hailed from Chandragiri in present-day Andhra Pradesh. During an invasion of Alauddin Khilji, Kumaramuttu Nayak the founder of the dynasty migrated from Chandragiri to Tirunelveli where he was granted the region comprising the later-established Ettaiyapuram estate. The town of Ettaiyapuram was established in 1567.