Nān̲maṇikkaṭikai: text, transliteration and translations in English verse and prose

The Nāṉmaṇikkaṭikai (The Four-Gemmed Ornament) is a post- caṅkam Classical Tamil literary work in verse form. It is one of the eighteen minor or lesser classics along with Tirukkuṟaḷ, Nālaṭiyār, Tirikaṭukam, etc. It is next only to the immortal Kuṟaḷ in literary merit and in the choice use of words, clarity of expression, verbal compression, pithy statements, etc., made use of everywhere in this work. There are one hundred and six quatrains in this work. In certain editions of the work, one finds only 104 quatrains as the invocation quatrains are left out. M. S. Purnalingam Pillai (1929) says that the work contains 101 quatrains while M. Arunachalam (1974: p.175) observes that there are 103 verses in the work. As each quatrain or veṇpā of this work deals with four important concepts, it is named ‘the Four Gem Pieces’. Every quatrain of this work is like an ornament made of four stones or pearls or diamond pieces in the form of four moral or ethical observations. The four moral observations or ethical adages are not isolated statements or ideas as they are presented in such a way that they are interconnected and an idea or a concept is made to emerge from what has been said already or it has a bearing on what is to follow in a quatrain. There are sufficient pieces of evidence presented at several places in the work for the writer’s love for nature and his keen observation of natural phenomena.