ABSTRACT
Kottayam Tampuran is to kathakali what Zeami was to the Japanese noh theater-that multi-talented creative genius who as playwright, actor, and patron shaped the basic form and structure of the dance-drama. Although the seminal figure in the early history of kathakali, we know very little about this royal ruler. Whether legend or fact, what we do know has been summarized in Aymanam Krishnakaimal’s brief notes on the author (1986:349-62). As a young boy, growing up in the royal family at Kottayam, Kottayam Tampuran was considered a slow learner. On a visit to the ruler (Zamorin) of the nearby kingdom of Kozhikode in Northern Kerala he made a grammatical mistake when asking, ‘What may I do for you?’ Because of this embarrassment to his family, he was sent to undergo a test at a nearby waterfall where he was made to stand under the waterfall for a full day to see if he would survive. The premise of the test was that if he survived he would become great in some way; and if not, he would die from the test.
