This is an India special…
Sankar, a friend of mine has the initial “V” in his name, which signifies his ancestral village ‘Vorupattur’. Instinct and family memory indicated that the village was somewhere in the North Arcot district or thereabouts (North Arcot of fifty years ago was a larger district than what it is now)… And he has been searching for this place all his life. In that ‘search’, yours truly too joined ‘eyes’.
One idea that came to mind was that the place name was probably ‘Urupattur’ … Internet did provide scores of people searching for the same place… And no positive finds… One did find people having ‘Urupattur’ in their names, and prominently so among Sri Vaishnava-s. One found that the great sage Nathamuni of 9th century CE had a disciple Urupattur Achan Pillai.. Enquiry with Vaishnava friends drew a blank as to where that Urupattur was. Then through a good friend, one spread the ‘search net’ wider, and he managed to speak to a very learned Vaishnava scholar whose ancestors hailed from Urupattur. The scholar, a nonagenarian, said that he too had done extensive search and had not found the place. He said that perhaps the village may have been in Nellore area of Andhra and may not be extant now… One lead was that many people had migrated from Urupattur, and come to Pon Valainda Kallattur near Chengalpet. Another school of thought was that Urupattur was not a place name, but a title.. Somehow that didn’t sound right.. It did sound so much a place name… And if people still proudly carry it in their names, and have been doing so for generations, it must have been a prominent place… Some mentions could be found in the Net of the village probably being in Kanchipuram district, perhaps near Orikkai or Thandalam… But some people of that area from whom one enquired did not know of any village of that name…
Then someone came with a lead that the village was now known as Upputtur (or some name close to this) and was near Namakkal.. That was close… And Nathamuni hailed from a place near Kaatumannar Koil, which is not all that far away.. So maybe…
Further seeking, I came across a blog which mentioned of Urputtur which existed many centuries ago in Andhra, where Vaishnavas had migrated to. To quote – “According to Historian Prof B.S.L. Hanumantha Rao who wrote ‘ social mobility in medieval Andhra’ mention that a large number of villages had tamil migrated srivaishnavite families such as Satlur, Vangiparru, Karambichedu, Puthur, Urputtur, Viravalli, Kundur, etc. in Karma Raashtra (present Guntur-Vijayawada area) settled during 8th and 9th centuries spreading vedism and Azwaar based Vishnu’s paratatvam.” (Click here for the blog post) .. That was a lead… Sounded like the Urupattur one was searching for…
Searching current maps of the region one could locate Satlur, Viravalli etc in the Guntur-Vijaywada region.. Names had slightly changed… For eg Karambichedu was the present Karamchedu… But one could not find Urputtur…
Searching further, one came across a research document (Click here to read), which mentioned Urputuru. It gave details of two copper plates of 8th and 9th century where someone from Urputuru had been donated a village…
Perhaps the name had changed… Could it be Upputuru or Upputur now? One then searched for Upputturu, and Bingo, there it was… In Parchur mandal of Prakasham district, bordering Guntur. And adjacent to Karamchedu.
Click here for a link about Upputturu village…
To quote from the link above : “The old name of Upputur was lavanapuri Agraharam. Once upon a time Upputur was the chola Kings capital. It has larger area about 8 miles circle. this King built famous temple which are very historical named amareswara swamy temple which is constructed about 1500 years ago and chennakesava venkateswaraswamy temple about 1200 years ago.”…
Could this be the Urputturu/Uruputtur/Uruppattur/Vorupattur?
It is possible… Sankar sure is interested to explore…
Signing off on the note – Maybe.. Maybe… 🙂
athato 