The Life
Punithavathi, born to a merchant family at Karaikkal, was from childhood a devoted worshipper of Shiva. Married to the merchant Paramadattan, she once, by the Lord's grace, produced a mango miraculously for a guest; when her husband, awestruck, came to regard her as a goddess and withdrew from her, she was freed of worldly life. She then prayed that Shiva remove her beauty and grant her a ghoulish (pey) form, so she might sing His praises forever. Shiva granted it, and as a skeletal being she journeyed to Mount Kailash, walking on her head in reverence, and to Tiruvalangadu, where she beheld and sang His cosmic dance. She composed some of the earliest Tamil devotional hymns. One of three women among the Nayanmars, she attained His feet. Her guru puja is in Panguni under Swati.