Glossary

Tulu and other Indian-language words used on this site, explained in plain English.

Aati: The monsoon month, a pause in festivals. About mid-July to mid-August. Weddings, housewarmings and temple festivals are traditionally held back.
Also spelled: Aadi
Aati Amavasya: The new-moon day of the month of Aati. The day families drink paleda kashaya, a bitter bark decoction, to guard their health through the monsoon.
Also spelled: Aati Amavase, Ashada Amavase, Bhimana Amavasya
Aati Kalenja: A masked performer who visits homes during Aati. Dressed in a skirt of coconut fronds, the Kalenja sprinkles water with charcoal, turmeric and tamarind to drive away misfortune. Played by members of the Nalike community.
Also spelled: Kalenja
adisthala: An original seat of worship of a daiva. The first, primordial place where a daiva is worshipped. Koragajja has seven at and around Kuthar, near Mangaluru.
Also spelled: aadisthala
agelu: A food offering made to a daiva. An offering of food set out for a daiva. At the Kallurti shrine at Panolibail it is a hen, parboiled rice, tender banana leaves, coconuts and red kepula flowers.
Also spelled: agel, agelu seve
ajalu: A humiliating practice once used against the Koraga community. Treating Koraga people as less than human, for example by giving them food mixed with hair and nails. Karnataka banned it by law in 2000.
alade: A shrine of Siri and her family. Siri, her son Kumara and the women of her line are worshipped at shrines called Adi Alade. The best known are at Hiriadka, Pangala, Nandalike, Kavathar and Nidgal. The word is also used for the oldest clan shrines, set beside water, where Bermer is worshipped with Lekkesiri, Maisandaya, Nandigona and Naga.
Also spelled: alade / aalade
aliyasantana: Inheritance through the mother's line. The Tulu system in which property and leadership pass from a man to his sister's son, his nephew, rather than to his own son. It was the custom of Bunt and several other Tulu communities.
Amman: A form of the Goddess worshipped in the Tamil south. Amman is a regional name for the Goddess in the Tamil-speaking south, best known in the form of Mariamman.
Also spelled: Mariamman
ani: The tall, decorated frame worn on the performer's back. A large halo-like structure that forms part of the kola costume for many daivas.
annadana: The gift of food: a free meal served to all at a temple. Feeding people as a religious gift. Dharmasthala is famous for serving a free meal to every pilgrim, whatever their caste or faith.
Also spelled: anna dana, annaprasadam
Ashlesha Bali: A food offering to the serpent deities on the day of the Ashlesha star. It combines worship, a fire offering and food offered to the serpents, and is famously performed at Kukke Subramanya.
Also spelled: Ashlesha bali
ayano: A regional name for a daiva ceremony. One of several local names for the kola; usage varies by area.
Also spelled: ayana
badikara: A pot of auspicious things carried as an offering. An earthen pot holding auspicious things, carried in temple processions and offered to daivas. Maisandaya is said to love the badikara offering, a pot holding a measure of rice.
bari: A clan, in many Tulu communities passed down the mother's line. People of the same bari traditionally do not marry each other. Each bari has its own ancestral serpent shrine, its moolasthana.
Also spelled: bali
basadi: A Jain temple. The usual name in Karnataka for a Jain temple. Moodabidri has eighteen of them, and Dharmasthala has one to Chandranatha.
Also spelled: basti, bastti
bhagawatha: The lead singer of a Yakshagana performance, who also directs it. He narrates the story in song, and leads the himmela.
bhandara: The daiva's sacred objects: swords, shields and ornaments. Kept in the spirit's shrine room and carried in procession to the ritual ground at the start of a kola.
Also spelled: bhandaara / bhandaro
bhandi: A regional name for a daiva ceremony. One of several local names for the kola; usage varies by area.
Bhattaraka: The monk who heads a Digambara Jain math. The head of a Digambara Jain institution, who looks after its temples, library and lands. The Bhattarakas of Moodabidri and Shravanabelagola all take the name Charukeerti.
Also spelled: bhattarak, bhattarakha
bhuta: A guardian spirit of a place, family or community; also called a daiva. Bhutas are spirits tied to a particular village, family house, field or forest. They protect those who keep the moral order and turn fierce when it is broken. There is no exact English equivalent; 'spirit' and 'deity' each miss part of the meaning.
Also spelled: bhoota / buta / bootha
bhuta kola: The night-long ceremony in which a guardian spirit takes over a performer to dance, bless and judge. The best-known form of daiva worship in Tulunadu. A trained performer from a hereditary family is possessed by the spirit, which then speaks with the village, gives blessings and settles disputes.
Also spelled: buta kola / bhootha kola / daivaradhane
bhutasthana: The shrine or shrine room of a daiva. Where the daiva's sacred objects are kept between ceremonies.
Also spelled: bhootasthana / daivasthana
Bisu kani: The display of rice, fruit, vegetables, flowers and gold laid out on the morning of Bisu Parba. Meant to be the first thing the family sees in the new year. Everyone prays before it and the elders give their blessing.
Also spelled: kani, suthye dipuna
Bisu Parba: The Tulu New Year. Kept on the first day of Paggu, 14 or 15 April. A Bisu kani is laid out in the morning, the elders give their blessing, and the first sowing of the year is done that evening.
Also spelled: Bisu, Bisu Parbha
bodhisattva: In Buddhism, an enlightened being who stays in the world to help others. A being who has reached enlightenment but chooses to remain in the world to help others towards it. Avalokiteshvara (Lokeshwara), the bodhisattva of compassion, and Manjushri, the bodhisattva of wisdom, were both worshipped at Kadri.
bonte: A hunt. At Keddaso the village headman and the villagers went hunting. It checked animals that harm the crops and was a break from farming.
chande: A loud drum used in Yakshagana. With the maddale, the main rhythm of the musicians' group.
chenne mane: A Tulu board game of seeds and hollows, a kind of mancala. Two players move seeds around the hollows of a long wooden board. In the Siri epic, the twins Abbaga and Daraga quarrel over a game of chenne mane.
Also spelled: chennemane
chitteri: A small shrine building, some of them for Bermer. Some writers compare its form to the Buddhist chaitya, a shrine hall. Place names such as Chitrapu and Chitrapura are said to recall them.
Also spelled: chitrakoota
daiva: A guardian spirit; used interchangeably with bhuta. Daiva is used interchangeably with bhuta for the guardian spirits of Tulunadu, and the worship itself is often called daivaradhane.
daivasthana: The shrine of a daiva. A place where a daiva is worshipped. On Pattanaje, offerings are made there and the doors are closed afterward.
Also spelled: daivasana, daivasanas
dakke: A small hourglass-shaped drum played in serpent rituals. Its beat accompanies the dancing in the Nagamandala and Dakke Bali.
Dakke Bali: A form of serpent worship, close to the Nagamandala, kept especially in Udupi district. Named after the dakke drum, which Vaidya families play as an inherited skill. At Padubidri it is held every other year, by oil lamp only.
Also spelled: dakkebali
darshana: A visit to the daivas, where a family can bring its troubles. In the account behind the Kallurti and Panjurli page, a family's problem is brought to the daivas at a darshana or at a kola.
Dharmadhikari: The hereditary head of Dharmasthala, the Heggade. The title of the head of the Pergade family, who runs the temple at Dharmasthala. The eldest man of the family holds it and is also called the Heggade.
Also spelled: Dharma Adhikari
dolmen: A burial chamber made of upright stones with a flat stone on top. A dolmen is a stone box or chamber for burial, made of standing stones capped by a large flat slab.
Also spelled: dolmens
Dvaita: Madhvacharya's school of philosophy, which holds that the soul and God are forever distinct. The "dualist" school of Vedanta founded by Madhvacharya at Udupi in the 13th century. It teaches that the soul always depends on God and is never one with him, against Advaita, which holds that they are ultimately the same.
Also spelled: Tattvavada, Madhva philosophy
garadi: A shrine to the twin heroes Koti and Chennaya; the word also means a gymnasium. Garadis stand all over Tulunadu. The name recalls the gymnasium where the twins trained in body-building, archery and swordplay. In many garadis the chief deity is Bermer, shown riding a horse between the twins.
Also spelled: garodi
Gejje Bicchapuna: Putting away the ankle bells at the end of the Yakshagana season. Kept on Pattanaje, when Yakshagana troupes take off their costumes and store them until the next season.
gopichandana: The pale sacred clay of Dwaraka. A pale clay from Dwaraka, used by Vaishnavas to mark the forehead. Legend says the Udupi image of Krishna reached the coast hidden inside a lump of it.
Also spelled: gopi chandana
Grantha: An old South Indian script used to write Sanskrit. The script from which Tigalari and Malayalam both grew.
gunda: A small shrine of Bermer standing on its own. A roughly round enclosure that held an image of Bermer. Many fell into ruin; a few were taken into later temples, as at Kateel.
Also spelled: Bermere gunda
guttu: The ancestral headquarters house of a landed family. The guttu is the head house of a landholding lineage, especially among Bunt families. Its daivas, lands and rights pass down the family, and many kolas are held on its behalf.
harake: A vow made to a daiva or god. A promise to make an offering or perform a service if a prayer is answered. Forgetting a harake is believed to bring the daiva's anger.
himmela: The musicians in a Yakshagana performance. The group of musicians, led by the bhagavata, who sing and play the drums behind the actors.
hoyulu: A dispute brought to the Heggade of Dharmasthala to settle. A civil complaint, from people of any faith, brought before the Heggade at Dharmasthala. Both sides are called to the temple and his ruling is accepted as final.
jangala: The forest; the wild world beyond the fields. One of three worlds in Tuluva belief as described by Peter Claus: the cultivated village, the forest, and maya, the world of spirits.
Also spelled: jāṅgala
jatre: A yearly temple festival or fair. The Siri Jatre is the yearly festival of Siri, held on a full moon day between February and May, when women gather to sing her story and many are possessed.
Also spelled: jathre / jatra
jatti: The long white cloth tied round a tiger dancer's waist. It gives balance and support in long performances, and keeps the costume in place during stunts.
joga: The world that can be seen: the world of the living. The opposite of maya, the unseen world of the spirits. In the Kalkuda paddana, the brother and sister pass from joga into maya and become daivas.
Also spelled: jogo
kalasha: The sacred pot-shaped finial on a shrine's roof. A pot-shaped crown, often of metal, set on the roof of a temple or shrine.
Also spelled: kalasa
kambala: A buffalo race run through a flooded paddy field. Pairs of buffaloes race along a muddy, water-filled track, with a runner behind them. The season runs from about November to March, and each event is run by a local Kambala samithi.
Also spelled: kambla
Kambala samithi: The local committee that organises a Kambala. Each event is run by a samithi, which arranges races in several categories.
Also spelled: Kambala association
kandel addye: A rice pudding cooked in a pot that is then broken. Offered by Koraga performers in the night-before ceremony of a Kambala, with toddy.
Also spelled: pot pudding
kane palayi: The Kambala category in which the runner stands on a round block of wood. The spray thrown up through holes in the block is used to judge the winner. It is for the most senior pairs.
kangilu: A full-moon folk dance in which Koragajja appears. A dance of the Udupi and Dakshina Kannada coast held on the full moon of the Tulu month of Mai, around March, to keep away disease and evil spirits.
Also spelled: kangeelu
katte: A raised platform shrine. A simple open-air shrine built as a raised platform. Guliga is often worshipped at one, as at the Guligana Katte at Deralakatte, near Mangaluru.
Keddaso: A three-day rest for the land, around February. Described as the earth's menstruation. For three days the earth is treated as a menstruating woman is in a Tulu household: rest, a break from normal work, and a closing purification.
kepula: A red wild flower used to decorate offerings and torches. The flowers of the hills, used to decorate the thudar.
Also spelled: Ixora
kiruvala: Royal ornaments of the king daivas, kept at their shrine. The ornaments worn by the performer of a royal daiva such as Ullalthi or the Ullakulu. They stand for the old kingship and are kept in the daiva's madu between festivals.
Also spelled: kiruvāla, kirvāl
kola: The ceremony in which a daiva is invited to possess a performer. Short for bhuta kola. Regional and scale-dependent names include nema, bhandi and ayano.
Also spelled: kōla
koltiri: A torch of belakki wood used in the old Bali ritual. About six feet tall, two of them stood on either side of the planted tree.
Kori Katta: The Tulu name for cockfighting. Two roosters fight in a ring, called the katta, until one is dead or badly hurt. It is illegal in India.
Also spelled: Koli Anka
kshetra: A holy place or pilgrim centre, usually a temple and the town around it. A sacred site and the settlement that grows up around it. Dharmasthala calls itself Shri Kshetra Dharmasthala.
Also spelled: kshethra, Shri Kshetra
Kshetrapala: The guardian of a sacred place. A guardian deity who protects a temple or sacred precinct. Guliga got this name when the seven water goddesses made him the guardian of their temples.
Also spelled: kshetrapalaka
kudu ari: Roasted grains shared during Keddaso. A spiced mix of horse gram, other pulses, dried coconut and rice, roasted and handed out to everyone. It gives winter's protein and oil.
kukutta panchanga: An almanac that says which colour of rooster suits which day. Reportedly followed by people who bet on cockfights.
Kural Parba: The festival of the first ears of new paddy. Kept on the first day of Nirnal, usually the day after Cauvery Sankramana. The head of the family cuts the first ears, an odd number of them, and they are carried home to the chant "Poliyo Poli".
Also spelled: Koral Parba, Thene Habba, Thene Parba, Puddar
linga: The rounded stone form in which Shiva is worshipped. The most common form in which Shiva is worshipped: a smooth, rounded stone, usually set in a base. The Tulu legend of Dharmasthala says its linga was brought from Kadri by the daiva Annappa.
Also spelled: lingam
maateregla: "To everyone", as in the greeting "Maateregla solmelu". "Maateregla solmelu" means "greetings to everyone". It is how a speaker greets a whole gathering, and you'll hear it at the start of speeches, plays and family events.
madarangi: The decoration of a bride's and groom's hands and feet with colour, the day before a wedding. A pre-wedding ritual performed for both the bride and the bridegroom. Portions of the Koti-Chennaya epic about the twins' childhood are sung during it.
maddale: A hand drum used in Yakshagana. With the chande, the main rhythm of the musicians' group.
madu: A shrine house of a royal daiva. The sacred house where a daiva such as Ullalthi or the Ullakulu is enshrined and its ornaments are kept. A madu is held to be very pure, and some may not be entered by women.
Also spelled: mādu, māda
manastambha: A tall stone pillar in front of a Jain temple. A free-standing pillar, often a single stone, set up in front of a basadi. At Moodabidri they usually carry a small figure of the guardian Brahmadeva at the top.
Also spelled: manasthambha, manasthamba
matha: A Hindu monastery, headed by a swami. A monastery and seat of learning, led by a line of swamis. At Udupi, eight mathas founded by Madhvacharya take turns to run the Krishna temple.
Also spelled: math, mutt, matt
maya: The unseen world where the spirits live. The third of the three worlds in Tuluva belief. A kola brings this world into the village for one night.
Also spelled: māya
megalith: A large stone set up by people long ago, usually for burial or ritual. Megalith means 'large stone'. In India, megalithic usually describes the burial monuments of the early Iron Age, such as stone circles, stone boxes and rock-cut chambers.
Also spelled: megalithic
meke-kamba: A pillar to which a three-pronged torch is tied. Used by many farming families around Kundapura to invite Bali.
moolasthana: The ancestral shrine of a clan, its "original seat". Each bari traces itself to a moolasthana, often an old serpent shrine. Families return there to worship, especially at Nagara Panchami.
Also spelled: mooltana / mūlasthāna
muga: The face or mask of a daiva. The metal mask, usually of bronze, silver or gold, that gives a daiva its face at a shrine or a kola. Its shape differs from place to place.
mummela: The dancers and actors in a Yakshagana performance. The group that dances and acts out the story as the bhagavata sings it.
naga: The serpent deity, usually pictured as a cobra. Worshipped across Tulunadu at family serpent groves (nagabana) and temples. In bhuta kola belief, Naga is also one of the spirit counterparts of the forest's dangerous animals.
Also spelled: nāga / naaga
naga kannika: The female serpent, danced by a performer in the Nagamandala. The performer, often a man in a woman's dress, sways around the serpent drawing to the dakke drum.
Also spelled: nagakannika / naga kannike
nagabana: A sacred grove where the serpent deity dwells. A patch of trees, often at the edge of a family's land, with carved stone cobras in a clearing. Its trees may not be cut, which has made many nagabanas small refuges of old forest.
Also spelled: naga bana / nagavana / devarakadu
Nagamandala: An all-night ritual in which the union of the serpents is danced out. A huge serpent design is drawn on the ground in five natural colours. A priest in trance (the patri) becomes the male serpent, and a dancer as the naga kannika (female serpent) circles the drawing to the dakke drum until dawn.
Also spelled: naga mandala
Nagara Panchami: The day for worshipping the naga. Falls in Shravana. Families return to their serpent groves to offer milk, flowers and turmeric.
nagaradhane: Worship of the naga, the serpent deity. The whole tradition of serpent worship in Tulunadu, from a family's yearly offering at its grove to the grand all-night Nagamandala.
Also spelled: naga aradhane / nāgārādhane
Nalike: A community of hereditary performers. Its members traditionally perform Bhuta Kola, take the part of the Aati Kalenja, and recite the paddana that calls people to the Keddasa hunt.
Nath: An order of yogis who trace their line to Matsyendranath and Gorakhnath. An order of wandering yogis whose practice drew on both tantric Buddhism and the worship of Shiva. Kadri, with its Jogi Math, was one of their main centres in South India.
Also spelled: Natha, Nath Panth, Natha Sampradaya
nema: Another name for a kola, the annual ceremony for a daiva. Used for the annual possession ceremony for a daiva, especially at family and village shrines.
Also spelled: nēma
nemotsava: A festival in which a deity or daiva is carried out in procession. One of the festival-season events expected to end by Pattanaje.
Also spelled: Nemotsava
nudi: The part of the kola when the daiva speaks with the village. After the possession dance, the daiva gives blessings, advice, warnings and judgments.
paddana: A long oral ballad, sung to tell the story of a daiva or hero. Paddanas carry the life stories of the daivas and of heroes such as Koti and Chennaya. They are sung during kolas and during paddy planting.
Also spelled: pāḍdana / sandhi
Paggu: The first month of the Tulu year. Runs from about mid-April to mid-May. The Tulu year begins here, not in Chaitra as in most Indian calendars.
paleda kashaya: A bitter drink of tree bark taken on Aati Amavasya. Made from the bark of the paale tree (Alstonia scholaris), and believed to be good for the stomach and gut.
Also spelled: paale ketteda kashaya
panchaloha: An alloy of five metals used for sacred images. "Five metals": a traditional alloy for casting images of gods. Kadri's Lokeshwara bronze is cast in panchaloha.
Also spelled: panchalauha
Paryaya: The handover of the Udupi Krishna temple from one matha to the next, every two years. The rotation by which the eight mathas of Udupi take turns to run the Krishna temple, two years each, and the festival held at each handover in January of every even-numbered year.
patri: A medium who holds the daiva's sword and bell and speaks as the spirit. The patri speaks only in the first person, as the daiva itself. In the traditions Peter Claus studied, patris were often Billava men. In serpent rituals such as the Nagamandala, the patri who becomes the male serpent is usually a Brahmin priest.
Also spelled: pātri
Pattanaje: The day the festival season closes. The tenth day of Beshya, about 24 to 25 May. Chariot festivals, Kambala and Yakshagana are all expected to be over for the year.
pili vesha: The tiger dance of the Dasara season. A folk dance of coastal Karnataka in which painted dancers imitate tigers to the beat of drums. Pili is the Tulu word for tiger.
Also spelled: Pili vesha, Huli vesha
pingara: The flowers of the areca palm. Siri is born from a blessed offering of areca flowers, and women hold pingara flowers as they sing her story at her festivals. Areca flowers are also offered to the naga, and their scent helps bring the patri into trance in serpent rituals.
pournami: The full-moon day. Kangilu is danced on the pournami of the Tulu month Maayi, around March.
Also spelled: poornima
prasanga: The sung poems on which a Yakshagana play is built. A set of poems composed in Kannada metres, with ragas and talas, that together form a musical drama.
prashna: A ritual divination, often by an astrologer, to learn what a daiva or deity wants. Held when something seems wrong (illness, strange signs, a forgotten shrine). The reading can call for a shrine to be repaired or a daiva's worship to be restarted.
Also spelled: prasna
Proto-Dravidian: The reconstructed ancestor of all the Dravidian languages, never written down. Proto-Dravidian is the common ancestor of Tulu, Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam, Telugu and their relatives. No text survives; linguists rebuild it by comparing the languages that came from it.
Also spelled: Proto-South Dravidian
Pursere Kattuna: A night-long ritual dance held at the full moon of Suggi. Troupes visit homes in Belthangady taluk, blessing them with healing, prosperity and protection through acting, singing, dancing and farce.
Also spelled: Pursa Kattuna
Purusha vesha: A comic folk theatre in which the Koti-Chennaya story is acted for laughs. The performers do not take the story seriously as ritual. Its message, as one folklorist puts it, is relaxation and not ritual effect.
Also spelled: Purusha dance
rajan daiva: A daiva of high, royal standing, the chief daiva of a place. Some daivas are honoured as rajan daivas, from rajan, a king. Where a daiva is the rajan daiva, it is worshipped as the principal daiva of that village or area.
rudraksha: The dried seeds strung into prayer beads sacred to Shiva. The hard, wrinkled seeds of the rudraksha tree, strung into rosaries and worn by devotees of Shiva. A rosary of rudraksha beads on Kadri's Lokeshwara bronze has been read as a sign of Shiva.
Also spelled: rudrakshi
sarnadde: A dish made on the last day of Keddaso. A food particular to Tulunadu, offered on a banana leaf at the Tulasi shrine after the earth's ritual bath.
Also spelled: Sarneda adde
Sarpa Samskara: A two-day rite to lift what devotees believe is a curse from the serpents. Performed at Kukke Subramanya, the temple most closely tied to serpent worship, for people who believe they suffer from sarpa dosha, misfortune linked to the serpents.
Shakti: The female power behind the universe, worshipped as the Goddess. Shakti means power or energy. In Hindu tradition she is the Goddess, known as Durga, Parvati, Kali or Devi, and her worship is called Shaktism.
Also spelled: Shaktism
Siddavesa: A similar night dance of the Sullia region. Its main figures are the Sanyasi, the Bhatru and Dasayya. The performers call out Dimbisale as they walk from house to house.
Also spelled: Siddavesha
Singode: The day after every Sankranti, considered auspicious. On Singode, Tuluvas do not give away anything that stands for wealth and well-being.
sirimudi: A great ornament tied to a daiva performer's shoulders and back. Worn by a daiva dressed as a king, such as the Ullakulu at Mandekolu.
solmelu: The everyday Tulu greeting, a respectful "hello". Said on meeting someone, often with palms pressed together. "Maateregla solmelu" greets everyone in a room. Pronounced sol-meh-loo.
Also spelled: solme
sthala purana: A temple's own legend of how it began. The traditional story a temple tells about its founding: which god appeared there, and who first worshipped at the spot. Many temples on the coast give Parashurama a part in theirs.
Also spelled: sthalapurana, sthala-purana
Suggi: The last month of the Tulu year. About March to April, the twelfth month. The full moon of Suggi is the time of the night dance Pursere Kattuna, and Bisu Parba follows the month.
sute: A torch made of dried palm leaves. A bundle of dried palm leaves set alight, used to show light to a daiva's offering and carried by the performer at some kolas, such as Guliga's.
Also spelled: tutte, sutte
tambila: A night ceremony for a daiva. The common name for ceremonies held for a daiva at night. Mogaveera families hold a tambila for their house daivas every year.
Also spelled: thambila
tembere: A drum of Tulunadu. Played for the Aati Kalenja as he dances from house to house.
thaase: The drum that sets the pace for the tiger dancers. A powerful drum, played with others such as the chende and maddale, that accompanies pili vesha.
Also spelled: tase, tasa
thene: An ear of new paddy, or the festival named after it. Tulu for the first ears of the new crop that are cut for Kural Parba. The festival is also called Thene Habba.
Also spelled: koral, kural
thudar: The torch lit in the paddy field to call King Bali. A tall tree stem set up at the corner of the field, decorated with kepula flowers and lit at dusk on Bali Padyami.
Also spelled: tudar
Tigalari: The old script used to write Sanskrit, Tulu and Kannada on the coast. A southern Indian script that grew out of Grantha and is a sister of the Malayalam script. Brahmin scribes used it mostly for Vedic and religious texts in Sanskrit, and for some Tulu.
Also spelled: Tulu Lipi, Tulu Grantha
tirthankara: One of the 24 great teachers of Jainism. Jains believe that 24 tirthankaras, "ford-makers", showed the way across the river of rebirth. Their images are worshipped in basadis. Parshvanatha was the 23rd and Mahavira the 24th.
Also spelled: tirthankar, thirthankara
Tudar Parba: The night farmers call King Bali home. Kept on the day after Deepavali, in Bonthyolu. Families light a torch in the paddy field and call King Bali home.
Also spelled: Bali Padyami
vihara: A Buddhist monastery. A Buddhist monastery, where monks lived, studied and meditated. Kadri was once Kadarika Vihara.
yaksha: A guardian spirit. In Jain temples, a yaksha is an attendant and guardian of a Tirthankara. In Tulunadu's basadis, Bermer was given this place as the Yaksha-Brahma at the entrance.
Also spelled: yakṣa
yejaman: The landlord or head of a household who hosts and leads. In the world of the kola, the yejaman looks after the cultivated land and hosts the ceremony; the daiva publicly reconfirms his right to lead.
Also spelled: yajamana / ejaman
yenne boolya: The formal invitation to the performer, with a purifying oil bath. An early step in the kola, before the spirit's story is sung and the performer is dressed.