<u>Bridal Archives Vol.6: Tamil Wedding Ceremony~ Tamil Pre-Wedding Rituals | Outfits Part 1</u>

Hey Everyone!

Today in ‘Bridal Archives’ feature I’m about to share the details about Tamil Wedding Ceremony, the kind of outfits, the accessories and rituals. As I’m a Tamilian girl I’m so much fond of silk saris and gold jewelry etc. And we have quite long list of rituals that we follow in Tamil wedding ceremony. There are number of customs that have been following in Tamil weddings according to the each caste and creed! I attended pretty count of weddings this year and I’m bit aware of the outfits & rituals etc. Here I give you composed posts of all outfit details along with type of rituals and I divided the wedding ceremony into 3 parts,

Tamil Pre-Wedding: Part-1
Tamil Wedding: Part-2

Tamil Pre-Wedding: Traditional Outfits and Customs Part-1

The pre-wedding rituals are done by Tamil speaking Brahmins. Everybody is set with a festive mood here and the ambience is completely filled with joy and silk saris. The engagement ceremony is done in the pre-wedding and it has consecutive rituals to follow with! Here the groom family is received by the bride family, they share their greetings for the upcoming wedding.

Tamil Pre-Wedding Customs:

Panda Kaal Muhurtham

This custom is done in order to seek the blessings and wishes from our ancestors. To me this is an interesting part of pre wedding rituals. The custom starts by adding the Navadhanyam (all 9 major Cereals) into the ground and they post a half trunk above the Navadhanyam and a pooja will be conducted by Brahmin Iyer. Here this is a sign to show that the wedding is on and all will pray that let the wedding proceed without any trouble. ! Is that interesting!

Receiving the Groom

The respected groom family will arrive to the wedding hall a day before the wedding and they are received by the bride family with fruits, flowers and beetle nuts. The bride’s sister or elderly women will take the aarti to groom and welcome him in to the avenue. In my brother’s wedding my sister-in-law cousins took aarti for mu brother! At the end a coconut is broken on the ground to ensure there is no evil eye upon the groom! It’s a custom we Indians follow in every state isn’t?

Vratham

In this part the fasting is taken by the bride and groom. They should be in fasting until the Muhurtham! Its bit difficult but it’s a part of wedding ceremony here.

Nicchiyadharatham

At this part the engagement ceremony takes place, by keeping the lord ganesha as the important god of ceremony, all the members from bride and groom family, friends and relatives pray for the wellness of the bride and groom. Here the bride will receive a new saree from the groom’s family known as Nicchiyadharatham Pattu Saree (silk saree). Before the brides receive the saree, the saree is blessed by the Iyer by keeping kumkum, chandan, and flowers and pieces of jewelry added to it! After that, the bride will be blessed by all the elderly people from bride’s and groom sides by keeping kumkum and chandan to bride’s forehead. This is done to ensure the bride received blessings from each and every one!

Reading of Lagna Pathirigai

Lagna Pathirigai (the hand written statement of wedding invitation), although the wedding invitations are given to everyone 6 months prior to wedding , the Iyer will read a hand written statement of invitation to all. It is composed with a holy prayer at the beginning followed by groom’s details and bride’s details. This is done to ensure that the marriage is approved by both groom and bride’s families.

Tamil Pre-Wedding Bridal Traditional Outfits:

For the wedding each bride is blessed with 7 to 5 silk saris. The outfits depend upon the number of rituals they follow! My family gave about 5 silk saris to my sister-in-law, it depends!

Initially bride is given a silk saree for the Panda Kaal Muhurtham custom. Except for the Muhurtham the rest saris can in any colors. Here in south usually the girls end with up sky blue, orange, purple teal, pink and maroon. These colors are so feminine and liked by all girls.

For the Vratham, the bride will wear simple silk saree.

For the Nicchiyadharatham part, the bride will wear gorgeous silk saree with golden and yellow prints. After she receives the Nicchiyadharatham pattu saree (silk saree) from the groom family, she will wear that silk saree for rest of the ceremony!