Mandyam Tamil

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Mandyam or Mandyam Tamil is a dialect of the Tamil language spoken in Karnataka, India. There is a city and district in Karnataka called Mandya.

Some Iyengars followed Ramanuja from Tamil Nadu and lower Andhra Pradesh (near the Tirupati region, which had a very large Tamil-speaking population) to regions near Mandya and settled there. One hypothesis is that these Iyengars are called Mandyam Iyengars because of Mandya, but Mandyam Iyengars also claim there was a village near Tirupati which sounded similar to "Mandyam" where the people originally came from. The Mandyam Iyengars have always been one of the smallest Brahmin social groups, and recently their local population is dwindling due to increasing amounts of inter-cultural marriages and emigration.

[edit] External links

• Information on the origins of the Mandyam people