Dinesh Kumar has been shaping clay since he was young. His hands know the work well. He places the wet clay on the wheel and turns it slowly. It rises into shape with the help of his hands. He keeps it aside to dry. Later, it will be placed in the kiln, where fire gives it strength. After that comes painting. He draws simple floral patterns by hand, learning new ideas from videos he watches online.
When the pot is ready for sale at his shop, Natarajan Manpaanai Koodam at Palavanthangal, it carries the effort of many hands. At the small shop, pots are neatly arranged according to size, prices starting at `80 and going up to `690. Pongal is here, but the crowds have not yet come. Dinesh waits quietly. His father works behind the scenes. Before him, his grandparents ran the same business. This was how the family earned its living. “Earlier we used to sell around 180 pots in a big vehicle load,” Dinesh says. “Now we sell in smaller vehicle loads. That shows the difference.”
In another part of the city, a large shop sells steel and aluminium vessels. Customers arrive one after another. Salespeople move swiftly, answering questions, packing boxes, and printing bills. The manager gives a nod before returning to his work, as there is no time for conversation. The vessels sell easily, and no one stops to think about where they come from.
Archaeology remembers
What sells quickly now took centuries to arrive, replacing a material that once formed the earliest record of settled life. Sujatha Shankar, architect and convenor of INTACH Chennai Chapter, speaks of clay as a civilisational baseline. “If you see remnants of Keezhadi or Harappa, it is all pottery. The first shaping of the earth comes from there,” she says.
The design of Pongal paanai, the wide-rimmed clay pot in which sweet rice is boiled during the harvest festival, invites overflow. The milk rises and spills, which signals abundance. This act, and the vessel becomes symbolic to the culture. “The farmers would have boiled the rice to make sakkarai pongal and ven pongal. It symbolises bounty, harvest, and auspiciousness,” she adds.
For centuries, the earthen pot was the only option. Later came vengalam, a brass-copper alloy favoured for its flavour. In Kerala, the uruli — a wide, shallow vessel — still holds pride of place during temple festivals. But in Tamil Nadu, the urban drift has rewritten domestic rituals. Big bungalows became houses, houses became flats, lifestyles condensed, and also somewhere along the timeline, stainless steel replaced clay. “Even though they wish to keep the culture alive, people living in flats would be using clay pots or vengalam, depending on each family, and some houses use stainless steel. Lifestyles are getting modified,” shares Sujatha.
Karthikeyan S, coordinator at the Centre for Heritage and Development Tourism, DHAN Foundation, traces the lineage further back. He notes, “If you take Keezhadi, it dates back 2,500 years ago. If you are talking about Korkai, it shows that it is more than 4,000 years old.”
Pottery, he explains, was not elite. At Keezhadi, archaeologists found vessels engraved with common names, not those of kings or queens. “It shows that common people were literate. Only literate people would write their name in vessels,” shares Karthikeyan.
Bronze and metal plates, by contrast, belonged to the privileged. But clay was democratic, he explains. In agrarian Tamil Nadu, the Pongal paanai was — and in some villages, still is — used only once. “Families buy a fresh pot for the festival, cook the ceremonial rice, and then dedicate the vessel to the sun god. Afterwards, it may be repurposed or discarded. In semi-urban and urban areas, bronze or stainless steel pots are reused year after year, stored in cupboards between Pongals,” shares Karthikeyan.
Shifting scenarios
But even in villages, the shift is underway. A recent survey by the State Planning Commission, Karthikeyan says, found that agriculture is no longer the primary livelihood in rural Tamil Nadu, having dropped to 22 per cent. People migrate for construction work, spend less time on the land, and return with urban habits. “It shows that people’s permanence in rural areas has reduced significantly. They spend more time outside the village, and convenience begins to shape the vessels they bring back into their homes,” he says. Sujatha frames the loss differently. “Do we risk losing knowledge, not just objects, when materials change? That is something we need to think about,” she says.
These shifts in livelihood and material choices are most evident in the lives of those who still depend on clay. Pongal continues to anchor Dinesh’s livelihood. Once the rains stop, work begins in earnest. Clay is collected, prepared, shaped, dried, and fired, a cycle he and his family repeat each year. The firing remains the most expensive stage, and the outcome of the season determines how the months ahead will unfold. “If the season goes well, then the year is manageable,” he says. Even on Pongal day, Dinesh and his family continue to work at their shop. After preparing pongal and celebrating with the traditional customs early in the morning, he is eager to go back to work as that is the day when the sales will catch up.
For the members of the potter community — traditionally called Kuyavars — like Dinesh, Pongal is a peak season. The other is Navaratri, but there is a third, older ritual that still holds in rural Tamil Nadu — Puravi Eduppu, notes Karthikeyan. In many villages, Puravi Eduppu, also called Kuthirai Eduppu, is observed as part of agrarian life. During this ritual, clay horses are made and offered to Ayyanar, the local guardian deity believed to protect villages, fields, and waterbodies. The deity is believed to guard the waterbodies that irrigate the fields and sustain farming communities. He adds that festivals like these form a shared cultural practice among rural communities. Besides pots, the Kuyavars make the horses for the ritual. After shaping the figures, they fire them, feed them as part of the ritual, and then paint them before the festival. Karthikeyan says, “The timing of Puravi Eduppu differs from village to village. It does not follow a fixed calendar date. In many places, it is held in relation to agricultural cycles, often before the harvest season. When the day arrives, the horses are carried in a procession through the village and placed near the shrine of Ayyanar, which is usually located at the edge of the settlement.” These clay horses do not require maintenance. They wither slowly, under the sun and the rain, until the next festival.
So do the earthen pots. And as the festival dawns, some homes still buy fresh clay pots. Others reach for steel kept in cupboards. The milk boils over in both. What remains constant is the need to mark the harvest and to acknowledge what the earth has provided.