Cite
MLA
“Sree Muthappan.” Hindu History, 2026, https://www.hinduhistory.in/devata/muthappan/. Accessed .
APA
Hindu History. (2026). Sree Muthappan. Retrieved , from https://www.hinduhistory.in/devata/muthappan/
No consecrated stone image: he is present in the theyyam performer, face painted, wearing a tall headdress, carrying a bow and arrow, a hunter; at the shrine bronze dogs guard the gate.
01The boy who would not stop hunting
The katha of Muthappan begins at Eruvessi in the hills of Kannur. A childless nobleman and his wife found a radiant baby boy and raised him as their own. As he grew he went hunting in the forests, ate what he killed, mixed with the poor and gave away what the household had, and his parents, pained, begged him to stop. When his mother pleaded with him, he showed her his true, divine form, and then left the house for good. He wandered the hills, met a toddy tapper named Chandan, who caught him drinking from his pots and was struck senseless, to be revived only by his wife’s prayers, and at last came to Kunnathoor and then down to Parassini by the river, where he stayed.
02Theyyam every day
Parassinikadavu is the only temple in Kerala where theyyam is performed as a daily ritual. Muthappan appears in two forms: Thiruvappana, the elder, and Vellattam, the younger; devotees speak of one as Vishnu and the other as Shiva, and of Muthappan as both together. The performers come from the Vannan community, while the pujas are done not by brahmins but by the Thiyya family of the madappura. Once the costume is on, the performer is the Devata. He hears each devotee’s trouble, speaks to them and gives his blessing. The offerings are those of a hunter and a poor man: toddy, dried and burnt fish, coconut, boiled gram.
03Tea, gram and the dogs
Every visitor to Parassini, of any caste or faith, is fed. Tea and boiled gram are served to all as prasad, and meals are given free. Dogs are dear to Muthappan, the hunter’s companions: bronze dogs guard the gate, dogs roam the temple freely, and the prasad is first given to a dog before it is served to people. The great festival, the Puthari Thiruvappana, falls on the sixteenth and seventeenth of the Malayalam month of Vrischikam, in late November or early December, when the new rice is offered. Muslims of the area take part in his festivals, and Malayali devotees have raised madappuras for him in Coorg, Bengaluru, Mumbai and Delhi.
In the texts
- Thottam songs of the Muthappan theyyam (Malayalam)
