Kartigai is one of the oldest festivals in the Tamil world, a celebration that predates many of the rituals we know today. Long before it became associated with lamps on windowsills and glowing thresholds, it existed as a festival of stars, fire, and cosmic light.
A Festival Older Than Its Stories
Kartigai appears in Sangam literature, making it thousands of years old. In its earliest form, it was connected to the rising of the Kartigai star cluster and the belief that this moment in the sky carried a shift in energy such as brightness, protection, and auspiciousness.
The festival is mentioned in texts like the Ahananuru and Tolkappiyam-era commentaries, which reference the Kartigai star and early fire rituals. Archaeological findings from ancient Tamil settlements also show evidence of lamp placements along hearths and thresholds, suggesting that lamp lighting long predates later temple practices.
The timing of the festival, aligned with the appearance of the Kartigai stars also connects it to prehistoric Tamil astronomy, where star cycles guided seasonal and agricultural rhythms.
The stories came later. Across Tamil regions, the festival is linked to both Siva and Murugan, depending on lineage and local tradition.
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In many Shaiva households, Kartigai honours Siva as Deepam, the infinite column of fire.
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In Murugan traditions, it celebrates the day Parvati’s six sparks became the six Murugan aspects, united into one form.
Both lineages hold one truth in common: Kartigai is the festival of light, not metaphorical light, but literal, glowing, elemental fire.
Why Lamps Matter
Before metal became common in homes, families lit clay lamps, placed at doorways and courtyards. Clay was accessible, humble, and rooted in the earth. Lighting these lamps was a way of:
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marking the turning of seasons
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honouring ancestral practices
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welcoming brightness into the home
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and offering protection against the unseen
In early Tamil society, clay lamps (vilakku or agal) were used in both domestic and ritual spaces. Excavations from sites like Adichanallur, Keeladi, and Arikamedu show small terracotta lamps dating to the Iron Age and early historic periods, confirming lamp-lighting as an established cultural practice long before large temples existed.
Even today, the festival carries this grounding energy. Each flame is both personal and cosmic; individual and ancestral.
How Tamil Homes Celebrate Today
Across Tamil Nadu, Kartigai remains one of the few festivals where lamps take centre stage rather than offerings or elaborate rituals.
Homes light rows of lamps on windowsills, thresholds, house edges, altars and courtyards. Many still begin with clay lamps, followed by brass lamps that carry the glow into the night.
The festival is a reminder that light, simple, quiet light has always been part of Tamil life. Not symbolic light. Not decorative light. But living light.
Why It Endures
Kartigai remains relevant because it is rooted in something timeless: the instinct to honour warmth, fire, and the returning of brightness.
It does not rely on material exchange.
It does not demand elaborate ritual.
It only asks us to pause long enough to light a flame.
And that is why, thousands of years later, the lamps still shine.