Iyengar
Sign in to saveAlso known as Tamil Sri Vaishnava brahmin, Sri Vaishnava brahmin caste
Iyengars (also spelt Ayyangar, Aiyengar, or Aiyangar, pronounced ) are an ethnoreligious community of Tamil-speaking Hindu Brahmins, whose members follow Sri Vaishnavism and the Visishtadvaita philosophy propounded by Ramanuja. Iyengars are divided into two denominations, the Vadakalai and the Tenkalai and live mostly in the Southern Indian states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, and Andhra Pradesh. The community belongs to the Pancha Dravida Brahmana classification of Brahmins in India.
~11 min read
Encyclopedic overview
15 sectionsContents
- Etymology
- History
- Common origins
- Schism
- Sectarian rivalry
- Relations with other communities
- Subgroups
- Hebbar
- Mandayam
- Wedding customs
- Notable people
- Notes
- See also
- References
- Further reading
Iyengars (also spelt Ayyangar, Aiyengar, or Aiyangar, pronounced ) are an ethnoreligious community of Tamil-speaking Hindu Brahmins, whose members follow Sri Vaishnavism and the Visishtadvaita philosophy propounded by Ramanuja. Iyengars are divided into two denominations, the Vadakalai and the Tenkalai and live mostly in the Southern Indian states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, and Andhra Pradesh. The community belongs to the Pancha Dravida Brahmana classification of Brahmins in India.
== Etymology == There are several opinions regarding the etymology of the term Iyengar, which is the anglicized form of the Dravidian word Aiyaṅgār (, ).
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Iyengar” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.