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Aazhvaars and dasaavathaaram

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chari • March 31, 1995 


hi,
 I have a question about alwars and the dasaaavataarams .  
 Most of the paasurams that I am familiar with are not about(or do not mention) any 
 particular avataaram. However , many of Aandaal's paasurams are about krishna .Periyaazhvaar , in his periyaazhvaar thirumozhi has a lot of paasurams about
 krishna (eg : poochoottal and kaappidal ). I know of a few paasurams in which 
 raamavataaram is there. What about others? Nothing comes to mind immediately. I do not know all the 4000 paasurams.  Am I finding this because I am familiar  with the  paasurams of only some aazhwars?  It would definitely be interesting
to  find out if there are some avataarams that are mentioned more often than others and if it is the case speculate on why. Right now, I think that krishnaavataaram is likely to be the one mentioned most. I would like to know your opinions about this. 

One factor would be that aazhvaars sang about the 108 divyadesams. So, any avataaram with no temple with the presiding deity being the avataara purushan will have no songs? I am not sure here. Are there temples for machcha, koorma, vAmana,
balarama avataarams? On the same note, we have a sannadhi for varaaha in tirupati. Varaaha is said to be the elder brother of Vekateshwara.

Varadhan