Representation of the Belligerent Hero

Once upon a time: The make up of weapons

The Para­pu­rap­pa­da is the Kathakali grand open­ing of war, includ­ing the make up of weapons, and a for­mal call to his armies by the hero war­rior. Tra­di­tion­al­ly, it is wide­ly used by the Kat­ti (“Knife”) char­ac­ter. It was in The Ili­ad or The Sto­ry of Achilles, that Parap­pu­rap­pa­da was first made use of as a chore­o­graph­ic pat­tern for the pac­cha (“Green”, or of benev­o­lent) type. As designed by Richard Trem­blay, in the Kathakali Ili­ad, the Parap­pu­rap­pa­da empha­sizes Achilles’ wrath as he returns to war after his friend Patro­clus is slaugh­tered by the Tro­jans. There­after, the pat­tern was used in oth­er new Kathakali works for sim­i­lar purposes.