nothing to begin with, whereas if it did,
then the remaining connecting power
would exist unconnected to anything,
which was clearly absurd. Finally, some
attacked the need for inherence at all—
which was cited as an example of “need-
less complexity” (gaurava).
The Navyanyaya school attempted to
sidestep these problems by positing a
new class of relationship, that of “self-
linking connectors.” These connectors
were seen as an integral part of all
things, by their very nature, and since
they were self-linking, this eliminated
the need for a separate inherence to
connect things together. In this under-
standing, the relationship and the related
objects are one and the same. This
notion allowed the Navyanyayas to
retain their fundamental assumptions
that there are real objects in the world
and they are connected to one another.
For further information see Karl H.
Potter and Sibajiban Bhattacharyya
(eds.), Indian Philosophical Analysis,
1992.
Nayachandra Suri
(14th c.) The author of the Hammira-
mahakavya, a Sanskrit drama that
chronicles the defeat and death of the
Rajputking Hammira by the Delhi sul-
tan Alauddin Khilji in 1301. Aside from
its historical value, this play is notable
because Nayachandra Suri was a Jain
monk. Although Jain monks are subject
to a strict religious lifestyle that would
seem to cut them off from the world,
they have a long history of deep involve-
ment with intellectual and literary cul-
ture. See also mahakavya.
Nayak Dynasty
Southern Indian dynasty whose capital
was in the city of Maduraiin the state of
Tamil Nadu. The Nayaks came to power
in the political vacuum created by the
destruction of the Vijayanagar dynasty
late in the sixteenth century. The Nayaks
ruled the southernmost part of the sub-
continent for about the next hundred
years. The dynasty’s greatest ruler was
Tirumalai Nayak (r. 1623–1659), who
constructed large sections of the
Minakshi temple, dedicated to
Madurai’s patron goddess, Minakshi.Nayanar
Group of sixty-three Shaivapoet-saints,
who lived in southern India between the
seventh and ninth centuries. In concert
with their Vaishnavacounterparts the
Alvars, the Nayanars spearheaded the
revitalization of Hindu religion vis-à-vis
the Buddhists and the Jains. Both the
Nayanars and the Alvars stressed pas-
sionate devotion (bhakti) to a personal
god—Shivafor the Nayanars, Vishnufor
the Alvars—and conveyed this devotion
through hymns sung in the Tamil lan-
guage. The Nayanars tended to be more
overtly hostile to the Jains. According to
legend the Nayanar Sambandar was
instrumental in the impalement of
eight thousand Jain monks in the city
of Madurai. The hymns of the three
most important Nayanars—Appar,
Sambandar, and Sundaramurtti—com-
prise the Devaram, the most sacred of
the Tamil Shaivite texts. An important
later source is the Periya Puranamby
Cekkilar, which gives hagiographic
accounts for all the Nayanars.Nayar
The Nayars are a Hindu jatiwho tradi-
tionally were the primary landholding
community in traditional Kerala. Jatis
are endogamoussubgroups of tradi-
tional Indian society whose social status
is determined by the group’s hereditary
occupation. The Nayars were one of the
few groups in India to practice matrilin-
ear succession, in which both descent
and inheritance were passed on
through the mother’s line.Nazar
(“glance”) The literal meaning of the
word nazaris an unobstructed line of
sight to a person or a thing. The word
nazaris also the term most commonlyNayachandra Suri