Answer to Question #300228 in English for garg

Question

Comment on the valorisation of the king in "The Book of Vanci".

Answer 1

The epic’s hero is Kovalan, a young Pukar merchant. It narrates Kovalan’s marriage to the virtuous Kannaki, his love for the courtesan Matavi, and his consequent ruin and exile in Maturai—where he dies, unjustly executed for theft after trying to sell his wife’s anklet to a wicked goldsmith who had stolen a similar anklet belonging to the queen. Kannaki comes running to the city and shows the king her other anklet, breaks it to prove it is not the queen’s—Kannaki’s contains rubies, and the queen’s contains pearls—and thus proves Kovalan’s innocence. Kannaki tears off one breast and throws it at the kingdom of Maturai, which goes up in flames. The third book deals with the Chera king’s victorious expedition to the north to bring Himalayan stone for an image of Kannaki, now a goddess of chastity.