thirukkural

The Tirukkuṛaḷ (திருக்குறள்) is a classic work of Tamil Sangam literature consisting of 1330 couplets, or kurals, authored by Thiruvalluvar. This repo provides the Thirukkural as JSON.

🔍 Search all 1330 kurals → tk120404.github.io/thirukkural

Search runs entirely in the browser over the JSON files in this repo — in Tamil or English, across the couplets, translations, transliterations, and all three commentaries. Filter by பால் or அதிகாரம், and link straight to any kural with #kural-1330.

thirukkural.json

All 1330 kurals, numbered contiguously from 1 to 1330, under the kural key. Every record has all eleven fields populated — there are no gaps.

{
  "Number": 1,
  "Line1": "அகர முதல எழுத்தெல்லாம் ஆதி",
  "Line2": "பகவன் முதற்றே உலகு.",
  "Translation": "'A' leads letters; the Ancient Lord Leads and lords the entire world",
  "mv": "எழுத்துக்கள் எல்லாம் அகரத்தை அடிப்படையாக கொண்டிருக்கின்றன. அதுபோல உலகம் கடவுளை அடிப்படையாக கொண்டிருக்கிறது.",
  "sp": "எழுத்துக்கள் எல்லாம் அகரத்தில் தொடங்குகின்றன; (அது போல) உலகம் கடவுளில் தொடங்குகிறது.",
  "mk": "அகரம் எழுத்துக்களுக்கு முதன்மை; ஆதிபகவன், உலகில் வாழும் உயிர்களுக்கு முதன்மை",
  "explanation": "As the letter A is the first of all letters, so the eternal God is first in the world",
  "couplet": "A, as its first of letters, every speech maintains; The \"Primal Deity\" is first through all the world's domains",
  "transliteration1": "Akara Mudhala Ezhuththellaam Aadhi",
  "transliteration2": "Pakavan Mudhatre Ulaku"
}

Field	Description
Number	Kural number, 1–1330
Line1, Line2	The two lines of the kural in Tamil
Translation	English translation
mv	உரை — டாக்டர் மு. வரதராசனார்
sp	உரை — சாலமன் பாப்பையா
mk	உரை — மு. கருணாநிதி
explanation	English prose explanation
couplet	English verse couplet
transliteration1, transliteration2	Romanized transliteration of Line1 and Line2

detail.json

The structural hierarchy of the work — பால் → இயல் → அதிகாரம் — nested three levels deep:

section (பால் / Paal)          3 entries: அறத்துப்பால், பொருட்பால், காமத்துப்பால்
└── chapterGroup (இயல் / Iyal)
    └── chapters (அதிகாரம் / Adhigaram)

Each chapter carries start and end, the inclusive range of Number values in thirukkural.json that belong to it, so the two files join on kural number:

{ "name": "கடவுள் வாழ்த்து", "translation": "The Praise of God",
  "transliteration": "Katavul Vaazhththu", "number": 1, "start": 1, "end": 10 }

Every level has name, transliteration, translation, and number.

Text normalization

Both files are normalized so that exact-match search, deduplication, and string comparison behave predictably for consumers:

• All Tamil text is Unicode NFC normalized. Without this, visually identical strings compare unequal depending on how the consumer's input is normalized.
• Whitespace is single-spaced and trimmed — no leading, trailing, or repeated spaces.
• Where the source text joined two verse lines, they are separated by a single space.

Running the site locally

index.html fetches the JSON files, and browsers block fetch over file://, so serve the directory rather than opening the file directly:

python3 -m http.server

Then open http://localhost:8000. There is no build step and no dependencies.

Contributing

Pull requests are welcome — for corrections, additional narratives, or other details. Please keep the conventions above intact: NFC-normalized text, single spaces, and all 1330 numbers present.

References

• http://www.thirukkural.com/
• http://www.gokulnath.com/thirukurals