Digital South Asia Library — Combined Tamil Dictionary Search, ஊடல் (ūṭal) entries
- Author/compiler: multiple independently authored dictionaries, digitized and jointly searchable by the Digital South Asia Library (DSAL), University of Chicago
- Publication: DSAL's "Combined Tamil Dictionary Search" tool, querying six underlying dictionaries at once; results returned this session from University of Madras's Tamil Lexicon (1924–1936), Winslow's A Comprehensive Tamil and English Dictionary (1862), Kriyā's Kriyāviṉ Taṟkālat Tamiḻ Akarāti ("Cre-A" dictionary, modern), and Kadirvelu Pillai's Tamil Moli Akarathi (Tamil-Tamil)
- Date: entries dated 1862 (Winslow), 1924–1936 (Tamil Lexicon), and undated modern editions (Cre-A, Kadirvelu); accessed 2026-09-08
- URL: query interface at https://dsal.uchicago.edu/dictionaries/tamil/ ; raw query verified directly via
curlagainst the underlying CGI endpointhttps://dsal.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/app/tamil_query.py?qs=%E0%AE%8A%E0%AE%9F%E0%AE%B2%E0%AF%8D&searchhws=yes&matchtype=exact(not a WebFetch-only read — the raw HTML was downloaded and grepped directly, per this project's standing WebFetch-synthesis caution) - Type: primary (five independent lexicographic entries, spanning 1862 to modern editions) — neutral, lexicographic
- Accessed: 2026-09-08
Extract
- University of Madras Tamil Lexicon (p. 493, the project's most authoritative single Tamil dictionary, a 12-volume work; this is the same reference class already used by this project for other headwords): "ஊடல் ūṭal, n. < ஊடு-. (Akap.) Love quarrel, between husband and wife, arising from jealousy, appropriate to the agricultural tracts, one of five uri-p-poruḷ, q.v.; மருதத்தி ணையி னுரிப்பொருளுள் ஒன்றாகிய புலவி. (நம்பியகப். 25.)" — i.e. explicitly defined as one of the five canonical uri-p-poruḷ ("proper/appropriate content") categories of classical akam love poetry, tied to the marutam (riverine/agricultural) landscape, and cited to a specific classical grammatical source (Nampi Akapporuḷ, verse 25).
- Winslow's 1862 dictionary (p. 163), the oldest source consulted for this word: "ஊடல், s. Feigned dislike–as of a woman to her husband, பிணக்கு. 2. Difference, variance, பிரிவு." Also gives derived forms: ஊடலாயிருக்க ("to be in a state of discord, at variance"), ஊடலொழித்தல்/ஊடனீக்கல் ("removing the feigned dislike of a wife"), ஊடறீர்தல் ("re-union of husband and wife"). Winslow's "feigned dislike" gloss is strikingly close to the modern popular listicle's "exaggerated and put-on anger" (see YourDictionary) — a rare case in this project's file where a 19th-century primary dictionary and a 2021 popular listicle converge almost exactly in wording and sense, 159 years apart.
- Cre-A modern dictionary (p. 160): "ஊடல் பெ. 1: (காதலர்களிடையே அல்லது கணவன் மனைவிக்குள் ஏற்படும்) சிறு பிணக்கு; fit of sulkiness as (between lovers)" — confirms the sense is still current in ordinary modern Tamil, not archaic or confined to classical poetry.
- Kadirvelu Pillai's Tamil-Tamil dictionary gives three separate headword entries (pp. 304, 1386, 1677) glossing ஊடல் with Tamil synonyms பிணக்கு (quarrel/estrangement), புலவி (sulking, the same term the Tamil Lexicon uses to gloss it), வெறுத்தல் (aversion), and துணி (a further near-synonym) — internal Tamil-language corroboration independent of the two English-facing dictionaries.
- All five entries across four independently authored/edited dictionaries and 159 years (1862–modern) converge on the same core sense: a quarrel or feigned/exaggerated show of displeasure between romantic partners, specifically associated (per the two dictionaries that address literary register) with the classical akam poetic tradition.
Gaps
- The Tamil Lexicon's own citation (Nampi Akapporuḷ 25) was not independently retrieved or read in the original — the definition is taken as the Lexicon states it, not cross-checked against the cited classical grammatical text itself.
- Retrieved via one combined search page rather than by consulting each dictionary's own separate dedicated interface; page/volume citations are as given by the DSAL tool.