Festival
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The famed Ezhara Ponnana festival
Ettumanoor Mahadeva Temple hosts the arattu festival, celebrated on a grand scale on the Thiruvathira day in February–March each year. Many people come to the temple on the 8th and 10th day of the festival, when seven and a half elephants (in Malayalam: ezharaponnaana) made of gold (nearly 13 Kgms) will be held in public view. This statue was donated to the temple by a travancore maharaja. The temple, one of the wealthiest Devaswoms in Kerala, has many valuable possessions.
The Thulabharam is one of the important rituals of this temple. People make offerings to God for favors received. On balance, the child or man for whom offerings were promised to God, is weighed against offerings ranging from gold to fruits.
Ezharaponnana
Ezhara Ponnana refers to the seven-large sized and one small sized-golden elephant (that is called Ezharaponnana), all of which are kept in the temple vault and taken out once a year for darshan by the devotees. Of the eight statuettes, seven have a height of two ft., and the eighth one is half that size, hence the name Ezhara (seven-and- a- half) Ponnana (Golden elephants). According to legend, they were presented to the temple by Anizham Thirunal Marthanda Varma, the founder of the Travancore kingdom. According to another story, while Marthanda Varma had made the pledge to present the ‘ponnana’, the offering was made during the reign of his successor, Maharaja Karthika Thirunal. There are also differing stories about the reason for the offering: some believe it was offered as a penalty for the damages suffered by the temple during the annexation of Thekkumcore by Travancore; others believe it was the offering made when the marauding army of the Tipu Sultan was hammering on the gates of Travancore. The statuettes are made of a jackfruit tree and covered in gold plates weighing nearly 13 kg.
The Ezhara Ponnana Darshan is one of the high points of the temple festival, held at midnight on the eighth day of the ten-day festival. Ezhara Ponnana Darshan begins with the ceremonial procession of the eight golden elephant statuettes. They are later kept at the Asthana Mandapam for the annual darshan by the devotees.