An All Night Kaliyattam: What Happens Between Midnight and Sunrise

You have been told the Theyyam starts in the evening and runs all night, so you arrive at eight, watch drumming for two hours, and wonder whether you have missed something. You have not. A kaliyattam is a long night with a shape, and the biggest forms usually appear in the darkest, coldest hours.

Here is roughly how a full night shrine festival runs, and what to do with yourself between midnight and sunrise. Every kaavu has its own order and its own timings, so ask when you arrive rather than working from a schedule you read somewhere. The same local asking is what turns up a shrine holding a festival in the first place.

Evening: preparation and the first songs

The compound fills slowly. Lamps are lit. Drummers settle in, and the sound builds through the evening rather than starting at full volume.

Early in the night you will usually see a performer in partial costume, without the full headdress, singing the story of the deity. This preliminary appearance is often called thottam or vellattam depending on the shrine and the form. It is not a warm up act. The song sets out who the deity is, where they came from and what they did, and the full form later assumes you have heard it.

Meanwhile, in a room or shed to one side, other performers are being painted. Preparation for a major kolam can take hours. If photography is permitted and you are given permission, this is quiet and remarkable to watch.

Late night: the middle stretch

Between roughly eleven and two, the pace varies. Some shrines run several forms in succession. Others have long gaps filled with percussion, offerings and the ordinary business of a village staying awake together.

This is the part visitors handle badly. Two suggestions:

• Use the gaps. Eat, walk, sit down properly, talk to people. Ask what is coming next.
• Do not leave and plan to return at four. Roads are dark, transport is thin, and you may not get back in.

The deep hours: the biggest forms

The major kolams, the ones with the tall headdresses, the fire sequences and the long circuits around the shrine, tend to appear in the small hours and towards dawn. Fire rituals in particular are usually held when the compound is dark and the crowd is settled.

This is also when the deity moves among the people present and speaks to individual devotees. Families wait all night for this. If you are addressed, stand, fold your hands, listen, and accept what is handed to you with both hands.

Sunrise: the last form and the close

Many festivals save a significant form for first light, and the atmosphere changes with it. People who slept in corners wake up. Children reappear. There is often food, and a final round of blessings before the crowd thins.

If you can stay for it, stay. The last hour has a quality the rest of the night does not.

Handling the night as a visitor

• Sleep in the afternoon before you go. This is the single most useful thing on this list.
• Bring a shawl or light blanket. Open compounds get properly cold before dawn, and you will be sitting on the ground.
• Bring a mat or thick cloth to sit on. Sand, gravel and stone all get uncomfortable after four hours.
• Carry water and some food. Many shrines serve food during the night, but timing is unpredictable and portions run out.
• Carry cash, a torch, and a phone charger or power bank.
• Sort your ride home before the night starts. Buses will not be running when you finish.
• Wear plain clothes you can sit on the ground in, and be ready to leave footwear at the compound boundary.

Do not try to see everything

A perunkaliyattam can run for several nights, and the whole calendar sits inside the dry months of the season. Even a single night has more in it than most visitors can absorb. Pick two or three forms you want to see, ask when they are expected, and rest in between rather than standing through the whole thing at half attention.

Finding out which shrine is holding its festival on which night is the harder problem, since dates are set and announced locally. EventifyPlus, our hyperlocal event discovery product for Kerala, covers temple festivals and Theyyam among other events, and gives organisers who rely on word of mouth somewhere to publish. Listings depend on what organisers share, so confirm with the shrine before you travel.