Paridhi (c. 11th century CE), also referred to as Paridhiyaar, was a Tamil literary commentator known for his commentary on the Thirukkural.
[2] He was also among the five ancient commentators whose commentaries had been preserved and made available to the Modern era, the others being Manakkudavar, Pari Perumal, Kaalingar, and Parimelalhagar.
The commentary appears more or less in a colloquial style, without losing the beauty of the language and ease of comprehension.
[3] Paridhi categorizes the chapters of Book I as Good, Moderate, and Bad, thus classifying the virtues and vices described by the Kural text in accordance with human behaviours.
[10] He uses simply language and focuses solely on getting the point across to common audience, without employing complicated grammatical constructions or showing eloquence.
[9] The following table depicts the variations among the early commentators in ordering, for example, the first ten verses of the Tirukkural.
Note that the ordering of the verses and chapters as set by Parimelalhagar, which had been followed unanimously for centuries ever since, has now been accepted as the standard structure of the Kural text.
The following table shows the numbering of variations found in the ordering of the Kural verses by various ancient commentators with respect to the commentary by Manakkudavar.
[4]: 9 In his compendium on the Kamatthuppal (Book III of the Kural text), Desikar has analyzed the history of Paridhi, Manakkudavar, Parimelalhagar, Kaalingar, and Pari Perumal and the nature of their commentaries.