Paṭṭattu Vāsudeva Bhaṭṭatiri

Paṭṭattu Vāsudeva Bhaṭṭatiri (c. 9th century CE) was an Indian Sanskrit poet hailing from the present-day Thrissur district in Kerala.

Bhaṭṭatiri's works are particularly noted for the use of the yamaka (a kind of rhyme) in the decoration of the verses, and his fame as a poet rests mainly on his unparalleled expertise in the use of yamaka-s in his compositions.

[2] Bhaṭṭatiri was born into Paṭṭttu Mana, a Naṃpūtiri family whose ancestral home is located near Thiruvullakkavu Sree Dharma Sastha Temple in Cherpu Gramapanchayath in Thrissur district.

[1][4][5] The members of Paṭṭttu Mana, the family into which he was born, were traditional hereditary priests in the nearby Śāstā temple at Thiruvullakkavu.

At that moment Bhaṭṭatiri heard a voice from the sanctum sanctorum imploring him to go the temple kitchen and eat the plantain fruit, kept there to be used as offering to the deity, to sate his hunger.

To the surprised queries of the servant, Bhaṭṭatiri's reply was a verse in the vernacular language Malayalam couched in beautiful yamakam describing what he had done during the previous night.

The fact that Yudhiṣṭhiravijaya has commentaries by authors from different parts of India, even as far away a place as Kashmir, attests to the pan-India popularity and spread of this great Sanskrit work from Kerala.