What do you call your grand father and grand mother?

What do you call your grand father and grand mother?

By

P.R.Ramachander

WE(palakkad) in the olden days used to call our grand father(majestic father) as Pattappa

And our grand mother (majestic mother) as Pattiyammai, becausePatta was word we used for old man and Patti , a word used for old woman (Kizhavan and Kizhavi were not very popular in Palakkad).

In tamil nadu they call grand father as Thatha and grand mother as Patti.

Though most of the old males did not have much objection to this, most of the old women had objection to this.In their mind Patti connotes “old hag” and so many type of alterations were made. The most common was Ammamma , Appamma but most of them did not have objection to the word “thathi”, though such a word did not exist in Tamil. Some people adopted the hindi word for Maternal grand mother “Nani” as no tamilian understand it ,But they avaoided “Dhadhi” which some how did not like .Some children were taught to call their grand mother as “thiruchi amma” by adding the place of residence of their grand mother.

The Kannadigas call the granpa as “Ajja” and Grand mother as “Ajji” and Malayali call them as “muthachan “ and “muthachi” and in Telugu they call them as “THathagau ‘ and”ammamma or Naanamma”

I some how preferred people to call me as “Raja Thatha” not as “Raja Patta” and people say it means “royal grandfather”