Kaalakanniya Kaamamma (ಕಾಲಕಣ್ಣಿಯ ಕಾಮಮ್ಮ)

I shall tie my senses to linga
I shall fall at the feet of the guru linga jangama
I shall erase vow-breakers,
burn and winnow their ashes, o Nirbhithi Nijalinga. [Vachana No.1306] ^[1]

Kaalakanniya Kaamamma might have hailed from a family of rope-makers, considering the epithet attached to her name. Nirbhita Nijalinga is her signature. Only one of her vachanas is extant. Strict discipline and the absence of moral uprightness have been severely censured here.

Kāmamma belongs to the Korava community that lives by making and selling ropes, basket, etc., required for purpose of agriculture. Kanni is a rope with a loop at one end used to fasten an animal with to a peg in a cattle shed. But Kamamma's Kanni assumes symbolic significance so much so that it becomes a means of binding her run-away mind fast to the work on hand as also a means of binding her own self fast to Guru, Linga and Jangama.

Kāmamma's only one vachana bearing the signature "Nirbhita Nijalinga' is available now. As her signature signifies, Kāmamma must have been a fearless devotee who mercilessly flays those who commit breach of vow. Her ire against vow-breakers is expressed in her vachana: “I will wipe out the vow-breakers completely and burn them to ashes and blow them away" [SVS, Vol. v. v. 668]. Regarding Kāmamma's time, scholars are divided in their opinions. According to Kavicharitakāras, she belongs to 1500 A.D. But because her vachana is found in the bundle of manuscripts containing the vachanas of the 12" century Sharana, including Basavanna's, she may be considered a contemporary of Basavanna and others.