By the 7th century, the Nayanars, a tradition of poet-saints in the bhakti tradition developed in ancient Tamil Nadu with a focus on Shiva, comparable to that of the Vaisnava Alvars. The devotional Tamil poems of the Nayanars are divided into eleven collections together known as "Tirumurai", along with a Tamil Purana called the "Periya Puranam". The first seven collections are known as the "Tevaram" and are regarded by Tamils as equivalent to the Vedas. They were composed in the 7th century by Sambandar, Appar, and Sundarar.