Kuruntokai is an akam anthology compiled on the basis of the metre and length of the poems. There are three metres used in the 'Eight Anthologies' and the poems using aciriyappa metre are divided into three anthologies on the basis of the number of lines in the poems. Kuruntokai is an anthology of 401 poems that are between four and eight lines in length. However, there is one poem of nine lines. There are 205 poets represented in the anthology.Its katavul valttu, the invocatory verse, is not numbered. This may be due to the inclusion of Kuruntokai 307 which transgresses the length of verses in this anthology as it is the only poem containing nine lines. Kuruntokai is accompanied by a note giving a tradition as to its compiler. The note says that the anthology was made by Purikko about whom nothing is known.There is a tradition embodied in two verses of unknown date and authorship that Naccinarkkiniyar wrote a commentary on 20 poems of Kuruntokai.