original_query: Who are the three or possibly four different persons mentioned in the Tamil tradition?
query: Who are the three or possibly four different persons in the Tamil tradition that are sometimes conflated into one?
answer: According to Kamil Zvelebil, the sage Agastya, Akattiyan the Siddha, and Akatthiyar, the author of Akattiyam, were three or possibly four different persons of different eras, who over time became fused into one single person in the Tamil tradition.