Corroboration for the Tamil Confederacy mentioned by Kharavela
Alfred Hiltebeitel
beitel at GWU.EDU
Mon Sep 28 14:35:13 UTC 2009
Sorry, sent inadvertently.
Alf Hiltebeitel
Professor of Religion and Human Sciences
Department of Religion
2106 G Street, NW
George Washington University
Washington DC 20052
----- Original Message -----
From: Alfred Hiltebeitel <beitel at gwu.edu>
Date: Monday, September 28, 2009 10:26 am
Subject: Re: Corroboration for the Tamil Confederacy mentioned by Kharavela
To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
> Great, circles upon circles, all closing in. Thank god for the Kalabhras!!!
>
> Alf Hiltebeitel
> Professor of Religion and Human Sciences
> Department of Religion
> 2106 G Street, NW
> George Washington University
> Washington DC 20052
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Mahadevan, Thennilapuram" <tmahadevan at HOWARD.EDU>
> Date: Sunday, September 27, 2009 3:34 pm
> Subject: Re: Corroboration for the Tamil Confederacy mentioned by Kharavela
> To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
>
>
> > Hello Palaniappan:
> > I just got back from India by was of Kyoto and World Sanskrit Conference.
> >
> > I find this article very interesting and stimulating. It has
> helped
> > me clarify the "mUvEndar" idea,in the Sangam period. Would you
> place
> > the CEras at Karur?
> >
> > Best, TP
> > ________________________________________
> > From: Indology [INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk] On Behalf Of
> Sudalaimuthu
> > Palaniappan [Palaniappa at AOL.COM]
> > Sent: Monday, August 31, 2009 12:25 AM
> > To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
> > Subject: Re: Corroboration for the Tamil Confederacy mentioned by
> Kharavela
> >
> > Here are some further thoughts on akam 31.
> > At a minimum, akam 31 firmly establishes that the Classical Tamil
> poems
> > like it are of the pre-Kalabhra and pre-Pallava period since that
>
> > region was
> > never under the control of the three Tamil dynasties at the same
> time
> > during and after the Kalabhra period. mAmUlan2Ar did not seem to
>
> > have been
> > patronized by the Pandyas. Of the 30 poems sung by him, only one
> mentions
> > Pandyas as a dynasty. It does not even mention a specific Pandya
>
> > king. If
> > anything, mAmUlan2Ar was probably a resident of northern Tamil
> Nadu
> > based on the
> > details he gives for various chieftains and areas of the northern
> Tamil
> > region as well as non-Tamil speaking people in the border regions.
> > Also, as one looks at the textual and epigraphic data, the
> existence
> > of an
> > earlier Tamil confederacy becomes more and more certain. Consider
> for
> > example the following Classical Tamil poem.
> > potumai cuTTiya mUvar ulakamum
> > potumai in2Ri ANTicin2Orkkum (puRam 357.2-3)
> > “Even for kings who ruled alone the land that was said to be
> (ruled
> > in)
> > common by the three kings…”
> > Another poem says
> > taN tamiz potu en2a poRAan2 ... (puRam 51.5)
> > “He will not bear (to hear) the saying that the cool Tamil land
> is ruled
> > in common”
> > The poems clearly point to an earlier view of the Tamil land
> being shared
> > by the three kings ’mUventar’. In other words, it was a land of three
> > states (or tri-state) in one common Tamil nation. Even though
> there
> > were
> > chieftains like atiyamAn2 and malaiyamAn2 in the northern
> regions,
> > the use of
> > mUvar in association with rulers only referred to the three
> lineages
> > of
> > Chera, Chola, and Pandya. This is also seen in the following
> puRam
> > lines sung
> > by veLLaikkuTi nAkan2Ar in praise of Chola kiLLivaLavan2..
> > …taN tamizk kizavar
> > muracu muzagku tAn2ai mUvar uLLum
> > aracu en2appaTuvatu nin2aE… (puRam 35.3-5)
> > "of (the kingdoms of) the three owners of the cool Tamil land
> with armies
> > with resounding drums yours alone can be called a real kingdom."
> > Thus “tamiz kezu mUvar” of mAmUlan2Ar and “tamizk kizavar…mUvar”
> of
> > veLLaikkuTi nAkan2Ar refer to the same threeTamil dynasties.
> > mAmUlan2Ar sings about the famous fierce battle between the Chola
> king
> > KarikAlan2 and Chera king cEralAtan2 as something in the past in
>
> > akam 55. But
> > he talks about all three kings protecting the northern frontier
> of Tamil
> > region in the present. It looks as if Tamil confederacy continued
>
> > even after
> > there were some famous battles among the three kings. There are also
> > occasions -good and bad- when the three kings come together as in
>
> > puRam 367 when
> > auvaiyAr compares the three kings to three Vedic fires or when kapilar
> > advises them in puRam 110 against their siege of chieftain pAri’s
>
> > hill. In
> > puRam 58, kArikkaNNan2Ar praises the friendship of the Chola king
>
> > and Pandya
> > king as following the tradition of the ancient ones and wishes
> that
> > they
> > incise their symbols of tiger and carp together on the hills of
> > their enemies.
> > Earlier scholars like K. B. Pathak (Epigraphia Indica 9.205) have
> > translated 'trairAjya' in South Indian Sanskrit inscriptions and
>
> > literary texts as
> > "the confederacy of three kings". Pathak quotes a commentary of Adipurana
> > which explains trairAjya as meaning "Chola , Kerala and Pandya".
>
> > The fact
> > that the royal officials of Pandya, and Chola continued to be
> given
> > the
> > title mUvEntavELAn2 as late as 13th century CE (where the prefix mUvEnta-
> > refers to the three Tamil kings), almost a millennium after the
> three
> > kingdoms
> > ceased to have any semblance of a confederacy, indicates the vestigial
> > notions that must have been developed during the days of the confederacy.
> > Possibly after the Tamil country comes under the rule of Kalabhras,
> > iLaGkO, a Chera prince and the author of cilappatikAram, the
> famous
> > Tamil epic,
> > seems to look back nostalgically at the bygone era of Tamil
> > confederacy and
> > recreates it in the actions of ceGkuTTuvan2, the Chera king. In
> > patiRRuppattu, a Classical Tamil text dealing with the Chera
> > dynasty, no Chera king is
> > described as having incised all three Tamil emblems (carp, bow,
> and
> > tiger)
> > on the Himalayas. Only the bow was incised by a Chera king. iLaGko
> > incorporates the spirit of puRam 58 and makes ceGkuTTuvan2 incise
>
> > all three signs.
> > There are other features in the text which shows that iLaGkO
> > presents a
> > unified Tamil nation and ceGkuTTuvan2 as representing a Tamil ‘confederacy.’
> >
> > Kamil Zvelebil calls cilappatikAram “the first consciously
> national
> > work
> > of Tamil literature, the literary evidence of the fact that the
> > Tamils had
> > by that time attained nationhood.” Actually this view should be
> > revised to
> > state that it was the last outpouring of the longing for a nation
> of
> > Tamils
> > ruled in common by the three kings, which had ceased to exist
> much earlier.
> > Thereafter, the Pandyas and Cholas seem to have ruled as Pandyas
> and
> > Cholas and not as Tamils sharing a common Tamil realm (even
> though they
> > patronized Tamil (along with Sanskrit) and Velvikkudi plates
> praise
> > a post-Kalabhra
> > Pandya king as having incised the carp, tiger, and bow emblems on
> a
> > tall
> > mountain). Also, when periyapurANam 4169.1 composed by the
> minister
> > of
> > Kulottunga Chola II of 12th century CE mentions “mUvEntar tamiz
> vazagku
> > nATTukku appAl” (“beyond the country where Tamil of the three
> kings
> > is prevalent”
> > ), we again seem to see a vestigial reference to the earlier confederacy
> > ruling over the common Tamil nation.
> > Regards,
> > S. Palaniappan
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