History of the Tamils: From the Earliest Times to 600 A.D. by PT. Srinivas Iyengar is a seminal work that offers a comprehensive and scholarly account of Tamil history, culture, and civilization. Originally published in the early 20th century, this classic text has stood the test of time and continues to be a foundational reference for students, researchers, and history enthusiasts alike.
lyengar meticulously traces the origins and evolution of the Tamil people, covering a wide range of subjects including language, literature, religion, politics, and socio-economic life. Drawing from a wealth of literary sources, inscriptions, and archaeological findings, the book presents a vivid picture of Tamil society up to the 7th century A.D., shedding light on the contributions of dynasties such as the Cholas, Pandyas, and Cheras.
This thoroughly revised edition has been set afresh in an easy-to-read typeface, making it more accessible to contemporary readers while preserving the integrity of the original text. The updated format enhances the reader's engagement with the material, ensuring a smooth and enriching reading experience.
A cornerstone in South Indian historiography, History of the Tamils remains an essential volume for anyone seeking a deeper understanding of one of the world's oldest living cultures.
PT. Srinivas Iyengar was a distinguished historian, educationist, and scholar of South Indian history and culture. Known for his meticulous research and clear narrative style, he made significant contributions to the study of Tamil history and literature. Iyengar served as a professor and later as Principal of A.V.N. College in Visakhapatnam, and was actively involved in promoting Indian education and historical awareness during the early 20th century. His works remain valuable resources for students and scholars of Dravidian studies.
Scope of the History:
If by history is meant the story of the rise and fall of royal dynasties consequent on the slaughter of an immense number of human beings on the field of battle in the name of heroism, the tale of the displacement on the map of the world of large masses of humanity, eager to plunder the wealth accumulated by the patient toil of peaceful people, the narrative of the rape of royal maidens and the shedding of innocent blood in revenge for the outrage, then Tamil India is the happy country which has had no history to recount up to 600 A. D. On the other hand if history means the account of the slow evolution of the social and religious life of a people under the stimulus of the geographical conditions of the environment and the influence of contact with peoples who have developed different kinds of culture, the description of the slow change in the ways in which they ate and drank, played and loved, sang and danced, paid court to kings and to gods, the relation of the story of the development of their internal trade and commerce with foreign countries, far and near, the narration of the evolution of their literature from humble beginnings till a complicated scheme of literary convention was established, there are ample materials for the reconstruction of the history of the Tamils from the earliest times up to 600 A. D. This story is attempted to be recounted in this book.
The stone tools of the different stages of the palaeolithic and neolithic periods of human culture have been collected, though unsystematically, by various people and lodged in Indian museums. An account of the kind of life led by the Tamil people in those far off ages, based on the silent testimony of stone artifacts has been given by me in the Stone Age in India. Their social, religious, political and industrial life as revealed to a small extent by the artifacts of the early iron age and to a very large extent by a consideration of the vocabulary they possessed before they came in touch with the civilization of the Aryas of North India, has been described by me in my Pre-Aryan Tamil culture. The present work is an attempt to recount the history of the Tamils such as can be derived from what has been saved, from the jealous hands of time, of their own ancient literature and from references to them in Sanskrit, Pali, Greek, Latin and other early records, literary and otherwise.
Sources of the History:
The Vedic literature, by which I mean, the Mantras and the Brahmanas (which together are the Vedas), and the Sütras which contain the early concepts of the Aryas with regard to the objects and the conduct of individual and social life, as well as the Itihasas (the Rämäyana and the Mahabharata) and the Puranas, besides the early Pali, Bauddha and the Arddha Mägadhi Jaina works i e. all the available Aryan sources have been ransacked for information. It goes without saying that the kind of information obtainable from such Sources will deal only with the intercourse of the Aryas with the Tamils. In using the Ancient North Indian tradition, and especially that which is recorded in the Puranas, I have almost entirely followed Pargiter's critical method and his conclusions. One most illuminating suggestion of his is that the Agastyas, Vasisthas, and Višvāmitras mentioned in the Sanskrit works, were not each one man who baffles the reader by appearing and reappearing in every age from that of Ikşvāku to that of Sri Krsna, but were a series of men, their names being family names and not personal names. This idea has reduced chaos to order and enabled Pargiter to frame fairly accurate lists of the sequence of kings in various ancient North Indian provinces, which I generally follow. These lists have enabled me to trace the gradual spread of Aryan cults in South India in the Vedic epoch.
Non-Indian sources of imformation, such as the Mesopotamian and Egyptian inscriptions, and Greek and Latin works, necessarily deal only with India's ancient commercial intercourse with countries to her west. These have been very thoroughly studied and utilized by Schoff in his edition of the Periplus of the Erythrean Sea and Warmington in his Commerce between the Roman Empire and India. These two books I have analysed and rearranged the well-documented information given in them, epoch by epoch, correlating it to what little information is available from the Indian side.
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Hindu (935)
Agriculture (118)
Ancient (1086)
Archaeology (753)
Architecture (563)
Art & Culture (910)
Biography (702)
Buddhist (544)
Cookery (167)
Emperor & Queen (565)
Islam (242)
Jainism (307)
Literary (896)
Mahatma Gandhi (372)
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