Didnt want to continue on the same thread and hence starting a new one.
In the Nakeerar episode mail chain, Vairam righthly pointed that Madurai was a great center of learning from very begining. And its confined to only Tamil studies, I think.
Was Madurai a center of learning or only a center of excellence where patronage was provided to poets? Vairam - can you please throw light on this?
Also, when we talk about the great universities of our country - probably the very first universities of the world - we talk about Takshashila, Pataliputra, Nalanda and Kanchi. Why no place for Madurai?
Do we have any other old universities or center of learning, apart from the above cities?
The following points have to be understood: By the time of Tolkappiyam - Tamil was made into 3 distinct groups..iyal isai nadakam The northern script was adopted to write Tamil and nearly the same script being used in all Chera Chola Pandiya lands Tolkappiyam mentions 12 dialects of Tamil and Centamil being the purest Tamil a dialect of Madurai Pandyas were probably the first dynasty of Tamil rulers. Influence of Pali Pakrit and Sanskrit are minimal in Sangam Tamil - when compared to Kannada or Telugu. Unified Grammer work was followed(Tolkappiyam).
All these show that there surely has been some kind of forum if not an institution which made major decisions of the standardization of Tamil.
And from earliest literature available to us either Tholkapiyam or Sangam ..they keep Madurai in a very high regard for its association with Tamil.
So linking all available information with us...we can assume that there was some kind of scholarly forum on Tamil available in Madurai.
Everything other than above mentioned are mere speculations and imagination.
Other point to mention here is that Dravidians in general were very settled people with good knowledge in Agriculture and they weren't into meta physical studies as their aryan counterparts did. And the other one being...Tamilians didnt have habbit of writing..they were extremly good with their memory that most of the manuals of architecture medicine etc was passed on orally. Nearly all the poems written in Tamil till very recent time was meant to be sung and not to be read.....
"Other point to mention here is that Dravidians in general were very settled people with good knowledge in Agriculture and they weren't into meta physical studies as their aryan counterparts did. And the other one being...Tamilians didnt have habbit of writing..they were extremly good with their memory that most of the manuals of architecture medicine etc was passed on orally."
Paripadal, I have read somewhere that, is a very close translation of 'Purusha Suktham'. It praises Vishnu, Murugan etc. There are lots of philosophy in sangam period. So saying that Tamilians didnt go into meta physical studies....hmm....I dont buy it.
None of the vedas or upanishads were written down and read. It was a shishya paramapara...our ancestors called vedas as 'Sruthi' (sound) and 'Smrithi' (rememberance?). So its a trait of Indian education system to memorize (not as the current day mug up) and its not confined to Tamilians alone. This system was practiced through out India.
I think transferring everything to the oral tradition is an over simplification and not a valid argument. Only Vedas/strutis was to be learnt and transferred orally and not to be committed to writing; this injunction does not apply to other literature - religious or secular. Even ithihasas and puranas were written down. Mahabharatam was written by Ganesha following the dictation of Vyasa. Thiruvalluvar is also holding the manuscript of kural. Writing and committing to manuscripts must be more ancient than we we now give credit to.Sampath
paripatal is very late work...it is not considered a part of Sangam literature. Usually it is attributed as late sangam work. Others in the category are thirumurugatrupadai,kalithokai.
But I read somewhere that Tholkapiar was 'shishya' of sage Agathiar...and if my memory serves me right, Nachinarkiniyar urai says this. Let me try to get my memory right and see whether I can get that reference.
First I will take this opp. to highlight certain key issues pertaining to dating of Tamil literature.
First thing most people dont know is the Palmyra or panai edu which was used for writing cannot last for more than 100-200 years in Tamil Nadu climate.
So every 100 or 50 years all the manuscripts are copied from the previous version and old version is disposed.
So while copying the old text...if any one inserts few lines or one or two poems of their own its pretty hard to identify.
Cases like that have been found...one one verison of Tamil mahabratham the copier was a shaivite so he deleted few pages and added few pages on Shiva. Situtation like this happen. One french scholar cliamed he had more than 1330 kurals and the additional kurals spoke about dalit rights.
Same may be the case with Tolkapiyam - as language changes the custodians also felt need to add new rules and hence interpolations are added.
So this makes dating an extraordinarily difficult process in India. Unlike India arabic manu scripts are still avilable with original authors signature. We have very few original manuscripts which got frozen in Tibet. Other than that nearly everything is copied manu scripts.
While dating a manuscript one has to have a reference point to start with for synchornisation. For Tamil Literature there was no historical evidence to synchornoise till late 50s with cave inscriptions of nedunchelian and other sangam kings name being found in caves.
So if u look at early Tamil studies work Sangam might be dated even as early as 500 BC. But After 50s with cave inscription found it is now widely accepted fact that Sangam literature is of 1-3AD. That is 1AD to 300 AD. We have some poems which are considered to be very close to BC AD divide.
And other thing to be noted in Sangam Literature is no anthology was written as book. All ettuthokai books are collections are short poems. So each individual poem might have different date. So no one can say exact date for Akam or Puram or kurunthokai or narrinai. It is compilation of various poems written between 1-3 AD.
Ettuthokai and Pattu paatu are considered to be sangam works. But out of these Kalithokai,Paripatal and Thirumurugatrupadi are considered later than 3 AD and generally dated between 4-6th century AD.
What are the factors taken into consideration: 1. language and diction. 2. style. 3. Themes and social conditions
First if you notice - in sentamil we have yan for me. Then it was changed to nan. there has been a recorded shift from ya-na. These kind of shifts happen regularly in language.
Like poovirunthamalli become pontha mali - thiru alli keni becoming thriuvallikeni ...as time progress we can see the there are shift in some letters. These kind of shifts and changes are first analysed. These kind of language shifts have been identified with Sangam literature and thirukural and silapathikaram etc. Now that in chronology we have accepted the earliest literature is sangam the language shift puts thirukural and silapathikaram to later stage. Also influence of northern languages are considered. Sangam literature has least loan words when compared to other literature. Style - the meters in which poems are written is also considered. For example nearly all sangam poems follow asriyiappa or one or two other meters. the paripatal meters and kali meters seems to be of later origin. This puts Paripatal and Kalithokai in later stage to that of other sangam works. Next one is social and religious conditions and themes. While Nearly all literature in Sanagm being secular with exception of Paripatal and Thirumurugatrupadi. The socio economic conditions of the people described in Sangam literature and of Paripatal has some varitations. The themes handled in early Sangam literature and the Paripatal and kalithokai also seems to be different.
All these factors put Kalithokai and paripatal and thirumurugatrupadai to later stage.
I am yet to go deeply in to paripatal dating.But will soon do it and post my update.
But I will give the reference books for further study here.
Tamil Literature by Kamil Zvelebil pg 101-103.-esp foot note 108 Eight Anthologies by JR Marr pg.369-389 Probably the best work till date on Paripatal - a French book- Le Paripatal by F Gros
Full Paripatal translation in english available in Institute of Asian Studies. Books can be purchase either at their center http://xlweb.com/heritage/asian/
Or its also available in Royapettah- Amutha Nilayam wil post the address if any one requires.
Agathiyar and tholakapiyar is big long standing myth. This issue has been clarified by lot of scholars. Will soon update my blog on it.
short points - There is no historical evidence of Agathiyar in Sangam age are before that. Agathiyar is a popular brand name in Tamil literature like CHettinad meals in Tamil nadu hotels.
Agathiyar name has been used from grammer to black magic. Some works which are attributed to Agathiyar has Urdu words in them.
There is one free book avilable about Agathiyar in Tamil Nadu. Please read it. Though its is not highly accurate book - you will surely understand the complexities of the name agathiyar in tamil Nadu. Agastya in the Tamil land- Author: Sivaraja Pillai, K. Narayanan, 1875-1941 http://www.archive.org/details/agastyaintamilla00sivarich
Mistake on my part sir. Well maintained Manuscripts can extend upto 400 years. But in general with negligence about old manuscripts and climatic conditions and general attitude of people most Manuscripts have gone waste.
Few lines from Tamil Literature by Kamil Zvelebil "S.V.Damodaram Pillai writes in preface to his 1887 ed. of kalithokai " only what has escaped fire and water and religious taboo remains; even of this,termites and the insect called Rama's arrow take a portion; and the third element earth , has its share too...when I was small,my father taught me from few books which are no longer available , even if one searched throughout Tamil Nadu...when you lift a plam leaf manuscript, the edge breaks in half... All ofld manuscripts are falling apart, one after other and there is no one to make new copies." According to Mayilai.Cini Venkatacami, " unprinted texts in manuscripts were lost within one scholar's memory or became available only in portions, the strings untied and other parts lost."
Few reasons why Damodara Pillai and U V Swaminathan Iyer should be thanked for their quest to bring lot of literature from verge of extinction to our knowledge.
U.Ve.Sa describes the ordeals he faced in his auto biography. He shares the pain that, many of the manuscripts have been burnt or thrown in water, as per 'tradition'. Actually, the 'tradition' is to make a copy of the worn out manuscript and then destroy th old one by burning or throwing in rivers. But people followed only half of this tradition, and the result- we lost huge asstes.