LIke Chola presence in Himalayas like in "Chola Ranges" in Nepal border, we can trace Pandian presence in Afghanistan from the "Maravar Pass" in the Village Sangam. Maravars are the pandiyan clan and the sangam probably refers to the Sangam age of pandiyas and could predate 3rd Sangam or kadai sangam in Maduarai. Both Chola ranges and the Maravar pass are a standing proof to tamil presence not only upto Himalayas but even upto Afghanistan. You have to take both and other proofs elsewhere and in tamil literatue. But both the promoters and the disbelivers tend to avoid other proofs as they tend to discuss only about either cholas or pandiyas or just cheras. You need to take other proofs as well as they complement each other. Then the discusion will be productive and bear results.
this is what we call the etymological trap places with similar names could lead you into historical quicksand the chola pass means the pass of the goddess in tibetian. all passes are called la in that language. nahutula pass is one example we had a discussion once on the chola pass and we had listed 20 passes all ending with the letters la. we have a pyramid in south america called cholulan, and a ziggaraut in iran called choga .both are co incidentally very close to the 216 feet of the big temple. but linking the two would be sheer idiocy
Etymology is an integral part of History without which history doesn't exist. Without etimology or linguistic evidence no history or any truth can be established...!!!???
Now, for the Chera's presence in Malaysia. Malay is a tamil word meaning Mountainious place is related to Cheras presence as they were also called Malainadu and their lanquage is called Malayalam
Arul stated .... "......we can trace Pandian presence in Afghanistan from the "Maravar Pass" in the Village Sangam. Maravars are the pandiyan clan and the sangam probably refers to the Sangam age of pandiyas and could predate 3rd Sangam or kadai sangam in Maduarai. Both Chola ranges and the Maravar pass are a standing proof to tamil presence not only upto Himalayas but even upto Afghanistan......."
Arul's observation is very interesting. I have recently come to know about Brahui language. (Brahui is a Dravidian language spoken by Brahui people of Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran, and expatriate communities in Qatar, United Arab Emirates, and Iraq. It is isolated from the nearest Dravidian-speaking neighbour population by a distance of more than 1,500 kilometres (930 mi).Brahui is spoken in the southwest region of Pakistan, as well as regions of Afghanistan and Iran which border Pakistan; however, many members of the ethnic group no longer speak Brahui -see - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brahui_language).
May be scholars of Linguistics and/or Anthropologists could share their view on this issue.
etymology is a seperate science. history is a record of what really happenned. literary evidence is the last resort when you dont have anything else . like in tamilnadu. your list of RRC's battles comes from literary evidence of his meikeerthi and is not collaborated in actual records where are these battlefields or which countries did he really conquer. and while etymological evidence can point the way its not the end all
Recording history as per the modern prescriptions is of late and the modern western way. The evidence and literature that we have is our indian and tamilian way and predates western history. If you want Indian or Tamil history you need to accept our way of recording history and evidences. Hope you open up and drop western learning a bit...!!!??? and if you open up, the other proofs will start pouring in from all over the world. Have happy learning and reconstruction of ancient history.
> > Recording history as per the modern prescriptions is of late and the modern western way. The evidence and literature that we have is our indian and tamilian way and predates western history. If you want Indian or Tamil history you need to accept our way of recording history and evidences.
thats rather patriotic. but take the case of the pallava- pulikesi conflicts. each record the other as the villian and responsible for great atrocities. do our history books reflect both views? if there is an afghan opinion on the pandya or a tibetean etymological explanation for the chola pass then what do we do? i am sure the chola pass is accounted for as the pass of the goddess.
There is nothing patriotic about it. You need to know that even a thousand years back only tamils had the written script and a long literary tradition ( to some extant may be sanskrit or the now extinct pali), neither english nor tibetians had any literature or script. So the only acceptable source is Tamil literature.
Further, we recorded our history in our way and you need to see the history through our eyes not through some non-existent other language or culture or lies. My intent is only to bring out the truth and make it known to the world and bring recognition and laurels to the achievements of Tamils which is also part of Indian history. For this if you call me patriotic, it's an honour.
ananda vikadan is publishing a 250 rs book on KARIKALAN. one entirely based on literary info. lets see how it turns out on comparisons between tamil and other histories, just check out england and french histories during 10th century. how well it is recorded in comparison there is no evidence on RRc finding the thirumurais. the only available substantiation is the THIRUMURAI KANDA PURANAM written some 300 years after the actual event.
The history we have is unlike british history. What we have is our traditional way of preserving history or truth. It's a bit like Ancient Greek history ( a pre-christian way of preserving history or truth). So don't compare our history with modern history or for that matter any history. It's unique and it's ours...!!!
To conclusively prove anything - we need both Literary and Material evidences.
Pandyas are first referred in Valmiki Ramayana ( assuming that the Valmiki's work predates Vyasa's work) followed by Mahabharatha. The Pandya Kings valour covers one Sarga and he fought in Pandava side post Drona period. ( Dont remeber whether he fought Karna's leadership or Salliya's leadership- need to check)
But one complete half a day ( of the 18days)was his and eventually died in the war.
The Chinnamanur Copper Plates refer that Pandyas were responsible for translating Mahabharata in Tamil. Obviously it is becasue Mahabharata talks high of them. This work must be different from the Perunthevanar Bharatam. Unfortunetely it is lost completely. I say it is different because,whateveravailable of Perunthevanar Bharatham ( Bheeshma Parva and Anusasana Parva) he talks about the Pallava Nandi's victory at Thellaar. Obviously a poet comissioned by Pandyas will not refer the victory of Nandi ( over Pandyas) and hence it is ruled out.
In Bhagavatha, the route taken by Lord Krishna to reach dwraka back is described. He had taken the route via east Punjab, Sindh to reach Dwaraka. Even he did not touch the NWFP.
The Pandyas in no way could have gone to Kurukshetra via afgan.
So there is no Puranic and Historic proof. Then the third reference is Sangam references. It is conclusively proved that most of the kings referred in Sangam or backed by material evidence- Both Brahmi inscriptions and coins.
Then we can consider the Pandya -Ariyap Padai Kadanda Nedunchezhian-
Did Tamils fight with Northeners? Yes. There is a material evidence.The Hatikumbha epigraphs referes the breaking of the Tramila Sangadana of 175 years. That means at most of the time a combined army of Tamil Kings were winning and protecting the entry of the Northern kings. The leadership of Tamil confederation must be different at each time. That proves the title of various Chera/Chola/Pandya Kings.
But again the confederation has not crossed Krishna or the max Godavari.
Hence it can be assumed that there is no literary proof or materia proof of Pandyas reaching Afganisthan. But yes they fought Kurukshetra war.
just curious and this is not for arul but the rest of our friends what are the evidences we have of a cultured society in tamilnadu in prechristian era
both literary and scientific.
this is not to provoke sentiments but to list out historic sources
and on literary and epigraphic evidences, a group of us PS members went on a semi- archeological expedition
in kachur a devara shrine we saw rajaraja 1's edict on the walls of our inner sanctum. and on on the outer wall in big bold letters a proclamation by on THIRUBUVANA CHAKRAVARTHI GOPALA DEVAR. i think sathish saw that
in 40 years of being a history buff i havent even heard of this guy so where does our traditional way of preserving history leave us
and talking of preserving we should all read how raja raja name was forgotten, and the big temple called karikalans temple and how a german epigraphist helped us discover our greatest king. I remember his words" there may have been a king called rajaraja associated with this temple" so effective was our history preservation
venketesh
> The history we have is unlike british history. What we have is our traditional way of preserving history or truth. It's a bit like Ancient Greek history ( a pre-christian way of preserving history or truth). So don't compare our history with modern history or for that matter any history. It's unique and it's ours...!!! >
I think Chandra shared some info on Gopala Devar long back. If I remember, he was a controlling over a large area and was a big shot. The adjectives should be ignored. if we want to argue, even RRC cannot be called 'Thribhuvana chakravarthy'.
Also, we cannot compare our culture and others...as Vivekananda called it, 'this is land of spirituality' and our ancestors were more interested in spiriality and self knowledge than recording the events of mortals.
If we dont have much records on history, similarly no other culture/country/race has such an abundance of philosophy. So everyone has some + and - and we should be proud of what we have than lamenting about what we dont have.
history is now a science in the humanities section. trying to tell the people as much truth about their past as possible there should be a logical if not a scientific approach
and comparable studies are needed.
we cant claim an advanced civilisation in one part of asia with flying machines when others had not even discovered the wheel.
simple standards like the last mini ice age ( 10,000 bc) invention of agriculture( 8000 bc) finding the wheel ( 4000 Bc) have all to be taken into account
what i mean to say is it is not needed to predate our civilisation to hypothetical times to gain an advantage.
when we dont have historical recording its better to accept that than invent things
Sir, Thirubhuvana Chakravarthy Gopalath Thevara is - Vijaya Kanda Gopala who ruled places around Kanchi - Telugu Chola- who ruled after the end of Cholas and before the advent of Pandyas.
His epigraph is very prominent in Kaverippakkam vishnu temple.
The oldest copper plate available with Kanchi mutt is also his.
Gopala Thevar is Vijaya Kanda Gopala. He was defetared by Second Pandyas.
Dear All, Interesting to read all the mails.As far as History is concerned our way of looking at it has been given beautifully byDr.Radhakrishnan and is given below. "The greatest fact in the story of man on earth is not his material achievements, theempires he has built and broken, but the growth of his soul from age to age in itssearch for truth and goodness. Those who take part in the adventure of the soulsecure an enduring place in the history of human culture. Time has discreditedheroes as easily as it has forgotten everyone else; but the saints remain. Thegreatness of Gandhi is more in his holy living than in his heroic struggles, in hisinsistence on the creative power of the soul and its life-giving quality at a time whenthe destructive forces seem to be in the ascendant" Regards,S.KarthikVandemataram
As a contrary to your views, Buddhist records in 550BC talks about Pandiyan Empire. Lord Meenakshi puranam states that she as the queen of pandiyan empire, went upto Himalayas defeating 100 North Indian kings enroute. (pretty close to Afghanistan.
We do consider puranams as supportive source but the date of puranam shoule be conclusively proven. Sources like Vishnu Puranam give many details, the meenakshi puranam can be assigned to very late period.
It would be helpful if the Bhudhist texts are shared. More over , since Valmiki mentions on the Pandya empire, their richness, their pearl doors, ( Kapadam) and Valmiki is dated minimum to pre 2nd BC ( andactually itwould be much earlier) and hence the question of presence of Pandyas is not disputed. Ashokan edicts assigned to 3rd BC talks about Pandyas.
Question is not about presence of Pandyas but Pandyas in Afganisthan.
I will give my personal experiance here. As i am compiling all the traces of Ramayanam ( as Ramayanam before Kamban ie pre 12th C, in Tamilnadu ie south of Nellore comprising TN, Kerala, Chittoor and Nellore of AP and Srilanka by personally visiting and collecting the traces.
There are many places in Srilanka with traces of Ramayanam stories. Once such place is "Sita Elia" . Story is Sita was kept captive there. But on close scrutiny - Elia means elivated place like Nuvre elia. Sita is short form of sitala ie cold. ( Sita+ Ushnam = sitoshnam, sitapalam, seetha kalaba sen thamaraip poom patham - Vinayagar Agaval)
It is actually cold hill but now a tourist spot associated with Sita.
I make it clear in my every presentation. My personal belief is different. I believe puranams but when it comes to research, 100% proof is the only criteria..If we persue with that belief, we can get many un refutable proof. We have collected so much on Ramayanam to conclusively prove. The list we discarded is very long but what we took as irrefutable is also very long.
what 5th century buddhist texts mention pandyas I wonder
and how long are we going to write our history based on mentions of names in alien texts.
why are we not able to list our kings who lived before BC? what monuments of ours survive from the BC period ( we have bc monuments all over north india, and europe including a zarathushrian temple in england)
none of these will stand the test of honest analysis
but then to tackle that we say tamil way of recording history is different.
the point is their history will survive your method of history but your history wont stand up to their measuring standards
but then this is basically a literary group and not a pure historical group. i think we would be doing great service to tamil history if we can list 5 kings, 5 literary works, and 5 monument which predated christian era, with some palatable proof other than that our tamil text books said " kal thondri man thOndra.." we should do this listing first before we even proceed with this debate.
Since this thread is going on for sometime, thought will also add my few cents. Bamiyan empire extended over Afghanisthan. We have clear artefacts from 2nd and 1st Century BC from this area. These include numerous sculptures of Buddha, paintings, stuccos. There have also been many images Brahminical gods from that period onwards. There is little or no doubt that this area was under the larger Bharata Varsha. Given the environment there, there has been better preservation of the relics, till recent times. We find hidden artefacts even today, which predate Gudimallam, which is one of our earliest Brahminical sculptures. There are Buddha representation in China even before the time we have Hinayanya Buddhism founding firm ground here. The early period of Ajanta influenced (also got influenced ) by the silk route. The silk route was a carrier of information across regions. When we see similarities, we need to look how the propagation took place and a logical way the propagation could have taken place. Gandhara region is no news for Indian history or mythology. This region has affinity to both Indian and Iranian nativity. Finding places having names similar to that of current Indian phonetics (Both Sanskrit and Dravidian) is no proof for one territory being held by another separated by huge distances. Venkat had expressed his views, you have expressed yours. I feel that is discussion is more carried on by 'want of dravidian glory' than any history. I don't believe a wee bit that Anai Kondan got termed as Anaconda, even considering portuguese's contribution. Salem from Tamil Nadu has a lot to do with Salem in US, etc. These are not adding value.
Request moderators to intervene and ensure that these discussions are kept just to historical or to Ponniyinselvan context.
Shankar, I am not an expert in Greek yet, but if you can, please refer Megasthenes' INDICA for pre-2nd BC info on Pandyas' -Meenakshi,and also Presence of Maravar Pass in the village of Sangam in Afghanistan (probably pre-third sangam location of Pandyas.
You are unaware of Tamil works that survived from BC period. There are quite a few. Most of those literatures belong to 3rd sangam and tend to quote 1st sangam and 2nd sangam literature. e.g Tholkapiyam belongs to second sangam period and quotes a few literature from 2nd sangam. Although exact quote and complete list of 3rd Sangam literature is a very big topic and any topic on sangam literature can potentially be a PhD topic. Money should be invested on Sangam literature and their culture and history and Music and S&T to get the complete truth out. Money is the problem and not availability of proofs.
Secondly, Tamils are truly international tribe and they travelled for and wide across the globe, learning, trading and conquering.
Alternatively, instead of reading form commentaries on Sangam literatures read the sangam literartures directly.
According to the Mahavamsa – a historical poem written in the Pali language, of the kings of Sri Lanka – King Vijaya (543 – 505 BC) married a Pandyan Princess. Along with Vijaya, all the men in his crew got married to Madurai girls and arrived Srilanka with a great celebration.
There are also plenty of names of kings and various poets account from 1st sangam, 2nd Sangam and 3rd Sangam. For more, please read sangam literatures on your own as they are simply too much to quote here.
Ramayana and Mahabharata were back to back happenings and happened between 200 BC to 0 AD and probably written between 200 BC to 200 AD. I can give you historical proofs. Notlies. We are here to establish the truth and nothing but truth. Truth may not appeal to everybody but it alone triumphs.
> Ramayana and Mahabharata were back to back happenings and happened between 200 BC to 0 AD and probably written between 200 BC to 200 AD.
so ashoka, alexander nalanda and buddha prededed the epics?
I can give you historical proofs. Notlies. We are here to establish the truth and nothing but truth. Truth may not appeal to everybody but it alone triumphs. >
Satyam bruyat priyam bruyat, na bruyat satyam apriyam Speak the truth, speak the truth in friendly tone, never speak even truth unfriendly This is what sastras say. Mahabharata is as old as 1400 BC. Kindly read Gita Rahasya of Tilak. Tilak has proved effectively that Mahayana Buddhism is influenced by Gita and has quoted numerous verses to the effect. Also read KT Telang's foreword to Bhagwad Gita Translation.