http://www.crystallotus.com/Lemuria/03KumariNaduorLemuria.htm
Kumari Nadu or LemuriaWas it ten million years ago ?
The first vascular plants lived during the Devonian Period, that is 405 to 345 million years ago. Based on plant fossils, six ancient landscapes of the world existed during various geological periods going as far back as 405 million year ago. These maps reveals that the only portion of the world that has been in continuous existence as land is southern India, while all the other countries of the world have been submerged in the ocean either in part or fully during some period or other since 405 million years. This has permitted the development of a culture of unusual antiquity and stability.
Vast tracts of land existed around Shri Lanka. South Indian manuscripts called this "Kumari Nadu". These lands are now identified as Lemuria. They extended far beyond the present day Kanyakumari the southern most tip of India. According to these historical scriptures it was the Pandyan Kingdom. Two Mighty rivers flowed through the land. "Kumari and Pahroli". The distance between the two rivers was in modern terms about 7000 miles. The scriptures mention the distance as 700 kavadam. Flora and Fauna proliferated in Lemuria. Such vascular plants are now extinct.
The Lost Continent of Kumari Kandam.
Tamil epics, written in the first century makes frequent references to a vast tract of country called "Kumari Nadu" now identified as Lemuria or Gondwanaland extending far beyond the present Kanyakumari, the southern most tip of modern India, lying submerged in the Indian Ocean. It is said that ancient Madurai was the seat of the Tamil literary Academy and Kavatapuram or Muthoor was the capital of the Pandyan Kingdom.
The Tamil commentators mention the submersion of the two rivers Kumari and Pahroli in 'familkam. Ancient epics state that the distance between these two rivers was about 7000 miles and that it was divided into 'Thahga, Madurai, Munpalai, Pinpalai, Kunra, Kunakkarai, and Kurumparai Nadus or States, each containing seven Nadus, or 49 in all. The country was interspersed with mountains with a bewildering variety of flora and fauna of a bygone age. Peninsular India extended from Kanya Kumari, forming a sprawling continent touching Africa in the West, Australia in the south and occupying a large portion of the Indian Ocean.
From 30,000 B.C. to 2,700 B.C. natural cataclysmic landslips occurred as a result of earthquakes and volcanic eruptions which periodically affected the surface of the earth and the ocean beds. As the continent of Lemuria was sinking in the western portion, people migrated to Asia, Nile Valley, Australia and the lands of the Pacific forming Mu. The Lemurians also colonized North and South America formed the continent of Atlantis and Inca civiliasation.
Migration of the populace began in the year 30,000 B.C. Earthquakes, sinking of the land and volcanic eruptions were inundating the land. Vast racts of land were disappearing into the sea. Migration was in all directions. To Australia, are the present day Aborigines, colonized North and South America In Asia the Nile Valley. The Egytians have their first migration from Lemuria and much later from Atlantis.
The ruby was mined of the mountain Mani Malia and gold from Mount Meru.The gold was used in the temples. The mountain range had fortyeight high peaks. Precious stones were mined by chinese labourers. Ancient Chinese cronicles confirmed the mass of labourers working in the Pandya Kingdom.
Geologists confirm that the rocks are distinct from those in the Himalayas."Peninsular India, south of the Vindhyan mountains, is geologically distinct from the Indo Gangetic plain and the Himalayas. It is the remains of a former continent, which stretched continuously to Africa in the space now occupied by the Indian Ocean. The rocks of this land mass formed are among the oldest in the world."
Wednesday, July 21, 2004
Tuesday, July 20, 2004
Lemuria Continent - 1
Historical Survey of EelamBy: K.T.RajasinghamSource: Weekend Express (April 24, 1999)
The history of the Tamils, is the story of the world. The history of the world is not complete, if the true story of the Eelam is not included. Up to date, a few historians wrote bits and pieces about the Tamils and Eelam, but those were not the complete story. Writing the true story demand researches to uncover the distorted, as well as the deliberately ignored details, to rewrite the discarded facts, the missing pages, into a true historical treatise.
Thiruvalluvar the great Tamil poet, in the opening chapter of his treatise on moral aphorism called Thiru Kural, in the first chapter "Praise of God" and in the very first Kural - prosody, a unit of two line verse, called couplet or distich, states -" 'Aah,' is the first letter of alphabets (in Tamil), God, is primordial to earth." He gave God the supreme position, as one that existed ever since. Now the question arises regarding the emergence of the world. According to Rig-Veda, the Aryan concept, the world emerged from, Soonya, which means from the Void or Nothingness :- Then even nothingness was not, nor existence, There was no air then, nor the heavens beyond it. Who covered it? Where was it? In whose keeping? Was there then cosmic water, in depths unfathomed?.... But, after all, Who knows, and who can say, Whence it all came, and how creation happened? The gods themselves are later than creation, So who knows truly whence it has arisen? - The Wonder That was India by A.L.Basham, (Rig Veda Translation).
Earlier, the entire land area of the world formed one continent. Later, due to grave impact of the Lunar and Solar gravitational pull including other violent process that took place deep inside the earth's core, the earth's lateral movements or the drifting of the earth, caused the split of the continent into two proto-continents, Laur Asia, the Northern hemisphere, that includes Europe, North America, greater part of Asia and Gondawanland, the Southern hemisphere. Geologists believed that a great continent called Gondawanland composed of South America, Africa, India, Australia and Antarctica. Researchers concluded that, Gondawnland remained one single continent, nearly 300 million years, subsequently after 180 to 150 million years, it began to break up.
Many millions' years after the break up of the Gondawanland, a land-mass named Lemuria continent emerged, for the first time surrounded by the ocean. This land-mass that came into existence, was the old oriental continent that stretched in unbroken land formation from Madagascar to Malay Archipelago, to Australia, including Polynesia and northwards to the present valley of Ganges. The Ganges valley, earlier occupied by the sea, spreading westward across Persia (Iran), Arabia (Middle-east) and the Sahara regions, forming the southern limit of the Palae-Arctic Continent, that embraced Europe, North Africa and Europe.
The land-mass of Lemuria, the eastern part of the Gondawanland, took credit for the human evolution. Paleontologists, gave Lemuria great importance as the place from where man emerged. According to findings, the ape - Homo-Erectus evolved into man - Homo Sapiens, from Lemuria. Three phases in the human history were recorded before the knowledge and use of metals, are often distinguished as, the Eolithic Age - or the early period of the Stone Age, when crude stone tools were used, followed by Paleolithic Age - when primitive man used unpolished chipped stone tools and finally the Neolithic Age - characterized by primitive farming and the use of polished stone and flint tools and weapons. An advance state of a society began to emerge, when man became a farmer, which led to the dawn of the human civilization. The interaction of the human-beings in a creative way, led to the emergence of the human civilization.
The earliest people to form the real cities in the world were those who lived in the region between the Euphrates and the Tigris river basins. The land bordering and between the Euphrates and Tigris rivers was called Mesopotamia. Historians consider the people who lived in the lower Mesopotamia as "mysterious" people and called them Sumerians, in short, Sumers. Western Historians had simply ignored the language they spoke as agglutinative language which has no clear or close relationship to any known language family. Later, researchers concluded that, the Sumers as proto-Dravidians. Even today, historians are not that comfortable to accept Sumers as Dravidians, speakers of the language, described in the historical parlance, Thamil or Tamil, the speakers of an eternal language and acclaimed, pioneers of human civilization.
Sumerians were neither Aryans, nor Caucasians, and not even Semites, furthermore from where they originated, nobody knows, moreover they were characterized as mysterious people. Their brown complexion, locks of long dark hair, the language they spoke and the kind of writing - the first of it's kind, they used to scratch upon clay tablets, clearly differentiated their individuality and confirmed them of being belonged to the proto-Dravidian origin. When their writing deciphered, it became apparent that, they were not a distinct ethnic group, but were proto-Elamites. Ela or Illa denote earth and Elamites means "Earthly people."
Sumer is the ancient name for Southern Mesopotamia. Sume in Tamil means, the word denoting a country. The name Mesopotamia derived from Greek word, Mesos -middle and Potamai means -Rivers and so literally means, 'between the rivers. Sumer does not indicate any special ethnology, but people who lived in the country of Sumer. The capital of Sumer was Ur. This is a Tamil word, referring 'a city,' or 'a place of abode of people,' or 'a settlement'.
During the Protoliterate period (3200 - 2850 BC), the city states dominated by the temples emerged and writing was also invented. The earliest writings were in the form of pictograms, or simplified pictures on clay tablets, usually baked after inscribed with a reed. Subsequently, their writing gradually evolved towards cuneiform, a way of arranging impressions stamped on clay, by the wedge-like section of a chopped-off reed. Name of places, cities and other names clearly indicated them as the early form of Tamil. Available information leaves beyond doubt, that, Sumerians spoke Tamil, as spoken in the pre-historic days.
Sumerian civilization had deep roots. The people lived in villages and also had a few cult centers. One of the cult center was located at Eridu, probably originated in about 5000 BC. It grew steadily and by the middle of the fourth millennium, there was a temple, which provided the original model of the Mesopotamian monumental architecture, but today only a platform where it rested, remains to be seen. Excavation conducted at Eridu, beneath the earliest Sumerians buildings and foundations, revealed that, there existed an early Neolithic culture, before the invention of writing or the use of bronze, amidst the other ethnic groups in the rest of the world. They used to harvest agricultural crops by earthenware sickles. The researchers concluded that, pre-Sumerian people were proto-Elamites and confirmed their findings, when they discovered similar Neolithic remains at Sausa, once the capital of Elam. The word Sausa in Tamil means cleanliness. (Elam, Ilam and Eelam are the corruption of the same word. Authors and historians modified foreign names according to the predilections of their tongues. Confusion of the name became inevitable as the Western historians were neither Elamites nor Tamils.)
On the other side of the Tigris, lived Sumerians' neighbors, the warlike people, called the Elamites. The name of the country was Elam, and those who lived in the country were Elamites - the earthly people, who influenced the civilization, culture, writing and economy of the ancient Sumer. They were the most ancient civilized human race, who lived during the early Neolithic period, eight thousand years before Christ. Elamites were the first to use the "Wheel" for transportation. The invention, a milestone, a forerunner to the industrial revolution, but the Western historians however credited the invention to the Summers, who adopted it at a later stage.
Khuzistan, a region in Iran, located in the east of the Tigris, presently identified as the location of former Elam. The capital city of Elam was Sausa. The Elamites were believed to be Negroid in type and there was a strong Negroid strain in them. Elamites' civilization flourished some 8000 years ago, with city-states, distinctive culture and a written language. The language of the Elamites, after analysis found phonetically and morphologically similar to that of the Tamil.
Earlier, Elamites had a pictorial graphic writing system, called pictograms, followed by hieroglyphics. After the middle of the third millennium BC, most of the Elamites texts discovered were in the cuneiform scripts. According to a research, it became apparent that, Elamites spoke a language cognate with that of the Tamil language. Historical details of Elamites disappeared from the face of the world, as the Western historians felt that crediting the Tamils of being the pioneers of human civilization, may not place them in any advantageous position, therefore Elamites became a forgotten race and today Persian (Iranians) lives in the ancient land of Elam, once roamed by the glorious predecessors of the Tamils.
Again, historians identified the Elamites in the Sahara region, located in the northern Africa. Sahara was once an inhabitable region, consisted of vast grassy plains and luxuriant forests, traversed by rivers with extensive swamps. It was the home of pastoral peoples herding cattle, sheep and goats. In those days, before 3000 BC, what is now a stretch of a largest desert and arid canyon, was a fertile Savannah region, intersected and drained by rivers running down to Niger and by another system running nearly seven hundred and fifty miles into Lake Tehad.
The region earlier had a large lake called the Triniton Lake, almost bordering the Northern shores of Africa. Due to an earthquake, the European-African isthmus breached and forced the waters of the Triniton lake to flow into the land-locked Mediterranean sea. When the lake and other rivers, that once traversed the fertile plains of Sahara flowed into the Mediterranean sea and elongated it, the region began to dry up and by 1250 BC, the entire region turned into an arid zone, that led to the emergence of the world's largest desert. When Sahara began to dry-up, the people who lived in the region disappeared. What happened to them? After the world war II, scientist began to explore the Nile Valley region in the Sahara area and discovered traces of the early human existence, the "Asselar Man."
While a section of the Elamites remained stationary in Elam even after 2000 BC, a large section, according to the migratory tendency of the early civilized man, another section of them were on the move. Elamites suddenly disappeared from the Euphrates and Tigris river basin area. What happened to them? "About the ninth century BC, Elam and Elamites whose capital was Sausa, a people which possessed a tradition and civilization at least as old as the Sumerian, suddenly vanish from history. We do not know what happened. They seem to have been overrun and the population absorbed by the conquerors. Susa is in the hands of the Persians." The Outline of History by H.G.Wells. Whilst the Elamites were in Elam even before the Great Flood, they were also identified in the Sahara region, and whilst being in the Sahara region, a section of them was on constant move, migrating all over. They were on the move through the Ural mountain region, ultimately established themselves in India by entering through the North-west. Their dispersal ranged from Central Asia to the Mediterranean regions in Africa, the Islands in the Aegean Sea, into Eastern Europe, ultimately to India and beyond.
Elamites, described as long-headed from front to back, (dolichocephatic) mixed with short-headed, from front to back (brachycepphalic) Armenoids along their migratory routes and established themselves in India, before the 5th millennium BC. Those immigrants might have possibly come into prolonged contact with the Ural-Altic (Ural - Hungarian, Finnish; Altic-Turkish, Mongol) speakers, thus explaining the striking affinities between the Tamil language and Ural-Altic language groups. Subsequently, this particular race of people, the Elamites, the people with the Neolithic culture, spread eastward, through the East-Indies to Polynesia, Australia and beyond. The Tamils lived in those countries, before the Neolithic period, which period ascribed to the evolution of the mankind.
They began to evolve into a new human race and in 1816, Francis W.Ellis, a British civil servant was the first European to recognize the Tamils and the Language family of the Tamils. Later in 1856, Robert A. Caldwell, in his, "A Comparative Grammar of the Dravidian or South Indian Family of Languages," used the Sanskrit word 'Dravidian' to name the independent family of the Tamil language group. Caldwell based his interpretation of the word Dravida, according to a 7th century Sanskrit text, to conclude to mean, Tamil. Many consider it a disgraceful arrangement to name one of the greatest, oldest and eternal language, an independent group of language, by a Sanskrit word. Many scholars found the word Dravida derisive, and to date, the Tamil scholars have not come forward to rectify or amend the injustice done to the oldest and eternal language family, by naming it with a derisive Sanskrit word and to put the record straight.
On the other hand, Dravida is purely philological and is a name of a linguistic family and is not an isolated linguistic group, with uninterrupted continuity over a period of more than eight thousand years, covering the period from the proto-Elamites, pre-Mediterranean, pre-Hammito-Semitic languages up to the present day. A language, considered one of the oldest, eternal, spoken by the mankind from the very day human civilization emerged, but still young and vibrant, spoken even today by more than 80 million speakers, scattered all over the world.
When the Elamites were identified in India, earlier their distinct ethnicity ignored, but since 19th century, ethnologists identified them Dravidians, based on their language, as the speakers of Tamil. Even though, the Tamils' ethnic identity continued to transform, they continue to remain, staking their claim of being the oldest civilized nation, based on their linguistic and cultural continuity.
In the early ages, the name Manu, applied to 13 successive mythical progenitors and sovereigns of the earth and two of those Manu's descendants were Saman and Elam (Ilam). Saman was the brother, who ruled the northern portion of the sub-continent, while his sister Elam, ruled the Southern portion, consisting of Thonda Nadu, Vanda Nadu, Kapatapuram, Elamandalam (later called Eelam or Ilankai), Madura and Viramahendrapuram. Due to a great cataclysm, a vast portion of the Southern India submerged under the sea. The first Tamil Academy, (Sangam), located at the Southern Madura too submerged about 2500 years ago, before the birth of Christ. Due to the flood, Elamandalam separated from India, emerged in the form of an island and this island is Eelam.
Regarding the great deluge and the separate entity of Eelam, there are several Tamil literary records available and the following are few of those recorded evidences: "The Cruel ocean engulfed the river Pakhruli and a row of hills including the mountain Kumari." - Cilapathikaram - the Tamil lyrical epic - Chapter 11:20-21.
"In order to compensate the area lost to the sea, King Pandia moved tirelessly, to other lands and captured them." - Kalitokai
"The Roaring sound of the ocean water trembled the peak of the mountain." - Kuruntokai
"Before the ocean engulfing, lies few countries, and the southern boundaries were described." - Ilampuranar - a commentator of Tolkapiam.
P.E.P.Deraniyagala, a former Commissioner, Department of Archeology, in his lecture on "Some Aspects of the Fauna of Ceylon (Sri Lanka)." delivered at the Royal Asiatic Society on 28 May 1965, describes on the geographical isolation of Ceylon as follows:
"The presence of Jurassic deposits both in the North-western Ceylon and in the Ramnad district of India shows that the two were once connected, but since the Island lacks many of the consecutive deposits, it appears to have broken off from the mainland during this period. The two countries became reattached by early Miocene times but shortly afterwards they broke away again, and several such unions and separations have occurred. During each interval of isolation plants and animals had evolved new subspecies which had invaded the neighboring country whenever the land connection was renewed." "Geographical isolation is one of the essentials for subspecies formation and in living things the amount of latent ability to undergo future modification is termed 'plastic' whereas a species that no longer respond to the environment and is unable to modify itself has reached the limits of its plasticity and should be designed "constant" or "fixed." "Although geologists generally consider Ceylon to be a part of one of the most stable areas of the earth, this view is only partially correct and some parts of the Island have undergone alteration as will be seen from the following: (1) Early records mention that there were about a hundred Islands off its coasts (Fahien 410 AC) and also that there was a large Island named Giri adjacent to it, which had disappeared (Skanda Purana and Dipavamsa). (2) Portuguese record mention heavy earth quakes with explosion and the formation of numerous fissures. (3) The disappearance of many Islands that appear in Dutch and early British maps has been studied and attention drawn to their inability, to the oscillation that is so evident towards the North-west of Ceylon and the elevation of the Negambo beach area. (4) The raised beaches from Mundel and Eluvankulam areas to the north-west and others in the South-east. (5) The ring of waterfalls in the highlands indicate that they have been produce by recent thrust. (6) The river gravel in the north-western and northern provinces and pot holes especially in the southern and eastern provinces which are now remote from the rivers that had produced them. (7) Submarine canyons at the mouths of such rivers as the Daduru, the Valave, the two Maha Oyas, the Galoya and Mahavilli. (8) Borings in the Bere lagoon near Colombo have revealed alternate layers of marine, fluviatile and swamp conditions of Pleistocene age. (9) The rivers frequently display river captures and a change of their courses, e,g, Mahavilli and Valave rivers. (10) The original beds of some of the larger rivers such as the Kalu and Kalani rivers are ten to twenty feet lower than the sea bottom from their mouths up to a distance of about a mile inland. (11) The abundance of thermal and mineral springs. (12) The presence of diamond, chalcedony and natural glass." "Geological movements such as faulting, tilting and dislocation that occurred during the last few geological periods are among the more important factors that have influenced evolution, especially after Ceylon had become isolated."
Confirming P.E.P.Deraniyagala's findings that through the existence common fauna and flora in Ceylon and in the South Indian coast of the earlier land links of Ceylon with India, S.U. Deraniyagala writes in his "The Prehistory of Ceylon, "The fauna and flora of peninsular India clearly suggest prehistoric land connects with Lanka at various times during the Quaternary, as firmly indicated by the presence of Elephas maximus, an Upper Pleistocene form, on either side of the Palk Starit. Land connections with the mainland would of course have been prime importance for prehistoric settlement of the island prior to the advent of seafaring."
Compilers of Ceylon annals, purposely avoided the historical geography of the country. They have failed to analyze the geographical side of the time wrought changes that took place in the formation of the insular country. This study helps to know the past, as well as helps to reconstruct the past more vividly. The geographical study of the pre-historic era of Ceylon, illuminates the physical evolutionary changes that took place in the landscape of the country from the very ancient period and provides a vivid picture of the early inhabitants, whether they were there when the country separated, or they migrated after the separation and how they happened to live in the island along with other details, such as the pre-historic society, their social interaction, civilization, the government and all the other details needed to discern a pattern of the past, to conclude the true historical background.
Mention regarding the origin of Eelam as an insular country, is also found in the Holy Bible. The Bible describes that Elam, 'became the maritime nations in various lands, each with a separate language.' Genesis 10, The Descendants of Noah- 1These are the families of Shem, Ham, and Japheth, who were the three sons of Noah; for sons were born to them after the flood. 2The sons of Japheth were Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshech, Tiras. 3The Sons of Gomer,: Ashkenaz, Riphath, Togarmah. 4The sons of Javan, Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim, Dodanim. 5Their descendants became the maritime nations in various lands, each with a separate language. 21 Eber descended from Shem the oldest brother of Japheth. 22 Here is the list of Shem's other descendants: Elam, Ashur, Arpachdad, Lud, Aram.
Following description provided in The Holy Bible, Genesis 7:19, about the deluge, the greatest cataclysm recorded in the human history: "All the tall mountains that were under the whole heavens came to be covered." - Also in, 2 Peter, 3:6,- "the world of that time suffered destruction."
As indicated in the Holy Bible, the deluge occurred in the year 2370 BC. The flood began - "in the second month on the seventeenth day of the month." - Genesis 7:11 The second month corresponds to the latter part of October and the first part of November on the present calendar. Many people around the world commemorate the 'Day of the Dead' or the 'Feast of Ancestors,' at the time of the year, to reflect the memory of the destruction caused by the Deluge and to remember the deaths.
After the deluge, according to The Holy Bible, descendants of Noah became the Maritime nations of the world. One of such descendant is Elam, also a maritime nation. The present Eelam, according to The Holy Bible, came into existence, after the Deluge. Therefore, the Eelam of today, is a creation by God, and according to The Holy Bible, the Elamites are a blessed maritime nation and not denotes the earlier nation Elam by the river basin of Euphrates and Tigris. The descendants of Elam, who descended from Noah and the maritime nation Elam came into existence, are both blessed in the Holy Bible and this act of God goes to prove the eternality of the country and the nation.
The Tamils of Eelam had their own rulers after the country separated from the mainland India, due to the second universal deluge. The land-mass that separated from the Kumari (Comarin) continent called Elamandalam, came into existence as Eelanadu or Lanka, the resplendent country, in the midst of the Indian Ocean. As prophesied in the Holy Bible, the maritime nation Eelam became a reality.
The history of the Tamils, is the story of the world. The history of the world is not complete, if the true story of the Eelam is not included. Up to date, a few historians wrote bits and pieces about the Tamils and Eelam, but those were not the complete story. Writing the true story demand researches to uncover the distorted, as well as the deliberately ignored details, to rewrite the discarded facts, the missing pages, into a true historical treatise.
Thiruvalluvar the great Tamil poet, in the opening chapter of his treatise on moral aphorism called Thiru Kural, in the first chapter "Praise of God" and in the very first Kural - prosody, a unit of two line verse, called couplet or distich, states -" 'Aah,' is the first letter of alphabets (in Tamil), God, is primordial to earth." He gave God the supreme position, as one that existed ever since. Now the question arises regarding the emergence of the world. According to Rig-Veda, the Aryan concept, the world emerged from, Soonya, which means from the Void or Nothingness :- Then even nothingness was not, nor existence, There was no air then, nor the heavens beyond it. Who covered it? Where was it? In whose keeping? Was there then cosmic water, in depths unfathomed?.... But, after all, Who knows, and who can say, Whence it all came, and how creation happened? The gods themselves are later than creation, So who knows truly whence it has arisen? - The Wonder That was India by A.L.Basham, (Rig Veda Translation).
Earlier, the entire land area of the world formed one continent. Later, due to grave impact of the Lunar and Solar gravitational pull including other violent process that took place deep inside the earth's core, the earth's lateral movements or the drifting of the earth, caused the split of the continent into two proto-continents, Laur Asia, the Northern hemisphere, that includes Europe, North America, greater part of Asia and Gondawanland, the Southern hemisphere. Geologists believed that a great continent called Gondawanland composed of South America, Africa, India, Australia and Antarctica. Researchers concluded that, Gondawnland remained one single continent, nearly 300 million years, subsequently after 180 to 150 million years, it began to break up.
Many millions' years after the break up of the Gondawanland, a land-mass named Lemuria continent emerged, for the first time surrounded by the ocean. This land-mass that came into existence, was the old oriental continent that stretched in unbroken land formation from Madagascar to Malay Archipelago, to Australia, including Polynesia and northwards to the present valley of Ganges. The Ganges valley, earlier occupied by the sea, spreading westward across Persia (Iran), Arabia (Middle-east) and the Sahara regions, forming the southern limit of the Palae-Arctic Continent, that embraced Europe, North Africa and Europe.
The land-mass of Lemuria, the eastern part of the Gondawanland, took credit for the human evolution. Paleontologists, gave Lemuria great importance as the place from where man emerged. According to findings, the ape - Homo-Erectus evolved into man - Homo Sapiens, from Lemuria. Three phases in the human history were recorded before the knowledge and use of metals, are often distinguished as, the Eolithic Age - or the early period of the Stone Age, when crude stone tools were used, followed by Paleolithic Age - when primitive man used unpolished chipped stone tools and finally the Neolithic Age - characterized by primitive farming and the use of polished stone and flint tools and weapons. An advance state of a society began to emerge, when man became a farmer, which led to the dawn of the human civilization. The interaction of the human-beings in a creative way, led to the emergence of the human civilization.
The earliest people to form the real cities in the world were those who lived in the region between the Euphrates and the Tigris river basins. The land bordering and between the Euphrates and Tigris rivers was called Mesopotamia. Historians consider the people who lived in the lower Mesopotamia as "mysterious" people and called them Sumerians, in short, Sumers. Western Historians had simply ignored the language they spoke as agglutinative language which has no clear or close relationship to any known language family. Later, researchers concluded that, the Sumers as proto-Dravidians. Even today, historians are not that comfortable to accept Sumers as Dravidians, speakers of the language, described in the historical parlance, Thamil or Tamil, the speakers of an eternal language and acclaimed, pioneers of human civilization.
Sumerians were neither Aryans, nor Caucasians, and not even Semites, furthermore from where they originated, nobody knows, moreover they were characterized as mysterious people. Their brown complexion, locks of long dark hair, the language they spoke and the kind of writing - the first of it's kind, they used to scratch upon clay tablets, clearly differentiated their individuality and confirmed them of being belonged to the proto-Dravidian origin. When their writing deciphered, it became apparent that, they were not a distinct ethnic group, but were proto-Elamites. Ela or Illa denote earth and Elamites means "Earthly people."
Sumer is the ancient name for Southern Mesopotamia. Sume in Tamil means, the word denoting a country. The name Mesopotamia derived from Greek word, Mesos -middle and Potamai means -Rivers and so literally means, 'between the rivers. Sumer does not indicate any special ethnology, but people who lived in the country of Sumer. The capital of Sumer was Ur. This is a Tamil word, referring 'a city,' or 'a place of abode of people,' or 'a settlement'.
During the Protoliterate period (3200 - 2850 BC), the city states dominated by the temples emerged and writing was also invented. The earliest writings were in the form of pictograms, or simplified pictures on clay tablets, usually baked after inscribed with a reed. Subsequently, their writing gradually evolved towards cuneiform, a way of arranging impressions stamped on clay, by the wedge-like section of a chopped-off reed. Name of places, cities and other names clearly indicated them as the early form of Tamil. Available information leaves beyond doubt, that, Sumerians spoke Tamil, as spoken in the pre-historic days.
Sumerian civilization had deep roots. The people lived in villages and also had a few cult centers. One of the cult center was located at Eridu, probably originated in about 5000 BC. It grew steadily and by the middle of the fourth millennium, there was a temple, which provided the original model of the Mesopotamian monumental architecture, but today only a platform where it rested, remains to be seen. Excavation conducted at Eridu, beneath the earliest Sumerians buildings and foundations, revealed that, there existed an early Neolithic culture, before the invention of writing or the use of bronze, amidst the other ethnic groups in the rest of the world. They used to harvest agricultural crops by earthenware sickles. The researchers concluded that, pre-Sumerian people were proto-Elamites and confirmed their findings, when they discovered similar Neolithic remains at Sausa, once the capital of Elam. The word Sausa in Tamil means cleanliness. (Elam, Ilam and Eelam are the corruption of the same word. Authors and historians modified foreign names according to the predilections of their tongues. Confusion of the name became inevitable as the Western historians were neither Elamites nor Tamils.)
On the other side of the Tigris, lived Sumerians' neighbors, the warlike people, called the Elamites. The name of the country was Elam, and those who lived in the country were Elamites - the earthly people, who influenced the civilization, culture, writing and economy of the ancient Sumer. They were the most ancient civilized human race, who lived during the early Neolithic period, eight thousand years before Christ. Elamites were the first to use the "Wheel" for transportation. The invention, a milestone, a forerunner to the industrial revolution, but the Western historians however credited the invention to the Summers, who adopted it at a later stage.
Khuzistan, a region in Iran, located in the east of the Tigris, presently identified as the location of former Elam. The capital city of Elam was Sausa. The Elamites were believed to be Negroid in type and there was a strong Negroid strain in them. Elamites' civilization flourished some 8000 years ago, with city-states, distinctive culture and a written language. The language of the Elamites, after analysis found phonetically and morphologically similar to that of the Tamil.
Earlier, Elamites had a pictorial graphic writing system, called pictograms, followed by hieroglyphics. After the middle of the third millennium BC, most of the Elamites texts discovered were in the cuneiform scripts. According to a research, it became apparent that, Elamites spoke a language cognate with that of the Tamil language. Historical details of Elamites disappeared from the face of the world, as the Western historians felt that crediting the Tamils of being the pioneers of human civilization, may not place them in any advantageous position, therefore Elamites became a forgotten race and today Persian (Iranians) lives in the ancient land of Elam, once roamed by the glorious predecessors of the Tamils.
Again, historians identified the Elamites in the Sahara region, located in the northern Africa. Sahara was once an inhabitable region, consisted of vast grassy plains and luxuriant forests, traversed by rivers with extensive swamps. It was the home of pastoral peoples herding cattle, sheep and goats. In those days, before 3000 BC, what is now a stretch of a largest desert and arid canyon, was a fertile Savannah region, intersected and drained by rivers running down to Niger and by another system running nearly seven hundred and fifty miles into Lake Tehad.
The region earlier had a large lake called the Triniton Lake, almost bordering the Northern shores of Africa. Due to an earthquake, the European-African isthmus breached and forced the waters of the Triniton lake to flow into the land-locked Mediterranean sea. When the lake and other rivers, that once traversed the fertile plains of Sahara flowed into the Mediterranean sea and elongated it, the region began to dry up and by 1250 BC, the entire region turned into an arid zone, that led to the emergence of the world's largest desert. When Sahara began to dry-up, the people who lived in the region disappeared. What happened to them? After the world war II, scientist began to explore the Nile Valley region in the Sahara area and discovered traces of the early human existence, the "Asselar Man."
While a section of the Elamites remained stationary in Elam even after 2000 BC, a large section, according to the migratory tendency of the early civilized man, another section of them were on the move. Elamites suddenly disappeared from the Euphrates and Tigris river basin area. What happened to them? "About the ninth century BC, Elam and Elamites whose capital was Sausa, a people which possessed a tradition and civilization at least as old as the Sumerian, suddenly vanish from history. We do not know what happened. They seem to have been overrun and the population absorbed by the conquerors. Susa is in the hands of the Persians." The Outline of History by H.G.Wells. Whilst the Elamites were in Elam even before the Great Flood, they were also identified in the Sahara region, and whilst being in the Sahara region, a section of them was on constant move, migrating all over. They were on the move through the Ural mountain region, ultimately established themselves in India by entering through the North-west. Their dispersal ranged from Central Asia to the Mediterranean regions in Africa, the Islands in the Aegean Sea, into Eastern Europe, ultimately to India and beyond.
Elamites, described as long-headed from front to back, (dolichocephatic) mixed with short-headed, from front to back (brachycepphalic) Armenoids along their migratory routes and established themselves in India, before the 5th millennium BC. Those immigrants might have possibly come into prolonged contact with the Ural-Altic (Ural - Hungarian, Finnish; Altic-Turkish, Mongol) speakers, thus explaining the striking affinities between the Tamil language and Ural-Altic language groups. Subsequently, this particular race of people, the Elamites, the people with the Neolithic culture, spread eastward, through the East-Indies to Polynesia, Australia and beyond. The Tamils lived in those countries, before the Neolithic period, which period ascribed to the evolution of the mankind.
They began to evolve into a new human race and in 1816, Francis W.Ellis, a British civil servant was the first European to recognize the Tamils and the Language family of the Tamils. Later in 1856, Robert A. Caldwell, in his, "A Comparative Grammar of the Dravidian or South Indian Family of Languages," used the Sanskrit word 'Dravidian' to name the independent family of the Tamil language group. Caldwell based his interpretation of the word Dravida, according to a 7th century Sanskrit text, to conclude to mean, Tamil. Many consider it a disgraceful arrangement to name one of the greatest, oldest and eternal language, an independent group of language, by a Sanskrit word. Many scholars found the word Dravida derisive, and to date, the Tamil scholars have not come forward to rectify or amend the injustice done to the oldest and eternal language family, by naming it with a derisive Sanskrit word and to put the record straight.
On the other hand, Dravida is purely philological and is a name of a linguistic family and is not an isolated linguistic group, with uninterrupted continuity over a period of more than eight thousand years, covering the period from the proto-Elamites, pre-Mediterranean, pre-Hammito-Semitic languages up to the present day. A language, considered one of the oldest, eternal, spoken by the mankind from the very day human civilization emerged, but still young and vibrant, spoken even today by more than 80 million speakers, scattered all over the world.
When the Elamites were identified in India, earlier their distinct ethnicity ignored, but since 19th century, ethnologists identified them Dravidians, based on their language, as the speakers of Tamil. Even though, the Tamils' ethnic identity continued to transform, they continue to remain, staking their claim of being the oldest civilized nation, based on their linguistic and cultural continuity.
In the early ages, the name Manu, applied to 13 successive mythical progenitors and sovereigns of the earth and two of those Manu's descendants were Saman and Elam (Ilam). Saman was the brother, who ruled the northern portion of the sub-continent, while his sister Elam, ruled the Southern portion, consisting of Thonda Nadu, Vanda Nadu, Kapatapuram, Elamandalam (later called Eelam or Ilankai), Madura and Viramahendrapuram. Due to a great cataclysm, a vast portion of the Southern India submerged under the sea. The first Tamil Academy, (Sangam), located at the Southern Madura too submerged about 2500 years ago, before the birth of Christ. Due to the flood, Elamandalam separated from India, emerged in the form of an island and this island is Eelam.
Regarding the great deluge and the separate entity of Eelam, there are several Tamil literary records available and the following are few of those recorded evidences: "The Cruel ocean engulfed the river Pakhruli and a row of hills including the mountain Kumari." - Cilapathikaram - the Tamil lyrical epic - Chapter 11:20-21.
"In order to compensate the area lost to the sea, King Pandia moved tirelessly, to other lands and captured them." - Kalitokai
"The Roaring sound of the ocean water trembled the peak of the mountain." - Kuruntokai
"Before the ocean engulfing, lies few countries, and the southern boundaries were described." - Ilampuranar - a commentator of Tolkapiam.
P.E.P.Deraniyagala, a former Commissioner, Department of Archeology, in his lecture on "Some Aspects of the Fauna of Ceylon (Sri Lanka)." delivered at the Royal Asiatic Society on 28 May 1965, describes on the geographical isolation of Ceylon as follows:
"The presence of Jurassic deposits both in the North-western Ceylon and in the Ramnad district of India shows that the two were once connected, but since the Island lacks many of the consecutive deposits, it appears to have broken off from the mainland during this period. The two countries became reattached by early Miocene times but shortly afterwards they broke away again, and several such unions and separations have occurred. During each interval of isolation plants and animals had evolved new subspecies which had invaded the neighboring country whenever the land connection was renewed." "Geographical isolation is one of the essentials for subspecies formation and in living things the amount of latent ability to undergo future modification is termed 'plastic' whereas a species that no longer respond to the environment and is unable to modify itself has reached the limits of its plasticity and should be designed "constant" or "fixed." "Although geologists generally consider Ceylon to be a part of one of the most stable areas of the earth, this view is only partially correct and some parts of the Island have undergone alteration as will be seen from the following: (1) Early records mention that there were about a hundred Islands off its coasts (Fahien 410 AC) and also that there was a large Island named Giri adjacent to it, which had disappeared (Skanda Purana and Dipavamsa). (2) Portuguese record mention heavy earth quakes with explosion and the formation of numerous fissures. (3) The disappearance of many Islands that appear in Dutch and early British maps has been studied and attention drawn to their inability, to the oscillation that is so evident towards the North-west of Ceylon and the elevation of the Negambo beach area. (4) The raised beaches from Mundel and Eluvankulam areas to the north-west and others in the South-east. (5) The ring of waterfalls in the highlands indicate that they have been produce by recent thrust. (6) The river gravel in the north-western and northern provinces and pot holes especially in the southern and eastern provinces which are now remote from the rivers that had produced them. (7) Submarine canyons at the mouths of such rivers as the Daduru, the Valave, the two Maha Oyas, the Galoya and Mahavilli. (8) Borings in the Bere lagoon near Colombo have revealed alternate layers of marine, fluviatile and swamp conditions of Pleistocene age. (9) The rivers frequently display river captures and a change of their courses, e,g, Mahavilli and Valave rivers. (10) The original beds of some of the larger rivers such as the Kalu and Kalani rivers are ten to twenty feet lower than the sea bottom from their mouths up to a distance of about a mile inland. (11) The abundance of thermal and mineral springs. (12) The presence of diamond, chalcedony and natural glass." "Geological movements such as faulting, tilting and dislocation that occurred during the last few geological periods are among the more important factors that have influenced evolution, especially after Ceylon had become isolated."
Confirming P.E.P.Deraniyagala's findings that through the existence common fauna and flora in Ceylon and in the South Indian coast of the earlier land links of Ceylon with India, S.U. Deraniyagala writes in his "The Prehistory of Ceylon, "The fauna and flora of peninsular India clearly suggest prehistoric land connects with Lanka at various times during the Quaternary, as firmly indicated by the presence of Elephas maximus, an Upper Pleistocene form, on either side of the Palk Starit. Land connections with the mainland would of course have been prime importance for prehistoric settlement of the island prior to the advent of seafaring."
Compilers of Ceylon annals, purposely avoided the historical geography of the country. They have failed to analyze the geographical side of the time wrought changes that took place in the formation of the insular country. This study helps to know the past, as well as helps to reconstruct the past more vividly. The geographical study of the pre-historic era of Ceylon, illuminates the physical evolutionary changes that took place in the landscape of the country from the very ancient period and provides a vivid picture of the early inhabitants, whether they were there when the country separated, or they migrated after the separation and how they happened to live in the island along with other details, such as the pre-historic society, their social interaction, civilization, the government and all the other details needed to discern a pattern of the past, to conclude the true historical background.
Mention regarding the origin of Eelam as an insular country, is also found in the Holy Bible. The Bible describes that Elam, 'became the maritime nations in various lands, each with a separate language.' Genesis 10, The Descendants of Noah- 1These are the families of Shem, Ham, and Japheth, who were the three sons of Noah; for sons were born to them after the flood. 2The sons of Japheth were Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshech, Tiras. 3The Sons of Gomer,: Ashkenaz, Riphath, Togarmah. 4The sons of Javan, Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim, Dodanim. 5Their descendants became the maritime nations in various lands, each with a separate language. 21 Eber descended from Shem the oldest brother of Japheth. 22 Here is the list of Shem's other descendants: Elam, Ashur, Arpachdad, Lud, Aram.
Following description provided in The Holy Bible, Genesis 7:19, about the deluge, the greatest cataclysm recorded in the human history: "All the tall mountains that were under the whole heavens came to be covered." - Also in, 2 Peter, 3:6,- "the world of that time suffered destruction."
As indicated in the Holy Bible, the deluge occurred in the year 2370 BC. The flood began - "in the second month on the seventeenth day of the month." - Genesis 7:11 The second month corresponds to the latter part of October and the first part of November on the present calendar. Many people around the world commemorate the 'Day of the Dead' or the 'Feast of Ancestors,' at the time of the year, to reflect the memory of the destruction caused by the Deluge and to remember the deaths.
After the deluge, according to The Holy Bible, descendants of Noah became the Maritime nations of the world. One of such descendant is Elam, also a maritime nation. The present Eelam, according to The Holy Bible, came into existence, after the Deluge. Therefore, the Eelam of today, is a creation by God, and according to The Holy Bible, the Elamites are a blessed maritime nation and not denotes the earlier nation Elam by the river basin of Euphrates and Tigris. The descendants of Elam, who descended from Noah and the maritime nation Elam came into existence, are both blessed in the Holy Bible and this act of God goes to prove the eternality of the country and the nation.
The Tamils of Eelam had their own rulers after the country separated from the mainland India, due to the second universal deluge. The land-mass that separated from the Kumari (Comarin) continent called Elamandalam, came into existence as Eelanadu or Lanka, the resplendent country, in the midst of the Indian Ocean. As prophesied in the Holy Bible, the maritime nation Eelam became a reality.
Research on Indian Languages
Languages of the Dravidian family is spoken by 39,400,000 people (1981 est.)
in southern Indian state, also another 2,697,000 in Sri Lanka (Ceylon),
by smallernumbers of people in Burma, Malaysia, Indonesia,
and Vietnam (about1,400,000), in East and South Africa (almost 250,000),
and by still smaller numbers in Guyana and on the islands of Fiji,
Mauritius,Réunion, Madagascar, Trinidad, and Martinique.
The earliest literary monuments of the
language belong roughly to the 3rd and 2nd centuriesBC. There exist a
number of local dialects, the major dialect regionsbeing the northern
and eastern areas combined, the western area, thesouthern area (split
into at least four major dialects of Madurai,Tirunelveli, Nanjiland,
and Ramnad), and Sri Lanka (Ceylon).Correlated with the social
position of the speaker are a number ofspeech forms; a major division
occurs between the Brahmin and thenon-Brahmin varieties. In addition,
there is a sharp dichotomy betweenthe formal language and informal
speech. Malayalam, which is closely related to Tamil, is spoken in the
Indianstate of Kerala by some 21,700,000 people. Possessing an
independentwritten script, it also has a rich modern literature. There
are atleast three main regional dialects (North, Central, South)
ofMalayalam and a number of communal dialects. In the Nilgiris and
adjacent regions, several minor tribes speak thefollowing languages:
Kota (1,400), Toda (1,145), Badaga (128,500),Irula (Irula) (6,176).
The less well-known languages of a number ofother tribes may yet be
established as independent members of theDravidian family (e.g.,
Kurumba, Paniya). Kodagu (Kodagu), a non-literary language of a
mountainous regioncalled Coorg, has 119,000 speakers. Kannada
(Kanarese), which is spoken by 25,700,000 people in the Indianstate of
Karnataka, exhibits a dichotomy between educated speech andcolloquial
Kannada; in the latter at least three social dialects arerecognizable
that may be characterized as Brahmin, non-Brahmin, andHarijan
("untouchable"). A number of regional dialects (among them areDharwar,
Bangalore, and Mangalore) also exist. Kannada has anorthography of its
own and an important ancient and modern literature. To the south of
the Kannada territory, more than 1,400,000 peoplespeak Tulu (Tulu), a
South Dravidian language having no developedwritten literature. Telugu
(spoken by 52,986,000 people), the official language of thestate of
Andhra Pradesh, exhibits a dichotomy between the written andthe spoken
styles, in addition to a number of sharply distinct localand regional
dialects (including Telangana, coastal area, Rayalaseema,and a
"transitional" zone) and divisions between Brahmin, nonBrahmin,and
Harijan speech. The language has its own script, closely akin tothat
of Kannada, and an important literary tradition. In extreme northern
Andhra Pradesh and in Maharashtra, the Kolamilanguage is spoken by
approximately 84,000 individuals. Parji isspoken by about 36,000
individuals in Andhra Pradesh and Orissa. TheKonda Dora, a scheduled
tribe of some 23,000, live mostly in AndhraPradesh and speak Konda.
The Gadba, who live mainly in Andhra Pradesh,number approximately
28,000. Pengo is spoken by fewer than 2,000individuals living in
Orissa, and Kui and Kuvi are spoken by a numberof tribes in Andhra
Pradesh and Orissa. In Madhya Pradesh and parts of Andhra Pradesh,
Maharashtra, andOrissa, many groups of Gonds (including about
2,620,000 persons) speaka number of Gondi dialects. To the north, in
Assam, Bihar, MadhyaPradesh, Tripura, and West Bengal, the Oraon tribe
speaks Kurukh(1,700,000), and, near the borders of Bihar and West
Bengal, 100,000tribals speak Malto. The only Dravidian language that
is spoken entirely outside India isBrahui, with about 1,580,000
speakers who live in Sindh andBalochistan provinces of southern
Pakistan. Historical survey of the Dravidian languages Although in
modern times speakers of the various Dravidian languageshave mainly
occupied the southern portion of India, while those of theIndo-Aryan
(Indic) tongues have predominated in northern India,nothing definite
is known about the ancient domain of the Dravidianparent speech. It
is, however, a well-established and well-supportedhypothesis that
Dravidian speakers must have been widespreadthroughout India,
including the northwest region. This is clearbecause a number of
features of the Dravidian languages appear in theRigveda, the earliest
known Indo-Aryan literary work, thus showingthat the Dravidian
languages must have been present in the area of theIndo-Aryan ones.
The Indo-Aryan languages were not, however,originally native to India;
they were introduced by Aryan invadersfrom the north. Several scholars
have demonstrated that pre-Indo-Aryanand pre-Dravidian bilingualism in
India provided conditions for thefar-reaching influence of Dravidian
on the Indo-Aryan tongues in thespheres of phonology (e.g., the
retroflex consonants, made with thetongue curled upward toward the
palate), syntax (e.g., the frequentuse of gerunds, which are nonfinite
verb forms of nominal character,as in "by the falling of the rain"),
and vocabulary (a number ofDravidian loanwords apparently appearing in
the Rigveda itself). Thus a form of Proto-Dravidian, or perhaps
Proto-North Dravidian, musthave been extensive in northern India
before the advent of the Aryans.Apart from the survival of some
islands of Dravidian speech, however,the process of replacement of the
Dravidian languages by the Aryantongues was entirely completed before
the beginning of the ChristianEra, after a period of bilingualism that
must have lasted manycenturies. Finally, the almost universal adoption
of Indo-Aryan in thenorth and of Dravidian in the south has covered up
the originallinguistic diversity of India. The circumstances of the
advent of Dravidian speakers in India areshrouded in mystery. There
are vague linguistic and cultural ties withthe Urals, with the
Mediterranean area, and with Iran. It is possiblethat a
Dravidian-speaking people that can be described asdolichocephalic
(longheaded from front to back) Mediterraneans mixedwith
brachycephalic (short-headed from front to back) Armenoids
andestablished themselves in northwestern India during the 4th
millenniumBC. Along their route, these immigrants may have possibly
come into anintimate, prolonged contact with the Ural-Altaic speakers,
thusexplaining the striking affinities between the Dravidian
andUral-Altaic language groups. Between 2000 and 1500 BC, there was
afairly constant movement of Dravidian speakers from the northwest
tothe southeast of India, and about 1500 BC three distinct
dialectgroups probably existed: Proto-North Dravidian,
Proto-CentralDravidian, and Proto-South Dravidian. The beginnings of
the splits inthe parent speech, however, are obviously earlier. It is
possible thatProto-Brahui was the first language to split off from
Proto-Dravidian,probably during the immigration movement into India
sometime in the4th millennium BC, and that the next subgroup to split
off wasProto-Kurukh-Malto, sometime in the 3rd millennium BC (see the
familytree diagrams,Figure 1, Figure 2, and Figure 3). Compared to the
work done on other language families, the progress incomparative
Dravidian studies has been slow and firm results are stillmeagre.
Considerable knowledge has been acquired in comparativephonology
(sound systems), but correspondences have been worked outonly for the
sounds in the roots of words. Very little comparativework has been
done on grammatical processes, and complete historicalgrammars of the
literary languages are still lacking. Hence thereconstruction of any
feature of the Dravidian protolanguage, with thepossible exception of
some parts of the phonology, must necessarily beconsidered very
tentative. The vowel system of Proto-Dravidian consisted of five
vowels--*i, *u,*e, *o, *a (an asterisk denotes an unattested,
reconstructed,hypothetical form)--each having two quantities, short
and long.Relative stability of root vowels seems to have been the
rule. TheProto-Dravidian consonant system consisted of obstruants
(stops) *p,*t, *t, *t, *c, *k; nasals *m, *n, *n, *ñ; laterals *l, *l;
the flap*r; the voiced retroflex continuant *r; and the semivowels *y
and *v.The most characteristic feature of the consonantal system was
the sixpositions of articulation for obstruants: labial (with the
lips),dental (tongue touching the back of the upper teeth), alveolar
(tonguetouching the upper gum ridge), retroflex (tip of tongue curled
upwardtoward the palate and back), palatal (body of tongue touching
thepalate, or roof of the mouth), and velar (back of tongue touching
thevelum, or soft palate). The retroflex series was very distinctive
andimportant and comprised an obstruant *t, a nasal *n, a lateral *l,
anda continuant *r. No consonant of the alveolar or retroflex
seriesbegan a word. In the final position all of the consonants
occurred,but all of the obstruants were followed by an automatic
release sound,the vowel *-u. Initial consonant clusters did not occur.
There wasonly one series of obstruant phonemes (distinctive sounds);
thesesounds were voiceless (produced without vibration of the vocal
cords)initially and voiced (with vocal cord vibration) between vowels.
AllProto-Dravidian roots were monosyllables. Proto-Dravidian used only
suffixes, never prefixes or infixes, in theconstruction of inflected
forms. Hence, the roots of words alwaysoccurred at the beginning.
Nouns, verbs, and indeclinable wordsconstituted the original word
classes. During the 1st millennium BC, while Aryanization steadily
progressedin north India, the Dravidian-speaking newcomers began to
mix with theNegritos and Proto-Australoids in the south; this process
ofacculturation continued during the period from approximately 1200
to600 BC. A movement of the Aryans into the south of India
begansometime about 1000 BC. Before the 5th century BC,
Proto-SouthDravidian was probably still one language, but with two
stronglymarked dialects. Within Proto-Central Dravidian, a similarly
deeptwo-way division also occurred, and as discussed above,
NorthDravidian must by that time have already been split into
theKurukh-Malto and Brahui subgroups (see the family tree
diagrams,Figure 1, Figure 2, and Figure 3). Apart from a possible
Dravidian word in the Hebrew text of the Bible(tukkhiyim "peacocks";
cf. Tamil tokai "tail of a peacock"), theDravidian languages enter
history in Sanskrit and Greco-Roman texts.The Ceras, a south Indian
dynasty, are possibly mentioned in the earlySanskrit text AitareyaA
ranyaka. Katyayana, a grammarian of the 4thcentury BC, mentions the
countries of Pandya (Tamil pantiya), Cola(Tamil cola), and Kerala, or
Cera (Tamil cera); these lands were wellknown to Kautilya (4th century
BC), the author of the earliesttreatise on statecraft, and mentions of
them also appear in the edictsof the great Buddhist leader Asoka (3rd
century BC). The term dravidaitself is almost certainly a
Sanskritization (with an inserted"hypercorrect" r) of the earlier Pali
and Prakrit terms damilo,damila, davida, which must have been derived
from the Tamil name ofthe language, tamil. A number of South Dravidian
words, almost all ofthem geographic and dynastic names, occur in such
Greco-Roman sourcesas the Periplus maris Erythraei ("Circumnavigation
of the ErythraeanSea") of about AD 89 and in the writing of Ptolemaeus
of Naukratis ofthe 2nd century AD; it is also very probable that
Western-languageterms for rice (compare Italian riso, Latin oryza,
Greek oryza) andginger (compare Italian zenzero, German Ingwer, Greek
zingiberis) arecultural loans from Old Tamil, in which they are arici
and iñciver,respectively. Sometime during the reign of Asoka (3rd
century BC), the two SouthDravidian languages, Tamil and Kannada,
developed into distinct idiomsand the two cultures emerged as separate
entities; a third majorDravidian linguistic and cultural unit, Telugu,
appeared in the Andhracountry. In the period from 300 to 100 BC, one
of the pre-Tamildialects (probably that of Madurai) gained prestige
and became thestandard literary language (centamil), the written form
of early OldTamil, which became established in poetic texts and in its
earliestgrammar, Tolkappiyam. During the same period, about 250 BC,
the AsokanSouthern Brahmi script was adapted for Tamil and was used in
shortcave inscriptions by Jain monks over a period of several
centuries,dating approximately from the 2nd century BC to the 5th
century AD. The earliest inscriptions in Kannada may be dated at AD
450; Kannadaliterature begins with Nrpatunga's Kavirajamarga, about AD
850. Theoldest Telugu inscription is from AD 633, and the literature
beginswith the grammarian Nannaya's 11th-century translation of the
Sanskritclassic the Mahabharata. In Malayalam, the earliest writings
are fromthe close of the 9th century, and the first literary text is
probablythe Bhasakautaliyam, AD 1125-1250. Since these attested
beginnings, the four languages--Tamil, Malayalam,Kannada, and
Telugu--have been used continuously in administration andliterature up
to the present day. In addition to possessing an immensewealth of
epigraphic and literary texts, they all developed pronouncedfeatures
of diglossia, a dichotomy between the standardized, formallanguage and
the informal, colloquial speech, which is divided intoregional as well
as social dialects. In modern times, all of the fourcultivated
languages have adapted quickly to new conditions resultingfrom
economic, social, and political changes. All of these languagesare
used in teaching basic courses in science and the arts; and
newtechnological terminology is coined, sometimes based either on
Englishor Sanskrit models, but often on exclusively indigenous
linguisticmaterial (in Tamil). To date, nothing is known about the
history of the nonliteraryDravidian languages before their
"discovery," which began at the endof the 18th century. The Gonds,
however, are mentioned (as Gondaloi)by Ptolemy of Naukratis, writing
in the 2nd century AD. A tendency toward structural and systemic
balance and stability ischaracteristic of the Dravidian group.
Nevertheless, there is no doubtabout the influence of the other
languages of India. Dravidianlanguages show extensive lexical
(vocabulary) borrowing, but only afew traits of structural (either
phonological or grammatical)borrowing, from the Indo-Aryan tongues. On
the other hand, Indo-Aryanshows rather large-scale structural
borrowing from Dravidian, butrelatively few loanwords. There is indeed
a possibility of Dravidianand Indo-Aryan drawing even closer together
in the future; but it ishighly doubtful that a new family of languages
will develop in such away that the bases of the contributing groups
(i.e., Dravidian andIndo-Aryan) will be completely eliminated through
the phenomena ofborrowing.
in southern Indian state, also another 2,697,000 in Sri Lanka (Ceylon),
by smallernumbers of people in Burma, Malaysia, Indonesia,
and Vietnam (about1,400,000), in East and South Africa (almost 250,000),
and by still smaller numbers in Guyana and on the islands of Fiji,
Mauritius,Réunion, Madagascar, Trinidad, and Martinique.
The earliest literary monuments of the
language belong roughly to the 3rd and 2nd centuriesBC. There exist a
number of local dialects, the major dialect regionsbeing the northern
and eastern areas combined, the western area, thesouthern area (split
into at least four major dialects of Madurai,Tirunelveli, Nanjiland,
and Ramnad), and Sri Lanka (Ceylon).Correlated with the social
position of the speaker are a number ofspeech forms; a major division
occurs between the Brahmin and thenon-Brahmin varieties. In addition,
there is a sharp dichotomy betweenthe formal language and informal
speech. Malayalam, which is closely related to Tamil, is spoken in the
Indianstate of Kerala by some 21,700,000 people. Possessing an
independentwritten script, it also has a rich modern literature. There
are atleast three main regional dialects (North, Central, South)
ofMalayalam and a number of communal dialects. In the Nilgiris and
adjacent regions, several minor tribes speak thefollowing languages:
Kota (1,400), Toda (1,145), Badaga (128,500),Irula (Irula) (6,176).
The less well-known languages of a number ofother tribes may yet be
established as independent members of theDravidian family (e.g.,
Kurumba, Paniya). Kodagu (Kodagu), a non-literary language of a
mountainous regioncalled Coorg, has 119,000 speakers. Kannada
(Kanarese), which is spoken by 25,700,000 people in the Indianstate of
Karnataka, exhibits a dichotomy between educated speech andcolloquial
Kannada; in the latter at least three social dialects arerecognizable
that may be characterized as Brahmin, non-Brahmin, andHarijan
("untouchable"). A number of regional dialects (among them areDharwar,
Bangalore, and Mangalore) also exist. Kannada has anorthography of its
own and an important ancient and modern literature. To the south of
the Kannada territory, more than 1,400,000 peoplespeak Tulu (Tulu), a
South Dravidian language having no developedwritten literature. Telugu
(spoken by 52,986,000 people), the official language of thestate of
Andhra Pradesh, exhibits a dichotomy between the written andthe spoken
styles, in addition to a number of sharply distinct localand regional
dialects (including Telangana, coastal area, Rayalaseema,and a
"transitional" zone) and divisions between Brahmin, nonBrahmin,and
Harijan speech. The language has its own script, closely akin tothat
of Kannada, and an important literary tradition. In extreme northern
Andhra Pradesh and in Maharashtra, the Kolamilanguage is spoken by
approximately 84,000 individuals. Parji isspoken by about 36,000
individuals in Andhra Pradesh and Orissa. TheKonda Dora, a scheduled
tribe of some 23,000, live mostly in AndhraPradesh and speak Konda.
The Gadba, who live mainly in Andhra Pradesh,number approximately
28,000. Pengo is spoken by fewer than 2,000individuals living in
Orissa, and Kui and Kuvi are spoken by a numberof tribes in Andhra
Pradesh and Orissa. In Madhya Pradesh and parts of Andhra Pradesh,
Maharashtra, andOrissa, many groups of Gonds (including about
2,620,000 persons) speaka number of Gondi dialects. To the north, in
Assam, Bihar, MadhyaPradesh, Tripura, and West Bengal, the Oraon tribe
speaks Kurukh(1,700,000), and, near the borders of Bihar and West
Bengal, 100,000tribals speak Malto. The only Dravidian language that
is spoken entirely outside India isBrahui, with about 1,580,000
speakers who live in Sindh andBalochistan provinces of southern
Pakistan. Historical survey of the Dravidian languages Although in
modern times speakers of the various Dravidian languageshave mainly
occupied the southern portion of India, while those of theIndo-Aryan
(Indic) tongues have predominated in northern India,nothing definite
is known about the ancient domain of the Dravidianparent speech. It
is, however, a well-established and well-supportedhypothesis that
Dravidian speakers must have been widespreadthroughout India,
including the northwest region. This is clearbecause a number of
features of the Dravidian languages appear in theRigveda, the earliest
known Indo-Aryan literary work, thus showingthat the Dravidian
languages must have been present in the area of theIndo-Aryan ones.
The Indo-Aryan languages were not, however,originally native to India;
they were introduced by Aryan invadersfrom the north. Several scholars
have demonstrated that pre-Indo-Aryanand pre-Dravidian bilingualism in
India provided conditions for thefar-reaching influence of Dravidian
on the Indo-Aryan tongues in thespheres of phonology (e.g., the
retroflex consonants, made with thetongue curled upward toward the
palate), syntax (e.g., the frequentuse of gerunds, which are nonfinite
verb forms of nominal character,as in "by the falling of the rain"),
and vocabulary (a number ofDravidian loanwords apparently appearing in
the Rigveda itself). Thus a form of Proto-Dravidian, or perhaps
Proto-North Dravidian, musthave been extensive in northern India
before the advent of the Aryans.Apart from the survival of some
islands of Dravidian speech, however,the process of replacement of the
Dravidian languages by the Aryantongues was entirely completed before
the beginning of the ChristianEra, after a period of bilingualism that
must have lasted manycenturies. Finally, the almost universal adoption
of Indo-Aryan in thenorth and of Dravidian in the south has covered up
the originallinguistic diversity of India. The circumstances of the
advent of Dravidian speakers in India areshrouded in mystery. There
are vague linguistic and cultural ties withthe Urals, with the
Mediterranean area, and with Iran. It is possiblethat a
Dravidian-speaking people that can be described asdolichocephalic
(longheaded from front to back) Mediterraneans mixedwith
brachycephalic (short-headed from front to back) Armenoids
andestablished themselves in northwestern India during the 4th
millenniumBC. Along their route, these immigrants may have possibly
come into anintimate, prolonged contact with the Ural-Altaic speakers,
thusexplaining the striking affinities between the Dravidian
andUral-Altaic language groups. Between 2000 and 1500 BC, there was
afairly constant movement of Dravidian speakers from the northwest
tothe southeast of India, and about 1500 BC three distinct
dialectgroups probably existed: Proto-North Dravidian,
Proto-CentralDravidian, and Proto-South Dravidian. The beginnings of
the splits inthe parent speech, however, are obviously earlier. It is
possible thatProto-Brahui was the first language to split off from
Proto-Dravidian,probably during the immigration movement into India
sometime in the4th millennium BC, and that the next subgroup to split
off wasProto-Kurukh-Malto, sometime in the 3rd millennium BC (see the
familytree diagrams,Figure 1, Figure 2, and Figure 3). Compared to the
work done on other language families, the progress incomparative
Dravidian studies has been slow and firm results are stillmeagre.
Considerable knowledge has been acquired in comparativephonology
(sound systems), but correspondences have been worked outonly for the
sounds in the roots of words. Very little comparativework has been
done on grammatical processes, and complete historicalgrammars of the
literary languages are still lacking. Hence thereconstruction of any
feature of the Dravidian protolanguage, with thepossible exception of
some parts of the phonology, must necessarily beconsidered very
tentative. The vowel system of Proto-Dravidian consisted of five
vowels--*i, *u,*e, *o, *a (an asterisk denotes an unattested,
reconstructed,hypothetical form)--each having two quantities, short
and long.Relative stability of root vowels seems to have been the
rule. TheProto-Dravidian consonant system consisted of obstruants
(stops) *p,*t, *t, *t, *c, *k; nasals *m, *n, *n, *ñ; laterals *l, *l;
the flap*r; the voiced retroflex continuant *r; and the semivowels *y
and *v.The most characteristic feature of the consonantal system was
the sixpositions of articulation for obstruants: labial (with the
lips),dental (tongue touching the back of the upper teeth), alveolar
(tonguetouching the upper gum ridge), retroflex (tip of tongue curled
upwardtoward the palate and back), palatal (body of tongue touching
thepalate, or roof of the mouth), and velar (back of tongue touching
thevelum, or soft palate). The retroflex series was very distinctive
andimportant and comprised an obstruant *t, a nasal *n, a lateral *l,
anda continuant *r. No consonant of the alveolar or retroflex
seriesbegan a word. In the final position all of the consonants
occurred,but all of the obstruants were followed by an automatic
release sound,the vowel *-u. Initial consonant clusters did not occur.
There wasonly one series of obstruant phonemes (distinctive sounds);
thesesounds were voiceless (produced without vibration of the vocal
cords)initially and voiced (with vocal cord vibration) between vowels.
AllProto-Dravidian roots were monosyllables. Proto-Dravidian used only
suffixes, never prefixes or infixes, in theconstruction of inflected
forms. Hence, the roots of words alwaysoccurred at the beginning.
Nouns, verbs, and indeclinable wordsconstituted the original word
classes. During the 1st millennium BC, while Aryanization steadily
progressedin north India, the Dravidian-speaking newcomers began to
mix with theNegritos and Proto-Australoids in the south; this process
ofacculturation continued during the period from approximately 1200
to600 BC. A movement of the Aryans into the south of India
begansometime about 1000 BC. Before the 5th century BC,
Proto-SouthDravidian was probably still one language, but with two
stronglymarked dialects. Within Proto-Central Dravidian, a similarly
deeptwo-way division also occurred, and as discussed above,
NorthDravidian must by that time have already been split into
theKurukh-Malto and Brahui subgroups (see the family tree
diagrams,Figure 1, Figure 2, and Figure 3). Apart from a possible
Dravidian word in the Hebrew text of the Bible(tukkhiyim "peacocks";
cf. Tamil tokai "tail of a peacock"), theDravidian languages enter
history in Sanskrit and Greco-Roman texts.The Ceras, a south Indian
dynasty, are possibly mentioned in the earlySanskrit text AitareyaA
ranyaka. Katyayana, a grammarian of the 4thcentury BC, mentions the
countries of Pandya (Tamil pantiya), Cola(Tamil cola), and Kerala, or
Cera (Tamil cera); these lands were wellknown to Kautilya (4th century
BC), the author of the earliesttreatise on statecraft, and mentions of
them also appear in the edictsof the great Buddhist leader Asoka (3rd
century BC). The term dravidaitself is almost certainly a
Sanskritization (with an inserted"hypercorrect" r) of the earlier Pali
and Prakrit terms damilo,damila, davida, which must have been derived
from the Tamil name ofthe language, tamil. A number of South Dravidian
words, almost all ofthem geographic and dynastic names, occur in such
Greco-Roman sourcesas the Periplus maris Erythraei ("Circumnavigation
of the ErythraeanSea") of about AD 89 and in the writing of Ptolemaeus
of Naukratis ofthe 2nd century AD; it is also very probable that
Western-languageterms for rice (compare Italian riso, Latin oryza,
Greek oryza) andginger (compare Italian zenzero, German Ingwer, Greek
zingiberis) arecultural loans from Old Tamil, in which they are arici
and iñciver,respectively. Sometime during the reign of Asoka (3rd
century BC), the two SouthDravidian languages, Tamil and Kannada,
developed into distinct idiomsand the two cultures emerged as separate
entities; a third majorDravidian linguistic and cultural unit, Telugu,
appeared in the Andhracountry. In the period from 300 to 100 BC, one
of the pre-Tamildialects (probably that of Madurai) gained prestige
and became thestandard literary language (centamil), the written form
of early OldTamil, which became established in poetic texts and in its
earliestgrammar, Tolkappiyam. During the same period, about 250 BC,
the AsokanSouthern Brahmi script was adapted for Tamil and was used in
shortcave inscriptions by Jain monks over a period of several
centuries,dating approximately from the 2nd century BC to the 5th
century AD. The earliest inscriptions in Kannada may be dated at AD
450; Kannadaliterature begins with Nrpatunga's Kavirajamarga, about AD
850. Theoldest Telugu inscription is from AD 633, and the literature
beginswith the grammarian Nannaya's 11th-century translation of the
Sanskritclassic the Mahabharata. In Malayalam, the earliest writings
are fromthe close of the 9th century, and the first literary text is
probablythe Bhasakautaliyam, AD 1125-1250. Since these attested
beginnings, the four languages--Tamil, Malayalam,Kannada, and
Telugu--have been used continuously in administration andliterature up
to the present day. In addition to possessing an immensewealth of
epigraphic and literary texts, they all developed pronouncedfeatures
of diglossia, a dichotomy between the standardized, formallanguage and
the informal, colloquial speech, which is divided intoregional as well
as social dialects. In modern times, all of the fourcultivated
languages have adapted quickly to new conditions resultingfrom
economic, social, and political changes. All of these languagesare
used in teaching basic courses in science and the arts; and
newtechnological terminology is coined, sometimes based either on
Englishor Sanskrit models, but often on exclusively indigenous
linguisticmaterial (in Tamil). To date, nothing is known about the
history of the nonliteraryDravidian languages before their
"discovery," which began at the endof the 18th century. The Gonds,
however, are mentioned (as Gondaloi)by Ptolemy of Naukratis, writing
in the 2nd century AD. A tendency toward structural and systemic
balance and stability ischaracteristic of the Dravidian group.
Nevertheless, there is no doubtabout the influence of the other
languages of India. Dravidianlanguages show extensive lexical
(vocabulary) borrowing, but only afew traits of structural (either
phonological or grammatical)borrowing, from the Indo-Aryan tongues. On
the other hand, Indo-Aryanshows rather large-scale structural
borrowing from Dravidian, butrelatively few loanwords. There is indeed
a possibility of Dravidianand Indo-Aryan drawing even closer together
in the future; but it ishighly doubtful that a new family of languages
will develop in such away that the bases of the contributing groups
(i.e., Dravidian andIndo-Aryan) will be completely eliminated through
the phenomena ofborrowing.
Research Links on Tamil
Archaeology
http://www.kalpakkam.com/sadrasdiscovery/
http://asiaminor.freeservers.com/archaeo1.html
http://dmoz.org/Science/Social_Sciences/Archaeology/Regional/Asia/India/
http://www.stephen-knapp.com/archeological_discoveries_of_2003.htm
http://www.indiantravelportal.com/tamil-nadu/excavations/chitaral-and-vallimalai.html
http://www.infitt.org/thf/monument/oodu/sangkam.html
http://www.indiantravelportal.com/tamil-nadu/excavations/poompuhar.html
http://shikshanic.nic.in/cd50years/12/8I/6D/8I6D0F01.htm
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/prehistoric/past/past37.html
http://stopfundinghate.org/actions/cachedocs/vedicempirecache.htm
http://www.earthwatch.org/expeditions/pappu/pappu_04.pdf
http://acharya.iitm.ac.in/mirrors/vv/literature/liter.html
http://www.cmi.ac.in/gift/Archeaology/arch_tambaramhistory.htm
http://www.grahamhancock.com/underworld/
http://www.grahamhancock.com/underworld/mahabalipuram2.php
http://www.grahamhancock.com/underworld/smithMike_poompuhur.php
http://www.arkeologi.net/linguistic.php
http://www.nfobase.com/html/bead_trade_in_the_indian_ocean.html
http://www.flonnet.com/fl1725/17250620.htm
http://rubens.anu.edu.au/htdocs/surveys/charlotte/bycountry/display00310.html
http://www.rbi.org.in/currency/museum/c-ancient.html
Language History
http://ckrishnamurti.tripod.com/book.html
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_country.asp?name=India
http://www.lmp.ucla.edu/profiles/proft02.htm
http://arutkural.tripod.com/tolcampus/jap-tamil.htm
http://www.bharatvani.org/michel_danino/tamil_cult01.html
http://murugan.org/research/pushparatnam.htm
http://kenax.hypermart.net/kenax/language_explanations.htm
http://www.hindunet.org/hindu_history/sarasvati/dictionary/0000intro.htm
http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mturkey.html
http://www.ancientscripts.com/
http://www2.4dcomm.com/millenia/dravdict.html
http://www.ling.upenn.edu/~jason2/papers/natlang.htm
http://www.kanithamizh.org/links.htm
http://www.unesco.org/webworld/mdm/1997/eng/india/indianom.html
http://www.linguist.jussieu.fr/~chevilla/
http://prodigi.bl.uk/illcat/searchMSNo.asp
http://www.xlweb.com/heritage/asian/palmleaf.htm
http://www.tamil-heritage.org/ebook.html
http://www.tamil-heritage.org/tamievol.html
Ancient History
http://www.intamm.com/culture/hara.htm
http://www.bartleby.com/67/326.html
http://www.agnosticwitch.catcara.com/timelineBC-part1.htm
http://fajardo-acosta.com/worldlit/timeline.htm
http://www.earth-history.com/Earth-08.htm
http://www.julen.net/ancient/Mythology_and_Religion/
http://www.datanumeric.com/dravidian/page001.html
http://web.cocc.edu/cagatucci/classes/hum210/tml/indiatml/indiatml1.htm
http://www.engr.mun.ca/~adluri/telugu/language/script/script1d.html
http://www.san.beck.org/AB-Chronology750-1300.html
http://www.maritimeasia.ws/topic/chronology.html
http://members.tripod.com/~vrperumal/Inscriptions.htm
http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/~sj6/schmidtcholas.html
http://www.atributetohinduism.com/Seafaring_in_Ancient_India.htm
http://www.geocities.com/raqta24/bangla3.htm
http://www.ycsi.net/users/reversespins/indianblast.html
http://www.movinghere.org.uk/gallery/hardship/famine.htm
http://www.india.com.ar/india3.html
http://www.bl.uk/collections/orientalwww.html#sea
http://www.historytoday.com
http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/asia.html
http://www.kalpakkam.com/sadrasdiscovery/
http://asiaminor.freeservers.com/archaeo1.html
http://dmoz.org/Science/Social_Sciences/Archaeology/Regional/Asia/India/
http://www.stephen-knapp.com/archeological_discoveries_of_2003.htm
http://www.indiantravelportal.com/tamil-nadu/excavations/chitaral-and-vallimalai.html
http://www.infitt.org/thf/monument/oodu/sangkam.html
http://www.indiantravelportal.com/tamil-nadu/excavations/poompuhar.html
http://shikshanic.nic.in/cd50years/12/8I/6D/8I6D0F01.htm
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/prehistoric/past/past37.html
http://stopfundinghate.org/actions/cachedocs/vedicempirecache.htm
http://www.earthwatch.org/expeditions/pappu/pappu_04.pdf
http://acharya.iitm.ac.in/mirrors/vv/literature/liter.html
http://www.cmi.ac.in/gift/Archeaology/arch_tambaramhistory.htm
http://www.grahamhancock.com/underworld/
http://www.grahamhancock.com/underworld/mahabalipuram2.php
http://www.grahamhancock.com/underworld/smithMike_poompuhur.php
http://www.arkeologi.net/linguistic.php
http://www.nfobase.com/html/bead_trade_in_the_indian_ocean.html
http://www.flonnet.com/fl1725/17250620.htm
http://rubens.anu.edu.au/htdocs/surveys/charlotte/bycountry/display00310.html
http://www.rbi.org.in/currency/museum/c-ancient.html
Language History
http://ckrishnamurti.tripod.com/book.html
http://www.ethnologue.com/show_country.asp?name=India
http://www.lmp.ucla.edu/profiles/proft02.htm
http://arutkural.tripod.com/tolcampus/jap-tamil.htm
http://www.bharatvani.org/michel_danino/tamil_cult01.html
http://murugan.org/research/pushparatnam.htm
http://kenax.hypermart.net/kenax/language_explanations.htm
http://www.hindunet.org/hindu_history/sarasvati/dictionary/0000intro.htm
http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mturkey.html
http://www.ancientscripts.com/
http://www2.4dcomm.com/millenia/dravdict.html
http://www.ling.upenn.edu/~jason2/papers/natlang.htm
http://www.kanithamizh.org/links.htm
http://www.unesco.org/webworld/mdm/1997/eng/india/indianom.html
http://www.linguist.jussieu.fr/~chevilla/
http://prodigi.bl.uk/illcat/searchMSNo.asp
http://www.xlweb.com/heritage/asian/palmleaf.htm
http://www.tamil-heritage.org/ebook.html
http://www.tamil-heritage.org/tamievol.html
Ancient History
http://www.intamm.com/culture/hara.htm
http://www.bartleby.com/67/326.html
http://www.agnosticwitch.catcara.com/timelineBC-part1.htm
http://fajardo-acosta.com/worldlit/timeline.htm
http://www.earth-history.com/Earth-08.htm
http://www.julen.net/ancient/Mythology_and_Religion/
http://www.datanumeric.com/dravidian/page001.html
http://web.cocc.edu/cagatucci/classes/hum210/tml/indiatml/indiatml1.htm
http://www.engr.mun.ca/~adluri/telugu/language/script/script1d.html
http://www.san.beck.org/AB-Chronology750-1300.html
http://www.maritimeasia.ws/topic/chronology.html
http://members.tripod.com/~vrperumal/Inscriptions.htm
http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/~sj6/schmidtcholas.html
http://www.atributetohinduism.com/Seafaring_in_Ancient_India.htm
http://www.geocities.com/raqta24/bangla3.htm
http://www.ycsi.net/users/reversespins/indianblast.html
http://www.movinghere.org.uk/gallery/hardship/famine.htm
http://www.india.com.ar/india3.html
http://www.bl.uk/collections/orientalwww.html#sea
http://www.historytoday.com
http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/asia.html
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