Page:Origin and spread of the Tamils.djvu/34

Rh Taylor's Road, at Kilpauk, a cist of this description was unearthed. There were large and small cists. The largest were oblong with six or more pairs of legs. The smallest were square with four legs. These were all provided with pottery lids. We have again tripod and fourfooted urns, the tripod being peculiar to the North Arcot District.

3. Excavated cave tombs: Kutakallu or the umbrella stone graves (Logan, Plate, IX). It was a circular chamber 4 feet deep and 6 to 8 feet in diameter, excavated vertically in the rock. A capstone covered it. One finds a link between these chamber burials, also known as dolmens, and large urn burials.

4. Pit chamber graves connected with Malabar 'Tholoi' (Logan, p. 182): These are cut at right angles into the rock and are provided with a central opening in the doomed roof. A capstone forms the laid. What is interesting in this connection is that the very expression tholoi is used in ancient Crete for these pit chamber tombs. In Crete it was a beehive tomb of brick on a stone foundation. A number of them are mentioned by G. Glotz containing seals, polychrome vases, daggers all belongiog to the end of the Early Minoan period. Tholai (தொளை) is a Tamil word meaning a hole, and these are family tombs in Crete. The same clan laid its head with the objects which they had loved (The Aegean Civilisation, pp. 133-7).

5. Stone chamber burials under stone circles, more of the Deccan than South India: In one such in