Page:Pre-Aryan Tamil Culture.djvu/84

 articles of food, produced in the hill country, in the low country and in the sea. There were traders who, brought different kinds of brilliant gems, pearls and gold from far off lands.… There were men who assayed gold; there were sellers of clothes, vendors of copper vessels which were sold by weight, men who, when their business was over, tied the proceeds to their loin cloth, men who sold choice flowers, and scented pastes. There were clever painters, kaṇṇuḷ vinaiñar, who painted pictures of all kinds of minute incidents'. This description pertains to the trade of the beginning of the first millennium, but this trade could not have differed from that of a very much earlier epoch, because civilization did not grow by leaps and bounds in any particular period, but grew so gradually that the life conditions of any one epoch resembled very much those of previous ages.

'Traders carried jewels to foreign countries on ships that had sails spread in the wind and that sailed on the ocean whose waves smelt of fish'. They carried jewels for sale on land, but in a country where the Maṛavar followed as their only profession that of highway robbery, the travels of traders were fraught with adventure. 'The merchants who enabled all men to enjoy the grand things which are found on the mountain and in the sea have breasts full of scars made by the piercing arrows, clothes tied tight round their waists and a knife stuck into it, strong broad shoulders to which was attached the cruel bow and so resembled Murugan who wears the Kaḍambu flower. They held in their hands a big spear like Yaman. A stinging dagger with a white handle made of ivory, looking like a snake creeping on a hill, was tied with a belt to their shoulders; their strong feet were covered with shoes and they wore coats.'