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378 rakshasas of the Ramayana. It is by no means easy to say when these races entered India.

Then came the Dravidian Tamils, the word 'Dravidian' being used in this work chiefly in a restricted sense to denote only the Velir or the Vellala tribe of the ancient Tamils, who were regarded as Kshatriyas, Vaisyas or Sudras according to their occupations, and this seems to be countenanced by Manu's definition of 'Draivda' as a man of an out-cast tribe descended from a degraded Kshatriya. The Dravidians were like the Brahuis and the Todas a fine stalwart race probably of the Aryo-Mongolian extraction. They were not dark complexioned, but their colour has been described in early Tamil works as that of the tender mango leaf. Their original home was somewhere in Asia Minor where the ancient Accadians lived. They had entered India by the North-western passes long before the Aryan migration. During the time of the Mahabharata War, say about the fifteenth century before Christ, they lived in Upper India, occupying small detached areas. Immediately after the 'Great War' the Dravidians trekked south wards by the way of western India halting for a time at Dwarasamudram in the Mysore (buffalo) Province. From thence they proceeded in three separate bands to the east, south and west, and established three small kingdoms known as the Chola, Pandya and Chera. The Cholas and Pandyas had very often to contend with the half-civilized Nagas, while the Cheras seem