Page:The Tamils Eighteen Hundred Years Ago.djvu/63

Rh their vctims.” They were so numerous especially on the East Coast between the Kaviri and Vaigai rivers, where they are still to be found in large numbers, that they successfully resisted the armies of the Tamil Kings. “The wrathful and furious Maravar” says the Poet quoted above “whose curled beards resemble the twisted horns of the stag, the loud twang of whose powerful bowstrings, and the stirring sound of whose double headed drums, compel even Kings at the head of large armies to turn their back and fly.” Their prowess in battle was so much valued by the Tamil Kings that they were enlisted largely in the Tamil armies. A Marava chieftain named Nalai-kilavan Nagan served the Pandya as a Minister and Commander in his army. Another Marava, Piddank-korran, chieftain of a mountain called Kuthiraimali, was in the service of the Chera King.

The Eyinar or Vedar were the most lawless of the Naga tribes. Cattle lifting and pillage and murder appear to have been th sole business of their life. Thy worshipped the dread goddess Kâli, and slaughtered buffaloes at her shrine, to secure her favor in their plundering raids. Before starting on their expeditions they usually consulted omens in the chirping and flight of birds. Their descendants are now known by the appropriate title of kallar or “thieves.” Dhirataran Murti-Eyinar the great chief of Viramangalam referred to in the plates of Jatilavarman, a Pandyan King of the twelfth century A.D. appears to have belonged to this tribe.

The Oliyar were another tribe of the Nagas who, it is said, were conquered by Karikâl-Choia. We find them in power as late as the eleventh century A. D. from an inscription at Mamallapuram This inscription is dated in the 9th year of the reign of the Chola King Koppara-Kesari-Varmman alias Udiayâr-Sri.. Râjendna Déva who defeated Ahawa-Malla, the western Chalukya King (1040—1069 A.D.) at the battle of Kopa. It is the copy of a deed by which a piece of land was granted to the Varâha-Swâmi