Page:The Tamils Eighteen Hundred Years Ago.djvu/72

Rh is proved not only by the continued antagonism they displayed towards the Aryans, but also by ancient Sanscrit works in which the Dravidas are spoken of as an alien people. That the Tamils had attained a high degree of civilization before the advent of the Aryans is established indisputably by the fact that the pure Tamil language is so copious and exact that it can do well without borrowing Sanscrit words. In fact, in the ancient Tamil classical works, the terms relating to Music, Grammar, Astronomy and even abstract Philosophy are of pure Tamil origin; and they indicate most clearly that those sciences were cultivated by the Tamils long before the arrival of the Brahmins or other Aryan immigrants. The Tamils obtained a knowledge of these sciences most probably from China, through Bengal or Burma, with both of which countries they had direct and constant intercourse. The Tamil language, unlike other Dravidian dialects, abounds in words with nasal letters such as nga, nja and nna: and this peculiarity is remarkable in ancient Tamil works, and in modern Malayalam. This is further evidence of the affinity of the Tamils and the Burmese and Chinese, the latter of whom call themselves “Celestials” like the ancient Cheras who were known as Vanavar or “Celestials” —

The modern Malayalam preserves, I believe, that form of language which was spoken by the early Tamil immigrants, some time after they had settled in Southern India. They had then learnt to use Dravidian words, but were not familiar with the personal signs of verbs. In this condition, the Malayalam of today resembles the Mongolian, the Manchu, and other primitive tongues of High Asia.

The early Tamil poets believed in the tradition that Agastya lead the first colony of the Aryas to the Pothya hills near Cape Comorin. How much of historical truth there is in this tradition it is difficult to determine; but the tradition seems to rest entirely on the Ramayana, in which epic, Agastya is represented as inviting Rama to overcome Ravana, the King of Ceylon. In the same poem