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Tolkāppiyam

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Topics inSangam literature
Sangam literature
Agattiyam Tolkāppiyam
Eighteen Greater Texts
Eight Anthologies
Aiṅkurunūṟu Akanāṉūṟu
Puṟanāṉūṟu Kalittokai
Kuṟuntokai Natṟiṇai
Paripāṭal Patiṟṟuppattu
Ten Idylls
Tirumurukāṟṟuppaṭai Kuṟiñcippāṭṭu
Malaipaṭukaṭām Maturaikkāñci
Mullaippāṭṭu Neṭunalvāṭai
Paṭṭiṉappālai Perumpāṇāṟṟuppaṭai
Poruṇarāṟṟuppaṭai Ciṟupāṇāṟṟuppaṭai
Related topics
Sangam Sangam landscape
Tamil history from Sangam literature Ancient Tamil music
Eighteen Lesser Texts
Nālaṭiyār Nāṉmaṇikkaṭikai
Iṉṉā Nāṟpatu Iṉiyavai Nāṟpatu
Kār Nāṟpatu Kaḷavaḻi Nāṟpatu
Aintiṇai Aimpatu Tiṉaimoḻi Aimpatu
Aintinai Eḻupatu Tiṇaimālai Nūṟṟaimpatu
Tirukkuṟaḷ Tirikaṭukam
Ācārakkōvai Paḻamoḻi Nāṉūṟu
Ciṟupañcamūlam Mutumoḻikkānci
Elāti Kainnilai
Bhakti Literature
Naalayira Divya Prabandham Ramavataram
Tevaram Tirumuṟai
edit

Tolkāppiyam,also romanised asTholkaappiyam(Tamil:தொல்காப்பியம்listenⓘ,lit."ancient poem"[1]), is the most ancient extant Tamilgrammartext and the oldest extant long work ofTamil literature.[2][3]It is the earliest Tamil text mentioning Gods, perhaps linked toHindu deities.

There is no firm evidence to assign the authorship of this treatise to any one author. There is a tradition of belief that it was written by a single author namedTolkappiyar,a disciple of Vedic sageAgastyamentioned in theRigveda(1500–1200 BCE).

The surviving manuscripts of theTolkappiyamconsists of three books (atikaram), each with nine chapters (iyal), with a cumulative total of 1,610 (483+463+664)sutrasin thenūṛpāmeter.[4][note 1]It is a comprehensive text on grammar, and includessutrason orthography, phonology, etymology, morphology, semantics, prosody, sentence structure and the significance of context in language.[4]Mayyonas (Vishnu),Seyyonas (Skanda),Vendhanas (Indra),Varunaas (Varuna) andKotṟavaias (Devi or Bagavathi) are the gods mentioned.[6]

TheTolkappiyamis difficult to date. Some in the Tamil tradition place the text in the mythical second sangam, variously in 1st millennium BCE or earlier.[7]Scholars place the text much later and believe the text evolved and expanded over a period of time. According to Nadarajah Devapoopathy the earliest layer of theTolkappiyamwas likely composed between the 2nd and 1st century BCE,[8]and the extant manuscript versions fixed by about the 5th century CE.[9]TheTolkappiyam Ur-textlikely relied on some unknown even older literature.[10]The Tolkappiyam belongs to second Sangam period.

Iravatham Mahadevandates the Tolkappiyam to no earlier than the 2nd century CE, as it mentions thepuḷḷibeing an integral part of Tamil script. Thepuḷḷi(a diacritical mark to distinguish pure consonants from consonants with inherent vowels) only became prevalent in Tamil epigraphs after the 2nd century CE.[11] According to linguist S. Agesthialingam, Tolkappiyam contains many later interpolations, and the language shows many deviations consistent with late old Tamil (similar toCilappatikaram), rather than the early old Tamil poems ofEṭṭuttokaiandPattuppāṭṭu.[12]

TheTolkappiyamcontains aphoristic verses arranged into three books – theEluttatikaram( "Eluttu" meaning "letter, phoneme" ), theSollatikaram( "Sol" meaning "Sound, word" ) and thePorulatikaram( "Porul" meaning "subject matter", i.e. prosody, rhetoric, poetics).[13]TheTolkappiyamincludes examples to explain its rules, and these examples provide indirect information about the ancient Tamil culture, sociology, and linguistic geography. It is first mentioned by name in Iraiyanar'sAkapporul– a 7th- or 8th-century text – as an authoritative reference, and theTolkappiyamremains the authoritative text on Tamil grammar.[14][15][note 2]

Etymology[edit]

The wordTolkāppiyamis a attribute-based composite word, withtolmeaning "ancient, old", andkappiyammeaning "book, text, poem, kavya"; together, the title has been translated as "ancient book",[17]"ancient poem",[18]or "old poem".[19]The word Kavya from Sanskrit can be seen as coming from the Tamil word kappiyam.[20]

The word Kappiyam can have three possible origins "tol-kappu-iyanratu", meaning "ancient protection [of language]".[17]An alternate etymology that has been proposed by a few purists is that the name of the work derives from the author's name Tolkāppiyan, but this is a disputed assumption because neither the author(s) nor centuries in which this masterpiece was composed are known.[17]

Date[edit]

The dating of the Tolkappiyam is difficult, much debated, and it remains contested and uncertain.[21][22]Proposals range between 5,320 BCE and the 8th century CE.[22][23]

The tradition and some Indian scholars favor an early date for its composition, before the common era, and state that it is the work of one person associated with sage Agastya. Other Indian scholars, and non-Indian scholars such as Kamil Zvelebil, prefer to date it not as a single entity but in parts or layers.[24]The Tolkappiyam manuscript versions that have survived into the modern age were fixed by about the 5th century CE, according to Zvelebil.[21][24][25]Scholars reject traditional datings based on three sangams and the myth of great floods because there is no verifiable evidence in its favor, and the available evidence based on linguistics, epigraphy,Sangam literatureand other Indian texts suggest a much later date.[26]The disagreements now center around divergent dates between the 3rd centuryBCEand 8th century CE.[21][26][27]

The datings proposed by contemporary scholars is based on a combination of evidence such as:

  • comparison of grammar taught inTolkappiyamversus the grammar found in the oldest knownTamil-Brahmiand old-Tamil inscriptions[7][21]
  • comparison of grammar taught inTolkappiyamversus the grammar found in the oldest known Tamil texts (Sangam era);[21][28]this evidence covers items such as phonemic shapes, palatals, and the evolution in the use of compounds[29]
  • comparison of grammar taught inTolkappiyamversus the grammar taught and found in the oldest known Sanskrit texts;[30]this includes tracing verses and phrases found in theTolkappiyamthat borrow, translate or closely paraphrase verses and phrases found in the works of ancient and influential Sanskrit scholars such as Panini, Patanjali, Manu, Kautilya, Bharata and Vatsyayana.[21]
  • comparison of poetry and prose rules taught inTolkappiyamversus the actual early Tamil poetry and prose[31]
  • Prakrit and Sanskrit loan words (vadacol),[32]and inconsistencies between the sutras of theTolkappiyam[21]

Dates proposed[edit]

  • In his book published in 1925, T. R. Sesha Iyengar – a scholar of Dravidian literature and history, states that theTolkappiyamwhile explaining grammar, uses terms for various forms of marriage in theKalaviyalchapter. Elsewhere it mentions terms related to caste. Such ideas about different weddings and caste, states Iyengar, must be the influence of Sanskrit and Indo-Aryan ideologies. He disagrees with those European scholars who refuse to "concede high antiquity to the Dravidian civilization", and as a compromise suggests the Tolkappiyam was composed "before the Christian era".[33]
  • In post-Independence India, the Tamil scholar Gift Siromoney states that the Tolkappiyam should be dated based on the chronology of TALBI-P system based inscriptions, which is difficult to date. He suggests that this could be around the time of Ashoka, or centuries later.[34]
  • Iravatham Mahadevandates the Tolkappiyam to no earlier than the 2nd century CE, as it mentions thepuḷḷibeing an integral part of Tamil script. Thepuḷḷia diacritical mark to distinguish pure consonants from consonants with inherent vowels only became prevalent in Tamil epigraphs after the 2nd century CE.[35]
  • V. S. Rajam, a linguist specialised in Old Tamil, in her bookA Reference Grammar of Classical Tamil Poetrydates it to pre-fifth century CE.[36]
  • Vaiyapuri Pillai,the author of the Tamil lexicon, dated Tolkappiyam to not earlier than the 5th or 6th century CE.[21][37]
  • Kamil V. Zvelebildates the earliest layer, the coreUr-textof the Tolkappiyam to 150 BCE or later.[38]In his 1974 review, Zvelebil places Book 1 and 2 of theTolkappiyamin the 100 BCE to 250 CE period.[39]Rest of the sections and sutras of the text to centuries between 3rd and 5th century CE. The extant manuscripts of Tolkappiyam are based on the "final redaction" of the 5th century, states Zvelebil.[40]
  • Takanobu Takahashi,a Japanese Indologist, states that the Tolkappiyam has several layers with the oldest dating to 1st or 2nd century CE, and the newest and the final redaction dating to the 5th or 6th century CE.[26]
  • A C Burnell,a 19th-centuryIndologistwho contributed to the study of Dravidian languages was of the view that theTolkappiyamcould not be dated to "much later than the eighth century."[41]
  • Herman Tieken, a Dutch scholar, states that the Tolkappiyam dates from the 9th century CE at the earliest. He arrives at this conclusion by treating the Tolkappiyam and the anthologies ofSangam literatureas part of a 9th-centuryPandyanproject to raise the prestige of Tamil as aclassical languageequal to Sanskrit, and assigning new dates to the traditionally accepted dates for a vast section of divergent literature (Sangam literature,post-Sangam literature and Bhakti literature likeTevaram).[27]Hermen Tieken's work has, however, been criticised on fundamental, methodological, and other grounds byG.E. Ferro-Luzzi,George Hart andAnne Monius.[42][43][44]

Author[edit]

There is no firm evidence to assign the authorship of this treatise to any one author.Tholkapiyam,some traditionally believe, was written by a single author named Tolkappiyar, a disciple of Vedic sageAgastyamentioned in theRigveda(1500–1200 BCE). According to the traditional legend, the original grammar was called Agathiam written down by sage Agastya, but it went missing after a great deluge. His student Tolkappiyar was asked to compile Tamil grammar, which isTolkappiyam.[45][46]In Tamil historical sources such as the 14th-century influential commentary onTolkappiyambyNaccinarkkiniyar,the author is stated to be Tiranatumakkini (alternate name for Tolkappiyan), the son of a Brahminrishinamed Camatakkini.[47]The earliest mention of Agastya-related Akattiyam legends are found in texts approximately dated to the 8th or 9th century.[48]

According to Kamil Zvelebil, it can be seen from the earliestsutrasof theTolkappiyamthat verses of Patanjali'sMahābhāṣyaare borrowed from it.

Content[edit]

TheTolkappiyamdeals withilakkanam(grammar) in three books (atikaram), each with nine chapters (iyal) of different sizes. The text has a cumulative total of 1,610 (Eluttatikaram 483 + Sollatikaram 463 + Porulatikaram 664)sutrasin thenūṛpāmeter, though some versions of its surviving manuscripts have a few less.[4][5]Thesutraformat provides a distilled summary of the rules, one that is not easy to read or understand; commentaries are necessary for the proper interpretation and understanding ofTolkappiyam.[49]

Book 1
Eluttatikaram

"Eluttu" means "sound, letter, phoneme", and this book of theTolkappiyamcovers the sounds of theTamil language,how they are produced (phonology).[50]It includespunarcci(lit."joining, copulation" ) which is combination of sounds, orthography, graphemic and phonetics with sounds as they are produced and listened to.[50]The phonemic inventory it includes consists of 5 long vowels, 5 short vowels, and 17 consonants. The articulatory descriptions inTolkappiyamare incomplete, but this is not indicative of a proto-language because some tolkappiyam texts have been lost owing to the invompleteness. It does not, for example, distinguish between retroflex and non-retroflex consonants which shows that some texts from the tolkappiyam were either stolen or lost, states Thomas Lehmann.[49]The phonetic and phonemic sections of the first book show the influence of Vedic Pratisakhyas, states Hartmut Scharfe, but with some differences. For example, unlike the Pratisakhyas and the later Tamil, the first book ofTolkappiyamdoes not treat /ṭ/ and /ṇ/ as retroflex.[51]

Book 2
Sollatikaram

"Sol" meaning "word", and the second book deals with "etymology, morphology, semantics and syntax", states Zvelebil.[50]Thesutrascover compounds, some semantic and lexical issues. It also mentions the twelve dialectical regions of Tamil speaking people, which suggests the author(s) had a keen sense of observation and inclusiveness for Old Tamil's linguistic geography.[50].[52]Verb forms and the classification of nominal compounds in the second book show the influence of Patanjali'sMahabhasya.[51]

Book 3
Porulatikaram

"Porul" meaning "subject matter", and this book deals with the prosody (yappu) and rhetoric (ani) of Old Tamil.[53]It is here, that the book covers the two genres found in classical Tamil literature:akam(love, erotics, interior world) andpuram(war, society, exterior world). Theakamis subdivided intokalavu(premarital love) andkarpu(marital love).[53]It also deals with dramaturgy, simile, prosody and tradition. According to Zvelebil, this arrangement suggests that the entireTolkappiyamwas likely a guide for bardic poets, where the first two books led to this third on how to compose their songs.[53]The third book's linking of literature (ilakkiyam) to the grammatical rules of the first and the second book (ilakkanam) created a symbiotic relationship between the two.[49]The literary theory ofTolkappiyam,according to Peter Scharf, borrows from Sanskrit literary theory texts.[52]

Epigraphical studies, such as those by Mahadevan, show that ancientTamil-Brahmiinscriptions found in South India and dated to between 3rd century BCE and 4th century CE had three different grammatical form. Only one of them is assumed in theTolkappiyam.[49]The language of theSangam literatureis same as the one described inTolkappiyam,except in some minor respects.[52]

Commentaries[edit]

TheTolkappiyamis a collection of aphoristic verses in thenūṛpāmeter.[4]It is unintelligible without a commentary.[49]Tamil scholars have written commentaries on it, over the centuries:

Commentaries onTolkappiyam
Author[52] Date[52] Notes
Ilampuranar 10th to 12th century Full: all verses[54]
Cenavaraiyar 13th or 14th century Partial: 2nd book[54]
Peraciriyar 13th century Partial: 1st and 2nd book[54]
Naccinarkkiniyar 14th century Partial: 1st, 2nd and part 3rd book[54]
Tayvaccilaiyar 16th century Partial: 2nd book[54]
Kallatanar 15th to 17th century[52][54] Partial: 2nd book[54]

The commentary by Ilampuranar dated to the 11th or 12th century CE is the most comprehensive and probably the best, states Zvelebil.[55]The commentary by Senavaraiyar deals only with the second bookSollathikaram.[54]The commentary by Perasiriyar, which is heavily indebted to theNannūl,frequently quotes from theDandiyalankaramandYapparunkalam,the former being a standard medieval rhetorica and the latter being a detailed treatise on Tamil prosody. Naccinarkiniyar's commentary, being a scholar of both Tamil and Sanskrit, quotes from Parimelalakar's works.[54]

Reception[edit]

Alexander Dubyanskiy,veteran Tamil scholar fromMoscow State Universitystated, "I am sure that Tolkappiyam is a work which demanded not only vast knowledge and a lot of thinking but a considerable creative skill from its composer." Dubyanskiy also said that the authority of the text was undeniable: "It is a literary and cultural monument of great importance."[56]

See also[edit]

Notes[edit]

  1. ^The palm-leaf manuscripts and commentaries on the text vary slightly in the total number of verse-sutras; they are all about 1,610.[5]
  2. ^According to Thomas Lehmann, theTolkappiyamrules are followed and exemplified in Old Tamil (pre-700 CE) literature. The Middle Tamil (700-1600 CE) and Modern Tamil (post-1600 CE) have additional distinct grammatical characteristics.[16]Causative stems of verb bases are "lexical in Old Tamil, morphological in Middle Tamil, and syntactic in Modern Tamil", for example, states Lehmann. Nevertheless, many features of Middle and Modern Tamil are anchored in the Old Tamil ofTolkappiyam.[16]

References[edit]

  1. ^Kamil Zvelebil 1973,p. 131.
  2. ^Kamil Zvelebil 1973,pp. 131–133.
  3. ^David Shulman 2016,p. 28.
  4. ^abcdKamil Zvelebil 1973,pp. 131–132 with footnotes.
  5. ^abHartmut Scharfe 1977,pp. 178–179 with footnote 2.
  6. ^Journal of Tamil Studies, Volume 1.International Institute of Tamil Studies. 1969. p. 131.Archivedfrom the original on 13 November 2017.
  7. ^abTakanobu Takahashi 1995,pp. 16–17.
  8. ^Nadarajah, Devapoopathy (1994).Love in Sanskrit and Tamil Literature: A Study of Characters and Nature, 200 B.C.-A.D. 500.Motilal Banarsidass Publ.ISBN978-81-208-1215-4.
  9. ^Kamil Zvelebil 1973,pp. 138–146 with footnotes, Quote: "this fact would give us approximately the 5th cent. AD as the earliest date of Porulatikaram, and as the date of the final redaction of the Tolkappiyam.".
  10. ^Kamil Zvelebil 1973,pp. 138–139 with footnotes.
  11. ^Mahadevan, I. (2014).Early Tamil Epigraphy - From the Earliest Times to the Sixth century C.E., 2nd Edition.p. 271.
  12. ^S. Agesthialingam, A grammar of Old Tamil (with special reference to Patirruppattu), Annamalai University, (1979), pXIV
  13. ^Kamil Zvelebil 1973,pp. 131–134 with footnotes, 150.
  14. ^Kamil Zvelebil 1973,pp. 131–134 with footnotes.
  15. ^Hartmut Scharfe 1977,pp. 179–180.
  16. ^abThomas Lehmann (2015). Sanford B. Steever (ed.).The Dravidian Languages.Routledge. pp. 75–76.ISBN978-1-136-91164-4.
  17. ^abcKamil Zvelebil 1973,pp. 131–132 with footnote 1.
  18. ^Bartholomaeus Ziegenbalg (2010).Tamil Language for Europeans: Ziegenbalg's Grammatica Damulica.Otto Harrassowitz Verlag. pp. 1–2.ISBN978-3-447-06236-7.
  19. ^Willem van Reijen; Willem G. Weststeijn (1999).Subjectivity.Rodopi. pp. 321–322.ISBN90-420-0728-1.
  20. ^Sir Ralph Lilley Turner - A comparative dictionary to the Indo-Aryan languages, Entry 3110 kāˊvyahttps://dsalsrv04.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/app/soas_query.py?qs=kāvikā&searchhws=yes
  21. ^abcdefghKamil Zvelebil 1973,pp. 138–146 with footnotes.
  22. ^abThe Date of the Tolkappiyam: A Retrospect. "Annals of Oriental Research (Madras), Silver Jubilee Volume: 292–317
  23. ^Takanobu Takahashi 1995,pp. 16–17, Quote=The date of Tol[kappiyam] has been variously proposed as lying between 5320 B.C. and the 8th Cent. A.D..
  24. ^abRamaswamy, Vijaya (1993). "Women and Farm Work in Tamil Folk Songs".Social Scientist.21(9/11): 113–129.doi:10.2307/3520429.JSTOR3520429.
  25. ^Takanobu Takahashi 1995,pp. 16–19.
  26. ^abcTakahashi, Takanobu (1995)."2. Erudite works".Tamil Love Poetry & Poetics.Leiden; New York; Cologne: Brill. p. 18.ISBN90-04-10042-3.These agreements may probably advance the lower limit of the date for Tol[kappiyam], but do not mean more recently than the 5th Cent. A.D., as suggested by some critics such as S. Vaiyapuri Pillai [...]
  27. ^abTieken, Herman Joseph Hugo. 2001. Kāvya in South India: old Tamil Caṅkam poetry. Groningen: Egbert Forsten.
  28. ^Takanobu Takahashi 1995,pp. 16–18.
  29. ^Kamil Zvelebil 1973,pp. 142–146 with footnotes.
  30. ^Takanobu Takahashi 1995,pp. 16, 18–19.
  31. ^Takanobu Takahashi 1995,pp. 16, 20–22.
  32. ^Kamil Zvelebil 1991.
  33. ^Sesha Iyengar, T.R. (1925),Dravidian India,Asian Educational Services, New Delhi, reprinted 1995, pp 155–157
  34. ^Gift Siromoney (1983),Origin of the Tamil-Brahmi script,Seminar on "Origin evolution and reform of the Tamil script", pp. 21–29, The Institute of Traditional Cultures, University Buildings, Madras-600005
  35. ^Mahadevan, I. (2014).Early Tamil Epigraphy - From the Earliest Times to the Sixth century C.E., 2nd Edition.p. 271.
  36. ^Rajam, V. S. 1992.A Reference Grammar of Classical Tamil Poetry: 150 B.C.–pre-Fifth/Sixth Century A.D.Memoirs of the American philosophical society, vol. 199. Philadelphia, Pa: American Philosophical Society, p. 7
  37. ^Vaiyapuri Pillai, S. 1956. History of Tamil language and literature; beginning to 1000 A.D.. Madras: New Century Book House.
  38. ^Kamil Zvelebil 1973,pp. 137 and 147, Quote (p. 137): "As we will see later, Tolkkapiyam, the core of which may be assigned to pre-Christian era, consists perhaps of many layers, some of which may be much earlier than others", (p. 147): "Thus, the nuclear portions of Tolkappiyam were probably born sometimes in the 2nd or 1st century BC, but hardly before 150 BC.".
  39. ^Kamil Zvelebil 1974,pp. 9–10.
  40. ^Kamil Zvelebil 1973,pp. 138–147 with footnotes
  41. ^"It is thus impossible to put the original text much later than the eighth century, for by the tenth century the whole Pāṇḍiya kingdom had fallen under the orthodox Coḷas."Burnell, A. C.(1975). "On the Aindra School of Sanskrit Grammarians: Their place in the Sanskrit and Subordinate Literatures". Mangalore: Basel Mission Book and Tract Depository: 8–9.{{cite journal}}:Cite journal requires|journal=(help)
  42. ^George Hart III. "Review of Tieken'sKavya in South India."Journal of the American Oriental Institute124:1. pp. 180–184. 2004.
  43. ^G.E. Ferro-Luzzi. "Tieken, Herman,Kavya in South India(Book review).Asian Folklore Studies.June 2001. pp. 373–374
  44. ^Anne E. Monius,Book review, The Journal of Asian Studies, Vol. 61, No. 4 (Nov., 2002), pp. 1404–1406
  45. ^book titled "Tholkappiyar Kaalam", Madhivanan
  46. ^Zvelebil, Kamil. 1973. The smile of Murugan on Tamil literature of South India. Leiden: Brill.
  47. ^Kamil Zvelebil 1973,p. 136.
  48. ^Kamil Zvelebil 1973,pp. 136–137.
  49. ^abcdeThomas Lehmann (2015). Sanford B. Steever (ed.).The Dravidian Languages.Routledge. pp. 76–78.ISBN978-1-136-91164-4.
  50. ^abcdKamil Zvelebil 1974,p. 132.
  51. ^abHartmut Scharfe 1977,pp. 180–181.
  52. ^abcdefPeter Scharf (2013). Keith Allan (ed.).The Oxford Handbook of the History of Linguistics.Oxford University Press. pp. 253–254.ISBN978-0-19-164343-9.
  53. ^abcKamil Zvelebil 1974,p. 133.
  54. ^abcdefghiKamil Zvelebil 1973,pp. 134–136.
  55. ^Kamil Zvelebil 1973,p. 134.
  56. ^Karthik Madhavan (27 June 2010)."Tolkappiyam is not dependent on Sanskrit sources: Tamil scholar".The Hindu.

Bibliography[edit]

External links[edit]

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