History of Indian and Eastern Architecture v1.c19.13

v1.c19.13

Of the three the most southern was the Pândya kingdom, which occupied the extreme south of the peninsula from Cape Comorin to the Vellâr river¹ in the Pudukottai state on the east coast, and to Achchankovil Pass² on the west, including the southern part of Travankor. It seems to have been of sufficient importance about the time of the Christian Era to have attracted the special attention of Greek and Roman geographers and merchants. How much earlier it became a state, or had a regular succession of rulers, we know not,³ but it seems to have attained to some consistency as early as five or six centuries before the Christian Era, for we find its princes referred to in the earliest Singhalese traditions of the 'Mahâwansa.'⁴ Their early capital was probably Korkai or Kolkai, at the mouth of the Tâmraparnî close to Kâyal, and known to the early geographers as the seat of the pearl fishery; but the Pândya princes, at an early date, either removed to Madurâ, or possibly they had another capital there. This continued to be the seat of government of the later rulers of the country from some time in the 12th century till its absorption in the middle of the 18th.